Is wanda powerful?

[Uedo]

1 hour ago, Mike23Ua said:

 

So as you can see here.. Glass Canon, Wanda is Not.

.hwat?

[Theukon-dos]

24 minutes ago, Bumber64 said:

None of this actually imperils Wendy herself. She can resummon Abi and return her to fighting strength in about 10 seconds using ghastly experience and a cure-all.

Not only does Wanda have to worry about taking too much damage, but also healing too much. (I believe aging downwards actually stuns her?) This forces her to play closer to death than Maxwell.

Ghastly Experience is from Wendy's skill tree, innit? I could go on about power creep again, but that hasn't even left the beta branch yet. So I will obstain for now.

 

As for "playing closer to death". It is technically true, simply by virtue of how health works. But it's still not saying much when, again, you can easily have 95% damage reduction. That's letting you take 20x the amount of hits you'd be able to otherwise. Wanda only ages by 1 year for every 50 damage taken while wearing night armor. So even against a boss that deals 100 Damage per hit like Ancient Fuelweaver, Old Wanda can take around 8 hits without dying. Sure, it's not a lot, but you'd be hard pressed to call that "fragile" for a character who's meant to be a glass cannon.

 

Also, the ageless watches always reduce your age by 8, so as long as you always heal while at 73 years old or above, you won't turn back to middle-aged.

[Cheggf]

5 hours ago, Theukon-dos said:

Other than that though, I'd love to know what you're smoking if you think Wanda was "average at best". Because clearly it's been laced with enough Copium to knock out an African elephant.

Yeah man you're clearly here for genuine discussion and aren't just here to be angry & disingenuous. I'm definitely reading your huge book when you start it by saying that. I already explained why she isn't that good, along with others here. 

[Theukon-dos]

15 minutes ago, Cheggf said:

Yeah man you're clearly here for genuine discussion and aren't just here to be angry & disingenuous. I'm definitely reading your huge book when you start it by saying that. I already explained why she isn't that good, along with others here. 

I admit I did let my emotions get the better of me. And apologize for them doing so. But I still stand by my point regardless. Claiming that Wanda was "Average at best" when she released is certifiably false.

 

Her kit may not feel like much now. But characters just couldn't do that much back when she first released. You either had utility, or you had damage. Maxwell couldn't cage bosses and cut them down as quickly as he cut down a forest. Wendy couldn't guzzle her ghastly grog or move graves around. Willow couldn't light up the night or light up her foes. Ect. Ect.

If you wanted someone who had both good damage and powerful utility, you had to either play Wickerbottom; who's only part of this list because on tentacles is good for bullying some raid bosses. Warly, who was the single most investment heavy character in the game. Or Wanda.

Wanda, who's damage was top of the line. Who was the only character with a unique revival item; much less a reusable one. Who was the only character who could teleport across the map on a whim. And who's unique health mechanics are more of a boon than a bust to those who know what they're doing.

 

If you want to claim that Wanda's below average now? Then I won't argue. I'm the one decrying power creep after all, so we're on the same page there. But claiming that she's "always" been average is a wild take that ignores so much of what she can do and the context of when she released.

[Guille6785]

39 minutes ago, Theukon-dos said:

I admit I did let my emotions get the better of me. And apologize for them doing so. But I still stand by my point regardless. Claiming that Wanda was "Average at best" when she released is certifiably false.

certified by what metric

[FillerText]

I think she is just a cool granny. and I find it fun to sometimes play her. Partially because I was never quite fond of farming up to make crockpot recipes. Even before skill trees and whatnot, I think she is a perfectly fine character for the game. I don't think she is as unbalanced as people like to imply(Beard hair effigies, Soul hops, Various speed boosts, etc). 

Alarming clock isn't, but I don't consider it to be a core aspect of her kit. 

Most people say Night armor, and stuff negates her main cost for high damage, but I don't always want to spend my nightmare fuel on night armor, and collect reeds whenever possible/use books to mass produce them. Her clock with a magiluminescence already eats enough Nightmarel fuel for a character that isn't naturally as efficient or convenient for farming it, compared Maxwell or Wormwood.

I am not particularly educated on the matter with Wanda, and only heard that her whip just caused the game to be bent to her own will or smth.

[Cheggf]

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

I admit I did let my emotions get the better of me. And apologize for them doing so. But I still stand by my point regardless. Claiming that Wanda was "Average at best" when she released is certifiably false.

 

Her kit may not feel like much now. But characters just couldn't do that much back when she first released. You either had utility, or you had damage. Maxwell couldn't cage bosses and cut them down as quickly as he cut down a forest. Wendy couldn't guzzle her ghastly grog or move graves around. Willow couldn't light up the night or light up her foes. Ect. Ect.

If you wanted someone who had both good damage and powerful utility, you had to either play Wickerbottom; who's only part of this list because on tentacles is good for bullying some raid bosses. Warly, who was the single most investment heavy character in the game. Or Wanda.

Wanda, who's damage was top of the line. Who was the only character with a unique revival item; much less a reusable one. Who was the only character who could teleport across the map on a whim. And who's unique health mechanics are more of a boon than a bust to those who know what they're doing.

