Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (Full Version)

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RobynJoanne -> Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (8/7/2023 12:42:28)

As many know, the Stat Revamp is an ongoing process. One of the threads on the topic was the Spring Balance Update thread, which has been closed and has yet to be reopened. While that thread should be reopened at some point since Ianthe should be finishing her guest update work if all is going according to her predictions in the first post of that thread, this post still remains apart from that. This is a thread regarding topics the Spring Balance Update thread doesn't address that are still important to the Stat Revamp.

Assumed Stat Spread
This is the most important point that needs to be addressed with the Stat Revamp. It's so important that I'm surprised it hasn't been widely discussed, but I guess it's not as alarming or glamorous as guest nerfs, widespread stat buffs, and Ranger identity. Nevertheless, an assumed stat spread is at the core of any attempt to balance stats. When the Stat Revamp's first changes were implemented, the most noteworthy one was the removal of Dex as a primary source of BtH for all non-Ranged attacks and the removal of Str as the primary source of damage for Ranged attacks. This was a major buff to players, as it gave us all 250 stats to use. This buff was never accounted for, and it needs to be addressed because it's impossible to make balance decisions without some core assumptions. The stat spread is one of the chief core assumptions. Before the stat revamp, players were expected to have Mainstat/Dex/Luk as their stats. That was mostly fine, but what about now? Do we expect players to have End or Cha? Making either part of assumed player stats has major consequences. If End is assumed, then End should be "necessary" in some sense (almost certainly would involve a universal change to monster damage, base HP, and End HP), and its current nebulous balancing that lets players essentially double their turns of survival would need to be reevaluated. If Cha is assumed, then pets would have to be assumed to be at full power and guest use would be assumed. The assumption of full power pets would put a strain on the current player turn model that assumes half power guests. The assumption of guest use would normally necessitate that guests be completely balanced, but that's proven to be an unpopular idea at best, and I'd like to avoid reopening that controversial discussion to avoid getting this thread locked. I think assuming Mainstat/End/Luk as a stat spread would be the best move going forward. In that case, it's absolutely essential that we change how HP works. There should be a clear and noticeable downside to not having End because straying from standards should always involve drawbacks. The specifics of this should involve a wider discussion with clear balance evidence for points (not necessarily completely based on AQ's math, but should draw upon it since specific numbers necessarily revolve around math).

One can make the argument that we should only assume mainstat. The unfortunate problem with that is that players have three times that number in total stats. The less power we assume players have, the more incorrect assumptions become in players' favor. Players have far more power than what is used to balance the game, so the game is far easier than intended. This is disregarding all the problematic items and mathematical errors involved. It's a fundamental mismatch that increases player power far beyond what's intended.

Luk (Just in General, the stat's a mess.)
When mentioning the previous assumed stat spread of Mainstat/Dex/Luk, I said it was mostly fine. The "mostly" came from Luk because it's a problem stat whose issues have been exacerbated with the Stat Revamp. To understand the whole picture, we need to look at all that Luk does. I'll use both its effects before the Stat Revamp changes and after to demonstrate how the Stat Revamp has worsened the problem. Luk provides both BtH and MRM. These were Luk/40 before the changes and are now Luk/50, a minor nerf. Luk provides Initiative. Before the changes, it was the sole stat provider of Initiative. After the changes, its bonus has been halved with the mainstats sharing the rest of the bonus. Luk enables Lucky Strikes. These have a 10% chance of occurring and deal Luk*3/8 stat damage. For reference, the mainstats provide Mainstat/8 stat damage, so Lucky Strikes give 3x stat damage. Finally, Luk is almost always the Minor component of status rolls.

