Reason Why Powercreep is a Thing

[Jakepeng99]

Most of the strongest characters in the game have little downsides. Even some of the weaker ones it is kinda a problem because Wilson's identity of being "no downsides, some ok upsides" is obselete.

Winona

She is getting a skilltree now, but her getting slightly hungry while crafting downside does nothing to compensate any power.

Wickerbottom

She has yet to get a skilltree, but her food spoilage and sleep thing is often never encountered by a lot of players. Sleeping is better than ever but it is still small.

Woodie

I play Woodie a lot, but him having no downsides at all, along with a powerful and versatile kit basically makes him buff Wilson.

Maxwell

Half health isn't nessisarly bad, but it is often barely impactful for Maxwell players and too little.

 

Why add downsides?

Besides from balance, downsides make the character feel much more fresh and different than the other characters. Wendy's damage debuff encourages fighting with abigail playstyle, Wanda's downside is a new mechanic to play, Wortox encourages a soul stealing lifestyle, Wigfrid's encourages a fighting playstyle, ect ect.

The best downside of them all is Wormwood's. They link with all his upsides, and it can also work as an upside too sometimes (eating red caps)

Problem is, adding good downsides to these characters is really hard. What could they be?

 

[grm9]

22 minutes ago, Jakepeng99 said:

Wanda's downside is a new mechanic to play

it just gives you free passive healing, it's more of an advantage, she has less risk and reward in comparison to wolfgang

22 minutes ago, Jakepeng99 said:

Besides from balance, downsides make the character feel much more fresh and different than the other characters

they just force you to do something most of the time, even if wendy wouldn't have had a less than x1 damage multiplier by default it'd be better to use abigail in comparison to not using it anyway, wanda's inability to heal from anything just removes already obsolete options because free passive healing is better than anything, wortox's x0.5 hunger just discourages you from eating anything except souls unless it's just leftovers that you can't spend on anything else and got as a byproduct of something else, simplifying hunger to just eating souls and leftovers that you get on the way

[reddocc]

Again Wanda's downside is inventory management not healing

[Jakepeng99]

54 minutes ago, grm9 said:

just gives you free passive healing, it's more of an advantage, she has less risk and reward in comparison to wolfgang

Its still a downside that changes gameplay.

19 minutes ago, Pedro cc said:

Again Wanda's downside is inventory management not healing

Doesn't matter.

[Mysterious box]

45 minutes ago, grm9 said:

it just gives you free passive healing, it's more of an advantage, she has less risk and reward in comparison to wolfgang

Depends on how you play her really young Wanda is low risk low reward, middle-aged is medium risk medium reward, and old age is high risk high reward.

48 minutes ago, grm9 said:

wanda's inability to heal from anything just removes already obsolete options because free passive healing is better than anything,

It really isn't they both have their advantages high value food means you can make far more mistakes or even tank in quite abit of scenarios should you choose to while on the other hand Wanda's healing clock gives you the benefit of saving time with skill as it takes time to heal but you never have to actively pursue healing.

 

57 minutes ago, grm9 said:

wortox's x0.5 hunger just discourages you from eating anything except souls unless it's just leftovers that you can't spend on anything else and got as a byproduct of something else, simplifying hunger to just eating souls and leftovers that you get on the way

Honestly Wortox's hunger downside really isn't impactful enough to overturn how high value meat dishes are and how abundant food is a meaty stew for example is nearly half his hunger recovered in 1 dish despite his downside. Not gonna say there's a right way to play him but I just see using souls for food outside of emergencies as wasteful.

[grm9]

15 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Depends on how you play her really young Wanda is low risk low reward, middle-aged is medium risk medium reward, and old age is high risk high reward

750 effective hp isn't high risk and reward is lower than wolfgang's

15 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

It really isn't they both have their advantages high value food means you can make far more mistakes or even tank in quite abit of scenarios should you choose to while on the other hand Wanda's healing clock gives you the benefit of saving time with skill as it takes time to heal but you never have to actively pursue healing

you never end up lacking healing from clocks and you can tank when using them

15 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Honestly Wortox's hunger downside really isn't impactful enough to overturn how high value meat dishes are and how abundant food is a meaty stew for example is nearly half his hunger recovered in 1 dish despite his downside. Not gonna say there's a right way to play him but I just see using souls for food outside of emergencies as wasteful

that's why i've said that you'd eat normal food if you get it as a byproduct of doing something else, killing 6 bees seems faster than getting ingredients for 2 meaty stews and making crock pots otherwise

[Jakepeng99]

7 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Honestly Wortox's hunger downside really isn't impactful enough to overturn how high value meat dishes are and how abundant food is a meaty stew for example is nearly half his hunger recovered in 1 dish despite his downside. Not gonna say there's a right way to play him but I just see using souls for food outside of emergencies as wasteful.

