Dapling
Duke Fishron
Each bullet gets separate iframes instead of using the global ones. This would let fast guns and shotguns actually be able to use them.
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Journey's End 1.4.4: Balance Feedback and Discussion Thread
- Thread starter Leinfors
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Ok, sounds fine to me
Yes yes yes yes yes we NEED that
Official Terrarian
Projectiles have a setting called usesLocalNPCImmunity that enables independent invincibility frames for each projectile. They also have a setting localNPCHitCooldown that is per-projectile that determines how long before each projectile of that type can hit the same enemy an additional time.
I made a plugin for Terraria Tweaker 2 that enables usesLocalNPCImmunity for all projectiles that aren't already using it, and set a localNPCHitCooldown cooldown of 10. Projectiles that have enabled usesLocalNPCImmunity but not assigned a localNPCHitCooldown might not function correctly and also won't be fixed by this plugin.
You can test this plugin to see what a fixed meteor shot might be like.
From a balance perspective, not using LocalNPCImmunity allows projectile damage to completely block players from dealing damage to an NPC for a short duration. Is there actually a situation where that is desirable? The game is designed around the player having iframes (Cross Necklace, etc), but I think the only reason for iframes for NPCs is to manage damage from penetrating projectiles. Isn't it correct that players get iframes when taking non-penetrating damage but NPCs do not?
J Bame
Terrarian
The localImmunity matters with weapons that can stack up a lot of piercing projectiles on top of one enemy. So stuff like Cluster Rockets, Electrosphere Launcher and especially Bees and Wasps would get a massive buff from localImmunity.
A little backstory:
Originally, the way the code was written in the early days of Terraria, the addition of piercing frames was the "only" workaround to allow piercing weapons to not just hit an enemy 5-6 times as the piercing bullet went through the target. I'm not going to say there was no solution, but Terraria is a big game and there are a lot of mechanics and things to work on, and since this "worked", making a better solution just sort of fell to the wayside.
Eventually, the LocalNPCImmunity system was created, but its original implementation had an UGLY impact on performance. As a result, it was only used exceedingly sparingly, because adding it willy nilly to every projectile that used it had a serious FPS impact.
By the time of 1.4, we've finally optimized that system to no longer be an issue. So one might ask, why not just make every piercing weapon use Local frames now?
Well, the answer is that for a lot of weapons, balance was built AROUND this limitation. Take Stormbow/Holy Arrows for instance . . . that thing was a massive beast, and even it was impacted negatively by piercing frames. If we just added Local immunity to the Holy Stars, it would have served to make it even more powerful than it was, which is not desirable. In essence, there are weapons with non-local piercing frames which are completely viable in their current form, or maybe even a little too good, and the universal implementation of piercing immunity would serve to upset that balance. Example include certain items which are already incredibly powerful for their purposes, such as Nimbus Rod (which doesn't need any sort of buff whatsoever, if not a nerf).
WITH THAT SAID! This doesn't mean that individually assessing items for addition to the local immunity system is out of the question. And people who have been tracking 1.4's balance changes may have noticed that there are several items (mostly Summon minions, but a few others, like Venom/Poison Staff) that were added to local immunity as part of a rebalancing project I worked on there. There are also a handful of 1.4.1 items also being added to use this system. But its something that takes time and attention and testing, and is only ever done on an individual basis to ensure I'm satisfied with the result as being an improvement over the current balance. As Bame mentioned, if I were to add local immunity to Bees . . . well, I'd have to fundamentally balance re-assess every single Bee-based item in the game, and likely rebalance them all. Which is not so easy as simply changing a setting for their projectile.
However, as I've said, balance changes are currently closed. I managed to sneak in a tiny handful of extra changes based on last minute feedback (some from this thread!), but we are focusing on bug fixes now and won't be implementing anymore. I'm also considering closing this thread for the time being, as I think its gotten rather derailed from most topic-appropriate discussion, but I'm still on the fence. I don't really want to squelch interesting discussion, but I also don't want to give the impression that there is much hope for making further changes, especially to the things recently being discussed (the addition of full new systems or content, particularly relating to things like world purification or brand new multi-class armors).
Official Terrarian
Wait a sec though. Those projectiles don't actually need global immunity. Weapons that are balanced around global immunity only need to block damage from projectiles of the same type. If enemies were switched from having one global immunity slot to several immunity slots for different projectile types, Bees would not always block damage from other sources that don't use Local Immunity. The number of immunity slots determines the number of projectile types without Local Immunity the player is allowed to use at a time, and that number is currently 1.
J Bame
Terrarian
The issue isn't that Bees would allow other projectiles to hit, the issue is that every single bee would be able to deal damage to the same instead of lingering on the target for a while, which would massively increase their DPS.
Right now having, say, 100 bees on one target isn't all that different from having 10 due to the shared iframes, but with LocalImmunity their DPS would scale massively.
