Post by Azherae on 2022-12-02 21:03:50
Splitting this into two Feedback sets, the first being directly from the starters and based on what has been explicitly 'addressed', and the second just random praise on stuff that is much more subject to change but I'd like to encourage anyway:
How do you feel about the synergy between archetypes and status conditions?
Would have to see more. Seems easier than I like but there's clearly no point to it being very hard in a showcase. That said, I mention it because the showcase was long ENOUGH that I figured we'd see some difficulty in coordination come up more than ... once I think it was.
That said, I understand that 'easy' is important for getting people into things and it was just Zombies. Core principle I'm good with, looking forward to more.
Do you think party composition should amplify the meta?
Yes but I agree with keeping it moreso in the realm of what was shown. The Base abilities synergize so that everyone can expect to be able to do it, but then hopefully we get cool/wacky stuff to go with it. As much as I'd like to say a lot positive here, I know things aren't quite far enough along to be showing a LOT of party composition stuff yet. That said, I definitely didn't see anything I disliked. Obviously I still care about that Weapon Focus Gauge but that's its own thread.
What are your thoughts regarding the active blocking shown during the November Update?
Looks good, particularly with the shield. I believe that for balance and challenge it MUST be tied to Stamina, and I believe that 'Stamina' is the correct resource to use for this. It is one of the few things that helps with both class identity and itemization, in my opinion. It also makes balance slightly harder, but I consider it intuitive enough, particularly with the crop of Adventure/Action games that are popular lately, that I don't think you'd have a problem adding it.
Share your thoughts about the hotbar, icons, minimap, party and targeting UI shown.
Minimap was good for me. I was surprised at how 'nice' it felt, but on the other hand it could be different against a lighter background and less immersive in certain ways. If the UI team can manage it, anything that would set the base hue and saturation of the 'background' sections of the map to be similar to something about the area, would be ideal.
UI feels very nice to me. It just 'becomes correct', to the point where I don't think about it, and that's without being the one playing so I consider that very good. Party targeting also seems really nice. Particularly given the precise movement speeds and other requirements along with the 'Soft Target', I don't think I'd have any trouble healing people even in complex situations, yet mobs have just enough movement that you might miss them during their attacks if you were otherwise occupied or threatened which is the perfect sweet spot for me. Unlikely to miss when you're in no danger even if your ally is moving, more likely to whiff if you let yourself get into a dangerous situation.
Is there anything in particular you’re excited or concerned about regarding what was shown with the Cleric update and weapons demo?
Not much excitement, as I know it's still in development and the main skills are still somewhat simplistic and without augments, but I'm definitely the type to enjoy things like building up Convictions, and it feels quite lore-appropriate. Obviously at higher levels there would be more to see, but that's an Alpha-2 point. As it is now, speculative progression ideas in my mind imply "this is gonna be great!"
I don't feel like we really got to see a LOT of what the weapons were like due to Steven's zoom preferences, but the moments I did see looked quite good. I don't mind the twirly and 'flashy' staff animations at all, and the Mace seemed to have some good weight, though it made me consider once again if all Swings in the Weapon Combo for all weapons are still going to be based on just the Power stat. Freedom to use anything you like is great, though, so that's not a complaint even if it is. Just thinking that the second or third hit of a combo is a perfect place to put SOME differentiation if you wanted it since they're somewhat optional for different builds. It's a balance difficulty either way, so I'd say 'might as well consider it'.
Speculative Stuff!
Mob Density/Aggro
I prefer having to take on 2-3 mobs at a time if you're 'going past just singles', even in a game with a large party size, because otherwise the mobs themselves need to be less complex or dangerous. However, this was almost definitively not the mob type where I care about that. Swarms of zombies are great. I just hope that we won't be seeing this as a baseline concept. I don't like the 'fodder mobs' idea to begin with, but one of the main reasons I dislike this is that the 'multipliers' tend to lock groups out of being able to try their hand at 'razor-edge' content. The placement of mobs makes it possible to only find one or two groups of that in a whole area. This 'feedback' can be summed up as 'Preferred Alpha-1 mob density and aggro, particularly near Moonhollow forests'.