It halves their health and sainity gains too.

[grm9]

4 minutes ago, Jakepeng99 said:

It halves their health and sainity gains too

you get souls for healing and that's why you get halved sanity drain from stuff

21 minutes ago, Jakepeng99 said:

Its still a downside that changes gameplay

by simplifying a mechanic

[Sacco]

I got some ideas on how to make characters more balanced/challenging/interesting to play, whatever you call it.

Winona could use some more perks related to her hunger, like faster hunger loss, more hunger required per craft (like 1 per EVERY single craft), but i honestly don't know much aboout these downsides, because they'd be just annoyances i guess.

For wicker i'd like to see recipes changes, i like the idea of killing a boss and crafting a book with his loot, it makes you feel powerful (you killed a boss and therefore you can gain some portion of his power)

like the bee book, i'd say add 1 royale jelly to the crafting recipe but make it so you can make bees charge to enemies.

something similar wit hthe full moon book, make it cost a cc shard, great nerf i know, but it'd be more logical even to a lore point.

Woodie just needs his skills to get tweaked (simple nerfs to the numbers and maybe a couple new minor downsides)

Then maxwell, i think spawning duelists should cost him 15 health, like in original dst, so now a maxwell player has to decide "do i fight so my shadows don't die but i risk to take damage or i don't fight so i don't risk to die but i will lose health when re-spawning my dead shadows?

[00petar00]

I don't like downsides, it iss good that so many of them don't matter. I don't want to be forced to put up with specific downside just because I pick a character because some of the upsides and may even decide against playing character because downside may not be worth putting up with for their upside.

[Well-met]

42 minutes ago, 00petar00 said:

I don't like downsides, it iss good that so many of them don't matter. I don't want to be forced to put up with specific downside just because I pick a character because some of the upsides and may even decide against playing character because downside may not be worth putting up with for their upside.

if you dont like downsides, play alone and do c_supergodmode()

[Wonz]

Many downsides like winona's are just random and not given much thought in terms of compensating for strengths.

Most of us could say wormwood is one of best designed characters but on other hand he can't really benefit from what he's good at what is farming fast. Thanks to veggies world of better sanity/health foods opens up but he doesn't benefit from health food and sanity problems don't exist due to him planting things. If he could use farm plants in some different way like unique crafts then one could say it makes sense. He's basically harder mode with possiblity to make it easier for other players.

[Jakepeng99]

23 minutes ago, Wonz said:

he can't really benefit from what he's good at what is farming fast

Wickerbottom does it way better anyway.

23 minutes ago, Wonz said:

He's basically harder mode with possiblity to make it easier for other players.

He's not. A lot of players play wormwood for his non farming upsides. He is very strong with his summons, speedboost, mushrooms, easy living log, planar stuff and brambles. 

Tents are really good for him

[00petar00]

1 hour ago, Well-met said:

if you dont like downsides, play alone and do c_supergodmode()

If you like downsides use mods.

[Jakepeng99]

If you don't like downsides use mods.

[Mysterious box]

5 hours ago, grm9 said:

that's why i've said that you'd eat normal food if you get it as a byproduct of doing something else, killing 6 bees seems faster than getting ingredients for 2 meaty stews and making crock pots otherwise

It is when you remember you can only stack 20 souls if your using souls for everything you end up wasting alot of time that could have been spent doing other things. And before it's said I know you could catch bees to store for later but that takes even longer.

5 hours ago, grm9 said:

750 effective hp isn't high risk and reward is lower than wolfgang's

Does that account for planar damage?

5 hours ago, grm9 said:

you never end up lacking healing from clocks and you can tank when using them

Some people prefer not to fill all their slots with healing clocks but hey to each their own but that does lead to a new downside no?

5 hours ago, Jakepeng99 said:

It halves their health and sainity gains too.

I know but in the case of hp recovery your actually are better off using souls as for sanity food and clothing are kinda your only options.

[Jakepeng99]

4 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

know but in the case of hp recovery your actually are better off using souls as for sanity food and clothing are kinda your only options.

Yup. 

