Suggestions on items of SKUME
I have some idea about the items in SKUME that might be helpful.
Artifact is a unique, build-defining, equip-able item that you can get for each time you defeat Solomon. The purpose of Artifact is to make each run more possible to win even if your RNG screws you up and gives garbo tier items. Artifact, because it is very unique, cannot be sold for gold but can be traded to get a different artifact. Of course, you will not know what artifact you will get until the trade is complete to prevent any abuse.
Artifact exmaple
1. Ring of Marksmans: Hitting enemy increases next attack by 1% and it can stack up to 10%. This buff disappears when you miss your shot.
2. Hierarch's Chestplate: Recieving damage while having 60% or lower health will give 30 health shield to player. This ability occurs in every 30 sec and hitting an enemy reduces its cooldown by 2 sec(this can only occur once per second to prevent lightning and frost jet from having infinite shield)
3. Storm Hammer: Hitting enemy with basic attack has 20% chance to stun enemy for 1 second (for channeled attacks like lightning, the chance is reduced to 5% and stun duration is reduced to .25 second)
4. Suncape: Deals 15 damage per second to all nearby enemies for 3 seconds when you use secondary ability
5. Voidcape: Nullify three incoming attacks for 5 seconds when you use secondary ability
6. Ring of Command: Nearby friendly summons gain 20% attack speed bonus and 20 % movement speed bonus
7. Ring of Hunger: Heals you for 100% of enemy's max health that you kill. However, you receive 1 + (your health regen) damage per second.
8. Ring of Shackled: Curse this item upon equipping. You gain +1 skill and -10% damage resist per each cursed equipment that you equip.
9. Ring of Equalizer: You only receive 10 damage(1 for dot damage like lightning) on any attack and spend 10 mana on any spell cast.
10. Hexphobic Heavy Armor: You gain 40% damage resistance, poison immunity, and 5 health regen. However, you cannot use any secondary ability, -50% resource(mana, faith, etc) regen, and -20% movement speed.
11. Gong Armor: Gain 60% damage resistance but also increase nearby enemies' movement speed and attack speed by 20% when you get hit by a physical attack (poison does not count).
12. The Robe of Wind: A robe made of wind that completely block arrows but increase damage received by any other attacks by 100%.
13. Hat of the Slugborn: Gain 50% mana regen, 20% cooldown reduction, and 50% magic resistance. However, player's movement speed is halved.
14. Lonely Robe: + 3 skill and 100% increased damage. - 1 skill and -35% damage for each other item you equip.
2. Cursed item
Cursed item is pretty common system in many rougelike. Basically, if you equip a cursed item, you will not be able to unequip that item until you remove the curse by using an item like curse removal scroll or an npc. This not only makes the game a bit more challenging but also allows you to make unique artifact that revolves around the curse mechanism. For example, there could be an item that gives +1 skill for each cursed item you equip. Also, it would make sense for Solomon to curse his treasures for entertainment or theft prevention purpose.
3. Scrap
Similar to Hearthstone's dust system, Scrap system allow player to scrap any low tier items that can be used to create an item of choice. It is a neat system that somewhat prevent RNG from screwing each run with useless junks.
Comments
Suncape becomes worthless in higher lvl dungeons especially when you’ve reset enough times so maybe (15*number of resets=damage done per second).
Voidcape only three over 5 seconds hmm makes more sense if you do nullify all but only 3 if not 2 seconds
Ring of hunger that’s just too op think about it the player health maxes out at per say 300 most enemies you face especially later on have more than 300 hp meaning every kill is a full heal better to make it every enemy killed heals by 10% and removes all health regen even from orbs.
Ring of equalizer just seems too op if you have mage shield cause if you have at least 10 mp per second regen you never have to increase regen again letting you focus on nothing but damage so you become too powerful and with mage shield or a shield that a character gets it just becomes that much more powerful
Gong armor only comment here is with your final add about the poison poison isn’t a physical attack so no need to mention it more of a lolz here
Robe of wind seems too punishing there’s allot of items on this list that only give benefits but this one is like 25% benefit 75% detriment....sure arrows don’t matter anymore but spells don’t care and some enemies that already hit like trucks now hit like 747 bowings you’ll die way too quickly and blocking arrows isn’t nearly as relevant as day all projectiles.
