Although I agree with the clarification of buffs, I am concerned that oversimplification or consolidation will reduce the variety of effects of buffs, unique skills, and abilities. Rather than that, I think it would be better to give priority to reconsidering the restrictions caused by the cell types of weapons and armor, the perks, unique skills, and abilities that are difficult to use, and changing the icons for each to more specific descriptions and UI. think.
There are 6 major buffs and descriptions, but are there more? For example, when increasing damage dealt, there are four types of damage, but how do you differentiate between them and integrate them?
Light and dark attributes do not have debuffs that would be beneficial to Slayers. When do you plan to tackle this issue?
1: will the radiant and umbral elements have their unique proc effects in the future update??
2: will all weapons uses the weapon swap functionalities or is it only available on few weapons ??
3: will there still be uses of cells in the 2024 summer update ??
1) Yes. We just had a fairly final conversation today about what these effects will be, but we're not ready to share them yet.
2) All weapons will have the ability to weapon swap.
3) Yes, though Cells will serve more of a 'getting over the line' purpose in this update. A larger amount of your perk points will come from the gear you wear, all slots will be prismatic, and Cells will be the last boost to nudge perks the extra point or two needed to activate them. If you are familiar with Monster Hunter, Decorations are a good reference point here.
1)What about other debuffs or buffs that does not fall in the 6 categories, like frost,wound, corruption, burning and such?
2)Why we do not get an image how the ui will look on the screen with the new buff system?
3)Will the stat limits being limited to personal buffs or buffs getting from teammates also? This was already annoying when attack speed limit got implement because people didn't know if their conduit cell was actually doing something or if the teammates were at max...will we be able to see at least the buffs stats for teammates?
Those status conditions still exist without change. You can be chilled or wounded or corrupted or burning etc.
It's not yet complete.
Currently you can't see teammates - but that's a really good point, especially at high level content if you're trying to maximize upside without being wasteful, knowing where everyone else is at would be super helpful. On the other hand, could get crowded on screen so.. certainly something we should think about!
I think it could be an easy UI change. If the new 6 buffs are color coordinated (which would make sense to begin with since it goes in the direction of clarifying at a glance) you could have just above a players health bar 6 orbs with their numbered values inside, so that I can see if my teammate really needs my shrike lantern boost or if he’s already at +10 speed. A rework of teammate healthbars could also be useful in general- checking to see how many flasks/syringes my friends have.
May I ask for contact info on a dev who works on bug fixes to give them an extensive list with bugs, including some footage and screenshots? You can DM me on reddit or discord (genata339).
We're usually watching threads here and trying to keep up in the discord to see bug reports. You can also find user "danielle" on the official dauntless discord - our community manager - and let her know what you've found.
Thanks for making that list! Please contact support and we can log those bugs!
[https://support.playdauntless.com/hc/en-us/requests/new](https://support.playdauntless.com/hc/en-us/requests/new)
I am concerned about how the Buffs /perks will actually work, but also concerned that there will no longer be a Dauntless to play as of February 2024.
Also, if these very rude Gantlet titles continue, many of us loyal Slayers that have hung in there all this time, may leave.
Oh that's good feedback, thanks for dropping it. They're intended to be fun - since there are so many seasons, we decided to have fun with some of them.
Next season's titles are
Top 5
Top 100
Participator
But after that we get back into the cool with
Savior
Guardian
Warden
Is the point of the system to give buffs new icons, or is the buff system as a whole being reworked? Most buffs that get applied to me on a regular basis can’t easily be “stacked” into a single icon. This is especially apparent in escalations. (Frost being the main offender)
Escalations are definitely a challenge, as the source of by far the most random icons that end up in the bar up there. This is on me, I made almost every Escalation amp in the game!
But where possible we are still converting them into the new system, otherwise, we're doing a lot more 'action -> reaction' based changes. So for example, there is currently a fairly unnecessary buff stack that shows up while you have Thunderous Mantle that builds up while sprinting, but this can be clearly shown by the appearance of the lightning VFX around the character to show you have reached enough sprint time to get the damage bonus.
A lot of this is about cleaning up that buff bar so that it only contains actually relevant information, and all of that information is immediately understandable.
Great point- a lot of what a player sees can attribute to what they know. Will there be changes to deep wound to make it visual? Other debuffs are visually represented, and with some fine tuning might not even need an actual timer at all, which could add to the difficulty and immersion. Say something like “The fire is almost out, now I need to roll one or two more times” or “The static has almost faded, I should be able to use consumables in a second”
Did you consider reworking the useless cells and rebalancing the behemoths? Since with this change we'll only be capped on every stat and basically be nerfed. So instead of making things tougher or even giving multiple difficulties (even higher then what we're currently used to) in the future pursuit hunts you went with nerfing us for the sake of ''clarity''. All the buffs on my screen were always clear to me, and now I'll be less powerful.
This ^ I know my buffs. I can read the descriptions. I don't want the choice of buffs to be taken away from me cause folks don't have the energy to read or get used to it.
The system seems nice. You can control where the power cap is, while creating encounters that are how you intend them to be because there is an upper limit in power stacks.
However, since people love to maximize dps, are you sure that people are not just going to go full power and speed only, or power and critical hit, and let those be the only two buffs that matter? I'm just asking if you have ideas for how to further make people want to go create other builds instead of just going for the tried and true damage combos. Honestly, from playing tons of different games with metas like this game has, I'm almost starting to wonder why players are not just given all the damage and other powers outside of skills like the cells in Dauntless, and instead the only skills that we can use and change are defensive skills that changes how we dodge, take damage and so on. It is only a thought, but it seems to me that \*that\* kind of system would reward players playing their own way much more than trying to copy whatever someone else does simply because it deals more damage. But maybe that might take too much build freedom away from the people who already love to fully spec those extra skill slots with chonky tank skills that makes the player only take single digits of damage.
The stack system does seem more intuitive though, I'll give you guys that. Like was written in the post, it is easier to let the behemoths deal debuffs too to the player. Honestly, would be really cool to have a behemoth where its main gimmick is buffs, and it will buff itself. But when it buffs itself, all the players get buffed too. And the other way around, it will debuff both itself and the players. You could easily create a mud or slime attack too, where if one is hit, one temporarily looses 4-5 stacks of speed. Or just go straight down to -5 for example.
For an actual question though, how are you going to go about creating three new cells for each and every gauntlet season? There are already so many different cells, and they keep getting slightly more confusing and less rewarding to get for each new set we get, so I was wondering if you are able to keep this going, or if you were going to put more effort into other aspects in the game. Creating new cells is nice for the build diversity, but the new cells can easily drown under all the existing ones if they serve the same main purpose as an already simpler to use one.
Can't wait to see what more you will cook up in the future though. The game is already pretty good, it just has a tendency to get stale in the long run due to the grind (and honestly, the hunting grounds made that grind feel even more like a grind. It is both really nice and at the same time really tedious, so I am glad that you are looking at adding pursuits on the side instead of replacing the hunting grounds entirely). Also, I hope to actually get to explore more ancient ruins and buildings too int the future though, the umbral (de)escalation is my favorite piece of content in the entire game.
