Are there any plans for character balance?

[kineticdreamss]

Title.

I made a similar thread on Reddit when I was still new to the game. But, decided to drop the subject until I got good.

8xx hours later and the only character change I've witnessed is a buff to Willow's freeze/sanity mechanic.

Are there any future plans for character balance? Any at all?

Wickerbottom and Wolfgang are God tier. They are literally leagues ahead of every other character in the game... to the point where not having one in your party is akin to gimping your runs.

From a solo perspective it's hard to justify playing anything except Wicker, or Wolf, if you want things done in a timely manner.

Hunger is not so hard to control that Wolfgang should get an obscene 2.00x dmg at full hunger, with added movement speed and health on top.

The tentacle fields that Wicker can create serve way too many purposes, on top of the other overwhelming perks her other books give.

Why is it that these two characters have managed to stay so overpowered for so long? Why have the devs done nothing?

clay plz






 

[Alarsin]

pls dont fix i dont want to sell my wolfgang skins

[Mr Pig]

I have no clue if there are any plans for character balance. However it seems to me at least that a majority of the community tends to want weaker characters improved to wolf/wicker tier (even though the game is becomes 5x easier with either of them) rather than having them nerfed to be balanced with the rest of the roster... Though admittedly with 11 characters (well you could say Wes belongs in  a category of his own where balance is unnecessary due to him being the challenge character and whatnot) its a tough group to keep in line with one another but I would be all for for some adjustments if they were to come.

[The Curator]

No. The community likes that the balance is broken, and even in communities that berate lack of balance it usually doesn't get fixed. Most developers can't be bothered to change single variables in code. Which is why some 20% or so of all items in the game are not even worth using, because the developers can't be bothered to buff them by changing single variables in order to add content to their own game. Because logic.

Beside, they're all too busy not making Wendella.

[TheKingDedede]

35 minutes ago, The Curator said:

Beside, they're all too busy not making Wendella.

Who is Wendella? Is it a character idea that you came up with? The name of the character whose name was discovered in an update and quickly removed in a patch was called 'Winona'. Strangely enough, it was a thread that you yourself made. Although, if I'm wrong, please provide evidence to show that a character by the name of Wendella quickly had their lines removed from the game or that there was something else to prove that the concept of such a character was in either DS or DST's files.

[Lumina]

Fun, twice the same mention of Wendella.

 

I think character rebalance is hard to do properly. I played others game when character are importants and changes are hard, because people doesn't like change.

 

I'm playing Wickerbottom, and i agree she is too powerful. However, balancing her right is hard. It's a perfect character for playing in group and probably one of the main help for surviving in group finding the game difficult (even if managing her sanity isn't easy for theses groups i think).

So how to change her without making the game harder and difficult for players ? How to change her without her being tedious (after all, she can't sleep and is picky about food, downsides that could easily make her tedious to play, so it's hard to limit her more).

If the change is reasonable for me, i will probably continue to play her and maybe playing others character time to time (because they are more attractive in comparison). This is the aim for a good balance : a character still attractive but not as attractive that i can't change time to time.

But it's hard to obtain, because of different playstyles and level of knowledge, way to enjoy the game and others stuff. A change bearable for me could be what will make the game tedious and unfun for some people.

 

But if i would suggest a change, it would be this : instead of a science bonus, Wickerbottom start by being able to do science tier 1 recipe, but still need to do an alchemy engine to make tier 2 recipe. Of course, tentacle book will change of tier (either science tier 2, or magic tier, maybe).

This will still allow quick start and pretty big bonus (shovel and backpack without science machine for example), but more reasonable, without making her to tedious to play or really more difficult. But you will have to build an alchemy engine sooner and later, balancing her a little.

