Game Mechanics Master Mode Suggestions

hi
With Master Mode incoming, I propose a list of mechanics/enemy changes that could be added in Master Mode to make
it feel a little bit more difficult (more than just increasing enemy stats obv).

post currently under heavy construction, it's going to be big!

Master Mode Changes

Enemy Changes

1578961482103.png

Antlion
Now inflicts Heat Stroke with sand shots 25%. (Explained further on)
Now only spawns in pools of Quicksand. (Explained further on)

1578961543441.png

Antlion Charger
Inflicts Slow 20% while attacking at maximum speed.

1579112988363.png

All Slimes
Now inflict Slimed on top of their own respective debuffs.

1578959923100.png

Black Slime
Now inflicts Blackout 100% for 15 seconds instead of Darkness for 30 seconds.

1578960009614.png

Blood Crawler
Now inflicts Bleeding 25% and is now completely immune to knockback while on walls.

1578960077795.png

Blazing Wheel
Now inflicts On Fire! 100%.

1578960189548.png

Cursed Skulls
Now inflicts Cursed 100%, charges at player sooner and faster.

1578960240324.png

Dark Caster
Shots can no longer be destroyed with attacks.
Water Bolt shots now cause the Wet debuff.

1578960355252.png
1578960358688.png

Giant Shelly
Now inflicts Confused 50% when ramming into the player.

1578960432993.png

Goblin Scout
Now travels in a small band of Goblins comprised of a couple Goblins of each type.

1578960503988.png

Granite Elemental
Continues to fly whilst in the invulnerable state, dealing damage, also releases a large wave of energy when attacked during this period.
The energy wave gives Electrified 100%.

1578960566812.png

Granite Golem
Now releases a large wave of energy when attacked while guarding.
The energy wave gives Electrified 100%.

1578960669466.png

Ice Slime
Releases water on death, inevitably causing the player to enter a water block thus getting the Chilled debuff.

1578960723163.png
1578960744084.png
1578960765612.png

Man Eater/Snatcher/Angry Trapper
Vine connected to body now deals damage.

1578960817891.png

Meteor Heads
Now spawn in greater quantities, take much longer to change trajectory, and aren't effected by knockback.

1578960913573.png
1578960917334.png

Lost Girl/Nymph
Now releases a shriek that inflicts Confused 100% if standing too close to the Lost Girl while transforming.

1578961012953.png

Piranha
Swims much faster in water and inflicts Bleeding 100%.

1578961175908.png

Salamander
Inflicts Poisoned 100% of the time with spit.

1578961207336.png

Sand Slime
Inflicts Heat Stroke 10%. (Explained further on)

1578961253234.png

Shark
Inflicts Bleeding 100% and Slow 25%.

1578961359755.png

Squid
Now propels self away with Inky Attack inflicting Darkness 100%. (perhaps this can just be a standard thing?)

1578961412197.png
1578961430680.png

Tim/Rune Wizard
Teleports faster, shots have a slight homing effect.

1578961677779.png

Undead Miner
Now drops an active Dynamite stick on death/swings pickaxe to deal more damage.

1578961706332.png
1578961935989.png

Undead Viking/Armored Viking
Now Swings a battleax to deal more damage.

1578961760414.png

Vulture
Now inflicts Heat Stroke 10%. (Explained further on)

1578961803758.png

Wall Creeper
Inflicts Poisoned 100%, immune to knockback while on the wall.

1578961903431.png

Angler Fish
Inflicts Electrified 50%.

1578961958048.png

Basilisk
Inflicts Slow 100% while attacking at maximum speed.

1578962000832.png

Blood Feeder
Inflicts Bleeding 100%.

