Idea for Cold Armor - help?

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Hardwood
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Idea for Cold Armor - help?

Post by Hardwood » Sun Jun 25, 2017 10:05 am

Hi,

I've been playing with the idea of changing some of the cold armors. But it's something quite complex and I'd like to ask for some help with my idea.

What I would like is for Frozen Armor to grant a physical damage reduction and "freezes melee attacker" (quite doable right now) attribute, but only for one hit taken from a melee attacker (also doable, I think?). Additionally, it would grant a melee attack made by the character to freeze the target, also for just one attack (not sure how to do this exactly). The buff state would expire if not used in a certain number of seconds (probably doable?).

My idea for Shiver armor is similar. When struck in melee, it would cast a single Frost Nova and then be removed. But on offense, it is a little different - I would like for the Frost Nova to not only be triggered on basic melee attacks, but also to work with skill casts, and to be centered around the target that said skill cast hits (e.g. I cast Shiver Armor, shoot a fire bolt, and when it collides, it casts a Frost Nova on top of the monster before removing my armor buff).

Perhaps Chilling Armor could work similarly to Shiver Armor, but cast Blizzard instead.

So, what I have so far for ideas on actual execution is this:

Frozen Armor - apply a state on cast. frozenarmor state causes attacks to freeze (would I accomplish this by causing it to spawn a freezing submissile on top of attacks? perhaps a 100% ctc this submissile on attacks?), frozenarmor state also grants "freezes attacker when struck" (should be pretty much the same as vanilla version of the skill, so I needn't change anything, right?) and damageresist. state lasts for n seconds (should be applicable in auralen, I think) frozenarmor state has a 100% ctc noarmor state (in the same group as frozenarmor).

Shiver Armor, Chilling Armor - similar, but grant 100% ctc a frost nova/blizzard spawner missile (not sure how to make this centered on top of the monster) on hit. But this ideally not apply to just basic attacks, but also to instances of skill damage. (e.g. cast Shiver Armor, then telekinesis to spawn a frost nova on target) also should grant 100% ctc frost nova/blizzard when struck, but this is probably easy. (if i gave it 100% blizzard when struck, would the resulting blizzard be centered on the character?)

This is admittedly quite complex, and for someone who's previously only slightly tinkered with the Skills.txt and Missiles.txt files, I'm not entirely sure how to achieve my ideas. Ideally it would be without making edits to hardcoded aspects of the game, but if the edits are small and easy to make for a newbie, I could probably try something there too.

Thanks

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gogodanny
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Re: Idea for Cold Armor - help?

Post by gogodanny » Mon Jun 26, 2017 7:44 am

Hi there,

I know I am not going into detail or addressing your question at all, but please consider the following:

Why would anybody invest in a skill that is 1 time use only and basically expires every so often. Unless the damage is godlike and brings a real benefit, recasting (prebuffing) after every single hit is extremely tedious...
only 2 things are infinite - the universe and human stupidity ... although i'm not sure yet about the universe (c) Albert Einstein
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Hardwood
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Re: Idea for Cold Armor - help?

Post by Hardwood » Mon Jun 26, 2017 7:13 pm

Hey, thanks for the reply. I actually have considered what you talked about, and yes, it is a real danger with modding this kind of skill into the game. However I don't think people would abuse it so in my mod. Here's my rationale behind it:

For some context, my mod isn't about clearing areas as fast as possible. It focuses on creating actual danger in combat so as to force players to respond intelligently and prepare thoughtfully for monster encounters. (Some new players have reported difficulties in clearing the Den of Evil with a level 1 character, for example.) I've slowed a lot of things down (character animations and movement speed, for example) to the point where you're encouraged to consider each action, make plans, and react as everything's happening. Monsters are much stronger and require intelligent play to be defeated safely. Potions were changed to drop rarely and are no longer stocked by vendors.

1) Making such a skill (for the fragile Sorceress, no less) would encourage players to create windows of time inside combat situations to cast it after the initial proc. This would encourage a more tactical kind of play as opposed to having Cold Armors be simple cast-and-forget buffs. (e.g. Earlygame, where mana is not abundant: Cast Frozen Armor on finding a single monster, run back, then two Fireballs with a small gap between (missile speed has been slowed to 3, a crawl). Time your run up to melee, start swinging a 2handed sword so the freezing Fireball interrupts his swing before it hits - your swing lands - the freeze expires during your recovery - fireball interrupts his second hit - you attack again for the kill. Pulling such a combo off would require that your fireball reliably do enough damage (1/4 target hp) to always hitstun, of course. If you knew it didn't, you could always disengage early after the first melee swing.)

2) Allowing such a skill to apply its effects on skill casts as well as normal attacks creates opportunities for tactical synergy. Situations could arise where it would be better to freeze a target from range using telekinesis than cast a simple Ice Blast or Glacial Spike. Perhaps you might want specifically to cast a Frost Nova on top of a monster, instead of around yourself. There's a Frost Nova skill delay of 4 seconds implemented in my mod - if you've already used this once and need it again before the skill cooldown is up, a shrewd player could cast Shiver Armor and then a damaging skill to spin out another Frost Nova in that time.

3) The defensive portion of the buff that lasts for one hit (physical damage reduction, freeze/cast cold skill on hit) would be useful to many Sorceress builds as well, and I don't think it would be overpowered or spammed by players. I think with such a skill it wouldn't be about the damage dealt. Instead, in a situation where your hardcore mode Sorceress won't survive more than four or five non-critical hits from a monster, a percentile physical damage reduction buff and autocasted cold spell (in case of hit recovery) could save your life.

4) Better options exist for spamming interrupts on single-target monsters or small groups. Ice Blast for the freezing effect (or even just Hit Freezes Target, Knockback, enough damage, etc), Glacial Spike for small clumps (until they can't be frozen anymore). In the first place, it's quite rare that you will be fighting single monsters. Even with slow, careful progression through an enclosed area, encounters usually consist of at least three or more monsters. Freeze-spamming is fine in the early acts of Normal, but I've granted monsters cold resistance/immunities later on so as to encourage players to invent different combat tactics.

I plan to attach a higher mana cost to these Cold Armor skills than actually casting their spells directly, so they don't end up replacing the spells they use.

Of course, the main difficulty I'm having right now is with modding the actual skills into the game first...

Ap0calypse
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Re: Idea for Cold Armor - help?

Post by Ap0calypse » Wed Oct 17, 2018 5:10 am

Someone making final fantasy tactics into d2 hehehe

well, at first I thought using the tiger strike func would be best (turning it into a buff instead of melee proc),
Then I had quite a brainstorm, I have no idea if it will be helpful:

1 - A non proggressive, buff-like tiger strike with the cold armor overlay, that adds the item freeze target effect while active, and is broken upon attack (for missile hitting you'll need skill = finishing move and/or srcdmg > 0)

2 - A bone armor that vanishes on any hit taken (absorbs 1 dmg), with the chilling armor property, but instead of casting an ice bolt, you can cast an invisible, fast and guided missile that calls the nova or blizzard upon impact.


if you find a way to mix both concepts, I think you'll have your special armors =)

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Nizari
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Re: Idea for Cold Armor - help?

Post by Nizari » Wed Oct 17, 2018 7:16 am

It is really kind of you for trying to help someone, however, I think you should check the main post/topic creation date first.

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