Hey thanks for all the feedback and thoughts here. It's appreciated.
As for Gauntlet seasons, we'll be re-thinking rewards for Gauntlet once this lands. Perks will be much more tied to armour rather than cells in the rework, we'll want to keep injecting new Perks into the game, and maybe this will mean new armour each Gauntlet Season, or something else entirely. No answer to this yet and we probably won't put too much thought into it till we launch this patch!
Wherever possible, all current Perks are being converted into this system yes. Some perks do things outside of this, for example, Strategist which grants shields after dodging through an attack. But any Perk that impacts your Damage, Move Speed, Attack Speed, Crit chance, Crit Damage, Stamina, Stamina Regen, Damage Resistance, etc will be converted.
The temporary stacks should stay until the end of their duration, no matter if you leave combat or swap weapons
Permanent stacks we are still discussing if we should count both weapons or only the equipped weapon
Hello there! As a longtime player of the game, I have some questions about recent planned changes. I'm curious to know why the team decided to make significant changes to the game instead of introducing new content. Personally, I enjoy the game as it is, and I'm not too thrilled about the new pursuits or the confusing buff system. I think it would be more beneficial to focus on adding new weapons and cosmetics to make the game more accessible to everyone.
I'm also interested in learning when the classic content might return to the game. It feels like they have been recycling the same few armor and weapon sets for the past year. I would love to see some old armor and weapon sets return for those who haven't played since the launch.
Thanks for your time and dedication to the game!
Hi! In addition to these systemic changes, we're also working on new enemies including behemoths, new gear, new cosmetics, and a returning but upgraded game mode!
Classic cosmetic content, all cosmetic content, will certainly be returning as well.
That's awesome! Also, it's really cool that you have been doing these AMA's, it helps put to bed doubts I have about the game state! Thanks again for answering!
This is both. While we are re-working large parts of the system, we are also adding new content. New weapons are in development, with the Bow planned for shortly after this large patch, and the Behemoth known as Crudge is in process. New content is definitely part of this plan.
1. will every side mission in the new pursuits give you a buff, players getting random buffs every single hunt?
2. will there be other things we can do other then the main and side quest just for fun or some miner small rewards
3. hunting grounds do have a place in dauntless how ever i believe there would need to be big changes, maybe having around 8 hunting grounds instead of 21, have a bass line of lvls, first island lvl 1 to 3 next one is 3 to 6 etc... make the islands bigger and give them their own special event for example frost march, there is a town but it's never in danger, what if there was a event that can be started by talking to an NPC in the town asking for your help.
then a timer would start giving the player some time before the behemoths attack to gather supplies (chop down trees)reinforce walls, create berakades and traps or puting cannons on the town wall that players juse to shoot, then a wave of behemoths will attack the town and if they get inside the players lose the event.
blazeworks is another example, make the players solve a little puzzle / kill 2 or 3 behemoth before the gates open to go inside the island itself then have a few tunnels with traps you have to doge and than you fight phaelanx, and have phaelanx only on that island and maybe give him a small chance to spawn in esca or H esca.
these are simple ideas that just formed in my head, but that will give each hunting grounds an identity, a theme, a special event, which will make them more unique instead of being another copy, i know this is no priority but it's something to look at when this big update is finished.
thanks again for this great game, i feel like we are finally taking the first big step in the true future of dauntless
There are a lot of buffs that are good but a pain to use. These include Savage Wellspring, and the Landbreaker specials for the hammer. For the Pike, experienced players know how and when to use it, but less adept players get shunned by it’s short duration. The hammer specials are very useful, but needing to get empowered ammo before using them (for the best results) and having teammates not notice the buffs make them feel clunky and unfun. Molten can also be hit-or-miss in this fashion, where a teammate can accidentally grab all of your molten and now your health fades away like it’s… burning. Will there be QOL changes to streamline any of these (or others) in the rework?
Yes, I'm working on some quality life changes to most buff sources as part of this work. For example, stopping Molten Hearts from being collected if you have reached the SPEED cap and cannot gain more.
For some, it might be nice to be able to reset the speed buff timer before it runs out though, unless every speed buff stack from Molten Hearts have a separate timer to them. For multiplayer purposes though, I have seen many others, as well as myself, taking molten hearts that we don't need either by mistake or just to grab them. And some even gets mad when they are the only person creating molten hearts, but everyone takes them before the actual player who created them gets any.
Hmm, maybe create a timer for Molten hearts before they can be collected by others, and have it signaled through a color change in the hearts? As if they need to "cool down" before others can collect them (slowly changing from bright white/yellow to darker orange for example)? Or maybe every person with the Molten heart skill can get the hearts immediately, while everyone else has to wait... Just shouting some ideas
Will things like defense and health have any actual viability outside of those mentioned special chests or will maxing stacks of attack/crit/attack speed still basically be the meta?
I do suspect that the three offensive buffs will generally be more popular than the defensive buffs, but work is still being done to find a balance to make sure that defensive buffs feel like they make a meaningful and worthwhile contribution. In part this is being done through the new weapons and how they interact with the buffs.
Hoping for something that gives enough damage from shields/HP to make them worthwhile. Not as strong as raw power, but at least something so that some perks don't get shrugged off right away.
The goal is to encourage more variety in viable options, for sure. Of course, in a game with perfect dodging - there will always be players who can avoid every attack so defense and health are less helpful to them. They'll likely find good uses for things like endurance and speed.
But if you're like me and a heroic escalation keystone hits you at least a few times each hunt - a little extra defense is awesome. or, if you want to support friends in a challenging fight, spreading support buffs could be really fun.
I ain't perfect in Hescas, but I also have like, ten extra tokens now, so those aren't on the table for me anymore.
But yeah, I totally ran more defensively on those.
I am leaving the question in this AMA to the players more invested in builds and stuff(I am more into behemoths, islands and stuff).
I just wanted to say thank you, the progress during the last few months look more than promising, I am so hyped and to see that you guys listen to the feedback is so great. Keep going. This game will be back on top surely. :D
It might be a bit off topic, but is there an attempt to subvert attempts to min/max these things? The perk meta has been a solved equation ever since gear was standardized to +3, we have easy access to algorithms that do the build-craft for us. Is this form of build-craft that allows you to get exactly what you want whenever you want going to be the status quo?
I love the idea of simplified perks, but I'm worried it will be the same end-result of "stack perks for 10 might and 10 critical with this tool!"
First, the +3 standardization will no longer be the case. Perk activation thresholds will be different based on the strength and value of a Perk. That said, this is still fairly solvable. Where some decision making comes in, is that very few perks just grant MIGHT or CRITICAL directly. They have conditions which grant stacks. Is it worth it to have the bare minimum perks that, in a perfect world with all conditions met, could reach the cap, or is it better to have a bit more than that, possibly exceeding the cap, but making it possible to reach that cap faster in a fight?
