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FFT Arena: Balance Discussion Thread

Started by FFMaster, July 13, 2010, 07:56:57 pm

FFMaster

It's true that there is no reason for Salamander to be around in Arena, unless it was massively different to Ifrit in some way other than bigger AoE and 20% Oil. There really isn't much left to add to Summoner that isn't already there though. Clearly I should make it the only 4 AoE spell in the game.
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Dokurider

Diamond Shield should Null Dark instead of Earth because they correlate to Golden Hairpin.

Do you guys thing that the Elemental Shield's weaknesses are relevant or needed anymore? Given that Clothes freely absorb *two* elements without drawback, how important is having Elemental weaknesses now?

JamesOnyx

You could replace Salamander with Midgardsormr (Midgar Swarm) and make it have the chance to inflict poison or some other debilitating status.  Just a thought.

I think the reason the absorb shields have elemental weaknesses is because it forces people to build around them, which is nice considering more equipment should behave like that.  Don't want to make building characters too easy now; there wouldn't be any fun in that. 

Dokurider

Except that anyone with access with clothes will just use clothes instead. My point being is that Clothes have made having an elemental drawback mostly obsolete. So either we phase out elemental weaknesses entirely or make a 180 and make them relevant again by removing the elements from clothes that shields already have (sans Earth and maybe lightning).

A unrelated point, but should we unflag Holy from self-hit? It's a terrible idea that the AI insists on doing for some reason. We've seen this in action and it's retarded. I say getting rid of self targetting won't hurt anything.

JamesOnyx

If we took out all elements that are absorbed by shields, how about we make all of the clothes behave like Earth Clothes?

Santa Suit becomes Aviator Suit:  Absorb: Wind, Strengthen: Wind
Black Costume changes to:  Absorb: Dark, Strengthen: Dark
Rubber Costume becomes Diving Suit:  Absorb: Water, Strengthen: Water

The only problem I have with changing clothes is that some elements will most likely become impossible to have a team fully absorb.  Most likely Ice, which having an all Ice team is already hard to accomplish as it is. Not to mention that clothes are limited to those who can wear them (which admittedly is a lot) but that's also something to consider. 

And I agree with unflagging Holy from self-hit.  Even if I gave some of my Holy units Cure spells they would still insist on targeting themselves with Holy.  Maybe I should just stop equipping Magic Rings on them... but I find my Holy units always dying to, you guessed it, Holy.  Removing self-hit would at least help out my current conundrum... I don't know how many others.

Malroth

thus making black magic even more useless as they would no longer be able to self heal with any armor ever

FFMaster

I agree with making stopping dumb AI from using Holy on Self.

I agree that the 3 elemental clothes are doing too much, but JamesOnyx also has a point about making absorb teams too hard to use then. Honestly, the problems with Absorb/Weak/Elemental crap has persisted since the beginning of this project, and I think it may be best to work this shit out now.

Xif has already suggested before to make Weakness only do 50% more damage. Absorb would also get neutered to 25% damage iirc. Bringing back weak/absorb would then become healing of 37.5% amount. So in essence:

No mods: 100% damage
Weak: 150% damage
Half: 50% damage
Absorb: 25% damage(healed)
Weak+Half: 75% damage
Weak+Absorb: 37.5% damage(healed)
Weak+Half+Absorb: 18.75% damage(healed)
Null+Anything: 0%

Oil will still override everything, and will at the same time be affected by the weakness changes.

This will overall make Arena less elemental focused, and having things like weakness on equipment may have some uses again, as well as bringing back some more complexity into team building.

As usual, I'm open to other ideas and comments about the current situation or proposed ideas.
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Dokurider

August 29, 2013, 02:18:47 pm #1427 Last Edit: August 29, 2013, 03:02:21 pm by Dokurider
Yeah these changes will be for the best.

That being said, should we start tacking on weakness onto more items, Clothes in particular?

Rubber Costume = Weak: Fire or Wind
Black Costume = Weak: Ice or Earth
Santa Outfit = Weak: Lightning or Water

Light Robe = Weak: Dark

Gaignun

Quote from: FFMaster on August 29, 2013, 07:30:16 amAbsorb would also get neutered to 25% damage iirc.


Is this necessary?  Since the absorption flag prevents the opposing team from using the element against them regardless of its modifier, reducing this modifier only weakens self-absorption as a concept.  Self-absorption already has disadvantages.  First, such strategies must make do with skill sets that lack revive or status healing (i.e. Black Magic, Draw Out).  Second, such strategies have little room to invest in more than one or two elements, so they are in danger of being hard-countered by a strategy that resists these same elements.

Malroth

I think absorb to -50% would work better since you could get 75% of current healing by combining absorb + weak  allowing elemental healing to be viable for very dedicated units dedicating 2 equipment slots to it  but making it impractical for primary healing for any but the most focused of teams.

Chameleon Robe: Weak Dark
White Robe:  Weak Holy.


JamesOnyx

I agree that 25% might be too much of a nerf for the exact reasons that Gaignun pointed out.  Somewhere from 33%-50% (I vote 50%) seems much more fair.  I myself would just give up trying to make absorb teams if they were dropped to 25%. 

