Author Topic: Sithicus -- Feedback  (Read 36397 times)

The Prophet of Misinformation

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Sithicus -- Feedback
« on: April 25, 2014, 09:14:11 AM »
Because it's done (unlike 3DR), please post your feedback regarding Sithicus here. If you happen upon any bugs, please PM me directly.

[youtube=425,350]enWTAEAw7DU[/youtube]
« Last Edit: April 25, 2014, 04:25:05 PM by The Prophet of Lies »
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APorg

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #1 on: April 25, 2014, 08:06:46 PM »
It is hard to express in words how awesome this domain is. Will post a mini-review later. (Spoiler-lite.)
“Moral wounds have this peculiarity - they may be hidden, but they never close; always painful, always ready to bleed when touched, they remain fresh and open in the heart.”
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #2 on: May 11, 2014, 08:43:44 PM »
To all whom dare enter the terrifying realm of Sithicus:

I'm aware that players are starting to begin exploring the domain. I likewise understand that it is difficult. Perhaps excessively so -- Please report your experiences here. I'm literally implementing weekly tweaks to the dungeons. The more feedback I get , the better I can address any inconsistencies with it. If you have the time, please post your experiences here. Everything you have to report will help me greatly in ensuring it's a challenging, enjoyable experience.
"The brave man inattentive to his duty, is worth little more to his country than the coward who deserts in the hour of danger."
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Phantasia

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #3 on: May 11, 2014, 08:57:40 PM »
From what I have seen so far it is an entirely manageable domain in terms of overall challenge and travel. Day hours are forgiving for the most part (assuming the Salt Shadows did not glitch) and it allows for a relatively prepared party of appropriate level and composition to explore the domain without much of a problem. Night time, however, invokes a feeling of dread and insecurity. More monsters spawn, and it becomes increasingly difficult.

My slim dungeon experience there was a rough one, but I can easily say when prepared properly it becomes 'much' easier. This is by no means an excuse to remain comfortable. The encounters there are still highly challenging, and actually still require tactics mid-combat instead of just auto-attacking and blasting away.

I could muster more detail, but I merely wished to stress those points I found key. I'll be sure to include more thoughts as I eventually manage to crack further into Sithicus itself.

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FullMoon

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #4 on: May 11, 2014, 11:25:16 PM »
To all whom dare enter the terrifying realm of Sithicus:

I'm aware that players are starting to begin exploring the domain. I likewise understand that it is difficult. Perhaps excessively so -- Please report your experiences here. I'm literally implementing weekly tweaks to the dungeons. The more feedback I get , the better I can address any inconsistencies with it. If you have the time, please post your experiences here. Everything you have to report will help me greatly in ensuring it's a challenging, enjoyable experience.

A few of us Knights of Takhisis were there earlier today and while I was not involved in combat I  liked the look and feel of it. Being characters from Krynn it holds obvious special appeal to us just as Lord Soth is a well known and intriguing entity to us. I do not know if this is way out there or if possible  but it made me wonder if perhaps some custom scripts that trigger if it identifies characters from Krynn revealing a little more extensive knowledge about Soth's story (I think you can guess where I mean so I don't have to spoil). Also I would like to see Soths description fleshed out, would be happy to help with that if wanted.

I look forward to seeing more of it and from what I hear it's a place where you want a rogue so that is nice to for me as a player. Really impressive so far from what I have seen.

MadJKevlar

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #5 on: May 25, 2014, 04:18:38 PM »
Looks great feels great but i have a few criticisms

Firstly transitions are way awkward we was not there five minutes before we had a transition death due to some one miss clicking a door and then not being able to come back again with out the slow fade, also many of the map edge transitions face you the wrong way as you come through them making fluid movement really bad.

The sheer amount of AC needed by a warrior there also seems far to high and only warriors who have taken "extra" measures for AC can really hold the things off long enough for a party to over come them, Monks seem to be able to do so and some dexterity builds too but these all have extra special attention to AC that common warriors do not have and i think its unfair to any one who is not going out of there way to max there AC with tumble and what ever else they can get.

Salt Shadows sneak attacks - these things in many places just come out of no where, and even one instance where you are all split up and potentially dumped singly between groups of them as you enter the shroud of nightlund by night and these guys just spam a ton of sneaks down at a terrifying speed, at what ever the AI chose to aim for first, you can seriously blink and any one with out a 65 AC will be dead that is fairly extreme in my mind and goes back again to this idea of getting so much AC out of a pure warrior with out taking extra measures to pump AC is just not happening. If your full plate wearing tower shield hefting warrior is not meant to be shielding then who is? its just unfair to the class entirely renders it unless unless its had AC pumped up through other means such as tumble and parry. Could these sneak attacks be toned down Just a bit so they cause you panic and to flee rather then just watch your health bar go like Venges signature?