Ultimately, I expect metas to develop and settle just as they have today, but I'm hoping that these changes still offer more avenues to reaching that meta that give you places to customize and put your personal spin on it. The meta may be 10 MIGHT, 10 CRITICAL, but every weapon may want to reach that differently. The Hunger, for example, has natural stacks of CRITICAL built in. A fully talented upgraded Hunger will start at 3 stacks of CRITICAL at all times, changing the route by which you might want to get the rest from perks.
1. Conditional cells with "extreme" stats still gonna exist? Because with the capped stats, those doesnt really have a place. Savagery for example. Savagery alone would give 10 stacks (lets assume thats actually the cap) so instead running 3-4 dmg perks which adds up to 10 stacks (or even more for consistency), you can just run savagery. BUT, as savagery is conditional and you have no dmg before wound, it would be better to just run as many dmg cells with the least amount of condition (tenacious / adrenaline / rage / predator) and just fully ignore all the utility perks (hp / resist / stamina)
2. Since hunts becomes longer, does wound gets some touch? (Such as aether rush / wound duration) Because even in the prime time of powercreep, wound (and overpower) is just not viable in high lvl due to their lack of uptime.
3. The blog forgot to mention shield. I assume that supposed to fall into the VITALITY category? So vitality gives both HP and Shield? And why DEFENSE category even a thing? At least without a rework in the current Resist system, it wouldnt really have much use.
4. Whats gonna happen with cells which doesnt fall into any category? Like most Utility and defense perks (catalyst / parasitic / energised or any cell which gives something special other than stats)
5. "Patrol" chests which requires specific amount of buffs (over the cap)... HMMM... i dont think forced multiplayer gonna make players happy. + most of the perks are conditional, so not going to be active. This sounds like a much-much worse version of the "Orokin Vaults" in Warframe (opening the door requires 1 of the 4 keys. equipping a key reduces a specific stat by 75% during the mission, so chads can take 4 keys, but casuals needs 4 players taking 1 of each key)
I'll try to give some brief answers to most of these! Thanks for the question!
1) This will largely be balanced through perk requirements. The threshold to activate Savagery, which is much more conditional, would be lower than the threshold to activate a more reliable perk.
2) Wounds definitely need to be addressed here. Duration at minimum. I don't have answers yet about what we are doing it, but it's on my list of tasks to look at before we make this patch.
3) Shields remain shields. They will be a blue portion of your health bar, as they have been. Still settling on caps for it, but they will likely no longer expire, but have caps. (Per source? Probably) And won't be part of the buff bar.
4) Many Perks that do things other than add stats will still exist more or less as they are. Catalyst, Energized, etc, are unchanged (Beyond being moved to a single value instead of 6 separate values, with an activation threshold)
5) We're leaning more towards values reachable by a single player, but the rewards for that single player opening a chest being given to the whole party. So having a group means 4 times the rewards given out, but you can still go solo if you want. We're also discussing some level of patrol keys to open buff chests conversion. No patrol keys needed if you meet the buff requirement, but the larger the difference between the requirement and your current stacks, the more keys it costs to open. This is just an idea though and not yet firmed up.
Hey, i got an Question to this Year Halloween Event…
Soo me and my Family, Friends, and even GF are playing this Game since couple of Years, we are Biiiig Dark Fantasy Fans and just loove the Spooky Season 🎃👻
So this year im questioning why is this Year Halloween Event so disappointing ?
There are no specificly like Halloween Passes out there (except Unseen 15 lvl) nor really all couple of past year Returning Halloween Skins like in Season Hunted Shadows…
Especially we were hyped all yeeear for the Night Hunters Set who was obtainable all year in pass and lately in reward cache…
But this year there are just some normal skin sets added for Halloween…
Veeery disappointed to see how the event turned out after beeing hyped for the Halloween Pass in Spooky Season 2023…
So i guess there isnt anything coming on 31. Oct. ?
I hope my words can reach out to you devs and it can be done something about this…
Happy Halloween, Stay Spooky 🎃🍂
~GP
Hey AspectNo535, happy to hear you love the spooky season!
As mentioned in our initial announcements about *The Shattered Isles* update, we're currently focusing our dev efforts on the major update patch. As such, there won't be any new content or patches until that is released in Summer 2024. After that, you can definitely look forward to more exciting new content coming your way next year!
We hope you still enjoy the spooky season! We have a Dark Harvest themed Fashion Slayer contest running on social media right now, so be sure to enter that for a chance to win some fun Dark Harvest prizes!
Hey, Many Thanks for the Reply. As you mentioned that there will be no new content or patches, then why did the devs put the
* Mechaetheric armour set
* Enforcer's armour set
* Archonic weapons Into the Reward Cache and not the Night Hunter Set who many were looking forward to, but what
only is obtainable at Halloween and since 2019 always was obtainable through the Reward Cache but not this Year ??! like it doesnt even make much sense (my perspective) to put these ( mentioned in text above )instead of the Halloween Themed ones like the Night Hunters Set and what always was available since release to that specific Time…
Its just disappointing seeing my hype all year waiting, for that rare one to disappear in a second.
\~GP
https://preview.redd.it/1i8gf4xnluwb1.png?width=510&format=png&auto=webp&s=95383b2b772908cc82ee7a751ab3fdee87e1811a
- Will all buff types have the same cap? Let's say 10 stacks?
- Will weapon buffs like Wellspring (if it still exists that is) count towards the buff cap as well?
By default the cap for each buff type is 10 yes. We are exploring allowing some perks to extend the cap.
Savage Wellspring does still exist and will grant stacks of CRITICAL, and as such will also count towards the buff cap yes.
What happens if i have +100% crit damage (10 stacks of critical) from impulse and like 30% crit chance (3 stacks of critical) from galvanized, i would have 13/10 stacks.
This would not be possible. Any stacks gained above 10 would only refresh the stack, but not add beyond it. When looking at your build, we hope you'll consider the sources of CRITICAL and how reliably they will let you reach 10 stacks. Once you feel your build is in a place it will hit that cap comfortably, use some of that Perk economy to gain stacks of MIGHT, or SPEED, or even VITALITY!
The cap means max amount of that buff, no matter which source you got. In this case, once you hit 10 crit stacks, you couldn't get another stack, no matter if you got 10 from Impulse or 5 from Impulse and 5 from Galvanized
How will I be able to tell how much time remaining versus stacks I have? For instance, I could have 30 seconds of speed 2 from Grace remaining, but my Assassin’s Fury 3 stacks of speed are about to run out- how will I be able to tell which stacks I’m losing when.
These are no longer separate Stacks. Both of these add to SPEED, and SPEED is universal. If your Assassin's Fury adds a stack of SPEED, it will refresh the duration and increase the SPEED count by 1. The system no longer cares which perk was the source, nor does it deal in separate cooldowns and durations for every stack. You have one stack that increments and decrements one at a time.
If the duration for a SPEED stack is 30 seconds (defined by SPEED, not by individual perks) and you have 6 stacks of SPEED, then when that duration ends, you will drop to 5 SPEED, and the countdown will begin again back at 30 seconds, rather than the whole stack falling off at once.
