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Dev Diary - 12/01/2014 - Paragon Brotherhood & Heroic Missions

793 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 1st 2014 at 5:40 PM
Last Edited December 1st 2014 at 5:51 PM
Justin Stocks (CNE Dev)
From the Upcoming Content and Features post:

Paragon Brotherhood

The Paragon Brotherhood is a new building and end-game system that helps you power up your character once you reach max level. You're able to accept jobs off of the Brotherhood jobs board and complete them to earn Paragon Tokens. You can spend Paragon Tokens on bonuses for your character or max level epic gear. The available jobs encompass all aspects of the game, so you're able to earn Tokens while playing many different game systems. Some examples of jobs are:

- Complete a specific heroic missions
- Complete a specific multi-player dungeon
- Donate gold/lumber/companion XP to the Brotherhood (a use for Lumber/CExp/etc. after you've maxed out your town and companions)
- Battle or win in the arena
- Defeat bosses in the Hall of Trials
- Etc.

Heroic Missions

Once you reach maximum level, you'll be able to play the Heroic versions of every mission. Heroic versions are balanced for a few levels above maximum, so they'll be more challenging then anything you've played before (excluding higher levels of the Hall of Trials, of course). They award max level loot, gold, lumber, companion XP, etc. You earn one Paragon Token for doing a Heroic Mission, in addition to any job specific Paragon tokens. There are some new achievements associated with doing Heroic missions as well.

These two new features are now live!



We also made a few changes to balance and bug fixes. Here are the Patch Notes (which can be found in-game via the "Notes" button as well):

Balance Changes
- Increased base speed numbers for enemies starting a level 16 (~3% more speed), increasing nominally up to level 30 (29% more speed), and then quickly up from there (120% more speed on level 50 enemies). Previously base enemy speed levels were equal to base player character speed, allowing players to very quickly outscale enemies using equipment, university buffs, and potions. This change should make higher level enemies more competative, especially in the Hall of Trials, and provide a better balance between speed and other combat stats.
- The bug fix below regarding combatants skipping their turns in combat could cause some noticable balance changes, especially in arena combat. We will monitor and make adjustments as neccesary. If you notice a particularily nasty non-arena fight that was not very challenging previously, let us know via ticket or on the forums.

Bug Fixes
- Fixed a long-standing issue that could cause combatants to randomly skip their turn in combat.
- Fixed the "class attack" stat so it properly grants AD, AP, or both depending on your class.
- Fixed an issue where the Quest Tracker bugged out when there were no quests in it.
- Fixed an issue where the Blacksmith enchant chance for Shardium enchants was not displaying the proper chance. This was a display issue only, and did not affect the actual enchant chance.

Known Issues
- Three of the nine Paragon Brotherhood skills are currently disabled/hidden. We will be enabling them in a future patch.
- The passive skills (such as Healthy, Armorer, etc.) are not properly applying their bonuses to non-player combatants. This will be fixed in a future patch.
- Heroic missions may be attempted before you have completed the equivalent normal mode mission. This will be fixed in a future patch.



Questions and comments can be posted here!

793 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 1st 2014 at 6:01 PM
Justin Stocks (CNE Dev)
In terms of specific feedback that would be helpful after this update, we'd like to hear from you regarding the following:

- Any heroic missions that are too difficult. We didn't test every mission with the new levels, so there may be a few that are very punishing.
- Any issues with the speed changes that seem out of whack.
- Any issues with Arena now that player opponents no longer skip their turns.

Thanks!

29 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 1st 2014 at 11:59 PM
tarot_wench
The missions with 2 and 3 waves of spiders are too crazy fast on heroic. By the time the spiders attack 10 times, I've killed 3, my companions are dead, and I only have enough health for 2 more hits, let alone another wave. Is there a way to put a break in those battles? Or just avoid those missions on heroic mode?

1 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 1:12 AM
Asunyan
Is the max of Paragon lvl same as character lvl? Or each stat upgrade lvl has cap individualy?

25 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 3:58 AM
Sils
Hey devs,

The heroic missions "Journey to the River" and "The Destroyed Camp" in the Temperate Rainforest have spider fights that are currently impossible to complete without taking very specific build paths that don't really help you much in any other fights in the game. It's effectively an unintended paywall.

In general, because spiders already had high base speed and their speed has just been increased by a significant percentage (and this percentage goes up with level), they've become impossible for most people's builds to deal with. Their damage output is no joke, either, and because they have such low health, lucky crits won't save your run. "Journey to the River" is particularly frustrating, as it has 4(!) consecutive waves of spiders, and even at 400 speed and 38,000 health, I die towards the end of the third, beginning of the fourth (and largest) wave.

At 3,200 a hit (we'll assume the queen hits this value too, though she probably hits higher than the others, and possibly more frequently), and since spiders attack first with their insane speed, the 4 waves come out to:

Wave 1 (4 spiders): 4 hits + 3 hits + 2 hits = 9 hits * 3200 damage/hit = 28,800 damage (assume companions kill the final spiderling, you attack first next wave)
Wave 2 (3 spiders): 2 hits + 1 hit = 3 hits * 3200 damage/hit = 9600 damage (companions likely dead here, if not on wave 1)
Wave 3 (4 spiders): 4 hits + 3 hits + 2 hits + 1 hits = 10 hits = 32,000 damage (you're likely dead here, but if not...)
Wave 4 (4 spiders + queen): 5 + 4 + 3 + 2 + 1 = 15 hits = 48,000 damage

Summed up, without taking AoE skills *just to kill these spiders and for no other purpose* and assuming you have enough speed to go blow-for-blow with the spiders for several turns, you'll take a whopping 118,400 damage from this fight.

