Willow loses her Trademark...

[Sadie]

Personally I don't believe they should've made changes to willows lighter that they did in the previous update. Her lighter is the same as Abigal's flower, Wilson's Beard, or Woodie's axe Lucy. It's what makes the character unique and its a perk to playing that character. The lighter itself is actually less powerfull than a torch but lasted forever. Making it a craftable is just pointless since theres already a torch which gives off more light and uses less resources.

Most people when they begin a game are hunting gold to make a science machine, alchemy machine, and lightning rods (there are more things). They don't want to give up two gold to craft another lighter when they could just craft a torch and continue on with progressing their bases for their survival. The lighter needs to be fixxed and turned back into being indestructable. Otherwise theres just really no point in playing Willow.
 

Comments?

 

*Note* I don't agree with all the people who complain about willow being a griefing character as it honestly doesnt matter if willow has a lighter or not. If there was no willow in DST people would still grief using torches this character just makes it a bit easier. Also this update will NOT stop griefing with willow all it does is hurt the people who enjoy playing willow for all her quirky pryo-ness (yes i know thats not a word).

[Rosten]

I agree, this was a downright silly addition.

[ButterStuffed]

Prolly only a temporary solution

http://forums.kleientertainment.com/topic/49526-what-is-this/page-6

 

Still though it seems kind of unnecessary for Willow's lighter to have a limited durability as it doesn't solve much.

[rezecib]

There was another thread discussing the Willow changes. Try to keep stuff together, guys, unless you have a distinct mechanic to suggest (as opposed to just arguing against something).

 

It's confirmed to be a temporary solution:

So, what did that leave? That’s right: Willow. As many forum-goers have guessed, this is not our final vision. It’s a stopgap that we hope will improve experiences in DST overall by reducing fire-destruction and starting to change some of the Willow perception problems that exist right now. With the changes, Willow players can’t light up a forest and stand around in it without consequence--but between Willow’s reduced fire damage and the previous nerf to overall fire damage, she won’t take very much damage. Her lighter is now craftable and limited: dedicated servers won’t get flooded with piles of lighters this way. We probably need to finesse the recipe a bit, but the lighter is still a worthwhile investment--it lasts 8 times as long as a single torch and isn’t affected by rain! Now that the lighter is craftable, a Willow can craft lighters for other players. As for the removal of insanity fires: it was the best (i.e. simplest and fastest) stopgap solution. We coupled that with increasing the effects of sanity auras on Willow. This version of Willow is a character concerned with managing the more extreme peaks and valleys of her sanity using proximity to fires, rather than the entire team worrying their Willow might accidentally destroy their entire berry farm because her insanity fire proc’d at an inopportune time.

 

Personally, I think if the following changes were made, she would be a decent character again:

• Lighter works like the lantern; it can be crafted, but also refueled, and doesn't disappear when spent. Maybe it has to be fueled with something interesting, maybe a fuel that you also have to craft. Based on Seth's chat, they wanted to make it something that Willow could share, but not something that she could just share and then leave, which is why it's craftable, but finite. Refueling with a fuel that only Willow could craft would be a good medium between those (and give room for making a more lore-sensible expensive recipe, maybe involving steel wool!). Maybe... charcoal + spider glands = lighter fluid? Or... maybe durians could be part of the recipe. I'm not sure why that appeals to me, but it does.
• Restore the fire immunity. I get that it has the effect they were aiming for in that particular scenario (Willow lighting the forest on fire and laughing as everyone else burns), but that's really not the main threat of griefing, and you can still burn a whole forest just fine... from the edge. Without fire immunity, Willow loses the stuff that really made her interesting, strategically, like fire traps.

But at the same time, I'm curious to see what else they have in store for her, because there's clearly some there (hat_willow_orphan)

 

Edit: And on the subject of her being a griefing character, which she definitely was, I don't think the changes impacted that in any meaningful way. What makes her a good griefer is that she starts with a light source and way to light things on fire. The changes don't affect that, giving her a good 6-ish nights worth of lighter right from the start.

[Asparagus]

charcoal + spider glands = lighter fluid? Or... maybe durians could be part of the recipe.

 

"Alcoholic" properties of the spidergland? Yeah!!

 

And biofuel from Durian! XD

 

But what about phlegm? A long shot but maybe used as another lighter fuel source thing

[Michi01]

But what about phlegm? A long shot but maybe used as another lighter fuel source thing

I'm just imagening Willow spilling the phlegm while trying to refuel the lighter.
"Help! The lighter sticks to my hand!"

[Ridley]

The point of the lighters being used up was to prevent 20 Willows from joining the server, dying, and leaving 20 lighters all over the place that never ran out. Refuel-able lighters just defeat the purpose of what Klei was shooting for.

 

No more spider gland recipes for a bit, I get sick of trying to manage the spider glands all the time.

[Sadie]

@ Resumptus

 

Yes there was another post discussing changes to willow but they talked about how they like the changes and wanted to suggest other changes that could be made (that would be a suggestion thread).

 

Mine is to more talk about what people don't like about the changes to the lighter have done (which would be feedback).

 

 

 

SethR

"Her lighter is now craftable and limited: dedicated servers won’t get flooded with piles of lighters this way. We probably need to finesse the recipe a bit, but the lighter is still a worthwhile investment--it lasts 8 times as long as a single torch and isn’t affected by rain! Now that the lighter is craftable, a Willow can craft lighters for other players."

 

 

The recipe does need to be tinkered with, but there in lies the issue now doesn't it. If you make the lighter recipe too easy then no one will make torches because they will have their neighborhood willow make a ton of them. If you make the recipe too hard like what it is now then there is no point in making lighters at all when you can make torches that use less resources that are crucial at the begining of the game.

