Lunch Break UpDate

Well Im on lunch break, dont have to much time but I figured I could give a quick update to you guys with the item I do have (roughly 10 minutes left now). I imagine everyone is happy that Im back but probably wondering why Im not so active on the forums or keeping everyone updated on whats going on like I usually do. Well firstly I am working on MM&M, actually alot harder then I originally intended, first thing I told pyth when I saw him the first day was that I need to find my groove again and that things would be slow for awhile. Well I suppose you could say Ive found a groove already.

Now an update on whats important that has changed since last we knew of 8.0 :

The old item system has been torn down. I am aware that alot of people liked it, I'm also aware that alot of people didn't like it. The basic fact is this, there where way to many abilities added into the game with the old system. Debugging alone would take weeks to release a stable map (which if anyone remembers is high on my priority list) on top of that the balance issues presented by practically doubling the amount of spells in one release is nigh impossible. So after alot of thought the lesson to learn is that Spells on gear is a restricted and highly sought after commodity and we should keep it that way. Now the replacement system information. First let me say this, building the first system greatly improved the speed at which I built the second system. As a matter of fact Im done. there are currently 200 gear pieces including the elemental and starter gear however I must warn everyone it is my complete intention to change the elemental gear to fit the new item system at a later date. In addition when the whole thing is complete before the release there are a total of 24 gear pieces that are required for customization and flexibility reasons. The raw data including The Coding, The Cataloging, Object Creation and Tool Tips where all finished in the past two nights. Next is the Artwork for each gear piece which either A)will be repeatable artwork to get this done quick or B)unique artwork each gear piece to give more content. After that is the actual shop implementation.

Now I have no more time to get further into this but let me state that I will be releasing more information on this later on tonight when I have more time.

No offense, but the items weren't the most broken thing in MM&M. I don't mind the overhaul, but I think other matters should be your priority. I'm mostly paranoid because of your last disappearance; and I want to make sure the most important things happen first. I've made at least two different lists of what I feel are the priorities ATM. You don't have to do what I say, as obviously I'm not in charge here. But, I do feel that the item system is lower on the priority list than alot of other things.

Oh, and since your changing the item system again, Jay and I are going to want the full specs of everything so we can put in our 1% of $2.


tl;dr: Fix the bugs and balances first, then worry about new features.



Edit: What the hell, I was trying to look for the links to my threads about what we need to work on next and all that stuff. I had like a full page report with intense details. But, it appears to have been pruned! What the hell!

Edit #2: In fact, the whole section for all the information on all of the elements and whole other portions of the forum appear to be gone. What the hell?

Edit #3: It appears that whole sections of the forum were deleted for no apparent reason, but many of the threads I just mentioned survived in the Garbage Can. I bumped the ones that I felt were important for you Rhys. Although, it seems that we lost all of the guides that everyone made and a few other things. Why did SinisteRing feel the need to delete the whole element, suggestions, and balance sections of the forum?

I think the items were actually rather important. There was clear cut better items with absolutely no arguments for the lesser ones.

Other things I think are important: NPC changes, EHP changes to change game times for Lower levels/Higher level games.

Water Remake

General tweaks

Concerning items, I think that it's fine if it was just made tiered items like I had originally imagined. It's just Normal items with the 4-5 categories, and Elemental items with two tiers. However, from the 8.0 item system I remember - they never actually UPGRADED. So you could just buy tier 5 straight, which makes no sense. You should have to buy tier one, and then upgrade to tier 5 for the items. Make sure it's actually upgraded, otherwise tiered items are pointless.

Yeah, I think the item system should be a relatively simple upgrading system. Something like a basic piece of each equipment with 4 different ways to specialize it depending on what piece of equipment it was, and then 3-4 upgrades with the final upgrading having another specialization choice. Elemental items should have 4 forms. Basic that gives stats, two different upgrades that effect different skill sets with slightly different stat bonuses, and a third upgrade choice that just gives alot of stats but no spell bonuses.

So, diagram time.

Basic Equipment(Each piece of equipment should have a different choice of 4 categories. This one could be a weapon or boots for example.)


That's just how I view it at least. Also, some of the tier 4 forms of items could have abilities. Especially Accessories. (Although 1-2 abilities in Boots, 1-2 in Weapons, and 1-2 in Armor would be good also. Then, like 4-8 in Accessories.)


Edit: It took all the fricken spaces out of my text. My diagram looks like crap without the spaces. If anyone knows how to fix that, please tell me. Or better, if Jay just fixes it for me.


Edit #2: Oh, and one more thing. Rhys, I still don't understand what part of your statement explains why your not very active on the forum. Checking it at least 2-3 times per day and maybe playing one of the forum games doesn't take alot of time. I mean, you can do what you want, but I don't see why you shouldn't check in every few hours or whenever you have free time.

He's already made the item system. The main point is, however it's done - make sure you have to upgrade >.>

No reason why he can't remake it again. (Muhahahaha) Anyway, I still want to know how it works and as much information as possible concerning the stats of everything.

As promised :

Abilities obviously as stated before are gone, however that is not to say gear is going to be just stats and numbers. Actually We are currently working to turn many of the object based abilities into jass coded abilities so they can be manipulated on the fly, what this will do is allow us to create gear pieces and technically other spells if we wanted to that can influence things like Damage, Cooldown, Mana Cost and Durations on existing spells. Instead of brand new abilities attached to gear pieces we will replace that with small ability buffs.

Also there will be requirements for gear, elements are going to play a larger role in what you can and cannot equip, choosing secondary elements will have more strategy involved because every elements gear will have different overall layouts and you will only have access to two separate elements gear pieces. In addition there will be a set of Gear for all colors to use.