232 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 4:55 AM
Andaho
Having had a long discussion with Sils about this in the world chat... I completely agree that this difficulty with spiders must have been unintentional...

But it opened my eyes to the idea of having to use a different character build/a different strategy to completing certain levels...

And I really like that!...

To have to think about the mission you're going into, and think about what skills you might need to have... That you might need to use AOE skills to kill spiders...

However, the paywall with that idea is that a re-spec is too expensive... Maybe if you allowed a skill respec for free once a day (or for gold)? - but then costing shardium after that first free/non-premium one?

273 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 5:35 AM
TsukasaWM
The heroic missions, while an awesome idea need to be toned down a bit in general, or at the very least the enemy speed.

793 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 10:38 AM
Justin Stocks (CNE Dev)
Asunyan - The max Paragon Level is 900 - there are 100 points to buy in each skill, and your level is equal to the number of points you've bought. This is an end game system that will be around forever, so there's lots and lots of room for character improvement through it.

Re: Spiders - We definitely would like to strike a balance between fights that are easier if you have AoE skills and fights that are easier if you have single target skills. We don't want to find ourselves in a situation where there's one skill spec that's absolutely the best at everything, especially at such a relatively low level. We're considering ways to let people switch specs easier, but we don't want to necessarily make respecs completely free. Some thoughts that are bumping around in our heads include making respecs cheaper (or free?) for VIP players, or potentially adding respec tokens in log-in streak chests or rarely as loot.

25 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 10:59 AM
Sils
One suggestion by a player I really liked was that we could have 2 skill sets -- set 1 and set 2 -- that we can freely switch between (except mid-battle). Changing either of these two skill sets will still cost 100 shardium, but you wouldn't have to pay if you feel you'd want to alternate between two builds often.

92 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 11:09 AM
Defiar
I like what Sils raised. I would further add an ability to purchase "additional" sets for shardium kind of like inventory space.

793 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 11:43 AM
Justin Stocks (CNE Dev)
Ah, yes! Multiple skill specs is an idea we've been considering as well. I forgot to mention that in my other post, sorry!

273 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 12:20 PM
TsukasaWM
Plus 1 for multiple skill sets. Being able to have 1 for arena, campaign and HoT would be really useful even if we had to earn them over time or with shardium.

221 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 5:42 PM
Elharith
Not sure where to put this, since it is on a heroic version of the mission. Character: Elharith
Mission: Goblin Mop Up
Bug: There is a chest that you can get to going left just prior to the bridge, the wolves guarding the chest are still level 10, whereas everything else is level 30+.

221 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 6:07 PM
Elharith
I like the idea of having a multiple skill spec, so I could keep my firestorm build for when I need a kill all option, and be able to have an alternative build with a laser when I need to kill one *thinking Oliver and Eliza*

221 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 6:08 PM
Elharith
P.S. The "kill all" skills for warrior and ranger *really* need to be tweaked to be more like the wizard skill. There are too many missions where that is a handy skill to have, but the capability in warrior and ranger is beyond horrendously wimpy.

91 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 2nd 2014 at 10:41 PM
shikitenshi
I just killed the damned spiders. I used cleave from the start and elharith is right , it is wimpy , it's just enough to kill spiders in one shot. anyway I wanted to say the only way to beat damned spiders is to kill all the wave instantly. which is impossible if you don't have at least 1 point in cleave(I only regretted the point wasted there ,it never been useful before :S)

3620 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 4th 2014 at 9:04 AM
Last Edited December 4th 2014 at 9:13 AM
Erika/Alyniana
Hey Justin,

Loving the Brotherhood, but I have a question. Are the Brotherhood tasks one-time only or should they repeat?

Because so far, it seems like I've done most of the variations on the donation, Hall of Trials and arena ones, so all I get now are tasks to do the heroic missions.

Which is fine, while I have stamina. But there is no way to even do 10 of my 20 available for the day, if I don't get the other quests again. And I have caught most of the task refreshes except for the 3 while I'm asleep since it's been released.

Thanks =)

793 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 4th 2014 at 11:05 AM
Last Edited December 4th 2014 at 11:16 AM
Justin Stocks (CNE Dev)
You should be able to get repeat tasks. If you're not, then that's a glitch in the system we'll need to look at.

Edit: We've taken a look at it looks like there is an issue that's preventing tasks from repeating properly. We'll see if we can get that fixed today.

3620 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 4th 2014 at 12:12 PM
Erika/Alyniana
Okay, cool. Glad to know I wasn't imagining the no-repeats.

Thanks for looking at a fix! =)

793 Posts
Link to post - Posted December 4th 2014 at 3:23 PM
Justin Stocks (CNE Dev)
The fix is live -- at least a temporary/workable one. The Completed Quests list was unfortunately preventing quests from re-appearing in the available tasks. We've wiped everyone's Completed Quests lists with the fix, and they should clear automatically at daily reset (midnight PST) as well, so you'll now be able to do each distinct Paragon Task once a day.