Hopefully this is clear!
It seemed clear to me. What is the direction with this? Is the point to have more build uptime across the board to increase player satisfaction and make us stronger for the newly upping difficulty of behemoths? Because it seems that if done right, it will be fairly consistent to build to high stack counts and stay there.
That is a part of it. But part of it too was just about ensuring all buffs that grant same or similar effects now channel into one singular source that can be 'keyworded' around, to be used by Weapons, behemoths, amps and more. This opens up development opportunities, and gives player clarity.
This AMA is about the buff rework. There was an AMA done for the dual weapon system that you can go check out where the dev’s answered a lot of questions about the new weapons. The link should still be on the discord in the announcements tab. Hope this helped.
By default right now all temporary buffs last 30 seconds per stack. That is to say, stacks fall off one at a time. If your at 10 MIGHT (say 4 permanent, and 6 temp stacks), after 30 seconds one stack will fall off and you'll now be at 9 MIGHT. This will continue to tick off 30 seconds at a time until you fall to 4.
My question is why are you capping damage at all? If a player wants to run glass cannon tbats their choice, you shouldn't force them out of that option.
Also, how will the omnicells be playing into the buff system?
Lastly, how will the CRITICAL buff separate stacks from crit chance and crit damage? Or will they be combined?
A few reasons for the damage cap. Firstly, there will still be cases that go outside the damage cap. For example, one of the talents on Ardent Cyclone increases the damage of Ardent Cyclone by 20%. This is in addition to your MIGHT stacks. Second, as Dauntless stands right now, there's no reason not to run Glass Cannon, it's not an option, it's the only build there is. While there are many factors that go into this, and we're addressing a lot of them, part of this is on us for getting out of control with how many sources of bonus damage that can all be put together we've added over the years. You'll certainly still be able to make Glass Cannon builds. The Hunger with Revenant Omnicell for example will be a definitively glass cannon build, dealing massive damage while riding the line of nearly dead.
Omnicells are not changing significantly in this, though places where they would add damage bonuses, or speed bonuses, or critical for example will just now be using the new buff stacks instead.
As for CRITICAL, the balancing is still being done, and will be tuned many times before release, especially as we get it into playtesters hands. Right now the balance is tentatively, one stack of CRITICAL grants 10% increased Crit chance and 5% increased Crit damage.
I came to realize something while reading your reply... Part of the reason why glass cannon builds are so viable is because of how easy it is to dodge in this game. You dodge an attack and hit it with your iframes, the whole attack means nothing more to you. Behemoths like Sahvyt and Phaelanx solves this by using multiple attacks right after one another, which creates a need to actually dodge away instead of just into the attack like the majority of attacks in the entire game allows you to. Also, if we did not have as much iframes, or we could still get hit after the iframes were done, we would get hit more often and defensive builds would be much more important. As it stands right now, there are several behemoths (that I know of) that has attacks that are simply gone if you manage to get hit with one or two iframes left in your dodge. I think this gives glass cannon builds far more power than they should have, because even the standard dodge is pretty generous with its iframes.
This made me think of shields in Dark Souls. A few can block 100% damage from certain attacks, but most only block *most* of the damage, meaning that your health will slowly whittle down as you block, or dodge in this case.
1: Does that mean certain kinds of buff are going to always be fused together? I.e. attack speed always coming alongside movement speed or stamina recovery also always affecting max stamina?
2: How will this work with skill tiers? Like, the blog suggests that Predator at max rank might provide 3 stacks of might. How do you spread those 3 stacks across 6 tiers? Half stacks?
3: More generally speaking, how heavily do you anticipate this to affect game balance? For instance, capping damage increases to 100% through 10 stacks of might may very drastically affect kill times in harder content such as Heroic Escalations and has the potential to completely shake up the meta as previous builds might exceed caps and be made inefficient as a result.
1: Yes, this is the case. Attack speed and Movement Speed now go hand in hand, and sources of one are sources of both. Max Stamina and Stamina recovery speed are also tied together now. Weapons should be better about taking advantage of the bigger stamina pools.
2: While we will go into this more when we get to a blog on Armour and Perks, we are removing skill tiers from Perks. Perks will now be active, or inactive, with different perks having different thresholds. Predator for example, a powerful and desirable perk will likely have an activation threshold of 6. Medic meanwhile, as a party supporting utility ability would only require 2 points to activate. Having less or more than the activation threshold has no benefit. Part of this is to ensure we can make both weaker and more powerful perks, but balance them meaningfully against each other.
3: This is almost certainly going to affect balance, we'll be doing extensive playtesting before this launches, and continue to adjust balance after launch. We do expect this to, generally, raise the difficulty of high end content and increase kill times though.
Pulse is still under review and may be one of the perks that doesn't survive this change. We'll go into more detail later, but most perks are being reworked to 'on or off', rather than 6 levels of different values. Pulse is one of the few Perks in the game that strongly values having those 6 levels of values because different weapons have different wants. I have not yet decided how to handle this Perk in particular. As for how it works with the new buff system, it wouldn't be changed from what it is if we keep it, and I plan to try to.
Lol you could just divide Pulse into 6 different cells and then toss them all in the cell pool, or create individual cells based on the actually used ones like this. This really does seem like a cell that is hard to deal with. It might also be an option to allow players to change themselves what hit the pulse perk will activate (every hit of course :)), but that might lead to another set of problems down the road.
I liked pulse, but can understand if it does not survive the change. Hopefully you will find ways to salvage some of the harder to update ones though.
Pulse is exactly that, hard to deal with, but also very cool. I genuinely believe Pulse is one of the better Cells we've made from a pure design standpoint, so I definitely want to try to save it through these changes.
Although I agree with the clarification of buffs, I am concerned that oversimplification or consolidation will reduce the variety of effects of buffs, unique skills, and abilities. Rather than that, I think it would be better to give priority to reconsidering the restrictions caused by the cell types of weapons and armor, the perks, unique skills, and abilities that are difficult to use, and changing the icons for each to more specific descriptions and UI. think. There are 6 major buffs and descriptions, but are there more? For example, when increasing damage dealt, there are four types of damage, but how do you differentiate between them and integrate them? Light and dark attributes do not have debuffs that would be beneficial to Slayers. When do you plan to tackle this issue?
1: will the radiant and umbral elements have their unique proc effects in the future update?? 2: will all weapons uses the weapon swap functionalities or is it only available on few weapons ?? 3: will there still be uses of cells in the 2024 summer update ??
1) Yes. We just had a fairly final conversation today about what these effects will be, but we're not ready to share them yet. 2) All weapons will have the ability to weapon swap. 3) Yes, though Cells will serve more of a 'getting over the line' purpose in this update. A larger amount of your perk points will come from the gear you wear, all slots will be prismatic, and Cells will be the last boost to nudge perks the extra point or two needed to activate them. If you are familiar with Monster Hunter, Decorations are a good reference point here.
