Notes on Wendy's changes for patch 645651 (2024-12-06)

[Well-met]

Having to buy bad skills on the path to the best is not only part of every previous survivor tree, but is literally the most common practice of every rpg game that's using skill trees, from even as far as Diablo 2 in 2000.

[WenericMember]

1 minute ago, Debruh said:

In addition to it not having to do anything with the sisturn. If I remember correctly, most skills that are upgrades of one another like Woodie's fast picker, etc that are the same benefit that increases come in sets of three (Sisturn line doesn't 100% fall into this category due to Sisturn |, but eh)

I suspect its a result of how heavily modified Wendys tree has become. Blessed sisturn 4 didnt exist originally.

2 minutes ago, Well-met said:

Having to buy bad skills on the path to the best is not only part of every previous survivor tree, but is literally the most common practice of every rpg game that's using skill trees, from even as far as Diablo 2 in 2000.

And tbh its how stronger survivors trees should be handled. Have tier 3/4 skills stay strong, but make them insight intensive so you can oly get 2-4 great perks instead of 5-7

[Oxealiz]

To be honest,this skill tree is completely useless.There's no any fundamental changes for Wendy.Really upset.

[Fufuji]

Is this the way what you thinks could help her battle against planar mobs?

[Well-met]

have you tried brightshade or voidcloth items i bet that's gonna help

[Nikki Darks]

Could you guys make it so that when a player dies and becomes a vengeful ghost, their ongoing elixir effects transition into their ghost form?

[kroban]

6 hours ago, aidankocherhans said:

I'd like if we could get one for Walter, to have a clearer understanding of what we can expect to change later on

I think in the dev stream they said something like Woby having her own post, maybe she will get one explaining the changes or them adding or removing things, but Idk

[Peasant]

Emm, can't say that I'm in favour of these changes…I mean, the elixir skills are good, butterfly skill is filler that should be expected, but it feels still lacks something. Both Abigail lacks planar damage, while the only resource of planar damage is the lunar elixir, should replace some of both Abigail's damage with planar.

[WenericMember]

11 minutes ago, YXukun said:

Emm, can't say that I'm in favour of these changes…I mean, the elixir skills are good, butterfly skill is filler that should be expected, but it feels still lacks something. Both Abigail lacks planar damage, while the only resource of planar damage is the lunar elixir, should replace some of both Abigail's damage with planar.

Presumably theres still more to come. there were no team spirit or gravestone changes they were mentioned last week. I dont think any of these skills were ever going to deal planar damage. Maybe make or bump a post recommending such a change.

Adding completely new functions like thecrown and graves is a lot more resource intensives than buffs. Plus there were bugfixes too.

[Nikki Darks]

11 minutes ago, YXukun said:

Emm, can't say that I'm in favour of these changes…I mean, the elixir skills are good, butterfly skill is filler that should be expected, but it feels still lacks something. Both Abigail lacks planar damage, while the only resource of planar damage is the lunar elixir, should replace some of both Abigail's damage with planar.

Butterfly skill is in no way filler if you go shadow alignment.

It lets you keep killing and reviving butterflies in your inventory to upkeep the shadow Abby damage buff....???

[WenericMember]

1 minute ago, Nikki Darks said:

Butterfly skill is in no way filler if you go shadow alignment.

It lets you keep killing and reviving butterflies in your inventory to upkeep the shadow Abby damage buff....???

In its current state it is a bit filler bc 4 mourning glory for 1 butterfly is way too much. But as far as needed changes thats pretty minor.

[Nikki Darks]

Just now, WenericMember said:

In its current state it is a bit filler bc 4 mourning glory for 1 butterfly is way too much. But as far as needed changes thats pretty minor.

With Pipspook skill 4, one pipspook gives 20 mourning glory, and that's only one pipspook.

Plus you can have graves in base now to reduce the time required to obtain mourning glory, the perk is phenomenal.

[Peasant]

Just now, Nikki Darks said:

Butterfly skill is in no way filler if you go shadow alignment.

It lets you keep killing and reviving butterflies in your inventory to upkeep the shadow Abby damage buff....???

And if I go lunar alignment, it is. And currently the only alignment providing more planar damage is lunar alignmant.

Besides, 4 mourning glorys for 1 butterfly looks kinda…unworthy. You could craft an elixir with just 3 mourning glory you know. I should expect 1 mourning glory for 1 butterfly, which seems to make more sense.

[Nikki Darks]

Just now, YXukun said:

And if I go lunar alignment, it is. And currently the only alignment providing more planar damage is lunar alignmant.

Besides, 4 mourning glorys for 1 butterfly looks kinda…unworthy. You could craft an elixir with just 3 mourning glory you know. I should expect 1 mourning glory for 1 butterfly, which seems to make more sense.