 

If you want to claim that Wanda's below average now? Then I won't argue. I'm the one decrying power creep after all, so we're on the same page there. But claiming that she's "always" been average is a wild take that ignores so much of what she can do and the context of when she released.

I have been saying that Wanda is not very good since she came out. I have been saying that she has just been a worse Wolfgang since she came out. She released right before the Wolfgang rework, but whether you compare her to pre-rework or post-rework Wolfgang it doesn't matter. Look at everything she has from an objective standpoint of how much it actually does to help you accomplish things faster and not just how powerful they feel.

• She does 75% more damage while she's at very low health, but Wolfgang does 100% more for little to no drawback.
• She has extended range to make some fights easier, but "making things easier" is redundant to skill. I always disliked using the clock because it controls very awkwardly, even when I played Wanda I would just use dark swords.
• She has the backstep watch which helps in like one fight.
• She can revive people easily, but reviving is already basically free. Red gems are so plentiful. I've never found this helpful, it's just a fun gimmick for public servers.
• She can teleport around the map, but it takes so long to set it up that by the time it starts saving you time compared to other characters you've already done everything.

The only notable things she has are a 75% damage bonus (lesser to Wolfgang) and the teleporting watches. Except the teleporting watches suck, so the only notable thing she has is a 75% damage bonus (lesser to Wolfgang). If you pick Wanda instead of Wolfgang then you permanently spend 100% more time harvesting resources, you permanently spend 14% more time fighting strong enemies, and if Wolfgang has the skill tree you permanently spend 10% more time walking. In exchange for all of this lost time you gain the benefit of being able to wait almost 3 hours for it to become Winter, then you can spend a bunch more time farming Mactusks (50% chance for the world to only have 1, which quadruples the time it takes to get watches!) in order for you to get a few watches that will slowly save time here and there. After a few years you'll be able to make a big watch network, and then you'll be able to actually start saving notable time. But by the time you've got the watch network set up, and by the time you've used it enough to make up for all of the time you lost by not only being Wanda but also making the network, the game has been over for quite some time.

Wanda is in a better spot now than she was on release because the game is longer, but she still sucks. I don't like her, I don't think she's very good, I don't think she's very fun. I think she's at best an average character, and always has been at best an average character. People just call her so powerful because they ignore details and just see a big number on the alarming clock or teleporting instantly. They don't care about the slow attack speed of the alarming clock or the 10,000 years it took to be able to teleport instantly.

[Guille6785]

58 minutes ago, Cheggf said:

bongus

Thank you, I feel like I've been living in a parallel universe this whole time because I've also been saying this since she came out. Wanda effectively suffers from what I like to call “the old Wortox syndrome”, where a character will seem incredibly powerful to noobs and intermediate players who've either never played them or just parrot things that their favorite youtuber/streamer says about the character without bothering to test anything, to the point where they will outright call that character overpowered, meanwhile for people who actually play the game (especially more skilled players) said characters will seem incredibly dull if not straight up garbage outside of things like babysitting noobs in public servers or having crutches that make killing bosses easier; Wanda, Wortox, Wolfgang and Warly have all fallen under this category

I'm also not sure exactly by what metric the people who think Wanda is strong judge her by; if we use something objective like speedrunning (which I still wouldn't use to judge character strength since speedrunning is a different way to play the game but at least it has time as an objective measurement) Wanda is by far one of the least used characters; she's seen occasionally in seeded tournaments that ban Wolfgang thanks to the existence of the shadow manipulator set piece but without that she's basically completely useless

[Theukon-dos]

9 minutes ago, Cheggf said:

I have been saying that Wanda is not very good since she came out. I have been saying that she has just been a worse Wolfgang since she came out. She released right before the Wolfgang rework, but whether you compare her to pre-rework or post-rework Wolfgang it doesn't matter. Look at everything she has from an objective standpoint of how much it actually does to help you accomplish things faster and not just how powerful they feel.

• She does 75% more damage while she's at very low health, but Wolfgang does 100% more for little to no drawback.
• She has extended range to make some fights easier, but "making things easier" is redundant to skill. I always disliked using the clock because it controls very awkwardly, even when I played Wanda I would just use dark swords.
• She has the backstep watch which helps in like one fight.
• She can revive people easily, but reviving is already basically free. Red gems are so plentiful. I've never found this helpful, it's just a fun gimmick for public servers.
• She can teleport around the map, but it takes so long to set it up that by the time it starts saving you time compared to other characters you've already done everything.

The only notable things she has are a 75% damage bonus (lesser to Wolfgang) and the teleporting watches. Except the teleporting watches suck, so the only notable thing she has is a 75% damage bonus (lesser to Wolfgang). If you pick Wanda instead of Wolfgang then you permanently spend 100% more time harvesting resources, you permanently spend 14% more time fighting strong enemies, and if Wolfgang has the skill tree you permanently spend 10% more time walking. In exchange for all of this lost time you gain the benefit of being able to wait almost 3 hours for it to become Winter, then you can spend a bunch more time farming Mactusks (50% chance for the world to only have 1, which quadruples the time it takes to get watches!) in order for you to get a few watches that will slowly save time here and there. After a few years you'll be able to make a big watch network, and then you'll be able to actually start saving notable time. But by the time you've got the watch network set up, and by the time you've used it enough to make up for all of the time you lost by being Wanda, the game is over.

