v0.10 First impressions

Tantarus

Tantarus

Virtuoso
There are some changes I really like in this one. In no particular order.

Life fixing Corrupt and Create undead seems great to me. I really think this one is change that is needed and balances out corrupt well.

No more paragons/ritual use points. Paragons seemed like a nightmare to balance and not sad to see another resource to track not get added.

Mettle, a new and interesting new fighter skill. I really want to see this one in playtest, I kinda think it should be default 3 secs not 10.

Bleeding out over dying, seems fine. Minor but helpful quality of life change.

Build and XP being simplified, this is great!

Ritual cap of 60 rits. This is great, 40 would have been better but this is a good start. And will hopefully help tone things down.

Magic item Duration change, this seems fantastic as a casual player. I have taken breaks before and come back with most my items expired. I really really like this change.

Fixing the choose a flaw abuse in rituals is also great. Tired of seeing people basically immune to 3 of the 4 elements.

Removing Terror is great and long over do. A very unfun ability.

And some things I am so so on. In no particular order.

Changing how races get bonus or penalty hp seems good, but the cost of hearty seems high to the point of making it very rare to take.

Spell Parry, I have mixed feelings on this one. Allowing everyone to use them feels like it becomes a default ritual of choice for weapons, everyone will want a few if they hold a weapon. Making you have to mediate between use feels really bad for fighters/templars. Having played melee most my years spell parries have been my life blood. Not really thrilled with the idea of having to reset armor and spell parry during combats all the time. Is alot of time spent kneeling and not fighting. Overall just feels like another fighter nerf.

This is a nitpick but still, "Warrior's Incantation" feels like it needs a name change as it is only usable if you can memorize spells, not very warriorish.

No more Meewee nickname! Gasp!

Relics... While I am glad earth finally get something to mirror a wand. This is just not thrilling. It is no where near what a wand is. A wand gives you dozens of more packets to throw in a day. This lets you save a spell by RPing for a min. Added in with refitting armor and rituals like spell parry... That is a lot of time RPing mid fight. Why not reduce the number of charges by a factor of 10 and make it a 3 count instead. At least it would fill useful in combat then?

I realize that the owners vision of earth is not as combat class or even really undead killers (earthstorm does the same damage to undead as magic storm, for instance). They see them as people that stand in the back and just heal it seems. I just don't understand that mindset. These changes to earth just further enforces that narrative. That said, we have a dozen threads on that already. I will leave it at that.

Over all this rules seems a lot more polished then last time around and I feel like a lot closer to actually going live at some point. I look forward to the magic item nerfs most of all and hopefully scaling down of the game. I do fear the fighter nerfs are too aggressive and we will be in a caster world soon. Bring on the Playtests!

Those are my first impressions, what are yours?
 
First impressions? Ok, here it is. "This is a bunch of horse ****."
 
Good:
  • Reducing rit limits. This has been needed for a while. Yay! Thank you thank you!
  • Absence of Paragons. Those were a big fat mess in the last edition. I like the concept of end-game growth...but those needed a LOT more work before release.
  • Terror is out. Wasn't a big fan of it.
  • Still liking but not new in v10: Swarm, built-spent-in-X, Hearty (though body itself is pretty useless now), Corrupt (esp after fixes), Cause Disease (esp after fixes), Educated
  • MWE to Sylvanborn, I like.

Undecided:
  • Barbarians to Oathsworn...I can't voice an opinion, since we still don't know what that means
  • The flaw/true empower changes may be good, but can't speak to them until they come out.

