Well, nowadays this greeting that we've used for so long seems somewhat odd, but here it goes: Hello all you lovely AIs out there!
The work on 2.0 is going well so far, even if we had some minor private things keeping us from working on it in full spare time.
Today we want to give you a small preview of the upcoming combat changes, clarify some spoilers hidden in the last posts and also receive your thoughts and feedback on these changes!
Please note that all is still work in progress, numbers are not final or may be used for testing, images, texts and values may be placeholders yada yada yada
The main goal of this rework is to give you more strategic options and decisions as well as more to do in Tower Defense mode, especially when playing higher levels or longer endless rounds. (And last but not least these changes hopefully are fun too)
For today's diary, we'll be focusing on the Artillery Tower.
General Combat Changes
Min / Max Damage
Towers now have a damage range instead of a fixed damage value.
So for example, if a tower has 5-10 Physical damage, each shot a number between 5 and 10 is rolled.
For AoE damage each enemy hit is rolled individually. We think this system brings a bit more dynamic to the battlefield and also allows us for fine-tuning some skills and damage types to our ideas. For example lightning damage having a high roll range, while cold damage is a bit more reliable in that it has not a great roll range, but also less damage in general.
It also allows for more customization of equipment, as you are able to pick whether you'd like to increase min or max damage of an element.
Tower Levels
Each time a tower damages an enemy, they gain a fraction of the enemy XP, depending on how much damage they've dealt. When the tower reaches a certain threshold, it levels up.
Each level gives a small damage buff which is +1% by default.
This buff can be increased by the Skilltree or Tower A.I. Chips, that also increase various stats like the max level, required XP multiplier per level etc.
(However, A.I. Chips do not provide new skills to the Tower anymore. (more on that in a later diary))
The tower level only counts for the current map, per tower and is reset either when you sell the tower or leave/restart the map.
Example of the tooltip, that'll show the buffs received.
Resistance & Piercing
We changed a bit how the system works. Before resistance could go over 100% meaning, every damage done of that element would actually heal the enemy.
Back then we thought this was a fun mechanic but after a lot of playing and especially with all the changes to combat, we now simply don't. Towers can now have many elements at once and it's simply not fun to have to avoid certain towers or invest heavily into piercing, just so the tower does not heal an enemy.
Thus we capped the enemy's resistance at 100%. You can still lower it through certain skills and deal bonus damage if the resistance reaches < 0 %.
Flying Enemies
We wanted to give flying enemies a slightly bigger or better said "different" role. Thus now the Cryo & Artillery Tower and some skills (e.g. the plasma puddle) can't target them anymore. We think this will improve the strategic decision, which towers to build and also make flying enemies slightly more of a threat since they now can't be drowned in a simple Cryo & Artillery AoE mayhem. In return we've tweaked their stats down a bit.
The "F" in Skilltree is for "Fun"
You may know by now, that we love Skilltrees, but we always felt that our old skilltrees are kind of boring. You don't have many paths to go down and only about ~3 or 4 really "interesting" nodes, that do more than a simple stat increase.
Thus we've overhauled each Skilltree quite a bit. You'll still find simple "increase x by y" skills, but also there are some more interesting ones that for example may add a chance to add burning damage on each hit, unlock skills (like you know from the old skilltree) and also unlock upgrades.
In addition to that the Skilltree now also has nodes, that allow you to alter skills and upgrades.
So for example a node may unlock the Plasma Puddle skill that leaves a void zone on the ground, damaging enemies running into it. Another skill somewhere in the tree might then increase its duration, size, damage %, add some effects to it like slowing an enemy, decreasing resistance etc.
This new system also allows us to apply these buffs from equipment, making it hopefully even more fun to customize it (more on that in a later dev diary).
Which leads us to our next topic:
Upgrades
Each Tower now has 3 possible upgrades that are unlocked and improved via the Skilltree.
Upgrades are ways of making your towers even stronger on a map, by spending coins to either increase some stats and/or unlock and upgrade new skills thus giving you more strategic decisions which Tower to place and upgrade. (Upgrades can not be sold separately!)
Each Upgrade is individual for each Tower and is gone if you sell this tower or leave the map.
The Tower Tier decides which upgrades you can buy and how many levels of it. At Tier 1 you can only buy the first upgrade (given that it was unlocked in the skilltree) and only buy 1 lvl of it.
Tier 2 allows for buying the second upgrade as well and raises the max level of all upgrades to 2.
Tier 3 then allows to buy all unlocked upgrades and raises the max level of all upgrades to 3.
Note again, that these upgrades can be improved via each skilltree. So an upgrade that may seem "meh" at first, might turn into a good damage boost over time.
We've also put in a lot of skill nodes and balancing to make sure you don't have to play with 2 towers now each level because you are out of coins. There are many ways to reduce upgrade and build costs but we've also tweaked all values, so that you (hopefully) have enough freedom in choice of Towers and Upgrades.
Example of all 3 Tiers with respective upgrades
Visuals
We are also updating some of the visual aspects of the game. You may have noticed that the artillery tower has a new model (While the image still is the old one - classic WIP screenshots amiright?)
Before you panic: We'll add a feature to switch between old and new tower models.
But we found a very gifted artist that is redoing all towers for us and we are very happy with his work!
Our goal is to have the Towers look a little bit more distinct between each Tier and also improve their visuals so you better have an overview, which tower is at which stage currently. (And last but not least let it have more of a visual impact!)
The Artillery Tower for example uses different colors of projectiles and effects to better visualize the progress of the plasma techniques used inside of it.
Also here's an example of the new Artillery Tower models:
We've also worked on making health bars and damage numbers slightly better visible.
All in all it looks something like this:
We'll showcase more in the future and then also post a video so you can see the action in more than 2 frames :)
So what do you think of these changes so far? Let us know in the comments or on our Discord, we are always open for feedback and would love to know if you like this new stuff or if there is anything you'd rather have changed?
Until the next time
- Snob Entertainment -
