Casual Quest

by IainPeregrine
A fast paced, casual, multi player action game with a little RPG touch
ID:937152
 
Applies to:Derio1994
Status: Open

Issue hasn't been assigned a status value.
I just lost my bloody post, damn it.

Okay, here was the basics of what I was saying:
Royal Knight people don't like. Gold sword isn't a good primary. To fix this, we could swap the keys for lance and gold sword.

Annd/or we could add a third skill to the RK. He could have an AoE effect that gave people a better sword temporarily. Or he could have an AoE ability that makes him take all damage that other characters would have taken for 5 seconds or so. Tanking, etc.

Or whatever you think of, or nothing.

We could also swap out some of the rogue's skills. Ever played Realm of the Mad God? We could steal bows that fire multiple arrows from that. So the rogue could have a skill that costs 1 mp (he has 4 total, bomb takes 2) that fires three arrows moving mostly forward, but maybe 15 degrees separated.

I'm fine with some classes being worse than others. If you try to achieve perfect balance then you end up having the game get easier and easier as people complain that classes are weaker than others and need upgrades. That being said, I always thought the four maxxed classes should be slightly better than the rest, hence why HP and Sorcerer are so good. RK and Rogue? Eh.
In the later waves, I would take a silver lance or axe rather than a gold sword.
Proper positioning play is much more difficult with a gold sword, because it gives no advantage in keeping distance from your target and it gives no advantage in being able to stay off of the center line of the target. The additional damage dealt is worthless if there's a much greater risk of taking damage.

This is why I would rather take Warlord over Royal Knight, because Warlord's weaponry does not compromise his ability to dodge and prevent damage, and because Warlord's flail allows him to keep even further distance than the Royal Knight.

The same can be said about Dark Lancer, whose magic swords allow him to deal damage without closing distance and risking taking damage.


The huge downside of Rogue is it sacrifices damage and durability compared to other rogue dominant classes (Ninja, Gypsy, etc) for what feels like nothing.
Ninja has 2-4 base damage with his primary, and has a 2 damage range secondary and 2 damage aoe tertiary.
Gypsy has a 1 damage primary but makes up for it with invulnerability, being able to charge in and mass DPS while not really risking death.
Vampire has 1 base damage, sure, but he has crazy damage output (his 2 damage fireball may as well be his primary) and can simply fly away onto unreachable terrain when in a bad position.
The Rogue's abilities don't really make up for this. He has pathetic damage output (Bomb arrow and Fire Arrow take too long to recharge) and doesn't carry his own weight in certain waves: Castle & Hell.
In Castle, nothing the Rogue has can reliably deal damage compared to the other alternative classes: Vampire can easily find a position to flank from, Gypsy can just shield himself and charge in, Ninja is kind of insufficient in castle as well.
In Hell, the Rogue needs to use his fire arrow, but after that, he will not be able to do sufficient damage to anything for a long time. His primary doesn't even affect Giant Demons, for reasons I can't fathom, so he has to use bomb arrows or fire arrows (since bombs would be dangerous). If he's already using fire arrows to protect himself from firesnakes, he's not going to be able to put out enough damage to Giant Demons.
In response to D4RK3 54B3R
D4RK3 54B3R wrote:
His primary doesn't even affect Giant Demons, for reasons I can't fathom

Yeah, real stupid idea, eh? This should be fixed. There's no reason giant demons should be immune to arrows. With that fixed, we could remove the wooden sword from archers that looks stupid but was needed for that reason.
In response to D4RK3 54B3R
{Okay, here was the basics of what I was saying:
Royal Knight people don't like. Gold sword isn't a good primary. To fix this, we could swap the keys for lance and gold sword.

