Torch Tree Adjustments

[CrisBlu]

Perhaps it’s too late for this but I figured I’d at least try to put some thoughts about this out there. I honestly don’t think the torch tree is necessarily all that bad, just underwhelming, but looking at the old Strange New Powers poster I totally get why Klei has gone this angle; Wilson holding a torch against the darkness is iconic and I really dig the theming here.

 

My problem with the torch tree is it’s lack of return per skill point, because imo the only way it’s worth using the torch tree is to get all 6 upgrades; that’s the only way you make the torch a viable competitor to the lantern and miner’s hat. My suggestion is to move the light and durability bonuses to the same branch and have you unlock them together, and then use the free branch to give the torch something unique not competitive with the lantern. I have three suggestions but to be clear I think the most important part of this suggestion is getting the torch light and durability on the same branch and putting something interesting there instead, to increase the variety of overall Wilson builds.

 

Suggestion 1:

Give the torch a sanity aura when held by Wilson, I thought this was neat and easy to implement 

Tier 1: 5 Sanity/minute (10 Sanity/minute for Willow)

Tier 2: 10 Sanity/minute (15 Sanity/minute for Willow)

Tier 3: 15 Sanity/minute (20 Sanity/minute for Willow)

I think this feeds in well to the “Banish the darkness” imagery Wilson got on his early posters and it works as an easy way to cancel out nighttime sanity drain for multiple people, if that’s desired.

 

Suggestion 2:

Give a negative health aura to nightmare creatures around Wilson while he’s holding a torch

Tier 1: -100 Health/minute

(enough to kill crawling horrors in 3 minutes)

Tier 2: -200 Health/minute

(enough to kill crawling horrors in 1.5 minutes)

Tier: -300 Health/minute

(enough to kill crawling horrors in 1 minute)

aoe against shadow creatures, a creature type that isn’t that threatening but can overwhelm you easily in certain situations. Honestly not sure about the balancing on this one.

 

Suggestion 3:

Causes shadow creatures in range to despawn, not even sure how you would implement this tbh

Tier 1: Every 15 seconds, chooses a shadow creature in range and causes it to vanish

Tier 2: Every 10 seconds, chooses a shadow creature in range and causes it to vanish

Tier 3: Every 5 seconds, chooses a shadow creature in range and causes it to vanish

Cuts the farming potential of the torch from suggestion two while still allowing a lot of shadow creatures to potentially overwhelm you.

 

any thoughts?

[maxwell_winters]

6 minutes ago, CrisBlu said:

Give the torch a sanity aura when held by Wilson, I thought this was neat and easy to implement 

Something crafted from grass and twigs shouldn't be such a potent sanity restorative. That would literally break the sanity system making him the easiest sanity character in the game. 

10 minutes ago, CrisBlu said:

Give a negative health aura to nightmare creatures around Wilson while he’s holding a torch

Causes shadow creatures in range to despawn, not even sure how you would implement this tbh

Again, it's crafted from grass and twigs. Why would it have magic properties?

[CrisBlu]

18 minutes ago, maxwell_winters said:

Something crafted from grass and twigs shouldn't be such a potent sanity restorative. That would literally break the sanity system making him the easiest sanity character in the game. 

Again, it's crafted from grass and twigs. Why would it have magic properties?

Looking at the numbers the sanity bonus the numbers could be decreased to 3.5, 5, 7.5, but Willow does have something similar as a perk with her fire sanity regain so the concept is not unprecedented. Tbh I’m not too fussed about the particular numbers as much as I am the concept, I’m not really equipped to attempt to balance this game, the numbers are just a rough estimate of how I think the mechanic should feel.

The torch is “magical” because Wilson is using it, in the same way Wilson’s beard grows “magically faster” because he put insight points into it. 

[bjanmanjs]

Doing AoE damage to shadows would be really nice for getting rid of woven shadows. Wonder if it would allow him to kill unseen hands without going insane.

Perhaps it could also scare off night hands and Wavey Jones's hands in a large AoE instead of having to step directly on them.

If the AoE also affects thrown torches then you could use that to create a large anti-shadow field. Could by very useful for fighting the fuelweaver: thrown down a torch to take care of the woven shadows for you so you can focus on killing him. This could also help with fighting the ancient guardian if it destroyed his otherwise-invulnerable shadow tentacles.

I think it'd be more fitting if the torch reduced the sanity drain from darkness rather than giving sanity. The idea being that it's not the fire itself that's comforting (except for Willow) but rather its protection from the darkness. During night (or while underground) the effect'd be the same, but during the day it wouldn't help you since there's no darkness for it to protect you from.

This reduction could also extend to the sanity drain from being near shadows and nightmare lights; another thing that would help with the fuelweaver: fight him near a torch to reduce the impact of his insanity aura in addition to dealing a little bit of damage over time.

Come to think of it, having abilities that help with killing a certain boss (and also the two bosses required to summon him) would make sense for a character who has an ability locked behind killing said boss.

[Yuuko]

As it sits now I'm finding lanterns are being phased out of my play b/c the lightbulb upkeep is too much.  I start with a rushing ruins lately to get starcallers and a magi, and for most of my lighting needs that's all I use.  The only times I've used a lantern is when I needed to have a backpack with me or when I'm in the caves anyway.  In my current world I crafted 6 lanterns when I came up from the ruins on day 10.  Its day 180 on this world, my lanterns are finally depleted, and I'm not in a hurry to refill them.  Grass and twigs are readily available on the surface, already on the list of things to accumulate towards base, and already bulking up with current farming methods.  I don't think crafting extra torches is going to require any changes, so I'm all for the improved brightness with Wilson.