If anything Wanda is in a better spot now than she was on release because the game is longer, but she still sucks.

I fully agree that in terms of raw damage, Wolfgang is certainly better. But you forget that Wanda's alarming clock has a higher base damage than the dark sword when fueled. 81.6 to be specific. So though her modifier is "only" 1.75x, she ends up dealing 142.8 damage per hit, which is a bit over twice the 68 damage of a dark sword. The only reason Wolfgang out-damages her in the DPS department is because the alarming clock has a slower attacking speed. Said attack speed is why you probably find it ackward to use, but I've never had a problem with it myself.

I agree that the Extended range isn't actually a huge deal. There are some niche uses for it, such as farming terror claws for fuel. But the reason I bring it up is because the game we have now is in a post-range nerf state. When Wanda was first released, the alarming clock's range didn't simply make some fights easier. It was able to completely stunlock many of the game's enemies and render them unable to fight back. Klei had to completely rework how hitstun was handled to prevent this, and I can't think of any character who had an ability that was so strong it forced Klei to bend the entire game around them.

No comment on the Backstep watch. I never use that thing either.

Reviving is cheap, yes. But DST is still a multiplayer game. So the second chance watch does still have utility even if solo players like you or be can seldom use it.

And I am genuinely confused why you seem to think that backtreck watches take so much investment to see a return. Unless you get abysmally unlucky, it's not too hard to get a spare tusk in your first winter. At which point, you can set it to teleport you back to base, and have now effectively cut the time you spend running around in half. Anywhere you go, any time you head out to gather resources, the backtreck watch completely eliminates the run back. Getting more watches may have diminishing returns on value, but you still don't need a map-wide network of the things to set a few rewind points to commonly visited POIs.

 

You're also forgetting a couple of Wanda's boons. She gets better at using shadow gear in general the older she gets, which is admittedly fairly small. But more importantly, she has her unique age meter. Being unable to heal with food or medicine can be a downside, certainly. But the trade off is the ability to make and use her ageless watches, which are effectively healing items that are infinite use, never spoil, are easy to make, and the only limit on how many you can use in succession is how much inventory space you're willing to cough up.

 

@Guille6785 asked by what metric I considered Wanda the strongest, but I get the feeling this answer will apply to the both of you, so let me make it simple. Wanda was the strongest character in the game because her skill set was wholly unique and uniquely powerful. Her alarming clock could reach upto an effective 1.9x or so damage multiplier at old age. Not as effective as Wolfgang's 2x damage multiplier perhaps, but at the time, the only other character who could even compare where Wigfrid with a "measly" 1.25x damage modifier, and Wendy who could only get that high because Beefalo ignore her 25% damage penalty, but not the 40% boost she gets when attacking targets cursed by Abigail. But even if you didn't want to commit to old age, you're still looking at an extremely solid 1.4x damage multiplier without needing to stay on the edge of death. Which was more than a solid 75% of the cast at time.

 

And when not fighting, Wanda's backtreck watches where the only method available for zipping around the map. Wortox wouldn't get the ability for another 8 months or so until the Wickerbottom refresh, Telelocators where at-best only two way and at worst extremely overpriced. And the Lazy Deserter was dependant on you having friends. Early game you only needed to avoid misfortune to get a spare tusk that would eliminate the travel time to get back to your base. And late-game Wanda could effectively make her own network of wormholes that let her travel anywhere and everywhere she wished in the blink of an eye.

 

She also had no need to invest in healing items, could revive anyone else who died due to either lag or inexperience at minimal cost, and was released right around the middle of the character refreshes, before Klei gave up on trying to keep the game balanced. She could hit nearly as hard as the character who's only notable trait was "Hits really really hard". She could teleport better than the character who's second notable trait is "Can teleport", and could manage her own health better than... basically anyone. She may not have come online as fast as Wolfgang, but she was an incredibly powerful generalist with abilities that couldn't be replicated by anyone else.

 

 

[Cheggf]

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

I fully agree that in terms of raw damage, Wolfgang is certainly better. But you forget[...]

I said it attacks slower, that's why I'm saying her damage is more comparable to Wendy's than Wolfgang's.

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

I agree that the Extended range isn't actually a huge deal[...]

Even in a pre-nerf state I don't think it was very good, and the only thing that Klei screwing the game up shows is that the ability was inherently poorly designed from the start and they had a massive overcorrection instead of just realizing "Wait, this boring garbage is boring garbage". A character being easier does not make them stronger, it makes them easier. Wanda being able to avoid needing to play the game and just hold F is not a powerful ability, that is an easy ability. There are certain situations where it saves a small amount of time, but overall it is not actually making the character stronger. Doing things faster, being able to do more things, those are what makes characters stronger. Ease of use and efficacy of use are two different things.

