Notes on Lunar Affinity

[YouKnowWho142]

This was my more anticipated affinity out of the two. I always figured WX would be more closely aligned with lunar than shadow, so i was really excited to see their lunar affinity. However, as i'm sure many of you know, their minions are extremely unpleasant to use. Below is a couple of the notes I took while testing them, and some things I'd like to see changed.

1. They are not pre-warbot exclusive. This was a major relief to find out since warbot is extremely late game, but i still have some problems with how it is now. As long as the backup has the spectral transfer module installed on it, nearby gestalts will float over to the chassis and possess it. This fixes a major initial issue i had with the skill, but the issue is that it is extremely hard to get possessed backups ready when you need them due to them starving to death over time. It would be nice if WX was able to use a weaker version of the phasmo encapsulator that only held the gestalts for a few minutes so that they would be able to bring it to chassises instead of needing to to all the way to where gestalts are located which is more often than not just lunar island pre rift.

2. The minions deal half damage, including planar damage. this is an extremely unusual quality to have for a planar weapon. it basically means that any weapon you give them will be stuck at only half the value, which doesn't feel great. I understand it for balance reasons but they need a WAY better ai to justify this.

3. If minions are given a normal weapon while you're using a spin circuit weapon, they simply will not attack. This is true for trees and rocks too (though in general they are not consistent with these tasks to begin with).This heavily discourages the use of spin circuit alongside your minions. this one is probably more just a bug, though.

4. Minions do not match your kiting patterns. They make a lot of mistakes when kiting because of this, and often they will run way too far from the target and spend most of their time running back. I've seen the minions never get a chance to attack because of this, or only swing 1-2 times, which when stacked with the half damage means they contribute very little.

5. They mindlessly spam gamma circuits. This especially looks super weird with the blocking circuit, where they will put it up for a split second then cancel it nonstop. Also likely a bug.

6. Minions starve and must be managed if you want them to stay alive. This is a major pain for obvious reasons. Why does a gestalt need to eat anyway?

7. Supplying minions with weapons, circuits, and armor is extremely tedious and resource intensive. This is, above all, probably my biggest reason I won't be very interested in this skill. They get hit often which utilizes armor poorly, they don't regenerate and have low base hp so they need circuits (which you cannot change while they are already possessed), and weapon damage is halved so in most cases you're wasting a lot of value on the weapons you give them. I don't even know how to fix this one, this is probably more of a personal problem than anything. However, for the way they are especially now, the last thing i want to do is give a minion 9-10 circuits, armor, and a weapon for a very minor dps boost that will die out on its own regardless. Maybe armor they wear or weapons they use drain durability significantly less than usual, and a slight health regen similar to what clockworks got?

This is by far the most tedious and unpleasant follower to use in all of DST. Even if their AI improves significantly, WX as a character requires a lot more investment than other characters because of their circuits and to be forced to do that 2 or 3 more times than they already have to, alongside having to supply them more weapons and armor than you would've otherwise needed, and having to babysit them throughout, is just not a great feeling.

Not to mention, the backups are commonly stated to be the strongest part of their tree, and you are sacrificing your ability to use them by turning them into followers. This is a tradeoff that shadow simply does not have to make while also offering stronger, unconditional damage and major utility (I have issues with some shadow affinity stuff too but I will hold off on that for the time being).

 

TLDR - Please just let armor and weapons the minions use drain less durability (at least like double durability for both), add a slight passive regen, and remove the hunger drain entirely, alongside much much better AI and letting us customize their circuits while they are possessed. I probably still wouldn't like it as much as shadow which is far simpler, synergizes with their BiS, and has more utility while not sacrificing the ability to use backups, but I want at least an EXCUSE to use lunar. I really really want this affinity to succeed.

Edited April 13 by YouKnowWho142

[NotGabriel]

Couldn’t have said it better myself

[Edible Coal]

[doritosdamafia]

25 minutes ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

 

3. If minions are given a normal weapon while you're using a spin circuit weapon, they simply will not attack. This is true for trees and rocks too (though in general they are not consistent with these tasks to begin with).This heavily discourages the use of spin circuit alongside your minions. this one is probably more just a bug, though.