1578969136938.png
1578969159136.png
1578969174158.png

Crimson Axe/Enchanted Sword/Cursed Hammer
Inflicts Curse 50% while attacking

1578969221035.png
1578969224407.png
1578969227167.png

Mummies
Inflict Slow/Silence/Confuse 100/100/50% on hit respectively also have 10% to inflict Heat Stroke. (Explained further on)

1578969401253.png
1578969404247.png
1578969406895.png
1578969412317.png

Ghouls
Inflict Heat Stroke/Cursed Flames/Ichor/Confusion 20/100/100/50% on hit respectively. (Explained further on)

1578969510202.png

Floaty Gross
Inflicts Weak 100%.

1578969556938.png

Giant Bat
Inflicts Feral Bite 50%, Confusion on hit reduced to 0%.

1578969625522.png

Giant Cursed Skull
Inflicts Cursed 50% on projectile hit, 100% on physical hit.

1578969659598.png

Inflicts Feral Bite 100%.

1578969689963.png

Giant Tortoise
Now inflicts Confused 50% when ramming into the player.


Ice Tortoise
Now inflicts Frozen 50% when ramming into the player.

1578969743548.png
1578969780686.png
1578969788554.png

Armored Bones
Now swing their own weapons while moving to deal massive damage.

1578970139034.png
1578970182453.png

Ice Elemental/Icy Merman
Inflicts Frozen 100% with Frost Bolt shots.

1578970237395.png

Illuminant Bat
Inflicts Confused 25% and Feral Bite 100%.

1578970453658.png

Moth
Now leaves a moth dust trail that Confuses 100%.

1578970501419.png

Pixie
Inflicts Slow 100%.

1578970544366.png

Red Devil
Attacks instantly kill. (this was a joke lol he's already OP)

1578970590905.png

Sand Poacher
Now completely immune to knockback while on a wall.

1578970822721.png

Toxic Sludge
Now inflicts Poisoned 100%

1578970843553.png
1578970853510.png

Wandering Eye
Now dashes like Eye of Cthulhu once iris is smacked out.

1578970910704.png

Werewolf
Inflicts Bleeding 100%.

1578970948978.png

Clown
Clowns are able to break blocks again with their bombs >: ) classic.

1578971009554.png
1578971032372.png

Infected Goldfish
Now walk during the rain and attack the player.

1578971096243.png
1578971101217.png
1578971104916.png

Sandstorm Enemies
Inflict Heat Stroke 10%. (Explained further on)

1578971373759.png
1578971378077.png

While iris is still attached, occasionally spins around rapidly shooting out multiple Servants of Cthulhu
1578971409695.png
.
With the iris detached, Eye of Cthulhu immediately starts doing its enraged charging, occasionally spinning around releasing multiple Demon Eyes.

1578971529936.png

Eater of Worlds is now spawned as two full sized Eater of Worlds. Will no longer get stunned when broken apart and keep the momentum.

1579105198903.png

Creepers occasionally fire a blood beam at the player dealing minor damage, making the first phase of the BoC fight appropriately harder.
1579105287715.png

When the heart is exposed, the clones it creates are immediately nearly-indistinguishable but also starts further away before charging from the player to
give the player some more time to react/spot the differences in opacity.

1578971634996.png

Now has four hands.

1578971906589.png

Stops mid-air and lets out a roar, making all nearby Hive blocks release 1-3 bees each. If there are no Hive Blocks in range (~50m), Queen Bee
becomes enraged, rapidly dashing from left to right endlessly at a nearly unavoidable rate.

1578971973635.png

Ninja inside throws shuriken constantly.
Now inflicts Slimed.
1578972009963.png

The center mouth will be replaced with a larger eye that fires additional lasers
The wall's health is divided into three parts, one third is each eye, the bottom and top most likely being harder
to hit due to the space constraints in the Underworld.
Once a part hits 50% health, it turns into a mouth that will rapidly spew Leeches that move at an increased speed and will not drop hearts.
Once a part is destroyed, a large amount of Hungry spawn at the wound.

1578972344806.png

When head spin begins, lets loose a slow wave of electricity that causes Electrified 100%.
The player will be forced to move to avoid the massive head spin damage.
Bomb Arm replaced with a Heat-Seeking Missile arm.

