Dark Gate OOC Thread

[GargantuaBlarg]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

I definitely wouldn't turn down a buff to my, uh, buffs.

I'm not sure about capping the EP upkeep per turn at 1. IIRC, it's currently 1 per the level of the buff, for each buff, right? That's not unreasonable, and it makes a nice tactical choice between a low-effect, low-upkeep spell, or a high-performance, high-upkeep one.

I like the idea of making them castable in addition to other actions. Helps speed up combat, since a turn isn't spent buffing... though if enemies start taking advantage of it and blowing tons of Spirit on several different buffs in a turn, it might get a little ridiculous.

 

[thetwo]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

I've thought more on buffs, and I think I like these ideas. Some or all.

Buffs:

• Allow us to cast another spell (or attack) the same turn as casting a buff, at a significant penalty to base casting (or to-hit) for that round.
• Improve buffs from Mind/10*level to Mind/5*level.
• Half initial energy cost, or completely remove upkeep and give a limited duration.
• Reduce maintenance cost to (0,1,2,2,3). No increase going from 3rd to 4th level because you can only use fourth level buffs if you specialize in certain elements. Maybe even have a talent that reduces this to (0,0,1,1,2) or only incurs cost every other round.

Nerfs:

• Limit number of buffs you can maintain to TWO. (A talent can increase it to four or five.)
• Limit the "subject" of buffs. For example, for the "body" element buffs, allow "to-hit", "damage", "grapple", and similar, but not just the primary stat "body". Damage would be reduced by the appropriate multiplier for the weapon.
• Introduce a penalty to casting for every buff you maintain. Reducible by a talent.

I think some combination of these (say, 3 of the buffs and 2 of the nerfs) would make buffs useful without being overpowered, and useful to specialize in without being overpowered.

 

[BlueSlime]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

I definitely wouldn't turn down a buff to my, uh, buffs.

I'm not sure about capping the EP upkeep per turn at 1. IIRC, it's currently 1 per the level of the buff, for each buff, right? That's not unreasonable, and it makes a nice tactical choice between a low-effect, low-upkeep spell, or a high-performance, high-upkeep one.

The trouble seems to be that the high cost ones, such as +25 Body, aren't comparable to the boosts one could get from spirit. A good indicator is to compare a level five +25 Body boost to say, summoning a Reaper, or leveling a town with a Storm spell. A level five spell should be a game changer, and as it is, all level 5 buffs are is an energy drain for quite a small effect.

 

[GargantuaBlarg]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

I've thought more on buffs, and I think I like these ideas. Some or all.

Buffs:

• Allow us to cast another spell (or attack) the same turn as casting a buff, at a significant penalty to base casting (or to-hit) for that round.
• Improve buffs from Mind/10*level to Mind/5*level.
• Half initial energy cost, or completely remove upkeep and give a limited duration.
• Reduce maintenance cost to (0,1,2,2,3). No increase going from 3rd to 4th level because you can only use fourth level buffs if you specialize in certain elements. Maybe even have a talent that reduces this to (0,0,1,1,2) or only incurs cost every other round.

Nerfs:

• Limit number of buffs you can maintain to TWO. (A talent can increase it to four or five.)
• Limit the "subject" of buffs. For example, for the "body" element buffs, allow "to-hit", "damage", "grapple", and similar, but not just the primary stat "body". Damage would be reduced by the appropriate multiplier for the weapon.
• Introduce a penalty to casting for every buff you maintain. Reducible by a talent.

I think some combination of these (say, 3 of the buffs and 2 of the nerfs) would make buffs useful without being overpowered, and useful to specialize in without being overpowered.

- Aw, but I don't like limited durations. :<
- Incurring upkeep every other turn sounds a pretty hard on book-keeping, since you also have to keep tabs on which turn to subtract, and which not to. I recall that being mentioned when I asked about, like, over-time effects - regeneration and poison, like.
- I'm uh pretty sure buffing my Resistance via the Body category just saved me from going through another series of posts about fucking, so while I understand the idea behind it, I'm going to oppose it.
- That's quite a deal of new talents to take, just for some buffs.


**EDIT**
Damn you Slime, you ninja.

I suppose there is that... but still, I think it's an interesting part of combat, having to choose and balance how much you want to power up with how much EP you want to conserve. In my opinion, rather than remove it's drawback (which a lot of other spells have - for example, the Reaper might attack you, and the thunderstorm-causing spells might blast you or a building you're hiding in - stuff like that), it would be more pertinent to, uh, buff buffs. Maybe increase the number of stats they effect at once (two at once at 3rd level, 3 at 5th? Or maybe one or two secondary stats at the median levels of buff, with 5th levels getting to hit two main stats at once...), and increase the bonus by decreasing the divisor from mind/10.

