RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (Full Version)

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Lorekeeper -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/26/2022 20:11:19)

I would like to draw everyone's attention to a prior explanation on the fact that balance is still essential in a single player game.

quote:

The single player nature of the game does not remove the importance of balance. That the gameplay choices of any given player do not directly impact the gameplay experiences of others does not alter the fact that development choices affect the experience of all players. Consistent balance is essential to the continuation of the game, for reasons including, but far from limited to:

- The value of all player experiences. Arbitrary choices and exceptions made for the sake of the preferences of a few detract from the experiences of the others and curtail future development.

- The integrity of our word as developers. Contradictory standards and arbitrary exceptions invalidate all reasons we may give for future adjustments. Players could (And rightly, one might add) point at any decisions we take and consider them moot on the grounds of inconsistency with other arbitrary choices. Balance is not something one takes piecemeal, especially only where it's easy or non-controversial to implement.

- The range of possibilities for future development. The existence of overpowered items inherently curtails the development of all future items that may be measured against them. In contrast, underpowered items are inherently unsatisfying, especially when not every individual item can be so elaborate as to have appeal beyond its primary use. %melee costs for effects increase the more than an item has going for it, making hedging the value of items that would measure up to arbitrary exceptions an exercise in spending additional effort for something that players are likely to be turned away by the drawbacks of.

In summary: Single player games aren't games with one singular player perspective. Balance remains important because our choices affect every player, our integrity depends on consistency, and both UP/OP items hurt everyone's fun. Underpowered items are disappointing, while overpowered ones cut off chances to make future fun items.


Of course, balance and fun aren't mutually exclusive considerations. RPG development involves an essential act of compromising neither in favor of the other. This is why we keep an eye on feedback about changes. Sometimes we get to implement it, as was the case when implementing the proposed changes to Spellcaster Lean. However, we also have the difficult responsibility of knowing when to say no to said feedback.

In this case, the above mentioned proposals adequately address the reason why Purple Rain was changed in the first place: Fixing one part of the item combinations that allow for the retroactive removal of effect costs. In fact, they would explicitly return the problem. [

There's certainly room for improvement, but Purple Rain will not enable the quick trivialization of SP/MP costs anymore. There is a wide variety of items and alternative items that we can barely even consider for as long as costs carry no weight as a counterbalance. It's one of the foremost reasons why revamped classes feature multiple instances of preparing skills over several turns.

Purple Rain is far from useless. The specific use case of retroactively removing costs is gone, yes, and this removal is both deliberate and irrevocable. However, the spell's reliability has objectively been buffed, and it has gained two different use cases instead:

  • Casting the spell for the buff, stacking it with others to increase chances for a quick victory, with the insurance of a second attempt with a different method.
  • If a gambit on the buff doesn't pay off, or the caster is confident in fighting through the debuff and wants a quicker return, the spell can be cast for a guaranteed rewind.

    I absolutely understand the annoyance of losing potential power in a game, but please bear in mind that an item no longer serving one's desired use for it does not, as was just exemplified, equal to serving no use.



    • CH4OT1C! -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/26/2022 21:01:26)

    I don’t normally interject in discussions such as these. The reason I’ve chosen to do so here is because of comments such as:

    quote:

    Source
    I honestly don't understand why people want anything that makes battles easier nerfed all the time.


    Such statements imply that if a player were to take an alternative side to the poster, that view may lack support or weight. Whilst I suspect this wasn’t intended by the poster, I believe it’s important for me to voice my own position given this context.

    My position rests upon a simple statement: Purple Rain as a spell should never have existed. The original effects of the spell were not covered in modern (or any, for that matter) balance assumptions. “Balancing” it, like PCO, is impossible. You can’t balance something that isn’t even accounted for in modern assumptions. On top of that, I believe these effects represent the epitome of the phrase “just because you can doesn’t mean you should”. Original Purple Rain is provided players with abilities that they should never have been able to access. They provide a second chance in the same battle and allow them to stack effects to an absurd degree. Although some individuals like @Kilvakar may argue that’s the spell’s main purpose, we have never confirmed (to my knowledge) that this was the creator’s intention. Even if it were, I argue that it failed in this goal because it trivialises the game.