Healing and Health Values
My opinion on this is that I still don't know how you plan to do this with minimal scaling and I don't much like the way I imagine the numbers would end up if you didn't, assuming 'level 15 has 700 health'. But none of this stuff really MATTERS to me, in the long run, since the numbers are just representations. Given that though, I would like them to stay within the 'easy to quickly understand' realm. People can do certain types of math in their heads better than others. 100->120 is a little easier to feel out while playing than 354->424 for some people, in my experience. It won't affect me, I don't think, though, so if there's even a tiny good reason for this in design space, carry on.
Gear Design Visuals
Perfect. No notes.
Enemy Effect/Combat Design Visuals
I am a huge fan of the 'ground telegraphs that are actual effects rather than just red/purple circles or cones'. The whole run gave a really good strong feeling of 'adventuring into an area', but if I had to critique something it would be the fact that the WAY enemies spawn and respawn would result in the player not having time to 'immerse in the area' if they didn't NEED to rest. I don't mind which philosophy one uses relative to resting, though. I would just ask that if one is staying 'low' on 'needing to rest' that the enemies moreso 'tend not to respawn on the main path' but rather ambush and aggro from just off the path as we saw in many places. This therefore is moreso praise than complaint. Keep doing the 'ambush and aggro from off-path' thing. It's great, I put this under 'Combat Design Visuals' because it adds to my immersion.
Mana Costs
Seemed low? Not sure if 'Sandal Lord Mode' was active, though. I don't really think that the speed of progression through the area was bad (as mentioned above) in fact it was nearly perfect, but it just feels odd for the Ranger to run out of mana before the Cleric does, and Steven wasn't 'not doing much', so it was a little surprising to me.
That said, the battle flow didn't show as much 'difficulty' and this is easily tuned so my feedback is 'if you were thinking that this is the sweet spot for Cleric mana consumption I would like it to be greater'. Not so much as to stress new healers getting into it, but as it is now, I don't think it would even 'prepare them for stronger content' in terms of understanding the flow. That's a difficult balancing act too though, so, good luck!
That's all from me, it was a great stream, and even though it didn't really 'show off a ton of new abilities' or anything like that, as a Cleric it gave me a good 'feel' for what fighting would be like and made me look forward to a more challenging version of the same for the future.
How do you feel about the synergy between archetypes and status conditions?
Would have to see more. Seems easier than I like but there's clearly no point to it being very hard in a showcase. That said, I mention it because the showcase was long ENOUGH that I figured we'd see some difficulty in coordination come up more than ... once I think it was.
That said, I understand that 'easy' is important for getting people into things and it was just Zombies. Core principle I'm good with, looking forward to more.
Do you think party composition should amplify the meta?
Yes but I agree with keeping it moreso in the realm of what was shown. The Base abilities synergize so that everyone can expect to be able to do it, but then hopefully we get cool/wacky stuff to go with it. As much as I'd like to say a lot positive here, I know things aren't quite far enough along to be showing a LOT of party composition stuff yet. That said, I definitely didn't see anything I disliked. Obviously I still care about that Weapon Focus Gauge but that's its own thread.
What are your thoughts regarding the active blocking shown during the November Update?
Looks good, particularly with the shield. I believe that for balance and challenge it MUST be tied to Stamina, and I believe that 'Stamina' is the correct resource to use for this. It is one of the few things that helps with both class identity and itemization, in my opinion. It also makes balance slightly harder, but I consider it intuitive enough, particularly with the crop of Adventure/Action games that are popular lately, that I don't think you'd have a problem adding it.
Share your thoughts about the hotbar, icons, minimap, party and targeting UI shown.
Minimap was good for me. I was surprised at how 'nice' it felt, but on the other hand it could be different against a lighter background and less immersive in certain ways. If the UI team can manage it, anything that would set the base hue and saturation of the 'background' sections of the map to be similar to something about the area, would be ideal.
UI feels very nice to me. It just 'becomes correct', to the point where I don't think about it, and that's without being the one playing so I consider that very good. Party targeting also seems really nice. Particularly given the precise movement speeds and other requirements along with the 'Soft Target', I don't think I'd have any trouble healing people even in complex situations, yet mobs have just enough movement that you might miss them during their attacks if you were otherwise occupied or threatened which is the perfect sweet spot for me. Unlikely to miss when you're in no danger even if your ally is moving, more likely to whiff if you let yourself get into a dangerous situation.
