Remove Weapon Stat Scaling and Requirements

Wicked Feedback
,
1

What main stat you choose feels inconsequential. The way it works now a full strength build can go around shooting magic at enemies and a full int build can just walk around swinging a great sword and there is no difference other than you can find more weapons that go with your stat. While the goal is build diversity, it really feels like every build is the same, as in there is no intrinsic difference between characters, currently it is all just is how you load out the character.

I propose removing the weapon stat scaling and requirement systems changing the 4 main stats to passive bonuses, something like this:

  1. Strength - Physical Damage
  2. Dexterity - Attack or Movement Speed
  3. Intelligence - Magic Damage
  4. Faith - Focus Cost Reduction

The scaling should have diminishing returns, as to balance hybrid builds. However, in my opinion, a full strength build should have 10% - 15% greater physical damage than a battle mage that uses both physical and magic damage. Some of the split stat penalty could also be addressed with combo effects, such as hitting an enemy with a cold skill and following up with a physical attack could deal increased damage.

I also feel this change would eliminate some of the current RNG pain felt when finding weapons during a play through. Currently if you find a good weapon, but doesn’t have the main stat scaling you are using, it is pretty much worthless. However, with this change your are almost always happy finding a good weapon, as you can use it with out the penalty of choosing the wrong arbitrary stat.

I believe this is a continuation of the core ethos of the developer in creating build diversity, if not improving it. As two builds with the same thematic load out, could play extremely differently. For example, you could have two heavily armored knights wield a great sword, but one attacks with great speed, while the other goes for big one hit damage swings.

1 Like
2

I have been on the fence for this for so long. It comes up rather frequently in the official Discord server so I’ve seen many takes on this subject. Thomas Mahler had to acknowledge on X because it’s come up in so many locations. Ultimately, I have two “pillars” I don’t want lost if a change similar came:

  • As best as possible, don’t make any of the attributes the de facto best. There will always be a best but the gap has to be minimized.
  • Don’t lose the ultimate goal of the system: keeping it classless so players can realize their class fantasy.

If we were to take your ideas, for example, we’d have to make some changes in gear as well. I don’t think gear should give straight damage or attack speed if it is provided in the stats. Instead their should be conditions. I want to stray away from gear giving what these stats would offer. It’s not an issue now because stats are purely flavor.

All this being said, I think builds would still come in two flavors: STR/DEX and INT/FTH. I know you gave it simply as a suggestion to start conversation, it’s not a bad start to the idea.

3

I think a lot of people, myself included, agree with you on letting us have more build diversity.

I just disagree with this method as I see the following issues:

  • Restricts player build freedom.

  • Adds a unnecessary layer of complexity. Personally I think most of the complexity should come from matching affixes/enchants on gear with playstyle and combat itself. I also think the current system is easy to understand, it just influences damage scaling on weapons. I am kinda happy I don’t have to make excel sheets for builds and can just freely invest point :joy:

  • With three attribute points per level and diminishing returns there will be some issues later down the line to where to invest skills into and as @DankMemeGod it will funnel builds into 2, rather than 10 we have currently. Even though the attributes themselves don’t mean anything.

1 Like
4

This is my suggestion to the the problem runes scale or some are restricted to stats.

Here’s the thread

5

I don’t see how this restricts build freedom. It actually allows for more varied freedom in my opinion. I think what gets last in the conversation about build freedom is that it is actually referring to load out freedom. This is my biggest problem, a characters build is purely defined by it’s equipment, which actually renders all builds the exact same, just with different gear. I think characters should have an intrinsic theme or fantasy, currently every character can be a mage or knight or some mixture, it doesn’t matter what main stat you choose. The current system could get rid of INT/FTH/DEX/STR and replace it with a damage stat and almost nothing would change. All I am proposing is that:

  1. Characters can be built to have a thematic core, (i.e. mage, knight, archer, rogue, or any mixture of them)
  2. You have a trade offs in your stat allocation. (i.e. putting more into physical damage leaves less points to allocate to speed or magic damage)

The diminishing returns on each stat allocated actually encourage a more varied allocation between players. Again, to me, the fun of making a build is about trade offs, the more points you put into one stat, the more enticing it is to allocate points in to other stats.