Annd/or we could add a third skill to the RK. He could have an AoE effect that gave people a better sword temporarily. Or he could have an AoE ability that makes him take all damage that other characters would have taken for 5 seconds or so. Tanking, etc.}


I have some good ideas for the third skill, would you prefer support skills or offensive ones? Also, I wouldn't set-up the cover-tank ability unless you could use it like a sage spell to target one character who you know will make the most use of it, or it auto-cancels/becomes unusable at a certain HP. Preferably half in the case an idiot does get the cover and decides to be a douchebag.Otherwise, if you let all characters receive it at once, you'll just encourage trolling or, even if there aren't any trolls, you still suffer from other player's mistakes even more so than you normally would, which can already get you killed in the first place. Of course you could also make it last x number of hits as well or offer some damage reduction to damage taken this way. A lot of ways you could implement the skill.

There also plenty of skills I could think up, but that depends on what you want for the character. Actually I could think up suitable skills for any of the warrior classes if you wanted to go that route and actually give them some more skills.

{We could also swap out some of the rogue's skills. Ever played Realm of the Mad God? We could steal bows that fire multiple arrows from that. So the rogue could have a skill that costs 1 mp (he has 4 total, bomb takes 2) that fires three arrows moving mostly forward, but maybe 15 degrees separated.}

It's funny you mention this because I was actually thinking of a very easy way to improve the damage output on bows that would also be quite practical and useful. Just increase the speed of the projectile. You don't have to stand as close for an optimal DPS, and since your rate of fire technically improves, you're better at pushing stuff away from the group, or doing long-distance saves. Also, with the advent of the bomb arrow, I do think his normal bombs should cover a wider area/Do more damage/cause more than a single explosion/have longer fuses. Any of those really.

Fire arrows are cool but are not worth a full bar, especially when the sage can do it better and more often. Perhaps you could change the mechanics of the skill altogether. Maybe an enemy could "burn" for a few tick using the status effect work-around that I mentioned before (Creating a mob which overlaps the enemy and just looks like an effect overlay or something while occasionally inflicting the status of choice on the enemy.) Each time the enemy took burn damage it could also leave behind a small flame that stays around for a short while or until it hit something, but it would have the same properties as a melee attack and could hit more than one thing at a time. So you'd just set something on fire, and push it into it's friends. If it's a knight, you could have monk punch it for you.

You could also replace the skill altogether, in favor of an arrow which penetrates and can hit multiple enemies. Which would make the class more useful in castle even if the skill didn't damage through a knight's shield.

{I'm fine with some classes being worse than others. If you try to achieve perfect balance then you end up having the game get easier and easier as people complain that classes are weaker than others and need upgrades. That being said, I always thought the four maxxed classes should be slightly better than the rest, hence why HP and Sorcerer are so good. RK and Rogue? Eh.}

I think you're misunderstanding the concept of making a game "balanced" a balanced game would not be too easy because in game development terms "Balance" refers to the game overall not just "Is this class better than that one" and so on. In this sense, making Casual Quest a balanced game would mean ensuring not only that none of the classes completely make another obsolete (With a few exceptions such as adventurer and pretty much every tier 1 class of course.) It would also mean making sure that no matter which combination of classes, or skills. The game will always provide challenge. Basically there is never a point where you get the feeling of "Well, that's all she wrote, guess we can kick back now." Presently, I'm sure there are a few combinations that are, by this definition, imbalanced or "broken" Sage+Sorc is definately one of them. The biggest problem with the sage class, and why I hate them so much, is that nothing challenges them. They don't have any enemies that check them in any way whatsoever. Even knights and dragons will fall in seconds to the sage's fireball, and even while blobs are out, they can give mana with little to no threat of being engulfed. Monks are at least immobile while doing it, and can only use it at close range, and even though it's an AOE, I'd say it's a balanced mana battery move since a careless monk can easily die while using it. Sages on the other hand can still give mana quite rapidly even if it's one player at a time, and can cancel it if they are about to be hit, allowing them time to move to a better location and try again. Even without aura, the fireball spell by itself is already good enough to let a sage basically solo most waves. Which again makes the rouge version of the skill even more useless than it already is. Not that fire arrow is bad, it's just rather situational. In most cases the arrow just knocks the enemies away and the flame burns harmlessly in front of them while they change directions, perhaps only bumping into it once or twice. Meanwhile, sage orb lands right on them, usually trapping them inside for what's probably the highest DPS in the game, guaranteeing kills on virtually every non-boss there is.


