Weapons & Equip Ankh Shield: Easy to get, better to upgrade

652Graystripe

Plantera
First and foremost, I'd like to thank the (untaggable due to name symbols) author of this suggestion on the Pocket Mirror, because that suggestion (as well as the age-old complaints about the Ankh Shield's lack of protection) directly inspired me to do this.

The Ankh Shield, as well as the Charm required to craft it, is an annoying accessory to obtain because of its many varying components, each of which is only obtainable from certain enemies, and even then only rarely.

I recommend that it be possible to create without needing all of the ingredients, and it can be upgraded later.

There are currently 9 accessories that go into the Ankh Charm: the Vitamins, Armor Polish, Adhesive Bandage, Bezoar, Nazar, Megaphone, Trifold Map, Fast Clock, and Blindfold.
Vitamins.png
Armor_Polish.png
Adhesive_Bandage.png
Bezoar.png
Nazar.png
Megaphone.png
Trifold_Map.png
Fast_Clock.png
Blindfold.png

Now, for starters, let's add two more in: the
Hand_Warmer.png
Hand Warmer (protects against Chilled/Frozen) and the
Pocket_Mirror.png
Pocket Mirror (protects against Stoned). But those are so rare, you say! Well, that's okay.

Now, you can combine any two (or more) of these eleven, OR one of the double accessories (Armor Bracing, etc.) with another component, to produce an Ankh Charm, which can then be used as normal to make the Ankh Shield. Added to both those items' tooltips is a short note: "Can be upgraded with certain accessories."

What that means is you can add any other component accessories to either the Charm or Shield, and it'll automatically add that debuff immunity in. If you made a charm with the Vitamins and Armor Polish, you can later add the Adhesive Bandage to it to get that immunity too.

Though they don't change in appearance, the Charm/Shield will change in name (modifiers remain - thanks for reminding me, @Banmei ) as more accessories are added. With three or fewer components, they're classified as a Lesser Ankh Charm/Shield; with 4-7, just a standard Ankh Charm/Shield; with 8-10, Greater Ankh Charm/Shield; and with all 11, Ur-Ankh Charm/Shield. You've truly collected them all!

Now, there are a few lasting discrepancies in the crafting tree which I should remedy:

Hand_Warmer.png

Hand Warmer
-Dropped by Ice Slime, Spiked Ice Slime, Ice Bat, Ice Golem, and Icy Merman (1%/2%), making it obtainable outside of the festive season.

Blindfold.png

Blindfold
-Protects against Blackout as well as Darkness. Also dropped by Demon and Ragged Caster (1%/2%).
Yes, I know, I have no respect for the Torch God.

Vitamins.png

Vitamins
-Also dropped by Herplings, which can now inflict Weak. This makes it significantly easier to obtain on a Crimson world.

Obsidian_Skull.png

Obsidian Skull
-Protects against On Fire!, as do all of its upgrades. Fire is not something you should have to pay attention to as you enter Hardmode.

As always, constructive criticism is appreciated. This is a big change, and I may have made some mistakes that I shouldn't have.
 
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while this seems nice in theory wouldn't this require adding an insane number of items? There's 11 different ingredients giving 11nCr2 + 11nCr3 + ... = 55 +165 + 330 + 462+ 462 + 330 +165 +55 + 11 + 1 = 2,036 different combinations. I'm not sure how Terraria handles items but if each combination needs its own item then this is clearly infeasible. Judging by the fact that there are very limited alternate upgrade paths I'm guessing this isn't going to work (but I'm not a developer so I don't really know)

I think an easier solution is just making each component easier to find on its own. Maybe just give them to the traveling merchant after a criteria has been met.

To solve the usability issues maybe they could just function from your inventory since they're so minor. like informational accessories do. It's not like that's unbalanced considering the Ankh Shield already exists. I realize you could just hold all the accessories at once and save an accessory slot but if you want to eat up 6-7 inventory slots for a minor buff go ahead. Knock-back resist is the best one anyway and that's tied to the shield.
 
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while this seems nice in theory wouldn't this require adding an insane number of items? There's 11 different ingredients giving 11nCr2 + 11nCr3 + ... = 55 +165 + 330 + 462+ 462 + 330 +165 +55 + 11 + 1 = 2,036 different combinations. I'm not sure how Terraria handles items but if each combination needs its own item then this is clearly infeasible. Judging by the fact that there are very limited alternate upgrade paths I'm guessing this isn't going to work (but I'm not a developer so I don't really know)

I think an easier solution is just making each component easier to find on its own. Maybe just give them to the traveling merchant after a criteria has been met.

To solve the usability issues maybe they could just function from your inventory since they're so minor. like informational accessories do. It's not like that's unbalanced considering the Ankh Shield already exists. I realize you could just hold all the accessories at once and save an accessory slot but if you want to eat up 6-7 inventory slots for a minor buff go ahead. Knock-back resist is the best one anyway and that's tied to the shield.
I did wonder quite a bit about implementation. Adding individual items is of course not gonna work, and for any other idea I don't know if Terraria's engine supports it. My immediate thought would be assigning values to the Ankh Shield on a world/player basis, similarly to how any chests in the world have their values set, or how a player's piggy bank is set. This gets gnarly with world-specific Ankh Shields, but it's a possible solution. Not pretty.

I do like the idea of having these accessories function from your inventory, since they're so small on their own. That makes a lot of sense.
 
I don't know if TModloader supports this but inheritance through classes could make this work.

One thought though, is a new item created every time? I ask this because then wouldn't you have to reforge it every time? Might want to add inheriting the modifier too if you implement this.
 
I don't know if TModloader supports this but inheritance through classes could make this work.

One thought though, is a new item created every time? I ask this because then wouldn't you have to reforge it every time? Might want to add inheriting the modifier too if you implement this.
Fixed, thanks. Inheritance seems like a good idea, just hoping that it's feasible.
 
Hmm I like the idea of the charm components working from your inventory but the recipe combination here kinda worries me as others have said with the sheer amount of side grades/equivalents or a new inheritance system it just doesn't seem feasible to me. Given that most of these aren't hard to get as long as you aren't playing on normal mode it seems unnecessary.

It is worth noting that there is actually a way to get on fire immunity in the game now using obsidian skin potions cures on fire debuff and prevents you from getting inflicted with it again in the same manner as debuff immunity accessories. It is important to consider that a few of the enemies which drop components are now found as statue Mobs namely Hornets( Bezoar ), Wraiths(Fast Clock) and if added Medusa(Pocket Mirror) Adding more enemies with this property could greatly bypass the issues.
For example if the Corrupt Statue is changed to spawn Corruptors rather than Eaters of Souls (Making a Floaty Gross counterpart Statue easy to do rather than Choosing one of Crimson's 3 prehardmode monsters for statues)) it would make Vitamins available via statues. Likewise if the Sword, Axe and Hammer Statues were changed to summon Enchanted Swords, Crimson Axes and Cursed Hammers respectively the Nazar could also be farmed (with the sword statue offering the nice benefit of making it less torturous to acquire the Blade Staff) Adding a statue for an enemy that triggers Bleeding, Confusion, Broken Armor and Silence respectively and the added Handwarmer you suggested.
 
Each combination would require its own item, and each item needs a unique internal name and sprite.

Also, about the Soul Stone in that mod. It progressed because bosses were defeated. It uses an if then which allows it to scale by checking the bosses defeated
 
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