 

i find kinda funny to this bug exist, because someone said before that using the spin circuit would make your fallowers to not chop trees, and i pretty much sure klei fixed it, so the living chasis having this bug is strange

Edited April 13 by doritosdamafia

[YouKnowWho142]

this is a minor request that's probably too late nor is it particularly relevant to my above points but it'd be cool if using different types of gestalts on the backups had different effects

Edited April 13 by YouKnowWho142

[Evelo]

One of the weirdest things for me is how the Lunar affinity requires the Chassis perk to function while the Shadow one benefits from it but it is not required. Just seems so odd to require a perk point to make use of said affinity when the counter doesn't. Just make 1 chassis baseline and remove that singular perk. No need to replace it with anything. It is very odd.

I do agree though I was most excited for the Lunar one given WX's maniacal interest in Alter's powers. I was expecting something a little more than "Make gestalt possess a body". I was thinking along the lines of Lunar Rocks, Moon Glass, etc.
Heck given WX's identity is more focused on "build your survivor" it seems like, the Shadow one Works well with that as you improve yourself depending on what you want, while the lunar is "Me times Three" which, doesn't feel right? Maybe just me. I do like the description mentioning '"borrowed"'. Though still would prefer if it didn't mention Wagstaff at all and focused on Alter instead.

Just my opinion as a DS fan, Wormwood Lover who dabbles in other survivors (except Wolfgang).

[YouKnowWho142]

3 minutes ago, Evelo said:

One of the weirdest things for me is how the Lunar affinity requires the Chassis perk to function while the Shadow one benefits from it but it is not required. Just seems so odd to require a perk point to make use of said affinity when the counter doesn't. Just make 1 chassis baseline and remove that singular perk. No need to replace it with anything. It is very odd.

I do agree though I was most excited for the Lunar one given WX's maniacal interest in Alter's powers. I was expecting something a little more than "Make gestalt possess a body". I was thinking along the lines of Lunar Rocks, Moon Glass, etc.
Heck given WX's identity is more focused on "build your survivor" it seems like, the Shadow one Works well with that as you improve yourself depending on what you want, while the lunar is "Me times Three" which, doesn't feel right? Maybe just me. I do like the description mentioning '"borrowed"'. Though still would prefer if it didn't mention Wagstaff at all and focused on Alter instead.

Just my opinion as a DS fan, Wormwood Lover who dabbles in other survivors (except Wolfgang).

Both at the bare minimum require the skill to unlock. I don't disagree that I wish lunar added something minor for WX outside of the backups, but discussing whether or not a skill should be baseline is not at all relevant to my discussion.

[Radicaljoe]

Lunar affinity makes me wish the chassis cap was higher. The minions could still be limited to 3 (36 biodata is hell enough anyway) and just let us have like 8 chassis available. Instead of choosing minions over teleporting (teleporting always wins, it's too important to trade for anything)

[Evelo]

18 minutes ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

Both at the bare minimum require the skill to unlock. I don't disagree that I wish lunar added something minor for WX outside of the backups, but discussing whether or not a skill should be baseline is not at all relevant to my discussion.

Oh, didn't notice that part. My mistake! thanks for mentioning that. oopsie.

[Radicaljoe]

And if not extra chasis, then a way to pick up the ones we have. I don't want to walk all the way to Lunar as Chasis 1 to be converted into a minion, just so I have to walk there again as chasis 2 to convert 1 with the gestalt funnel.

[DVGMedia]

I mean this idea that seems kind of fun I haven't had a chance to really mess with it but being able to basically create clones of yourself as pretty strong despite people saying it's not worth it. 

The strongest thing in this game is literally multiplayer 

I want to see how these things actually work though before I really comment too much. 

It's an actual like fully interactive minion that you can make do whatever you want 

[YouKnowWho142]

7 minutes ago, DVGMedia said:

I mean this idea that seems kind of fun I haven't had a chance to really mess with it but being able to basically create clones of yourself as pretty strong despite people saying it's not worth it. 

The strongest thing in this game is literally multiplayer 

I want to see how these things actually work though before I really comment too much. 