    “Many players” are arguing that the current version of Purple Rain is now ”pretty much useless”. I cannot corroborate this statement; the players I have discussed the issue with primarily disagree with it (though this isn’t universal). Nonetheless, I wholeheartedly disagree with that viewpoint. Clearly, the spell isn’t quite as strong as it was before. However, the negative effects for reversing time are incredibly minor. The player loses 10% damage through choke and around 32% of your pet/guest stat damage (or approx. 16% of total damage for the pet). These effects can be more than offset using boosters applied during the PR turns. In addition, the change to Purple Rain’s save makes it even stronger because it’s far more reliable than before.

    The real nerf to Purple Rain comes from it being classed as a “Form Shift” effect. This was clearly done deliberately, placed under the same banner as PCO and the tag effects of Paladin. It is no secret that, from now on, challenge bosses are likely to feature “Form Shift Immunity” to deliberately exclude these effects. The reason is simple: they are too powerful and trivialise content. I agree with this decision because it’s a compromise. It allows players that enjoy these effects to use them, whilst also making challenge content… challenging. It also avoids a lot of work to fundamentally rework the items (which would also likely antagonise parts of the community).

    In the past, it has been argued that, if the player wants a boss to be challenging, they should just not use that overpowered gear. They argue this approach allows for the best of both worlds. I disagree with this approach because it does cause harm. Such overpowered gear distorts choices made by the playerbase. It limits staff design options because no matter how good they try to make a balanced item, it will forever fall short of the outliers. We’ve seen this happen with Chieftan’s Ironthorn. Even if they manage it, all they succeed in doing is causing powercreep (something which we shouldn’t intentionally strive to accomplish). It also makes it impossible to make a truly challenging boss without making it nigh impossible for those without these powerful items. This is particularly problematic when such items are rare/exclusive. The “ solution” proposed by @SapphireCatalyst2021 fails to address the most important concern around Purple Rain: it does not provide a check for challenge content. From my perspective, it’s barely even a change to the original.

    My counterargument can be summed as:
    1). Purple Rain should never have existed
    2). Now it exists, removing it would be more problematic
    3). This new version, far from “useless” is ideal. It offers a compromise, allowing players to still use its insane power, but also providing some necessary restrictions
    4). The alternative is not a compromise and does not address the key issue with the spell.

    Directly responding to the question that I used to justify myself writing this post: I want Purple Rain nerfed not because I enjoy giving myself fewer options, but because the benefits of the change far outweigh the sacrifice. In the long run, Purple Rain’s nerf will enable more creative challenge content and diverse strategies to be used. We sacrifice the spell, but we also remove the distorting effect it has on gameplay.



    Kilvakar -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/26/2022 21:31:33)

    It honestly never occurred to me that the spell as it was would somehow inhibit the staff's future design ideas, but I can see how that would be a problem, I certainly don't want that. It just didn't seem like it would be an issue since so many bosses are immune to nuking in the first place, and I haven't used a lot of the other items/strategies that people say are being abused with PR.

    I just get frustrated because key aspects of playing my character keep getting removed or made unusable. The stat cap change and subsequent game rebalance already forced me to change to Poe mage where I used to be a FO beastmage. Maybe I'm not playing the game properly, but it seems to me that buffing and getting two turns of nuke damage is the only way for my character to beat certain enemies before they either one-shot me or status-lock me to death. This is what I meant by bosses requiring cheese strategies to beat.

    I can certainly see the point about the staff wanting to be able to design other items and challenges without having to think about players getting to use them twice or hitting monsters with them twice, etc. So I guess the question would be, is spell-nuking enemies considered an "unbalanced" aspect of the game? Because when your playing a glass cannon character that seems to be the only way you can survive ever since the Sweep changes. Or are the staff attempting to make mages FD characters instead of FO? This is making me curious about future game design and re-balancing plans.