**YOU YOU DOUBLE EDIT**
Aaaaa stop that

On a somewhat related note, the Body school should totally get a Mass Paralyze or something for a L5. Other status effects, too. :x

 

[BlueSlime]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Limiting the upkeep or taking it away altogether (like with summoning) is good. The initial cost for a level 5 spell is high enough anyway. I also like the suggestion of it going from Mind/10 * level to Mind/5 * level. Makes it more significant for dedicated mages who have 8-12 in Body. Suddenly they can become legitimate fighters, albeit with no fighting skills to back them up, but at least enough to escape a grapple from a decently strong enemy.

 

[Tassadar]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Going through ideas, one by one.

-Increase the effect from Mind/10 to Mind/5

Mind/5 works, actually. I looked over some values. At Mind = 30, that's +6 for a level 1 spell and +30 for a level 5 spell, with no other buffs to it. That's fairly reasonable.

-Buffs no longer take a turn to cast.

Nah. That'd make them a little bit too powerful, as they're also no longer costing any upkeep. Even though they don't affect the turn they are cast in, they're still going to be good enough to warrant said turn, presumably.

-Limit the subjects of Buffs.

I was going to do this for my big update. Like, certain buffs form certain elements could only affect certain things, like Entropy increasing only Spirit or Dodge, or Body increasing only Armor or Body or Dodge or speed, Arcane increasing Mind, ect. A global rules change of making buffs only able to affect secondary stats is reasonable though, I suppose. Still, that means no more buffing Mind for more damage.

-Two buffs at a time.

That seems reasonable. Actually, limiting the number of active effects period in some way seems reasonable, though maybe not to a hard cap at 2. Mind/10 perhaps? Something to consider for DG3, at least.

-More Talents that affect only Buffs.

I'd prefer to limit it to only one Talent per spell type, and Buffs already have one.

-Changing energy costs of Buffs.

If I'm taking off the upkeep, then I'm not decreasing the casting cost as well. That would make them a little bit too overpowered.

-More spells!

x| I already went over that. So far, I'm just planning on waiting until I decide to work on DG3. Right now, we're basically at DG2.1, or DG2.5, or what-have-you. Enough new content for one edition. XP

-Limited durations.

Maybe for next rules change, but for now I';d just say until end of encounter, or until the caster turned them off.

 

[IronAnt]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Hey, everyone! I'd like to update this thread with a small little announcement that might catch your interest.

I'd like to start playing a secondary character in a game GM'd by someone other than Tassadar (For he is very busy). I came up with an amusing little idea I'd really like to try out. What is it? In short, rank and file soldier that got corrupted and chased away. So it's someone that'd be real easy to recruit.

If anyone is interested, great! Just message me or post on my main page. I also have a very unpolished copy of the characters sheet up.

 

[Shrike7]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

It occurs to me that my character could use a companion, though i am GM'd by Tass, so there's that to think about. Up to you if you want to approach him about it, but it's got my okay if you can update at least as fast as he has been, which should keep his workload from jumping too much. Should be interesting, at the very least.

 

[thetwo]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

I spent way too much time working on

You must be registered to see the links

. "File->Make a copy", then edit things with purple boxes. Don't touch anything with a grey box. Also select talents, flaws, mutations, armor, weapons, etc, from drop-down menus. Only the "character", "powers", and "spells" sheets should have elements that you edit, and eventually a "skills" sheet.

For players I think the most interesting bits are the "powers" and "spell" sheets, which list details personal to you to allow you to check the effects of various changes quickly.

 

[plmnko]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Wow, nice work thetwo, maybe the next time that i spend points i will use it.

Also like a curious note Lurker new character Mithral is a little similar name that my character name

 

[GargantuaBlarg]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

No body-quake AoE attack in Body anymore?

I'm assuming the L5 Emanation is like regular healing, but AoE?

Gonna miss Mind and Resistance buffs... but I guess I can steal those from Arcane anyway.

 

[Tassadar]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

No body-quake AoE attack in Body anymore?

I'm assuming the L5 Emanation is like regular healing, but AoE?

Gonna miss Mind and Resistance buffs... but I guess I can steal those from Arcane anyway.

Things with the heal descriptor can heal OR deal damage. Casting it allows you to heal or damage everyone within it's AoE, at the casters discretion. And it's only a work in progress at the moment, spell lists may change later.

I hope that that section isn't too rules-y for people.