Is there anything in particular you’re excited or concerned about regarding what was shown with the Cleric update and weapons demo?
Not much excitement, as I know it's still in development and the main skills are still somewhat simplistic and without augments, but I'm definitely the type to enjoy things like building up Convictions, and it feels quite lore-appropriate. Obviously at higher levels there would be more to see, but that's an Alpha-2 point. As it is now, speculative progression ideas in my mind imply "this is gonna be great!"
I don't feel like we really got to see a LOT of what the weapons were like due to Steven's zoom preferences, but the moments I did see looked quite good. I don't mind the twirly and 'flashy' staff animations at all, and the Mace seemed to have some good weight, though it made me consider once again if all Swings in the Weapon Combo for all weapons are still going to be based on just the Power stat. Freedom to use anything you like is great, though, so that's not a complaint even if it is. Just thinking that the second or third hit of a combo is a perfect place to put SOME differentiation if you wanted it since they're somewhat optional for different builds. It's a balance difficulty either way, so I'd say 'might as well consider it'.
Speculative Stuff!
Mob Density/Aggro
I prefer having to take on 2-3 mobs at a time if you're 'going past just singles', even in a game with a large party size, because otherwise the mobs themselves need to be less complex or dangerous. However, this was almost definitively not the mob type where I care about that. Swarms of zombies are great. I just hope that we won't be seeing this as a baseline concept. I don't like the 'fodder mobs' idea to begin with, but one of the main reasons I dislike this is that the 'multipliers' tend to lock groups out of being able to try their hand at 'razor-edge' content. The placement of mobs makes it possible to only find one or two groups of that in a whole area. This 'feedback' can be summed up as 'Preferred Alpha-1 mob density and aggro, particularly near Moonhollow forests'.
Healing and Health Values
My opinion on this is that I still don't know how you plan to do this with minimal scaling and I don't much like the way I imagine the numbers would end up if you didn't, assuming 'level 15 has 700 health'. But none of this stuff really MATTERS to me, in the long run, since the numbers are just representations. Given that though, I would like them to stay within the 'easy to quickly understand' realm. People can do certain types of math in their heads better than others. 100->120 is a little easier to feel out while playing than 354->424 for some people, in my experience. It won't affect me, I don't think, though, so if there's even a tiny good reason for this in design space, carry on.
Gear Design Visuals
Perfect. No notes.
Enemy Effect/Combat Design Visuals
I am a huge fan of the 'ground telegraphs that are actual effects rather than just red/purple circles or cones'. The whole run gave a really good strong feeling of 'adventuring into an area', but if I had to critique something it would be the fact that the WAY enemies spawn and respawn would result in the player not having time to 'immerse in the area' if they didn't NEED to rest. I don't mind which philosophy one uses relative to resting, though. I would just ask that if one is staying 'low' on 'needing to rest' that the enemies moreso 'tend not to respawn on the main path' but rather ambush and aggro from just off the path as we saw in many places. This therefore is moreso praise than complaint. Keep doing the 'ambush and aggro from off-path' thing. It's great, I put this under 'Combat Design Visuals' because it adds to my immersion.
Mana Costs
Seemed low? Not sure if 'Sandal Lord Mode' was active, though. I don't really think that the speed of progression through the area was bad (as mentioned above) in fact it was nearly perfect, but it just feels odd for the Ranger to run out of mana before the Cleric does, and Steven wasn't 'not doing much', so it was a little surprising to me.
That said, the battle flow didn't show as much 'difficulty' and this is easily tuned so my feedback is 'if you were thinking that this is the sweet spot for Cleric mana consumption I would like it to be greater'. Not so much as to stress new healers getting into it, but as it is now, I don't think it would even 'prepare them for stronger content' in terms of understanding the flow. That's a difficult balancing act too though, so, good luck!
That's all from me, it was a great stream, and even though it didn't really 'show off a ton of new abilities' or anything like that, as a Cleric it gave me a good 'feel' for what fighting would be like and made me look forward to a more challenging version of the same for the future.