Howdy, everyone, Blair here!
We have already shown you some of the bits and pieces of the Myrmidon animations and art over the last few weeks during the Crowfall livestreams. Today, I am going to reveal his power kit in detail!
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 that 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 the interface.
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. Like the Druid, the Myrmidon is another archetype that benefits from previous archetypes; we didn’t have to build that much new tech for him.
Myrmidon musings!
As I said in the Meet the Myrmidon update, we felt the Myrmidon was a good fit for the canonical berserker-style character (the phrase “bull in a china shop” leaps to mind…!)
He is the kind of warrior that wades into melee, rampages around, destroys everything and, when the dust settles, looks down and notices that his guts are spilled out over the battlefield. Going berserk should be powerful, but risky… step too close to the fire and you just might fall over dead from your injuries.
With this vision statement we also had to incorporate his base role of tank, which means a plethora of crowd control in his powers. Since we have been building modular pieces for the powers system for over a year now, we have finally reached the point where our tool kit is pretty robust. We have a lot of flexibility when it comes to how we want to design and build new powers. (If you’ll recall, this was the plan all along. And as Hannibal from the A-Team says, “I love it when a plan comes together.”)
We only needed two new features to support the Myrmidon: “proc accumulators” (which is the basis for the Berserk power) and some minor variants on movement-charge and chain-pull style attacks. As a nice side effect, the “proc accumulator” work unlocked some of the functionality of the food & hunger system, which is why we were able to pull that work forward on the schedule.
The nice thing about getting so much tech reuse is that we were about to spend some time working on improving our root motion functionality. This is something that we’ve been needing to address for a while so that characters can perform a lunge without sliding past the target. This is a component that we wanted to add back in December, but too many things on the combat fix list were deemed to be higher in priority. Now that we’ve added it for the Minotaur, we need to go back and mirror those changes to the Knight, Legionnaire, Ranger and the Champion, as well. These fixes that we’ve added into the Myrmidon’s powers really give him a great feel that we wouldn’t have gotten using our previous methodology.
Enough musings, onto the Myrmidon!
Myrmidon power resource
The Myrmidon uses a new resource type called Fury. This resource type regenerates very quickly and the Myrmidon has a very small pool to fill. This gives his resource pool a very “bouncy” feel, and that feeling is reinforced by all of his attacks, including his left-click basic attack, having a Fury cost.
Since the Myrmidon doesn’t use a traditional build-to-spend mechanic, it is possible to run out of resource and have to wait a few seconds. With a bit of skill, however, this scenario can be easily be avoided.
iFrame powers
I’m going to reiterate the definition of iFrame powers again in case anyone forgot or missed it from previous updates:
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.
Raging Bull is the Myrmidon’s iFrame power. When this power is activated, the Myrmidon rapidly charges multiple times in a small area and knocks down any (and all) enemies. While he is executing this power he is also (briefly) invulnerable to damage.
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 Myrmidon’s retaliate power is a leap to his feet and deals damage to nearby enemies.
The Myrmidon’s primary passive power is Taste for Blood, which has a high chance to proc a 20-second buff any time the Myrmidon hits a bleeding target. This buff grants the Myrmidon a 75% damage bonus to his left-click basic attack whenever he damages a bleeding target.
Sprint is technically a passive ability, but we don’t display it on the power bar. Depressing 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 powers for the Myrmidon are fast, deal damage and advance him forward as he is attacking. The third basic attack also applies a Moderate Bleed effect which, like all Moderate Bleeds, can stack up to three times. Unlike other archetypes, the Myrmidon must spend resources (Fury) to use his left-click attack. This means the Myrmidon must pay careful attention to his Fury pool.
His right-click power is a short (10m) Leap similar to the Champion’s right-click. The Myrmidon Leap also deals damage in a small radius when he lands.
SIDE NOTE: We recently went through 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 powers bar in detail.
The first power in the powers tray is Bull Rush, this power charges the Myrmidon forward 23m as the input key is depressed. It is very similar to the Knight power Pursuit. The Myrmidon version uses slightly different tech, however, which we call a sticky charge. Any enemy player the Myrmidon touches as he is charging forward is stuck to the Myrmidon (like glue) and gets dragged along with him. If the Myrmidon charges more than 66% of the power, enemies who are being dragged get violently knocked into the air at the end of the charge. The effect looks like he is scooping up enemies on his horns and tossing them like rag dolls at the end of his charge. It looks spectacular!
