Howdy, everyone
Thomas Blair here! It seems like every other month I deliver an update on the newest archetype as we finish the bulk of their implementation, and this month is no exception.
Today I am happy to reveal the basic powers kit of… the Guinecean Duelist!
As with the previous archetypes, the standard caveats apply: We are still building this archetype, so things are liable to change. In fact, they are almost guaranteed to change!
Before we start, let’s review some of the development basics we use on Crowfall®.
Our Approach: Minimum viable powers
We have been building each archetype with what we think would be a ‘minimum viable power’ kit for that archetype to be useful and fun in combat. This means that the current list isn’t final, and some of the powers might even jump to other archetypes (or be cut entirely) as we continue development.
We are leaving ourselves room on the powers tray for the player to eventually slot additional combat powers (i.e. the ones that the player will acquire via disciplines, advantages or class promotions). We also assume there will be another non-combat related power bar when we start building those systems.
In other words, don’t freak out about anything at this stage!
Each new power we build often has a set of new (and different) components that would be useful not only in the construction of that particular power, but that would also open up a new area of design discovery. The goal is to build reusable elements that we can repurpose in other powers for other archetypes. The Duelist is yet another archetype that has really benefitted from previous archetypes and the tech we have built for him gave us quite a few new toys for the powers toolbox.
Duelist musings
The vision for the Duelist was interesting to say the least. He’s a swashbuckling, rogue-esque, guinea pig who uses a rapier and a pistol. I remember back when we were implementing the Druid (yeah, I’ve been thinking about Duelist for that long) other members of the development team would ask me what our plans were for the Duelist, and I remember thinking, “I really have no idea what the hell we are going to do with that guy.” (Then again, I always worry more about stuff in the future. By the time we get to the next item on the list, the vision always seems to come together.)
To start with, after discussing with Todd and the team, one thing was apparent: no one wanted to make a pistol tray and a rapier tray. We felt like that playstyle was covered with the Ranger, and we need to leave some breathing room for the Stalker, so we went looking for an alternative that would feel unique and interesting. We decided to stick with one tray for both melee and ranged and to think of his firearm as more of a short-range burst power (an extension of his melee arsenal) so that he wouldn’t start to feel like just another ranged character.
We also wanted to pull in many elements of what has come to be expected from a rogue class as seen in most MMORPGs. We really like some of these elements (like combo points, which we hadn’t done yet) and stealth (which seemed natural given our stated vision for this archetype includes burrowing).
We also felt like it was time to bite off Stealth as a feature because it dovetails nicely into the Exploration game loop that is going to be more important now that we are transitioning from session-based games to a persistent universe.
(Thankfully, since the engineers have known Stealth was a part of the core vision, this wasn’t coming as a surprise. They planned for it when designing our server architecture. One less thing to worry about!)
With that preamble, keep in mind that I am talking about the stealth system whenever I mention “burrowing” in the following power descriptions.
Enough musings, on to the Duelist!
Duelist Power Resource
The Duelist uses a new resource type called pips to fuel most of his tray powers. It is very similar to what you would find on a rogue in any MMORPG labeled combo points. (We changed the name because we didn’t want any confusion with the functionality of our current power-combo system). Pips generate every time the Duelist uses a left-click attack or his first pistol shot attack in his power tray. The Duelist can collect a maximum of five pips.
Duelist powers that use pips all require a minimum of one pip, but can be fueled with up to (the maximum of) five. When any power that requires pips is used, it always consumes ALL of the pips you currently have accrued. The effect of the power (or change) based on number of pips spent. As a general rule this means: the more pips you spend, the more damage that power will do. In other cases, it might gain secondary effects or add to any buffs or debuffs applied.
Many traditional MMO rogues also tend to be gated with an additional resource (usually energy), but we chose not to do that. We’ll see how this works out. Relying on just pips and cooldown timers should make him feel smoother to play… but it could also lead to imbalances that we can fix due to oversimplification. So, we will see how this plays out.
iFrame powers
I’m going to reiterate the definition of iFrame powers again in case anyone forgot or missed it:
iFrame powers, on activation, typically remove the player from the physics simulation and render them invulnerable to damage while performing the power (a very, very short duration, obviously!)
This means if you use a physics impulse on a character performing an iFrame power, they won’t get pushed around. We are putting all attacks we designate as iFrame powers on the C key.
We generally try to associate powers that use this property with those powers that send a player into the air. We are also limiting both use and availability of these powers, since they step outside the simulation. In other words, we only plan on giving some of the archetypes access to these powers.
This power is what we like to call an “Oh Sh..!” power.
Vanish is the Duelist’s iFrame power and has no resource cost . When this power is activated, the Duelist is taken out of combat and placed into burrow (stealth mode). It also leaves behind an incendiary device that looks like an explosive barrel. After a few seconds the barrel will explode, dealing damage and knocking down all enemies within 5m range.
Passive Powers
Every Crowfall archetype gets an archetype-specific Retaliate passive power that can only be used when stunned or knocked down. This power, when activated, will leap the character back to their feet from the stunned or knocked-down state and will then generally deal damage to everyone in the area.
Retaliate powers are treated like a hidden combo, so the player never sees it on their powers bar; the button to activate it only appears when you are stunned or knocked down. The cooldown is lengthy, so you might have to eat a full stun or knockdown in some cases if crowd control immunity hasn’t kicked in on you yet. The Duelist’s retaliate power, for example, is a leap to his feet that also deals damage to nearby enemies.