One thing you might have noticed is that the Stat Revamp dumped on Luk extensively. There were no buffs here. All the changes were nerfs. Unfortunately, I'm here to say that Luk needs another nerf because those nerfs did not hit the factor that needs it most. Back when the stat cap was raised to 250 (yes, these problems start from that controversial update), there was no change made to the effects of the stats except that 250 was now assumed, so 250 Int was necessary for the same amount of MP as you used to get from 200 Int. The problem was that the assumption did not change much of anything else, so there was a major shift in power for main builds that invested 250 into stats. Stat damage increased and stat BtH increased with no corresponding decrease somewhere else to keep the balance in check. The Stat Revamp has addressed this problem to some extent. Accuracy is fixed now, and your assumed accuracy and blocking of 85% and 15% respectively match their actual ones if you have 250 Mainstat/Luk and are facing a monster with assumed stats. The Stat Revamp did not address the stat damage issue. We're now in a situation where 250 Mainstat is equivalent in power to an item's inherent power. That is kind of fine. You are assumed to get 50% power from an item and 50% from stats. The issue is that Luk is ignored here. More specifically, Lucky Strike damage is ignored since that's the only time Luk plays a damage role. We're now in a weird situation where Luk is assumed for your accuracy and blocking but not your damage, which makes no sense. It should be either fully assumed or not. There's an adjacent problem to this. Since Mainstat is 50% of power, that means Lucky Strikes provide 150% power when they proc. In other words, Lucky Strikes are worth 150% Melee for weapons/armors/spells and 60% Melee for pets. The problem is that most items in the game assume Lucky Strikes are only worth 100% power when they proc (there are older items that make even worse assumptions and power up Lucky Strikes even further). There are only two ways to fix this problem: manually change all these items to the correct numbers or change how much damage Lucky Strikes do. I mentioned nerfing Luk because the latter is far easier for the devs, a small change in the same code that was used to change how stats work in general. The problem is that LS items will likely need to be manually changed anyway unfortunately because of other balance problems with them mostly revolving around Hypercritical, a status with mathematical problems that would be fixed by addressing this issue, implementation problems that would need to be fixed by tackling actual items, and fundamental balance problems that revolve around the very nature of the status effect. Needless to say, that's a discussion for another GBI thread.

Now that the nerf talk is done, I'd like to open up the discussion about buffs because Luk absolutely needs them. The main thing to note is that all Luk used to do is keep the Player at parity with the monster. Luk kept accuracy and blocking equal. Luk made both sides basically equally likely to go first. Luk kept Minor rolls balanced. Both sides could Lucky Strike. All of these are true benefits, but they're also really minor, especially now. Luk only provides 5% of accuracy/blocking. Even with 250 Luk, you only have a 4.88% chance of going first without any other Initiative boosts if you have Mainstat/Luk and the monster has the assumed stat spread of 275 Mainstat/250 Dex/225 Luk. Minor roll only affects +-10% chance on status rolls. This theme can be kept, but Luk needs to do a lot more different things if that's the case.

Monster Dex
One problem with the Spring Balance Update thread was its focus on the player side of the effects of stats and the buffs to go along with it. That doesn't address the other side of the Stat Revamp: the effects on monsters. The obvious point from the Spring Balance Update is it gives player stats free buffs but doesn't provide the same effects to monsters even though most Stat Revamp changes applied to both sides equally. The more important problem unrelated to that but related to the Stat Revamp as a whole is the matter of monster Dex. As I noted above, monsters are assumed to have a stat spread of Mainstat/Dex/Luk. This is because monsters predominantly have Dex despite not attacking with Ranged. That's no longer the case for newly released monsters but remains the case for almost all monsters. Dex currently does almost nothing for monsters that do not attack with Ranged. That is 250 stats that are almost completely wasted on most monsters. Dex only gives them Initiative. This also makes Entangled and Off-Balanced completely useless status effects for the Player. Monsters absolutely need to gain a benefit of some kind from Dex.



Sapphire -> RE: Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (8/8/2023 19:37:17)

I'm glad that you brought up monster DEX, as other than initiative it's doing literally nothing. I was told at some point likely something monster specific would need to be given to monsters based on DEX, considering since pre-stat revamp most monsters used Dex for accuracy...and staff isn't about to go through and move DEX to END.

I wanted to point out that my suggestion of "precision hit", a DEX-based DEX/25% rate no damage penalty auto-hit mechanic was both for Rangers and monster alike.

This serves 3 huge purposes.

A: Gives Rangers an accuracy boost , which some want to be included with any damage identity theme they get. I view this mechanic as free add-on mechanic to DEX, outside of the style bonus.
B. We all know dodging in AQ is off the charts easy. It's Op'd and only auto-hit really seems to counter it. So why not slightly nerf dodge mechanics and in the process, add this to monster side, too?
C. LK mentioned part of the reason for this project, is to tie things to main stat that even hybrids can benefit from. This mechanic would work for all attacks/spells/skills, and so Ranger hybrids of warriors and mages would gain this feature on melee and magic attacks.

Now, this isn't to say something in addition to this isn't going to be needed, but IMO it serves multiple purposes. I find it to be a no brainer, that's how strongly I feel about the idea.

