Slawbug

The real problem is that Burning Spray has a misleading name. Jeff uses both "searing" and "burning" to describe acid type attacks in his games, though sometimes he uses "burning" to describe fire attacks. Searer is, frankly, a questionable word to begin with, and not a good spell name if you ask me.

Anyway, the reasoning is that Artila are common, and a staple attacker. They need a straightforward attack that actually does damage (i.e., Searer). The Searing Artila are a variant, so they can have the variant attack (Burning Spray).

Also, keep in mind that only if you look at the scripts do you realize the Artila attack with Searer. The game just describes them as attacking with a glob of acid or something like that. Searing Artila are described the same way.

Edit: Also, Searing Orbs haven't been called that since G1. They're Essence Orbs now.

After discussing the game balance so much recently, it occured to me that I could actually change it -- or at least much of it -- if I wanted to. So I did.

I went through the attack, creature, and item definition files, and made minor adjustments to things I feel are over- or underpowered. The key word here is "minor"; with very few exceptions, I changed numbers by the smallest amount I thought would make a difference. Anything more would be disastrous, since the same sets of definitions determine both player power and enemy power.

I also noticed some previously unnoted imbalances. Did you know that Burning Spray basically does the same thing as Searer, except without the magic damage, and at a lower hit rate... yet costs an extra point of essence?

I'm testing them a bit to make sure nothing causes evil crashes, and then I'll probably put them online in case anyone else wants to give them a try. But I thought I would gather up my edits and see if anyone had any well-reasoned suggestions.

Besides reducing power (Vlish) and increasing it (Clawbugs), I also tried to make boring creations interesting without being unbalanced (Thahd Shades, Searing Artila), add a few skills for flavor (Vlish telepathy, Roamer roaming) and to make arbitrarily annoying aspects of the game less so (item weights). My general rule was that if a great ability still seemed great even after weakening it, I was probably still in OK territory (Mass Energize), and vice versa with crappy abilities. The overall goal: increase potential for fun.

Changes:

Increased general melee damage by 1/5

Increased javelin damage by 1/5

Increased thorn damage by 1/4 (not including reapers)

Reduced Vlish missile damage by 1/6

Reduced Vlish melee damage by 1/5

Held Gazer melee damage at 7/6 normal

Held Alwan's melee damage at normal

Increased Alwan's swords by 3 levels to compensate

Increased accuracy of Burning Spray by 10%

Increased acid level of Burning Spray by 2/3

Increased essence cost of Group Heal to 10

Increased essence cost of Mass Energize to 30

Increased essence cost of Battle Roar to 40

Gave Alwan 30% armor

Gave Greta 15% armor and 15% energy resistance

Increased Enraged Fyora's missile skill by 2

Increased Cryoa's effective base level by 2

Gave Thahd Shade the Icy Touch melee attack Ghosts use (ice damage + slow)

Reduced Thahd Shade's melee skill by 2

Reduced Thahd Shade's effective base level by 2

Increased Thahd Shade's Dexterity by 2

Increased Plated Artila's HP bonus by 10

Gave Searing Artila Burning Spray instead of Searer as a missile attack

Gave Roamers +1 AP

Reduced Vlish's effective base level by 2

Increased Vlish's Luck by 4

Gave Terror Vlish Terror instead of poison mist as a missile attack

Increased Clawbug's melee skill by 3

Increased Plated Bug's melee skill by 5

Increased Plated Bug's armor by 10%

Increased Stinging Clawbug's melee skill by 5 to compensate for the Vlish melee attack weakening

Increased Battle Alpha's melee skill by 3

Increased Battle Beta's melee skill by 3

Increased Battle Beta's effective base level by 2

Increased Battle Gamma's melee skill by 3

Increased Ur-Glaahk's armor by 20%

Gave Ur-Glaahk a cursing melee attack instead of a slowing one

Increased Ur-Glaahk's fire, ice, acid, and poison resistance by 30%

Increased Cryodrayk's missile skill by 8

Increased Cryodrayk's effective base level by 2

Removed Symbiotic Cloak's bonuses to Missile Weapons, Quick Action, and Parry (bug fix)

