=DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (Full Version)

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Jay -> =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/20/2019 20:50:00)

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[image]https://www.dragonfable.com/images/mini/Verlyrus.png[/image]
Verlyrus
Prepcat

The Nest: Be Prepared

Hey there, heroes!

This week in DragonFable, we return to The Nest, the orphanage run by The Rose in Greenguard Forest. Last time, you were able to save the children from Siofra, the shape-shifting mage's attack, only for Siofra to obtain his true prize: a medallion of pure dragonbane.

Now, he's vowed revenge for your interference, and it's up to Messimy, Cole, Grace, your dragon, and you to stop him from destroying The Nest! This week, you'll being your preparations, but with Siofra more powerful than ever, will it be enough?

[image]https://cms.dragonfable.com/df/images/BEPREPAREDdn.png[/image]

Here's a word from San Robin, who wrote this week's release:
Hello there! San Robin here.
It has been a while, but the next quest of The Nest storyline is up right now!
Last time Siofra stole a powerful artifact and is planning to exact his revenge upon those who stood in his way. Luckily you hurt him pretty bad the last time you met so now you have time to prepare!
Meet up with Messimy to start planning your defenses and to prepare for the final(?) encounter with Siofra!

Head over to The Nest in the Greenguard region of the Book 3 Travel Map to play this week's release: Be Prepared!



Chaosweaver has received yet another update!
  • Obliterate and Soul Shred have had their effects swapped.
  • Soul Siphon can now be Empowered to cleanse DoT effects on yourself.
  • You can now click on the Spirit Loom on your wrist to show or hide your Soul Claw when out of combat. (This took a LOT of time to get working properly!)
Chaosweaver is now in a satisfactory state- some more small changes may be forthcoming, as well as any bug fixes as necessary, but most skills are where they will be for release.



Have feedback about today's release, or the game? Have feedback about Chaosweaver? Have theories about the story? Want to discuss all things DragonFable?

Join the discussion on the official forums!

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Tags: Verlyrus




LouisCyphere -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/20/2019 21:35:52)

Alright. So CW is almost at Endgame Testing? [:D]

I like the change of switching Soul Shred and Obliterate. Now I can finish off mobs stylishly.
Being able to click CW's Soul Claw is a huge QoL too for cutscenes.

Now for the other changes.
I was not expecting Empowered Soul Siphon to have a DoT purge. I think an MP drain would still be better unless the DoT purge was inserted in Empowered Soul Aegis instead.
I'm still standing by having Vengeance get reworked a tiny bit by having a bigger -All debuff and removing its Empowered Version because with Empowered Siphon, CW now has 5 Empowered Skills and only 2 ways to recover Soul Threads. So this would result to CW having an even bigger problem of recovering STs unless it's possible for CW to choose between using the Normal or Empowered Version.
I was still expecting for the Soul Shred now to have -Boost instead of -Bonus from its Empowered version.

For the recent quest; Be Prepared
So some of the previous theories are now being revealed with
spoiler:

1. Messimy being a dragon
2. Grace being Aria's grandma


Edit: I forgot to add. Thanks for keeping the black sclera for CW! A few more tweaks needed and I think CW is ready for release.




Axpower -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/20/2019 21:52:52)

Soul Shred and Obliterate Switch: Great
Soul Claw Toggle: Fantastic
DOT cleanse on Emp Siphon: In agreement with @LouisCyphere. Mana regen would be an amazing touch! Also DOT purge on Soul Aegis would make everything flow together so so so well... Please Verly consider this!




ProbablyCallum -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 4:01:32)

Chaosweaver having a move that does a bonus debuff for the enemy is really really pointless when gambit guarentees you're going to get hit no matter what you do.
Dot purge feels really pointless as well, if a dot is going to kill you while you've got aegis up then you're likely going to die on the first tic of it before you get the chance to purge it.
The empowered version of vengance is also pretty pointless, there's a handfull of enemies in the game that heal significantly enough that a heal resist sunder would make a significant difference to the fight and even then for most of those kinds of fights you're better off outdamaging it anyway because you're chaosweaver, something like that should be on a tank class that cant output lots of damage, not a literal glass nuke. Fighting bosses which dont have heals and having to spend a soulthread if you want to -All something with no further benefit to the non soulthreaded version also sucks a lot.




TFS -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 4:48:43)

Chaosweaver doesn't need mana regen, you're going to be ending fights long before you run out of MP. If you're speaking more in terms of general questing, Chaosweaver is already insanely good at clearing out trash mobs and definitely doesn't need a buff there.
The useless effect on Empowered Siphon means that there's some oppurtunity cost on using your very strong healing skill - you don't want to use it while you already have threads. I suspect this was an intentional nerf designed to make the use of a very strong skill more tactical - useless empowerment effects that can't be toggled off are a balancing mechanism.