 

But i think that changing balance of a character need to be done when enough content is here to distract the player for the loss of power of his/her favorite character. Especially if the character is able to do new, cool things (that are balanced because the content is here to make them not too powerful)

 

[ShadowDuelist]

I'll add my 2 cents here: From what I've seen in very long term games and playing with 1k + hours players, wickerbottoms are rare on servers and just do their magic once and then, and then act as any other character. Most very experienced players gravitate towards Wendy or Wolfgang, to the point where sometimes every char on the server is one of those. Not saying they are OP, just that it all depends on player skill, and since the game is not competitive I'd only buff a little the characters that are less liked/ used so we see them more often (Willow and Woodie)

[FreyaMaluk]

 

23 minutes ago, Lumina said:

Fun, twice the same mention of Wendella.

 

I think character rebalance is hard to do properly. I played others game when character are importants and changes are hard, because people doesn't like change.

 

I'm playing Wickerbottom, and i agree she is too powerful. However, balancing her right is hard. It's a perfect character for playing in group and probably one of the main help for surviving in group finding the game difficult (even if managing her sanity isn't easy for theses groups i think).

So how to change her without making the game harder and difficult for players ? How to change her without her being tedious (after all, she can't sleep and is picky about food, downsides that could easily make her tedious to play, so it's hard to limit her more).

If the change is reasonable for me, i will probably continue to play her and maybe playing others character time to time (because they are more attractive in comparison). This is the aim for a good balance : a character still attractive but not as attractive that i can't change time to time.

But it's hard to obtain, because of different playstyles and level of knowledge, way to enjoy the game and others stuff. A change bearable for me could be what will make the game tedious and unfun for some people.

 

But if i would suggest a change, it would be this : instead of a science bonus, Wickerbottom start by being able to do science tier 1 recipe, but still need to do an alchemy engine to make tier 2 recipe. Of course, tentacle book will change of tier (either science tier 2, or magic tier, maybe).

This will still allow quick start and pretty big bonus (shovel and backpack without science machine for example), but more reasonable, without making her to tedious to play or really more difficult. But you will have to build an alchemy engine sooner and later, balancing her a little.

 

But i think that changing balance of a character need to be done when enough content is here to distract the player for the loss of power of his/her favorite character. Especially if the character is able to do new, cool things (that are balanced because the content is here to make them not too powerful)

 

I agree with you mostly but on this point: Wickerbottom is not "too powerful," she is useful IMO. Every character has his advantages and disadvantages and I don't see why Wicker needs to change. Not sleeping is already a big pain in the a**, specially if you are playing in a small group of people. And the stale food penalty can screw you big time as well. WX has his overcharge and upgrading, Maxwell has his minions, Wolfgang has his mightyness, Wigfrid has... everything.. lol... etc, etc

Willow and Woodie on the other hand need a serious buff. It makes little sense the HUGE nerf they got in DST. Willow could be the Dragonfly specialist, now she is reduced to an annoyingly weak character that can't even resist the normal heat dmg. Same goes with Woodie with cold resistance and his miserable DMG in Beaver form while his sanity drain like crazy.

And that's why the topic "rebalance" is such a delicate matter. The Willow and Woodie cases prove that a change can make a character boring as in the case of these two. Ik there are some Willow and Woodie's mains here and I'm not saying this as a critic on your character's choice, but on the note that most people find these two particularly tedious.

[Lumina]

I think she is too powerful. I mean, the books are very useful (especially agriculture and tentacle) and she can do a science machine and never bother with a alchemy engine until she needs to do tentacle books. She can craft a backpack whenever she want, makes a lantern very quickly, sanity is not that hard to manage now that you have mushrooms planter.

I would not feel that she is very less powerful if she can only craft science recipe tier 1 but still need alchemy engine for tier 2. Also, i feel like it could help balance modding a little but this is a personal taste. If you make a recipe for science tier 2, you are making it a little challenge to do for normal character, but nothing special for wickerbottom, and every new recipe you add is making her stronger in some way because she will benefit for her bonus for every recipe existing that isn't magic.

 

And imagine that someone (Klei or a modder) want to add tier 3 machine and recipe : wickerbottom will access all only with an alchemy engine. So the challenge you could want to create by making a difficult to make machine would be ruined.

