Journey's End 1.4.4: Balance Feedback and Discussion Thread

[JohannSimm]

Also, this just occurred to me but it could be neat to have the True Excalibur crafted using the hardmode ore swords instead of Chlorophyte. Maybe also add in some of each mech soul if we still want it to be post-mech. It would help alleviate the Chlorophyte scarcity issue though, as well as be a nice nod to the 1.1 days when you had to combine the ore swords for regular Excalibur.

Could work, although it’d still have to include at least a handful of Chlorophyte to ensure that it’s still at the proper tier. But potentially it could be a very small amount, like 6 bars.

 

[VVV101]

We’ve actually touched on a lot of stuff you said here, so I’ll summarize some things here.

-Obsidian Armor is getting a nerf for sure, not only is it better than Bee but also better than other prehardmode sets. Absolutely too strong for post-Worm tier, and can last well into Hardmode. Only question is by how much.

-Imp Staff will be corrected to not effect the *player*’s piercing shots, but will probably still be able to disrupt one another.

-I think Optic may see a buff in the form of interrupting one another less by reducing the immunity frames they inflict, although we haven’t gotten much about that. Not sure

-Leinfors said he’d ask about a buff to Cool Whip. Of course, that doesn’t mean it will happen, it means it could

-Leinfors also said that at this state in game development, having whip bonuses on lategame armors probably won’t happen.

I didn't mean to exactly add whip-specific bonuses for all summoner armors. It was just *may*.
I meant that both Tiki/Spooky sets didn't provide anything really interesting/special comparing to melee/ranged/mage sets of the same tier.

 

[The2ndComing]

Well, I just undertook an absolute boatload of reading.

From what I can see, most things I would've discussed here have been answered, but I just wanted to say something. It's awesome that this thread is here because it shows the devs really care about our opinion and want to make the game as best as possible, so don't think it's bad that you're giving your suggestions.

However, some people here aren't too pleased about some decisions the devs may be making. I just want you to remember that they did an awesome balancing the game in 1.4 and 1.4.1, especially with Summoner which has been long overdue. So, before you might want to give a suggestion you think would make the game better, just remember that these guys have done the most amazing job on the game we never asked for, but we needed, especially during this these times. So, go to their Discord server, or put out a tweet, or even put a post here giving thanks to them, congratulating them for their journey, and giving your support to them, and then come back here where we can discuss on how to make this game awesome before its set in stone. We're all in this together, k?

I'll start: I love you Re-Logic and Leinfors, you guys have done an amazing job and are the most awesome devs anyone can ask for. Good luck on your future journies, and we'll always be there to support you.




Moving on, I have one suggestion. Plantera likes to throw a hissy fit when she can't see her background walls and speeds up a lot. Since Plantera arenas are usually absolute behemoths, I feel this becomes unfair for both new and veteran players if she just randomly starts speeding up and absolutely wrecks you. Is there any way to fix this? I would personally like if the Flower Walls that the Dryad sells count as background walls in the Jungle biome only and nowhere else as to not accidentally create a jungle biome whole decorating, but I feel as if that might be outside the scope of this thread.

 

[lorddamien]

Moving on, I have one suggestion. Plantera likes to throw a hissy fit when she can't see her background walls and speeds up a lot. Since Plantera arenas are usually absolute behemoths, I feel this becomes unfair for both new and veteran players if she just randomly starts speeding up and absolutely wrecks you. Is there any way to fix this? I would personally like if the Flower Walls that the Dryad sells count as background walls in the Jungle biome only and nowhere else as to not accidentally create a jungle biome whole decorating, but I feel as if that might be outside the scope of this thread.

Putting a bunch of mud block rows covered in jungle grass in your arena and then using actuators to put said blocks in the background will usually fix this problem. Just make sure the background never changes to caves no matter where you stand in your arena and you should be good.

 

[Leinfors]

What are people's thoughts about allowing Hellfire Treads to be used as an alternative for Lava Waders as a Terraspark Boots tinker?