As far as the lack of synergy between the blind and Gambit goes, I agree that it's not quite optimal - if you rely on a protection dragon you can cancel out Gambit's MPM debuff and take advantage of the blind for a single turn, but I think I said this in the last thread (or at least spitballed something about MPM/BPD reduction that stemmed from this).

Overall though I feel like Chaosweaver is in a good place right now - there are a couple minor bugs that I belive have already been reported, but other than that I don't have any gripes with the class at all. It's a solid DC class with clearly defined strengths and weaknesses in addition to its fun and unique playstyle, which is I feel like is right around where the final version of the class is intended to be. I'd also like to express appreciation for being able to sheath/unsheath claws outside of battle, I didn't know how much I wanted this until we actually had it. Class is aesthetically and thematically an 11/10; it's the small yet impactful details like retractable claws that make Chaosweaver feel like so much more than just another DC class. Mad props to the DF team.




Loewe -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 4:56:16)

I have been loving the Chaosweaver so far! Honestly, I think I've played it for 3 to 4 hours yesterday trying to solo as many inn bosses as I can without using anything. I would suggest carrying a Verraad with you, both because how cool it looks with Chaosweaver, and also because the synergy between that weapon and Soul Aegis is simply insane.

However I feel like there are couple of issues with the class that could be looked at before it gets locked for good. I will try to keep it short so that we don't end up with a wall of text again.

As has been pointed out by multiple people before, -bonus on Obliterate (now Soul Shred) feels pointless because of the Gambit debuff (even though I also suggested a -bonus debuff in my previous post whoops).

Vengence doesn't get used much, mostly because the empowered effect is generally unnecessary and the fact that you have to use a soulthread if you have one in order to get the -20 All debuff makes it very hard to work into a combo.

Annihilation also generally goes unused because of Chaosweaver's insane dmg output. If the enemy is in Annihilation range, Obliterate will probably just kill it. If there is a way to calculate for Annihilation AFTER the dmg from the skill goes through it would be enough to fix it.

Lastly, the new change to Soul Siphon. I am absolutely NOT a fan of this change for a few reasons.

The main reason is the one I already explained while talking about Vengence. The fact that you have to use a soulthread if you have one makes it very hard to work into a combo. Soulthread count is also an issue. For a majority of battles, you will have access to 4 soulthreads, which means you will want to save as many soulthreads as possible for Gambit's / Aegis' / Rip's / Shred's empowered versions.

The empowered effect itself is also less than ideal. I'm assuming this effect has been added to synergize with Soul Aegis, however it fails completely at this, mainly because Siphon recovers HP while Aegis relies on you not having HP. Another reason is most enemies that deal DoT dmg can renew this dmg with every hit (Xan and Centaur Abomination are very good examples of this) which makes a Dot cleanse mostly useless.

I also saw the suggestions for an empowered mana regen, and I highly disagree with this. Chaosweaver's playstyle assures that the battle will be over long before you run into mana problems. Chaosweaver's insane dmg and the low mana cost of Slice also means you won't really run into mana problems during quests either.

Despite these problems, current version of Chaosweaver is probably one of the most fun and rewarding classes in the entire game. You guys really nailed it this time. Keep up the good work!




JIKIL -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 5:32:24)

Giving Soul Siphon empowered ain't so hot chief, we get so little soul threads as a whole and the empowered effect is very niche but not so useful due to how few mobs there are that inflicts DoT.
Besides the point with monsters that can inflict DoT, there's nothing stopping them from doing it again the next turn since most likely, we cant block.

That said the effect swap is pretty cool.




PhantomKnight -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 9:31:34)

I really love the animation that this class offers, especially the whirlwind blade. I do wish there was 1 more skill that restored soul siphons. However I did discover a niche with the class when you use the combination of gambit + untangle. It dishes out an absurd amount of damage (Was able to beat this week's quest boss in 3 turns).

Speaking of the quest
spoiler:

I hate spiders




Loewe -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 15:32:26)

I had an idea about Obliterate!

How about we turn it into the opposite of Rebuke, as in it deals more dmg the lower your OPPONENTS health is, rather than yours?

It also makes a lot of sense conceptually. Because of Vaal, The Laughter and The Snap were the skills that came to mind when one thought of Chaosweaver for the longest time. For those two signature skills to work together in such a way would be really cool. I know Chaosweaver already has more dmg skills than it knows what to do with, but I really liked the idea so I wanted to post it here anyway.




dragon eye01 -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 20:25:15)

Personally, I think with how the whole theme of the class is "The best defense is overwhelming offense", empowered effects should focus on enhancing the class' strengths, rather than trying to cover its weaknesses. The -bonus isn't enough to balance gambit's negatives, so I'd prefer an effect that emphasizes the frantic race to kill your target before your own choices catch up with you. Personally, I'd recommend leaving Soul Shred solely as a useful, high damage skill, similar to Riftwalker's far left skill "Power". Meanwhile, add an Empowered effect onto Soul Slice, decrease its damage to make it more of a setup skill, but increase its duration and cooldown. Vengeance, as others have stated, also needs tweaking to allow it to fit more neatly into combos, however I don't know what could be done to it (while keeping the same general effect) to make it more desirable than just using Ice Scythe, since ChaosWeaver's high hit-counts make that a very reliable debuff.

