Bug Fixes and Monk Talents | Patreon Weekly #193

Hey Patrons, in this weekly I’ve got some info on v2.0 beta progress and the Monk!

But first, here are the results from Patreon Poll #38:
Feint:                       86%
Parry and Riposte: 14%
To be honest I was expecting feint to win this poll, but not by such a commanding margin! There’s not a lot else to say here, the Duelist’s 3rdarmor ability will obviously be feint instead of parry/riposte.

Beta Details

The beta for v2.0 released on Thursday last week, and since that time I’ve been mostly busy fixing up bugs and listening to feedback. Here’s a few major things I’ve fixed between BETA-1 and BETA-3

• A nasty bug that caused the game to incorrectly think a weapon was always equipped if the player attempted to use an ability while out of range.
• Another tricky bug that caused the game to refuse to use English if the player’s device was set to a non-English language.
• A long standing bug that caused particle effects to sometimes fail to appear is (hopefully) finally fixed.

I’ve also been listening to player feedback, and so far, it seems that the Duelist may actually be a bit on the weak side! This is surprising to me as usually entirely new item mechanics that I make tend to release on the strong side (with the wand of living earth being the biggest example). I’m planning to keep listening to feedback and probably make some initial balance adjustments as the beta continues. In particular I’d like to try to sure up weaker weapon abilities and talents so that the Duelist can feel more consistent in the mid game.

Monk Details

While I have not started on implementation just yet, I have tried to spend at least a little time this week working on Monk concepting.

Firstly, here are four Monk abilities which I just shared in the beta blog for v2.0:

• Flurry of Blows costs 1 energy and lets the Monk make a quick unarmed strike that penetrates armor. This strike is instant if it follows up a regular attack, making it a great finisher.
• Cleanse costs 2 energy and removes most harmful effects from the Monk, but takes a couple of turns.
• Dash costs 3 energy and lets the Monk instantly move to a location within a few tiles. This is great for a quick reposition, and even goes over hazards.
• Focus costs 3 energy and lets the monk prepare to dodge the next incoming attack, just like a dwarven monk would.

I’ve also spent some time designing out potential talents for the Monk. One obvious talent, to fit her theme, is to grant the Monk bonus energy if she is wearing very light equipment. This opens up some interesting strategies, where a player may choose to largely eschew weapons and armor in favor of using wands and heavily relying on higher monk ability uptime. A lot of this will come down to specific mechanics and tuning though. I’m considering either having this be one talent or splitting it into one talent each for weapons and armor. I like the greater flexibility that two talents offer, but I do worry it makes the subclass a little too ‘light gear’ centric.

I’m also strongly considering a talent that will augment the Monk’s abilities, somewhat like Enhanced Combo for the Gladiator. As the Monk is more flexible, this could take a few different forms. As I want the monk to have more of a utility emphasis, I’m consider giving her 4 or 5 purely defensive abilities at base and locking an additional 3 attacking abilities behind this talent.