The brightness and throw perks easily let the torch replace the lantern.  Any time I need to move and drop a light source multiple times in a night I could just craft a torch.  I can still use magi when traveling and starcallers when I'm parking in one spot for a bit.  In the caves I'll probably continue using lantern / moggles b/c the fuel is down there anyway.

Durability is a bit of a rip off though.  Torches last soo short a time that 100% bonus durability doesn't feel that cool, honestly I'd just craft 2 torches and put the points somewhere else.  As I said I'm already stockpiling grass and twigs, using them on a torch here or there isn't a big enough tax that cutting the cost in half matters.  Really what I'd need is the convenience, the confidence knowing my torch will always outlast the night - even the longest night in default winter.  In short unless the durability tree hits 150% I don't see any reason to use it b/c I'll have to craft a second torch *anyway*

imo a buff to +50% / +100% / +200% would be tempting.

As for your suggestions - I kinda like the idea of letting his torches repel shadows.  idk about exactly how you implemented it...  But lets say they combined durability and brightness to 1 leg and turn the other leg into a "banishing the darkness" chain.  Just give the torch bonus damage to shadow creatures.  This would be cool for new and experienced players - new players because shadow monsters are sometimes tough for them to deal with, and having a real weapon against them from day 1 can help them gain a better footing - and for experienced players who want to stay insane to farm nm fuel but don't always want to waste real weapon durability on them.  Something like 20 / 35 / 50 would be cool.

[CrisBlu]

2 hours ago, Shosuko said:

As it sits now I'm finding lanterns are being phased out of my play b/c the lightbulb upkeep is too much.  I start with a rushing ruins lately to get starcallers and a magi, and for most of my lighting needs that's all I use.  The only times I've used a lantern is when I needed to have a backpack with me or when I'm in the caves anyway.  In my current world I crafted 6 lanterns when I came up from the ruins on day 10.  Its day 180 on this world, my lanterns are finally depleted, and I'm not in a hurry to refill them.  Grass and twigs are readily available on the surface, already on the list of things to accumulate towards base, and already bulking up with current farming methods.  I don't think crafting extra torches is going to require any changes, so I'm all for the improved brightness with Wilson.

The brightness and throw perks easily let the torch replace the lantern.  Any time I need to move and drop a light source multiple times in a night I could just craft a torch.  I can still use magi when traveling and starcallers when I'm parking in one spot for a bit.  In the caves I'll probably continue using lantern / moggles b/c the fuel is down there anyway.

Durability is a bit of a rip off though.  Torches last soo short a time that 100% bonus durability doesn't feel that cool, honestly I'd just craft 2 torches and put the points somewhere else.  As I said I'm already stockpiling grass and twigs, using them on a torch here or there isn't a big enough tax that cutting the cost in half matters.  Really what I'd need is the convenience, the confidence knowing my torch will always outlast the night - even the longest night in default winter.  In short unless the durability tree hits 150% I don't see any reason to use it b/c I'll have to craft a second torch *anyway*

imo a buff to +50% / +100% / +200% would be tempting.

As for your suggestions - I kinda like the idea of letting his torches repel shadows.  idk about exactly how you implemented it...  But lets say they combined durability and brightness to 1 leg and turn the other leg into a "banishing the darkness" chain.  Just give the torch bonus damage to shadow creatures.  This would be cool for new and experienced players - new players because shadow monsters are sometimes tough for them to deal with, and having a real weapon against them from day 1 can help them gain a better footing - and for experienced players who want to stay insane to farm nm fuel but don't always want to waste real weapon durability on them.  Something like 20 / 35 / 50 would be cool.

I think this is an interesting take, personally the light bulb gathering never impacted me that much but maybe I haven’t played in a world as long as you have. My only problem with simply increasing the durability is that, correct me if I’m wrong, I don’t see a point to increasing the durability of the torch and nothing else? Like who is ever going to pick the durability branch and not the light branch? The former depends on the latter to be useful so just lump them together I say.

 

Tbh I think a torch being a weapon against shadows is perfectly valid, I would also be happy about that but I may increase the damage of the torch against shadows a lot so that it’s a go to option even late game.

[Yuuko]

9 hours ago, CrisBlu said:

I think this is an interesting take, personally the light bulb gathering never impacted me that much but maybe I haven’t played in a world as long as you have. My only problem with simply increasing the durability is that, correct me if I’m wrong, I don’t see a point to increasing the durability of the torch and nothing else? Like who is ever going to pick the durability branch and not the light branch? The former depends on the latter to be useful so just lump them together I say.

 

Tbh I think a torch being a weapon against shadows is perfectly valid, I would also be happy about that but I may increase the damage of the torch against shadows a lot so that it’s a go to option even late game.

I don't think its about playing in a world a long time, as much as its trying to maximize efficiency in the early game.  I've been playing Warly and Winona a lot lately and they both have a lot of things they want to get set up.  As I looked at the list of things I wanted to do, how much time it takes to do them etc I had to prioritize.  Things like dfly were a tough one to evaluate because I like the furnace before first winter, but the time it takes to set that up conflicted with other things like beefalo taming or setting up bee queen trap.  Exploration time on the surface was a big sink too.  What I found was a reasonable answer was to rush ruins first for a magi and starcaller to tackle these two issues.  What I found was that while the magi helped a lot with early exploration, its light source was actually sufficient for most cases.  Its normal to bounce around at low sanity unless you do something to specifically cap it up, so there is always a steady supply of nm fuel coming in.  After I started using it the chore of gathering lightbulbs became more apparent.

This definitely set my perceptions differently, making me eager for the torch tree.  The times I did use a lantern were because I needed to light up an area short term, like I was fighting / mining / chopping but wasn't going to be there long enough to really warrant a dwarf star.  I normally have twigs and grass with me anyway, so in these cases I could toss a torch, use it for the night and just let it burn out where currently I'm packing the lantern with me for these trips.