 

So yeah, if i could choose, i would tune her down a bit, make willow/woody/wilson a little more enjoyable and see how it works.

[MondayNight]

Every now and then a new topic pops up: fix Woodie, needs buffs as beaver is lame (but wait, planting cones is too OP for sanity management, that needs a nerf), fix Willow, also needs buffs as I loved DS variant (and I like burning stuff hihi *looks at random base on map, pyro griefer style*), fix Wolfgang, needs nerf 'cause in all those 0.1% PvP matches I and friend fought Wolf vs Wig face-to-face, mano-a-mano at gate, Wig lost when Wolf max hunger; fix Wickerbottom as, after N days of collecting tentacle spots (what is the random drop from killing tentacles again?!), M days of building walls after Z days of collecting materials, and X days of fighting shadows after spawning tentacles, and S days of collecting mushrooms etc, oh, summoned tentacle field, so unfair, needs nerf; fix Wilson, too default, needs perks, fix Maxwell, shadow puppets suck as they kite (when they didn't do that they sucked for not kiting, bum-tz!); fix Wigfrid, 1.25x is obscene, and who said making helmets and spears is a thing?! Preposterous! (Funny thing: no one complains about poor Wes chap - oh, he's "hardcore mod for profy-pros"; played maybe in 3-5% of total matches - that plain ol' sucks on shoelaces harder than an alcoholic on gifts day from a pack of J.Daniel's)

And then you complain about lack of diversity. Really?

How would it be to just have 1 character with different skins? That sounds perfectly "balanced", right?! With just +/- 5-10% on some random attributes in relation to default concept, yes?! As is really fun to play default +/-5% random stuff. Yeey!

 

Not to mention the "entitlement" of some forumites regarding free updates (why they don't tell us when, where and what, why secrecy, why, WHY?!). FREE updates! Epic lel!

[kineticdreamss]

1 hour ago, Lumina said:

Fun, twice the same mention of Wendella.

 

I think character rebalance is hard to do properly. I played others game when character are importants and changes are hard, because people doesn't like change.

 

I'm playing Wickerbottom, and i agree she is too powerful. However, balancing her right is hard. It's a perfect character for playing in group and probably one of the main help for surviving in group finding the game difficult (even if managing her sanity isn't easy for theses groups i think).

So how to change her without making the game harder and difficult for players ? How to change her without her being tedious (after all, she can't sleep and is picky about food, downsides that could easily make her tedious to play, so it's hard to limit her more).

If the change is reasonable for me, i will probably continue to play her and maybe playing others character time to time (because they are more attractive in comparison). This is the aim for a good balance : a character still attractive but not as attractive that i can't change time to time.

But it's hard to obtain, because of different playstyles and level of knowledge, way to enjoy the game and others stuff. A change bearable for me could be what will make the game tedious and unfun for some people.

 

But if i would suggest a change, it would be this : instead of a science bonus, Wickerbottom start by being able to do science tier 1 recipe, but still need to do an alchemy engine to make tier 2 recipe. Of course, tentacle book will change of tier (either science tier 2, or magic tier, maybe).

This will still allow quick start and pretty big bonus (shovel and backpack without science machine for example), but more reasonable, without making her to tedious to play or really more difficult. But you will have to build an alchemy engine sooner and later, balancing her a little.

 

But i think that changing balance of a character need to be done when enough content is here to distract the player for the loss of power of his/her favorite character. Especially if the character is able to do new, cool things (that are balanced because the content is here to make them not too powerful)

 

The very best example I've heard on how to change Wickerbottom came from someone in a discord I used to hang out in.

She can't read books without having the required sanity.

That ALONE would bring her down to just "op" rather than God-tier-broken-as-hell.

I don't care so much for the fact that she can make football helmets with just a science machine. I actually think that's a pretty decent perk to have.