    But to clarify, I (somewhat) recant my statement about it doing nothing. I disagree that it's something that never should have happened, as there were many enemies that were literally impossible for my character to beat without it (without actually changing my build and getting very specific armors/pets/miscs), but I can see the reasoning behind the changes. It's not going to be useful for my specific build most likely, but I concede that it isn't completely useless, since I didn't originally see that it actually gives you a buff when first cast now. But this is making me genuinely curious as to what sort of playstyles the staff is wanting us to use going forward...



    Lorekeeper -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/26/2022 22:12:31)

    quote:

    So I guess the question would be, is spell-nuking enemies considered an "unbalanced" aspect of the game?


    Neither explicitly nor implicitly.

    quote:

    Because when your playing a glass cannon character that seems to be the only way you can survive ever since the Sweep changes.


    Every single challenge I suggest is tested under a number of conditions that ensure broken combinations and premium gear are not in any way essential to victory. Bosses aren't being designed to take very specific gear combinations to beat, let alone ones that explicitly exclude optimal gear. They're not being designed nor tested with a bias towards FD gear.

    I test every single boss and challenge I suggest with a STR/DEX/INT build, with first runs specifically avoiding gear that counters the mechanics of the fight itself so that I can be 100% certain that:

    - Meta gear isn't mandatory to succeed.
    - Broken combinations aren't and don't even feel necessary, subjective as this may be.
    - My meta knowledge of the fight can't be subconsciously acted on to skew a first-run perspective.
    - You have breathing room to adapt if you misinterpret the mechanics.

    If a boss can be beaten under these conditions, with a combination of offensive and defensive gear that explicitly excludes packages, resource loops, and twin boosters, it can absolutely be beaten by optimal offensive strategies.

    There is no push in either direction for player builds, nor a style that we as developers want all players to trend towards. The only push I'm making, and transparently at that, is to ensure bosses aren't functionally identical to mooks and cannot be trivialized as easily as a frogzard.



    Kilvakar -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/26/2022 22:32:35)

    Very good to know, thanks Cray! :)



    s_venom -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 6:46:14)

    Each time I am thinking about getting back into the game another nerf hits something like a sledge hammer.

    I get that balance is important, but I honestly think that this game is being balanced to death and that the fun aspect is being slowly but surely killed (at least for me).

    Of course this is only my opinion and I know nothing will change from it, but it hurts quite a bit to see a game you played for a decade and half going in this direction.



    Kaizoku -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 7:25:29)

    quote:

    I want Purple Rain nerfed not because I enjoy giving myself fewer options, but because the benefits of the change far outweigh the sacrifice. In the long run, Purple Rain’s nerf will enable more creative challenge content and diverse strategies to be used. We sacrifice the spell, but we also remove the distorting effect it has on gameplay.

    Couldn't have put it better myself, well said CH4OT1C!.



    Sapphire -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 7:35:07)

    People are upset because it took too long to change PR. As soon as the meta changed to quick cast and rewind, literally within the month, it should have been adjusted...considering PR was out before current quick cast stuff.

    In order to continue to ensure growth of AQ, and not encourage players to leave, and I'm not saying anyone will over this, it's simply just best to address bugs and overpowered items as soon as possible irregardless of time constraints, people constraints, and most other reasons that might be given. Nobody can reasonably expect to have players who use overpowered items for months or years to be happy and desire to play when one day they log in and the item they built their entire character play style around has been destroyed. I didn't use PR much, but I do use an item oir two fairly often that I believe might get tagged and I would be upset, the longer it takes to address it. So I get it.


    In regards to my suggestion to PR, I made it, and no I do not think even for 1 millisecond staff will do this. I don't want to get into a lengthy debate on a never going to happen solution, as it would be a waste of time, so I will simply say that I still feel as though the idea represents a fair solution that has several of the following balancing factors:
    1. Costs a turn to click the first time
    2. 3 versions, each that only affect HP, MP, and SP.
    3. This means inventory slots, which is a huge downside
    4. Costs SP upon both clicks for the HP rewind mode, costs HP for both clicks on the MP/SP versions
    5. All versions reset monster HP, but if you wish for all things to return then fine.