If I were to draw up a tier list I'd probably put Sorcerer and Sage at the very top, especially when used together. No offense, but the game already offers very little especially for non-subs. It offers even less once these two enter the stage. Fire snake just utterly destroys almost everything in it's path, leaving only the weakest and furthest enemies alive. leaving very little for anyone else to do. When your class becomes obsolete, how is playing any different from spectating at that point? This is why I keep pushing to add more challenging stages and monsters especially for the post 150 game since by that point it just becomes another 100-150 waves or so of boss swarming.

I think that after the ninja map, most if not all of the monsters should be radically different than before. You already designed the monster line-up that exist now. Why not add a new one? You wouldn't even need to do too much, just a few simple change here and there would do and if you don' feel like designing new challenges, then I'm more than happy to do it for you, all you'd have to do is implement them, unless someone else is capable of doing it in which case they could do it and you wouldn't have to do anything.

{In the later waves, I would take a silver lance or axe rather than a gold sword.
Proper positioning play is much more difficult with a gold sword, because it gives no advantage in keeping distance from your target and it gives no advantage in being able to stay off of the center line of the target. The additional damage dealt is worthless if there's a much greater risk of taking damage.

This is why I would rather take Warlord over Royal Knight, because Warlord's weaponry does not compromise his ability to dodge and prevent damage, and because Warlord's flail allows him to keep even further distance than the Royal Knight.}





I think if gold sword had less knock-back than normal or none at all, then it could be more useful because the resulting DPS would be worth the close range and having to line up. It's not like it needs knockback anyway since the lance if you want to push stuff away then the lance is by far the better choice anyway and for most enemies that this sword wouldn't be useful on, the axe is probably the best choice already as well. So I say you might as well maximize the only redeeming feature of the sword, which is DPS. Alternatively you could give the sword a small arc that is only one tile wide and give it slightly more range than a normal sword. The arc would stat at maybe a quarter of the way into the right, across the middle, quarter of the way into the left. Much less swing than an axe but more reach, though not as much as a lance. This would make it a useful weapon without being too useful, yes?

{The same can be said about Dark Lancer, whose magic swords allow him to deal damage without closing distance and risking taking damage.)

Dark lancer can also invoke invulnerability which is already a very powerful skill on dark knights, but when you throw an axe into the equation, even if it's a bronze one...


Which kinda got me thinking before, aren't dark knights a little more useful than a paladin? Paladins can heal twice, block projectiles, hit stuff with a sword.

Dark Knight can block projectiles, hit stuff with a sword, fire 2 damage projectiles, become invulnerable at will for a full bar. A dark knight, when played well, can get into the fray, clear out the most troublesome areas of a wave then get out before taking too many hits, if any at all. Then while they recover aura, they can still block and attack, or if needed, fire a magical sword.

Paladins can heal up to two times, and unless the damage done to the character is very minor, this isn't all that useful. Especially when the paladin is better served by using the heal to maintain it's own HP. I think the class would be better if it perhaps had a few changes. In fact, I can think of quite a few class changes especially for the Knight/priest combinations tree which are rather uninspired.

Especially when you compare them to what the mage/knight classes can do.

(Dark Knight) Body:10 Aura:4 Rate: 200 Speed: 1
(Paladin) Body:6 Aura:2 Rate:256 Speed: 1

The way I imagine a paladin and every other Priest/Knight being played is that they task themselves with the protection of their allies. So I could envision a paladin using their body to shield the other players then simply healing the damage, while simultaneously healing the members of his team. The higher tiers would build on this concept in their own ways depending on which path you take.