Other than that the rest of the items you mentioned are pretty balanced and most importantly helpful. Since they are gained at pretty much the end of the game or at least the first play through they should be like legendary items that have a pretty amazing benefit and maybe a minor detriment. But that’s just my thoughts on your list.
First thing first, if you get acid rain(which you called poison rain), you are either a masochist or new to this game. Second, acid rain and ring of fire(which you called fire burst) have no synergy so do not ever go both at the same time. Lastly, you can’t wipe enemies using acid rain andring of fire in mid to late game cuz they deal low damage.
You are underestimating the potential of invulnerability status. If you look at MOBA genre games like LoL or Heroes of the Storm, you can see how people utilize even .75 seconds of invulnerability to nullify a wave of incoming attacks and turn the tide quickly. Despite the fact that Solomon games are not MOBA, invulnerability’s value does not change. Even if your secondary cooldown is all 60 sec, you still have at least 3 chances to nullify incoming attack per minute.
If we look at other class, Having an extra invulnerability skill as a paladin is super strong regardless of the cooldown time. Invulnerability not only nullifies damage but also buys time for health regen. Voidcape on rogue can be helpful for most secondary skill for rogue would be defensive ability. Necromancer... obviously useful for it would use secondary to summon minions anyway.
I disagree that voidcape is inferior to other artifacts because voidcApe does not have negative attributes, easy to proc, and it gives invulnerability which is a very rare and extremely powerful ability. In fact, I even feel that it is still op.
Cooldown generally varies from skills. Some like stoneskin(6-10 sec invulnerability) takes about a minute or more and magic trap and phasing takes less than 10 seconds. Combing with focus, you can constantly get invulnerability even if the duration of invulnerability is 1 second.
I understand the reason why you think it is underpowered but it looks like you don’t seem to realize the potential of invulnerability and you did not seemed to have researched all the skills that has been out in all Solomon games(including Solomon Dark and some teased info of SKUME).
The infos from the alpha stuff does not give detail but it does show how the class would generally look like in future. It is not accurate but gives some idea to speculate. After all, we don’t even know if this idea of artifact will ever going to be a thing.
I never thought it as a stacked not it should. The purpose of voidcape is to nullify single wave of attack, not having 3 stoneskin at your disposal. It is more closer to some sort of dodge ability instead of a real invulnerability ability. The whole thing about having infinite invulnerability is basically people using phasing and magic trap(two really low cooldown secondary) to constantly procing 2 second invulnerability while filling any cooldown gaps with flash freeze or stoneskin. If properly used, it can give AT LEAST 14 seconds of guaranteed invulnerability and there will be very few seconds of gap before the cycle repeats.
I agree that we should not think everyone is pro but utilizing 1 second invulnerability is not on the level of pro because AI in Solomon’s keep are very easy to predict in general.
Here is the list of secondary skill that are most likely be in the game and its possible chemistry with the void cape:
1. Ring of fire: Even if you blast enemies away, ring of fire cannot block projectiles and lightning. Having voidcape will ensure that you don’t die by barrage of enemy ranged attack before yhe fire consumes them.
2. Ring of ice(or Flash freeze): Same thing with ring of fire, it makes sure that you dodge any incoming ranged attack by the frozen enemies and other enemeis that you were unable to freeze.
3. Acid rain and Magic Storm: Considering both of them cannot clear all enemeis within the area instantly, voidcape allows to player to dodge some attack while the cloud deals with enemies.
4. Earthquakes: Same with ring of fire.
5. Dampen: Voidcape will block incoming arrows and any unblocked magic while dampen block magic attacks.
6. Call leviathan, Fire wall, Summon golem, Ether drain, Turn undead(paladin): Can be used to proc voidcape
8. Magic trap, phasing : Perfect secondary spell for voidcape for its low cooldown.
9. Call comet, stoneskin: Not great with voidcape for thier long cooldown.
10. Magic shield: This make sure the shield does not instantly pop when deployed. Oh yes, the voidcape proc should prevent shield from recieving damage too.
