Maxwell’s current beta state

[Kappachinos296]

Give reasons if you’d like for what you want to see changed or added.

[CyberSkink]

I voted “no” because there are some things I want changed, but for the most part I like it!

[Memerguy]

 maxwell still needs some changes, he looks off his cast timers are terrible and servants are strange

[edulopes]

i already talked my last batch of opnions here

 

[SullyD]

I voted "no" because the WORST thing that exists at the moment is aggro on Maxwell. 

[Cheggf]

They could ship it as is and be good, but I compiled my thoughts on how to make it even better here.

[Gi-Go]

I'm a little worried that klei won't fix workers and they'll stay dumb forever. 

[LDee]

No because he's way to overpowered in combat. The ability to lock enemies, especially bosses and their minions, in place at almost no cost is just silly.  It basically makes all raid bosses a joke because canceling both their ability to move and locking up their minions means 90% of what made them difficult is gone. 

Add to that the fact that he can spam at almost no cost dualists that are both far stronger than the originals and in far greater numbers than the original, and you've made a character that just breaks the game.  

 

The ability to hold enemies, especially bosses, in place should be removed from the game completely and replaced by some other ability that doesn't break every single raid boss fight.  If this ability absolutely must be in the game, the cost of using it should scale based on both the size and quantity of the enemies being held.  

His ability to instantly summon 6 dualists that can withstand multiple hits from bosses should be balanced by making it more expensive to do so.  It should cost at least 1 NM fuel to summon a dualist, even that might be too little considering how easy it is to get NMfuel.

[grahm]

I've said once earlier, gonna say that again

I'm opting for a unique gameplay. Atm Maxwell could just spam duellists and in order to be effective stay with them or fight along

But primarily he is a puppet master, not a brave knight encouraging his squires to attack and participate in fight, it's just weird. If one wants to be a minion brawler have webber, fishy, tame crabs, pigs. This isn't even the matter of power, that looks nice in order to kill bosses it's about gameplay. And i personally want that Maxwell does something really-really special. Like everyone could tame creatures and make them farm and fight along with you. Of course nobody else could have their minions fetch them stuff, this is definitely nice. But in terms of deuilists? Looks not that good. I know that not a lot of people like controlling different minions and strategy games, but why would you play Maxwell after all? Because he is strong? Oh yeah, i have a feeling that just most of the people just like him because he's strong...prob never tried to play him consistently before. Clap-Clap.

And i honestly don't get people who constantly say, that staying in the back and watching as your minions fight instead of you isn't fun. Well, the Maxwell is a puppet master, why would he at all? As said before, go get some tamable things. Sure thing, don't restrict him from doing that, he used to have his sword and armour in handy before, but it would be nice to make both strats equally strong and viable, not like you are close - they get damage. You are fighting? The overall DPS skyrockets even more.

And in terms of item gradation stuff. I'd prefer to have permanent craftabale buffs, not something to wear, I'm dapper Maxwell, i don't want to wear stupid skull or anything and look overall as ridiculous as possible. 

[ShadowDuelist]

Not sure if Klei can see the amount of Beta hours I got, but I really tried him a lot. He's amazing, and even if it was released tomorrow I'd be super happy.

[BB Marioni]

25 minutes ago, ShadowDuelist said:

Not sure if Klei can see the amount of Beta hours I got, but I really tried him a lot. He's amazing, and even if it was released tomorrow I'd be super happy.

same. although I'm hoping they would still implement a separate "void storage" for each Maxwell in a world. Sharing 1 inventoy space means more maxwells = more people using the same storage from anywhere.

 

[Ohan]

Everything he does is extremely powerful and unsatisfyingly cheap. 

All his spells could be made free and barely anything would change thats how cheap they are. He spawns out of the gate with 50 free spells for Alter’s sake. 

Low max hp while he can still chug healing food and wear night armor without the sanity drain over time is also a very understated downside in exchange for everything he can do now. 

[Dr. Safety]

7 minutes ago, Ohan said:

Everything he does is extremely powerful and unsatisfyingly cheap. 

All his spells could be made free and barely anything would change thats how cheap they are. He spawns out of the gate with 50 free spells for Alter’s sake. 

Low max hp while he can still chug healing food and wear night armor without the sanity drain over time is also a very understated downside in exchange for everything he can do now. 

I definitely agree that he spawns with too much potential. I'd honestly be okay with spells being locked behind magic progression altogether, but I know others probably wouldn't agree. Removing his nightmare fuel he spawns with seems appropriate, and even somehow removing his 20 spells from having a fully charged codex at the gate. 

