What if Wickerbottom had to do a puzzle similar to Winona for books?

[marshyds]

As the title suggests, what if Wickerbottom had to learn a constant alphabet/language to use her books in a potential skilltree? It could add a more interesting learning curve and could still be puzzling if you have to do a varied ammount of writing to cast a spell.

You could learn to write various things for different effects from existing or new books.

Failing could harm wickerbottom specifically.

Then again you could be a lazy shmuck and use the wiki.

[DegenerateFurry]

If it's randomized per world, you couldn't use the wiki and would have to actually learn the language. She could get a notebook craft that automatically keeps track of what symbols represent what words or effects to help with that. I do think this is a really, really cool idea, though: allowing Wickerbottom to do dynamic spell-crafting by allowing the player to write their own books. It'd also make her much less of a swap character if she could tailor-make books for specific purposes, since then you'd have more of a reason to go back to playing her instead of just crafting one or two of every book plus a bookcase or two and then switching to Maxwell.

Sanity cost could scale with differing values. For instance, cast radius (for things like Lux Aeterna and Silviculture/Horticulture books) would increase sanity cost as it increases, and adding additional effects adds to the sanity cost proportionately. Going over Wickerbottom's sanity cap in spell cost would cause her to spawn a bunch of nightmares and/or could add to the durability cost of using the book, as well as the amount of paper needed to craft it. 

[A4FE]

Awesome idea! If they ever do decide to mix it up with Wickerbottom, I'd be a huge fan of them taking this direction! 

[Evelo]

What puzzle(s) does Winona need to do?

[marshyds]

24 minutes ago, DegenerateFurry said:

If it's randomized per world,

The idea is that symbols are randomized, but the place you learn them from are the same.

For example, if you had a unique item for studying glyphs (I.E reading glasses), then Wickerbottom would examine a light flower and say "Hm, i believe the translation for light is Lux"

3 minutes ago, Evelo said:

What puzzle(s) does Winona need to do?

When opening broken cache boxes.

[DegenerateFurry]

3 minutes ago, marshyds said:

The idea is that symbols are randomized, but the place you learn them from are the same.

For example, if you had a unique item for studying glyphs (I.E reading glasses), then Wickerbottom would examine a light flower and say "Hm, I believe the translation for light is Lux."

Oh, that makes sense. So, it's a bit like WX-78's scanning minigame. 

[Evelo]

1 hour ago, marshyds said:

When opening broken cache boxes.

Oh yeah those. Meeeehhh. I'd rather not have them. They aren't hard just annoying. (Pulling a mike here) comparing to Total War: Warhammer 2 where there were puzzles when scouting ruins for a reward, there was only a set number of them which just made it annoying rather than puzzling given you could recognize the pattern and instantly answer correctly. In Warhammer 3, they did away with this mechanic entirely. It just seems like tedium rather than something interesting. Now if you could literally create your own spells that would be another thing but given the limitations that are present, that will not happen.

[Demigardenerner]

18 hours ago, marshyds said:

As the title suggests, what if Wickerbottom had to learn a constant alphabet/language to use her books in a potential skilltree? It could add a more interesting learning curve and could still be puzzling if you have to do a varied ammount of writing to cast a spell.

You could learn to write various things for different effects from existing or new books.

Failing could harm wickerbottom specifically.

Then again you could be a lazy shmuck and use the wiki.

That idea would be quite bad because most of the time your using half of wicker bottoms books in reaction to something like the sleep book during a hound wave the fire absorbing book a random fire and if you have to do a mini game then it will make books that require your instant reaction to be useless.Winona is only gathering materials for her mini that’s why it’s not an issue but for wickerbottom this idea is just not a very good idea

[marshyds]

1 hour ago, Demigardenerner said:

mini game then it will make books that require your instant reaction to be

Some books wouldnt work, that's true, but they could have an mechanic of being "locked and loaded" for a use. 

Then again it may make her a swap character again.

Self writing spells on a papyrus that are single use could be a way to cast a spell instantly, while a reusable book would need writing every time.

[Ohan]

39 minutes ago, marshyds said:

Some books wouldnt work, that's true, but they could have an mechanic of being "locked and loaded" for a use. 

Then again it may make her a swap character again.

Self writing spells on a papyrus that are single use could be a way to cast a spell instantly, while a reusable book would need writing every time.

Ur theorycrafting a completely new character, not improving upon current wickerbottom. 

2 hours ago, Demigardenerner said:

That idea would be quite bad because most of the time your using half of wicker bottoms books in reaction to something like the sleep book during a hound wave the fire absorbing book a random fire and if you have to do a mini game then it will make books that require your instant reaction to be useless.Winona is only gathering materials for her mini that’s why it’s not an issue but for wickerbottom this idea is just not a very good idea

+1. 

it does not work at all with how Wickerbottom is played. 

[A4FE]

Truthfully, I would much prefer a rework (ala the Willow Skilltree) over just "more books" or "book buffs". Don't get me wrong, I love Wickerbottom, she's my most played character (probably), but I would take a skilltree that modifies how she plays rather than just amplifying it any day.