Character Rebalance Discussion thread

[366107044]

Also, I would very much like to know- is the new character going to be unlocked with XP, (please), or through adventure mode or the caves?

[Amkar]

Also, I would very much like to know- is the new character going to be unlocked with XP, (please), or through adventure mode or the caves?

Didn't Kevin say a while back he wanted characters to be unlocked via gameplay, not XP? Like Wes and Maxwell are at the moment. I would like to see if this is still planned.Anyway, Wickerbottom's perk sounds AMAZING! What kind of spells would the books give? I really can't wait for this update! Edited June 17, 2013 by Amkar

[jbeetle]

Didn't Kevin say a while back he wanted characters to be unlocked via gameplay, not XP? Like Wes and Maxwell are at the moment. I would like to see if this is still planned.Anyway, Wickerbottom's perk sounds AMAZING! What kind of spells would the books give? I really can't wait for this update!

I hope so.

[D7X]

I took a massive break from this game but I love all the changes that have been made recently and I've become obsessed with it once again. I've got to say I used to get really worried about the suggestions people made and how willing the developers were to implement them but everything added to this day is brilliant. Some ideas for this character overhaul worry me though.I'll start with what's good. Wilson's beard ability seems useless to a new player but it's brilliantly subtle once you learn what it's for. I think Wes' new balloon ability is the same, virtually useless but if say hounds get distracted by them it's subtle enough to work. I only played Willow once but I think she is fine, the addition of starting random fires when going insane and gaining sanity from fire is a nice touch and not too complicated for new players to grasp. WX-78's proposed changes are what worry me though.WX-78 is my favourite character simply for how he looks, the food spoilage thing is a bonus too because I like being able to take long trips away from camp without worrying about starving (and it promotes exploring as opposed to staying close to home base which is something I know used to be a concern). The whole lightning/umbrella/rain/gears thing is needlessly complex though. One of the things I like about Don't Starve is how simply the character differences seem.First of all, holding an umbrella to negate lightning is... odd. If anything it should increase the chances of being hit for all characters, but getting hit should cost them the umbrella and maybe damage them a little.Here's what I think should happen with WX-78. Either have it so:- Can eat spoiled food- Rain hurts his heart not his head (rain damages his health but not sanity)- Walking, talking, lightning rod (give him a 50% chance to get hit by lightning usually, and a 100% chance to get hit while holding an umbrella, gets sanity loss/small heal/glows/speed boost for as long as a lightning rod would, no fire)or- Can eat spoiled food- Rain hurts his heart not his head- Can eat grave items to upgrade stats (It'd be nice if certain grave items gave certain boosts. so gears/rocket gave him a speed boost, lying robot/wires gave him a health boost or just any grave item that's not a gem gave a boost. Otherwise it's just a case of find Wooden thing, eat 8 gears, find all things, jump to a new world, repeat...) this way each world could provide different boosts.I prefer the first because it just seems like a cleaner ability, and in both cases the rain damage can be adjusted if their bonuses are too OP.

[Kevin]

Today I'm waiting for the new wolfgang art, and starting on the wendy changes.

[xazzerr]

The whole lightning/umbrella/rain/gears thing is needlessly complex though. One of the things I like about Don't Starve is how simply the character differences seem.

The whole lightning/umbrella/rain/gears thing is pretty easy man. It's a robot. You know how it acts in the real world, right? Get's damaged by water, lightning can mess it up bad, etc. There's nothing THAT complicated. I do agree it's a bit more complex than other characters, but...

[Hairplane]

Today I'm waiting for the new wolfgang art, and starting on the wendy changes.

Absolutely loving all these new character tweaks and changes, and looking forward to seeing the Wolfgang art and Wendy rebalance! ^_^

[brummbar7]

I'm thinking the wickerbottom might gain a unique crafting tab, where she can bind books out of papyrus. These books will act kind of like consumable magic spells. Still thinking about that one, though.

I kind of agree with some other comments on this, that it's a bit out of character with Wicker's logical personality, and much more in character (presumably) with Waverly's. I do think it'd be much more in character for her to be able to teach pigs to use weapons and armor (and speak better) per my earlier suggestion (page 35, post #342 ). And just as fun, imo. And it would still use books. Edited June 17, 2013 by brummbar7

[Orima-Kazooie]