It's an actual like fully interactive minion that you can make do whatever you want 

that's what i thought as well. However, when people say they are clones, they are really clones. as in, you need to feed them, heal them, protect them, etc. They also lock you out of backups since they are the backups, so no teleportation and no bonus circuit builds. their ai is extremely clunky and bad, though im trying to be fairer on that one since im sure itll be largely fixed.

not to mention the fact that you need to supply them the weapons and armor, of which they deal half damage and get hit often so theyre extremely wasteful with both, and you need to give them circuits which is extremely resource intensive.

it's a really fun idea for an affinity, but i do not like how it works currently. my post above was only my initial gripes, though the more testing i do the more things i have found extremely unfun about using them.

Edited April 13 by YouKnowWho142

[Ruperstiltskin]

3 minutes ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

not to mention the fact that you need to supply them the weapons and armor, of which they deal half damage and get hit often, and you need to give them circuits which is extremely resource intensive.

They fr should not make em get hungry and deal normal dmg tbh they are really cool other wise if they could also help you doing chores and if you could interact with them to get access to their inv, and being able to transfer to them in case you need to swap circuits or smth, also rest mode switch for when you need the tp instead of a minion

[YouKnowWho142]

2 minutes ago, Ruperstiltskin said:

They fr should not make em get hungry and deal normal dmg tbh they are really cool other wise if they could also help you doing chores and if you could interact with them to get access to their inv, and being able to transfer to them in case you need to swap circuits or smth, also rest mode switch for when you need the tp instead of a minion

i agree that hunger drain should be removed, but i would be fine if the half damage stayed since i understand why they did that and with a better ai that could be extremely strong. At the bare minimum, I want them to have at the very least double durability on their weapons so that the weapons are not going to waste.

[DVGMedia]

10 minutes ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

i agree that hunger drain should be removed, but i would be fine if the half damage stayed since i understand why they did that and with a better ai that could be extremely strong. At the bare minimum, I want them to have at the very least double durability on their weapons so that the weapons are not going to waste.

I'm kind of want to be able to make them fed though I think that's fun we don't have anything like that that's like one of the main things I prefer doing in the game. Plus they can literally still just eat trash  can really do a lot with them especially because of the circuits

[YouKnowWho142]

Update for this post since Jakey made an excellent analysis on the lunar affinity. The weapons do have double durability, and if you use post-rift gestalts to possess the backups they deal full planar damage. that solves two of my bigger concerns. I would still like a lot of their tedium reduced a bit (specifically the hunger drain removed, the sanity thing can stay since it makes sense for a gestalt to disappear at low sanity), and for them to not despawn when logging out or entering caves. 

also of course for better ai, inventory management, and circuit swapping while they are possessed, alongside an easier way to possess the chassis or to move the chassis to where they need to be possessed. But I'm warming up to lunar affinity slightly more the more information we get on them.

Edited April 13 by YouKnowWho142

[Jarrec]

16 minutes ago, Soul7k said:

link to Jakey's post?

Hunger drain and sanity don't make a lot of sense because Gestalt things, but then how would we heal them? duct tape and sewing kits?

There should probably be a u.i. component if we have to babysit their health/sanity, armor, and weapons if they are not going to have their own. Though i think native damage reduction, health regen, and a weapon would be an easier solution.

Oh and of course Jackey's idea of being able to capture gestalts with the device and maybe stockpile them for later

Its not a post he made a vid on the affinties

[Mysterious box]

3 hours ago, YouKnowWho142 said:

Update for this post since Jakey made an excellent analysis on the lunar affinity. The weapons do have double durability, and if you use post-rift gestalts to possess the backups they deal full planar damage. that solves two of my bigger concerns. I would still like a lot of their tedium reduced a bit (specifically the hunger drain removed, the sanity thing can stay since it makes sense for a gestalt to disappear at low sanity), and for them to not despawn when logging out or entering caves. 

also of course for better ai, inventory management, and circuit swapping while they are possessed, alongside an easier way to possess the chassis or to move the chassis to where they need to be possessed. But I'm warming up to lunar affinity slightly more the more information we get on them.

I think this is where the hunger circuits and hunger reduction clothing comes in for the hunger aspect.