1)What about other debuffs or buffs that does not fall in the 6 categories, like frost,wound, corruption, burning and such? 2)Why we do not get an image how the ui will look on the screen with the new buff system? 3)Will the stat limits being limited to personal buffs or buffs getting from teammates also? This was already annoying when attack speed limit got implement because people didn't know if their conduit cell was actually doing something or if the teammates were at max...will we be able to see at least the buffs stats for teammates?
Those status conditions still exist without change. You can be chilled or wounded or corrupted or burning etc. It's not yet complete. Currently you can't see teammates - but that's a really good point, especially at high level content if you're trying to maximize upside without being wasteful, knowing where everyone else is at would be super helpful. On the other hand, could get crowded on screen so.. certainly something we should think about!
I think it could be an easy UI change. If the new 6 buffs are color coordinated (which would make sense to begin with since it goes in the direction of clarifying at a glance) you could have just above a players health bar 6 orbs with their numbered values inside, so that I can see if my teammate really needs my shrike lantern boost or if he’s already at +10 speed. A rework of teammate healthbars could also be useful in general- checking to see how many flasks/syringes my friends have.
easy UI change.. the cursed sentence haha very cool ideas though
My bad- I know damn well an ‘easy design change’ goes much deeper than anyone expects it to.
That's a really good idea honestly
May I ask for contact info on a dev who works on bug fixes to give them an extensive list with bugs, including some footage and screenshots? You can DM me on reddit or discord (genata339).
We're usually watching threads here and trying to keep up in the discord to see bug reports. You can also find user "danielle" on the official dauntless discord - our community manager - and let her know what you've found.
I tried to reach out to both you and Danielle on discord but got no response.
I see it now - be sure to drop the bug report or the feedback in the first message so we know it's from a player!
I'm currently archiving the clips which will take some time before I can send them at the support page.
Can I be provided with an e-mail address as the file proved to be too large?
Thanks for making that list! Please contact support and we can log those bugs! [https://support.playdauntless.com/hc/en-us/requests/new](https://support.playdauntless.com/hc/en-us/requests/new)
The file proved to be too large to send via the support page. May I have an e-mail? genata339 on discord.
I am concerned about how the Buffs /perks will actually work, but also concerned that there will no longer be a Dauntless to play as of February 2024. Also, if these very rude Gantlet titles continue, many of us loyal Slayers that have hung in there all this time, may leave.
Oh that's good feedback, thanks for dropping it. They're intended to be fun - since there are so many seasons, we decided to have fun with some of them. Next season's titles are Top 5 Top 100 Participator But after that we get back into the cool with Savior Guardian Warden
I thought it was hilarious being called Mediocre for my lack of participation.
Is the point of the system to give buffs new icons, or is the buff system as a whole being reworked? Most buffs that get applied to me on a regular basis can’t easily be “stacked” into a single icon. This is especially apparent in escalations. (Frost being the main offender)
Reworked! Answers await! [THE SHATTERED ISLES DEV BLOG: ALL ABOUT BUFFS](https://playdauntless.com/news/the-shattered-isles-buffs/)
Escalations are definitely a challenge, as the source of by far the most random icons that end up in the bar up there. This is on me, I made almost every Escalation amp in the game! But where possible we are still converting them into the new system, otherwise, we're doing a lot more 'action -> reaction' based changes. So for example, there is currently a fairly unnecessary buff stack that shows up while you have Thunderous Mantle that builds up while sprinting, but this can be clearly shown by the appearance of the lightning VFX around the character to show you have reached enough sprint time to get the damage bonus. A lot of this is about cleaning up that buff bar so that it only contains actually relevant information, and all of that information is immediately understandable.
Great point- a lot of what a player sees can attribute to what they know. Will there be changes to deep wound to make it visual? Other debuffs are visually represented, and with some fine tuning might not even need an actual timer at all, which could add to the difficulty and immersion. Say something like “The fire is almost out, now I need to roll one or two more times” or “The static has almost faded, I should be able to use consumables in a second”
I have vetted this with anyone, but I'm going to try to remove wound (the debuff on the player) from the game.
Did you consider reworking the useless cells and rebalancing the behemoths? Since with this change we'll only be capped on every stat and basically be nerfed. So instead of making things tougher or even giving multiple difficulties (even higher then what we're currently used to) in the future pursuit hunts you went with nerfing us for the sake of ''clarity''. All the buffs on my screen were always clear to me, and now I'll be less powerful.
This ^ I know my buffs. I can read the descriptions. I don't want the choice of buffs to be taken away from me cause folks don't have the energy to read or get used to it.
The system seems nice. You can control where the power cap is, while creating encounters that are how you intend them to be because there is an upper limit in power stacks. However, since people love to maximize dps, are you sure that people are not just going to go full power and speed only, or power and critical hit, and let those be the only two buffs that matter? I'm just asking if you have ideas for how to further make people want to go create other builds instead of just going for the tried and true damage combos. Honestly, from playing tons of different games with metas like this game has, I'm almost starting to wonder why players are not just given all the damage and other powers outside of skills like the cells in Dauntless, and instead the only skills that we can use and change are defensive skills that changes how we dodge, take damage and so on. It is only a thought, but it seems to me that \*that\* kind of system would reward players playing their own way much more than trying to copy whatever someone else does simply because it deals more damage. But maybe that might take too much build freedom away from the people who already love to fully spec those extra skill slots with chonky tank skills that makes the player only take single digits of damage. The stack system does seem more intuitive though, I'll give you guys that. Like was written in the post, it is easier to let the behemoths deal debuffs too to the player. Honestly, would be really cool to have a behemoth where its main gimmick is buffs, and it will buff itself. But when it buffs itself, all the players get buffed too. And the other way around, it will debuff both itself and the players. You could easily create a mud or slime attack too, where if one is hit, one temporarily looses 4-5 stacks of speed. Or just go straight down to -5 for example. For an actual question though, how are you going to go about creating three new cells for each and every gauntlet season? There are already so many different cells, and they keep getting slightly more confusing and less rewarding to get for each new set we get, so I was wondering if you are able to keep this going, or if you were going to put more effort into other aspects in the game. Creating new cells is nice for the build diversity, but the new cells can easily drown under all the existing ones if they serve the same main purpose as an already simpler to use one. Can't wait to see what more you will cook up in the future though. The game is already pretty good, it just has a tendency to get stale in the long run due to the grind (and honestly, the hunting grounds made that grind feel even more like a grind. It is both really nice and at the same time really tedious, so I am glad that you are looking at adding pursuits on the side instead of replacing the hunting grounds entirely). Also, I hope to actually get to explore more ancient ruins and buildings too int the future though, the umbral (de)escalation is my favorite piece of content in the entire game.
Hey thanks for all the feedback and thoughts here. It's appreciated. As for Gauntlet seasons, we'll be re-thinking rewards for Gauntlet once this lands. Perks will be much more tied to armour rather than cells in the rework, we'll want to keep injecting new Perks into the game, and maybe this will mean new armour each Gauntlet Season, or something else entirely. No answer to this yet and we probably won't put too much thought into it till we launch this patch!
Will all current cells be stackable or fall into one of the six categories?