Official Terrarian
What I am proposing is substituting Projectile Type Immunity in place of Global Immunity.(for NPCs) All bees would share an immunity that would be independent from Cluster Rockets, Electrosphere Launcher, etc. Bees would still block damage from other bees.
Global Immunity: Any damage blocks all other damage.
Projectile Type Immunity: Damage from a projectile blocks damage from other projectiles of the same type.
Local Immunity: Damage from a projectile blocks damage from that same projectile.
I think replacing Global Immunity for Projectile Type Immunity would allow multiple weapon types to work together without breaking balance.
AquaNathan
Terrarian
Hmm I wonder. Since Golem won't be getting buffed will cultist have the same treatment because that "boss" is even easier than golem imo due to how weak he is in every aspect
whoneedsnamestbh
Retinazer
It would make sense for Cultist to be stronger, having him act as a bit more of a wall before the Pillars and encouraging the players to gear up more, giving all the optional content between Golem and the Cultist more relevancy. Though I think it’s probably too late by now.
AquaNathan
Terrarian
Ye you're probably right. It's probably too late now like you said. Cultist has always been kind of a joke (maybe even bigger than Golem) and will probably stay like that.
Void-Prime
Terrarian
i think the Blade Staff needs to be moved to Hallowed Mimic drops, currently early hardmode for summoner is either, fighting the super hard dreadnatilus and hope to get a sanguine staff, or, killing 500 for a blade staff, so if it got moved to hallowed mimic drops it would be easier for summoners to have a better start in hardmode
Dapling
Duke Fishron
wouldn't that make the hallowed mimic's drop pool assymetric from the other biome mimics though?
J Bame
Terrarian
It already is since Hallowed mimics don't drop an accessory. If anything, it'd make it more symmetric as then they'd all have the same amount of drops.
Terrablade101
Terrarian
Welp, as much as I like the way this sounds, if the devs didn’t add it in to 1.4.1 by now, it’s not happening, it’s too late.
whoneedsnamestbh
Retinazer
If 1.4.1 is in the bugfix phase, I may throw in one last suggestion that could be considered both bugfixing and balance: minion AI.
Minions are notoriously stupid, we all know that. I’m no programmer, so if I say something stupid or outlandish, ignore me, but I have a few ideas that could help fix minion AI that may or may not work based off my run as a summoner.
-Projectile minions should continue to fire at the enemy as they keep up with rhe player. A huge killing point for projectile minions is that the second the player gets too fast, the minions instantly disengage to follow the player. This isn’t as much of a problem with melee minions who tend to stick to the boss, but it’s a huge hit for ranged minions. By making minions continue to shoot while catching up with the player, it could potentially help fix this huge weakness in ranged minions.
-Disengaged minions should pass through blocks to reach the player. They do this if you get too far away, but too far away is usually 20-30 seconds of time in tight spaces. Otherwise they just get stuck. Minions like Deadly Spheres and Spazmamini are especially guilty of this. If the minion does not have a target, it should move through blocks until it reachrs the player.
-Minions should use the player’s position to determine aggro rather than their own. I noticed that minions that had a set position near the player would not engage if the player had their back to a wall (Terraprisma) or their head to a cieling (Blades), etc. I imagine that this is the issue, and by changing this, not only would minions fail to attack sometimes but they would also be slightly more consistent. If I’m wrong, ignore this statement.
-While minions were given their own hit frames and knockback stats, these weren’t carried over to projectiles fired by minions. I assume this is unintentional and was an oversight. It appears that Hornets and Imps and other minions have no knockback on their projectiles despite having advertised knockback stats. Imps and Retinamini also seem to be able to steal hit frames from each other.
-Whips getting shorter with speed modifiers. I know this is a known issue but it fit here so...
-Not as much of a bugfix, but a glaring inconvenience that would probably take all of five seconds to fix. Sentries should last much longer before vanishing. I’d say 10-15 minutes. Currently, outside of Old One’s Army for some reason, I noticed that sentries disappear after a very short period, meaning they vanish mid boss and are practically garbage at the two things they should shine at: invasions and farming.
Again, I’m not a programmer, and I was basing these off of my own observations after running a few summoner runs and trying certain staffs out against Queen Slime and Plantera. If I’m wrong about how something works, ignore my statements, but I figured I could try to help address some issues in a relevant thread before it gets closed.
Minions are notoriously stupid, we all know that. I’m no programmer, so if I say something stupid or outlandish, ignore me, but I have a few ideas that could help fix minion AI that may or may not work based off my run as a summoner.
-Projectile minions should continue to fire at the enemy as they keep up with rhe player. A huge killing point for projectile minions is that the second the player gets too fast, the minions instantly disengage to follow the player. This isn’t as much of a problem with melee minions who tend to stick to the boss, but it’s a huge hit for ranged minions. By making minions continue to shoot while catching up with the player, it could potentially help fix this huge weakness in ranged minions.