If you were to change the phrasing from "Wanda on release was an overpowered character" to "Wanda on release was an easy character for noobs who fundamentally undermines the core principles of the game and is terribly designed" then I would agree with that. A so-called glass cannon who doesn't actually interact with combat? What kind of design is that? Regardless of how strong she is I dislike her design choices.

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

Reviving is cheap, yes. But DST is still a multiplayer game[...]

I already said it's just a fun gimmick for constantly reviving noobs. If you want to talk about character power, their strength, their efficacy, if you want to say who is or is not overpowered then you must ignore fun and ignore feelings. These things are irrelevant to the discussion of power. Speaking objectively, constantly reviving noobs isn't progressing anything. The "correct" play here is to just let them be dead and drain your sanity while you actually accomplish things since they aren't. To constantly keep going back to revive them is wasting your time for no benefit. Obviously reviving noobs is good, it's no fun for them when they're dead, but I don't think "This character is overpowered because I'm able to keep constantly going back to revive people who aren't helping me and I don't even need to spend 3 grass to do it" is a very good argument.

I'm not a solo player, I play almost exclusively in pubs, and I'm constantly reviving people. I just don't think that this is relevant for discussion on character power. It makes it slightly easier to be kind to people. That's not strength. 

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

And I am genuinely confused why you seem to think that backtreck watches take so much investment to see a return[...]

Let's say you want to start at your base, go fight the Bee Queen, then come back to your base. This is an ideal situation for Wanda since you're going from point A to B to A, and not a longer journey with many stops where only the distance from your final stop to the base matters and nothing else (which is typically how most of my expeditions go).

Instead of taking X time to walk there, Y time to fight Bee Queen, and X time to walk back, Wanda takes roughly X + Y*0.57 time. But that's comparing Wanda to nobody. Wolfgang would take roughly X*0.9 + Y*0.5 + X*0.9 time, so you aren't saving X time, you're saving X*0.8 - Y*0.07 time. And those savings aren't even positive yet, you need to eat away at all the time you lost for the first 20-30 days by not having access to the watch. For the first 20-30 days you've been spending an extra 10% on all movement actions compared to Wolfgang, an extra 100% on all harvesting actions compared to Wolfgang, and an extra 14% on all fighting actions. You still continue to spend that extra time infinitely, too, so that will continue to weigh against the savings of the watch. It's just it had 20-30 days to pile up before the watch can even start to work against it.

You need to eat away at all that lost time before you even start to break even, and every time you walk over to the Mactusks to get another cane that's more time you're adding to the deficit since you wouldn't otherwise need to be going there. I don't know about you, but the Mactusk camps are always really far away from me, and they take a long time to get to. A common strategy I've seen is using a watch to teleport to the Mactusks, but that still isn't saving time because you otherwise wouldn't need to go there, that's just lowering the amount of time you're losing. It doesn't even help until you already have 2+ spare tusks since the first watch would obviously be more helpful at the base. 

And that is, of course, ignoring the fact that there's a 50% chance that there's only one Mactusk camp, the tusk drops are random, and as you said it can also be multiplayer. There could be 4, 8, even 12 people who need a walking cane, and you only have one camp. At a 50% drop rate and a 3 day respawn if you've only got one camp you're looking at an average of 24, 48, or 72 winter days before everyone has a tusk and you can even start thinking about making watches from further camps, and that's if you perfectly farm them every single time without ever missing any of them, which could further add to time loss since you could need to stop what you're doing and come back to it or not start things in the first place.

That's several years of you not having access to the network, several years of you losing more and more time because the only benefit you have is a damage bonus lesser than Wolfgang's, several years of everything piling up because this character is unreliable garbage who is very reliant on multiple layers of RNG and is very uncooperative with other players. Even in a singleplayer world you could just be really unlucky and never get a second tusk, it's not even that rare. You just need to get a 50% chance like 4 times. 

If you're playing multiplayer and it's a single tusk world, or you're just unlucky in a singleplayer world, you could literally complete every single thing in the entire game well before even being able to make a single watch.

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

She also had no need to invest in healing items

Which is not a super powerful thing. Wortox & Wigfrid have little to no need to invest in healing items for the entire team, not just themselves. Wanda's watches are awkward to make and rather expensive, unlike healing items and the things Wortox & Wigfrid can do. Depending on the situation the watches might be convenient and save some time, or they might be inconvenient and cost more time. Either way this is a minor benefit at best, especially if you don't get hit much. 

[WilsonHiggs]

I wont enter in the discussion but just wanted to point that, despite wanda having less atack speed, she can hit more consistently in most fights because of her range atack. Not wasting that much time kitting increase her real dps

Also you can always cancel her atack animations

Anyway, if she must be nerfed then the 90% of the cast should. I just wished that her top dps came from melee weapons instead of her whip...makes her way safer to play than, imo, should

[Ugur01]

When her skill tree comes out the forums will be in chaos and everyone will argue about her damage. There will be more talk about her damage than Wendy and she will definitely get a nerf

Edit: Imo

[Szczuku]

Of course she is. Her movement abilities are ridiculous and allow her to save huge amounts of time that'd otherwise be wasted on travel

Combat is not the only aspect of dst and frankly speaking Wanda is also busted at that too

[WilsonHiggs]

23 minutes ago, Szczuku said:

Of course she is. Her movement abilities are ridiculous and allow her to save huge amounts of time that'd otherwise be wasted on travel

Combat is not the only aspect of dst and frankly speaking Wanda is also busted at that too

The time she saves on traveling, which can take several in game years without world gen mods or world gambling, is wasted gathering resources without any perk that helps on that. Worse, her downside makes her need more time to perform actions and working

She only really saves time on gathering healing but by that metric wigfrid and wolfgang should be the ones getting a nerf

We need to wait to see her skill tree because right now willow, wolfgang, woodie, walter wigfrid and maxwell are way better in many aspects 

[nicolas103]

I'll start this by saying Wanda is probably my 2nd favorite character in the game.