Basically I think he should have a rough early game in exchange for a power spike that comes once he gets magic up

[Qairon]

55 minutes ago, Ohan said:

Everything he does is extremely powerful and unsatisfyingly cheap. 

All his spells could be made free and barely anything would change thats how cheap they are. He spawns out of the gate with 50 free spells for Alter’s sake. 

Low max hp while he can still chug healing food and wear night armor without the sanity drain over time is also a very understated downside in exchange for everything he can do now. 

The true downside nobody is talking about is that putting on night armor drops your backpack, making it ripe for the taking for the Wilson that just walked by and saw a free backpack. Kappa

[Hornete]

11 minutes ago, Qairon said:

The true downside nobody is talking about is that putting on night armor drops your backpack, making it ripe for the taking for the Wilson that just walked by and saw a free backpack. Kappa

I have a solution, Maxwell should get the Vortex Cloak from Hamlet upon spawning in! .

[Qairon]

1 minute ago, Hornete said:

I have a solution, Maxwell should get the Vortex Cloak from Hamlet upon spawning in! .

Absolutely lmao.

[ShadowDuelist]

1 hour ago, Hornete said:

I have a solution, Maxwell should get the Vortex Cloak from Hamlet upon spawning in! .

I get it’s a joke but if you play alone he sort of got that, with the hat + night armor he could very well never use a backpack and always exist fully armored.

3 hours ago, BB Marioni said:

I'm hoping they would still implement a separate "void storage" for each Maxwell in a world. Sharing 1 inventoy space means more maxwells = more people using the same storage from anywhere

But it is not meant to be a personal “Woby”, just a way to quickly teleport items. It does work like an extra storage if you play alone (and it excels at that) but otherwise I think it is fine as it is.
 

2 hours ago, Dr. Safety said:

Removing his nightmare fuel he spawns with seems appropriate, and even somehow removing his 20 spells from having a fully charged codex at the gate. 

Basically I think he should have a rough early game in exchange for a power spike that comes once he gets magic up

I’m glad someone else thinks like that.

I think this is the only thing that makes Maxwell feel imbalanced, the duelists progression is great now, but it’s a small thing in the grand scheme of spells he got. I wouldn’t remove the duelists progression but the big spells themselves should be locked upon some small secret knowledge quest now. I’d make the duelists themselves be unlocked by a shadow manipulator (Or wicker’s encyclopedia equivalent) and I’d make the prison be unlocked by using a pseudoscience. 

[Dr. Safety]

3 minutes ago, ShadowDuelist said:

I think this is the only thing that makes Maxwell feel imbalanced, the duelists progression is great now, but it’s a small thing in the grand scheme of spells he got. I wouldn’t remove the duelists progression but the big spells themselves should be locked upon some small secret knowledge quest now. I’d make the duelists themselves be unlocked by a shadow manipulator (Or wicker’s encyclopedia equivalent) and I’d make the prison be unlocked by using a pseudoscience. 

Honestly, I really like the idea that Maxwell doesn't start being good until magic is unlocked and then snowballs as he gets access to ruins/FW loot. It seems really fitting for him. Before the shadow manipulator he is just a dapper stage magician with the magic hat and some parlor tricks, but then starts being powerful the more he dives into magic.

[BB Marioni]

11 hours ago, ShadowDuelist said:

But it is not meant to be a personal “Woby”, just a way to quickly teleport items. It does work like an extra storage if you play alone (and it excels at that) but otherwise I think it is fine as it is.

I understand sharing it with people in base by accessing your magic box, or having 2 people have access to it outside base by having the hat on one person and chester on another, but having more than 1 maxwell in a world would render the other maxwell's storage ability useless as it would seem like he is just accessing the first maxwell's storage. 

[LeafyFly]

1 hour ago, BB Marioni said:

I understand sharing it with people in base by accessing your magic box, or having 2 people have access to it outside base by having the hat on one person and chester on another, but having more than 1 maxwell in a world would render the other maxwell's storage ability useless as it would seem like he is just accessing the first maxwell's storage. 

No matter how many Maxwells there are in the world, the storage space is shared. It's a public resource on your server.Negotiate with other players about how to use the storage space better, rather than asking for giving everyone a private storage space.

[Pig Princess]

On 11/15/2022 at 11:57 AM, LeafyFly said:

Negotiate with other players about how to use the storage space better, rather than asking for giving everyone a private storage space.