Increased Deadeye Cloak's Missile Weapons bonus by 2

Increased Farsight Chitin's Missile Weapons bonus by 2

Increased Shielding Knife's armor by 4%

Increased Singing Rapier's Parry bonus by 2

Gave Frozen Blade an icy slowing attack instead of a cursing one

Gave Flaming Sword a fiery cursing attack instead of a normal one

Increased Thorn Baton's attack level by 2

Increased baton, wand, and javelin default charges by 2

Reduced weight of javelins to 0.5 lbs

Reduced weight of Research Notes, Shaper Equipment, and Living Tools to 0.5 lbs

Increased All-Protector's hostile effect resistance by 3%

Increased Projection Band's armor and hostile effect resistance by 3%

Increased Deflection Band's hostile effect resistance by 10%

Arbitrary flavor changes:

Replaced Carnelian Gloves with Lapis Lazuli Gloves

Replaced Rod of Defenses with Rod of Lordly Might

Replaced Rod of Battle with Rod of Channeling

Replaced Koerner's Blade with a secret weapon that Phobia will very much appreciate

Yes. See above.

I think it's a safe bet that Jeff was using "type" and "class" interchangeably in that sentence.

Magma, you really need to stop answering questions that you don't know the answers to!

Jeff wrote here that:

"There are five basic rebel character types. Four of them are human."

He wrote in a newsletter that there will be an option to play a servile.

Nice discovery.

P.S. Red wizard shot the potion!

There's an easy way to test this. Get an enemy terror vlish to attack you, then do the same thing with higher mental resistance and with higher poison resistance. Only the former should reduce damage, I'm pretty sure.

Apparently, Searing Artila and Thahd Shades are not flagged as regular creations.

They have creature type 3, which they share with turrets, pylons, spinecores, and specters.

Other than that they have no special resistances. As far as magic (= energy) damage goes, there is not more than one type. However, disruption is its own category of damage, and terror and stun based damage uses poison resistance, not magic resistance, I guess because they are status effects.

Oh, wait! That's not poison elemental damage, it's mental damage! Duh. The Terror Vlish poison attack is flagged as that type of damage because it used to be a terror attack. Duh, Slarty.

Searing Artila do not get any more health than regular Artila, btw, if you level both up. The Searing Artila just start at a higher level, about 10 levels higher. Since you gain access to regular Artila a lot earlier, this is not particularly relevant.

Vlish absolutely need to be fixed. They are far, far stronger than comparable creations. Flat-out power (as you suggest with the Strong Daze example) is only one issue; relative power is another issue. Right now Vlish outclass practically every second and third tier creation so badly that there's no reason to make the others. That's the definition of poor balance.

Hmm...

No, the damage calculations did not factor in poison or acid drips. I haven't seen poison damage go that high, but I haven't experimented with it that much either.

The Terror Vlish is not crap at all; there are so few enemies that resist poison that it's useful merely for the poison elemental attack itself. Gazers, for example, have good resists against energy, fire *and* ice, and armor as well -- but they don't resist poison. Putting two Terrors at the head of a pack of Vlish would actually be a worthwhile investment in my book.

The Vlish's missile attack does count as magic (= energy). I was only listing special effects in that chart -- you'll notice I didn't list fire or ice flavored damage either.

The Terror Vlish's poison attack does poison the victim (both melee like the regular Vlish, and missile). The amount of poison (and hence amount of damage) depends on attack strength. In general it's less immediately damaging than acid is. I wouldn't rely on it, and I'd certainly say it's much less useful than slowing is.

Difficulty setting affects monster level. When their level is higher, they have more HP, better to-hit and to-dodge rates, and do more damage.

Did anyone here ever play Realmz?

Does anyone else remember the giant pile of poop that resulted when Realmz doubled the number of races and classes available?

That's an extreme case, but less is more. Jeff understands that. It's one of his best qualities as a designer, I think.

Clarifications: creatures that the game engine spawns from spawners don't give any XP. Most spawners seem to have creations around them already when you get there, often a different flavor than what they spawn. Those creatures are not technically "spawned" so they give usual XP.

First, as the other thread demonstrates, Roamers are almost exactly the same as Artila. Less so at lower levels, but the difference is still pretty small. In G1, Artila had a sub-par melee attack... that is no longer the case.

Based on my math, rotghroths will do more damage than a gazer if their Quick Action kicks in, and less if it doesn't. They only have 6 QA. They drip acid, but not really any more than an Artila or Roamer ships out. Here's the thing -- gazers actually have a great melee attack. It stuns, and it does damage with 1-6, rather than 1-4 as Rotghroths and everything else do. So running out of energy isn't a huge problem, especially if you use a melee attack where it's sufficient.

The advantage to rots, of course, is that you can shape them a whole island earlier. The place of gazers and eyebeasts is really alongside vlish, both so you can afford the essence cost, and you don't have to fire the kill ray constantly.