[grm9]

6 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

It is when you remember you can only stack 20 souls

not really an issue if you'll be able to refill in 2 days or less

6 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Does that account for planar damage?

no, because there are no hard planar bosses yet

6 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Some people prefer not to fill all their slots with healing clocks

even if you use 10 clocks you could carry 1-2 and only pick the rest up before going to a boss and drop them back after you get back to base to dump the loot

[Mysterious box]

2 hours ago, Wonz said:

Many downsides like winona's are just random and not given much thought in terms of compensating for strengths.

Most of us could say wormwood is one of best designed characters but on other hand he can't really benefit from what he's good at what is farming fast. Thanks to veggies world of better sanity/health foods opens up but he doesn't benefit from health food and sanity problems don't exist due to him planting things. If he could use farm plants in some different way like unique crafts then one could say it makes sense. He's basically harder mode with possiblity to make it easier for other players.

I feel like Wurt, Warly, Walter, and Wormwood represent what a downside should be something that's large part of the character's identity and impacts how you experience that character it's just more unique and interesting that way.

[grm9]

7 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

to each their own

i wasn't talking about myself, i don't really play as vanilla wanda much, usually with own rework that sets her max hp to 18.75, 4.6875 when old

[Mysterious box]

3 minutes ago, grm9 said:

not really an issue if you'll be able to refill in 2 days or less

So 16 minutes or less vs near instant access due to the abundance of food and auto farm foods.

4 minutes ago, grm9 said:

no, because there are no hard planar bosses yet

Well I mean the idea is that our hypothetical player is good enough to avoid taking much damage then I don't think the amount of potential hp is really relevant one way or the other. I mean yes I know veterans aren't going to have issues with dodging but that doesn't really make any of the risk go away.

7 minutes ago, grm9 said:

even if you use 10 clocks you could carry 1-2 and only pick the rest up before going to a boss and drop them back after you get back to base to dump the loot

Idk I mean that's doable in a gunpowder bosses kinda way but it just seems like it'd be more annoying to boss that way than anything.

[Sacco]

3 hours ago, 00petar00 said:

I don't like downsides, it iss good that so many of them don't matter. I don't want to be forced to put up with specific downside just because I pick a character because some of the upsides and may even decide against playing character because downside may not be worth putting up with for their upside.

you may not like downsides, but don't starve characters have always been built with downsides in mind, you might not like them, but people often do.

[grm9]

6 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

So 16 minutes or less vs near instant access due to the abundance of food and auto farm foods

making crock pots, farms etc. requires time, i don't make them even when playing as characters without hunger related downsides because they aren't worth it, you also need to go to to the farms to take stuff from them, similarly in comparison to how you need to go to bees/spiders

8 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Well I mean the idea is that our hypothetical player is good enough to avoid taking much damage then I don't think the amount of potential hp is really relevant one way or the other

the point was that they're even easier than dfly

9 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

gunpowder bosses kinda way

you can get 4 healing clocks by just bringing red gems from ruins and marble from daywalker's pillars, that doesn't require nearly as much time as gunpowder

[Mysterious box]

5 minutes ago, grm9 said:

making crock pots, farms etc. requires time, i don't make them even when playing as characters without hunger related downsides because they aren't worth it, you also need to go to to the farms to take stuff from them, similarly in comparison to how you need to go to bees/spiders

When I mentioned auto farms I meant things like volt goats, pigs, and things along those lines I don't farm either that being said it's 1 time investments which you just need to pick things up and cook them which greatly cuts down the amount of time you spend soul farming since now you just use them on teleporting and healing.

6 minutes ago, grm9 said:

the point was that they're even easier than dfly

I mean there are still plenty of players who struggle to kite dfly...

8 minutes ago, grm9 said:

you can get 4 healing clocks by just bringing red gems from ruins and marble from daywalker's pillars, that doesn't require nearly as much time as gunpowder

I mean yea getting any number of clocks doesn't really require much effort that wasn't really my point managing 10 clocks and trying to tank in old age it seems annoying.

[grm9]

2 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

I mean there are still plenty of players who struggle to kite dfly...

and they're easier than dfly, so

2 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

When I mentioned auto farms I meant things like volt goats, pigs, and things along those lines I don't farm either that being said it's 1 time investments which you just need to pick things up and cook them which greatly cuts down the amount of time you spend soul farming since now you just use them on teleporting and healing

ik that you meant those, i still don't make them even when playing as characters without hunger related downsides, i usually only have an alchemy, a furnace and a think tank at base

3 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

I mean yea getting any number of clocks doesn't really require much effort that wasn't really my point managing 10 clocks and trying to tank in old age it seems annoying

you don't need 10 clocks, that was an arbitrary worst case scenario number, you can tank when old and you probably should when fighting e.g. BQ