1578972406144.png

Laser shots pass through blocks, has certain sporadic periods of invulnerability where if the Destroyer is hit, the damage will be
reflected back to the attacking player.
(since Daedalus Stormbow with Holy Arrows takes a long period to stop the attack, users of this strategy will take massive damage)

1578973177369.png



Spazmatism/Retinazer will line and lock itself up with the player at opposite sides and dash at an almost unavoidable speed after a couple seconds, the only
way to avoid being to go parallel to the attack. It continues
lining up with the player in each direction (up down left right)

^^^
Retinazer and Spazmatism will alternate these moves.

Spazmatism (Green one) will now do Eye of Cthulhu dashes once iris is gone
Retinazer will now dash nearly as fast as teleportation to the diagonal corners of the players and shoot lasers all around them in a box formation.

1579105456542.png

Plantera's "Arms" are now physical objects and now deal damage. When bulb opens up, a large amount of spores
1579105647749.png
get flung into the air, unable to be
destroyed now from any attacks.

1579105753291.png

Will now jump through blocks to reach the player anywhere on the map to prevent cheesing, hands will now travel much slower when punching
but will not retract when damaged to disallow stun-locking.
Golem's Lasers will now inflict Electrified 10%
1579105828145.png
1579105834567.png


Second Phase Golem will now be comprised of two defeatable parts. The body and the now detached head.
If the head is defeated first, the body will become enraged and begin to rapidly jump up and down with barely any lag in
between jumps.
If the body is defeated first, the head will become enraged and begin to spit fireballs and shoot lasers at an astounding rate.

This will encourage health management for the fight, trying to defeat them simultaneously.

The Body's health will be thrice as great as the Head's.

1579106036858.png

Duke Fishron will be surrounded with Detonating Bubbles at all points in time, regenerating them every 20 seconds.
1579106123661.png

When Detonating Bubbles pop, they will now release smaller Detonating Bubbles that will race towards the player, these smaller bubbles
can also be popped with attacks.
1579106284607.png

For second phase, Fishron will be accompanied by a school of Sharkron
1579106302556.png
, around eight will cover his body and swim along with him.
Fishron will also be 100% invisible during this phase, the only visible entities being the Sharkron that swim over his body and his glowing eyes.

Once a Sharkron around Duke is killed, it will be promptly fired at the player as an invulnerable missile.
These Sharkron will not respawn once killed.
All attacks inflict Wet.

1579106465659.png

For Lunar Cultist upgrade, look no further than Derpling Ω 's post:

Lunar Cultist Master Mode Rework

Now inflicts:
1579113247981.png
1579113254559.png
1579113291709.png


With appropriate attacks


1579106600382.png


For this boss, I feel like it shouldn't be messed with tbh, I have faith in the Dev Team they'll either do Moon Lord good, or have an actual
final boss to wrap things up.

My only suggestion would be for it to be a sort of "Boss Rush" where an enhanced version of Eye of Cthulhu, Brain of Cthulhu, and Eater of Worlds are spawned
to fight a one on one battle with, these enhanced versions would be recolored a nice blue tint to match the Moon Lord and would not drop anything.

Desert Mechanics

First on the list is adding a new block into the game called
Quicksand
SandQuicksand.png
SandQuicksandC.png
SandQuicksandCr.png
SandQuicksandH.png

(Left= Regular Sand Right= Quicksand)
This block would be naturally spawning only in a Master Mode world, but is still craftable in any other world:

1579107293654.png
x1 +
1579107315237.png
or
1579107321960.png
=
Quicksandbit.png
x1

Just the same as making Mud, Sand and a water source gets you a Quicksand block.

This is how the Quicksand block will function, if the player steps into it, then the player will begin to slowly sink unless the [JUMP] key is pressed
fast enough to escape it.

Quicksand is only active if: a water source is 10 blocks away or closer
or if: it is raining
Quicksand.png

Here is an example of a Quicksand pit, note the slightly darker color in the pit as well as it being sunken-in
rather than on a flat area.
Antlions will only spawn in these Quicksand pits.

