Improving Willow's Skill Tree Even Further

[Reecitz]

In this current beta, Klei is currently working on making Willow's Shadow Fire a more reliable and worthwhile spell to choose, making her Lunar Flames more intuitive to use, and buffing Bernie's regeneration skills. They have officially stated that they are not removing the cooldowns from her affinity spells because they want the spells to serve as secondary weaponry of sorts, rather than being Willow's primary means of combat; that's alright with me, although I wish using them alongside basic combat was more intuitive, especially for those who are unlucky enough to play with controllers. 

I still feel that some of Willow's other skills could be improved, specifically those in the Lighter branch - improvements that'll allow her to differentiate herself from Wilson-esque combat by using fire and fire-related abilities more often.

Here are some ideas I have in mind for you to hopefully consider and work around with:

 

- The concept of "dealing damage over time" is really interesting, and since poison currently isn't a mechanic in DST, fire is the closest thing, and Willow definitely has the means to embrace this playstyle. One suggestion of mine is to further increase the damage of fire, but if you're unsure about making that change by default, you could add some synergy with existing items by making it so the additional damage applies when fighting with items like a torch, fire staff, or Willow's lighter, or while a certain skill is active, like Burning Frenzy. 

- Speaking of Burning Frenzy, although the skill works, the process of applying the effect, setting a mob on fire, and fighting with a proper is rather awkward to do in general, especially for those unskilled in inventory-swapping. Some people also believe that it simply increasing base damage against those on fire is uninspiring. If you truly insist on keeping the skill instead of replacing it, then at least consider making the effect last longer (or make it a toggle state that consumes embers over time while active instead), and/or make it so Willow automatically ignites mobs she hits.

- She has synergy with scalemail, making her skills apply to it, but it encourages a tanking playstyle, something neither Willow or the armor is known for; however, the synergy could be improved by making the armor more durable (or making it so it repairs itself) while worn by her, giving her better protection, and/or allowing Willow to set mobs on fire by hitting them.

- Speaking of synergy, perhaps there could be more of that with the fire staff. Maybe it can last longer for Willow, or maybe it actually deals damage, fire damage specifically; it'd be small, but maybe the fire damage over time could be increased further, as stated earlier. 

- I haven't even discussed the kolalephant in the room, and it's the fact that half of the mobs in the game can't be set on fire. I'm fine with this being the case for mobs that are also immune to fire damage, but I feel like Willow should take advantage of those who can still be indirectly damaged by fire. A popular suggestion to solve this issue, one that arose when Willow's skill tree was first introduced, was giving Willow the ability to set herself on fire, making herself a burning source that damaged mobs who got too close. This could be a new skill, a skill that replaces Burning Frenzy (apply it to Burning Frenzy itself), or even base-kit somehow (maybe the lighter, torch, and fire staff has a prompt to do so while it's in the inventory but not equipped). An alternative to this dilemma that could be done would be giving Willow the ability to ignite these specific mobs once she chooses one of the affinity lighter skills, but it'd be planar damage instead of fire, and the fire effects would be based on the alignment chosen.

 

It's always insightful when someone at Klei directly gives their input on the decisions they have made, and whether or not suggestions made are possible or not; Although thatt's not likely to happen here, having them at least see and read through this essay of a post would be greatly appreciated. 

Edited March 11 by Reecitz

[SSneaky]

There should be a fire damage modified that works sort of inverse of electric damage, that being instead of doing more damage to igniteble targets it, well you know, ignites the target.

Along with that willow could benefit from bonus damage with fire weapons While Burning Frenzy Is Active.

as of now the only Fire "weapons" are the touch, lighter, fire dart, and fire staff (the later 2 need impact damage).

Though willows alignment skills could deal sudo fire damage (get the damage buff from Burning Frenzy without setting targets on fire).

Also willows fire cast and combustion spells could deal a small amount of fire damage (like 25)p

[Reecitz]

Don't know if this actually does anything or not, but bump because why not; I've seen other people doing this.