But, when you add up all of her perks on top of all of her books... then how ridiculous she really is starts to show.

Similar concept for Wolfgang:
He doesn't NEED 2x dmg + move speed + higher health when he's full on health.
Either higher health + move speed, or 1.6x dmg at full hunger. But, all 3 of his current perks far outdo the fact that he's "scared of monsters." Especially given that being insane is a wonderful thing.

@xxVERSUSxy I don't play much single player. Sorry.

[Lumina]

I don't see a problem about discussing character, how to improve and nerf them as long as :

 

- people are polite and respectful (i think it's the case here*)

- they give reasons for their choice and feeling (i think it's the case here*)

- they don't demand something, but suggest/ask (i think it's the case here*)

 

(*For most posts at least)

 

I mean, suggesting and asking for improvement (whatever the improvement is for you, me or the people posting) is ok, and often, people do this because they love the game. It's not a bad thing if it's done in the right way.

 

5 minutes ago, kineticdreamss said:

She can't read books without having the required sanity.

Yes, it was another option. She doesn't need massive change (also i'm not a big fan of massive change), just small one, and one could be enough. Both options have their advantages/disadvantages, depending of the point of view, but i would be ok with each.

[KoreanWaffles]

I remember a while back, there was a Wes thread talking about character balance.

Here's a quote from JoeW

Spoiler

"So I don't have a direct answer to this, but I think something is important to notice. I am speaking personally here as I don't know where we all stand in terms of balance right now.

DS characters were never intended to be balanced as equals. Wes was fully intended to be kind of a hard mode character. He is at a disadvantage and that's pretty much all there is to it.

I know, for a fact that if we were to "balance" Wes in a way that made him "equal" to everybody else; a lot of people would be upset by such a change. Any changes to balance up to this point have been to adjust a perceived problem. In general in terms of balance, characters were made for an interesting experience, not so much to be equal.

As somebody who has worked in MMOs almost exclusively before coming to Klei, I really think this is something interesting that I would like to explore more as we grow DST in the future. I don't know how I feel about making everybody balanced to be equal; I don't know that that's really in the spirit of the game. So, then how do we "balance" in interesting ways?

Obviously this is weird in an online game, right? I mean, up till now as players we have always thought of balance as meaning equal, where that is not the case in Don't Starve. But does it have to be equal? Can we help players choose know that they should pick Wes for the challenge? Is it something we need to change, or is it something we need to encourage?

We do have plans for some pvp oriented changes to the game in the future, so I am very interested in knowing more about how others feel about this. Again, this is all me here, I am sure other devs have different opinions here; but we would love your thoughts."- JoeW

(I couldn't quote it directly because the thread is now archived)

 

Don't Starve isn't meant to be a game focused around balance, but around the whole experience of it. If you look closely, you can find several quirks that are different and unique to Don't Starve. This may range from it's art-style, the fact that characters are voiced by instruments, or even the wild Goose chases Klei sends you on in their puzzles (Metheus flashbacks intensify)

I could write an essay about character balance, and propose several changes to each character, but that's a topic for another time.

 

[kineticdreamss]

I agree that DST has its own quirks that are different and unique. However, the same can be said for any other popular game.

JoeW has also written that Don't Starve is Klei's baby, and the reason it has not been updated in a while is because Klei also has other babies to take care of. I can agree with and understand that, as well.

However, if his personal opinion on character balance is that each character should be a truly different experience and actual balance should be thrown out the window, and if the rest of the devs were to agree with such an opinion (which very well seems to be the case, as there have been no balance changes in a long time,) then DST enters a very dangerous territory, in my opinion.

It is definitely possible for each character to be a different experience without also ignoring balance.

I am positive that I'm not the only one here that has been 300 days into a run with a character and had a gut feeling that I could have accomplished so much more if I had picked Wickerbottom, or Wolfgang.

That uncomfortable feeling doesn't need to be there. That uncomfortable feeling is what leads people to quit games.