 

When i do play her i play for her the QoL her kit provides.

 

I have to heavily disagree with the time loss on the rift watches.

1 at Base saves more than enough time for the entire game. My 2nd usually being in the Atrium, Then Ruins.

Also amazing for group travel.

 

Backstep when young is absurdly good for early traversal due to how world gen can just be wack, makes it easy to just reverse super fast and try a different path.

Its absurdly good for any boss when old, but losing aggro so often is cringe.

Outside that it just fails to scale into the lategame.

 

I normally automate Walrus drops by day 15 at most. So i dont ever waste time walking back and forth for tusks unless im unlucky with my 1st cane.

Another big thing is i dont really wear armor much, and when i do its usually just bone armor, or Planar DMG Sources, so being able to take an infinite amount of damage and negate it works wonders for me.

I dont like how slow crockpots are so just being able to eat crap like honey, and heal cheaply through watches is also game changing for me.

I dont like boats either.. too slow lol

Rifting to any of the islands when i want is amazing and skips boating or fishing.

 

I normally stay middle aged, but old works too for when i need to go to the ruins just because hp thresholds in caves are so low you can like 1 shot most the annoying crap before they even get close, but outside of that the DPS increase for being old doesnt change much for me other than duration of boss fights which, tbh, most are like 20-50 sec fights nowadays.

 

 

Biggest downside is all the watches taking my inventory, and healing so often, i feel pretty forced to wear a backpack as this character, but other then that, shes an alright character, definitely not the strongest for really anything other than idk.. getting around, lol.

[Theukon-dos]

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

I said it attacks slower, that's why I'm saying her damage is more comparable to Wendy's than Wolfgang's.

Even if that is the ccase. That's still a lot of stinkin' damage. And is assuming that Wendy is fighting in the best possible circumstances. IE that Abigail is alive and dealing her max of 40 DPS.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

Even in a pre-nerf state I don't think it was very good, and the only thing that Klei screwing the game up shows is that the ability was inherently poorly designed from the start and they had a massive overcorrection instead of just realizing "Wait, this boring garbage is boring garbage". A character being easier does not make them stronger, it makes them easier.[...]

No, actually. I'd say that a character being easier does make them stronger. Skill can't completely eliminate risk of error after all. But pre-nerf clocks attack range effectively could. And even now, the range is still another advantage on top of her damage. If you want to argue that it's not because a skilled player doesn't need it. Then would this logic not apply to any combat perk?

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

I already said it's just a fun gimmick for constantly reviving noobs. If you want to talk about character power, their strength, their efficacy, if you want to say who is or is not overpowered then you must ignore fun and ignore feelings. These things are irrelevant to the discussion of power. Speaking objectively, constantly reviving noobs isn't progressing anything. The "correct" play here is to just let them be dead and drain your sanity while you actually accomplish things since they aren't. To constantly keep going back to revive them is wasting your time for no benefit. Obviously reviving noobs is good, it's no fun for them when they're dead, but I don't think "This character is overpowered because I'm able to keep constantly going back to revive people who aren't helping me and I don't even need to spend 3 grass to do it" is a very good argument.

I'm not a solo player, I play almost exclusively in pubs, and I'm constantly reviving people. I just don't think that this is relevant for discussion on character power. It makes it slightly easier to be kind to people. That's not strength. 

Pragmatic, but sound.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

Let's say you want to start at your base, go fight the Bee Queen, then come back to your base. This is an ideal situation for Wanda since you're going from point A to B to A, and not a longer journey with many stops where only the distance from your final stop to the base matters and nothing else (which is typically how most of my expeditions go).

Instead of taking X time to walk there, Y time to fight Bee Queen, and X time to walk back, Wanda takes roughly X + Y*0.57 time. But that's comparing Wanda to nobody. Wolfgang would take roughly X*0.9 + Y*0.5 + X*0.9 time, so you aren't saving X time, you're saving X*0.8 - Y*0.07 time. And those savings aren't even positive yet, you need to eat away at all the time you lost for the first 20-30 days by not having access to the watch. For the first 20-30 days you've been spending an extra 10% on all movement actions compared to Wolfgang, an extra 100% on all harvesting actions compared to Wolfgang, and an extra 14% on all fighting actions. You still continue to spend that extra time infinitely, too, so that will continue to weigh against the savings of the watch. It's just it had 20-30 days to pile up before the watch can even start to work against it.

