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[RELEASE] Golden Sun Reloaded

Started by Caledor, 22, December, 2016, 03:56:07 PM

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Caledor

#540
What i find really strange is how you both keep mentioning Jonin and nobody has said anything about Chaos Lord yet.

Shuriken has already been nerfed: you need to update, Maxi.

QuoteI'd like to note [...] I once had
I will always ignore any luck-related complain/suggestion/whatever formulated this way.
Not only about this mod or this game, but in real life as well.
A lot of things have low odds of happening but they will still happen. A random person might get struck by lightning while someone else's winning the lottery. But then what? I can't (and won't) tailor this mod for a 2%. Because if i did that, i'd be making a change that's worse for the other 48% and unnoticeable by the other 50%.

Think about it from the opposite perspective. Somebody fought Poseidon tons of times and never had any character instantly downed by Watery Grave. Should I boost the ID rate because i feel he should experience that? Obviously not.

Tomorrow i'll probably try to battle poseidon with that save

Average Wind Seer

I don't see how removing MT ID from a boss that's plenty strong enough without it will somehow make the experience worse. If anything, it makes it better since there's no chance of getting completely screwed by bad RNG.

Why bother with Chaos Lord when Jonin exists? Jonin offers better utility with Impact and Ward, along with far better PP, EPAs, a MT EPA, and the ability to function as a powerful Hybrid. Heck, why bother with any other class for Isaac, Felix, and Garet when Jonin is blatantly the best class for pretty much the rest of the game once you get access to it?

The few things Chaos Lord DOES have that Jonin doesn't (Poison, Haunt, and Curse) are basically useless in any scenario you'd want to use them either due to bosses having total status immunity or it simply being faster to just attack to win the battle (BTW by no means am I even trying to suggest any ID should possibly work on bosses, cuz that defeats the whole point of boss battles). Not to mention I previously pointed out how extremely marginal the differences between Jonin's and Chaos Lord's HP and defense stats are.

Proxian Obs

What is the recommended level I should challenge Saturos and Menardi'? for some reason I feel like I should come at level 70 from the difficulty of the Mod 'lol. oh and (Very Very) good job on this mod too! :medal:

Average Wind Seer

#543
Hello, Proxian Obs!

I fought Saturos and Menardi at Lv.29/30 with Isaac & Garet as Black Knights (6 :VenusStar: 6 :MarsStar: ) spamming Ragnarok and Planet Diver, sometimes buffing themselves with Courage/High Impact. Ivan and Mia were Wises (6 :MercuryStar: 6 :JupiterStar: ) for Double Wishing and Break. Tonic :MercuryDjinni: is a huge help during the Fusion Dragon battle, since it cures all ailments including Haunt.

Down below are screenshots of the equipment I used to fight the final battles and Deadbeard.

I hope this helps!

Maxipotter

Cal, you are right I made two mistakes. First, I was only considering tri-elemental classes, I didn't give two-elemental enough credit. Second I didn't know Shuriken had been nerfed, in the patch notes for 1.72 and 1.73 it doesn't say it explicitely so I assumed it was unchanged, I guess it falls under "mid-tier psynergies for Ninja" though I wouldn't call it that. I see now it has a x1.0 multiplier. So let's go over these:

First Chaos Lord, for the early game its a really good class, both it and Sun Champion have a lot of uses. Once you get the 6 Djinn that allow you to go Shinobi, Chaos Lord remains the top choice against Poseidon. After that most of the mid-game focuses around multi-target fights and Mars-alligned bosses where Chaos Lord is inferior. You could still use it for specific djinn or Mad Plants, but they aren't hard enough to justify moving all your djinn around and then back, are they?
For end-game Chaos Lord looks like the perfect Unleasher, since PP doesn't matter for that, and it gets bravery to buff his attacks, it is strictly better than Jonin at this since they have the same atk but Chaos Lord has way better surviveability, so you would put him in a (posibly cursed) Crit+atk set to get the perfect crit chance, with the Darksword or Herculean Axe or something.
However, as you pointed out there's the posibility of getting stat capped, so then the highest atk multiplier doesn't matter. If you are aiming for 666 atk it's worth noting that if your Chaos Lord is at 708 atk, him in Warlord would be 666 and Warlord is then strictly superior (Same HP and Def, Higher PP, Agi, Luck and Ward. And having access to 3 EPAs, Bravery, Guard, Cure and better MT psynergies). Likewise if your Chaos Lord is at 687 atk, him in Shogun would be at 666, though it is not as strictly superior since it doesn't have atk buffs himself and has to relly on others for it. Shogun does have improved surviveability over Chaos Lord (and PP and Agi) and access to 3 better EPAs.


Secondly, Shuriken has a 16.6% damage reduction compared to my game. This means it now will (probably) deal less damage than ThunderClap and Punji, encouraging to build your Jonin more on elemental power than attack which is nice, while still having a budget option in Shuriken. Shuriken should also hit lower than for example Warlord's Stone Spire when learned at level 33 against Jupiter Lighthouse enemies or Supernova when leared at level 35 against some Mars-weak enemy. However at end-game if neither is geared for elemental power then Shuriken will outdamage all other warrior classes in MT which if perfect by me Jonin should be the best warrior option in MT and it should be hitting for slightly lower damage than Mage's top-tiers, which it didn't before but it now does.
Against the mid-game Bosses Jonin is still the best against Moapa, since MT any element destroys them, which is fine. Against Karst and Agatio and the Flame Dragons it is no longer the clear choice since x2.0 is still strong but just as strong as Quick Strike and considering elemental power differences possibly as strong as Plume Edge's x1.7

Against Star Magician it used to be that Shuriken could 1-shot some of the Balls, with this change even at 999 atk it is not enough to one shot Refresh Ball, though it IS enough to one shot the Thunder Ball. It is still a good choice, but not as mandatory since it would still need extra damage. Shogun, Warlord and Chaos Lord are all able to oneshot one Ball at a time and are better at dealing with the Magician himself.

Against Sentinel I should add Chaos Lord as an option since Odyssey is a good EPA. But Jonin still remains a solid class 'cause Ward.

So of my previous 6 points 2 fell flat with that change I didn't notice. Sorry. I guess you were somewhat right. I still don't see the need for Jonin to have the highest atk multiplier if it is suposed to be more like a caster but I understand its not really that big of a deal and Shogun/Warlord can't have a higher multiplier because it would make Chaos Lord completely useless.


I noticed you didn't say anything about my proposed change to Fire Breath, you didn't like it?

Average Wind Seer

#545
Doesn't Sentinel's barrier gimmick also nullify EPAs? I can't remember if it did or not.

Honestly Cal, if you want Jonin to be balanced, then either nerf its HP and Defense modifiers even further to make an actual dent in the Warrior's HP and Defense scores, or nerf Jonin's attack modifier so it isn't on par with Chaos Lord in terms of attack. Personally, I believe it should have the lowest Attack Modifier of Isaac's, Garet's, and Felix's tri-elemental classes at about 150% to 155% attack.

I feel that Shogun needs some major changes, because the intended draw of it being Debuff-focused is really bad. Debuff Psynergies just aren't worth using due to how quickly they fade and being more difficult to maintain (yes, i'm talking about the MT versions). This intended draw-point for Shogun is made even worse by having a PP score marginally better than Chaos Lord's. Not to mention Chaos Lord, Jonin, and Warlord all performing the EPA spam much better due to either higher attack modifiers or better PP pool (or both in Jonin's case).

Caledor

#546
One thing that makes sense from the whole Jonin debate is that i should tweak the "weight" for atk and def when calculating stat totals (to balance classes). By making atk weight slightly more and def a bit less (as is should be cause atk is always more or less double than def), it turns out that i should, among other changes, drop the jonin's hp by another 5%. But that's it. 5% Hp is how much it is imbalanced so i really think that you're grossily overestimating the Shinobi line.