The reason I haven't quit is because I happen to main Maxwell... who can be considered a jack of all trades. So, I am never at a disadvantage when I play alone, or with other people. I always have something to offer, for the most part.

But, Woody players? Willow mains? Those who like Webber? They're getting the VERY short end of the stick.

In essence, it might be a different experience to play Woodie, but it does not necessarily mean that it's a fun one, or one that brings fulfillment... at least compared to what one can accomplish if one were to play Wolf or Wicker.

[ShadowDuelist]

3 hours ago, Lumina said:

I think she is too powerful. I mean, the books are very useful (especially agriculture and tentacle) and she can do a science machine and never bother with a alchemy engine until she needs to do tentacle books. She can craft a backpack whenever she want, makes a lantern very quickly, sanity is not that hard to manage now that you have mushrooms planter.

Wickerbottom may seem powerful early on, but once there is a running general base and food is no longer a problem, her powers quickly balance down to be just a support character. 

Like I mentioned earlier, in long games very awesome players Ive been with seem to use Wendy and Wolfgang mostly, I assume it's because their special skills never really lose their momentum whether its day 10 or day 2000: Wolfgangs keep raiding bosses over and over with very little effort, and Wendys seem to enjoy to keep mass murdering ruins stuff (specially monkeys) and on the surface world they beefalo ride to compensate their damage penalty (With the orb of destruction "Abigail" as an extra bodyguard unique to her).

On the other hand, Wickerbottom "loses" her original ability of not needing a science machine since everyone will eventually get to that point (for most players that happens in 20 days or less) and her books are not really required that often once there are several food sources. In lategame Wickerbottoms seem to play their role just fixing tentacle fields near bee queen, and overcharging WXs if there are any.

Im not suggesting any of these needs a nerf or a buff, just that their roles are different and it all depends on your goals in the game. If you goal is to make it to the second autumn with all the basics quick and efficiently covered, then Wickerbottom is probably your char. If your goal is to mass murder everything that is not a boss in the game, go Wendy. If your goal is to kill bosses and swim on boss loot, go Wolfgang/Wigfrid. If your goal is to stockpile food and healing forever, and live most of the time alone in a corner of the world, go Webber.  If your goal is to build huge pretty bases quickly, without going through the problems of gathering wood and stone, go Maxwell. If your goal is to explore the land effortless and not die very often, go WX. If you don't really want to have any advantage/disadvantage because you don't like that part of the game much, go Wilson. If your goal is to suffer,  and yet hide your constant pain to prove that you are better than the other players on the server, go Wes.

It all goes down to which playstyle you like, what role you want to fill on a team, and what character you like more. Some characters are less picked than others, because their skills may seem boring,  not fun, or not challenging enough to many of the players. Thats why I suggested to perhaps add a little something to those instead but for "fun" purposes mostly, not to make them as powerful as X char. (IMHO those requiring a little spice up their world would be Woodie and Willow I've given extensive suggestions about them in other posts).

[kineticdreamss]

6 hours ago, ShadowDuelist said:

On the other hand, Wickerbottom "loses" her original ability of not needing a science machine since everyone will eventually get to that point (for most players that happens in 20 days or less) and her books are not really required that often once there are several food sources. In lategame Wickerbottoms seem to play their role just fixing tentacle fields near bee queen, and overcharging WXs if there are any.

 

Wicker only scales harder as the game goes longer. The more books you have the more nightmare fuel + book perks you'll have. Books aren't very hard to craft in DST, given how easy Dfly is to kill.

It would be a legitimate statement to say that no other character in the game scales as hard as Wicker does. Once you have a steady supply of purple gems(EDIT: SORRY, MEANT Tentacle Spots!) going, anything is possible.

On your very first winter, you can, not only get a krampus sack, but also have weaponry for multiple, extremely safe, ruin runs.

Her tentacles do not only extend to bee queen... she can drop a book on basically any kind of farm you can think of. Pig farm? Tentacles. Bunny farm? Tentacles. Splumonkey farm? Tentacles.  Gear farm? Tentacles. Spider farm? Tentacles.