Bad (most of these are ongoing concerns not yet fixed as of v10):
  • This still feels messy as a rules release. A lot of clunkiness and a lot of cludge to fix problems that may/may not exist. Previous editions were focused on fixing things. This one appears to be focused on releasing a new game system, without fixing bugs from previous editions. The goal and direction of these changes feels haphazard at times.
  • Removal of various alchemies, including quicksilver
  • Evade changes. Rogues don't have the body to support half damage. The old evade was nice flavor and situationally useful. The new one feels pretty awful, except maybe for scouts.
  • Rogues cease to be worthwhile as combatants. The intent appears to be to move them to gas/traps. Those who liked playing combat rogues need to find a new class for the most part.
  • Fighters are amazing, until they aren't. Mettle helps, but overall, they're pretty weak in physical combat with other fighters 2.0. With the removal of P2D, triple-tapping a fighter can burn all their daily skills or make them lay down. No skill to it anymore, just character cards. Almost feels like rock-paper-scissors at times. Against almost any other class, though, fighters win the game in 2.0 (or die instantly...there's no middle ground).
  • Earth is just a healbot class. With the decrease in viability against undead and no way to use defenses tactically anymore, the only role for this class appears to be binding and after-the-fact healing. Since binding is largely mitigated by Mettle, that leaves just healing. Not sure all healers want to be support-only.
  • A lot of this is unscalable for plot. If your PCs walk around swinging 4s all day, but can spike to 19s for ten minutes at a time, how do you scale/plan? If you plan for momentary burst and the PCs are out for the day, they all die. If you don't, they steamroll. This is ugly from a numbers perspective.
  • Huge body/armor...and it doesn't matter at all. Everyone can/should have max armor with the new armor system, and body bloats up bigly. However, none of it matters, when NPC fighters can just wander by and swing "disarmdisarm70normal" and burn through it, or force you to use a ton of daily skills every time.
  • Life leech for invisible/undetectable necromancy. Using the Big Bad Evil should be risky, not something you can do freely without consequence! I'd be happy with "appears to heal me" and otherwise silent.
  • Kyn having 3 racials is seriously OP (and I play a kyn). Same for unlimited Racial Dodge and Resist Magic purchases.
  • [added because I forgot] Per-logistics period items. I hate this...but that's because I play regularly, travel, and pass items around to teammates. This change is GREAT for intermittent players. It's terrible for heavy players and hurts newer players, as items won't be handled off as readily. Instead of "this expires next month, so you can have it" now we have "this has 2 logistics left, so I'm going to keep it at home until I think I need it."
    • EDIT: I was just told that somewhere (I can't find it) numbers were given as 20 logs to replace 1yr and 100 logs to replace 5yr. If those are correct, my concerns are moot, as that more than covers the average traveling player. It does not reduce my concern for items not going to newer players, but does address my concern about durations.

Sum total:
  • Do not like. Do not want. Does not feel like Alliance. Does not feel like a rules upgrade, but a replacement with a totally new and unrelated game.
 
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hey, it said "first impressions". But fine, here you go.

Through this entire redesign process, the group that's developing the new rules has been taking a giant dump on the fighter class. From the change in weapon prof cost to the point of making your damage completely negligible, to removing magic items, to getting rid of, or changing, things like damage aura, monster slayer, and golems. Now, some of it is needed, I agree, while other bits went way over the top and caused more problems then they solved. Through all of .6-.9 my response was "ok, but you can still do <insert whatever>." But with every step, it seems like the rules are determined to make the Fighter class unplayable. There are 16 pages of comments, complaints, suggestions, theorycrafting and everything else about the Fighter state in .9, yet not only was none of it addressed in this new packet, it was made worse. With every single step, it is making the class worse. Now all you do is stop every 20 seconds to reset your things. Spell parry not being tied to parry was great, but now you have to stop and meditate after every use. Mettle is a neat idea, but you have to stop and do whatever after every use (sure, you can use 2 of them and only spend 3 seconds, that's both decent and crappy at the same time). There were suggestions on how to still scale the weapon profs but still make them not so cost prohibitive, none of that was introduced. I don't know if those things were proposed and voted down, or completely ignored, cause we don't get that info, which is also frustrating. So to me it feels like "lets take this stick we've been screwing the fighters with, and turn it sideways, just for the hell of it."
Meanwhile, casters get another boost through Rituals no longer tied to 9th level spells. Congratulations!
 
I appreciate Relics. They do take an awfully long time to use, in the middle of a fight, but I appreciate the very fact of their existence.

I appreciate the balancing of Corrupt and Create Undead to be more consistent ("Greater Undead" nomenclature aside) with each other, as well as the apparent opening up of Life as an offensive ability against undead (assuming the Life fix applies to NPC-created undead as well as the battle magic-created undead).
 
Front line fighting of any sort looks terrible.

Scouts look like the strongest martial class.