OK hold on. Where are you getting those Wolfgang numbers? Because pre-refresh Wolfgang had the speed boost, but not the harvesting bonus. And post-refresh Wolfgang lost his speed boost until getting it back via skill tree. And Wanda hasn't gotten hers yet.

Second, yes. Wolfgang is absolutely stronger in the early-game. I have made no effort to contest this fact. However, you also assume that the player will have no ways to scale up their capabilities in other ways. Wolfgang harvesting faster is less relevant when you can make Bearger paint the forest red in your stead. And speed bonuses are additive, not mutiplicative. So once you start getting gear like the walking canes and magis, his speed boost is less of a difference. Yes, this is late-game. But despite you going on about how the game ends before Wanda can take off, DST is a Sandbox and only truly "ends" when the player decides it ends.

 

When I said that Wanda's teleporting was unique, that's because it's an ability that nobody else had access too. Even now, Telelocators haven't been buffed, so the only other options are also character-exclusive and have their own caveats. It's a perk that nobody else could close the Distance on, thus something that would never have diminishing returns for her.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

You need to eat away at all that lost time before you even start to break even, and every time you walk over to the Mactusks to get another cane that's more time you're adding to the deficit since you wouldn't otherwise need to be going there. I don't know about you, but the Mactusk camps are always really far away from me, and they take a long time to get to. A common strategy I've seen is using a watch to teleport to the Mactusks, but that still isn't saving time because you otherwise wouldn't need to go there, that's just lowering the amount of time you're losing. It doesn't even help until you already have 2+ spare tusks since the first watch would obviously be more helpful at the base. 

Let's assume it takes 3 minutes to run from your base to the Mactuak camp, and another 2 to actually kill tusk. Assuming the player already has a Backtreck watch going back home, and doubling our time to account for the 50% drop rate on average. Then that means a backtrack watch only needs to save 10 minutes of travel time to turn out net positive on time saved. That's really just not a lot in the grand scheme of things. For a particularly remote location such as the Ruins, lunar island, or Pearl's island, that's only two or three trips to make the difference. And mind you, if you already have a watch to take you home, then you don't need to make the return trip either.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

And that is, of course, ignoring the fact that there's a 50% chance that there's only one Mactusk camp, the tusk drops are random,

While the inconsistency is something that should be factored in. Using the worst case scenario as an argument means I can point out the best case scenario. That you do have 4 mactusk camps and get a dozen tusks before the end of winter.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

and as you said it can also be multiplayer. There could be 4, 8, even 12 people who need a walking cane, and you only have one camp. At a 50% drop rate and a 3 day respawn if you've only got one camp you're looking at an average of 24, 48, or 72 winter days before everyone has a tusk and you can even start thinking about making watches from further camps, and that's if you perfectly farm them every single time without ever missing any of them, which could further add to time loss since you could need to stop what you're doing and come back to it or not start things in the first place.

Multiplayer is it's own demon, I admit. But Mactusk isn't the only source of walking canes in the game. The best, no question. But there are other sources. Namely getting lucky with AG'S treasure chests or sunken chests. But they are methods.

 

Nevermind the fact that multiplayer also means division of labor. You don't need the entire server to be running Mactusk down every three days. One guy can do it while all the others do something else.which means a lot less time spent overall.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

That's several years of you not having access to the network, several years of you losing more and more time because the only benefit you have is a damage bonus lesser than Wolfgang's, several years of everything piling up because this character is unreliable garbage who is very reliant on multiple layers of RNG and is very uncooperative with other players. Even in a singleplayer world you could just be really unlucky and never get a second tusk, it's not even that rare. You just need to get a 50% chance like 4 times

 

If you're on a multiplayer server, then Wolfgang becomes even worse than Wanda is. All of Wolfgang's perks just boil down to "number but bigger". But the very nature of having multiple people means you already have bigger number. If you're on a server with 5 other people, that 100% damage boost only amounts to 20% more damage when everyone's wailing on a single boss. And that 100% faster harvesting is also hit by diminishing returns, and is also dependant on assuming that nobody else is playing a character with even faster harvesting than he does.

 

Wanda, at the absolute very least, still has her second chance watch. Revival is cheap, yes. But an infinite use version is still cheaper. And it also has the advantage of reviving allies without any max HP penalties and sending them right back to where they died in the first place. Admittedly that second one can be a double edged sword if you died somewhere that'll just kill you again. But it can still save Wanda or the other players from having to run back.

And if Wanda does get her backtrack watches, she can use a purple gem to let everyone teleport along side her. Wolfgang's perks may benefit other people indirectly, but he can't give his damage or faster harvesting to them in the same way.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

 

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

If you're playing multiplayer and it's a single tusk world, or you're just unlucky in a singleplayer world, you could literally complete every single thing in the entire game well before even being able to make a single watch.

Once again, you are assuming the worst case scenario. Horrible tusk RNG can happen, but it's not so common that it's something you'll regularly encounter. On average, you'll end your first winter with atleast one extra tusk. And that's all Wanda needs to start seeing returns. 

 

Also why the obsession with being able to "beat" the game before getting a network of watches? DST is a Sandbox. There is no set "win" condition, or any strict timer on doing so.