Also, i think shinobi itself is why you were having such a hard time against poseidon. Changing Piers to radiant and Felix to Psy champion made the fight a joke even though the entire setup was completely unprecedented for me (btw why miko jenna didn't have asteria's staff?).

As for debuffs, I did some math and I think I can drop the base recovery chance by 5%.

About Fire breath, i found the post cause i didn't really remember hearing about it. It kinda makes sense, i'll mull it over and it will either be in the next update or i'll tell you why it didn't make it.


EDIT (Answer to last point below) I never thought that Jonin has ever been anything near the best for the Isaac Felix and Garet. I'd still pick Shogun and Chaos Lord over it, and i've enjoyed using Leader a lot. I just happened to think something that makes sense math-wise, which involves reducing Jonin's HP multiplier by 5%. Shuriken at x1.2 was actually OP and in fact it only took me 3 castings to nerf it to x1.0

Average Wind Seer

#547
Jenna didn't have Asteria's Staff because I had her wielding a Sylph Rapier in preparation for Valkyrie until I noticed she lacks Blessing from the get-go. Thus it went to Sheba, then sold to Izumo after nabbing a Crystal Rod. After Poseidon, I was gonna have Jenna go Infidel and Piers go Strategist, so the staff she's wielding right now gives more mileage to Punishment.

As long as that 5% takes off more than a measly 100HP when comparing to Chaos Lord, then maybe it'll be fine.

Like Maxipotter said in his first post about changing Fire Breath to a MT EPA, it makes the Dragon Helm's bonus actually worthwhile. I also agree with his point of making more MT EPAs for various hybrid and warrior classes would help knock Jonin down a peg or two from being the "undisputed best" for Isaac, Felix, and Garet.

EDIT (Reply to Cal's edit):
Jonin at the very least was the best class before the planned nerfs to it. We'll see if it keeps a firm grip on that title once the next update is out.

On a separate note:
why did Destroyer get Douse downgraded to Frost?

bpat

Saturos and Menardia (and Fusion Dragon) are all trivial compared to Deadbeard. I usually fight them right after Deadbeard which I do at whatever level Mia learns Break because I dunno how to beat him without Break.

Average Wind Seer

I personally find Deadbeard fairly trivial compared to Fusion Dragon, largely due to Deadbeard having a finite PP pool and a pointless Monster Move. Fusion Dragon's AoE Haunt and Venom can be crippling if not dealt with immediately via Tonic, not to mention Crushing Blow having a chance to reduce its target's HP to 1.

Caledor

Quote from: Average Wind Seer on 27, February, 2019, 07:11:00 PM
why did Destroyer get Douse downgraded to Frost?
when you said you'd like more variance in psinergy lines i ended up counting them all. Frost was among the rarest ones and i decided that it fits destroyer better than douse (themathically).

QuoteWe'll see if [Jonin] keeps a firm grip on that title once the next update is out.
You misunderstood. I never thought that Jonin was the best for the boys. You think it's the best and i find that questionable. I don't like that class, I'd always pick Chaos Lord or Shogun over it. Shuriken alone was too good and it got nerfed but that's it.

Average Wind Seer

I didn't misunderstand you. It's been clear for a while that you simply don't care for Jonin. However, regardless of how much you liked or disliked Jonin, it was simply overpowered and the best class for the boys. If that extra 5%HP loss cuts off more than a puny 100HP when compared to Chaos Lord, and more classes get MT EPAs, then Jonin will be as balanced as you (and everyone else) want it to be.

Huh. Okay, that makes sense for Frost.

Also, will General be gaining an Endgame Venus Mace and a Venus equivalent to the Cosmos Shield? Jonin has a bit of an unfair advantage over General by having the Hagbone Mace and the Cosmos Shield. General doesn't get anything from Alecto's Mace, and Rising Mace's Mercury Power doesn't help him all that much.

