Boon Suggestions Thread, Including Missing Common Ones

Wicked Feedback
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It’s a bit early of course and I heard there’s still more to come but I figured I’d lay this down now while people are here and we can keep iterating it for a few days while there’s interest. There’s quite a few roguelites mainstays missing currently

  • boons/debuffs that when you complete a task it turns positive or levels up
    • caveat to this though is want to make sure the game doesn’t give you this type of boon to the player on a really really late stage room, or it’ll just feel sucky.
  • a way to just upgrade boons and not simply add more
  • weapon type specific boons, one reason it feels shallow rn is every boon buffs a general stat all weapons share
    • there’s always been affixes that focus on weapon specific stuff(bows fire an extra arrow, AOE attacks are 10% larger, stabs deal 50% mroe elemental damage)
  • Multi-affix boons in general because right now one boon accomplishes one thing(a stat) & one thing only
  • lean into elemental natures
    • lightning per hit that chains through enemies close enough
    • fire that sprays out into a wave of AOE
    • ice creates spots that reduce enemy movement/attack speed or build up status
    • plague IDK tbh
  • even negative ones need to be added but with a focus on gameplay styles & mechanics like take 50% more ranged damage, but deal 100% more ranged damage.
  • boons that give bonuses to your weight class or overall weight
  • boons that give negatives or bonuses to roll type rolling leaves behind an element trail
  • successful parries give those elemental effects, a parry-only run could genuinely be interesting to try & it’s not cheesy since parrying is so risky and hard to learn anyway
    • enemy is slowed after parry too, not just damage but debuffs given

I got more but I don’t want to spend all day here typing out, plus not all affixes from all roguelites apply to Wicked’s combat but I do think these are relevant. But I do like that the foundation for affixes is getting overhauled, but now it’s a matter of you have to tune the boons to specific playstyles and not just a general “this affix does all” type deal.

3 Likes
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I’m going to piggyback off a couple of your ideas.

Weapon-Specific Boons

  • Two-handed weapons gain an additional {X} range on their attacks.
  • Two-handed weapons gain increased Attack Speed with each hit. Stacks last {X} seconds, up to {X} stacks.
  • Daggers deal increased damage from behind a target.
  • Staves gain more Focus on attacks (not Runes).
  • When wielding a one-handed weapon, your Parry window is increased.

Elemental Boons

  • Freezing a Burning target causes them to burst with damage.
  • Shattering a target Burns enemies around them.
  • Hitting an electrified enemy causes bolts to strike enemies around them.
  • Afflicting enemies with Plague has a chance to create a pool of Plague beneath them.
  • Why do I keep making AoEs effects…
  • Running builds a static charge over time. When fully charged, your next attack deals a large portion of damage.

Defense

  • Every {X} seconds, you block all damage from one hit.

This is all I have thinking quickly. Definitely need more ideas, haha.

2 Likes
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I’d really prefer if we drop most of the current boons with this % stuff and go more of the Hades route with things like, charged heavies send out waves, arrows bounce between targets, being near enemies grants focus gain, etc etc. Actual things that change how your weapons work and how you play the run rather than oh you do 30% more damage and have life steal. These feel like lackluster placeholders until they can have more resources to work with.

1 Like
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Well the solution is both, a roguelite that only changes weapon properties is also disincentivizing as well, but boons that both change combat properties & buff them pushes you toward them

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I’d like more of those unique boons as well. Would be even better if it had like a ‘‘combo’’ system where you can fuse boons together into a new one. I do think what we have right now is a good skeleton. Furthermore, I do like the idea of upgrading boons rather than having more. It gets cluttered really fast to the point where you don’t know what you have anymore.

As for suggestions:

  • Echo Clone: every time you use a rune you create 2 echo’s of yourself that mirrors the rune with 25% effectiveness.
  • Floating Weapon: you get several copies of your current weapon that mirror your basic attacks with 25% effectiveness.
  • Static: enemies that hit you take 10 lightning damage.
  • Focus Fire: with every 50 focus gained sent out a fireball at the nearest enemy.
  • Plague Born: become the scourge, gain a plague aura that lashes out at nearby enemies (like a hand/claw in plague form). Does so every X seconds and lowers defenses as well as deal X plague damage.
  • Frost Mines: when dodging you drop a frost mine below your feet, this can happen once every 5 seconds. Enemies who get to close trigger it and freeze (trash) or are slowed (bosses) and take X frost damage.

These could then be upgraded and players can look for synergies such as increased focus gain + focus fire for example.

Sidenote: I kinda also want those unique boons as affixes. If we can use some of them in regular play, that would be really cool.

1 Like
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These are so much better than mine, haha. Boons definitely need to be more quality over quantity. Upgrading Boons also reminds me a little of RoboQuest.

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I’d also love to see: twice the enemies but half of them start to revolt^^

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I would also love to see some boons for physical damage. I kinda get the feeling that there are a lot of elemental boons, but none exclusively for pure phys? There are the generic %dmg ones, but none as interesting as, for example, the elemental one that boosts ele dmg at the expense of phys.

Or is it just the dev intention, that in the end every build sources some kind of ele dmg via infusion and/or rune?

If I were to make a big bonk 2h build, infuse weapon with spike etc. what boons would I even pick in the crucible? I would love more options here