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In regards to Luck, I am of the opinion that yes, Luck was essentially nerfed. Many players outright will tell you to train END or CHA over LUK because of the power they give in comparison.

And I'm also glad you brought up that how Luck is sort of assumed with some aspects of standard assumptions (like with BTH), but now you're claiming for damage it is not. While I don't know if that's necessarily accurate, I think it's healthy if staff would outright say whether to not it's assumed under standard assumptions.

You are right, it is either assumed or it isn't, and shouldn't be partly yes and partly no.

LK mentioned in discord that more and more he is convinced that likely luk should lose all BTH value and it should be 100% on main stat. That might be the direction needed if it were decided that Luk isn't assumed, however, if it were decided that luck *is* assumed, then I think it actually needs to play a *larger* role in BTH. Here's why:

The main-stat/CHA/END build (backlashers use this) used to have a massive downside. Lack of BTH. It meant you were not reliably landing hits, and sort of needed to rely more on the Lash-mechanic. This was more balanced than it is now, as main-stat has now taken on such a rather massive role in BTH. Now backlashers lack 5% BTH only. Not a bad tradeoff (along with losing 5 MRM which is wanted with backlash) I think the backlash build needed a larger hit to BTH to help bring it a touch back to before. This is why I say and will always say that instead of luck adding 5% bth, it should add 10%, with mainstat losing that 5%.

But that means luck is then assumed. If it's assumed, then so is the damage from lucky strikes. Regardless of whether luck gains the bth as I suggest (1% chance, but the right thing to do IMO), it's main attractive feature is lucky strikes.

This stuff affects item power, too. Main stat boosting has become more powerful. (Is this the real reason for no Dex version of buffalo, et al despite the supposed attempt at creating incentive to play Ranger?) Does altering BTH formulas mean auto-hit items need revisited once again?

But back to LS's, Some think they're OP. Some think they're fine. I think it's the items that we have access to that are the biggest issue, that play with lucky strikes, not the stat itself.

What's being suggested is the same thing as what's being done to CHA, in reality, even if unknowingly. See, I already know based on several comments that there's a huge potential to anger many players with some of the ideas suggested with CHA. This isn't a guess. This is based on things I see. Now, all those players who love luck may also get angered with a huge nerf to lucky strike stat damage, too? What about the Lucky variety beast build? You might as well punch these players in the face with the collective proposal to CHA and LUK.

I would suggest leaving lucky strikes alone. The attempt to give Luck some more stuff is simply a play to soften the blow of losing the potency of lucky strikes, much like giving guests ferocious strikes is an attempt to soften the blow for drastically increasing upkeep. I would tread carefully. Unless players aren't viewed as customers, then by all means destroy the two stats. Just how I feel on it.


As for giving things to luck, the more I think about the totality of the stat revamp as well as nerfs to some items that are most likely on the horizon, I think my latest idea of a luck-based sp regen psuedo lucky strike like mechanic is something that would be a feature that definitely would be viewed as desirable. If you're going to give luck stuff, don't make it haphazard nuanced insignificant things.

So I propose a 10% rate (so this occurs at the SP regen phase each turn, so 1 in 10 turns on average) luck-stat based SP regen add-on. The numbers can be worked out, but I suggest literally a 1:1 add on....meaning if you have 250 luck, you get the normal amount+250 10% of the time. This is only 25/turn on average. And luck boosting adds to this. I think this is the only idea that I have seen, or thought of personally, that I think adds to the desirability of luck...and since many many many players recommend CHA and END over luck these days as it is already, and now we're proposing the one thing that even makes it worthwhile being nerfed, I see little reason not to give it something desireable.

And this also means you can remove ideas that tie SP regen help/discounts from any main stat. Just have it here, instead...and remain build agnostic (ie Warrior, Ranger, Mage)

I'd add this and leave LS's alone anyway. I'm more willing to part with BTH help, although I think current stat revamp ideas have buffed backlashers.



ruleandrew -> RE: Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (8/8/2023 21:50:50)

If you nerf luck in term of bonus to hit damage formula from its current state, then luck shall play a role in sp regeneration. This move could reduce the impact of planned increase to guest costs. For now, do not change how luck work for lucky strike.
--

I believe LK is aiming for this model:
250 in main stat + 250 in secondary stat + 250 in secondary stat

STR, DEX and INT are main stat. END, CHA and LUCK are secondary stat.