Caledor

You keep misunderstanding. Jonin being OP or best class is only your opinion, one i disagree with. It's not that i don't care, i just think you're vastly overestimating that class.

Pretty sure i already answered that, but no. Power bonuses for warriors are already balanced. There's no need to keep adding equipment.

Average Wind Seer

#553
Quote from: Maxipotter on 25, February, 2019, 05:59:11 PM
My main issues with Jonin is that there are so many different situations where you would want to use it over other clases:

  • Pretty much all the mid-game, from the moment you get the 6 djinn up until end-game. Since you are not stat capped the extra atk and PP go a long way
  • All mid-game bosses, except maybe Poseidon. Avimander is easy enough (and alternative setups Protector and Paladin are niche and not really needed) and then Moapa, Karst and Agatio and Flame Dragons all get destroyed by shuriken faster than by ST :MercuryStar: EPAs. Since Shuriken is 1.2xN°enemies, so with 2 enemies you get 2.4 multiplier, way better than Plume Edge's x1.7 or Quick Strike's x2.0
  • Bosses weak to Venus (namely Sentinel): Since Annihilation is just a more expensive Tyrfing but because Jonin has a higher PP pool it somewhat cancells out. You could consider Shogun Skull Splitter to debuff Defense, but you lose out on the impact/ward utility jonin offers.
  • Finally, if you want to run a Hybrid for some reason

While the other clases only shine in really specific Boss fights:

  • Warlord in Balrog and thats it
  • Shogun in Doom Dragon and Dullahan that hit so hard it may not be a good idea to go Jonin
I dunno, it sure doesn't seem like it's just my opinion.
Regardless, Jonin having Shuriken aka currently the only MT EPA falls in line with what I stated earlier with Support-type Classes:
Jonin is so highly appealing and so good for the majority of the game mainly because it has something only it can do. Take the exclusivity of a MT EPA away from it, then it falls back to being appealing as a Hybrid Class.

QuotePower bonuses for warriors are already balanced.
Unless I'm missing certain pieces of equipment, I have to strongly disagree with that statement. In the screenshots below, you can see that I gave Piers and Garet the same armor pieces and Garet is wielding the Hagbone Mace. Garet is clearly boasting a whopping 37 extra Jupiter power over Piers' 128 Venus Power. Do take note that Piers' highest Elemental Power is also Jupiter instead of Venus.

EDIT:
never mind about a Venus Cosmos shield. I just remembered the Titan Gloves exist.

But an Endgame Venus Mace would still be fantastic, since Jonin has the Hagbone Mace. I think the Grievous Mace from the beginning of the Eastern Sea is a fine candidate to receive the same treatment that the Phaeton's Blade got. It is kind of pointless even for when you get it. Sheba would rather have the Cloud Wand for better Wishing, and the guys don't really get anything from Venus Maces at this point, not to mention you can easily sequence break into Gaia's Rock to snag the Demon Mace right away. Even playing the dungeons in the intended sequence, the Grievous Mace is quickly outclassed, and the Demon Mace is a direct upgrade shortly before Strategist is available.

Caledor

QuoteUnless I'm missing certain pieces of equipment
Yes. Once again, please use the editor. Titan Gloves, Big Bang Gloves, both Greaves.

Average Wind Seer

#555
The Knight Greaves close the gap, but the Silver Greaves are... kinda pointless in my opinion. Jonin gets absolutely nothing from their Mercury Boost, and General would rather have the Knight Greaves. I guess Paladin benefits from them, but honestly why even bother with Paladin in this mod? Not to mention, both Warlord and Destroyer would much rather have Ninja Sandals for higher Unleash Rates.

Though for the sake of elemental power balance, I suppose that there really isn't much to be done here.