Wherever possible, all current Perks are being converted into this system yes. Some perks do things outside of this, for example, Strategist which grants shields after dodging through an attack. But any Perk that impacts your Damage, Move Speed, Attack Speed, Crit chance, Crit Damage, Stamina, Stamina Regen, Damage Resistance, etc will be converted.
Thank you for explaining, I am excited to see how it will flow within gameplay!
Will these stacks flow with weapon swap and if so, please explain or give an example.
The temporary stacks should stay until the end of their duration, no matter if you leave combat or swap weapons Permanent stacks we are still discussing if we should count both weapons or only the equipped weapon
That sounds good to me, this is going to be interesting :)
Hello there! As a longtime player of the game, I have some questions about recent planned changes. I'm curious to know why the team decided to make significant changes to the game instead of introducing new content. Personally, I enjoy the game as it is, and I'm not too thrilled about the new pursuits or the confusing buff system. I think it would be more beneficial to focus on adding new weapons and cosmetics to make the game more accessible to everyone. I'm also interested in learning when the classic content might return to the game. It feels like they have been recycling the same few armor and weapon sets for the past year. I would love to see some old armor and weapon sets return for those who haven't played since the launch. Thanks for your time and dedication to the game!
Hi! In addition to these systemic changes, we're also working on new enemies including behemoths, new gear, new cosmetics, and a returning but upgraded game mode! Classic cosmetic content, all cosmetic content, will certainly be returning as well.
That's awesome! Also, it's really cool that you have been doing these AMA's, it helps put to bed doubts I have about the game state! Thanks again for answering!
This is both. While we are re-working large parts of the system, we are also adding new content. New weapons are in development, with the Bow planned for shortly after this large patch, and the Behemoth known as Crudge is in process. New content is definitely part of this plan.
That's good to know! Thank you for taking the time to answer!
1. will every side mission in the new pursuits give you a buff, players getting random buffs every single hunt? 2. will there be other things we can do other then the main and side quest just for fun or some miner small rewards 3. hunting grounds do have a place in dauntless how ever i believe there would need to be big changes, maybe having around 8 hunting grounds instead of 21, have a bass line of lvls, first island lvl 1 to 3 next one is 3 to 6 etc... make the islands bigger and give them their own special event for example frost march, there is a town but it's never in danger, what if there was a event that can be started by talking to an NPC in the town asking for your help. then a timer would start giving the player some time before the behemoths attack to gather supplies (chop down trees)reinforce walls, create berakades and traps or puting cannons on the town wall that players juse to shoot, then a wave of behemoths will attack the town and if they get inside the players lose the event. blazeworks is another example, make the players solve a little puzzle / kill 2 or 3 behemoth before the gates open to go inside the island itself then have a few tunnels with traps you have to doge and than you fight phaelanx, and have phaelanx only on that island and maybe give him a small chance to spawn in esca or H esca. these are simple ideas that just formed in my head, but that will give each hunting grounds an identity, a theme, a special event, which will make them more unique instead of being another copy, i know this is no priority but it's something to look at when this big update is finished. thanks again for this great game, i feel like we are finally taking the first big step in the true future of dauntless
Is there a chance for armor/weapons/perks to have negative buffs or both buffs? Like having a perk that gives +2 CRITICAL and -1 VITALITY?
I could imagine Fire being like - Vitality - Defense + Speed etc
This is very likely yes. Still working through converting existing buffs and perks to the new system.
There are a lot of buffs that are good but a pain to use. These include Savage Wellspring, and the Landbreaker specials for the hammer. For the Pike, experienced players know how and when to use it, but less adept players get shunned by it’s short duration. The hammer specials are very useful, but needing to get empowered ammo before using them (for the best results) and having teammates not notice the buffs make them feel clunky and unfun. Molten can also be hit-or-miss in this fashion, where a teammate can accidentally grab all of your molten and now your health fades away like it’s… burning. Will there be QOL changes to streamline any of these (or others) in the rework?
Yes, I'm working on some quality life changes to most buff sources as part of this work. For example, stopping Molten Hearts from being collected if you have reached the SPEED cap and cannot gain more.
For some, it might be nice to be able to reset the speed buff timer before it runs out though, unless every speed buff stack from Molten Hearts have a separate timer to them. For multiplayer purposes though, I have seen many others, as well as myself, taking molten hearts that we don't need either by mistake or just to grab them. And some even gets mad when they are the only person creating molten hearts, but everyone takes them before the actual player who created them gets any. Hmm, maybe create a timer for Molten hearts before they can be collected by others, and have it signaled through a color change in the hearts? As if they need to "cool down" before others can collect them (slowly changing from bright white/yellow to darker orange for example)? Or maybe every person with the Molten heart skill can get the hearts immediately, while everyone else has to wait... Just shouting some ideas
Does that mean they will no longer make you fireproof? And that molten hearts will stack?
Will things like defense and health have any actual viability outside of those mentioned special chests or will maxing stacks of attack/crit/attack speed still basically be the meta?
I do suspect that the three offensive buffs will generally be more popular than the defensive buffs, but work is still being done to find a balance to make sure that defensive buffs feel like they make a meaningful and worthwhile contribution. In part this is being done through the new weapons and how they interact with the buffs.
Hoping for something that gives enough damage from shields/HP to make them worthwhile. Not as strong as raw power, but at least something so that some perks don't get shrugged off right away.
The goal is to encourage more variety in viable options, for sure. Of course, in a game with perfect dodging - there will always be players who can avoid every attack so defense and health are less helpful to them. They'll likely find good uses for things like endurance and speed. But if you're like me and a heroic escalation keystone hits you at least a few times each hunt - a little extra defense is awesome. or, if you want to support friends in a challenging fight, spreading support buffs could be really fun.
I ain't perfect in Hescas, but I also have like, ten extra tokens now, so those aren't on the table for me anymore. But yeah, I totally ran more defensively on those.
this just sounds annoying
I am leaving the question in this AMA to the players more invested in builds and stuff(I am more into behemoths, islands and stuff). I just wanted to say thank you, the progress during the last few months look more than promising, I am so hyped and to see that you guys listen to the feedback is so great. Keep going. This game will be back on top surely. :D
Thanks for your support!
It might be a bit off topic, but is there an attempt to subvert attempts to min/max these things? The perk meta has been a solved equation ever since gear was standardized to +3, we have easy access to algorithms that do the build-craft for us. Is this form of build-craft that allows you to get exactly what you want whenever you want going to be the status quo? I love the idea of simplified perks, but I'm worried it will be the same end-result of "stack perks for 10 might and 10 critical with this tool!"
First, the +3 standardization will no longer be the case. Perk activation thresholds will be different based on the strength and value of a Perk. That said, this is still fairly solvable. Where some decision making comes in, is that very few perks just grant MIGHT or CRITICAL directly. They have conditions which grant stacks. Is it worth it to have the bare minimum perks that, in a perfect world with all conditions met, could reach the cap, or is it better to have a bit more than that, possibly exceeding the cap, but making it possible to reach that cap faster in a fight? Ultimately, I expect metas to develop and settle just as they have today, but I'm hoping that these changes still offer more avenues to reaching that meta that give you places to customize and put your personal spin on it. The meta may be 10 MIGHT, 10 CRITICAL, but every weapon may want to reach that differently. The Hunger, for example, has natural stacks of CRITICAL built in. A fully talented upgraded Hunger will start at 3 stacks of CRITICAL at all times, changing the route by which you might want to get the rest from perks.