Final thing we went up against was the Shadowy poison fog breathing Dread Trents, they are immune to a hell of allot of things, have a substantial +5 to hit on there already high AB, they took a serious long time to clear out, took a serious amount of spells to bring down and we had to rest a monumental eight or nine times to clear a single area. On the plus side we did learn allot about there vulnerabilities and can almost certainly clear them with less stress in future visits but considering there difficulty, there immunity and there heavy yield of damage they were worth next to nothing in exp. Can these things be made worth more for the effort they take or at least have there evil +5 attacks toned down so we do not have to rest so much and lean on the casters few spells that actually work on them so much?

Its not at all my intention to dig out your new creation i love it , its part of krynn i am a devoutly Krynn player and want people to enjoy this map but currently I feel most of what i have encountered has been designed with power in mind, its been designed to slap down power builds and still challenge them if in groups and to completely thwart them should they go alone but the result is a slightly OP environment that only a few people are ever going to enjoy because it annihilates anything that has not been built for maximums.

Thank you and sincerely, Jay



« Last Edit: May 25, 2014, 05:33:50 PM by MadJKevlar »

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #6 on: May 26, 2014, 11:25:19 AM »
Quote
Firstly transitions are way awkward we was not there five minutes before we had a transition death due to some one miss clicking a door and then not being able to come back again with out the slow fade, also many of the map edge transitions face you the wrong way as you come through them making fluid movement really bad.

I'll take a look at it. Normally there shouldn't be any enemies near transitions.

Quote
The sheer amount of AC needed by a warrior there also seems far to high and only warriors who have taken "extra" measures for AC can really hold the things off long enough for a party to over come them, Monks seem to be able to do so and some dexterity builds too but these all have extra special attention to AC that common warriors do not have and i think its unfair to any one who is not going out of there way to max there AC with tumble and what ever else they can get.

You should only normally need about 50 AC (though the parties I ran averaged a bit higher). Can you tell me the handles of the players in the party?

Quote
Salt Shadows sneak attacks - these things in many places just come out of no where, and even one instance where you are all split up and potentially dumped singly between groups of them as you enter the shroud of nightlund by night and these guys just spam a ton of sneaks down at a terrifying speed, at what ever the AI chose to aim for first, you can seriously blink and any one with out a 65 AC will be dead that is fairly extreme in my mind and goes back again to this idea of getting so much AC out of a pure warrior with out taking extra measures to pump AC is just not happening. If your full plate wearing tower shield hefting warrior is not meant to be shielding then who is? its just unfair to the class entirely renders it unless unless its had AC pumped up through other means such as tumble and parry. Could these sneak attacks be toned down Just a bit so they cause you panic and to flee rather then just watch your health bar go like Venges signature?

They shouldn't have been spawning in the Shroud of Nightlund and in general, I significantly decreased their numbers (to about 7/8) at a maximum spawn. Were you encountering it differently?

Quote
Final thing we went up against was the Shadowy poison fog breathing Dread Trents, they are immune to a hell of allot of things, have a substantial +5 to hit on there already high AB, they took a serious long time to clear out, took a serious amount of spells to bring down and we had to rest a monumental eight or nine times to clear a single area. On the plus side we did learn allot about there vulnerabilities and can almost certainly clear them with less stress in future visits but considering there difficulty, there immunity and there heavy yield of damage they were worth next to nothing in exp. Can these things be made worth more for the effort they take or at least have there evil +5 attacks toned down so we do not have to rest so much and lean on the casters few spells that actually work on them so much?

They're undead trees, so absurd immunities should be anticipated. However, it shouldn't take that many rests or yield so little XP. I'll rectify both.

Thank you for your feedback. It will be very helpful.
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EberronBruce

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #7 on: May 26, 2014, 12:23:22 PM »
Personally I think AC of 50 is so ridiculously high. With my level 17 fighter, I cannot reach AC of 50 and I have special feats to raise my AC. The AC should be tone down. I would like to visit Sithicus but to do so would very bad as a fighter he would be useless.

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #8 on: May 26, 2014, 02:14:17 PM »
Personally I think AC of 50 is so ridiculously high. With my level 17 fighter, I cannot reach AC of 50 and I have special feats to raise my AC. The AC should be tone down. I would like to visit Sithicus but to do so would very bad as a fighter he would be useless.

