LadyWYT Posted August 24 Report Posted August 24 So in my opinion, the fight as it is now is pretty solid, and gets the job done. However, there are a few tweaks that could make it better, I think, while keeping the same flavor. The main flaws I see in the fight itself are that the anti-cheat measures of the arena aren't immersive, and the fight itself doesn't last long enough to do the music justice. 1. The boulder toss attack This attack is mostly fine as-is, however, I think it could be slowed down and telegraphed more clearly in order to give the player more time to notice and dodge it. As a trade-off, this attack also becomes unblockable and does more damage, since I mean...it's a boulder. A shield isn't gonna do much of anything to stop or mitigate that kind of damage, and if the player can more easily dodge it, they don't really need to rely on blocking it. The player can choose to hide behind one of the pillars to block this attack, if they so wish. However, the pillars have a limited amount of boulders they can block before getting destroyed. This becomes an important factor for the second point below. 2. The ground slam attack This attack can be changed to cause the player to stumble/stagger, rooting them in place for a second or two as they regain their footing rather than shooting them into the air. This change means that the player no longer gets as disoriented in the fight, makes more sense realistically, and also means that the invisible walls on the nearby alcoves can be removed since there's now no way for the player to be launched into these(or replaced with iron bars if we want to make absolutely sure they can't access the alcoves from the arena somehow). Additionally, this attack still causes debris to rain down from the ceiling. This debris can't be blocked but doesn't do much damage either, simply acting as intermittent "chip damage" for this fight. However, supporting pillars that get destroyed will cause the ceiling to become more unstable, allowing the boss's ground slam to knock more/larger chunks of debris loose and thus gradually increasing the incoming chip damage over the course of the fight. 3. The locusts These still remain unchanged, since I don't think these really need adjustment. The only tweaks I can think to make, if absolutely necessary, are to either prevent them from spawning until the boss is at a lower health, or introduce a requirement for the ceiling to be at a certain damage level(ie, one pillar broken or so) before they start to spawn. 4. When the boss dies, it stays dead Unless there's something about eidolons that lets them reboot themselves and return to life, the boss should stay dead after the player kills it, rather than respawn. Otherwise, if a location has been completed, it shouldn't be reset unless the reset command is used, or other later story events require the player to return to the location and thus have more monsters move in to provide some challenge. ---- I think these changes could smooth out the fight and make it take a little longer, without changing the flavor too much. The fight itself starts off slow and steady, giving the player more time to learn each action and how to deal with it. The partially-destructible arena and increasing damage as the fight progresses make it a little more dynamic and help naturally push the player into more sense of urgency, especially towards the end where the fight turns into "kill or be killed" desperation, as well as give the player a bit of influence over how the fight progresses(ie, if you can keep the pillars intact, you can keep the boss's damage on the lower side). And of course, if the boss stays dead, the player can freely return to retrieve loot as needed/wanted, rather than being pressured to cart everything to the surface on a single trip.
qualicabyss Posted August 24 Report Posted August 24 59 minutes ago, LadyWYT said: This attack is mostly fine as-is Gonna have to hard disagree on this. That attack is not realistically dodgeable as is unless you bring a shield (why would you? you've never had any indication one was needed). It's also an incredibly fast attack that looks like a melee attack, not a ranged attack. 1 hour ago, LadyWYT said: 4. When the boss dies, it stays dead disagree with this idea tbh, refighting the boss should be doable. Also don't you unlock a path past the boss after you beat it? If not that would be a better solution, perhaps the previous fight cleared the hallway of rubble Also think the boss should have a built in player respawn mechanic, if you die in the fight you respawn before it with all your stuff, but the boss is also fully healed, a time rewind sort of thing lore wise maybe? The problem with bosses in games like this is you either win first try or lose everything, or there's the keep re spawning and whittling it down strategy. This would fix both of those problems. I do like the idea though, and the fight does need some adjustments (this thing is not bronze tier imo)
LadyWYT Posted August 24 Author Report Posted August 24 7 minutes ago, qualicabyss said: That attack is not realistically dodgeable as is unless you bring a shield (why would you? you've never had any indication one was needed). It's also an incredibly fast attack that looks like a melee attack, not a ranged attack. This is why I said slow down the attack and telegraph it more clearly so that it can be easily dodged; as a general rule, attacks that are easily dodged are also attacks that aren't meant to be blocked...hence why they do a LOT of damage if the player doesn't get out of the way. And no, a boulder is not something you would block with a shield. You would, however, know that bringing a shield to a fight is generally a good idea, since a shield is very useful for dealing with ranged attacks and mitigating melee hits. Hence why the player might also try to block a boulder with a shield. 11 minutes ago, qualicabyss said: disagree with this idea tbh, refighting the boss should be doable. With a reset of the area, sure. Otherwise...what, exactly, is the point? It makes returning to the area later a pain, should you have forgotten something in the library or just want to look around. There's no indication that automatons can just return themselves to life. And to my knowledge, you only get loot for the first boss kill. The other boss that's in the game also does not respawn after being defeated, to my knowledge. So I mean...why should the first boss respawn on its own without a reset of the Archive? 13 minutes ago, qualicabyss said: Also don't you unlock a path past the boss after you beat it? You do not. 14 minutes ago, qualicabyss said: If not that would be a better solution, perhaps the previous fight cleared the hallway of rubble I like the idea of clearing the hallway of rubble, however, I don't think it's a reason to let the eidolon keep returning to life without a reset of the dungeon. The only reason I can think of for why one would want to fight it again after defeating it, is either loot drops(which it doesn't have and in my opinion, shouldn't have past the initial loot drop), or just for grins and giggles. Grins and giggles doesn't work very well as an excuse though, since currently the other boss in the game can only be fought once without using console commands to reset the area. 17 minutes ago, qualicabyss said: Also think the boss should have a built in player respawn mechanic, if you die in the fight you respawn before it with all your stuff, but the boss is also fully healed, a time rewind sort of thing lore wise maybe? The problem with bosses in games like this is you either win first try or lose everything, or there's the keep re spawning and whittling it down strategy. This would fix both of those problems. It's the player's responsibility to make sure they have their spawn point set appropriately if they expect trouble. The arena is small enough that the player shouldn't have any trouble dropping in and immediately retrieving their stuff, and since armor is not lost on death the player won't be defenseless while retrieving their stuff. Regarding the lore, a "time rewind" could be an excuse, however, it would also ruin one of the big reveals introduced in Chapter Two, which I don't think is an ideal decision here. I do agree though that boss fights should reset if the player(or all players involved) either die in the process or otherwise leave the area. That way the player can't just win through attrition.
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