The gear itself is divided into 10 Categories. One for Each Element, One for the Elemental gear and then One Vanilla set. Each set has 16 Gear Pieces divided into 4 Wearable Sets. 4 Accessories, 4 Garments, 4 Boots, 4 Staffs. Each of those is properly tiered upwards in overall power. Specifically there is an overall strength level assigned to each tiered set overall and each element follows a rudimentary stat progression. For instance Fire and Water will be considered a balance element and will have all of there stats generally balanced, where as Lightning is considered a power element and is more focused on the power element and lacking severely in the rest of the stats even though they are of similar power levels the two elements gear pieces are simply assigning the points in separate ways.

Now the tiered pieces inside the categories we have are also restricted by level on top of elements. Each Tier level has a raising Level that your character must attain in order to wear it. The levels Are :
Tier 1 - Level 5
Tier 2 - Level 15
Tier 3 - Level 30
Tier 4 - Level 45
Tier 5 - Level 60 (Elemental Gear)

As far as over all Power Level. Technically I set the bar low, mainly because Instead of attempting to balance a gear piece one by one until I have them all done I instead grouped them into wearable sets, wearing a Lightning element 4th tier set of gear pieces, all 4 of them, you should get these overall stats, then I took that and divided everything up into the 4 gear pieces. Taking into account that for example earth is a generally high armor elemental and thus his Garment is stronger overall then the rest of the gear pieces in the set.
The strength of the gear set up currently is actually weaker then I intended for, I set a mark then lowered that mark by about 25% and thats where I came up with the power level to start this off with. So right off the bat the gear in general may not seem to strong, which is good because Id rather we work our way towards over powered rather then start that way.

Also The layout for the Gear piece tool tip Description is Changed, I opted for a Cleaner Look rather then Corny Generalized Descriptions with Stats in a Sentence format. This both looks cleaner and displays information quicker for the user.

Lightning Staff
Requirements (Will Be Grey)
Lightning Element (Will Be Grey)
Level 45 (Will Be Grey)

Effects: (Will Be Green)
+15 Damage
+1 Armor
+60% Mp Regen
+60 Mana
+2 Stamina
+8 Power
+2 Essence

Fire Staff
Requirements (Will Be Grey)
Fire Element (Will Be Grey)
Level 45 (Will Be Grey)

Effects: (Will Be Green)
+64 Damage
+100% Mp Regen
+4 Stamina
+4 Power
+4 Essence

Side Note
Lightning Element has its Physical Damage Divided into all 4 Gear Pieces as a Unique Feature to Lightning Element, there for its Staff is generally weak on its own as far as attacks are concerned. This only matters mostly when considering multi element options. Many small unique to element features like this will play a larger role in the game from now on. From these two actual Stats of the staffs that will be released you can see the major differences between the two staffs at the 4th Tier. In the future overall Power Level of the items as a whole will be increased as needed.


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As far as everything else that needs to be done. One thing at a time is all I can say. When I get this done I will work on the next thing on the list of things to do. Balance and Bug free is the way I want to keep things and for the most part I'm told that is handled fairly well so far. If someone would like to send me a file with basic issues to deal with and not a wall of text describing in extreme detail everything that has to be done from now until forever from now then that would be great. Something like This Spell Fire Bolt is Bugged, No Damage is Dealt is far better then reading a 3 paragraph story on how the game went and then at the end the explanation of the problem at hand.

I belive this was brought up and deemed to difficult a long time ago, but I think this may be a good time to bring the topic up again.

Perhaps it would be wise to assin a value to anything that can be a bouns from an item, such as attk dmg, stats, regen%, etc. This would involve a monetary value, or with the new tier system, a relative value. by comparing th value bte items, it would become possible to see if things are balanced btw elements or items.

Short list is that the aoe bug needs to be fixed, the Cursed Waves improper numbers thing needs to be fixed, and Lightning needs an animation. There are also numerous little things like quests having improper grammar and stuff.

Balance is that Water needs to be reworked, Lightning Strike needs a large range buff, and Thunderbolt needs some kind of large buff or remake. The NPC heroes need to be fixed after that. And, there are numerous other more minor things spread across various elements.


Btw, I think my item idea sounds better, but yours might work better in the end. I can't know until I've seen it. I just thought going simple would be easier.


Edit: Btw, Fire and Water are not "balanced". Water is roughly 20%/30%/50%, (Stamina/Power/Essence) and Fire is roughly 30%/50%/20% as far as the stats go. Or at least it should be in my opinion. I can give you such a break-down for every element if you want.

According to your example....do Elemental items not add effects to your original spells?

Like +100 range on Firebolt, or +100 damage to Death coil, or whatever? As a reminder - I don't know if you still have the file or not, but this was my example of Elemental gear. Can't believe I still have the file on my computer actually.

Here is the link for the file either way. But ya...What's the point of Elemental Gear if they don't boost your Element? Unless I either missed where you said that, or you forgot to mention it.

yes they will still have it the same for elemental gear.

Wait what? Have it the same? Still have spell upgrades? Sorry :S Kind of awkward wording.

I guess I'l check forums alot more often waiting for release.

Someone's gotta update the spell information'

Ahh, Djinni's back. Want your powers back or what?

Jay.J wrote:

Ahh, Djinni's back. Want your powers back or what?

Can I have Purple?

We need a new spells part of the forum, I can't find it. It will be nice to do something repititve for a little bit. Just sit down and copy stuff onto a forum haha.

Sin got rid of that whole section since it wasn't used for aproximately 3 months...now that Rhys has come back >.>...I'll give you purple when I get around to it.

Yeah, it sucks that Sin deleted all of that. It would be nice if we had it back.

Also, DarkDjinni should get his powers back IMO. He is a good spam nazi, and it's sometimes useful to have one of those around.