Dokurider

White and Chameleon Robe don't need nerfs, Chameleon Robe in particular. Although we could give Chameleon Robe Weak: Holy as a buff.

On second thought, I'm not so sure I want Weak: Dark for Light Robe, as that would make it the defacto Robe for Dark spamming Cursed Ringers.


Dokurider

Quote from: Gaignun on August 29, 2013, 03:18:19 pm
Is this necessary?  Since the absorption flag prevents the opposing team from using the element against them regardless of its modifier, reducing this modifier only weakens self-absorption as a concept.  Self-absorption already has disadvantages.  First, such strategies must make do with skill sets that lack revive or status healing (i.e. Black Magic, Draw Out).


This is specifically targeted to nerf team absorption. I don't understand how having to deal with skillsets without revival/status is a bad thing because it's not. With an offensive unit, you don't want that unit to have revival/status healing because having those skills on your offensive unit is a distraction and a detriment. Secondly, at least half, if not more, of team absorption is done through weapons.

QuoteSecond, such strategies have little room to invest in more than one or two elements, so they are in danger of being hard-countered by a strategy that resists these same elements


Except the main appeal and power of absorb team is healing each other. As long as you don't make your entire offense nothing but your respective element, you will be able to withstand the enemy's damage and fight back using a different element, or more practically, a non-elemental attack. Furthermore, Oil solves this problem anyways.

Quote from: JamesOnyx on August 29, 2013, 05:49:00 pm
I agree that 25% might be too much of a nerf for the exact reasons that Gaignun pointed out.  Somewhere from 33%-50% (I vote 50%) seems much more fair.  I myself would just give up trying to make absorb teams if they were dropped to 25%.


I say 33%. At 50%, Weak Absorb will produce 75% absorption, which is too high. Weak Absorb @ 50% is perfect, which is exactly what you get with 33% Absorption.

Gaignun

Quote from: Dokurider on August 29, 2013, 06:48:06 pm
This is specifically targeted to nerf team absorption. I don't understand how having to deal with skillsets without revival/status is a bad thing because it's not. With an offensive unit, you don't want that unit to have revival/status healing because having those skills on your offensive unit is a distraction and a detriment.


That's true, but Black Magic, Draw Out, and Lore users are typically mage types (low HP and SP).  Fielding additional mages for revival duty makes the team as a whole quite squishy.  Weapon absorption, on the other hand, is intrinsically weaker, as it heals only one target at a time.

Regardless, I wasn't aware that people viewed the self-absorption strategy negatively.  I think the strategy is easily confronted with a bit of one's own elemental resistance (particularly if Oil is changed to no longer override resistances -- have you made your decision about this, FFMaster?).  Ultimately, it doesn't feel that overpowered to me.  For instance, Reks' Severe Weather Alert probably utilises self-absorption to the fullest extent possible, but it still struggled in the ongoing tournament.

I'll resign myself if the consensus is to cut out self-absorption from the metagame.  At least I've given my input.

CT5Holy

Wait, why all the hate on elemental absorb all of a sudden? Cutting effectiveness of absorb makes that strategy completely worthless. Even 50% is enough to make it pretty darn bad. It's not a dominant strategy whatsoever. You really need AoE (with good damage) to make it worthwhile. AoE means you aren't only healing one person, and good damage (and thus healing) means you can sorta keep up with the opposing team's damage output (turn a 2HKO into a 3HKO at the very least). You really need every unit active for an elemental absorb to be highly effective. Even disabling one unit is enough of a momentum shift, as the ele absorb team is now less likely to heal enough to mitigate the enemy team's damage. Then, another unit on the ele absorb team has to get rid of whatever's disabling their teammate, further reducing their ele absorb capabilities. If enough damage has been sustained during this time, then units that can only do single target healing are stuck healing their teammates instead of attacking the enemy team. Further keep in mind that 2 AoE attacks require near-max MA setups to do good damage, except perfumes/DefUP/MDefUP are still very popular, which makes the ele absorb team less likely to drop enemy units.

Arena is not highly elemental focused. Elemental absorption tactics are something to consider and to look for when making teams, but I don't think any of the top teams would be considered elemental absorb teams. Elemental absorb teams are best against teams that can only do damage (and ideally have low to average damage outputs, aka not strong teams (not counting defensive teams since they don't really care about damage)). Ele absorb teams cannot disrupt enemy teams (aside from KOing them) because they need all their units to perform elemental attacks. These teams are also highly susceptible to disruption, for the same reason - everyone needs to be doing their job, otherwise their position could easily crumble.

I would be fine with Weak being 150% damage instead of 200% though.
Winner of the 1st FFT 1.3 AI Tourney

Dokurider

Just a random thought: People have expressed interest in expanding Bard's equips to Robe, but denied it because it would make them too good of spellcasters. I disagree that robes would make Bards any better at spellcasting then they are now. Sure they would be better at casting Black Magic and Holy, but they would still fall short of the versatility of the other mage classes. But that's not what I'm asking for. Instead, what if we gave Bards (and Dancers) Armor, but not Helmets or vice versa? It would make them better melee fighters then present.

