Insane Difficulty: WOTL Development Discussion - Insane Difficulty

Hart-Hunt, on 22 April 2014 - 08:51 AM, said:

Thanks. I'll give 'em Chakra instead... And Move-MP up.

Right guys, not posted in a couple of days, apologies. Still avoiding stat growths like they're the plague

Got started on removing unnecessary innates on jobs/ monsters, and replaced Almagest with Cherry Blossom for the Behemoths (will need to test as this could be crazy strong.) Also gave them Critical: Restore MP for lulz (will probably change back, just want to see how it goes.)

Got Balmafula's Witch of the Coven skillset more or less sorted (gonna have to change the name; it gets cut off in-battle. Will probably name it Ark/ Arc Witch to match PSX translation.) She'll essentially be a Red Mage-type with bits of every magic* (bar Summon) plus her own unique skill, possibly two.

*On the subject of Magic classes, with the recent discussions on Black Mage's usefulness (or lack, thereof,) both myself and Stann have been considering a rework of Black Mage (or at least, ideas and concepts were flung around Chat last night (my time) regarding a rework/ overhaul.) With said discussion in mind, does anyone have any ideas? If so, post 'em here!

I'll start the ball rolling:

Dark Chant - Dark/ Non-elemental - Utilise dark arcane powers to damage foes, constricting their voice and disorientating them. Add: Silence, Confusion (single target)

Thunderburst - Lightning - Call down judgement from the heavens, smiting foes and leaving them rooted to the ground (AoE 2, Add: Immobilize, Stop

Depending how powerful this class could be, I'm considering the possibility of changing the job tree slightly (but that's a different issue that doesn't need looking at just now. Only testing could determine that stuff.)

ANOTHER aspect I'm considering is removing dark element from some skills like Temporal Strike and changing bosses from Cancel Dark to Absorb Dark and giving them Demi (example) to still get fractional heals, but I'll need opinions/ discussions on this.

So yeah. Thoughts?

Hart-Hunt, on 22 April 2014 - 08:51 AM, said:

Going of PSX here, but...

Behemoths are only available endgame. They are slower than humans and have 4 move. Not only that, they have so much fucking HP (plus maybe mp switch?) that they don't get targeted often. This means that by the time ulmaguest comes into play, you are probably in pretty decent shape anyway seeing as how you haven't lost yet.

In order to
Rock a behemoth
Not lose because you have a shitty unit
Win via ulmaguest

You are probably good enough to have won anyway.

Hard to get to work but incredibly powerful moves aren't broken,they are just another strategy. Broken is something you use in every fight and is always incredibly valuable (ie Onion Knight with a Whale Whisker poking bitches for 700 in ch3).

Kjata, on 25 April 2014 - 01:07 AM, said:

I would like to see evidence that this is possible on anything but a critical hit on a good or best compat victim in 1.3.0.8

Ludovician, on 25 April 2014 - 02:55 AM, said:

It's not. That was my point, it's fucking broken. In 1.306 it was, so it got removed.

Fair enough.

Ludovician, on 25 April 2014 - 02:55 AM, said:

inb4 "Onion Knight, Holy Lance, Flash Hat, Attack UP, 108 Gems"

Kjata, on 25 April 2014 - 01:07 AM, said:

While we could argue about this if this were the PSX subforum (as it is an interesting topic), here in the WOTL sub-f I'd have to say you're missing the point of me calling out on Ulmaguest.

Kyozo has this idea of battles lasting longer, by means of reducing damage output, reducing speed, and some other things he'd have to point out. While this is an awesome concept to put into practice, it gets inmediately in conflict with moves that deal fixed damage. Why? Because while you're toning down speed and damage output (and he was also considering things like more elemental resistances iirc), you're still keeping moves that take fixed, incredible damage.

tl;dr - Ulmaguest has its ways of being justifyable in the PSX 1.3, but in the WOTL'd idea of 1.3, a fixed AoE uber-damage move would break the implied rule of less damage output = battles lasting longer.

A workaround could be lowering it's %hit, though, to something like 30% per unit. But that would be horrible, aye? So I'd suggest replacing it with something that is not fixed, like its Dark counterpart, Giga Flare.

Advent, on 25 April 2014 - 07:32 AM, said:

FTFY.

Hart-Hunt, on 25 April 2014 - 07:41 AM, said:

Ah, right. Forgot about that one.

I actually gave the Behemoth Kings Cherry Blossom, to carry on the theme of lol Meteorain as their monster skill. It's Holy element now, so can potentially be absorbed by theee... Chameleon Robe, is it? My memory's fuzzy.

You're right.

For reference in the future, I'm going to put this chart here:



These are the current 1.3.0.8 stats using the C and M values taken from Patcher.

Oooh, awesome Stann! Thanks man.

Hart-Hunt, on 25 April 2014 - 07:40 AM, said:

I wasn't calling you out. Whenever people talk about removing stuff for people to good I like to devil's advocate and make sure it gets removed after both sides are considered. With everything you have said, i agree that it should probably be removed.

Im really likin the witch of the coven idea. What moves will she have?

azavier, on 28 April 2014 - 04:16 PM, said:

At the minute, she's a red mage type thing, with one unique skill. Her skillset currently is:


Stat growths are as follows:



Generics and Specials have these growths (including boss units/ non-recruitable specials) but at the moment I haven't touched monsters yet. Generic modifiers are:

kyozo22, on 01 May 2014 - 10:01 PM, said:

Are those absurdly dreadful growths to dissuade anyone from levelling her in that class, ever? Or to try and get people to stay as low level as possible until they get her so she isn't gimped by the time she's available?

kyozo22, on 01 May 2014 - 10:01 PM, said:

Those are multipliers, not growths. I don't think I like the idea of all but 3 classes having the exact same SPM.

Ludovician, on 01 May 2014 - 10:50 PM, said:

Those growths are for all classes, not just the Witch of the Coven. I think it's pretty safe to say that I've over complicated this, hugely, and might need to have a rethink.

I'll have a look at the multipliers again, although I'm thinking it might be best to just use the psx version modifiers and then tweak from there.

I haven't beaten 1.3 and haven't played WotL 1.3 so take what I contribute with a grain of salt.

Two things.

On what to do with unique characters: Example: Balthier: You say he loses Marksman skills and gains Quickening skills and you're not quite sure which direction to take it. I'd recommend, on top of your other considerations, and not in lieu of them, that attention be paid to the archetype or metaphor that a unique character fulfills in the game. Like... if everyone on your team was an aspect of a pantheon of heroes and gods, what niche does each fulfill that no one else can do?

IIRC Balthier is the Sky Pirate. So what would a pirate captain without a ship do? (I bet we could take a few tips from Jack Sparrow on that one.) Perhaps if you give him team support and damage with no healing... that strikes me as what a captain would do. You don't get to live in the captain's quarters because you know your way around an infirmary. He can always find a medic, the captain has to rock people's socks off, not tuck them in to bed after a nice vapo-rubdown.

Second: There's some chatter about changing up the black mage skill set (and others). Take a look at Jot5 to see what they've done with their changes. Some of it might inspire you in ways you hadn't imagined. (ie: minor mana heal on Ramza's Duke skills called 'Encourage' with range 3 on 1 panel or something.. and Black Magic is essentially entirely revamped.)

I hope you have luck with your work here.