I do believe they said the umbrella prevented the damage from being rained on dude, and it's not like WX isn't also flavor-wise furthest from anyone else than any other twoAs for Wicker's spells, something that reverses food spoilage seems a given, as does some sort of thralling spellI'd love to see some sort of mental spell that reveals hallucinations to those around her (you may notice a recurring theme here but I think it's genuinely interesting, useful but not overpowered, and would be very easy to make rare enough)But anyways spells that'd make sense imo, ingredient ideas in parentheses assuming papyrus is a component used for all of them)-Something like a weaker one-man band effect on a broader variety of creatures (speaking of has anyone tested the OMB on Rock Lobsters?) (purple gem, cooked veggiemeat?)-Food revitalization (guano, veggiemeat?)-Ring of sight hallucination revealy dealie (this I think could actually work as a summoned ally in either direction depending) (2xPigskin [instead of papyrus, think "bound in human skin" type thing]Deerclops Eye, 10xNightmare Fuel. Needless to say this should be expensive)-Summoned lightning strike (4xGold, fire staff? a Fire Staff may be too expensive to use as an ingreedient in a one-time thing, but on the other hand it could be a good way to let it go out with a bang when it's about to run dry)-magic ball of light follower (light bulbs or fireflies, monster meat?)-cause frog rain ([a large amount of] frog legs, ?? I can't think of a single thing that we already have that would make sense here except perhaps a blue gem, but it might be cool letting such a ridiculous, fun, and most importantly highly likely to catastrophically backfire be the easiest to get?)-turn an enemy into a frog (cooked monster meat, froggle bunwich?)-transmute wood to marble; i'm thinking turn regular trees into marble trees as being able to turn a log into a marble would allow ridiculously large stacks of the stuff when it's supposed to be a rare resource (living log, marblesuit? another one i'm not sure how to do; using the tail end of a dying marblesuit makes the most sense and it'd make it like the shadow manipulator; you can only use it to make more marble, not to get it in the first place)or en lieu of the marble tree thing, it'd be wicked cool to have one that petrifies an enemy that can then be mined for marble, although that could require a bit of work in the art department where every enemy now needs a marblefied skinI can also imagine having some really interesting spells that consume resources that're semi-renewable by way of the fact that they're used to make their sources renewable (spider eggs, fleshy bulb, berry bushes, etc.) ; wouldn't it be cool to make a fountain of spiders? or maybe you could just give her the ability to craft a makeshift spiderhat out of monster meat, spider eggs, and silk so she can skip the step between tier 3 web and spiderhatI'll stop here before I go on forever, you might be able to tell I enjoy brainstorming these things. Probably not all of it is actually useful in practice but hey that's what testing's for right?

[D7X]

The whole lightning/umbrella/rain/gears thing is pretty easy man. It's a robot. You know how it acts in the real world, right? Get's damaged by water, lightning can mess it up bad, etc. There's nothing THAT complicated. I do agree it's a bit more complex than other characters, but...[ATTACH=CONFIG]9443[/ATTACH]

I do mean complicated in comparison to the others. I'm fine with it as long as all the characters are taken in a direction like this. But imo it's all or none. If we're taking characters down this route then Wilson's beard should grow a stage longer and you trip up on it occasionally, or it makes him more flammable the longer it gets. Abigail should be able to absorb other ghosts to get stronger and Wolfgang should have a strength increase depending on how much protein he's getting. Their descriptions are going to get messy is all I'm saying. I'm of the opinion that clean and simple is better.

[Orima-Kazooie]

looking at someone's suggestion of allowing wicker to teach the pigs to use weaponry and armor is a fantastiv idea, although i LOVE the magic book idea and I disagree with the fact that magic is somehow inherently illogical

assuming magic and science can't coexist demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of what science actually is, which would be finding out how **** works; as such if we did have magic, it'd be studied the same way as anything else. when prnouncing spells, what accent makes the best match, can it be cast by a recording, is the volume in any way relative to the effect, does anybody actually have to be able to hear the spell, how do echoes mess with it?

already in Don't Starve's universe we have some evidence that magical things are fairly well explained hinted at from Wicker herself who nonchalantly describes the dark sword and night armor as based on transdimensional effects, that the hallucinations are made of ectoplasm (presumably not the same thing as what we see at a cellular level in conventional life, else it'd be theoretically possible to use a large enough quantity of meat as a substitute for nightmare fuel (maybe that's how sacrifice works in the first place?)) and similarly can identify taxonomically the koalefant, the wormhole, and the /deerclops/, so clearly she has some experience with the paranatural even if that knowledge isn't widely available

the only things she expressed surprise or unfamiliarity with that I can recall are the marble tree, the treegaurd, and the ghost, which we could assume isn't the same form of life as the hallucinations, if you'd call them that

sorry, i seem to have gone into theorizing mode

isn't tearing media apart stitch by stitch fun

[Orima-Kazooie]

man at this rate i'm going to get a reputation as the guy who can't make a post under a thousand characters aren't I

[D7X]

“Magic's just science that we don't understand yet.”― Arthur C. ClarkeGiver Wickerbutt that as a line. Everyone's happy.or"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

[Orima-Kazooie]

Precisely

[Frantz93]

so for now seems that willow and wendy will have related items... BUT in case of adventure mode, should you pick these item in the telepotato? i hope no...