The next power is Pulverize. This is a charged power; the longer the Myrmidon charges the power up, the more damage it will deal. It also plays a key role with the Berserk Crash mechanic; while he is charging this power, he is considered berserk crash immune. This will prevent him from taking any of the crash damage he was dealt when his Berserk power wears off. The timing aspect can be tricky, and it sounds easy -- “Just start doing this 2 seconds before you crash!” However, in practice, it can be difficult to accurately time during the adrenaline rush of PvP combat, and that means you can be much more (or less) effective at playing the Myrmidon, depending on your level of skill.
The first combo series in the power tray is the Bloodied Swipe series. Bloodied swipe is a damage power that chains into either Gore or Colossus Smash. Gore deals damage and applies the “Hunter Hunted” buff to the Myrmidon, adding Fury into his Fury pool every two seconds for 20 seconds. This buff is integral to maintaining Fury generating in combat when the Myrmidon isn’t Berserking. Colossus Smash deals damage and applies a Stun effect to three enemies.
Arcing Slash is the next power in the tray. It deals damage and is the set up power to Whirlwind. Whirlwind is a channeled power; while it is active the Myrmidon spins and hacks wildly with both of his axes, dealing AoE damage every second and applying a moderate Bleed effect to all targets hit, every second they are hit. In a manner similar to the Champion’s Whirling Pain power, only spinning much faster, the Myrmidon can move while he is spinning.
Next up we have our first real root-style power in the game with Cast Net. It fits very well with the Tank roles in Crowfall that are generally themed around crowd control. The Myrmidon can root a single enemy up to 30 meters away from him for a few seconds via throwing a net at them. (Note that this is a raycast, not a projectile.) The Myrmidon has two potential combos for this power: he can either Net Pull, which instantly pulls the rooted target to the Myrmidon’s feet, or he can Charge and the Myrmidon instantly slams forward into the target. If the Myrmidon missed with Cast Net, the combo portion of the power will do nothing.
The final power in the tray is really the core of his gameplay: it is aptly named Berserk. When this power is activated, all damage that is taken is healed back over a series of one second ticks, and a portion of that damage is converted into the damage bonus stat. (Roughly 75,000 damage taken would convert into 100% damage bonus for the duration of the Berserk buff.) The Fury regeneration rate is also doubled when Berserk is active. (By the way, our FX artists made a really awesome shader effect for the Myrmidon’s head and upper torso while this is active. His eyes are made of nightmare fuel! I really can’t wait for you to see it!)
The downside to Berserk is that when the power ends, the Myrmidon will be hit with the Berserker Crash. When the crash happens, the Myrmidon will instantly take all the damage that was dealt while in Berserker mode! (So, continuing the example from above: If the Myrmidon took 75,000 total damage while Berserk, he would crash for 75,000 in one tick and instantly die.)
That said, the crash can be avoided if you play it right. There are currently three methods to mitigate or eliminate the crash damage:
- Charge the Pulverize power when the damage is dealt. The Pulverize method completely reduces the crash damage to 0, or
- Be using the C power, Raging Bull, that renders the Myrmidon damage immune and also covers crash damage, and, finally
- Hit a bleeding target with any attack within three seconds of the crash mitigates 50% of the crash damage.
You will know you have done this as we have a special widget which appears on the Myrmidon Berserk UI meter, which can be seen below.
This is your rage meter. Yes, it’s a pulsing heart. Props to Billy, this element not only looks cool, but it does a great job of conveying how much damage has been taken and how far away from the crash you are.
In both of the cases above, timing is critical. (And, as a reminder, I’m pretty sure both of these powers will be tweaked after we see the Myrmidon in action. It may take us a few iterations to get the timing just right!)
Enemies will definitely try to knockdown or stun the Myrmidon when they are about to crash, thus stopping the Myrmidon from using a power to prevent the crash damage. The crafty Myrmidon player will have saved their Raging Bull as an emergency backup method to prevent the crash damage. Raging Bull is on a very long cooldown so it will be difficult to bank on it.
TL;DR Summary
The Myrmidon is definitely going to bring a fun new archetype to the field of battle! His crowd control tricks, bleeds and unique method of dealing and avoiding damage is going to take some getting used to, even for seasoned players. Those who can’t figure it out will be sad pandas and should pick a different class.
One thing I like to say about each new archetype is, “We made this archetype too awesome!” We can’t wait to see the Myrmidon in action when he comes online next month!
As always, excited to hear your thoughts and ideas,
Thomas Blair
Design Lead, ACE
Bonus: Crowfall Live! Encore - Building Myrmidon powers
In this encore video from the Crowfall Live! event in July, Blair gives a walkthru of the process involved in creating a power for an archetype.