So to this end, I think it'd be cool if the paladin had the following stat change.

Body:10 Aura:3 Rate:230 Speed:1.5

Then you gave him a passive ability which causes any enemy which touches the paladin to be knocked away as if having taken damage, thus allowing them to move into the way of such things like birds, demon skulls, spiders, and so on. The push effect's range would be very small although the amount of pushback would be the same as that of a sword's but if you're close enough to more stuff it would push anything that was in range when triggered.

Crusaders would build on this, by giving the skill more range and thus more knockback. This would replace turn demon which would be given to the templar instead. Then, you could give the crusader a prayer or battle chant ability that could give all players in range extra melee damage as well as some active damage reduction by perhaps 1 point against demons and the undead. Which would be great for when you bomb on a hard wave and are going into the next one with an army of adventurers, this would increase the chances of a comeback.

Templars would gain turn demon in place of turn undead and could get a "longsword" which is what I described the royal knight having as the golden sword earlier in this reply.
Alternatively, you could replace turn demon with an "aura" similar to the paladin and crusader passive except that it lets the templar tank hits for anyone inside of it which is kinda similar to the Royal knight skill mentioned earlier.

The aura would be in the immediate area around him though so they'd have to be standing near him for it to work. IT can be toggled on and off. The aura wouldn't constantly drain, but it would take one point when someone took damage while inside of it whilst also dealing the damage to the templar instead. Aura and aura regen would be unaffected.

Note that all knight/priests would probably have 1.5 speed so they could take full advantage of their aura effects.

Now to get a little bit back on topic.

{Ninja is kind of insufficient in castle as well.}

True, but at least he can use sneak to avoid being ganged on by knights, yet another edge that he has over the Rouge. Also, his Aura regen is far superior, allowing a greater use of bombs and making Sneak's cost rather inconsequential unless you move to a bad location or something. Which is possible, but shouldn't happen if you know what you're doing.

I think any successful attack done out of sneak should do double damage. If you manage to line up a backstab using a completely invisible mob, I think you deserve to deal the 8 points of damage.

{Yeah, real stupid idea, eh? This should be fixed. There's no reason giant demons should be immune to arrows. With that fixed, we could remove the wooden sword from archers that looks stupid but was needed for that reason.}

I think this was done back when some players had a few ideas of enemies that were strong against ranged characters. Which in itself is a good idea. I do agree that a boss that is completely immune is a problem. Unless that boss is only immune because one of it's powers is becoming immune to different attacks or something. Kinda like jugglers from Chrono trigger or the Nightmare Humanoid from Mabinogi.

http://wiki.mabinogiworld.com/view/Nightmare_Humanoid (Be sure to show the notes and advice to see how it works.)

Anyways that's all I was going to rant on for now.


I don't think Paladin needs a buff. If you look at the stats only and ask "which one gets more", it looks like the paladin or any healing class is weak. You need to observe the class in-game and see how it interacts with a party. Over and over again I see classes that had a weak healer, like Paladin, change to Dark Knight and within three waves the entire team is dead. Being able to heal only "twice" doesn't mean 2 points of hp, it means up to 10. It mean that a player with very little hp can hang back for a while and refill. It's the difference between a living team and tier0 all over again.
I don't think taking knockback out of the gold sword would fix DPS problems or anything with the weapon. There's like a 0.25 second invulnerability granted to a monster after taking damage, so if knockback were taken out the DPS dealt to a single monster would still be the same. Knockback with any weapon is actually advantageous if you study positioning play, so as I see it, there's no reason to remove it from the gold sword.

The reason why charging in and spamming works with a Bard/DK/whatever with shields is because you're supposed to charge into a group and hit all of the monsters. When one monster just took damage and has his invulnerability, you're supposed to hit a different monster.
This is the only time when closing the distance improves damage and generally doesn't apply as well to melee classes.
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