Naturally spawned Quicksand can also only be broken with a 65%+ pickaxe (same as a Desert Fossil) and is unable to be effected by Bombs.
Crafted Quicksand can be broken as easily as sand, however.

Heat Stroke
HeatStroke.png

Inflicted by:
1579108598064.png
1579108546164.png
1579108566227.png
1579108458046.png
1578969224407.png
1578969227167.png
1579108532502.png
1579108479529.png
1579108493919.png
1579108504788.png

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Heat Stroke Effect:
Causes screen to do the "Desert Heat Wave Distortion" except slightly more exaggerated no matter the biome.
Reduces speed by the same amount as Chilled
1579108861157.png

------------------------------------------------------------------

Heat Stroke is a longer debuff that can stay on the player for up to a full minute, a harsh punishment given the Desert is already
a harsh place.
Heat Stroke can be instantly cured by drinking a Water Bottle or entering a Water Source (or of course the Nurse).

Buff/Debuff Mechanics

1579109249600.png

Bleeding not only stops health regen, but deals 2 dps.
During a Blood Moon the damage dealt per second by Bleeding is doubled.

1579109258947.png

Now deals double dps to entities with Slimed and will not be expunged by water.
Can now be healed with Wet debuff.

1579111220784.png

Venom now deals 8 dps instead of 6 dps.
Keeping perfectly still will slow the spread of venom in your body, making it deal only 3 dps.

1579111276287.png

Now also increases the use time of all items by 5.

1579111282974.png

Now also increases the use time of all items by 3

1579111308414.png

Can only be healed by receiving the On Fire! and Cursed Flame debuff or receiving the Cozy Fire buff.

1579111313215.png
1579111318302.png

Player now has to rapidly click to break out of the debuff, each keeping their respective elements.

1579111327524.png

Electrified usually does 4 dps while still and 16 dps while moving.
This dps is doubled while the player also has the "Wet" debuff.
Is now received from a greater slew of sources. (see enemy changes above)

1579112558011.png

Now can be received from a vast majority of sources including Water Sources. (see enemy changes above)
Rain causes an irremovable Wet Debuff that only goes away once indoors.
Wet grants immunity to On Fire!

1579112817318.png

Slime Mount stomping now gives this debuff, Slimed has no effect on its own but allows
On Fire and Cursed Flame to deal double dps and to be inextinguishable.
Slimed is now received by a greater variety of sources. (see enemy changes above)

1579111338339.png

No longer increases player damage.

1579111424775.png

Cancels ALL healing including from potions, player must actively drink potions at the appropriate time or they will heal 0 health and get
Potion Sickness.





post currently under heavy construction, it's going to be big!





 
Last edited:
I've actually been building up a list of my own that's very much like this one. Nice seeing others doing the same.

Most of these ideas add to the enemies without being very over-the-top, which is something I can appreciate. There's a lot of just debuffery goin' on, though, which only acts as extra punishment rather than direct challenge. The possessed weapons in particular caught my attention, as you literally just increased the infliction chance of Cursed from 1/3 to 1/2.
 
I've actually been building up a list of my own that's very much like this one. Nice seeing others doing the same.

Most of these ideas add to the enemies without being very over-the-top, which is something I can appreciate. There's a lot of just debuffery goin' on, though, which only acts as extra punishment rather than direct challenge. The possessed weapons in particular caught my attention, as you literally just increased the infliction chance of Cursed from 1/3 to 1/2.
Yeahhhhh I mean anything else and it feels too mean :D
Once I start adding actual mechanics it'll start getting interesting ;)
EDIT: Also makes the Ankh shield feel much more appealing!
 
Last edited:
These all seem like good additions, however I hope the dynamite stick dropped by the undead miners doesn't destroy tiles, otherwise it may damage some player's farms or underground buildings ect...
Also I'm not too sure about the ice slimes dropping water, as it could flood the surface snow biome.
 
