Right, so this is obviously a controversial topic, but I wanted to say my piece.
I genuinely like the durability system in this game, and I played on day one before it was kneecapped - and it felt balanced to me.
Now, this is coming from an experienced souls player, so I wasn’t dying left and right, meaning that I never actually had problems with my gear breaking on me. I can definitely see how a player inexperienced with the soulslike genre would be disproportionately punished by gear durability though. New players would make mistakes, end up dying, break their gear, run out of money and are unable to repair any of their stuff. So the system obviously wasn’t perfect, but the durability nerf/buff thing made it so that for experienced players, durability basically doesn’t exist.
This makes me very sad, because like I said, I actually liked it - you have to watch your gear durability, manage your budget so that you can always make repairs, and make use of the repair rune or repair powders if you need to.
So what’s the solution?
I’d suggest a difficulty option on realm/character creation, to either make durability easier to manage (like it is now) make it more of a problem (like it was at launch) or disable it entirely.
TLDR; I actually like durability, and don’t want it to be removed, but it definitely needs adjustment.
I don’t think most people want the durability mechanic removed but it was simply too brutal for new players, the way it was balanced at first.
I literally ran out of gold with broken gear and thought it meant game over. When you’re new and poor, durability could potentionally make them lose players if it is enough to kill all joy.
I also agree. I like the durability system and I think the difficulty is spot on for the time being (also a veteran souls/sekiro player). In my 12 hours of the game I went from getting knocked around to pretty much being unstoppable, with the exception of grinding on a boss.
I think people are too impatient and want too much immediate gratification. Ie say you try to kill Darrak and he smacks you around, you have no durability and no food. Instead of being frustrated and mad that you can keep smashing your head against the wall; try ENJOYING the process of farming up food again, silver, try another quest, maybe upgrade your gear. That’s what’s really pulling me into the game is “oh, maybe I should break here and go explore or build the city etc.”
When you say you like it: why? You admit that it was largely invisible to you, as infrequent deaths makes it close to non-feature. But frequent deaths make it unreasonably punishing. So who is actually having anything positive added by its inclusion? You’re essentially saying, I like that other people get shot in the head. It doesn’t happen to me, so my game wouldn’t be any different for it, and it really sucks to be those people, but also I’m glad it’s happening to them. Doesn’t make any sense.
true, instead of removing it it should be balanced AND add mechanics that could take advantage of durability.
for example a unique weapon that loses durability each hit but repairs itself each kill.
and the lower it’s durability is the more damage it will do. maybe turn it into a random gear effect.
give players oppertunities to make a build around durability.
This sounds like sharpness in Monster Hunter, which is indeed an actual mechanic that adds value to the game. As opposed to durability loss in NRFTW as currently implemented, which merely adds a tax on your time for trying to have a challenge.
For the record, I do think that gear durability at launch was absolutely overly punishing to new players - what I liked about it was the way it forced me to budget my money to ensure that I was always carrying enough for repairs. However, the enjoyment I gained out of the old durability system is definitely outweighed by the way it put off new players - I think that it was a good idea, but it ended up being implemented in a way that was less than ideal.
I really like the idea hovsep56 presented as well - having mechanics that spend durabililty to give you additional benefits at the cost of risking your weapons breaking would be a BLAST. The idea that comes to my mind is in relation to the wooden sword (and other wooden weapons) what if fire buffs applied to it had increased effect, like 1.5x or 2x damage at the cost of draining the weapon’s durability? Or something like implementing a powerful focus skill that does a giant chunk of damage at the cost of most of your weapon durability.
Like I said, durability wasn’t a bad idea - it was just implemented poorly. If its reworked properly, it could be a blast to play with.
I agree I also see myslef as an experienced souls player so for me the durability wasn’t any problem from the begining, but after the patch it certainly feels more pleasant at least for most of the people I supose
This durability punishment is good way to do it, the game is more accessible to gamers who don’t like the souls-likes.
I wonder if these people want to lose exp or gold on death more than few points of durability
I liked it too! It made game more interesting!!