Dokurider

Got more ideas here:
Going back to Katanas for a minute, I have an idea for Asura Knife. I find at often times, a support samurai can't deal decent damage at all, even with Two Hands. A Female Samurai with base PA 7 and a Fury of 40 only deals 94 damage before target Fury, which means hitting a target with Auto Potion can do more healing than hurting. So what if instead we made Asura a WP*WP weapon? Leaving it with its exact same stats, but lowering its W-Ev to 5 and giving it 9 WP would make a 148 damage sword before target Fury at minimum and a 252 damage weapon after Attack Up. That sounds high, but even a 9 WP Katana can deal 288 damage with 12 PA, with a choice of 100% Silence or Faith. Overall, it would be a very solid weapon if implemented, acting as a supplemental form of damage.

Ragnarok/Save the Queen: Just give them 30 W-Ev. If people don't warm up to it, then their loss. Well we could give one or both a proc in exchange for a WP drop. Give Ragnarok 20% Berserk in exchange for 13 WP? I mean these weapons are basically Chaos Sword with Protect/Shell, let's try to give them a chance next time, right?

The Future of Transparent and Hidden Knife: I think instead of removing Transparent or +1 Speed from Hidden Knife, we could instead remove its 100% accuracy? "If we did that, then what good would there be in leaving Transparent on?" Transparent has an effect on the AI itself. Basically it makes the AI more aggressive. That alone is a worthy effect. It's subtle, but it has significant effects. For example, giving a Ninja Item while equipping Hidden Knife would result in a unit that isn't so OCD about item usage to the point of being crippled by it like it would typically be.
Failing that, just replace Initial: Berserk with Always: Transparent and leave its Concentrate intact. God knows Initial: Berserk sucks and Always: Berserk is going to be possibly problematic. Always: Transparent sounds like a good compromise. (Removing Transparent from Hidden Knife is implied if this route is to be followed instead.)

Transparent as a Negative Status: Expounding more on Transparent, what if we used Transparent as a negative status? When added temporary, Transparent units act timid, refusing to break Transparent by acting. This could be useful as a makeshift Don't Act, a brand new status, no reprogramming needed. It could also act as a drawback for a new item, acting similarly to initial: Petrify. (Hint, hint)
So exactly what should proc Transparent? What if we replaced Ninja Edge's proc with 25% Transparent? It can also be slipped into Bad Luck's proc list. Or we can give one of the Knight Swords Transparent?

Dokurider

So I remember the idea of a healing gun, but at the time, I think I was pretty indifferent to it. But now I see it would be a great weapon, because it would force consistent use of the Snipe skills. With this weapon, every attack could possibly be a Arm Aim or a Weapon Break, rather than the AI only using it whenever they feel like.

The only objection I remember was that it would make X-Potion obsolete. That's not true at all. First off, the healing powers will not be remotely comparable once you factor in Fury. With 12 WP and 40 Fury, you're only healing 108 damage, and that's before target fury, which could drop it as low as 81 damage. Even at 6-8 range, that's just not comparable to what a Throw Item X-Potion can do. Not to mention having to worry about getting caught up by friendly projectile guards. Finally, you're trading a way to deal reliable damage, or damage at all for a 'better' X-Potion, when you can just have X-Potion.

Overall, it's a good idea, and I hope to see it implemented next version. Just don't give it a Reflect proc. That might mess up it's use on Support Magic teams.

Gaignun

October 02, 2013, 04:36:42 am #1438 Last Edit: October 02, 2013, 04:44:43 am by Gaignun
Quote from: Dokurider on October 01, 2013, 09:59:33 pm
Overall, [a healing gun is] a good idea, and I hope to see it implemented next version. Just don't give it a Reflect proc. That might mess up it's use on Support Magic teams.


You think it would?  There is a collection of basic support skills which ignore Reflect (e.g. Protect/Shell 2, Haste 2, Cure 4, Murasame, Masamune).  Also, the AI is clever at using Reflect offensively (e.g. casting Demi 2 on a single unit twice in a row for instant-death).  It's true that Black Magick self-absorption and Cure 1~3 would become ineffective, but I think that is a small sacrifice for this added potential.

On an unrelated note, would anyone mind if we buff Revive's Y value by 10~20?  Maybe I'm sore from the recent tournament, but witnessing a 300 JP, 0 Vert revival skill miss on good compatibility (multiple times) is harsh.  Surely such an expensive skill could use more reliability, especially considering that we're buffing the range of Revive's closest competitor, Wish, from 1 to 3.

Dokurider

Well, reflecting Esuna, for one, is a near deal breaker for me. Add in a (possible) Haste spell buff for the next update and yeah, Reflect procs could be a problem for some teams. Eh, on second thought, it could use that proc as a possible demerit once people catch on to using it as an Arm Aim/Weapon Break spammer.

Yeah, I think Revive could use a buff. It's 0 Vertical punishes it hard enough to the point it can't ever be a main form of revival.