Foreclosure

Hey there! I've been keeping track of all the work done in this website and, honestly, you guys are amazing.. From Rolina to Atrius and everyone else, thank you for keeping Golden Sun alive. I love this patch (this is my fav to be honest, I can't play vanilla anymore hehe) and I'm happy you keep updating it. I must confess I still do some tweaks for my gameplays (I hate it that items like Douse Drop and Frost Jewel become obsolete later on and you can't even remove them from inventory, for example). So I just turn them into some items that bestows useful battle psyenergies that I design myself (e.g. turning Douse Drop into Regen Drop, item that bestows the Regeneration psynergy).

Well, sorry for overextending myself. Your patch is great, congratulations. Keep it up.

Average Wind Seer

#557
So now that I've reached the Western Sea and did some Sequence Breaking by going to Contigo first to empty out all of my Game Tickets, I have a couple things:


  • Golden Boots are now the 3rd Worst boots (Turtle and Leather Boots being the two worst). As I've stated a few times now, Luck just isn't worth investing in until you can break 40 Luck, which can only be feasibly reached by Angel Mia with all the Luck Boosting Mercury Djinn, Psychic Circlet, and Clotho's Distaff. This kinda defeats any reason to bother with activating the Thieves' Bonus Event back in TBS for a Password Transfer. On the flipside, the Fur Boots are now actually useful thanks to the HP Boost.
  • Brilliant Circlet and Floral Dress are direct downgrades from the Astral Circlet and Cocktail Dress respectively. the Brilliant Circlet only adds one singular point of Luck over the Astral Circlet and lacks the MaxPP Bonus. Floral Dress' effect is just awful garbage. Why bother with Sleep when Stun exists? Cocktail Dress effortlessly beats out the Floral Dress. This is a pretty considerable problem since the defense bonus from either armor piece isn't enough to justify losing the extra MaxPP from either previous piece.
  • What is Elementalist's Role? Incantrix and Fateweaver are strong Offensive Mages with some good supportive capabilities, but I can't tell if Elementalist is supposed to fall under the same vein or have a different role.
  • I know that MT Heals had their PP Cost drastically boosted and the healing boost from elemental power was nerfed to weaken Dual-Wishing Teams, however, with both nerfs in effect, Dual-Wishing is honestly kind of pressured on to the party. One Wisher will quickly deplete their PP Pool, and likely won't be able to heal enough HP when fighting bosses such as Doom Dragon or Dullahan. I think un-nerfing the healing bonus from Elemental Power will help alleviate the pressure to use Dual-Wishing, since it will better allow for one Wisher with encouraged smarter healing (as opposed to simply spamming MT Heals).

And here's a few ideas I've come up with:


  • Would it be possible to have the Douse Drop and Frost Jewel to bestow their entire Psynergy Lines, like the Sand Prince and Snow Queen Jewels in Dark Dawn? These would make them much more useful in TBS as it gives everyone but Mia a Base Damage Mercury Option they wouldn't normally have in a good number of their classes.
  • Give Jenna's Heretic a Venus Fume Psynergy and swap Punji with the Jupiter Psynergy closest in base power. This would give the Ker's Weight purpose and thus make sense for a Cursed Mage Build.
  • This is a pretty big one, but I thought about how to make the Rising Mace and the Silver Greaves more useful since Paladin/Holy Knight aren't worth using. The solution I came up with was scrapping Paladin/Holy Knight altogether and crafting Mage Classes to replace them. Since Jenna gets a Warrior Class in Valkyrie, I figured why not give a Mage Class to the guys? Paladin could be replaced by a Mercury Fateweaver with a Mercury Fume, Plasma, and Heal/Wish/Boon. Holy Knight could be replaced with a Mercury Heretic, with Mercury Fume, Tornado/Plasma, and Gaia/Punji. Naturally, these classes would likely have the lowest attack, defense, and HP multipliers of the tri-elemental classes, but boast the highest PP, Ward, and possibly Luck. This way they're not stepping on the toes of the Hybrid Classes, since those will be more durable and more versatile than a purely caster class.

That's about all I could think of for now. I'm interested in hearing your thoughts on these.