As if majority of people even wanted to negotiate... And even if they wanted to, people often happen to disagree. What would likely to happen in case 2 Maxwells need same storage is one of them just dropping stuff of another in some random place because they think they need that space more, and/or won't even ask and steal, especially in case strangers. And it doesn't even need to be Maxwell, just any player that found any magician's box/shadow chester.

There is a reason why people hammer lazy deserters (if build them at all), moon dials (if built), get rid of moonlences and don't keep orb at common base, there are reasons why people build bases in remote locations, keep all really valuable staff on the boat in open sea or prefer to base on monkey island and deal with monkeys rather than particular category of players. Even if 10 players are the friendliest and the most willing to cooperate and negotiate, 1 jerk is enough to screw up everyone. Usually people are neutral and don't care about anything, so it's even harder to somehow defend oneself or punish robber. Other people should have means to protect themselves. You are making game community look like bunch of altruists which is not the case, and everyone who doesn't think about world as place of eternal friendship, let alone protects their personal space, like some kind of weirdo.

Right now magician's hat as it is is very poorly implemented addition taking into account multiplayer nature of the game. One and only shadow dimension harms both well-organized teams and strangers on the same server. Unless people don't store anything there period, in which case it says a lot about design.

Why do people fail to understand that adding more privacy to item usage could actually promote cooperation and make item more interesting overall?

[LeafyFly]

2 hours ago, Pig Princess said:

As if majority of people even wanted to negotiate... And even if they wanted to, people often happen to disagree. What would likely to happen in case 2 Maxwells need same storage is one of them just dropping stuff of another in some random place because they think they need that space more, and/or won't even ask and steal, especially in case strangers. And it doesn't even need to be Maxwell, just any player that found any magician's box/shadow chester.

There is a reason why people hammer lazy deserters (if build them at all), moon dials (if built), get rid of moonlences and don't keep orb at common base, there are reasons why people build bases in remote locations, keep all really valuable staff on the boat in open sea or prefer to base on monkey island and deal with monkeys rather than particular category of players. Even if 10 players are the friendliest and the most willing to cooperate and negotiate, 1 jerk is enough to screw up everyone. Usually people are neutral and don't care about anything, so it's even harder to somehow defend oneself or punish robber. Other people should have means to protect themselves. You are making game community look like bunch of altruists which is not the case, and everyone who doesn't think about world as place of eternal friendship, let alone protects their personal space, like some kind of weirdo.

Right now magician's hat as it is is very poorly implemented addition taking into account multiplayer nature of the game. One and only shadow dimension harms both well-organized teams and strangers on the same server. Unless people don't store anything there period, in which case it says a lot about design.

Why do people fail to understand that adding more privacy to item usage could actually promote cooperation and make item more interesting overall?

It was designed as a public storage, where players could exchange items. It's not a private chester, it just acts like a private chester when you're playing alone, because in that case you have all the public resources. When you're not playing alone, return it to its original use of exchanging items with other players instead of storing personal items. Otherwise, any other player has the right to take the item you put in, which is not stealing because once you put the item in a public space, it no longer belongs to you. I know you want a personal chester, but you also want to be able to exchange items by it, which is greedy, and not the shadow containers are designed for.

[Pig Princess]

32 minutes ago, LeafyFly said:

I know you want a personal chester, but you also want to be able to exchange items by it, which is greedy, and not the shadow containers are designed for.

Except I don't need extra storage as much as being sure that things I pass to people I trust would be received by those people. I can manage my inventory perfectly fine, without any chesters and so on. If magician's hat stays as is, I would just not craft it period, because on personal server I don't need that space, and on public server items I would like to transfer could very well not reach destination.

Not to mention drop in efficiency if multiple Maxwells or subteams try to use the hat to pass resources.

But if possible, I would rather have item that is actually good and interesting to use instead of abandoning part of character's kit. Which is why I'm here discussing it.

32 minutes ago, LeafyFly said:

It was designed as a public storage

Which would also be forever empty unless people treat it as trash can and are ok with anything disappearing at any moment for everyone.

It could be a good strategy to keep things like sewing kits, healing/sanity food bundle, emergency weapon or commonly used tools here - for everyone to use at any moment - but alas: no one would use this space for those things and carry those items in regular inventory, much like it is now without magician's hat. I wouldn't even use magician box unless I'm in voice chat and I'm sure the other person can take items from box the moment I put them there, which minimal chance of stealing.