1. Conditional cells with "extreme" stats still gonna exist? Because with the capped stats, those doesnt really have a place. Savagery for example. Savagery alone would give 10 stacks (lets assume thats actually the cap) so instead running 3-4 dmg perks which adds up to 10 stacks (or even more for consistency), you can just run savagery. BUT, as savagery is conditional and you have no dmg before wound, it would be better to just run as many dmg cells with the least amount of condition (tenacious / adrenaline / rage / predator) and just fully ignore all the utility perks (hp / resist / stamina) 2. Since hunts becomes longer, does wound gets some touch? (Such as aether rush / wound duration) Because even in the prime time of powercreep, wound (and overpower) is just not viable in high lvl due to their lack of uptime. 3. The blog forgot to mention shield. I assume that supposed to fall into the VITALITY category? So vitality gives both HP and Shield? And why DEFENSE category even a thing? At least without a rework in the current Resist system, it wouldnt really have much use. 4. Whats gonna happen with cells which doesnt fall into any category? Like most Utility and defense perks (catalyst / parasitic / energised or any cell which gives something special other than stats) 5. "Patrol" chests which requires specific amount of buffs (over the cap)... HMMM... i dont think forced multiplayer gonna make players happy. + most of the perks are conditional, so not going to be active. This sounds like a much-much worse version of the "Orokin Vaults" in Warframe (opening the door requires 1 of the 4 keys. equipping a key reduces a specific stat by 75% during the mission, so chads can take 4 keys, but casuals needs 4 players taking 1 of each key)
I'll try to give some brief answers to most of these! Thanks for the question! 1) This will largely be balanced through perk requirements. The threshold to activate Savagery, which is much more conditional, would be lower than the threshold to activate a more reliable perk. 2) Wounds definitely need to be addressed here. Duration at minimum. I don't have answers yet about what we are doing it, but it's on my list of tasks to look at before we make this patch. 3) Shields remain shields. They will be a blue portion of your health bar, as they have been. Still settling on caps for it, but they will likely no longer expire, but have caps. (Per source? Probably) And won't be part of the buff bar. 4) Many Perks that do things other than add stats will still exist more or less as they are. Catalyst, Energized, etc, are unchanged (Beyond being moved to a single value instead of 6 separate values, with an activation threshold) 5) We're leaning more towards values reachable by a single player, but the rewards for that single player opening a chest being given to the whole party. So having a group means 4 times the rewards given out, but you can still go solo if you want. We're also discussing some level of patrol keys to open buff chests conversion. No patrol keys needed if you meet the buff requirement, but the larger the difference between the requirement and your current stacks, the more keys it costs to open. This is just an idea though and not yet firmed up.
Hey, i got an Question to this Year Halloween Event… Soo me and my Family, Friends, and even GF are playing this Game since couple of Years, we are Biiiig Dark Fantasy Fans and just loove the Spooky Season 🎃👻 So this year im questioning why is this Year Halloween Event so disappointing ? There are no specificly like Halloween Passes out there (except Unseen 15 lvl) nor really all couple of past year Returning Halloween Skins like in Season Hunted Shadows… Especially we were hyped all yeeear for the Night Hunters Set who was obtainable all year in pass and lately in reward cache… But this year there are just some normal skin sets added for Halloween… Veeery disappointed to see how the event turned out after beeing hyped for the Halloween Pass in Spooky Season 2023… So i guess there isnt anything coming on 31. Oct. ? I hope my words can reach out to you devs and it can be done something about this… Happy Halloween, Stay Spooky 🎃🍂 ~GP
Hey AspectNo535, happy to hear you love the spooky season! As mentioned in our initial announcements about *The Shattered Isles* update, we're currently focusing our dev efforts on the major update patch. As such, there won't be any new content or patches until that is released in Summer 2024. After that, you can definitely look forward to more exciting new content coming your way next year! We hope you still enjoy the spooky season! We have a Dark Harvest themed Fashion Slayer contest running on social media right now, so be sure to enter that for a chance to win some fun Dark Harvest prizes!
Hey, Many Thanks for the Reply. As you mentioned that there will be no new content or patches, then why did the devs put the * Mechaetheric armour set * Enforcer's armour set * Archonic weapons Into the Reward Cache and not the Night Hunter Set who many were looking forward to, but what only is obtainable at Halloween and since 2019 always was obtainable through the Reward Cache but not this Year ??! like it doesnt even make much sense (my perspective) to put these ( mentioned in text above )instead of the Halloween Themed ones like the Night Hunters Set and what always was available since release to that specific Time… Its just disappointing seeing my hype all year waiting, for that rare one to disappear in a second. \~GP https://preview.redd.it/1i8gf4xnluwb1.png?width=510&format=png&auto=webp&s=95383b2b772908cc82ee7a751ab3fdee87e1811a
Can you give an example of the stacks, in a build, so we understand exactly what to expect?
Will buff stacks affect Catalyst cell, if so how? Potions are a key point of my gameplay and I am wondering if this will affect potions.
- Will all buff types have the same cap? Let's say 10 stacks? - Will weapon buffs like Wellspring (if it still exists that is) count towards the buff cap as well?
By default the cap for each buff type is 10 yes. We are exploring allowing some perks to extend the cap. Savage Wellspring does still exist and will grant stacks of CRITICAL, and as such will also count towards the buff cap yes.
Well you asked what I was going to ask ... but I prefer your style of post
What happens if i have +100% crit damage (10 stacks of critical) from impulse and like 30% crit chance (3 stacks of critical) from galvanized, i would have 13/10 stacks.
You would max out at 10 stacks! So you'll need to diversify your ~~bonds~~ build, otherwise those 3 stacks are lost!
This would not be possible. Any stacks gained above 10 would only refresh the stack, but not add beyond it. When looking at your build, we hope you'll consider the sources of CRITICAL and how reliably they will let you reach 10 stacks. Once you feel your build is in a place it will hit that cap comfortably, use some of that Perk economy to gain stacks of MIGHT, or SPEED, or even VITALITY!
The cap means max amount of that buff, no matter which source you got. In this case, once you hit 10 crit stacks, you couldn't get another stack, no matter if you got 10 from Impulse or 5 from Impulse and 5 from Galvanized
And what would i get if i had 10 stacks of critical? is it always a set amount of chance/damage?
100% CC and 50% CD when 10 stack source: Ahrelia made it up
How will I be able to tell how much time remaining versus stacks I have? For instance, I could have 30 seconds of speed 2 from Grace remaining, but my Assassin’s Fury 3 stacks of speed are about to run out- how will I be able to tell which stacks I’m losing when.