Wendy's ability to mass farm spiders and splumonkeys is suddenly negated by ONE Wickerbottom book.

I also think it's unfair to say "If you want to do X, just pick X." Especially given that the game offers various ways for characters without certain perks to do things faster.

If you want a fast megabase, you don't "just" pick Maxwell. Anyone can farm trees as fast as Maxwell and Woodie can. It just takes some ingenuity.

I can write an essay on Maxwell, since I've played him for a good 98% of 820 hours. But, I'll name a couple of things that have made Maxwell's viability somewhat moot:

 - Bone Helmet: Maxwell is no longer a nightmare fuel battery. Now everyone is a nightmare fuel battery.

 - Bone Armor: Maxwell is no longer one of the tankiest characters via Night Armor + Tam. Now everyone is the tankiest character, for minimal nightmare fuel cost.

Those 2 items make characters that can already reliably rush Weaver (Wicker and Wolf) into late game powerhouses.

Edit***
 

[ShadowDuelist]

4 hours ago, kineticdreamss said:

Once you have a steady supply of purple gems going, anything is possible.

Sorry, I don't understand this statement. What specific use would get a wickerbottom out of more than one purple gem?

4 hours ago, kineticdreamss said:

Her tentacles do not only extend to bee queen... she can drop a book on basically any kind of farm you can think of. Pig farm? Tentacles. Bunny farm? Tentacles. Splumonkey farm? Tentacles.  Gear farm? Tentacles. Spider farm? Tentacles.

Agreed! I've done this extensively as her, but usually on solo runs. Tentacles are incredibly useful, but also dangerous and unreliable, even a tiny distraction or lag spike will get you (or more often, a teammate) stunlocked and killed. In team coop games there are usually easier and less dangerous ways to farm these things. The Bee Queen is the most common boss that proves troublesome even to a bunch of Wolfgangs, so they usually accept having a tentacle farm support to help with the grumble bees spam. My statement was meant to reflect what I've seen more often on long lived coop servers, and it does not reflect all Wicker's potential as a character. Don't get me wrong, she's a great character and I really like her, but for example, having more than one Wickerbottom in a decent team will get you no benefits, whereas having 2 Wolfgangs will.

4 hours ago, kineticdreamss said:

I also think it's unfair to say "If you want to do X, just pick X." Especially given that the game offers various ways for characters without certain perks to do things faster.

You've made a good point in which I probably wasn't very clear. I only meant to explain things that would "exploit" the natural special abilities each character has, since that's the point of the thread. Of course any char can accomplish and rush everything in many ways, I just meant that, for example, it's obviously easier to have a Maxwell on a team running around a rock biome with a piggyback and 3 shadow miners to get the job done, than a WX with a Luxury Pick. However, eventually any char can get to walk bearger over a petrified forest, and the trinkets obtained of the ruins regenerations will yield more gold via Pig King than anyone can use. But if you want to get all the basic materials to construct peacefully and with little effort at the early game, unless I have other long term plans, I'd go Maxwell. I like to think what I want to do the most before starting a game and focus on that first, and as the game goes by new objectives come up. But that's probably just me anyway. Other people seem to like characters just for the character itself, and for role playing purposes, without minding much about their advantages/disadvantages. And among those people are the ones that main Willow or Woodie.

4 hours ago, kineticdreamss said:

I can write an essay on Maxwell, since I've played him for a good 98% of 820 hours. But, I'll name a couple of things that have made Maxwell's viability somewhat moot:

 - Bone Helmet: Maxwell is no longer a nightmare fuel battery. Now everyone is a nightmare fuel battery.

 - Bone Armor: Maxwell is no longer one of the tankiest characters via Night Armor + Tam. Now everyone is the tankiest character, for minimal nightmare fuel cost.