Funny thing is, in skill trees, you are supposed to mix and match skills for different outcomes... But what you're doing is expecting every skill to work with every skill.

A skill not working with your preferred set up does not mean that the skill is "filler".

[WenericMember]

3 minutes ago, Nikki Darks said:

With Pipspook skill 4, one pipspook gives 20 mourning glory, and that's only one pipspook.

Plus you can have graves in base now to reduce the time required to obtain mourning glory, the perk is phenomenal.

Thats too a big insight cost that i cant make room for in my build. I want 3 ts, 3 alignment, 2 potion, 2bs, 3mg and 2 headstones. 

So im working with ike 7mg per pipspook. Not even 2 butterflies, and not making potions, and all the other crafts. I think 2 is a fair compromise.

[Cassielu]

2 minutes ago, Nikki Darks said:

With Pipspook skill 4, one pipspook gives 20 mourning glory, and that's only one pipspook.

Plus you can have graves in base now to reduce the time required to obtain mourning glory, the perk is phenomenal.

I don't think these buff can make 40 mourning glory equivalent to 1 bug net

[Nikki Darks]

Just now, WenericMember said:

Thats too a big insight cost that i cant make room for in my build. I want 3 ts, 3 alignment, 2 potion, 2bs, 3mg and 2 headstones. 

So im working with ike 7mg per pipspook. I think 2 is a fair compromise.

I mean that's fine, like I've said in a previous reply. You're supposed to mix and match for the most complementary setup. Some skills will work better with others.

Like for me, I don't even bother with the Abby skills, I go full elixir production and mourning glory for supporting. It'd be foolish of me to expect to also have good Abby damage....

1 minute ago, Cassielu said:

I don't think these buff can make 40 mourning glory equivalent to 1 bug net

From my testing, doing Pipspook quests costs both less time and 0 resources to amass hundreds of mourning glory.

Compared to how much time it takes to keep catching butterflies over and over and over again before every major fight.

[WenericMember]

Just now, Nikki Darks said:

I mean that's fine, like I've said in a previous reply. You're supposed to mix and match for the most complementary setup. Some skills will work better with others.

Like for me, I don't even bother with the Abby skills, I go full elixir production and mourning glory for supporting. It'd be foolish of me to expect to also have good Abby damage....

I agree that skill synergy is a good aspect of Wendys tree, but synergy shouldnt be needed to make a perk usable for its intended purpose.

[Peasant]

3 minutes ago, Nikki Darks said:

Funny thing is, in skill trees, you are supposed to mix and match skills for different outcomes... But what you're doing is expecting every skill to work with every skill.

A skill not working with your preferred set up does not mean that the skill is "filler".

If a skill only works well when tied up with another skill I can hardly think it's a goo design. Such situations I recall only happened in Willow and Winona, whose skilltree brought a whole new system

[Nikki Darks]

Just now, WenericMember said:

I agree that skill synergy is a good aspect of Wendys tree, but synergy shouldnt be needed to make a perk usable for its intended purpose.

 

Just now, YXukun said:

If a skill only works well when tied up with amother skill I can hardly think it's a goo design. Such situations I recall only happened in Willow and Winona, whose skilltree brought a whole new system

This is literally how skills work and have worked throughout years of MMORPGs. As someone who played Neverwinter, Lost Ark and Guild Wars 2, this is how skill trees work.

Klei is just accurately and honestly following the design of them in their game. This is nothing new in the slightest.

[Littlefat1213]

i dont think it's worth when you use 4 Mourning Glory to revive only one butterfly 

and the shadow abigail seems not so pretty, i dont know i'm not an artist, just feeling weird about the white lines at the bottom.  

[Peasant]

2 minutes ago, Nikki Darks said:

 

This is literally how skills work and have worked throughout years of MMORPGs. As someone who played Neverwinter, Lost Ark and Guild Wars 2, this is how skill trees work.

Klei is just accurately and honestly following the design of them in their game. This is nothing new in the slightest.

That kind of design in MMORPG should be working well alone, but works even better when combined with other skills, not works bad and can only saved by another skill that works well itself.

Anycase, since the only alignment providing both survival ability and planar damage for Abigail is the lunar alignment, I think people would prefer lunar alignment, which makes butterfly not that useful

2 minutes ago, Littlefat1213 said:

i dont think it's worth when you use 4 Mourning Glory to revive only one butterfly 

and the shadow abigail seems not so pretty, i dont know i'm not an artist, just feeling weird about the white lines at the bottom.  

Wilson's beard

[Fufuji]

Reason for why Gestalt Abi now feels dumb: 

This patch added a "gestalt_rest" stage for Abigail after she finishes her attack. The stage lasts for 1 second and during this stage Abigail literally does nothing.