Mettle seems pretty much worthless@10 seconds.

Single use spell parry is hilarious from a caster's perspective, and player targeted alchemy is going to just ruin lives.

Crowd control pretty much rules the game, and damage is inconsequential. On top of that though, martial damage scaling is abysmal.

What a great time to be a caster/alchemist.
 
Battle Necromancy is also suddenly way more viable as a lifesaving tactic for your friends, since all of it extends their death counts by the duration of the Create spell + five minutes... How devious... I... Definitely disapprove. >.>
 
Very glad to see a ritual cap instead of the overcomplicated Ritual Use thingy. Very glad to see Flurry gone.

Glad to see Paragons on hold. I hope they make it in at some point, but I think just the base 2.0 rules are enough of a task without adding so much additional content.

I like the change to magic item duration, I think.

I appreciate that Earth Casters get something wand-ish, but I'm not excited by Relics. Something that replicates a spell effect, but takes forever to cast? I'd rather carry potions.

Like others, I really, really dislike the Earth Caster-as-healbot paradigm that continues to develop.

Not new, but I continue to dislike the fact that protectives (and spell stores, coatings, etc) reset in between games. Honestly, I'd really like to see this go in the opposite direction -- have casters able to pre-cast at first logistics a certain number of protectives on themselves or others. Why would a caster or anyone that travels with one go into a gather utterly unprepared?

Also not new, but I'm bummed to see some nice customer service changes to so many races and nothing for biata. I would love if nothing else an Earth Ward-analogue. (I misread the high magic changes and thought this made spellcrafting Limited Circles more viable, and got excited, but no.)
 
Below are my personal opinions on the v0.10e playtest packet. Some sentiments are specific to v0.10e, while others are my feelings towards v2 as a whole.



General:


  • Standardization of battle magic spells that turn a player into an undead (Create Undead, Corrupt), use of Life to immediately end the effect, and the changes to resurrection timers are solid. I was very happy with this change.
  • First Aid working on Disease was a much needed fix. Disease’s impact disproportionately affected lower level players. Having a readily accessible way to prevent losing an ally to this effect is critical. I was very happy with this change.
  • Relics are something that I feel Earth has needed for awhile. While introducing them is a huge step in the right direction, their current form is particularly underwhelming. It has already been proposed earlier in this thread, but I feel that reducing their use time to align with Break Command, or adding Protection spells to their available options would make them more competitive. I was happy that these were added, but am unhappy with their current state.
  • Flurry was removed from this packet. This is probably my favorite change of the entire packet. I was very happy with this change.
  • Removal of Terror was great. While not a major adjustment, I am pleased to see that ability gone. I was happy with this change.
  • Mystic Wood Elf name change is great. The “MeeWee” abbreviation always annoyed me. I was happy with this change.
  • High Magic purchases no longer being restricted by 9th level spells is a massive buff to casters, who can now buy as many Cloaks or Banes as they like. While absolutely incredible for casters, it is yet another slap in the face to the already shortchanged martial classes. I had mixed feelings about this change.
  • Ritual limit of 60 rituals per player seems to be addressing edge case issues that are symptoms rather than problems. While I feel that a stronger focus on cultivating positive player culture would better address these situations, I have no feelings either way about this change.
  • Adding Meditate requirements to the meager remnants of defensive rituals left at frontliners’ disposal is yet another slap in the face to martial classes. I was very unhappy with this change.
  • Removal of Paragons was hugely necessary. In their current form, they were a train wreck and balancing nightmare. I was very happy with this change.


Celestialists:


From my perspective, and from our playtest results, these are now arguably some of the strongest characters in the game. Aside from an “adjustment” to wand damage, and the removal of Master Construct, Celestialists appear to have enjoyed a considerable number of buffs throughout the v2 development process. Wands now use all Celestial skills when calculating damage and charges, casters can “buy down” to customize their spell lists, damage of every element is available at each level - allowing Celestialists to maximize their damage output against any form of elementally susceptible foes, and they may now purchase an unchecked number of Cloaks or Banes. Celestialists are the class most likely to benefit from Meditate, and the class least restricted by the ritual changes. Note that Counterspell does not require Meditate to be performed between uses, and their go to damage ritual - Potency - lasts ten minutes before a Meditate is needed. Given the newfound flexibility they enjoy, Celestialists further benefit from Potency in that they can align all damage to fall within the appropriate element of the Ritual. Celestialists are essentially a missile battery set to “full auto” in a world of club wielding kobolds throwing rocks. These world-ending wizards are arguably quite well positioned coming out of the v2 changes.