If you observed this in G2, it's also possible things have changed. For one thing, spawned creations never give any XP in G3.

Are you sure this just happens with Vlish?

Weird. If this really happens, it must be hardcoded. Here's the Vlish script:

begindefinecreature 90;// pc created Vlish// base for all Vlish imports	import = 9;	cr_name = "Vlish";	cr_graphic_template = 18;	cr_max_health = 25;	cr_max_energy = 0;	cr_max_essence = 0;	cr_regen_rate = 2;	cr_energy_regen_rate = 6;	cr_walk_speed = 24; //base_speed;	cr_base_level = 12;	cr_creature_type = 1;	cr_default_attitude = 1;	cr_default_courage = 70;	cr_sound_when_slain = 108;		cr_resistances 0 = 30;	cr_resistances 1 = 80;	cr_resistances 2 = 50;	cr_resistances 4 = 50;		cr_abil_num 0 = 80; // sting attack	cr_abil_level 0 = 4;	cr_abil_step_of_launch 0 = 8;	cr_abil_anim_in_reverse 0 = 1;	cr_abil_num 1 = 64; // slow attack	cr_abil_level 1 = 3;	cr_abil_step_of_launch 1 = 8;	cr_abil_anim_in_reverse 1 = 1;

Ancillary effects increase in strength the same way damage does. For creation attacks you get a level or two of slow/acid/poison/whatever for each point of Strength or skill.

Dodge rate for creations is, I think, based entirely on Dex (and the Nimbleness bonus that Thahd Shades and Searing Artila get). So Vlish shouldn't be better at dodging than any other high level creation.

Dominate has a base effect of 1-3 and an effect per level of 1-3 (from the scripts). How that translates to chance to hit and duration, I couldn't tell you. You might be able to figure it out by making lots of comparisons with other spells, such as Daze (1-2 and 1-2, a good measuring rod for spell success as it's pretty consistent and we know it is based directly on enemy level) or War Blessing (1-2 and 1-1, so a good measuring rod for duration). Good luck, though.

(Cautionary note: the title is a bit of an exaggeration. Vlish are severely overpowered and certain small but influential aspects of shaping are absurdly unbalanced.)

I don't think I've played a Shaper on Torment before, not since G1, anyway. I rarely play Shapers. Well, this game, I have periodically been checking the preferences to make sure the difficulty is actually set to Torment. It hasn't seemed like it. Nothing can touch me. It's ridiculous.

1. Some background:

I was trying to figure out which creations were really the most valuable, so I did a little testing, and looked through the creature definitions file. With the exception of the fourth-tier creations, who have a plethora of unique skills but aren't available until very late in the game anyway, there are very few things differentiating any of the creations. The most important ones are:

- Essence cost (which also affects cost to pump stats)

- Base level

- Type of attack

- Attack skill

There are a few others:

- Base HP and Energy

- Small bonuses to stats

- Resistances

But differences among them are mostly insignificant, so I'll mostly ignore them.

Type of attack is obviously important, as creations that don't have ranged attacks can't be employed the same way as ones that do, and some of the ancillary effects (slowing and stunning) are quite useful.

Level is by far the most important characteristic, however. A creation's four primary stats are equal to half its level (rounded down). Level and Endurance are responsible for the bulk of HP, and Strength + Attack Bonus is responsible for how strong ALL creation attacks are (yes, including missile attacks). Attack bonuses are generally smaller than base levels, and HP bonuses are almost all puny in comparison to even mid-level creation HP, so level is really what makes or breaks a creation.

If you look at the creation stats with this in mind, they actually seem fairly balanced. The more expensive, higher tier creations have higher base levels. There are two problems with this, though.

1) Bonus to base levels. When you shape a creation, it gets a bonus of +1 for each point in Create X you have, and +1 for each point in the appropriate Shaping skill (+1 per 2 points above 10 and +1 per 3 points above 20). It's trivial for a Shaper to reach 10 in any Shaping skill, so you can basically add a flat +11 or +12 to each base level right away.

2) Levelling up. As frequently discussed on this board, having 7 creations follow you reduces your own XP by nearly 50%, but by the end of the game you will only be down a handful of levels over this, perhaps 4-6. Creations get almost exactly 75% the experience that you do, regardless of the creation's own level, and the level of your creations doesn't affect how much XP you get. So if a creation follows you around for 20 level ups, you can expect it to gain 15 levels. Not insignificant!