Info is inferred from SGabigail.lua.

[oak_sapling]

I hope to enhance the effectiveness of the potions so that they can work better on the characters. Spectral Cure-all is designed to provide quick and short-term recovery, but it require the telltale heart first, which have a health deduction as a cost, as Wendy does not have any automatic healing mechanism, which limits the benefits of this operation and may not be comparable to other treatment methods such as honey poultice or sufficient butterfly wings. The shield provided by the potions is a good design, but in many combat situations, it is disadvantageous to only withstand one attack in the face of continuous attacks or a large number of biological attacks, which we can see frequently in recent boss designs, such as scrappy werepig and crab king. It can be understood that the design of the new hat allows Wendy to share the effects obtained from the potion with other players, but there is a conflict between occupying the helmet and other designs. The weapon after the rift will receive a gain from the helmet. Even in the early stages of the game, due to the existence of backpacks, head armor, rainproof or warm equipment has outstanding performance, which greatly limits the performance of the new hat. Could we achieve this effect in other ways, for example, allowing Wendy who has skills, to make shareable potions?

[Maybe Just]

9 hours ago, Jason said:

Full patch Notes

Hope everyone is having a good Friday (or Saturday depending on where you're at). On to the notes:

It was likely that Gestalt Abigail was very strong as she was checking a lot of boxes, high damage, low cost, great survivability, etc, but it was how she was drafted originally and had not yet been experience that way as some of her brain behaviors were crossed, so she was not changed for the last patch. 

Indeed, she was too strong. For the changes, We wanted to define the choice of Abigails more, so Gestalt Abigail's choice is about being more aloof and personally survivable, lower maintenance, at the cost of damage speed (DPS). She's been made targetable again when attacking, so bosses will go after her and kill her if she doesn't have someone or something pulling some agro for her. Her damage has come down to be more in line with our desire to separate the two paths. If her health goes below 25% she will go into a hiding mode or pouting state and stop attacking until her health goes back above 25%. But If her health drops from above 25% to 0 in one hit, she will instead live at 1 health.

For extra uses of Mourning Glory, there was a common suggestion of having players be able to use elixirs. Some of the uses of Mourning Glory we planned did map to some of the elixirs, so we ran with that and found uses for the rest. Wendy can craft a hat of Mourning Glory that while worn lets someone drink elixirs (use them on the hat). Some have similar though lesser effects to those that Abigail gets, others follow the theme of the elixir if not the direct effect on the ghost. Some are more useful than others, but it's a lot of utility value for one skill.

Earlier on in the design phase of Wendy's skill tree, we had thought over various revival mechanics, but we'd turned them down since the Meat Effigy existed, but there were enough requests for Wendy to help revive her friends with a grave that we revived the idea.

Last, we added a way for Wendy to revive Butterflies using Mourning Glory. It has some general uses and pairs well with Shadow Abigail's path. It also shows her staring to learn how Mourning Glory can be used in Revival, leading to her new grave reviver skill.

These things have become their own Mourning Glory skill path to replace the missing Dark Petals path.

Wendy's skill tree is driving me crazy, and when compared to the other two, it feels like it wasn't made by the same company. Wendy's initial skill tree was jokey, and after the numerical enhancement, it was satisfactory. But after being weakened, it became even more speechless. It's not just about the battle with the boss, but also about the actual benefits, such as the difficulty of making a moon dial in the first thirty-one days, and by that time, many people have already cleared all the current processes.

As one of the most popular characters, Wendy players will pay for his appearance and background, but those who only like Wendy may turn from expectation to disappointment and gradually lose the desire to play the game.

Here are a few suggestions I have:

1. The urn can hold more items. For example, dark petals, forget-me-lots, fire nettles, foliage... to give Abigail different effects.

2. Increase the acquisition of Mourning Glory. There is no story introduction for Pipspook, and helping Pipsook should be considered as care rather than for rewards. So, other methods can be thought of to obtain Mourning Glory, such as using the urn to convert 400% of petals into 4 Mourning Glories.Furthermore, the Pipsook branch in this tree should be removed.
3. The Sisturn and health increase. The 600 health increase should be changed to a permanent boost or one that slowly regenerates, such as allowing Abigail to use the picnic basket to restore health, albeit at a slower rate than the Sisturn.
4. The Moon Abigail should not be weakened. Not only should we consider the combat performance against bosses, but also the actual survival. I have already mentioned this above and will not repeat it. Moreover, it is particularly ridiculous that Abigail can still be attacked while attacking.

Hope the game is made with heart rather than just for the sake of progress, and of course, I wish the game continues to get better.