 

Tell me, does your definition of "complete every single thing in the entire game" include goals such as building a barnacle farm, terraforming an entire biome, or building an aquarium to hold every species of fish? Or is it just short hand for "beat all the bosses and open rifts"? Those are absolutely valid goals to have. But saying that Wanda's backtreck watch takes to long to be useful is incredibly dismissive towards the fact that for every player who strives to beat every boss in less than 200 days, there's another who will happily spend over 2000 days in a single world simply because they had another idea for something to build or do.

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

Which is not a super powerful thing. Wortox & Wigfrid have little to no need to invest in healing items for the entire team, not just themselves.

Yes, Wortox and Wigfrid do have great healing abilities. Arguably even better than Wanda's. The difference is that Wanda's has powerful healing abilities *and more*. Wortox can heal and teleport across the map. But has far harsher downsides and no ways to bolster his damage beyond that of other characters (barring his skill tree, which isn't fully released yet). While Wigfrid has better healing and survivability in general. But she doesn't have a lick of utility to her name.

 

This is the heart of why I considered Wanda to be the strongest character. She may not have been the best at everything. But she does a ton of different things and does them all extremely well. She has great survivability due to her age mechanics and the general absurdity of late-game damage reduction. She has fantastic damage potential that is second only to Wolfgang. And she has great utility on account of the best teleportation in the game. Even now, only two other characters have gotten teleporation. And while cheaper, Wortox's map hopping requires active resource investment instead of a simple cooldown, can't teleport heavy objects, and is dramatically more expensive to bring other people with you. And Winona's teleporation is locked to lunar-alignment and less flexible.

 

As I said at the start of all this, most characters just couldn't do everything Wanda can do. And those who could couldn't do it as easily or as well. 

On 2/20/2025 at 8:18 PM, Cheggf said:

Wanda's watches are awkward to make and rather expensive, unlike healing items and the things Wortox & Wigfrid can do. Depending on the situation the watches might be convenient and save some time, or they might be inconvenient and cost more time. Either way this is a minor benefit at best, especially if you don't get hit much. 

OK hold on just a moment. What makes Wanda's ageless watches expensive? They only take 3 components; Marble, Time Pieces, and red gems. Marble and time pieces are both easy. And earlier you dismissed the second chance watch because red gems for revival items are plentiful. So then how come the ageless watch "isn't that good" because it's too pricy, while the second chance watch isn't that good brcause revival items are already cheap?

 

 

Now that we've gone back and fourth a few times now. I get the impression that your argument against Wanda boils down to 2 main things.

1. That Wanda's backtrack watches are to RNG dependant to be good. And this I will acknowledge. She is RNG dependant, even if I think you're massively overblowing how how likely it is to screw you over and how many watches she needs to start seeing returns. But the RNG is a factor and something to consider.

 

2. That Wolfgang is stronger than her. Now as I said earlier, you claimed that Wanda's has always been average despite comparing her to capabilities that Wolfgang's had for less than 2 years. But otherwise, I can understand why someone would think this. 

 

Wolfgang does have his advantages, such as coming online faster, not being dependant on specific weapons, and being better at gathering resources. So while I disagree that this lets him beat her out overall, the argument is certainly there.

 

Now what about everyone else?

 

Barring when you countered my point about her healing perks, you have only brought up 2 other characters when trying to prove that Wanda is overrated. Wendy and Wolfgang. But really? It's just been Wolfgang.

 

"Wolfgang deals more damage", "Wolfgang saves more time", "Wolfgang has more utility". 

 

Even if we take all of that at face value. Where does that leave everyone who isn't Wolfgang? 

Wolfgang does more damage? That much is unquestionably true, but it still leaves Wanda dealing nearly twice as much damage as most of the cast. More utility? Sure. A flat bonus to chopping and mining is great. But only a handful of characters have that kind of bonus. And even fewer have access to teleportation

Saves more time? Debatable, but if so, then what about all the characters that don't have perks to save time? 

 

Even if you think that Wanda was never the strongest character in the game (she definitly hasn't been sense the Maxwell refresh atleast), the terms "Wanda is blatantly overpowered" and "Wolfgang is a stronger character than Wanda" can both be true. I don't think Wolfgang needs nerfed per se, if only because of how one note he is. But he's still an absolute powerhouse for all the reasons you've been listing.

 

If you looked back at the game before Klei forgot Syndrome was the villain and added skill trees, then who was Wanda average with? Who else had the damage potential, versatility, and utility that Wanda, Wolfgang, and Maxwell all shared?

 

[Guille6785]

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

If you want to argue that it's not because a skilled player doesn't need it. Then would this logic not apply to any combat perk?

yeah, exactly

1 hour ago, Theukon-dos said:

And speed bonuses are additive, not mutiplicative. So once you start getting gear like the walking canes and magis, his speed boost is less of a difference

this is wrong btw

[lowercase skye]

On 2/20/2025 at 6:57 PM, Cheggf said:

• She can teleport around the map, but it takes so long to set it up that by the time it starts saving you time compared to other characters you've already done everything.

...