Also, considering letting Mages take a tree that eventually lets them cast all spells. Without the bonuses from Focus they wouldn't be as good, but they'd still have a lot of options. It seems like giving Mages too much though. What do you guys think?

 

[Keylo]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

I'm having flashbacks to D&D wizards...only with spontaneous casting and spell slots... Rather not go down THAT path... But that's just my kneejerk reaction.

 

[GargantuaBlarg]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Hmm... so if I take Healer and Focus (Body), and then cast an L3 buff, I'll get the results as if they were L4, and thus have a +4 bonus from Focus?

I would make it really expensive, I were to implement an allspell thing. There's already the one that takes you up to L3, so I guess it's an obvious extension, but... well, if we're talking crunch and balance, most spells won't benefit significantly at L5 from +10 damage or so, right? Conversely, the ability to summon a Reaper (who's basically got L10's worth of stats, is that right?), or to get three L4 lightning blasts a turn is awesome. All arounders get all the big nuke rapespells, and can easily offset the lack of Focus-granted Base Casting bonuses by picking up Concentration a couple times.

Perhaps it should come with heavy consequences if used - a limiter. Not regenerating your EP, taking a hit on your XP gained (though that probably doesn't make much sense IC-wise), stuff like that. "Damage and doubled-EP-costs" might not work as a limiter as it does for the Spirit Ceiling, since... well, EP costs are fixed, but also characters regenerate after every fight, right? That would make dudes that have this blow it on the big spell at first, then just regen with no loss of anything while the reaper rapes everything or whatever.

 

[Hafnium]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

An option that opens up every tree for mages kind of removes options, in a way. That is to say, it removes some decision making because it's so incredibly potent that, without some serious "Matthias will drop everything on his schedule to murder you in your sleep" style drawback, it would be almost silly not to work towards it. Plus, it gives mages, a class that wasn't necessarily lacking in the area before, a tremendous boost in utility. It isn't really in line with how spirit users and warriors function either (skilled and additional powers weren't quite the same as taking more foci in the first place, though).

And, y'know, I don't think it's necessarily unfair that a mage has to take a focus in something before summoning Death.

Note: Math below may or may not be derp quality, I apologize for it in advance. I am tired.

Speaking of things that might be too powerful, I think attack penalties for damage boosting skills might be a little too small for the damage increases given. Lightning Jabs is probably the worst offender. Stacking battle dance, lightning jabs, and power jab results in a 30 body duelist with a one-handed sword and the appropriate to hit skills and talents doing something like 93-138 damage while maintaining 46 to hit and 25 dodge. Stacking flurry and whirling death under similar circumstances results in 52-112 with 32 hit and +8 armor, 54-136 with 28 hit and +8 armor if you throw in a rend. A Heavy weapons specialist at 30 body, charge, supreme might, and slay can expect to see 108-144 at 5 dodge (assuming a starting place of 25), and 10 to hit.

When you move up to 40 body then it becomes:

Duelist: 108-153, 56 to hit.
Two Weapon Fighter: 72-132, 42 to hit; 74-156, 38 to hit with rend
Heavy Weapons Specialist: 118-162, 20 to hit; 78-122, 40 to hit if you just use slay and charge.

It's worth noting that I'm happy with where Heavy Weapons Specialist is in comparison to the other two (with those damage numbers, you can probably tell why >.>). There are certainly unique advantages to slay over the multi-attacks (armor only taking effect once, for example, which can be a big deal). I still felt that it was worth noting that hit penalties seemed a little skewed, though. The damage potential across the board seemed worth bringing up too, especially since the general goal seems to be a world where-in people can't reliably ohko juggernauts. >.>

Also, sweet, sweet buffs.

Yesss, give Tamonten the focus-boosted +54 body natures power buff, we needsss it...

No, seriously, gimme.

 

[Tassadar]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Hmm... so if I take Healer and Focus (Body), and then cast an L3 buff, I'll get the results as if they were L4, and thus have a +4 bonus from Focus?

I would make it really expensive, I were to implement an allspell thing. There's already the one that takes you up to L3, so I guess it's an obvious extension, but... well, if we're talking crunch and balance, most spells won't benefit significantly at L5 from +10 damage or so, right? Conversely, the ability to summon a Reaper (who's basically got L10's worth of stats, is that right?), or to get three L4 lightning blasts a turn is awesome. All arounders get all the big nuke rapespells, and can easily offset the lack of Focus-granted Base Casting bonuses by picking up Concentration a couple times.