    Costing a turn, 2X SP or HP cost is nothing to sneeze at. I believe this is a far better idea that includes 1. Balancing factors and 2. Compromise.... . I think my idea has MORE downsides than the current redesign, but KEEPS the meta by in large. I wouldnt even be against the form shift aspect, as I doubt every boss will have this going forward. But think about making the second click a 50% save on normal monsters, and then the boss boosts, etc making each click a pain to get successfully, thus losing large swaths of resources before a "pass"? This is hardly game breaking IMO, and IDC what anyone says or who they are or think they are. That's simply my opinion on it. If that statement bothers someone, go look in the mirror and understand we're likely in the same boat. We are all entitled to our opinions =) (or should be, but we'll see)

    Maybe staff could implement what I suggested on the father time shields as a test, and see if it still comes off as O/P still and do so with a disclaimer and reevaluate in a month or two? However, spell slots is more valuable than shield slots IMO, so carrying 3 versions (would need to make another father time shield) isnt as cumbersome as doing so with spell slots.

    At this point, I will move on from my time wasting attempts at striving for compromise by making a "suggestion". I just want to avoid situations like with what s_venom posted. I hate that.

    Anyway, Further debate on my suggestion moving forward by me (and likely already there) is moot. =)

    Moving onto the current situation..

    The item now...

    1.05X empowerment for +miniscule charisma for 200-something SP, and then an unbalanced debuff that isn't build agnostic. Beastmasters lose out far more than pure builds with this "fix". -10% damage can be made up for by other buffs for sure, but -80 charisma on top for BM's makes this spell geared towards pure builds. It was said approx 16% for pet damage. What is it for guests? So why was it decided that the debuff would be more powerful for BM's? They attack and cast spells/skills, too. So they get the 10% choke *and* loss of damage with poets/guests? What? This isnt a fix, unless you do another version where the debuff is smaller for BM's and bigger for pure builds...

    . I propose the change made isn't even a fair change if BM's get more of a raw deal. At LEAST balance it so that the choke and loss of pet/guest damage is equal.





    Lorekeeper -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 9:11:50)

    Setting aside the oddity of bringing up points that have been explicitly addressed back up only to then declare it the last worthwhile word on the matter, I'll address the two remaining concerns:

    - Charisma builds have a larger, while still minor, penalty for the simple reason that this penalty is a reversal of the larger Charisma buff given with the opening cast.

    - Bugs are being dealt with as soon as possible. However, I'm afraid that it makes no sense to proceed with any direction regardless of time constraints and staff constraints. Even setting aside a preemptive blanket rejection of "most other reasons that may be given", these are not soft limits or voluntary constraints. As much as we want to, we can't cast Purple Rain in real life.

    We're committed to delivering the best experience we can, and dealing with all such issues is an essential part of it. However, there is a finite amount of time, both in any given work day and in a production schedule.

    My teammates and lead already go above and beyond to frequently work on fixes on top of the content flow, and dedicated fix/overhaul weeks have already released several times this year alone.

    However, not all bugs or balance concerns are the same in terms of workload, and there are too many of the shorter ones to fix to be done with them in any given week. Until late 2018, the team was also having to juggle this responsibility with writing -- Which I can personally assure you is not as simple of a task as stringing together random lines of dialogue, given that our canon also has an extensive list of issues to navigate and solve.

    We want the bugs gone, and all balance issues dealt with, more than anyone. There are a lot of cool ideas that we can't wait for you guys to get to have fun with as these problems slowly move out of the way.