-Disengaged minions should pass through blocks to reach the player. They do this if you get too far away, but too far away is usually 20-30 seconds of time in tight spaces. Otherwise they just get stuck. Minions like Deadly Spheres and Spazmamini are especially guilty of this. If the minion does not have a target, it should move through blocks until it reachrs the player.
-Minions should use the player’s position to determine aggro rather than their own. I noticed that minions that had a set position near the player would not engage if the player had their back to a wall (Terraprisma) or their head to a cieling (Blades), etc. I imagine that this is the issue, and by changing this, not only would minions fail to attack sometimes but they would also be slightly more consistent. If I’m wrong, ignore this statement.
-While minions were given their own hit frames and knockback stats, these weren’t carried over to projectiles fired by minions. I assume this is unintentional and was an oversight. It appears that Hornets and Imps and other minions have no knockback on their projectiles despite having advertised knockback stats. Imps and Retinamini also seem to be able to steal hit frames from each other.
-Whips getting shorter with speed modifiers. I know this is a known issue but it fit here so...
-Not as much of a bugfix, but a glaring inconvenience that would probably take all of five seconds to fix. Sentries should last much longer before vanishing. I’d say 10-15 minutes. Currently, outside of Old One’s Army for some reason, I noticed that sentries disappear after a very short period, meaning they vanish mid boss and are practically garbage at the two things they should shine at: invasions and farming.
Again, I’m not a programmer, and I was basing these off of my own observations after running a few summoner runs and trying certain staffs out against Queen Slime and Plantera. If I’m wrong about how something works, ignore my statements, but I figured I could try to help address some issues in a relevant thread before it gets closed.
qwerty3.14
Terrarian
With the exception of the deadly sphere and desert tiger, all the minions with 'bad ai' were added before 1.3, these minions feel more dated if anything. This is why all the top tier minions were added in 1.3+ (and I'm counting the spider since it gained the ability to latch onto enemies in 1.3).
I've never had issue with Terrapirsma's AI it may need LoS to start attacking things but once it does it completely disregards tiles until everything is dead.
I haven't used the blade staff yet because, I can't be bothered to grind for super rare items. What I do know is that the spider minion is extremly good at dealing with caves dungeons, and other tight spaces so even if the blade staff can't do caaves you got a super easy to obtain minion that can replace it for that job.
This is a bit more of a minor incovienience for me, I think the reason sentries are like this is because unlike minions there's no debuff to desummon them, there should be a proper way to de summon your sentries.
Also while we're at it I just want to mention how imbalanced the sentries are, you got the queen spider which is strong, maybye even a little too strong, you got the frost hydra which is quite weak since it is too innacurate for bosses, and the lack of piercing makes it underwhelming for crowd control, and even if you get all its shots hitting it barely out dps's the far more accurate queen spider, then you got the moonlord sentires which are better than the queen spider but quite underwhelming compared to the other moonlord weapons.
Then you got the DD2 sentries, the ballista and lighting aura are fine sentries, but the flameburst is a bit weak and the explosive trap is complete trash, also I'm a bit bothered by the fact that the queen spider is better than the t2 dd2 sentries which require you to kill a mech to obtain.
I'd be in favor of buffing all the DD2 sentries so that the t2 sentries are a bit better than queen spider, and the t3 sentries could also use a buff, especially since a lot of players find t3 OOA event to be too hard. Also buff the frost hydra to around the point of the buffed t3 dd2 sentries.
Official Terrarian
I believe all sentries last exactly 2 minutes, then they disappear instantly and without warning.
Why do sentries despawn? If the purpose is to clean up abandoned sentries, then it shouldn't be desirable to have them disappear in combat. Sentries could have their lifetime reset when they attack so that they are only removed if 2 minutes pass without them making an attack.
AquaNathan
Terrarian
This right here is why people say summoner sucks and i have to agree with them (not saying the class is garbage in every stage of progression but compared to other classes its underwhelming). Minions are too slow, have isssues with immunity frames, some cant go through blocks which i guess isnt a problem most of the time but this adds in to the fact that minions don't even know what to do most of the time, they are also extremely inaccurate which is why summons like the UFO are so good. Adding everything together is basically enough said on why people don't usually play summoner. Almost every weapon except blade staff, sanguine staff and terraprisma have issues with aggro range, accuracy, speed or immunity frames. Whats probably the most infuriating thing about summons is when an enemy is on screen and relativly close to the player they would rather stay with the player rather than try to attack the enemy. This is probably the biggest reason why summoner also kinda struggles with boss fights accompanied by the fact that every single summoner armor has incredibly low defence.
Journey's End 1.4: Official Item Balance Feedback and Discussion Thread
Wait.. what? 1.4.1 is OUT??? Er, no? At least, I don't think so.
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