Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Suggestions for game development and improvements. One suggestion to a thread, please.
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Goliath
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Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by Goliath »

Angels gain a +30/-10% resistance against Holy/Unholy at T2, and +50%/-20% at T3. Demons gain the reverse. Their pets gain T2 bonus.

Similarly, transcendents get +10/+15% to both at T2 and T3. Transcendents affiliated with an aligned EP (in a good/evil) faction don't get protection to the opposing damage type.

This would be justified by Holy/Unholy damage being the manifestation of Aligned EPs rejecting beings of opposing alignment. Same-aligned beings would be largely unaffected, while transcendents who have rejected aligned EPs should be somewhat resistant to both.
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SaltedSalmon
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by SaltedSalmon »

Oh no this would be bad.

Unholy gets thrown down the dumps because now its unusable in Evil versus Evil infighting and also the Transcended damage isn't as good anymore. Imagine trying to contest a Stygian Overlord without access to (decent) charged attacks.

Meanwhile, Arcane and Holy retain roughly the same value.
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Goliath
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by Goliath »

Unholy gets thrown down the dumps because now its unusable in Evil versus Evil infighting.
Current breath is focused on alignments fighting for territory. Discouraging in-alignment fighting, at least on a larger level, is the intent of this.
Imagine trying to contest a Stygian Overlord without access to (decent) charged attacks.
As far as I'm aware, DOs don't get any charged attack that can be used against demons to deal Unholy damage, other than, possibly, through thralls.
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SaltedSalmon
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by SaltedSalmon »

Goliath wrote: Wed Mar 09, 2022 8:48 am Current breath is focused on alignments fighting for territory. Discouraging in-alignment fighting, at least on a larger level, is the intent of this.
Which I disagree with.
In general, it would be better to encourage demons to fight Angels, rather than discouraging them from fighting Demons.
Evil versus Evil is not meant to completely go away as Evil is supposed to fight over their class-specific Endgame spots.
Goliath wrote: Wed Mar 09, 2022 8:48 am As far as I'm aware, DOs don't get any charged attack that can be used against demons to deal Unholy damage, other than, possibly, through thralls.
Taint Spell, although I suppose that one already sucks versus Demons.
Which leads to the odd position of Defilers not having a charged attack that works against most people, unlike Sorcerers and Shepherds. Something to think about...
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Kandarin
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by Kandarin »

Demons have faction infighting that Angels generally don't, but I think the spirit of the suggestion could be addressed by giving Angel T2s a flat baseline soak against holy damage.
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indigosound
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by indigosound »

I like this idea do to the flavor of it. Why not do something like 1 point of damage extra for every 5 on targets that are opposed to the damage. but it just doesn't reward good on good or evil on evil. and arcane can hit both and both can hit arcane. That way it feels more rewarding to fight the opposition but it also does not actively hurt you if you need to defend yourself or sang endgame objectives. IE that would basically be if you hit for 30 to an aligned but 35 to an unaligned.
SignedName
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by SignedName »

Is it really necessary to discourage Goods from killing each other? They already have multiple reasons not to. I'm not even sure why negative resistance would be necessary either, given that their innate armors are already weaker against the opposite alignments and they can't enchant armors to protect against the other alignment.

If you want to make aligned attacks aligned attacks, another idea could be to make it so aligned damage is more potent at passive infusion, but only if it's not against someone of the same alignment. Actually, I might spin that off as my own suggestion since I have other ideas related to it.
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erikune
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Re: Gameplay: Holy/Unholy shouldn't be as good against same alignment

Post by erikune »

I don't think I like this much.

Innate armor already provides high soak against the matching aligned element. Divine Armor is best against Holy, and the IB/Doom Howler both have high Unholy soak. This also has some strange interactions with the Advocate, Holy Champion, and Conduit, who can get immunity to those damage types.

Good v Good already has problems with attacking each other, and the Good pets counter-attacking in defense (regardless of alignment restrictions) is one of the ways of further discouraging such attacks. But when the Wheel of Righteousness only hits for 2 damage with such a change - after Divine Armor - that's not much of a threat anymore. Evil v Evil would get a pretty heavy nerf, with charge attacks actually doing less damage and some options (like Unholy Weapons) becoming almost a penalty. If the whole skillset of the DO is any indication, there is intended to be some in-fighting between evil characters.

If the intent is to focus on alignment fights, then why are the transcendents getting Holy/Unholy soak? All that seems to do is encourage the transcendents to join aligned factions, or at least stick with fighting each other. While the neutral Elder Powers do put an emphasis on choice, you think that they'd focus on protecting neutrals from other neutrals (if the intent is to avoid infighting) rather than making them resist angel and demon attacks.
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