11. Prismatic shock: Does not synergize well with voidcape for each of their timing is different.
12. Teleport: Not much of a synergy unless you are playing boneyard mode.
Also, I only said that ring of fire does not work well woth acid rain. Perosnally, I think ring of fire has way more potential than acid rain and made some suggestions on how to improve them.
P.s. I do enjoy this balance conversation for I haven’t had any for awhile but please make it more easier for me to read like dividing into paragraphs and using accurate vocabulary(ex. Ring of fire instead of fire nova). Also, can you specifically tell me about the 15 second invulnerability diablo mage stuff? I’m trying to find what you were talking but all i could find was 3 second invulnerability skill of monk in diablo 3.
Void cape: once every 300 seconds if you would die you become invulnerable for a total of 3 seconds and a vortex of void appears around you sucking every enemy in the current room into it, minus bosses who get thrown to the edge of the room and or stunned for 5 seconds. Also maybe not a cooldown what about a passive that relies on you getting a certain number of kills or even a once a floor use item. Also you don’t get gold or item drops from the enemies who get sucked inside.
I am sorry to confuse you(and myself) in a bit but I never meant artifacts to be as powerful as a legendary items in some way. The purpose of the artifact is to make sure that you get some sort of “build-defining” or “style-defining” item before entering into difficult run to support various playstyle and make each game feel different other than “op or garbo”. The artifacts must have emphasize shaping the different playstyle so that player can experience various unique ways to play the game without complaining too much to RNG.
What you have proposed as a new ability for the voidcape is a good legnedary item ability but does not fit for an ability of an artifact. It does not propose any build or playstyle that can be worked with that effect. Of course, there are some items Ive put up there that does not fit as an artifact due to my carelessness.
Then what is my version of voidcape trying to accomplish? It is basically promoting the use of secondaries with short cooldown like magic trap and phasing and increase survivability of magic storm build. Magic storm build has two core secondaries: Magic storm and prismatic shock. Considering that magic shield is essential to all mages, magic storm build will not be able to get additional defensive secondary. Voidcape can give magic storm users a defensive ability which they crave and solve thier problem.
Problems with your second reply:
1. Flash freeze or ring of ice(its not called frost nova) does not freeze entire enemy in the map and does not stop any projectiles that has been fired before freezing the enemy. Having the 1 or 2 sec invulnerability will deal with those projectiles that you were unable to nullify by using flash freeze.
2. Stoneskin has longer duration but it cannot be used often which leave player vulnerable to incoming attacks for a long time. voidcape, on the other hand, has shorter duration but it can be used very often and barely leaves player vulnerable. If used in right way like timing the secondary well, its defensive capability can surpass those typical defnsive secondaries easily. Even if you don’t time it well, having constant short invulnerability will do decent job at keeping player alive as long as they have at least one short coolodwn secondary like phasing or magic trap.
3. Rest of the part... i just simply cannot understand your point clearly. Beg your pardon but could you at least put some period? I just want to make sure I understand your statement.
I wouldn’t say it is late when you get the first artifact because the end of student difficulty still somewhat counts as the early game. The student difficulty is very easy to complete even with acid rain focused user(well it is an over-exaggeration but you get the point). The problem starts to emerge from wizard difficulty when things get somewhat difficult and flaws of your build starts to show up. Considering that the mid of wizard difficulty is when most players fall behind, late of student difficulty seems reasonable time to get your first artifact.
That suggestion you said about focusing on developing mage is basically what I have been doing right now. I am so glad there are others to discuss about mage balance and come up with idea. I’ll make a new post dedicate to brainstorming artifacts since this one is filled with disgustingly long arguments of whether voidcape is op or garbo stuff.
There is one post about mage balance that Ive posted quite ago that might be interesting. Feel free to check that one out if you have tume: http://www.raptisoft-forums.com/discussion/813/solomon-balance-rant#latest