Perhaps it should come with heavy consequences if used - a limiter. Not regenerating your EP, taking a hit on your XP gained (though that probably doesn't make much sense IC-wise), stuff like that. "Damage and doubled-EP-costs" might not work as a limiter as it does for the Spirit Ceiling, since... well, EP costs are fixed, but also characters regenerate after every fight, right? That would make dudes that have this blow it on the big spell at first, then just regen with no loss of anything while the reaper rapes everything or whatever.

Yep. That's how it works.

Well, so far more or less everyone has been confirming my suspicion that Talents for giving mages access to everything isn't a great idea. Twas why I wanted to ask people whether they thought it was a good idea, as I was fairly iffy about it to begin with.

It would have just been an extension of Experienced Caster, with one Talent for level 4 and then another for level 5.

An option that opens up every tree for mages kind of removes options, in a way. That is to say, it removes some decision making because it's so incredibly potent that, without some serious "Matthias will drop everything on his schedule to murder you in your sleep" style drawback, it would be almost silly not to work towards it. Plus, it gives mages, a class that wasn't necessarily lacking in the area before, a tremendous boost in utility. It isn't really in line with how spirit users and warriors function either (skilled and additional powers weren't quite the same as taking more foci in the first place, though).

And, y'know, I don't think it's necessarily unfair that a mage has to take a focus in something before summoning Death.

Note: Math below may or may not be derp quality, I apologize for it in advance. I am tired.

Speaking of things that might be too powerful, I think attack penalties for damage boosting skills might be a little too small for the damage increases given. Lightning Jabs is probably the worst offender. Stacking battle dance, lightning jabs, and power jab results in a 30 body duelist with a one-handed sword and the appropriate to hit skills and talents doing something like 93-138 damage while maintaining 46 to hit and 25 dodge. Stacking flurry and whirling death under similar circumstances results in 52-112 with 32 hit and +8 armor, 54-136 with 28 hit and +8 armor if you throw in a rend. A Heavy weapons specialist at 30 body, charge, supreme might, and slay can expect to see 108-144 at 5 dodge (assuming a starting place of 25), and 10 to hit.

When you move up to 40 body then it becomes:

Duelist: 108-153, 56 to hit.
Two Weapon Fighter: 72-132, 42 to hit; 74-156, 38 to hit with rend
Heavy Weapons Specialist: 118-162, 20 to hit; 78-122, 40 to hit if you just use slay and charge.

It's worth noting that I'm happy with where Heavy Weapons Specialist is in comparison to the other two (with those damage numbers, you can probably tell why >.>). There are certainly unique advantages to slay over the multi-attacks (armor only taking effect once, for example, which can be a big deal). I still felt that it was worth noting that hit penalties seemed a little skewed, though. The damage potential across the board seemed worth bringing up too, especially since the general goal seems to be a world where-in people can't reliably ohko juggernauts. >.>

Also, sweet, sweet buffs.

Yesss, give Tamonten the focus-boosted +54 body natures power buff, we needsss it...

No, seriously, gimme.

Hrm......

This requires consideration. Upping the penalties for the assorted skills seems necessary though. Except maybe the two handed ones.

 

[TentanariX]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Well..... unless you're just being mobbed my monsters or fighting demon lords or some such then I personally think the Reaper is a bit over kill, and if it CAN'T kill...... three monsters, was it, then it comes after the caster. Though from the sound of it anything sort of a demon lord or out right invasion/mob/swarm of enemies like the start of DG 2.0 or something, would be just like a group of heroes going up against Galactus, so to speak.

Though I guess it makes sense to put a debuff on to hit for skills, as i guess it's more balanced, makes more sense to have the potential or the capability to ohko monsters, but it should be possible with great difficulty to be more realistic or whatever.

 

[Keylo]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Well..... unless you're just being mobbed my monsters or fighting demon lords or some such then I personally think the Reaper is a bit over kill, and if it CAN'T kill...... three monsters, was it, then it comes after the caster. Though from the sound of it anything sort of a demon lord or out right invasion/mob/swarm of enemies like the start of DG 2.0 or something, would be just like a group of heroes going up against Galactus, so to speak.

That's the point really, the reaper is meant to be used for group combats as opposed to normal ones given how it has 120 body (for only 8 EP? I wish Call spirit could give me something that strong for 8 EP... I need to pay 36.)). Granted other summons are more loyal to you and don't run the risk of killing you, but tbh...compared to the other 1HKO stuff? I'd argue it's rather balanced.

 

[Mamono Assault Force]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

Hey guys, can I play?

 

[Keylo]

Re: PbP Interest Check(And OOC Thread)

How much are you willing to pay?