 

I don't think dedicated servers gettting flooded with piles of lighters was ever an issue. I know personally I would be happy if a willow would pop in die and leave their lighter because I could take it and I wouldnt need torches any more. This also begs the question are you making abagails flower "limited" and craftable as well? Dedicated servers would get flooded with tons of those too. The point of this thread is that the lighter is an essential piece you get for picking willow.

 

I do like the idea Willows can craft lighters for other players, but why not make the one you spawn with infinite like it was, but add the ability to craft limited lighters for other people? It would keep the mechanics of cooperation going but it wouldnt punish willow players who play her because of the lighter and her quirks.
 

[rezecib]

@Sadie, It was particularly the Dedicated Wilderness servers that ended up with piles of lighters. On one I was hosting, I went to the pig king and literally the entire screen was coated in lighters. Evidently someone had been collecting them and making some sort of... shrine or something, but it was pretty ridiculous. But was it an issue? Ehh, mostly in terms of performance, I guess.

[Asparagus]

@rezecib, I forget, can lureplants eat Willow's lighter?

If not, since they're craftable now, shouldn't they be? Sure, they'll be refuelable so why not go full Lantern up on this thing and make it disposable like that... that should solve something right?

 

Well, then we have to make lureplants a big thing... or...

 

Could we just bring Krampus in this and he'll pick up litter from time-to-time? He could appear anywhere in the world and gather "litter" like rot from seeds or discarded material, if it's a player item like Lucy, Abigail's flower or something then that item, upon being picked up by Krampus should return to it's owner, if no owner is found the he'll hold it until he disappears or get's killed... if the player owning it just left the server then he'll get it back upon his return...

 

So basically, I'm pitching Krampus to solve some small performance issues stemming from litter on the screen... like the lighter shrine you were talking about...

 

O__O

 

Krampus...

[Deerclops]

*grumbles and rubs forehead* if the problem is lighter spam, why don't they make it (and other player items) undroppable, or have it vanish when she dies and have her rez/spawn with a new one?

 

I think they could have addressed the problem better- Klei is not Blizzard, and aren't restricted to major content patches.

 

if it was the lighter itself, give it a recharge rate. have it burn fuel, and then she can slowly regen it as time goes by.

 

if it was greifing in general, they could have removed charcoal temporarily from crafting recipes and disabled the “ignite” option for players.

 

This whole "nerf" thing may benefit others, but it does squat for actual players- it's like posting your credit card number online, everyone else will love it, but you're not exactly having much fun, eh?

[Michi01]

I KNOW THE SOLUTION:

-Willows lighter is craftable
-you can fuel it with lighter fuel that only Willow can craft
-her lighter will still vanish when it has 0%

So Willow can fuel her lighter with cheap lighter fuel,
but the world isn't spamed with lighters that don't run
out.

[Chesska]

So basically Willow is even more useless than she was before?

 

Why even play as her if you get absolutely no perks for playing her?

 

And why does this have to affect my co-op server where I play with my friend and nobody griefs? I'm upset.

[CammoAmmo]

The problem is that Willow is being nerfed to try to fix problems that don't specifically deal with her.

- Griefers will always grief with anything. Imagine if wickerbottoms tentacle book was taken away because it could be a griefer tool. Imagine how many things could be removed cause it could be a griefer tool. Klei shouldnt hurt normal Willow players for choosing a character that they like that just happened to have a kit dealing with fire. They should be dealing with griefing in general.

- Willow's lighters are not the only thing making servers lag. There could just as easily be Abigail's flowers or anything else left on the ground; I know the most prevailent one on my server are seeds that birds drop. Therefore, the problem that should be adressed is how to get rid of all these excess items; having them disappear after a certain amount of days is the easiest solution I can think of.

-The only reason why Willow's lighter is useful is that it needs no maintenance at all. One never needs to worry about crafting a new one or about adding fuel. Therefore, making it anything short of infinite is useless. There are already light sources that are cheap and light sources that burn for a long time.

-I guess fire immunity also falls under griefing. Once again, the wrong solution has been implemented. Immunity to fire is a part of Willow's kit. If she's going to take damage, she might as well take full damage from fire cause theres literally no point.

- Removing her insanity fires is one thing that I do agree with, because it's way too dangerous on multiplayer. Burning everything down purposefully is griefing, but insanity fires are the product of inexperienced players. Having a fire spread is part of the game and just another thing you will be punished for, and that's how the game should be. However, an inexperienced player should not be able to mess up other people's progress so quickly and have such a huge effect on them, which is something that only a Willow player can do- oh wait, players who refuse to be revived can also do that. Huh. Guess we better nerf every player now, since they can all turn into ghosts. (All jokes aside, insanity fires do need to be removed, and a slight loss in max sanity could compensate for the buff)

Anyways, my point is that Willow's kit was wonderful. I know that these are not final changes, so I hope klei will listen when I say that one should never completely destroy a character's kit when looking to balance- and in this case, her kit should have barely been touched at all.

[Sadie]

@rezecib

 

I understand that the build up lighters on server is a problem with lag, but nerfing the lighter doesnt do much to solve that problem. You would still have to find all of them and burn them out or the build up continues. Personally I think there should be a way to destroy these items. There should also be an if statement in the code dependant upon the servers protection system i.e password or public. If its a passworded server the item should be destroyable but not decayable. If its public after the owner of the lighter has been offline for X amount of days (maybe make the days changeable on the owners side) the lighter will vanish.

[Uthael]

I wouldn't like to copy-paste the same thing for the third time, so I'll just link it... Check my post here:

http://forums.kleientertainment.com/topic/51396-some-suggestions-for-willow/

 

It states the obvious and already told, but there are some suggestions in it, too.