The flame trail would NOT carry over to Terraspark Boots, and you would not be able to recoup the Flame Waker Boots out of the deal. But it would allow people to craft Hellfire Treads and then later upgrade to Terraspark Boots if they so desire.

I'm 100% sure people will later point out that "then the flames should carry over" and/or "but what about the Flame Waker Boots that were lost", but that would just have to be one of those inconsistencies that have to be overlooked for this change to be made.

This hasn't been approved/denied yet, I'm just floating the idea for feedback here . . . I know full well its the kind of change that might induce an "inconsistency itch" that will bother people more than the current issue, so I want to get a feel for it.

 

[whoneedsnamestbh]

What are people's thoughts about allowing Hellfire Treads to be used as an alternative for Lava Waders as a Terraspark Boots tinker?

The flame trail would NOT carry over to Terraspark Boots, and you would not be able to recoup the Flame Waker Boots out of the deal. But it would allow people to craft Hellfire Treads and then later upgrade to Terraspark Boots if they so desire.

I'm 100% sure people will later point out that "then the flames should carry over" and/or "but what about the Flame Waker Boots that were lost", but that would just have to be one of those inconsistencies that have to be overlooked for this change to be made.

This hasn't been approved/denied yet, I'm just floating the idea for feedback here . . . I know full well its the kind of change that might induce an "inconsistency itch" that will bother people more than the current issue, so I want to get a feel for it.

I think that’s the best solution to Hellfire Treads being completely redundant. This way, if you craft Hellfire Treads, you’re not locked out of Terraspark Boots, and since flame wakers are just vanity it’s not too bad if they don’t carry over.

 

[NeoPhantom]

Yeah, seems like the best alternative.

Besides, the Dunerider Boots > Terraspark Boots already give me the inconsistency itch due to their boost in sand not carrying over. Whats a purely visual effect in comparison.

(Ps- im not saying the effect should carry over, its fine as it is)

 

[J Bame]

What are people's thoughts about allowing Hellfire Treads to be used as an alternative for Lava Waders as a Terraspark Boots tinker?

The flame trail would NOT carry over to Terraspark Boots, and you would not be able to recoup the Flame Waker Boots out of the deal. But it would allow people to craft Hellfire Treads and then later upgrade to Terraspark Boots if they so desire.

I'm 100% sure people will later point out that "then the flames should carry over" and/or "but what about the Flame Waker Boots that were lost", but that would just have to be one of those inconsistencies that have to be overlooked for this change to be made.

This hasn't been approved/denied yet, I'm just floating the idea for feedback here . . . I know full well its the kind of change that might induce an "inconsistency itch" that will bother people more than the current issue, so I want to get a feel for it.

Doesn't sound very useful. I mean, Hellfire Treads are meant as a vanity alternative, right? So if someone wants Terraspark Boots they'll just use their Lava Waders on those, and they should already know what they are missing out on if they want Hellfire Treads for the vanity.

But I suppose having the option is better than not having the option, so yeah why not.

 

[Leinfors]

Doesn't sound very useful. I mean, Hellfire Treads are meant as a vanity alternative, right? So if someone wants Terraspark Boots they'll just use their Lava Waders on those, and they should already know what they are missing out on if they want Hellfire Treads for the vanity.

But I suppose having the option is better than not having the option, so yeah why not.

The argument being made is that "people are tricked into wasting their Lava Charm on Hellfire Treads, without knowing that Terraspark is an option", with some people so upset about this that they want the item to be removed entirely.

I would never agree to that. But if I could work out a consolation "way out" of that situation, then I'd like to do so if I can. And I think this is the only way I can do so (with other options being not-approvable, like making the flame trail do damage).

 

[Lythael]

Yea this seems fair to allow Hellfire Threads to be crafted into Terraspark in case someone doesnt realize that these are a thing and accidently wastes Lava Charm.

While we are on topic.
Will there be any changes to the Obsidian Rose problem? Its a bit too rare to get / farm and adding it as requirement for lava threads made them more annoyingly RNG based than before.