If player choose a second main stat over a second secondary stat, player get a minor penalty in power.

250 in one main stat is going to be worth more than 250 in one secondary stat.



CH4OT1C! -> RE: Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (8/9/2023 18:35:55)

@SapphireCatalyst2021: To clarify some of the points raised:
  • DEX does almost nothing for monsters and it does need changing. Unfortunately that's going to have to be a long-term project
  • The reason percentage chance to autohit hasn't proven popular in the past is because autohit is intended for the sake of reliability, and so basing its activation upon chance effectively counteracts its primary benefit. It would be extremely difficult to make work
  • LUK isn't assumed but, as has been said before, the player turn model has a lot of inconsistencies. It would be far easier to fully exclude it from accuracy than it would be to incorporate. To incorporate it would cause chaos, to put it mildly. Lots of nerfs would result.
  • I'm deeply against tying SP regeneration to any stat. That said, it would undoubtedly be worse tying it to a mainstat. However, giving SP regeneration even on LUK has implications for Mages and Non-mages as I discuss in detail here. This would be especially true if it were assumed



    • Sapphire -> RE: Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (8/9/2023 19:09:50)

    I am not opposed to ensuring luck isn't assumed as I am opposed to nerfing lucky strike stat damage and then offering some new ideas to "soften the blow".

    I do think it should be 100% assumed or not. If 85% accuracy is assumed then luck by default is assumed IMO, and then the damage you get, and the blocking you get etc is then assumed. Or un-assume it, and revise everything.

    This would mean, if you removed the assumption completely, that

    1. Main stat BTH needs to go up by 5%
    2. Luck should lose 5% bth, unless it is to be considered a style bonus, and having luck pushes accuracy to 90% much like having dex pushes dodge rate higher (outside of assumptions)
    3. Luck would need to lose 5 blocking, same scenario as #2 above
    4. Luck's lucky strike damage is then no longer assumed, and thus
    A. Would be considered extra
    B. Provides a scenario where lucky strike damage can be reviewed and modified, even on an item category basis (weapon attacks, spells, pets could all have different values) w/o repercussions
    C. This likely means an entire swath of items that deal with lucky strike rates/damage, etc need to be adjusted
    D. All damage-based statuses in the same vein as alchemical unity, celestial armaments, mason form choke, independence scythes et al need revisions (standard damage no longer being 404)

    The workload required just to De-assume Luck is quite a bit more than assuming it.

    If that's the road that needs to be taken, then I'd rather they do it right 1 time than feel like later they needed to do it in the past, but didn't, and then we have another mini stat revamp project.

    I'm not opposed to a re-write of assumptions. I think the old assumptions are actually the root of many issues. It's exactly my point with Guests, upkeeps, and assumptions that surround CHA/Guests. Balancing something based on bad assumptions can't by definition, be balanced.
    So let's get the assumptions re-written, I'm for it to a degree...with 1 caveat: Be careful with how far specific things go with nerfs. Players fun, and thoughts on the game matters more than mathematical precision, and by a mile. I think staff knows this, so I trust they'll tackle all of this the right way. A balanced approach.., no pun intended.





    CH4OT1C! -> RE: Stat Rebalancing - An Addendum to the Spring Balance Project (8/9/2023 20:42:44)

    The opposite is true - LUK is far closer to not being assumed. The Player Turn model was deliberately set up that way for support stats like LUK. This only changed recently when the BTH and blocking formulas changed to have it assumed, putting it in a weird place (this is described by @RobynJoanne already). It's much easier to revert those accuracy changes:

  • Mainstat BTH would need to increase to reach 85% accuracy
  • LUK wouldn't necessarily need to lose BTH. The player isn't assumed to invest in a support stat like LUK, so it wouldn't need to adhere to accuracy assumptions (i.e. it could be treated as a benefit of investing) so long as the baseline without it reached 85%
  • For the same reason, it wouldn't necessarily need to lose blocking. The only caveat is, without LUK, player base chance to dodge needs to reach approx. 15% at standard monster accuracy
  • We don't need to isolate lucky strikes because, as @RobynJoanne pointed out, they aren't an assumed part of player damage. They will, of course, still need to be reviewed as they point out. That said, this doesn't require large scale quantities of item reworks to achieve. Indeed, such changes would be necessary if you were to incorporate it as an assumed component of player damage
  • All damage-based statuses like alchemical unity need revising anyway, so it doesn't matter whether they relate to LUK.



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