405. We were sure we catched a bug during the MMO concerning quality formula calculations. Was reported, but it's still in with the latest patch. Reported it again today, Tolik fowarded it to the designers and it turned out it's not a bug ... it's a feature!!!
- Answer: Seems legit in my opinion.
The report was the following - iron doesn't get bonuses from high skill, blacksmith shop and high quality hammer. It's even losing quality!
Experiment:
We have 90+ forging skill, 80+ Blacksmith shop, 80q hammer - all of this gives bonuses to the end product. Then we get 59q iron bars and steel bars and try to craft Glassblower's Tools (2 bars, no handles).
- from 59q iron bars we get 55q tools
- from 59q steel bars we get 80q tools
Using 59q iron everyone expects to hit the 60 cap with so many bonuses. Nope, turns out that's a feature forcing us to use steel. The explanation was that even if before the cap we were supposed to get 75q now with the cap we WON'T get 60q, it will be lower like 55-56Q on purpose. We should either use 80q+ iron or 30q steel to make something 60q.
The Blacksmith mafia protests saying that it would be stupid to turn 30 quality iron into steel, better invest that flux in 60q iron where we will hit the 80 cap. And if we have 80q iron on us we will definetly turn it into steel/vost steel instead of using it for 60q tools...
So is such punishing ... "feature" really needed? - depriving the iron from all kinds of bonuses, even degrading it's quality only that we have to use steel? Isn't the cap at 60 enough? Most players kind of expect that using 50q metal in the mentioned situation will result in 60q end product after all those bonuses are applied.
406. Thank you for your time Bobik making that PvP Q&A in our TS! Some questions were missed or incorrectly stated. I will repeat them here after you agreed to answer more questions in text when you have the time
a) Should wooden weapons like simple spears take very high damage when blocking, meaning they will break after 2-3 successful parries?
- Answer: Not very high, but still greater than metal weapons like swords.
b) Shields currently passively (just hanging on your back) block 100% arrows damage, but only 40% or so other damage. As that's balance do you think it will be better to transform that damage to blunt one? Currently slash through shield (without active block) gives 60% slashing damage, shouldn't that be blunt damage as the sword can't really slash through shield?
- Answer: We consider it as a passive block, and just decrease the damage, but not converting it to anything. From the game design perspective, it is fine to me.
c) Will shields become stand alone skill as formations as well? Or at least in the place of blades mastery, so that spear users won't have to learn swords only for the shield?
- Answer: We will consider it.
d) Do you plan to make the small shields (that are unpopular as they are heavy, but don't protect from archers) more popular in combat (meaning they are better then parry with weapon)? Currently you can parry just fine with weapon and don't need shield. It's even better to parry as you will stun your enemy! While on that topic - are the hard stuns after parry really necessary? It turns into wait for parry to hit a stunned target after that.
- Answer: With pushing mechanics it might not be that straightforward. But I agree that we have to do something with smaller shields blocking.
e) If players are finally forced to fight in war stance (instead of switching in/out) do you plan to buff the agility and willpower bonuses? Like more speed (AGI) and stamina regeneration (willpower), so that they can still sprint and catch targets as now, but only if they have AGI+Willpower build?
- Answer: We will consider it.
f) Once there is difference between male and females - will that also affects throwing weapons? Like throwing them further because of longer arms = more leverage for males?
- Answer: No, that difference will not affect ranged combat at all.
g) In the latest devblog you mentioned you plan to make horses more "valuable" - what do you mean with that?
- Answer: Make them harder and more expensive to produce. But that was mostly related to the simple horse to warhorse conversion.
h) Last one I promise
What do you think about the idea to "nerf" the regular warhorse to the speed and maneuverability of a Hardy warhorse and "buff" the same Hardy warhorse to the current speed and maneuverability levels of regular warhorse? We can then consider that Hardy warhorse is special combat breed, something like the medieval destriers. It will be more valuable for combat and it's already much rarer then the regular warhorses.
- Answer: We're looking into making more significant bonuses for all horse riding skills and different types of horses.
Thank you for the time again