Perhaps ability to fish up Obsidian Rose from Obsidian / Hellfire crates would be a nice alternative to this issue?

 

[CellarDoor96]

The Hellfire Treads change sounds good to me, FW Boots are a vanity item so I don't think anyone will miss them too much. Though, on that note, it would also be helpful if the tooltip for the FW Boots specified that the flame trail was just vanity, since I remember being very confused about their function when I first found them.

Agreed about the Obsidian Rose being kind of rare too, although it should be noted that you can just use Imp Statues to farm them fairly easily. Sucks if you can't find any Imp Statues, though.

Speaking of Imps, this might be kind of random but would it be possible to have the Stardust Guardian (and maybe Chlorophyte Crystal?) target destructible projectiles as well? I don't think it would change game balance much if at all but it would be a great QoL improvement for underworld fishing trips.

 

[Leinfors]

I'm not really of the opinion that Obsidian Rose is altogether that rare. Imps are common pests that you will fight constantly in the Underworld.

 

[Lythael]

I'm not really of the opinion that Obsidian Rose is altogether that rare. Imps are common pests that you will fight constantly in the Underworld.

One would think they are not that rare but they are very inconsistent in spawning compared to how other hell monsters spawn. Idk how to explain this but for example its usually like this : per 10-20 lava bats / lava slimes 1 imp appears. Which can make farming the Rose which already has quite rare drop chance a bit problematic without the statue. One would argue that Chaos Elementals are common pests too cause they appear almost at same rate as Imps. Not saying its as bad as with farming RoD but still pretty darn rare.

Basically changes were made to make Lava Charm less rare to make Lava Warders "easier" to get but by adding Obsidian Rose into the mix one rarity problem was replaced with another.
I've seen some threads complaining about this aswell (on Steam forums mostly) so can't be just me who thinks the Lava Threads are a bit too RNG now with the inclusion of Obsidian Rose?

I won't lie alternative in obtaining Obsidian Rose like you can with Lava Charm via fishing would be nice.

EDIT: That's a lotta edits. Sorry i'm a bit sloppy today.

 

[CellarDoor96]

Imps are not rare but they're still not that common, and when the Rose is a 1/50 drop from them that makes it kind of bothersome to get. It's not a huge deal honestly but I think bumping the drop rate up to like 1/30 or so would go a long way.

 

[JohannSimm]

@Leinfors, what are your thoughts on the crafting recipes I proposed on the previous page that would allow you to craft Chlorophyte armor into Shroomite, Spectre, or Turtle armor? Or allowing you to convert Chlorophyte gear back into bars?

Also, what are your thoughts on giving Spider Minions local immunity, or removing critical hits from the Nimbus Rod to fix the held weapon crit chance issue (buffing its base damage to compensate)?

1. Give the Spider Staff minions local immunity. Currently, only Spider minions of the same type conflict with each other, but Spider minions of different types don’t interfere with each other’s attacks. Since the three spider types are different entities, it’s impossible to give them true static immunity. However, the current way the weapon works is extremely unintuitive, and punishes players based entirely on luck, as all but a tiny minority of players won’t realize why the weapon sometimes performs better than other times. This change also remove the need to tediously re-summon minions to get the optimal distribution. The staff is already 50% of the way to local immunity just because of how the weapon is implemented. It should just be given local immunity, so that this weird, unintuitive quirk is done away with. If it needs a slight damage nerf of one or two points afterwards, it’s a worthy price.

2. I have a proposed fix to the weird critical hit issue with the Nimbus Rod, where you can boost the cloud’s critical hit chance by switching to a different weapon. Since it’s hardcoded into the engine that critical hit chance is based on the weapon you are holding, the root issue cannot be resolved easily. But since this issue disproportionally impacts the Nimbus Rod, I suggest that it be treated the same way as summons, and lose its ability to deal critical hits. To compensate, its damage should be buffed by 20-30% – that way, instead of dealing 100% more damage X% of the time, its dealing X% more damage 100% of the time. This is much more simple and intuitive, and improves the weapon for the majority of players who are unaware on this strange quirk of the system – and therefore will never be able to capitalize on its max potential DPS.