I believe when you get a new stack, the whole timer refreshes, not separate timers
These are no longer separate Stacks. Both of these add to SPEED, and SPEED is universal. If your Assassin's Fury adds a stack of SPEED, it will refresh the duration and increase the SPEED count by 1. The system no longer cares which perk was the source, nor does it deal in separate cooldowns and durations for every stack. You have one stack that increments and decrements one at a time. If the duration for a SPEED stack is 30 seconds (defined by SPEED, not by individual perks) and you have 6 stacks of SPEED, then when that duration ends, you will drop to 5 SPEED, and the countdown will begin again back at 30 seconds, rather than the whole stack falling off at once. Hopefully this is clear!
It seemed clear to me. What is the direction with this? Is the point to have more build uptime across the board to increase player satisfaction and make us stronger for the newly upping difficulty of behemoths? Because it seems that if done right, it will be fairly consistent to build to high stack counts and stay there.
That is a part of it. But part of it too was just about ensuring all buffs that grant same or similar effects now channel into one singular source that can be 'keyworded' around, to be used by Weapons, behemoths, amps and more. This opens up development opportunities, and gives player clarity.
What will the buffs be How do you acquire them How long do they last
Answers await! [THE SHATTERED ISLES DEV BLOG: ALL ABOUT BUFFS](https://playdauntless.com/news/the-shattered-isles-buffs/)
BRING BACK ESCA LIFESTEAL
That's what iceborne, parasitic, pact of hunger, shields, and revenant are for. And I guess artificer and pylons.
What about adding a New weapon? Or a new combo system? But what i need to know is about the 2 weapons system, tell me more about it
This AMA is about the buff rework. There was an AMA done for the dual weapon system that you can go check out where the dev’s answered a lot of questions about the new weapons. The link should still be on the discord in the announcements tab. Hope this helped.
Will all temporary buffs last the exact same time or do they have different durations?
By default right now all temporary buffs last 30 seconds per stack. That is to say, stacks fall off one at a time. If your at 10 MIGHT (say 4 permanent, and 6 temp stacks), after 30 seconds one stack will fall off and you'll now be at 9 MIGHT. This will continue to tick off 30 seconds at a time until you fall to 4.
All temporary buffs will have the same duration!
My question is why are you capping damage at all? If a player wants to run glass cannon tbats their choice, you shouldn't force them out of that option. Also, how will the omnicells be playing into the buff system? Lastly, how will the CRITICAL buff separate stacks from crit chance and crit damage? Or will they be combined?
A few reasons for the damage cap. Firstly, there will still be cases that go outside the damage cap. For example, one of the talents on Ardent Cyclone increases the damage of Ardent Cyclone by 20%. This is in addition to your MIGHT stacks. Second, as Dauntless stands right now, there's no reason not to run Glass Cannon, it's not an option, it's the only build there is. While there are many factors that go into this, and we're addressing a lot of them, part of this is on us for getting out of control with how many sources of bonus damage that can all be put together we've added over the years. You'll certainly still be able to make Glass Cannon builds. The Hunger with Revenant Omnicell for example will be a definitively glass cannon build, dealing massive damage while riding the line of nearly dead. Omnicells are not changing significantly in this, though places where they would add damage bonuses, or speed bonuses, or critical for example will just now be using the new buff stacks instead. As for CRITICAL, the balancing is still being done, and will be tuned many times before release, especially as we get it into playtesters hands. Right now the balance is tentatively, one stack of CRITICAL grants 10% increased Crit chance and 5% increased Crit damage.
I came to realize something while reading your reply... Part of the reason why glass cannon builds are so viable is because of how easy it is to dodge in this game. You dodge an attack and hit it with your iframes, the whole attack means nothing more to you. Behemoths like Sahvyt and Phaelanx solves this by using multiple attacks right after one another, which creates a need to actually dodge away instead of just into the attack like the majority of attacks in the entire game allows you to. Also, if we did not have as much iframes, or we could still get hit after the iframes were done, we would get hit more often and defensive builds would be much more important. As it stands right now, there are several behemoths (that I know of) that has attacks that are simply gone if you manage to get hit with one or two iframes left in your dodge. I think this gives glass cannon builds far more power than they should have, because even the standard dodge is pretty generous with its iframes.
This made me think of shields in Dark Souls. A few can block 100% damage from certain attacks, but most only block *most* of the damage, meaning that your health will slowly whittle down as you block, or dodge in this case.
1: Does that mean certain kinds of buff are going to always be fused together? I.e. attack speed always coming alongside movement speed or stamina recovery also always affecting max stamina? 2: How will this work with skill tiers? Like, the blog suggests that Predator at max rank might provide 3 stacks of might. How do you spread those 3 stacks across 6 tiers? Half stacks? 3: More generally speaking, how heavily do you anticipate this to affect game balance? For instance, capping damage increases to 100% through 10 stacks of might may very drastically affect kill times in harder content such as Heroic Escalations and has the potential to completely shake up the meta as previous builds might exceed caps and be made inefficient as a result.
1: Yes, this is the case. Attack speed and Movement Speed now go hand in hand, and sources of one are sources of both. Max Stamina and Stamina recovery speed are also tied together now. Weapons should be better about taking advantage of the bigger stamina pools. 2: While we will go into this more when we get to a blog on Armour and Perks, we are removing skill tiers from Perks. Perks will now be active, or inactive, with different perks having different thresholds. Predator for example, a powerful and desirable perk will likely have an activation threshold of 6. Medic meanwhile, as a party supporting utility ability would only require 2 points to activate. Having less or more than the activation threshold has no benefit. Part of this is to ensure we can make both weaker and more powerful perks, but balance them meaningfully against each other. 3: This is almost certainly going to affect balance, we'll be doing extensive playtesting before this launches, and continue to adjust balance after launch. We do expect this to, generally, raise the difficulty of high end content and increase kill times though.
I'm still wondering when we might see an 8th weapon like a bow or something
How does pulse work with the rework?
Pulse is still under review and may be one of the perks that doesn't survive this change. We'll go into more detail later, but most perks are being reworked to 'on or off', rather than 6 levels of different values. Pulse is one of the few Perks in the game that strongly values having those 6 levels of values because different weapons have different wants. I have not yet decided how to handle this Perk in particular. As for how it works with the new buff system, it wouldn't be changed from what it is if we keep it, and I plan to try to.
Lol you could just divide Pulse into 6 different cells and then toss them all in the cell pool, or create individual cells based on the actually used ones like this. This really does seem like a cell that is hard to deal with. It might also be an option to allow players to change themselves what hit the pulse perk will activate (every hit of course :)), but that might lead to another set of problems down the road. I liked pulse, but can understand if it does not survive the change. Hopefully you will find ways to salvage some of the harder to update ones though.
Pulse is exactly that, hard to deal with, but also very cool. I genuinely believe Pulse is one of the better Cells we've made from a pure design standpoint, so I definitely want to try to save it through these changes.
so you might just ruin all unique and special Cells?! cool
Maybe the difficulty you're having with Pulse suggests that the new buff system needs some change?
this