These all seem like good additions, however I hope the dynamite stick dropped by the undead miners doesn't destroy tiles, otherwise it may damage some player's farms or underground buildings ect...
Also I'm not too sure about the ice slimes dropping water, as it could flood the surface snow biome.
When water gets really spread out then it dissipates into nothingness. So either that will happen or it'll get funneled downhill into a nearby pool.
Regarding the Undead Miner thing, yeah I'd probably have it so it doesn't damage tiles, you have a fair point that it's just a disaster waiting to happen.
 
Adding Debuffs on top of buffed enemy stats still seems artificial. The only way that I'd consider Master Mode to be a new mode worthy of playing through is if there are changes to the enemies' patterns and AI (even simple stuff such as making enemies faster or more aggressive). Adding Master Mode just seems like it'd be a mode that is overly punishing for my personal enjoyment. The boss changes (and the changes like the vines being able to cause damage from the Snatchers) are the only things that could be welcomed from the potential of Master Mode. In fact, I'd prefer it if these changes were brought to Expert Mode instead, where enemies will have their stats slightly lowered to compensate (again, overly bloating stats is in no way a creative way to increase difficulty. It's lazy.)
 
where enemies will have their stats slightly lowered to compensate (again, overly bloating stats is in no way a creative way to increase difficulty. It's lazy.)
I would be ok with this, or if the stats were equal to Expert with new AI, but from the trailer we've seen bosses have more HP than Expert in Master mode.
 
I would be ok with this, or if the stats were equal to Expert with new AI, but from the trailer we've seen bosses have more HP than Expert in Master mode.
I mean higher stats is to be expected
Adding Debuffs on top of buffed enemy stats still seems artificial. The only way that I'd consider Master Mode to be a new mode worthy of playing through is if there are changes to the enemies' patterns and AI (even simple stuff such as making enemies faster or more aggressive).
People who read my past suggestions know I love debuffs and I wish they'd incorporate them more, but that's just my bias.
And yeah you're totally right. I was originally thinking of reimagining some of these old and pathetic AI like the Fighter AI and give them the intelligence to sense incoming terrain and react accordingly rather than bumping their heads on a 4 block tall jutted out cliff and turning around to fall off screen and despawn.....

But I feel that'd be incredibly difficult to code, should apply to more than just Master Mode, and people wouldn't probably like it if it was Master Mode exclusive.

Making enemies faster feels more like an artificial difficulty booster imo, knock back would probably be the new meta so that dealing with crowds is a lot easier.

I was originally not planning on making enemy changes at all but it sorta just happened, again once I start talking about my ideas on some new Mechanics that could actually make Master Mode harder and make less viable things seem more viable it's going to feel less artificial.

At the moment I'm just trying to sprite some stuff exclusively for Master Mode but I'm slow and bad at it so yeah that's the hold up :D
 
Brain of Confusion Mark 2, 100% chance to inflict confusion for 5 seconds on every enemy within a 20 tile radius by double tapping down and has a 15 second cool down.
 
Brain of Confusion Mark 2, 100% chance to inflict confusion for 5 seconds on every enemy within a 20 tile radius by double tapping down and has a 15 second cool down.
Definitely going to incorporate some double taps, perhaps not in the down direction though as that would mess with the armor double tap effects like Ancient Armor and Vortex/Stardust Armor
 
Armor bonuses should all be down, because you can't have any conflicts that way.
But if you're on a platform you'll fall through:dryadtongue:
What I meant is armour abilities should have a seperate key to activate, and my idea which is mostly a joke would have a different key.
(My first ever suggestion was something like this)
 
But if you're on a platform you'll fall through:dryadtongue:
What I meant is armour abilities should have a seperate key to activate, and my idea which is mostly a joke would have a different key.
(My first ever suggestion was something like this)
Eh, never really had that issue with double tapping, and ik its a joke but a different key would most likely be too many buttons imo xD

Also:
Added "Game Mechanics" section,
Also changed up some of the enemy changes/boss changes
Finished the last of the Boss Changes
 
Back
Top Bottom