Edit: I thought replies can't merge as long as 1st one has reaction on it. I'm sorry for inconvenience.

[LeafyFly]

2 hours ago, Pig Princess said:

Except I don't need extra storage as much as being sure that things I pass to people I trust would be received by those people. I can manage my inventory perfectly fine, without any chesters and so on. If magician's hat stays as is, I would just not craft it period, because on personal server I don't need that space, and on public server items I would like to transfer could very well not reach destination.

I would say that most players are friendly, and unfriendly players don't play on one server for very long. You can simply say who you want to give the item to and ask that person to wait by the chest and take it as soon as you put it. If it can be snatched away by another player, give it to him, because he really needs it.

2 hours ago, Pig Princess said:

It could be a good strategy to keep things like sewing kits, healing/sanity food bundle, emergency weapon or commonly used tools here - for everyone to use at any moment - but alas: no one would use this space for those things and carry those items in regular inventory, much like it is now without magician's hat.

That's what I mean when I say you should negotiate with other players and come to an agreement. It's not as hard as it sounds. As long as you're not on a competitive server, talk with a good attitude and other players will listen.

In addition, Desert Stone is a good item to keep in the shadow container at all times.

 

[Pig Princess]

50 minutes ago, LeafyFly said:

I would say that most players are friendly, and unfriendly players don't play on one server for very long

Yes, a lot of people are actually nice to play with. If I was playing exclusively with friends, I probably wouldn't even think about such situations, especially if those are irl friends and they sit right next to me and can even peek into my screen. But even with a lot of friendly people few not caring/with ill intentions are enough for preferable strategy to shift from "open community" to "partisan encampments in least convenient places on the map which only few people know about".

Relatively recently I played on yet another public server with some very nice people (for the most part). Location of bases were the following: spawn (small camp), oasis (turned out to be decoy base), monkey island + Pearl's island (they were within screen distance), waterlogged at the opposite to monkey island corner of the map (near the very corner), my boat base, cave entrance base, base in forgotten place past rock lobster biome that was dead end, and finally - ruins base way past monkeys and fissures. Can you guess what bases were burnt/hamnered/raided and how often? Spawn base - regularly, we didn't bother to even rebuild it after a while; oasis base - several times, some of those were sincere accidents, but it was located quite far and a lot of times we just refused to tell base location only for people to ragequit, otherwise accidents would be more common; monkey island base - griefed once, but it was because other player was noob Woodie who just happened to find it as weregoose and did stupid things by accident; cave base - was raided at least once (bye-bye bundle of dragonpies); ruins base - held steadily, and even though some jerk spent 99% of my bee queen crown durability, other people reaching this place were considerate and generally adequate; base past rock lobsters - never was raided, impregnable fortress of the caves; my boat base and my waterlogged base - unreached by strangers fortress, but sometimes it was useful for friends to have safe place nearby, and I invited some strangers who seemed trustworthy to my boat base to use bookcase and cook some food.

See, it was fun to play with people, but all precautions that we did were actually a necessity as was shown by spawn and oasis base: even if friendly, people are oblivious of a lot of things and let bases of other people burn, take their bundles with food and let contents spoil like nobody's business because they are hungry (despite field of banana bushes nearby and other food), hammer your black Fuelweaver statues because they think white would be better (and never actually place white ones) and so on. If people leave some flint in chest near spawn for late joiners, first person almost always takes all of it without ever returning borrowed for next joiners; if people are borrowing something like bee queen crown left in the ruins specifically near station to not loose sanity from nightmare lights - they would either break it, or leave at 1%; if people find pirate stash - they will claim they are legit owners of everything they found there, even if actual owner lost items due to bugged pirate raid which attacked Wonkey-owner (100% vanilla).

People steal in the blink if an eye, people don't even care about running screen away to houndius and not spawn hounds on glommer (in the end I evacuated him to waterlogged base and brought 1-2 stacks of glommer goop to oasis base periodically. People are legit stupid enough to threaten regulars to find and grief their base unless and because they refuse to tell base's location (15 days until the end of autumn, but this time people managed to kick that clown, although it was hard to convince enough people do it (!)). I can go on - even if friendly, majority either doesn't care, or are stupid. I don't want this, I want to interact with nice people and pass resources to them if needed.

50 minutes ago, LeafyFly said:

If it can be snatched away by another player, give it to him, because he really needs it.

But that is exactly what is the problem: in the end magician's hat wouldn't be used nearly as much as it could.