Point #2 becomes horrifically relevant when you realize that some creations (generally, the weaker ones) are available before others are. Yes, you could theoretically find a way to run to Dhonal's Keep at level 1 and get Drayks right away, but aside from the fact that you wouldn't have enough essence to make one, that takes the fun out of the game, for me anyway.

Here's a table of this basic information about the first three tiers of creations. I've left off the fourth tier since they would be poorly represented on this chart, and I've left off Cryodrayks since they don't become available until fourth tier creations do. I separated them out based on when they become available to you -- almost immediately, soon after reaching Harmony Isle, and soon after reaching Dhonal's Isle. I also clumped the creatures with no missile attack together.

(Note that this table uses actual base levels, which are 75% rounded down of the base levels listed in the definitions file. Also, for the creations like Battle Alphas that get tiny Strength bonuses, I just lumped those in with melee and missile skill.)

           BASE    MELEE    MISS    MISS    MISS    MISS
CREATION    COST    LV    SKILL    SKILL    MULT    TOHIT    TYPE
Thahd        8    3    3
Fyora        8    1    2    2    1-3    60%    Fire
Artila        12    3    2    4    1-4    70%    Magic/Acid

Pyroroamer    12    3    3 Exp
Clawbug        20    7    4
Thahd Sh.    28    12    2
Plated B.    48    12    0 AP
Roamer        15    7    2    2     1-4    70%    Magic/Acid
S. Artila    30    13    0    0    1-4    70%    Magic/Acid
Cryoa        30    6    2    2    1-5    80%    Ice
Vlish        15    9    4 Poi     3    1-5    70%    Magic/Slow
Terror Vlish    45    15    2 Poi    1    1-5    70%    Poison/Poison

B. Alpha    40    15    9
Glaahk        60    15    10 Stn
Drayk        50    18    8     2    1-6    75%    Fire

B. Beta        60    19    9
Ur-Glaahk    100    22    10 Stn

The following table presents the creations as they would be if you put 10 points in the appropriate shaping skill, buy 2 levels of Create X, create them as soon as you have the ability, and keep them with you. I adjusted these where necessary -- you can only get 1 point in Drayk right away, from a canister, whereas Terror Vlishes require using at least 1 canister to get to 3, the value I used for them, and so on. This means that several of the creations, such as Vlish, could actually be created a level higher with canister use.

For a point of comparison I've chosen level 25, which when gaining levels slowly allows time to potentially get even the Beta and Ur-Glaahk. There are a variety of creation strength-boosting effects available:

+2 Transference Robe

+2 Sharing Belt

+2 Guardian Claymore

+3 Crystalline Shroud

+4 War Blessing

Since any player will have at least some of these, I'll be conservative and pick the two biggest no-brainers (Claymore + Shroud) to give each creation a bonus of 5 to Strength, and no Endurance bonus. Basically, the effect of wearing more is just to make the creations with better damage multipliers (like Drayks) better, and to make to-hit rates even less relevant.

I averaged out the typical damage assuming no resistance. I didn't include base damage because it's small and I'm not sure if it applies to creation attacks. (i.e. the Fyora's attack, Firebolt, has a multiplier of 1-3 per level but may have base damage of 1-4 as well.) HP calculations do include bonus HP.

I still haven't included the cost of 2 points of Int in the base cost, since it may be useful to skip those at first in order to create more creatures when you are at a lower level despite having lower essence.

LV GOT						MELEE	MISS
/MADE	CREATION	COST	LV	HP	DMG	DMG	EFFECTS
10/16	Pyroroamer	12	27	182	52		Explodes
2/12	Thahd		8	29	270	55
10/19	Clawbug		20	30	268	60
10/25	Thahd Sh.	28	36	393	62
10/20	Plated B.	48	31	250	50		+2 AP
16/27	B. Alpha	40	33	332	75
22/32	B. Beta		60	34	358	77
16/27	Glaahk		60	33	312	77		Stun
22/35	Ur-Glaahk	100	37	382	82		Stun

1/ 8	Fyora		8	26	201	50	40
4/14	Artila		12	29	220	52	57	Acid
10/19	Roamer		15	30	258	55	55	Acid
10/26	S. Artila	30	37	352	57	57	Acid
10/19	Cryoa		30	30	258	55	66
10/21	Vlish		15	32	289	62	72	Slow/Pois
10/28	Terror Vlish	45	39	381	65	75	Pois/Pois
16/29	Drayk		50	35	366	75	84

Several things should be apparent from this chart. The first is that levelling up creations is really powerful.