50 AC is fairly easily achieved with buffs. The entire point of it being that high is to encourage groups to explore. It isn't the place for a single PC to wander through unless they're super-kill-guy (i.e. Mayvind) and even then, it is a risk. Furthermore, fighters aren't relegated to obscurity as I've heard more than once. The expectation (and reality) is that in previous dungeons, Fighters (or the "tank" if you prefer) are the be-all, end-all central focus of the experience. Every other class is a peripheral satellite that either (a) supports the fighter in melee or (b) buffs the fighter (mostly in the case of Mages). This doesn't fly in Sithicus. Every member of a party needs to actively contribute. If they're not, then you're going to fail. Hard. Certain altercations are going to require that your "support classes" deal damage because if they don't, the fighter won't last long enough. That is the "nature of the game."
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APorg

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #9 on: May 26, 2014, 07:44:21 PM »
Note: if you're a Fighter, you will probably need to rely on Improved Expertise if you're getting targetted by lots of enemies.
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #10 on: May 26, 2014, 07:48:18 PM »
Note: if you're a Fighter, you will probably need to rely on Improved Expertise if you're getting targetted by lots of enemies.

Good luck hitting anything then if you are relying on Improved Expertise.


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APorg

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #11 on: May 26, 2014, 07:51:18 PM »
Hence why you should bring a balanced party, so that while the Fighter is getting tanked, others can deal damage.
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #12 on: May 26, 2014, 07:53:19 PM »
Note: if you're a Fighter, you will probably need to rely on Improved Expertise if you're getting targetted by lots of enemies.

Good luck hitting anything then if you are relying on Improved Expertise.

This is assuming most properly built and buffed fighters can still have high 20s to low 30s ab in improved expertise?
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #13 on: May 26, 2014, 08:07:04 PM »
Note: if you're a Fighter, you will probably need to rely on Improved Expertise if you're getting targetted by lots of enemies.

Good luck hitting anything then if you are relying on Improved Expertise.

This is assuming most properly built and buffed fighters can still have high 20s to low 30s ab in improved expertise?

Call me crazy but making a whole domain based so that you have to have certain feats to go there is a bit much in my opinion. If you have improved expertise great but say a fighter does not have such, does this mean he can not go to the domain.


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APorg

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #14 on: May 26, 2014, 08:21:09 PM »
Call me crazy but making a whole domain based so that you have to have certain feats to go there is a bit much in my opinion. If you have improved expertise great but say a fighter does not have such, does this mean he can not go to the domain.

The entire point of Sithicus is that it's supposed to be a "a bit much". It's the place to dungeon that takes the difficulty up to 11. Not everybody's supposed to do it or be successful. If your character can't be part of a team that has an effective strategy to get through Sithicus -- and I stress the word team here because that's how you need to think there -- then, indeed, it would be unwise for you to take your character dungeoning there.
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #15 on: May 26, 2014, 08:56:17 PM »
Note: if you're a Fighter, you will probably need to rely on Improved Expertise if you're getting targetted by lots of enemies.

Good luck hitting anything then if you are relying on Improved Expertise.

This is assuming most properly built and buffed fighters can still have high 20s to low 30s ab in improved expertise?

Call me crazy but making a whole domain based so that you have to have certain feats to go there is a bit much in my opinion. If you have improved expertise great but say a fighter does not have such, does this mean he can not go to the domain.

Of the 28 feats that a level 20 fighter receives, I do not feel it is unreasonable that the PC may or may not (really depending upon what buffs are available) need to take two feats. Even my Wizard had them.
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #16 on: August 06, 2014, 07:16:02 PM »
Speaking from the aesthetic viewpoint that my character has been able to thoroughly enjoy; I feel the atmosphere and map design in Sithicus, from the terrain to the Silvanesti (?) in Har-thelen is excellent and engaging. Personally the land I have enjoyed visiting the most for the scenery. The claustrophobic forest trails with statues opening in swamp like dead trees and fog banks.. to cliff jumping or reclining somewhere in a grove whose spirits make it seem like one walks across the night sky. If foreboding and gloomy with beautiful woven in was the objective, it has been met.

Hat off to the designers/creators/scripters.