Soul Siphon's change also makes it a far more strategic skill, which I do like, however it can cause some soulthread wasting problems. While this could be completely intentional balancing, it will also make playing the class sometimes feel a little BS, due to the need to recover health conflicting with the need to conserve soulthreads to set up your next combo, especially when your two soulthread generating moves are two of your highest-damaging moves, at 225% and 300% (with 200 Crit) each, making them your main go-tos during a Gambit combo. That being said, I do like Soul Siphon being more of a strategic skill, but if that's how it's going to be, then we need to be able to toggle Soul Thread consumption, to avoid feeling like we're being punished for trying to play the class how it's intended to be played.




Greldracion -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 22:10:52)

I have to disagree with Soul Shred needing a different effect. I have found that for Inn challenges and the like, that it is better to open with soul shred than to use gambit or vengeance. This is because (A) soul shred guarantees a free turn to set up another attack, and (B) it pairs well with other blind inducing effects (Tickles, weapon specials? and guest debuffs) as well as shielding skills and items like Zardburger. This in turn allows for a pretty good setup to apply Soul Slice or vengeance and to fully maximize on their benefits with a gambit into "insert attack here" in relative safety so long as an enemy doesn't have a +bonus buff. So Emp Soul Slice does actually have a nice use and is a generally well thought out skill imo.




dragon eye01 -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/21/2019 23:37:44)

While I can agree that having a guaranteed free turn to set up an attack is good, you have to consider a few things. While as an opening the skill is.. useful, it's not great. You get 1 turn of a guaranteed stun, and 1 turn of -100 boost, so two turns of relative safety. It pairs well with other blind effects, sure, but if you're going to be stacking blind effects anyway, why not just go something more suited toward that like DLR/P with Light? Then you have the fact that it uses up a soulthread, which you get few and far between. Overall, after the opening of the fight, its use as a skill drastically plummets. Honestly, I find my best strategy is Gambit -> Untangle -> Slice -> Wheel -> Gambit -> (Loop Gambit/Damage Skills until close to death) -> Aegis -> Rebuke -> Slice -> Siphon. The only reason I would put Shred in there is if I have a soulthread I need to get rid of before using Siphon, and I have no reason to put Vengeance in there, due to it wasting a soulthread for health +70, since that effect is only useful against bosses that heal, and only against bosses that heal via the traditional way of healing, and not like Sinnocence where it just sets his health to max. If I've used up all my soulthreads, sure, it makes for a good filler attack while waiting for Gambit, but that's about it.




Axpower -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/22/2019 1:07:35)

Soul Shred is good as is imo. It has good damage while in gambit, and is a free turn of damage. Used it quite a bit against Dally of the Archives.

Vengeance is great for the multiple hits to proc an on hit special and -All res to set up big damage, although as I've said before the emp health res is a bit silly.




EdyMaster -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/22/2019 17:37:20)

I didn't like the change in Siphon. If you have low HP and a DoT that will kill you next turn your main options are:

a) healing and survive a few more turns
b) purge the DoT and try to protect itself from the boss's next attacks (blind/stun/shield from guests/pet dragon, or foods)

At no time do you want to do both at the same time. And being a Chaosweaver and being at the mercy of Gambit's debuff, the second option doesn't suit you well. You will not want to use your precious healing skill before HP is low, nor will you spend your precious soulthread for an unnecessary effect. I think if the purpose of change was to balance the skill it was done in a bad way. And if it was made to help with CW vulnerability it could be applied to some better skill like Aegis.




KittyKat Destroyer -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/25/2019 19:31:54)

The Soulthread cap could be 3 instead. If starting with 3 Soulthreads is too powerful then the cap could just 3 but we still start with 2.

I like the idea behind Soul Siphon but I think the DoT purge should be moved to Soul Aegis instead. It'd be cool if Soul Aegis could also prevent DoT statuses while it's active.

I agree that Soul Shred works as a nice opener for some battles since it gives me a bit a stall time. This was mainly against harder hitting enemies for me. Although, the -100 Bonus becomes pretty useless after you've used Gambit (for obvious reasons).

Vengeance needs to be buffed to -40 All or lose the Soulthread cost. I rarely ever use this skill.


This will probably be my favorite class. I can't wait until it's officially released.




The_element -> RE: =DF= September 20th Design Notes: The Nest: Be Prepared (9/26/2019 10:40:13)

I'm not a giant fan of the new run style for Chaosweaver, I definitely preferred the old soul-blinking animation. Could the old style be added back? Or can we choose the run-style we prefer in the same manner we choose to show the soul claws?




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