The second is that Battle Shaping sucks, a lot. In exchange for a not very useful advantage in HP, battle creations have weaker attacks than magic creations, especially when you consider how common physical resistance is.

The third is that Vlish are really overpowered. Their slowing effect would already make up for the few points of additional damage a Drayk gets, if it weren't for the fact that Vlish cost 15 and Drayks cost 50! There are a handful of enemies with high resistance to energy attacks -- good thing the Vlish has a physical attack that's as strong as any other creation's, considering it also causes poison damage. Oh, and speaking of resistance, the Vlish gets built in resistance to several types of attacks, more than any other creation in the first three tiers.

The cheap cost of Vlish means, furthermore, that you can more easily afford to pump their stats or support them with spells. And if you pump stats, wear more boosting equipment, or gain more levels, the advantage their 1-5 missile attack has over the majority of creations that are stuck with 1-4 attacks just increases.

And let me reiterate that the slowing effect is really powerful.

2. Torment, really?

The other thing that should be apparent is that by levelling up creations, you can make powerhouses without using up too much essence. One level 32 Vlish might be weaker than a level 30 solo Agent or Guardian, but seven of them? Supported by Mass Energize? That's about where I am now, and even on Torment, the game has become a joke.

I almost never buff, because even without it, I can take out several enemies per round. Buffing meant, for example, that Spharon's HP got reduced to nothing in two rounds, despite his having high resistance to energy attacks. The shard kept him alive longer, but being hit with slow fourteen times per round meant that he never got to attack at all.

I don't think I can say anymore that G3 is the Agent's game. I haven't spent any skill points the past couple of levels because there's nowhere to put them that will actually make a difference. I suppose I can put a bunch in Intelligence later if I want to shape some Gazers.

I know, I know. Geneforge is all about Shapers. They are supposed to be powerful. But this much power is ridiculous, particularly from a 15 cost creation.

Levelling up is only part of that, though. Going around Greenwood with level 14 Artilas was pretty easy, too. My balancing suggestions would be:

- Reduce the base level bonus from shaping skills slightly, or just make the skills more expensive

- Make the XP your creations gain depend on the number of creations you have. Levelling one creation up this much is a nice option, I think, but levelling seven up is too powerful.

- Fix the Vlish's attacks so that they are weaker than average as in G1.

- Do something to make battle creations worthwhile.

You hit the nail on the head.

Bonuses start to plateau at 10. Up to 10, your creations get 1 bonus level per point. Between 10 and 20, they get 1 level per 2 points. After 20, they get 1 level per 3 points.

6 skill points for a level is still quite reasonable if you're a shaper. 12 is much less reasonable; at that point you'll probably get more in both the short and the long run out of some Intelligence.

Because clearly, investing in Strength makes you better able to take hits.

I liked you better when you just ranted about minotaurs.

Unfortunately, no. In Torment, enemies hit for a lot of damage. Until you have heavy armor, good Parry skill, and spell buffs like Augmentation and Essence Armor, it's pretty hard to survive more than one hit. So any time there are multiple enemies attacking me -- which, for an Agent with no creations who can't pump Mental Magic enough to use Daze effectively, is going to be all the time -- there is a decent chance that I will randomly get hit twice in a row and die without being able to do anything about it. That's way too much save-and-reload for my taste.

This is compounded by the fact that the limited supply of good missile ammo means that most things will survive (and attack me) for multiple turns.

The other thing is that I'm not even at visible 1% against all the enemies I meet. This may get better over time, like when I find the +3 luck boots... but it already costs a boatload to increase the relevant skills. I get about 3 or 4% increase in dodge capability per level up, and it's dropping. I'm at visible 40% against Brutal Thahds, for example, and they kill me in one hit. That's just not good enough.

Chibi, I'm sure your contributions would be welcome. You aren't presumptuous about your conclusions and you don't start fights. A lot of people do

Perhaps a better phrase than "any strategy will work in Normal" is "any strategy CAN work in Normal." A useful distinction can be made between strategy, and tactics. Tactics cover some details of gameplay that apply regardless of strategy, like positioning your characters well in battle, deciding what enemies to attack with which characters, what wepaon to use, what spell to cast, and so on. There is a lot of room for play style differences even within a given strategy, or a given build.

About dying on Normal: well, what kind of situations are you in that cause you to die? What do you do differently that causes you to not die? Asking yourself questions like that is the best way to learn. The game is frequently harder at the beginning. (This is characteristic of Jeff's games, because he packs them full of optional quests and goodies, but wants players who ignore most of them to be able to finish the game.)