[LuckyMole]

Some thoughts about Maxwell and his abilities right now and what could be improved - basically he has almost the same usefulness as Wickerbottom. You start with sword and armor which are good up to the point you use them. I'd just save them so that i can get insane quicker as he has this dapperness issue that is considered a perk. But think about it. When you get to unlock him finally do you really worry about insanity or staying insane? His ability is more like an insurance for the people who want to stay sane. Once I finished adventure there was nothing that could make me panic or catch me off guard. And that's the way for probably the majority of people who finished it. And to me him staying sane doesn't make much difference than not.

But going insane doesn't give you anything. The sword and armor are up to their durability is used. Making more doesn't change their cost with Maxwell and I think he should be able to make them "cheaper" or with 50 to 100% more durability.

So to summarize - you get 2 good items that are your "perk", like 50 hp and dapperness? Hmmm not much of a special character as neither of them makes the game with him special. Only the lowered hp and that is it. If you could be just starting to play DS and be able to play as Maxwell, his abilities would make sense. But to experienced players... meh.

Did Kevin say something like giving him companions? Well they better be something other than merms. It just looks lazy to give him the ability to control them when you have pigs and meat and bunnies and veg. And even more... and probably even more in future pathes.

Someone here gave a great idea for Maxwell - give him the ability to mind control almost every creature that it isn't considered too OP. But only one at a time. After that either the mob follows you like a pet or you take direct control over his body. You stop to control Maxwell as he will stay where you initiated his ability. That way you can do stuff in your new body without the normal restrictions, but at the same time you have to stay near Maxwell's body to protect him. If you die while controling the creature you return to Maxwell's body. If something kills Maxwell's body while you are controlling a creature you will be stuck in that creature's body for rest of the game unless there is another item prebuild to save you from your plight.

Maxwell was the puppet master after all. It fits him greatly. And it's balanced in the way that by controlling others you endanger yourself. But since he has that low hp it makes sense to use others to do his bidding.

[Orima-Kazooie]

I had assumed you were going to say you'd lsoe the game but wow that'd be a perfect feeling of despair being stuck in a body that can't really do much and kind of just trying to stave off the inevitableI can see people debugspawning whatever creature, minding it, and using it to kill maxwell and seeing how long they can last as that creature

[Hairplane]

That is a fantastic idea. It would definitely give Maxwell a unique gameplay experience contrast to the others being implemented. I also like both of the Wickerbottom suggestions. This is getting to be quite the exciting update.

[oCrapaCreeper]

What about Maxxy being able to straight up take control over a creature (obviously nothing too OP like the Deerclops)? He could take control of say a hound or a Beefalo to do his bidding for a bit. I kinda like the idea of Maxxy still having some sort of power over the world.

Considering his nickname is "The Puppet Master", that would be a fitting ability. Edited June 17, 2013 by oCrapaCreeper

[Cryo]

What happen to the item when you go trough the teleportato and change the character?

Edited June 17, 2013 by Cryo
correction

[CREU]

yea somoene ansew me PLEASE now every chactares will recive a buff so why wendy will stay the same just abgil will be sumonable what should be since th e begening ,Comn give she special ablites she is the 4 chactares and going by this the wekest ,Reallyy will u serius make me spot playng her she war alredy usulees by many and a dead weight later game , just cmon buff her make wendy be able to ge a buff in she statisc by ´´abosving abigil´´ and make wendy more controrable PLEASE OR ELSE SHE WILL BE THE WEAKENESS AND SHE IS MY FAVORITE (and yea she is the only one that didnt get more pros and conrt just the same cmon kevin i expect more of you)

[Amkar]

yea somoene ansew me PLEASE now every chactares will recive a buff so why wendy will stay the same just abgil will be sumonable what should be since th e begening ,Comn give she special ablites she is the 4 chactares and going by this the wekest ,Reallyy will u serius make me spot playng her she war alredy usulees by many and a dead weight later game , just cmon buff her make wendy be able to ge a buff in she statisc by ´´abosving abigil´´ and make wendy more controrable PLEASE OR ELSE SHE WILL BE THE WEAKENESS AND SHE IS MY FAVORITE (and yea she is the only one that didnt get more pros and conrt just the same cmon kevin i expect more of you)

These aren't set in stone, and she's likely to have some other stuff like more/less sanity or something too.

[CREU]

i am prayng to be like you say but less sanity ,its crazy since abigil is prety much usuless

[CREU]

i chose her beacuse she can kill lots os spider (i hate to get silk every time) and she just calm dowm and make me relaxe

[Amkar]

i am prayng to be like you say but less sanity ,its crazy since abigil is prety much usuless

That's partially what her buff will be... Abigail improvements.