I'd also like to hear your opinion on my current proposal for alternate crafting recipes for two of the new vanity sets, now that I've revised them to be pre-Hardmode only:

I see. What if the Timeless Traveler set used Tattered Cloth (Goblin Scout drop) instead of Rotten Chunks, and the Plaguebringer set were switched to Rotten Chunks? Alternatively, the Plaguebringer set could be crafted with either Vile or Vicious Power, making it more readily accessible on both Crimson and Corruption worlds.

Tattered Cloth is the main material used to craft the Goblin Battle Standard, and this would give it an additional use beyond that. You'd be able to use excess Tattered Cloth to make the set. Meanwhile, the two powders are readily available pre-Hardmode.

This would actually increase the availability of the two sets, as you'd no longer have to grow an artificial biome pre-Hardmode to obtain the other one.

I'd also like to know what you think about switching some of the sound effects used by summon staffs to better suit their theme, particularly the newer ones.

Also, if there's any hope at all for the Flameburst sentries to receive a buff, I'd like to know whether that exists, or whether it's just not in the cards.

 

[J Bame]

removing critical hits from the Nimbus Rod to fix the held weapon crit chance issue (buffing its base damage to compensate)

Not Leinfors but, is this really a problem? Only Sky Fracture can really abuse this, if anything it can just stay as a hidden perk of it.

 

[Leinfors]

1. I'm neutral on the first one, I'm concerned uncrafting it would set a "precedent" which would only lead to more people wanting reverse-craftability (which isn't something that's ever going to happen game-wide), so it would really come down to Red's approval and time-frame.

2. Changing Spider Staff to local means I'm going to have to nerf it. I don't really want to have to nerf it.

3. I don't think Nimbus Rod needs ANY kind of buff, its really strong already, so fixing the exploit and then counter-buffing it is kinda backwards. And strategically removing critical chance from a Magic weapon is just going to raise more "its inconsistent" concerns, so I'm not really in favor. (And no, that isn't an opportunity to segue into the age old "It should be a Summon weapon" debate, as that isn't going to get approved).

EDIT: I'm not even seeing a clean way to do Chlorophyte -> Shroomite Armor crafting anyway. It would be a really ugly and inconsistent crafting recipe, like hundreds of mushrooms + armor piece.

 

[JohannSimm]

Not Leinfors but, is this really a problem? Only Sky Fracture can really abuse this, if anything it can just stay as a hidden perk of it.

3. I don't think Nimbus Rod needs ANY kind of buff, its really strong already, so fixing the exploit and then counter-buffing it is kinda backwards. And strategically removing critical chance from a Magic weapon is just going to raise more "its inconsistent" concerns, so I'm not really in favor.

My problem with it is that it's unintuitive and hidden information, which means that many people will never realize its maximum critical strike potential. It leaves the item disproportionately powerful in the hands of those in-the-know, while leaving it relatively underperforming in the hands of those who may never find out. Ideally, it would be balanced in the middle of that, with its max potential available to all.

The problem is that it's effectively a summon that deals magic damage, but it's not treated as a summon in regards to critical hits. This leads to a balancing problem – its maximum power is always as great as its performance with these exploits, but as long as the exploit exists, the item can never be properly balanced. Any attempt to balance it around its default performance results in it being overpowered with the exploit, and any attempt to balance it around the exploit leads to its default performance being underpowered.

2. Changing Spider Staff to local means I'm going to have to nerf it. I don't really want to have to nerf it.

I get that, but unfortunately right now it has the same issue as the Nimbus Rod, which is that this quirk of functionality is hidden information. Only those in-the-know will realize that re-summoning until you have an even split is the optimum strategy; meanwhile most players will be at the mercy of RNG. Most players won't understand why the item is suddenly dealing less damage when they have a bunch of one spider type. So there ends up being a performance inconsistency with most players.