    Sapphire -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 10:22:35)

    I am sorry you cant cast Purple Rain in real life. That was a good one =P

    I understand fully about the constraints. It has to be frustrating to no end. Big bugs should take priority, and in no uncertain terms is myself nor anyone expecting all bugs to be squashed, as there will always be severity, and thus, priority. My point is more about moving forward and not about hindsight. It's simply my hopes that larger, more game breaking situations can be addressed sooner, rather than later, and to hopefully avoid situations that might discourage the game from growing, because it affects *everyone*, in the end, even if a single individual wasn't using a specific item. This a 40,000 foot view perspective such that the game's still here in 10 years. My intent is that, and not to create a defensive posture. My hope is any disagreements on debatable issues doesn't cloud that.


    The debuff removes the buff. These do not cancel. The turns on the buff side are reversed and therefore, are deleted. All that is left is the debuff, so how can the +40 charisma pay for the -80 charisma on the backside?

    I do not follow this assumption.

    This debuff is sounding more like an attempt to counter quick cast buffs, and I get that, but you're losing a turn on your quick casts now that PR is forcing you to take a turn.

    So the "cost" is 1. SP on click
    2. A debuff for 3 turns
    3. Loss of a turn on all quick casts casted. Some of these are 3 turn, and become 2 turn. All 1 turn quick casts were eliminated.


    So a warrior/mage who casted buffalot/arcane amp now get 2 rounds but also get 3 rounds of debuff. What's +105 stats vs .90 choke?
    A BM who used una poca gets +105 MINUS 80, for only +25 charisma. So + 25 charisma and .90 player damage for 200 something Sp. No thank you.

    I know the bigger picture is the totality of buffs. A beastmage can do both arcane and una poca. Maybe they do zfinity gauntlets. Maybe there's some multi turn empowerments. There's others.

    But the loss of a turn + debuffs + SP cost on initial click isnt anywhere near worth the ease of casting it, compared to before. I wouldnt make that argument ever. I *rarely* had issues when I used PR, and I *always* made sure I had enough SP to ensure I got it to take even against bosses before.

    Ah, SP, the real problem. Fixing an issue with a bandaid when the real issue is Essence orb. You wont be able to endlessly quick cast buff if essence orb gets restrained. Another item long out of balance, supposedly slated for a nerf, and likely when it does, addresses so many other things, and would have made the old PR so much more less OP.

    Now, the combination of both PR and essence orb getting the nerfbat will further make PR more and more unworthy of having in your inventory.


    40,000 foot view. 40,000 foot view.









    Lorekeeper -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 11:16:58)

    Retreading the very points answered by my prior posts will not lead the discussion anywhere productive, so I'm afraid I'll respectfully withdraw with one final clarification:

    This is not, by any stretch, a bandaid measure, let alone one that eschews a single 'real' problem. This is part of a solution to the several aforementioned problems stemming from broken item combinations. There is no single 'real issue' in either balance as a whole nor this specific situation, and it is certainly not a single item. Purple Rain and Essence Orb were individually broken. They're being addressed in ways that solve both their individual flaws and compound effect, constituting a solution in steps rather than a temporary measure.



    Branl -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/27/2022 16:35:39)

    Definitely nice to see a commitment to keeping the meta balanced. Single player or not, the existence of broken combinations implicitly has a chilling effect on the type of items that release like it, and I am aware this has been a point that's been raised. The less balance standards have to orient around broken item combinations, the easier it'll be to create challenging fights and the less hamstrung devs are by unintended overpowered items.

    The lack of change in "years" shouldn't be taken as things like Purple Rain's interactions with spells and miscs that came out after it were intentional, and just because imbalances have existed for a long time doesn't mean those imbalances shouldn't be addressed. The stat system is something that's existed the way it has for years as well, yet I doubt anyone here would argue against Dex not being a required stat for hit rate (although I'd maintain it should maintain preferred status as a second stat for pures, so we don't get 250 main stat/ 250 cha/250 luck builds being pure and beast builds).



    OverLordOfDeath -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/28/2022 7:46:03)

    I'd prefer it if the nerfs were in another item so both sides can be happy and use the item they prefer but that's just me.



    Sapphire -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/28/2022 13:22:25)

    The debuff part isnt balanced

    ^ PR def needed a nerf, and long ago.