EDIT:
Oh yeah, I just remembered that I found this weird text glitch. Sheba still changes to the Tamer class just fine when equipping it, and it only happens when she changes to Tamer specifically. I don't think I've seen this happen with her other classes, though. It's a minor and kinda funny glitch, so no worries if you can't fix it.

Maxipotter

Wind Seer:
You've been asking for a Venus Hagbone Mace to have extra :VenusStar: Power, but there already is Tungsten Mace (Crafted from Golem Core) that has 15  :VenusStar: Power, over Hagbone's 12 :JupiterStar: Power. It does have lower atk (129 vs 143) but if you want it for casting it's good.

You don't like Paladin/Holy knight and I agree, persolnaly, I don't want to use them, but I don't think they are bad classes, they fit their theme very nicely. Also think that Cal rates Def and HP way higher than you or I do, and that is likely not going to change. I think the main issue with these classes is that there isn't really a place where they shine because all the enemies are similarly affected by physical attacks and psynergy attacks; If there was a boss (pre-reunion) that had UBER defense and low resistances (kinda like FF Flans) then you would want to have the guys heal and the girls be in offensive classes with Fume/ Punishment. Thing is if this boss was after reunion, you would probably go full mages.
Other than this you would need some boss with really high atk-based MT (high enough that it makes the mages die in one turn) so that you go full warriors with 2 of them wishing, but that would probably be hard to make work.
Still, it's not a bad strategy to have one of your double Wishing come from a low speed unit, since that way you would heal some of the damage the boss did in this turn, which could save someone. Ex: If the boss does 400dmg three times, its really significant if all of that comes at once (1200 would kill most) or it there is a wish in between (-400-400+500-400=700 final).

I agree that Golden Boots are underwhelming if you compare them to end-game gear, but since you get them so early in the game maybe we should be comparing them to the other alternatives available at that moment? It will be a strict upgrade for anyone using Leather Boots and will remain so through all Eastern Sea up until Contigo. Still, I don't agree that Luck is meaningless unless its capped and it's not true only Angel Mia can reach said cap.

On the Circlets and Dresses I agree completely.

Average Wind Seer

#559
The Tungsten Mace is a bit too weak for my liking, but since the Knight Greaves give +10 :VenusStar: Power, I'm willing to let go of an Endgame Venus Mace.

The Paladin/Holy Knight aren't bad classes, per se, however they certainly are the least useful of the classes available to the Warriors. Due to how fast Attack scales upwards, Defense is kind of moot, and the rising number of Base Damage attacks the further you go in the game also renders Defense pointless. HP also scales up absurdly fast, which kind of make High HP Classes a bit redundant since they'll have super high HP regardless of their class.

A lot of the boots have been adjusted to where only the Monster Drop Boots/Shoes can be considered "endgame", so the Golden Boots are very lackluster of the available boots before the Ninja Sandals and Knight & Silver Greaves are available. It's not exactly any strong point to be better than the Leather or Turtle Boots, especially considering the steps you need to take to unlock the Golden Boots.

Angel Mia is really the only one who will hit 40Luck at a reasonable level. At Lv.42, I just barely broke 40Luck with the aforementioned Djinn Set-up and equipment, whereas other characters would likely have to abandon some very strong endgame gear to come close to 40 Luck around that same level. 15 Luck on my Cursed Fury Ivan and Cursed Guardian Jenna was plenty enough for all of endgame.

EDIT:
To clarify what I mean by "defense being moot" in regards to the super fast Attack scaling, I never really found any reason to care about defense past getting the most recent armor piece, up until 300 Defense. Once you hit 300, it becomes more of a question of "which pieces of armor help boost my offense?" rather than "which pieces of armor give the highest yields of bulk?"

I don't know the damage formula, but I don't think defense has enough weight to really be worth investing past 300 or even using a Tank Class past that 300 benchmark. Not to mention it's often times better to go balls to the walls with offense to clear out the random encounters before they do too much damage to the party.