The Duelist’s primary passive power is Resourceful, which has a 20% chance per pip spent to instantly generate one pip. So if you spend five pips on a power, there is a 100% chance you will already be at one pip for your next power. This is a piece of new tech we built to be able to modify our proc chances with stat or resource values. (Designers were overjoyed.)
Sprint is technically a passive ability, but we don’t display it on the power bar. Pressing and holding the Shift key will increase the speed of the character (currently by 30%) and rapidly drains his Stamina bar.
Left- and right-click powers
The left-click power for the Duelist uses his rapier to deal damage and generate one pip with each that hits a target. Each basic attack also has a chance to remove any remaining cooldown time on the first power in the Duelist’s tray, which is “Flintlock Shot”. (More new tech! Prior to this we were unable to modify a power’s cooldown after that power had already been placed into a cooldown state.)
His right-click power is a short (10m) Leap, similar to all melee archetypes right-click.
SIDE NOTE: We went through recently and normalized all the melee right-click Dodge powers to traverse 10m, which should enable them to get out of an incoming AoE but not be used as a primary method to close distances.
The powers bar
Let’s look at the Guinecian’s powers bar in detail.
The first power in the powers tray is a ranged attack aptly named Flintlock Shot. This attack is a single target, 30m range pistol shot that generates two pips if you hit a target with it. It has a small cooldown which, as mentioned, has a chance to reset based off of left-click attacks. Did I mention the Duelist uses his right hand for pistol attacks? Yes, he is a lefty with his rapier (…or IS he?!)
The next power is Pepperbox Shot. This is also pip spender attack: a high-damage, single target, 30m ranged pistol attack that includes a stun if four or more pips are consumed.
Impale is the third tray power and, as the name implies, it is a rapier piercing attack. Another pip spender, this power applies a new type of bleed effect on the target, aptly named “Impaled”. While impaled, the target will continue to bleed until a certain health percentage is reached OR until they are healed to full health. Right now, we have the bleed scaling to the amount of pips spent; a one pip Impale would bleed the target to 90% OR until they get healed back to 100%... and yes, it gets worse from there. As you can imagine, this is super nasty so obviously we will have to tweak the values until it feels right.
The next power in the tray is Inconceivable! Yes, that’s right: Inconceivable! You could say this power has a bit of randomness to it. It is a pip spender that activates one to six random (unique) buffs on the Duelist. The more pips spent, the higher the probability that more buffs will be added as well as increasing the length of those buffs.
Available Buffs:
- Humiliations Galore! - Adds one bonus pip to every pip generating attack.
- Bonetti’s Defense! – Passively regenerates .5% of Duelist’s maximum Health per second.
- Capo Ferro! – Adds a chance to every basic attack to deal an extra swing in the next basic attack used.
- Prepare to Die! – Increases damage bonus stat by 15%.
- Agrippa! – Increases critical hit chance stat by 30%.
- Thibault! – Increases critical hit damage stat by 100%.
Obviously, we are still balancing these numbers and effects as we don’t want any one (or combination) of these to make the Duelist incredibly OP – which could be a problem when he uses max charges and gets all six stacked buffs.
Visually, this power mechanic is turning out pretty cool. Billy made us a pretty slick UI widget that shows you how many buffs were applied… and we are working on another widget to highlight them so that they don’t get lost with other buffs you have currently applied.
Redirect Pain is a defensive power for the Duelist. It consumes pips to apply a barrier to the Duelist for a period of time (currently set to 6 seconds). The strength of the barrier increases based on the number of pips. In addition, Redirect Pain also adds the Retribution effect to the Duelist for that time period. This is basically a traditional ‘fire shield’ type power that deals damage back to all attackers based on the amount of damage dealt (50% Retribution would deal 50% of all incoming damage back to the attackers).
The next power on the tray is the Burrow power. When the Duelist is not in combat mode, they can trigger this power to go into the burrowing state. While burrowing, the Duelist moves at a reduced speed, can’t be seen by enemies and their standard combat powers tray is swapped with their Burrow Tray (described below).
Burrow Tray
This first power in this tray is Ambush. This is the traditional rogue ‘backstab’ power. It is a single-target rapier (piercing) attack. The Duelist comes up from the ground () and hits the target very, very hard and applies a daze effect. This attack also generates three pips.
Cannon Barrage is an attack where the Duelist uses a ground target reticle to designate an area to be attacked (very similar to the Ranger Barrage power). This power does not remove the Duelist from stealth, however it does have a long cooldown and requires fairly short range.
The next power is Recon. We’re still experimenting with this one, so we’ll see if it makes the final cut. Recon applies a debuff called “Exposed” that will be unique to all specialist archetypes. If a player has the Exposed debuff on them and is hit by a specialist archetype, nasty things will happen. (As I said, we’re still working on this one, so I’m reluctant to give details until we have a better handle on how it should work.)
Tunnel is a power that activates a short teleport in a forward direction. This will allow a Duelist in the burrowed state to go under/past castle walls and other objects.
Finally, we have the aptly named Leave Burrow power to manually break out of the burrowed state, if needed.
TL;DR summary
We are definitely opening the door to undiscovered country with the Duelist. Not only are they very small, they also bring with them the introduction of stealth. Their gameplay has a few interesting twists to it, bring a new combat mechanic (pips) and changes the siege mechanics by allowing them to shortcut defenses in a siege.
One thing I inevitably say about each new archetype is, “We made this archetype too awesome!” and in this case that is probably true (again).
We can’t wait to see the Duelist in action! As always, we’re excited to hear your thoughts and ideas!
Thomas Blair
Design Lead, ACE