Completely agree on this one, these changes have made him somewhat less unique. I've mained Waxwell quite a long time as well and I also love the char (Hence, my forum name). I believe he could remain unique if his duelists could actually handle some things, and didn't suck almost completely. But that's probably for another topic.
 

[kineticdreamss]

Omg, I am SO sorry about the purple gem thing. I had Maxwell in mind when I was writing that! I meant tentacle spots! lol

I will edit it asap!

Admittedly, Maxwell is the king of rock gathering. There is no one that does it more efficiently.

But, when it comes to trees, any character can cut trees at very close efficiency to Maxwell's, and almost equal that of Woodie's. No Bearger.

You are absolutely right in that having 2 wickerbottoms in the same team is less efficient than having maybe a Wicker and a Wolf... but therein lies my gripe with DST - it is ONLY those 2 characters, with some WX sprinkled in whenever there's a Wicker.

Consider: A team of Wicker/Wicker, Wicker/Wolf, or Wicker/WX, will outperform almost any other combination, except maybe Wicker/Max (Wicker/Max is a pretty OP combo, in all fairness.)

All I ask is that Wicker and Wolf be brought down a notch, or 2. For devs to make it such that other comboes are just as reliable and fulfilling.

On shadow duelists: Bro, we could open up a thread just between the two of us and make it a hundred pages of just Shadow Duelists. Most people consider them useless, but believe me when I say that they aren't. They have so, SOOO many uses. AoE kills them, yep, but their DPS on top of Max's is comparable, if not higher than Wigfrid's.

Many, many people underestimate Maxwell's ability to tank. If you add a couple of duelists to the mix, you'd be amazed at how fast some bosses and minibosses go down.

It is my opinion that the only somewhat balanced characters in this game are Maxwell, WX, and Wendy... though, I've never played Wendy. However, a friend I play with has a pretty disgusting Wendy... even though he always uses Wicker, for obvious reasons.

 

[Mr. Despair]

The only characters that in my opinion need a change are Wendy, Willow and Woodie.

- Wx-78 is extremely powerful if you get gears or during spring,

- Wigfrid has extra damage, Sanity and health from fighting and a good helmet and spear (That are only useful early game btw)

- Webber is great if you're playing solo or with others Webber's, After some time the world will be infested of spiders but he doesn't really works with other characters.

- Wes is a joke characters He's supposeed to be bad and doesn't needs a change.

- Wilson is supposeed to be boring, You can get beard hair with bunny farms anyway.

Wendy deals less damage, All mobs got more HP in DST but Abigail still has just 600 HP,  She can barely deal with one lv3 spider nest and wouldn't help you at all with the bosses. She can't get a lot of blow dirts (A weapon that would be really useful to her) because she needs two hits to kill a bird with the boomerang (Birds have 25 HP , The boomerang with Wendy deal 20 damge, You need an extra hit for just 5 hp).

Just to see the damage difference:

The total damage dealt from a 100% Dark Sword is 8,500 with Wigfrid, 13,600 with Wolfgang, 6,800 with the rest and 5,100 with Wendy and Wes, Abigail dies after 3 hits of almost every boss and she deals like 300 damage to the boss during the night (When she deals 40 damage), So she will be even less helpful during the day or Dusk. That's a really huge difference. You need a lot more time to kill the bosses. She loss less sanity from mobs but it doesn't really matter because you will loss around  the same that every other character because they can beat the mobs faster.

And like was mentioned before Wendy's ability to farm spiders is nothing compared to Webber and Wicker who can do the same but better.

Basically Wendy is female Wilson when she's with Abigail against normal mobs and female Wes when she's fighting  bosses.

Everybody already knows why Willow and Woodie sucks.

[Sicko Hog]

They really need to rebalance the characters. Webber makes it way too easy to get rotten eggs for gunpowder... Maybe he shouldn't be able to command spiders to attack each other?

[ShadowDuelist]

6 hours ago, JellyUltra said:

They really need to rebalance the characters. Webber makes it way too easy to get rotten eggs for gunpowder... Maybe he shouldn't be able to command spiders to attack each other?