Earth Casters:


Removal of “Prepare to Die” calls, while a minor Fighter buff, has removed a large portion of Earth Casters’ “active contributor” role by indirectly reducing the effectiveness of Weapon Shield. “Backpack” play style Earth Casters can duplicate the lost functionality with investment in Fighter skills, and the purchase of several Intercepts, but the expenditure seems insulting to replace a game component that was removed unnecessarily. Earth Casters benefit from the same changes to spell memorization and High Magic purchases as Celestialists, however Relics in their current state when compared to Wands appear sorely lacking. They also benefit from the new Ritual system in many of the same ways Celestialists do, even potentially doubling the healing output of their Storm spells with Potency. Earth Casters are indirectly but substantially buffed as a result of the removal of the Expanded Enchantment Ritual, as they are now the only sustainable source of Life spells on the field. This, in the same manner, additionally extends to healing. While damage can come in many forms and ultimately from all classes, this now makes Earth Casters the only “mandatory” class in the game to have on a module, a prestige they are privileged to hold without contest. Earth Casters, aside from the Wand / Relic imbalances and the changes to Weapon Shield application for “backpack” play styles, are in a considerably strong place coming out of the v2 changes.



Rogues:


Rogues overall do not appear to have received much love in v2. While Alchemy and Traps have been visibly brought into the tree of Rogue skills, that play style is not necessarily appealing to all Rogue players. Waylay, a fairly clutch skill in their 1.3 repertoire, has received murky treatment in v2. Surprise is no longer needed, but wearing an unfashionable enough hat stops the skill outright. Arcane Armor no longer stops it, and you can double tap it, but you have to buy it on a times per day scale. Overall it’s hard to tell if it’s a buff or a nerf, or just something other classes will splash into now because it’s a cheap conditional super-Terminate. Rogues received the Counteract skill, which is so underwhelming and niche that it’s hardly a blip on the radar. Rogues, like Fighters and Scouts, still have no endgame to speak of. Changes to Evade flavor it more as a Fighter skill than a Rogue skill, as Rogues do not have sufficient body to sustain half damage from Slays or Assassinates, or any respectable volleys of normal weapon damage. Overall it is seen by many as a nerf to the skill, leaving Rogues, in the grand scheme of things, at a net negative for v2 when the mounting costs of Backstabs are considered. Sure, they can throw 10 to 15 Back Attacks onto the stack for ten minutes, giving them a burst of +20 to +30 damage if advantageously positioned, but this huge spike in variable performance makes the balancing of an encounter simply nightmarish on Plot teams. Finally, Rogues’ signature defensive skill, Dodge, is now freely purchasable by WylderKin and Hoblings without any points prerequisites. Sure, it’s more expensive, but if you’re another class and you don’t want 30 points of fluff before you spend the points on your almighty v2 Dodge, then it’s actually cheaper. So overall, Rogues appear to have had a lackluster time with the v2 changes, and seem to be coming out worse for wear as a result.



Fighters:


As wonderfully put by another Coordinator, “Fighters are amazing so long as they’re not fighting anything with Fighter skills, or takeouts.” The v2 name changes might not be finished yet - Barbarians to Oathsworn, Templars to Spellsword, Mystic Wood Elves to Sylvanborn - and now Fighters to “Count to 10”. Whether it’s 10 seconds with Mettle or 10 minutes because you ran out, Fighters are faced with some of the most crippling changes in v2, the vast majority of which are indirect. Let’s not be mistaken, there have been some significant and quality changes to Fighters that should not be overlooked. The weapon you use actually matters now in some ways. The removal of “Prepare to Die” calls and the change in Disarm and Shatter deliveries can be quality of life improvements for the attacking party (and can be argued as detractors to the defending party). Intercept in v0.10e is definitely a great and versatile skill that lends a bit of a “tank” feeling to the class. Mettle is arguably a competitive skill when supplemented by a “full” defense like a Dodge, so that a player can choose whether or not their team is in a position to survive them being out of service for 10 seconds, or if they really need you to not take that incoming effect at all. Unfortunately the Fighter portfolio is still found to be lacking in that department, and as a result Mettle doesn’t quite make it from good to great. All decent stuff! But then we have the wobbly Resolute that still hasn’t seemed to be able to find footing in the new environment, even after being tweaked repeatedly. On top of that, much like Rogues, Fighter damage has been made prohibitively expensive, there is zero endgame in sight, and the spastic nature of their available burst damage skills or Critical Strike stacking makes module stating a dreadful experience on the Plot side. So while they’re up, if they have burst damage available, then sure, they’re a steamroller. But they’re a glass steamroller, and it doesn’t take much to make them “count to 10”. The removal of Cloaks and Banes, the Meditation check on Spell Parries and Stalwart Shields, and the removal of sustainable supplementary status effect restoration from Expanded Enchantment all combined mean that effects will stick more often due to a shortage of defensive skills, and will likely stay in effect longer due to a shortage of effect restoration. And these effects aren’t being thrown at Casters or Rogues, all who have Whatever Shields, unchecked Cloaks, or substantial Dodges. No, they’re being thrown at Fighters, the class with nothing to stop them. Fighters are up front. They’re the first thing the NPC’s see, and the immediate targets of the overwhelming majority of effects that come flying in. Mettle alone doesn’t cut it. If Resolute were changed to be the choice of negating any one non-damaging effect, or staying at 1 body when a damaging effect would reduce you to zero or fewer body, then sure, we’d be talking! But right now, Fighters are just an overarmored speed bump on the NPC’s way to the back lines. While v2 may have thrown them a few tidbits that look like bones, the majority of people I’ve heard from now cite the class as almost unplayable. Myself included.



Suggestions:


  • Increase bleed out timer to two minutes. This supports lower level gameplay, and reduces the need for Life spells in an environment in which they will be far more limited than they presently are.
  • Add a “Martial Prowess” system similar to High Magic for Fighters and Rogues. I’m not tied to the name, I don’t care what it’s called, but the classes need an endgame that’s not Paragon Paths.
  • Buff Resolute. Fighters need a reliable non-weapon defense. Make it purchased once per 60 build points spent if you’re worried about it being too common. I’m fairly certain folks will max out on it if it hard stops takeouts.
  • Improve timer and / or effect selection on Relics. Opening them up was a great start, but they need a lot more love.
  • Add Counterspell to the “needs Meditate to use again” list.
  • Give Combat Rogues something. I’m open to whatever, but they could seriously use a hug, at a minimum.
 
Having had a bit to look over the .10 packet here's my two cents.

The Good:

  • Relics. Well, the idea of them. The current version of them is a little lackluster. The awaken relic only really solves sleep. Cleanse and antidote can be useful, but having to take a minute to fix in combat is a bit rough. We might start seeing shield fighters being taken off the line for a pit stop (Refit, relic waving, meditation.) and sent back off on their merry way. Its a funny image, but its not very engaging from a gameplay perspective.
  • Potion coating, poison cache, poison trigger. These rituals are awesome, and a weapon with all three might be the combat medic's magic item of choice. Its a lot easier for me to pre-prep my knife with purifies and backhand a friend with it later than a frontliner finding three seconds to try and chug while being beaten on. As an Earth caster that tends to follow rogues, and would be bored to death on a back line, anything that rewards me for preparing in advance is a good thing. Even if 2.0 completely dies I'd love to see these three rituals make it into our current game.
  • Reducing ritual limits. This is just long overdue.
  • Swarm is still good, as is the build in X system of advancement, also removing flaw and true empower shenanigans....well I assume it'll be good after we find out what those changes are exactly.
The Bad:
  • Mettle. Not the idea of a fighter being able to power up like a Super Sayian and break out of a confine, but the idea of it being on the same power level as disarm. This needs to be at least parry if not riposte cost/xp requirement level. Ten seconds might be too long of an activation time, maybe something like three seconds base or even instant. I'm big proponent of fighters having a way to Taylor Swift their way out of a bind, it just needs to be faster and a little more limited.
  • Oh boy high magic being uncapped. This is a bad idea. Somewhere along the line our designers decided that cloak and bane were too powerful to have as magic item effects so they removed the rituals in the playtest then decided that casters can have as many as they like. It just feels really inconsistent.
  • "Must meditate before using this ritual again." These things are already limited by daily uses, why throw extra limitations on them?
  • Rogues. Just in general. What's the point anymore? Assassinate does more damage than slay but damage doesn't really kill people as much as takeouts do. Evade is half as effective as before, it honestly feels like they have been pushed into gas/trap handlers. Going up against undead in an open field? Leave the rogue behind and grab another fighter.
  • Earth Casters. At every turn throughout this play test it has felt like the design goal for Earth scholars is for us to stand in the back and be "good community resources". Taking expanded enchantment away has put the pressure of the all powerful life spell firmly in our hands. Its going to force us to make hard choices, which I like from a roleplay perspective. I have the backbone to look at someone and say "Nope, I've got one life left and I'm not wasting it on your idiot friend", many people don't though. Its going to lead to hurt feelings, its going to lead to bad roleplay bleed, its going to lead to earth casters feeling bullied. We will be bullied because the few offensive tools we have (That won't have the entire town trying to hang us for necromancy) have been greatly diminished. I currently have four binds, in the future I'll have two. I'm the kind of ES that brings a sleep and a paralyze, but many won't.
  • Unlimited racial anything is bad, especially dodge. There's no point to this, I don't understand the reasoning.
Overall I don't think this is ready for release. I'm willing to test this, I'm even willing to do so at our mod day in March with my actual character, but I just don't feel like 2.0 is even the same game anymore. It feels like change for change's sake when all we need is a 1.4 with a few patch and some new content (Like those awesome poison rituals!). There's some good ideas here, there always have been, but the bad far outweighs the good.
 
Nobody seems to have noticed something that really stood out out to me on the first read through. Weapon coatings go away at the end of the weekend. ALL weapon coatings.

This doesn't mean much to the rare person who coats a sword, but this is devastating for a large number of archers that I know. I know a bunch of archers that have built up a nice supply of vorpal 10 arrows. Suddenly, that supply goes poof after the next game played. I think this small change (which I appreciate the reasoning behind why it was done), will have an extreme effect on a specific portion of the player base, in some cases completely destroying character concepts.

-MS
 
Tevas said:
Below are my personal opinions on the v0.10e playtest packet. Some sentiments are specific to v0.10e, while others are my feelings towards v2 as a whole.
  • Give Combat Rogues something. I’m open to whatever, but they could seriously use a hug, at a minimum.
Click to expand...

Combat Earth Casters too, please. If people want to do full healer, that's awesome, but Earth Adepts and Templars need some love.
 
mikestrauss said:
Nobody seems to have noticed something that really stood out out to me on the first read through. Weapon coatings go away at the end of the weekend. ALL weapon coatings.

This doesn't mean much to the rare person who coats a sword, but this is devastating for a large number of archers that I know. I know a bunch of archers that have built up a nice supply of vorpal 10 arrows. Suddenly, that supply goes poof after the next game played. I think this small change (which I appreciate the reasoning behind why it was done), will have an extreme effect on a specific portion of the player base, in some cases completely destroying character concepts.

-MS
Click to expand...

Personally, I think coating arrows with Vorpal has always been stupid expensive, but I have to agree this is a bad change.

Here's something else that's a problem.

"Contact gels used on weapons last until they connect, not one swing"

You've just made contact gels better then Eviscerates and Slays, skills that actually cost xp to purchase, versus a freaking alchemical gel.
 
So it has come to my attention Mettle works on curse but not eldritch force. So Fighters can mettle out of earth only effects like Paralyze, Silence, Weakness, Destruction but not Prison or Stun Limb....

#CelestialConspiracy
 
Tantarus said:
So it has come to my attention Mettle works on curse but not eldritch force. So Fighters can mettle out of earth only effects like Paralyze, Silence, Weakness, Destruction but not Prison or Stun Limb....

#CelestialConspiracy
Click to expand...

Can’t Mettle out of Death, bruh.
 
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