6

I’m not sure that gear needs to be changed to fit this model, obviously there will be balancing and tuning, but gear and stats already give the same benefits. You have weapon damage and a damage stat, endurance and weight reduction, heath and added health, so this wouldn’t be any different.

I would also argue that my point is that damage stats aren’t even flavor at the moment, they feel completely arbitrary and 2 characters using different stats can play the exact same way. This leaves no room for build crafting or thematic builds outside of what equipment you have have on. To me, it’s important that a character has some intrinsic characteristics outside of it’s equipment, which is what skills trees provide in a classic ARPG. Since we are going away from the skill tree model, I feel like stats should provide some thematic consequence.

I don’t think you need to have DEX/STR and INT/FTH builds only. As DEX helps cast speed and melee damage speed and faith reduces the cost of all rune abilities, not just magic ones. Ideally you can have any mixture of the stats and varied levels of each depending on what you are going for. Each character is tuned to how you want to play. Sure you will have builds that exclude one or two of them, but that’s the point, you also have characters that use all four. It is all about trade offs and play style.

7

I believe that your proposed system restricts freedom more than the current system here is why.

You mention that the choosing your main stat feels inconsequential. You are right in the sense that it doesn’t matter as the only thing it does is increase attribute damage; and is a gatekeeper of certain weapons. It not mattering gives more build freedom in a sense.

Because the meta now is, how much stamina, focus, health and equip load do I need as a MINIMUM for my build to be effective. Then everything after you dump into the respective damage stats.

With your proposed system I have to juggle 4 potential new stats. I’m obsessive when it comes to CRPGs to the point where I make excel sheets. If I take a weapon I will calculate it’s attack speed and damage and plot it in a graph to see the return on investment (roi) on spending attribute points to those stats. This will differ from weapon to weapon, from rune to rune.

What if I want to play as a hybrid magic knight, in the current system, most customization stems from matching gear and affixes. I think this is complex enough as it is. And will only get more and more complex. So I invest into health, stamina, focus and equip load as I deem necessary. And the rest is dumped into the attributes.

With your system I need to think about whether or not I am more magical or physical, like how Titan Quest handled hybrid builds; either or. Then start min-maxing those 4 stats on top of the other 4.

Correct me if I am wrong, but if you are referring to your equipment dictating stat investment, then I agree with you; I just don’t think it’s the biggest problem But, it does feel weird to invest stat points based upon equip load. Like if you are wearing plate and want a heavy load, you will skirt as close to encumbered as possible to invest as little as possible into equip load.

This reminds me a lot of the game Battle Brothers, where there is a fatigue neutral concept. For example, an attack costs 15 stamina, so you equip heavy enough gear to wear you have 15 stamina regen a turn. So you can attack once per turn. In here you would equip gear to the edge of the equip load you want to be in. Have enough stamina to dodge out of the longest combo of a boss.

It feels weird initially.

These exist for as far as you allow them to exist.

I can already do that by matching my equipment to my thematic core. And then choosing affixes that further this. I don’t need stats for it.

I agree with you on this. I have the same with CRPGs where you have to carefully pick your feats and skills and think about what you need most. This game doesn’t have that due it’s systems. The closest thing we have to this is choosing our affixes, which right now are limited. I think in the future we will have a lot more freedom.

1 Like
8

whatever we do, the current attribute system doesn’t contribute to a class fantasy system in any way.
why am i specced into str and dex for my halberd but now i have to switch over to str, int to use a bardiche. it’s the exact same class fantasy. the attributes are only restricting the weapon variety you can use for the exact same gameplay and fantasy.

9

I guess this is just a point we would have to disagree on. My character having meaningful attributes outside of the equipment is important. I also want the world to make sense and me pumping and INT attribute to swing a sword or pumping STR to shoot fireballs, just feels lame. Like a copout to make the system easier to balance.