    It *can* be used as a simple quick cast for a 5% player damage buff (1.05 empowerment) and a 12% pet/guest combined buff (+40 charisma)

    But the debuff if you click it, erases this completely since it goes back to the time you first casted, and then the debuff does .9 choke (-10% player damage) and -22% pets/guest combined damage per turn (-80 charisma) for 3 turns.

    This resets the battle, so if you're resetting the battle the best usage case is via quick cast buffs, and when you consider the totality of all quick casts in terms of what's giving players damage, there are far more that affect players (blocking, ele vuln, elem resistance, stat boosts, etc) compared to the player's pets/guests. And considering a Beastmaster is also receiving the 10% loss to it's attacks/skills/spells, on top of the 22% reduction in pets/guest damage, the PR change is best case usage for Pure Builds, and BM's will never recover.

    +105 buffalot/arcane amp is boosting damage about 28%, where the choke bring this down to a roughly 16% total increase, but with 1 less turn usage for the quick cast. If you stacked moonwalkers for the 86 dex this brings the 16% up to more around 23%.

    +105 Charisma for your pets/guests boosts you 32.65% damage from them, but the -80 bring this all the way down to only about 7% increased damage from pets/guests. If you had also done moonwalkers, this is increased to about 16% damage buff. This doesn't even include the -10% damage from the player.


    Celerity is another factor being used with PR since turns are more damage, and so a rewind where you also used shadowfeeder will only serve to widen the difference.


    I get this is a LOT of variables, but I still fail to see why pet/guest damage was given a much larger debuff than player damage was.

    Neutral Armor Warrior (250 Str/Dex/Luk)
    Neutral Armor Warrior + buffalot = 28% damage buff (with the choke it's 16% total)
    " " + " " + Moonwalkers = 38% damage buff (With the choke it's 24% total)

    This is still worth it.

    FD BeastMaster (dex) assuming 100 Proc Bows, which is optimal 250 (Str/dex/char)
    Dex BM + buffalot = 16.5% damage buff (with choke it's 4.8%)
    " " + " " + Moonwalkers =39.4% damage buff (with choke it's 25.5%)

    Pets/Guests
    + Una Poca = 27% damage buff combined. (With the -80 charisma debuff, this becomes 7.4%)
    + " " + Moonwalkers = 35.7% damage buff (With the -80 charisma debuff, this becomes 15.9%)





    As you can see, the debuff for BM's is much greater. IDK why.



    dizzle -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/28/2022 13:59:59)

    Cray responded to you with an explanation regarding the CHA debuff just yesterday.

    quote:

    - Charisma builds have a larger, while still minor, penalty for the simple reason that this penalty is a reversal of the larger Charisma buff given with the opening cast.


    I should also note that not every item has to equally benefit every build.



    Sapphire -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/28/2022 14:48:19)

    ^ Doesnt the buffs at the beginning mean nothing once you PR back to the beginning, since it's replaced? This is the part thats not meshing.


    So you're saying the design decision is specifically to have BM's receive a larger penalty ? So PR isn't build neutral, as designed?



    Lorekeeper -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/28/2022 15:14:58)

    As per the rules on constructive discussion, please abstain from attacking straw man rewritings of other users' points. "So you're saying" followed by what not even an extreme stretch could connect to a politely made refutation is nothing short of flaunting the rules by making a show of a bad faith reinterpretation. There have been repeated thread locks pertaining to ignoring such warnings, and this discussion could be very good for feedback if kept on topic.

    Pursuant to that: Reiterating points that have been thoroughly addressed, along with the statement that they haven't, will only take this discussion in circles. I would suggest moving on to the next point of feedback.



    Sapphire -> RE: Purple Rain Nerf Discussion (2/28/2022 17:08:55)

    If someone had just answered yes to my last question, I am/would have moved on. I was operating under the impression it would still be build neutral on the buff/debuff side, and thats the *only* reason I continued to push it, and it turned out I was under the wrong impression. That's my fault. My questioning was in good faith, whether you believe it or not. I apologize.



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