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QCF Design Community • View topic - IMAWAL


IMAWAL

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IMAWAL

Postby Darvin on Mon Jul 16, 2012 7:07 am

I feel this glyph needs some attention. It's slowly been suffering from changes made throughout the beta. From the experience curve change, to the slowly increasing value of popcorn monsters, to the generally more clog-prone monster positioning, the glyph has been hit by one indirect nerf after another. The recent change to its interaction with slowed monsters correctly identified that it had a dissonance with WEYTWUT and WONAFYT, but failed to address the real problem: IMAWAL removes popcorn monsters from play, preventing you from capitalizing upon them later, and its effect really isn't strong enough to justify this heavy double-edge.

Now, IMAWAL does shine when you're an Earthmother worshipper or if there are plentiful no-XP enemies to target, but in the baseline case the glyph is highly questionable. In most maze-style dungeons it's completely suicidal unless ENDISWAL spawned with it, and even in other dungeon layouts it's often unusable just by the luck of positioning.

I believe a secondary effect is in order, one that only triggers when using it on an XP-granting enemy. Here are a few suggestions:

* 40% temporary magic resist (as the counterpart to ENDISWAL)
* 10 CP per level of the monster petrified
* gain increased health and mana regeneration for the next few tiles you reveal (effect is stronger based on the level of the monster petrified)
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Lujo on Mon Jul 16, 2012 8:56 am

All very true, and if the vids show anything it's just how valuable popcorn is.

You can: gain 2/4/5/8 (+1) piety by killing them, you can remove curses, you can gain mana via the bead, you can set up dodges, and they provide XP by default. All of this makes IMAWAL unusable on the popcorn even without other reasons, and since popcorn is now fule for the by far strongest phys spike in the game (Drac) wasting any of it is sort of always suboptimal. You don't even get bloodpools, which is niche but a rather big downside.

The big problem here is that IMAWAL works off the assumption that XP is the only thing that needs to be compensated for when spending a monster on its use, while in thruth XP is mostly an afterthought, at least the way I play it.

There's the "you can wall up 1-2 lvl9 monsters" argument, which does have it's merits, but if there's 3 lvl 9's the thoughest one gets slayer wanded, so that limits IMAWAL use a little bit.

SUGGESTION:

My conclusion is that IMAWAL needs to compensate for more stuff than XP. Doing a "Cleansing" of some sort, a small across the board debuff removal, might be too strong, and might be just what is needed.

I'd spend a popcorn monster to get rid of: Poison, Mana Burn, 1 Weakening, 1 Corrosion and 1 Curse stack. I never liked the fact that HALPMEH removes poison, and I'd love it if that effect moved to IMAWAL to give regen fighters a bit more inventory space and mana allocation issues. I also wouldn't mind if using IMAWAL on an 8 or higher monster gave you an Indulgence, there's too few ways of gaining those in the game.
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Sidestepper on Mon Jul 16, 2012 10:02 am

Agree completely that IMAWAL has lost its shine. I posted something to the same effect a while back, before Curses were introduced, which made IMAWAL even weaker than ever. The +1 xp for stoning slowed monsters is kind of nice (although it can also complicate mid-fight level-ups if you're careless), but the glyph isn't going to be saved by mere incremental changes. It needs radical surgery. If I find it right before taking on an 8+ monster I usually use it once and then convert it, and even that might be over using it. If that extra 4-6 xp doesn't eventually result in an otherwise unobtainable level up (and it is really hard to calculate this sort of thing so far in advance), then you are better off keeping the popcorn.
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby TigerKnee on Mon Jul 16, 2012 1:34 pm

Speaking of glyphs that need attention, I kind of feel that Halpmeh has fallen by the wayside a lot ever since Fireball is getting a billion and one special effects involving burning. Same with Cydstepp, which is useful for Rogues and Warlord and then everyone else it's a high candidate for "use then convert"

But on the topic of this particular glyph, sure, I would love to see an additional effect.
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Darvin on Mon Jul 16, 2012 3:56 pm

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Re: IMAWAL

Postby gjaustin on Mon Jul 16, 2012 4:50 pm

I think the simplest boost to IMAWAL would be to make it give a larger bonus to XP when used on an XP granting monster. That would keep it's niche and power it up, but not overpower Earthmother.
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Lujo on Mon Jul 16, 2012 5:12 pm

Concerning LEMISI, wait for the next video. At least it showcases why I never thought there was anything wrong with it.

As for HALPMEH - it might be the best it's supposed to be now.

And about CYDSTEP - i'd rather have it as a pre-fight buff than a "spike on a stick" machine. It's probably overly expensive right now, and there might be wiggle room (make it cost 10 but be recastable for Warlord, and cost less for everyone else?).

IMAWAL got my suggestions allready.

And what came to mind is that the Rogue's perma first strike ability may be a lot stronger in practice than on paper.
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Darvin on Mon Jul 16, 2012 6:22 pm

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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Lujo on Mon Jul 16, 2012 6:47 pm

Not to get into the whole thing CYDSTEPP thing all !!! like, the thing is I, personaly, never thought about a repeatable CYDSTEPP as a good idea. Truly. Realy. When I play Warlord these days, the stuff I get to do in regular dungeons just seems like I'm playing a whole different game with a whole different power curve.

I mean, it's powerfull, yes, but compared to almost anything else, the repeatable CYDSTEPP, if any good, is sort of too good. It's an endgame spike powerfull enough to kill bosses - who aren't just lvl 10 monsters but lvl 10 monsters + or ++ or even +++!!!. Being able to use the same tactic on regular monsters feels kind of wrong.

The problem I see with that glyph is that it costs the same for warlord (who has class bonuses on top of a repeatable cydstepp) and everybody else (who gets to pay mana for a death protection every so often).

Rogues notwithstanding, although there is a thing...

The problem with CYDSTEPP the way it is now seems to be inventory space competition with other stuff. GETINDARE for on thing - if you can only get one DP per DING!, why not just use GETINDARE? But I'm not sure the problem is CYDSTEPP as much as GETINDARE (and the fact that rogue gets inventory-free perma first strike which is like a DP+ per fight which is insane, tbh).

If it cost less mana to operate for regular guys and more mana for Warlords, it'd probably be fine. Because what the Warlord is casting and what everyone else is casting is not the same glyph.
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Re: IMAWAL

Postby Darvin on Mon Jul 16, 2012 7:29 pm

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