These are similar to my biggest issues with Diablo 3 is that every build is the same, just swap some skills and bam an entire new playstyle. Or that my magic damage is based on my sword. That loss of consistent world logic is a detriment to how much fun I can have.

10

Yes! I’m not saying that the system I laid out is the best or only way to go, but there needs to be something for my character to differentiate on that isn’t what equipment the have on. They actually do a good job on the other stats with this. I have be a character that can hold heavy armor or has a lot life or focus, but then the damage stats, arguably the most important stats, are just completely watered down and arbitrary, leaving no room to feel like my character is any different than any other character. Really a detriment to replay ability.

11

yea. if anything i would just completely remove them and have “damage, health, stamina, weight, focus” and nothing else.

12

Basically all it is now, with the one wrinkle that it makes random weapons unusable. I’d prefer collapsing all the damage stats into one fi they don’t make them more meaningful.

1 Like
13

This is something I 100% agree with you on but for a different reason. Icebreaker the great sword… The item looks like your typical great sword, but scales with intelligence. This doesn’t make sense to me. Now, if the blade is made out of pure ice and has magical particles and stuff sure. But, it legit looks like a zweihander from Warhammer or something a Scottish Highlander would wield.

1 Like
14

I don’t think the current speed of some of the weapons and focus attack animations allows any room for bonus Attack speed to exist as a stat. Which is why I’m shocked they’re already looking at putting it on gear. The stat doesn’t work currently but I can’t imagine how it could ever look right if it does work.

Having secondary benefits for investing into a particular scaling Attribute would go a long way to making it feel like builds have an identity and doesn’t necessarily require the removal of stat scaling. If I were going to attempt it I would first bin the Stamina / Equipload / Focus attributes and instead do something like this:

Strength
Increases maximum weight
Reduces the stamina cost of blocking / Charged attacks
Increases knockback resistance while charging an attack
Increases the damage of Strength scaling weapons
(All large shields and heavy weapons should have some amount of STR requirement)

Dexterity
Increases total Stamina and Stamina recovery speed
Increases “Stealth” (movement speed and aggro range while crouched, less fall damage)
Increases the casting speed of Spells and Bow abilities
Increases the damage of Dexterity scaling weapons
(All Bows should have some amount of DEX requirement)

Intellect
Increases Focus and Focus regeneration
Increases the discovery rate of consumable crafting components (Make more Focus pots)
Increases the damage of Intellect scaling weapons
(All Staves have INT requirements, I assume there’s some alternative idea for FTH)

Faith
Increases Healing taken
Increases the buildup of Status effects
Increases the duration of positive buffs
Increases the damage of Faith scaling weapons

These secondary bonuses should gain the greatest returns from early investment into the Attribute and then the returns should trail off steadily without having an exact cap. The intention should be that players might put points into another Attribute which their weapon does not scale from, in order to pick up the early returns on the secondary bonus. So an INT character who also dips into STR will have access to heavy armour, while an INT character who dips into DEX will have faster casting speed. A DEX/FTH character will have access to better self buffs and status buildup while a DEX/INT character will have more available Focus and a STR/DEX quality character will have a combination of high stamina and equipment load to make the best use of big weapons and shields.

I would also like to see unique benefits added to the weight classes, as it’s clear currently that Light weight with low armour is objectively bad and you gain nothing which would offset the massive loss of damage mitigation which is currently offered by high armour. Suggestions like increased Range/Spell damage or faster Range/Spell animations for being Light would go some way to making that an option instead of a challenge run.

1 Like
15

I originally thought of secondary bonuses as well and would be greatly improved system. I was attempting to not complicate the system too much, as it appears there is a desire for simplicity.

However, in either your solution or mine, there is room for grey areas between the four main damage stats, thus increasing build diversity. Currently, there is a major limit on build diversity, as you are forced to ignore 3 (sometimes 2) of the four damage stats.

The game systems already lean so far in souls direction, I think meaningful character choices would go a long way into balancing some of the systems more toward the ARPG genre.