An alternative resolution to the issue would be to ensure that duplicate spiders aren't summoned until the spider ratio is even. So you'll never end up with an imbalance of spiders, as no spider type can exceed the others. (For example, first summon summons a random spider, the second summons one of the remaining two types, and the third type summons the third. For the next three spiders the same thing repeats, as you now have an even split.)

1. I'm neutral on the first one, I'm concerned it would set a "precedent" which would only lead to more people wanting reverse-craftability (which isn't something that's ever going to happen game-wide), so it would really come down to Red's approval and time-frame.

The reverse-crafting thing is weird, and a long-shot. I'm more interested in hearing what you think about being able to upgrade Chlorophyte armor, as that would give players more reason to craft it than they do currently.

 

[NeoPhantom]

1. I'm neutral on the first one, I'm concerned uncrafting it would set a "precedent" which would only lead to more people wanting reverse-craftability (which isn't something that's ever going to happen game-wide), so it would really come down to Red's approval and time-frame.

2. Changing Spider Staff to local means I'm going to have to nerf it. I don't really want to have to nerf it.

3. I don't think Nimbus Rod needs ANY kind of buff, its really strong already, so fixing the exploit and then counter-buffing it is kinda backwards. And strategically removing critical chance from a Magic weapon is just going to raise more "its inconsistent" concerns, so I'm not really in favor. (And no, that isn't an opportunity to segue into the age old "It should be a Summon weapon" debate, as that isn't going to get approved).

EDIT: I'm not even seeing a clean way to do Chlorophyte -> Shroomite Armor crafting anyway. It would be a really ugly and inconsistent crafting recipe, like hundreds of mushrooms + armor piece.

Yeah, imagining it as a sentry weapon and comparing it to the other sentry weapons, you can see how being able to summon up to five of those clouds could be overpowered compared to the tier in which you obtain it. It would certainly have the consistency of the lightning aura which is definitely a problem.

Also, changing a weapon type would be a big change which is very unlikely to happen at this point. (That would be what mods would be for)

 

[Leinfors]

My problem with it is that it's unintuitive and hidden information, which means that many people will never realize its maximum critical strike potential. It leaves the item disproportionately powerful in the hands of those in-the-know, while leaving it relatively underperforming in the hands of those who may never find out.

Its basically an exploit. That's kinda how exploits tend to be. Except its an ugly one that applies to a lot of weapons in the game, and as you say, isn't one that can be fixed. And I don't think making sledgehammer fixes to just Nimbus Rod is needed to avoid it.

I get that, but unfortunately right now it has the same issue as the Nimbus Rod, which is that this quirk of functionality is hidden information. Only those in-the-know will realize that re-summoning until you have an even split is the optimum strategy; meanwhile most players will be at the mercy of RNG. Most players won't understand why the item is suddenly dealing less damage when they have a bunch of one spider type. So there ends up being a performance inconsistency with most players.

An alternative resolution to the issue would be to ensure that duplicate spiders aren't summoned until the spider ratio is even. So you'll never end up with an imbalance of spiders, as no spider type can exceed the others. (For example, first summon summons a random spider, the second summons one of the remaining two types, and the third type summons the third. For the next three, the same thing repeats.)

I'll have to talk to Yorai about a summon order thing, it might be possible to give it an order, but I'm telling you . . . almost every solution to this issue is probably going to take the form of a nerf. And I'd rather do nothing and leave the exploit in than end up nerfing Spiders to fix it. I'm certainly not going to buff it up to the level of the exploit to remove the exploit. In the end, what's more important . . . decent spiders but a lingering exploit of limited potency, or "no exploits" but worse spiders?

EDIT:
Spoke to Yorai. It should be do-able to have the game try to summon them in strategic order. Still needs to be approved.

The reverse-crafting thing is weird, and a long-shot. I'm more interested in hearing what you think about being able to upgrade Chlorophyte armor, as that would give players more reason to craft it than they do currently.

I mean, we could do it. But Shroomite is a sticking point, IMO. If it can't be done cleanly with Shroomite, then its not going to be done on any of them.