But by the time you've got the watch network set up, and by the time you've used it enough to make up for all of the time you lost by not only being Wanda but also making the network, the game has been over for quite some time.

I have the urge to list out every possible resource farm/useful build that one could set up, but instead I'll just say there is no way to "do everything" or for the game to "be over" in a survival sandbox. Wanda's teleportation isn't suited for a optimal fast-as-possible rush to the end of the questlines, but she doesn't have to be, that isn't the point of Wanda. As someone who plays worlds for thousands of days trying to set up the best resource farms possible before calling it quits, I have to actively stop myself from playing Wanda because she would make my entire gameplay so much more convenient that I wouldn't be able to touch any other character in the lategame ever again.

That being said, I'm surprised tusks are being treated as something you exclusively get from MacTusk camps in winter, when I've sometimes found myself having 2-3 from treasures before winter has even properly started. If getting tusks as Wanda is truly that indomitable of a task, maybe you should consider other options than MacTusk.

[mmmmmmmmmmm]

On 2/21/2025 at 1:16 AM, Theukon-dos said:

As for "playing closer to death". It is technically true, simply by virtue of how health works. But it's still not saying much when, again, you can easily have 95% damage reduction. That's letting you take 20x the amount of hits you'd be able to otherwise. Wanda only ages by 1 year for every 50 damage taken while wearing night armor. So even against a boss that deals 100 Damage per hit like Ancient Fuelweaver, Old Wanda can take around 8 hits without dying. Sure, it's not a lot, but you'd be hard pressed to call that "fragile" for a character who's meant to be a glass cannon.

 

I mean, it is true that Wanda is technically encouraged to wear night armor, (the reduction on the sanity drain doesn't really make a difference but who cares) but that doesn't mean that all other characters just can't wear it, yes, Wanda can tank a lot if she's using night armor, but a character that can stay at 150 hp while being in their highest potential can tank about 5x more than Wanda in that same night armor, so yes, she isn't a glass cannon by any means but she's as close to it as possible in a game where everyone can access 95% damage reduction, on a related note, Wanda doesn't have to wear night armor all of the time, if you're good at kiting, you can get by with football helms or a void/BS helmet late game in most situations. I kind of see her like a general fantasy barbarian, as she can choose whether to be fragile and strong or normal and weak, as opposed to a normal glass cannon that is always strong and is always fragile, kinda like wathom from UM.

[Cruvimaster]

Wanda is extremely powerful to the point of being the most used. Wendy is the weakest and no one uses her. The graph below is inverted (contains irony).

[WilsonHiggs]

55 minutes ago, Cruvimaster said:

Wanda is extremely powerful to the point of being the most used. Wendy is the weakest and no one uses her. The graph below is inverted (contains irony).

While is true that a one of the reasons wendy and Wigfrid have been the most played for making the basic survival way easier, a big reason for why wanda is less played is because she is a dlc character 

[Edible Coal]

1 hour ago, WilsonHiggs said:

While is true that a one of the reasons wendy and Wigfrid have been the most played for making the basic survival way easier, a big reason for why wanda is less played is because she is a dlc character 

wurt: hmm

[WilsonHiggs]

15 minutes ago, Edible Coal said:

wurt: hmm

Yes, im very surprise to see her being in the top when she always has been one of the least played characters

[Cruvimaster]

4 hours ago, WilsonHiggs said:

While is true that a one of the reasons wendy and Wigfrid have been the most played for making the basic survival way easier, a big reason for why wanda is less played is because she is a dlc character 

Wanda was an incredible character when she was added to the game, but she became obsolete. Obsolete is without a doubt the best term for this character.
The planar system, reworks, skill trees, new weapons and armor added to the game have made other characters much superior or more attractive than Wanda.
Wanda's damage is conditioned on low health (37.5 points), while other characters can do more damage without any disadvantage in the survival factor. In turn, there are characters who deal damage to multiple enemies (Wendy, Winona, Wigfrid) or at a much safer distance than Wanda (new Walter).
As for teleportation, she is the worst of the three (Wortox, Winona). It takes a lot of time and luck (rng) to get a reasonable amount of walrus tusk. It gets even worse on a collective server where the players' priority will be to use walrus tusk to make walking cane for everyone.

[WilsonHiggs]

8 minutes ago, Cruvimaster said:

Wanda was an incredible character when she was added to the game, but she became obsolete. Obsolete is without a doubt the best term for this character.
The planar system, reworks, skill trees, new weapons and armor added to the game have made other characters much superior or more attractive than Wanda.
Wanda's damage is conditioned on low health (37.5 points), while other characters can do more damage without any disadvantage in the survival factor. In turn, there are characters who deal damage to multiple enemies (Wendy, Winona, Wigfrid) or at a much safer distance than Wanda (new Walter).
As for teleportation, she is the worst of the three (Wortox, Winona). It takes a lot of time and luck (rng) to get a reasonable amount of walrus tusk. It gets even worse on a collective server where the players' priority will be to use walrus tusk to make walking cane for everyone.

Also, for how her mechanics work and her favorite dish, you dont have to interact with much pieces of content which can make the gameplay pretty poor in the long term