My one nag might be the that the NPCs in Har Thelen lack any descriptions for the most part, including the named NPCs which seems a bit of a shame. If the region starts having quests revolving around it, I hope any named characters have some descriptions added for more flavouring. Only the ferryman half-elf. The apparitions (wont spoil for those who haven't gone) and Handsome Jack have anything in their description.
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #17 on: August 06, 2014, 08:05:03 PM »
I've had very little experience in Sithicus so far, but I'll second pretty much everything Maelithii said

Also, the fighting I've done there is -very- difficult, come to think of it I've died every time  :lol: It's sitll always been fun and from the experiences I've had I don't think it's anything that couldn't be handled, as has been said, if I were with a group that was properly prepared and worked together instead of the impromptu visits that I've made to this point. Horribly challenging, sure-impossible? No, that's what makes it fun eh? Look forward to exploring it more as soon as I work up the nerve again!
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #18 on: August 26, 2014, 09:14:08 PM »
...Must get off ass... Must complete...
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #19 on: August 26, 2014, 09:20:27 PM »
...Must get off ass... Must complete...

[Cracks the whip.]

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #20 on: August 27, 2014, 05:49:42 PM »
All right people. Sithicus needs to be fixed. I'm messaged daily by multiple players about this (no I'm not).

I understand that the encounters need to be modified and CR needs to go up in order to precipitate greater XP gain.

Concisely, efficiently, and not in PMs to me, what else needs to be done?
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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #21 on: August 27, 2014, 08:23:30 PM »
I went with a pretty effective party for a rescue about a week or so back. We didn't get very far mind, but I at least got past the initial area and we got to see the tree's of doom. Mind, the xp at 15 for those tree's is amazing, but that is at 15, at which point my effectiveness relied on throwing a bunch of varnishes. I couldn't hit anything , didn't have the ac, but with the other two with me tanking I managed to find an effective way to participate and actually help in combat.

Note, that the npc in the first inn, if that is an inn, has no conversation at all, nor does the rose night or what ever he is near the initial circle or stones, they just stand there all stoically and do nothing. My advise would perhaps to pop a shop on that inn npc and perhaps sell at least bandages, food, drink, and cure lights for a minimal effort. But that's me thinking of being super nice to traveling parties. :)

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #22 on: August 28, 2014, 12:08:58 AM »
I went with a pretty effective party for a rescue about a week or so back. We didn't get very far mind, but I at least got past the initial area and we got to see the tree's of doom. Mind, the xp at 15 for those tree's is amazing, but that is at 15, at which point my effectiveness relied on throwing a bunch of varnishes. I couldn't hit anything , didn't have the ac, but with the other two with me tanking I managed to find an effective way to participate and actually help in combat.

Note, that the npc in the first inn, if that is an inn, has no conversation at all, nor does the rose night or what ever he is near the initial circle or stones, they just stand there all stoically and do nothing. My advise would perhaps to pop a shop on that inn npc and perhaps sell at least bandages, food, drink, and cure lights for a minimal effort. But that's me thinking of being super nice to traveling parties. :)

Which inn was that?  Because if it was Soth, it was a mannequin.

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #23 on: August 28, 2014, 11:06:57 AM »
The first inn looking place, right after the misty woods with all the warriors of doom that kick the hell out of you and just before the forest of the walking tree's of death. At least I am pretty sure it's an inn. The fifth out door area perhaps, I'll check my screen shots and see if i captured the name of the area.

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Re: Sithicus -- Feedback
« Reply #24 on: August 28, 2014, 11:15:53 AM »
I went with a pretty effective party for a rescue about a week or so back. We didn't get very far mind, but I at least got past the initial area and we got to see the tree's of doom. Mind, the xp at 15 for those tree's is amazing, but that is at 15, at which point my effectiveness relied on throwing a bunch of varnishes. I couldn't hit anything , didn't have the ac, but with the other two with me tanking I managed to find an effective way to participate and actually help in combat.

Note, that the npc in the first inn, if that is an inn, has no conversation at all, nor does the rose night or what ever he is near the initial circle or stones, they just stand there all stoically and do nothing. My advise would perhaps to pop a shop on that inn npc and perhaps sell at least bandages, food, drink, and cure lights for a minimal effort. But that's me thinking of being super nice to traveling parties. :)

Which inn was that?  Because if it was Soth, it was a mannequin.

I think i recall the one he is talking about. Its just after the bridge and all the  underground memory lane type ordeals with the painful elf people there is a safe building just to the right after crossing a bridge and trees would be left after saide bridge.. At the top off the inn there are assassin ghosts or painful shadow things to fight... How ever i was told the lone figure in the cornor was a cursed statue and i was told IC never ot touch it or bother it.

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