But this is like the only thing going for him... and they even nerfed it in dst compared to ds, since it now takes some practice to do it without aggroing the spiders towards you.

 If they take this away from him he'd have nothing.

[Mr Pig]

21 hours ago, ShadowDuelist said:

since the game is not competitive I'd only buff a little the characters that are less liked/ used so we see them more often (Willow and Woodie)

I think we can all agree that Willow needs changes however considering Woodie has technically no downsides (Pine cones negate beaver sanity loss) and its more that people wouldn't pick Woodie since Maxwell can chop faster so why pick Woodie plus not to mention that people are upset they can't get there old beaver back and don't look at the fact it's supposed to be his main downside now. So in my opinion it would be better to nerf Maxwell's tree chopping power to be more on par with the lumberjack themed character. I just had to say that from the depths of my dedicated Woodie maining heart.

 

9 hours ago, Mr. Despair said:

Basically Wendy is female Wilson when she's with Abigail against normal mobs and female Wes when she's fighting  bosses.

Actually Abigail beats up bees and splumonkeys like nobody's business which in the case of bees at least most characters struggle with doing without taking damage due to the sheer number of them. Not to mention she proves valuable in killing Grumble-bees during the queen bee fight if wicker hasn't made a jellybean farm out of her yet.

Those are my personal thoughts on legitimate character balance options for those 2 anyway. (AKA They're fine and the ones that need changing are Willow, Wolf, and Wicker if you ask me)

[Lumina]

If you nerf one of Maxwell abilities, you need something to make him more attractive, because chopping tree faster is one of the reasons for choosing him.
 

For me, wilson needs a change too, but it could be as simple as giving more use for beard hairs, because at the moment they are pretty useless except meat effigy, and you don't use meat effigy in all the modes.

[kineticdreamss]

46 minutes ago, Mr Pig said:

I think we can all agree that Willow needs changes however considering Woodie has technically no downsides (Pine cones negate beaver sanity loss) and its more that people wouldn't pick Woodie since Maxwell can chop faster so why pick Woodie plus not to mention that people are upset they can't get there old beaver back and don't look at the fact it's supposed to be his main downside now. So in my opinion it would be better to nerf Maxwell's tree chopping power to be more on par with the lumberjack themed character. I just had to say that from the depths of my dedicated Woodie maining heart.

 

Actually Abigail beats up bees and splumonkeys like nobody's business which in the case of bees at least most characters struggle with doing without taking damage due to the sheer number of them. Not to mention she proves valuable in killing Grumble-bees during the queen bee fight if wicker hasn't made a jellybean farm out of her yet.

Those are my personal thoughts on legitimate character balance options for those 2 anyway. (AKA They're fine and the ones that need changing are Willow, Wolf, and Wicker if you ask me)

 

I'm a sucker for Woodie. If Maxwell wasn't Maxwell, I'd probably be maining Woodie.

Here's a run someone did after I started whining on reddit that every video posted featured Wolfgang:
 

If Wicker and Wolf were to be nerfed, we would start seeing more and more videos like these pop up, showcasing the abilities of other characters. If Wolfgang wasn't so obscenely strong, Woodie would be one of the mainstays for those who like to rush ruins early.

Every character can do something awesome, it's just that no one cares to figure those characters out because... why would they? They can just megabase with Wolf or Wicker for very little effort.

Another example is Maxwell's REAL NF farming ability. Maxwell can get a stack of NF a day, but no one knows how because no one has ever truly taken the time to play Maxwell... because why would they? They can just pick Wolf or Wicker... lol

[Sinister_Fang]

13 hours ago, kineticdreamss said:

But, when it comes to trees, any character can cut trees at very close efficiency to Maxwell's, and almost equal that of Woodie's. No Bearger.

And how exactly dose one chop down trees at a rate almost equal to Woodie? I must know this trick...