I think the good way of making everybody happy is making U loose less durability at begining, and the number of loosing durability would scale with level, which means the more experienced player is, he would die less often, so the game could be brutal for him
So far people saying they like it barely mention what it adds to the game other than being the mechanic that is your punishment on death. Its not interactive, most people end up saying they don’t actively think about it after a while, yet for some its a constant annoyance that forces them to retreat from the content they enjoy most, the combat, the exploration, the world etc.
What does it ADD to the game that another, more interactive system couldn’t.
Honestly, you make a good point here - durability as it is now doesn’t really add much to the game, but like I said in my original post, I don’t want to see it removed entirely.
Changing it somehow to be a more entertaining mechanic would definitely be my preference.
In my opinion they could keep the low cost of repairs but revert back some of the changes at durability loss. Bring back losing 10 durability on death, keep the durability on hit as it is now, and you have a hard but (probably) balanced punish for dying.
I’d say that the idea behind durability was adding consequences to your death, more than the usual soulslike at least. Consequences that force you to aknowledge them and actively intervene to solve them.
If you think about it, it’s the same as losing money on death - just that you can’t simply think “eh, it happens” and keep pushing forward. Durability forces you to stop, pay for repairs, and come back. You are indirectly feeling the impact of the many times you died, and the cost is gold + some of your time.
I think it’s a really well integrate system, it was a bit overtuned at first and now after the patch it has lost a bit of its purpose, but with some balance they can end up with a really cool concept.
I would argue that a system that makes you stop in the middle of a progression system such as combat or exploration, just to go waste 2 minutes and a bit of currency is more of an interruption to good gameplay flow than it is a boon. Keep a player in the action, engaging with the parts that make them sing praises for it.
A system should always be pushing the players into the systems that are enjoyable, e.g. Combat and Exploration. I definitely still agree there should be penalty on death and some form of economy control as that causes gameplay friction, I just think interrupting the gameplay flow to introduce that friction isn’t necessarily good. I wouldn’t want the devs to get rid of the friction, I just don’t think durability is a good system for it, as it doesn’t keep the player moving forward.
They want to innovate on the genre, and while durability is an easy solution, its not necessarily a fun or innovate one. I believe in the devs to do something in the space unique, because so far the rest of the game has delivered.
I am new to souls combat (I died many times learning) and I also preferred the original day 1 balance with repairs. It made every death mean something and I had to scrounge for repair consumables and use them wisely.
I understand why it was rebalanced but I think at some point in the story progression it should revert back to the original scaling or closer to it. The problem now is repair consumables are all but worthless and repairing is so cheap it feels meaningless. More like a chore than the walk of shame it was designed to be.
That being said this is just my experience in Chapter One and maybe later on the costs will be more impactful.
Have to say that I agree, but not in its current state. I really like the concept of the durability system, but currently it doesn’t really cut it in my opinion.
For example, I sell all of my repair pouches because I never need to use them. And when I respawn at a Whisper with partially damaged gear, I’ll just pop over to Sacrament, get repairs for 18 copper and be on my way again. In summary, durability currently doesn’t really exist for me.
i think they could add a curve to that depending on the level you are, so in the beginning it doesn’t hurt when you can’t afford it, while also slowly getting introduced to it as it becomes more present the more you play and are able to afford it. Doesn’t mean it should get too annoying though
The Durability in this game need serious balancing if the Devs insists on keeping it in game.
It is brutal in the beginning of the game. Solution is to make Repair Powder easier to access and obtain.
Further in the game, after obtaining the Repair Rune, Durability can easily be ignored. So this now becomes a redundant feature, so why have it at all?
My suggestion is to do away with durability completely and instead add a Maintenance instead. Instead of Repair Powder, have Sharpen Powder but with the same function as Durability (not timed). When item is “Maintained”, it does extra damage until it runs out then it does normal damage.
That way this feature will not be redundant as it is still applicable until end game. And when you run out of “Maintenance”, you won’t be handicapped and be left without a weapon or armor.
