Dragonfall Event Feedback - What are your thoughts about the 2.0 Rules

Thank you all for making the Dragonfall event so fantastic and for working with us to make sure that our first weekend playtest of the 2.0 Rules went smoothly.

We got a lot of informal feedback from people over the course of the weekend but we want to hear your thoughts about the experience.

Please be constructive with your feedback. If there's something you feel really doesn't work, it's much more helpful to the process for you to explain why you feel it didn't work than for you just to tell us that it sucked, or that 2.0 is terrible. A lot of work went into putting together this ruleset and running a whole weekend with the new rules, we did that because we want to see how our Players feel about things. Your feedback is important to us.

Also, don't forget to tell everyone about the great things that happened during the event in this thread.
 
I hate hate hate, "Are you healed" unless we all get our own copy of the monster manual, we have no basis for "only asking the question when there is a reason" Anything that can get verbally spammed during combat is not a good thing.

I'm worried Resolute on NPCs is going to push people into static damage, which will push body bloat. "175 Normal... Resolute", over and over, feels bad. Not just resolute, there are a ton new defenses in the game, which if used by NPCs makes takeout effects less useful. Not a fault of the system, just a thought about stats. We didn't have a ton of combat this event, it was a Faire weekend, so that might have been an isolated incident.

Overall the less calls in the game, makes combat quieter, (save for are you healed) but it also makes the game near impossible to marshal. Cheaters gonna cheat, yeah not concerned about that. I'm more worried about lack of calls on things like retribution ritual, or the "free rogue attack on counted actions" skill. So people learning the game, don't know they can't Spell Parry into Retribution, but no one corrects them because the call is just "Bane." Sure, a new player saying "500 weapon Strike Body" is a real call that can happen, but do they have the ability to make an Eviscerate a strike?

I would like their to be more item rituals in the game. I've converted my items from 1.3 and there's really nothing left to get. So many things are only on armor or shields. Something like Eternal Resolution only being on Armor seems odd to me. Unless, people can use Armor enchantments without wearing the armor. So arcane Armor users could enchant a metal bracer and carry it.

I would really like Channeling to be Meditatable. It's really only nerfing Celestial, since Earth Channeling touchasts. Meditate seems to be a skill that allows people to get use out of there stuff, and that really hurts a focused on channeling build.

I'm sure people get a re-write or whatever when these rules go into effect. I would just like to request that happening twice. Yes these playtests are helpful, but so much relies on the stats of the monsters which we can't be exposed to. So maybe with the new stats pure channeling is garbage, maybe it's amazing. But if we only fight 5 things that's hard to gauge, for a choice that will define your character for years. That was the good thing about 1.3 is that, builds were solid. You could be an X and know that it's going to be helpful, in 95% of situations.
The other option would be sharing the monster manual, which I'm guessing wont happen. Perhaps a middle ground, is to share the stats of some base monsters? Not everything, but enough to get a sense. "Fire elemental in 1.3 would have been X now it's Y" type stuff. Or maybe just sharing the cards of what people fought over the weekend. Since PCs were NPCing they have that info anyway, so it's not really a secret.

Overall, I'm ok with the 2.0 rules. I can play this game.
Stating is always a concern, with any ruleset, and we'll all learn together.

-Joe
 
I'm sure people get a re-write or whatever when these rules go into effect. I would just like to request that happening twice. Yes these playtests are helpful, but so much relies on the stats of the monsters which we can't be exposed to. So maybe with the new stats pure channeling is garbage, maybe it's amazing. But if we only fight 5 things that's hard to gauge, for a choice that will define your character for years.

I'll do what I can, you know. But, this isn't something we're actively choosing not to do. There's a voting process that we're stuck with.

That was the good thing about 1.3 is that, builds were solid. You could be an X and know that it's going to be helpful, in 95% of situations.

This is a culture change in 2.0 I think. There are totally situations where you won't be useful even if you try for a general build. It feels like it's the new nature of the game. That being said there are going to be situations where you're super useful.

My gut says this will give players a chance to feel useful at times where they might now.


The other option would be sharing the monster manual, which I'm guessing wont happen. Perhaps a middle ground, is to share the stats of some base monsters? Not everything, but enough to get a sense. "Fire elemental in 1.3 would have been X now it's Y" type stuff. Or maybe just sharing the cards of what people fought over the weekend. Since PCs were NPCing they have that info anyway, so it's not really a secret.

I really don't want to share the monster manual because I think it's a really good base. Like surprisingly good. @A.mungo and his team did a banging job on it having not played a ton of 2.0.

That being said you have a pretty valid concern. Maybe we can talk more about monster stats at the next pc talk? It'll be too late to change cards for that weekend but, I would be open to a QA about it.

Maybe we'll run another one day after the season is over? Who knows.
 
From the rouges side of the play field, I am ecstatic about how I made pyke. I felt i was very useful and in fighting along with craftsmans. I built himto be a take out fighter not constant hard hitting from the back and at the end of each logistics I still had skills left. I was on a constant mod rotation as well which felt like I did more than normal this weekend.
One thing I saw that may be hard is when using retribution and things are swinging weapon strike "carrier" opposed to spell strike "carrier" or both are happening on the same mod. Bring so close i thought i had baned a weapon strike doom and felt I cheated because i couldn't but to find out it was a spell strike. Larping on little sleep can make your mind hear other things.
As I'm gettingup in level I didn't take alot of things i needed to remember before but now I have a lot of defenses and special attacks so while combat is happening I forget i have more things now. This is just a new style of play i have to get use to which is very nice as I felt i couldn't do all the stuff before and have the side things like alchemy and craftsmans.
 
This is a bit long and I apologize in advance.

I love love love Reposting Strike. It has made being a rogue way more useful (especially in a door battle situation. This is my favourite new toy.

I'm still getting comfortable with the new rules, but the monsters did feel quite balanced. Good job people who wrote it!

I think the rule book needs to clarify Wither more. I think it should also be casters call and not targets choice. If the 'caster' (or monster swinging wither), doesn't pick, you go with a stub limb situation and then the target picks. I noticed that the NPC's had trouble figuring out whether people were offensive or defensive. I choice offensive every time and flipped both swords up so, I wouldn't be tempted to block. I really really like the idea of the new wither, the mechanic's idea is cool. It might be hard for people to reflexively not block (or attack). This might be a learning curve kind of thing.

I miss Vampire Charm, I think it added flavour to the game and while it can be mostly recreated, I disagree with it's removal for being 'concise' with the rules.

Mettle. Not sure how I feel about it. Chris pointed out that it's a better thing for NPC's than PC's. I think that might be a fair assessment. I'd like to see a PC's comments on it if anyone took it.

I think Meditation is so key. It's a great resource and probably more so for new players, while they get better at throwing/landing attacks.

Fear/Berserk blow is very situational. I see where in moments it would be super effective, but those moments will be few and far between. I will probably take one when the playtest is over. Did anyone else take it/use it? I would love to hear their thoughts on it.

I think the removal of 'the' from 'I call upon the Earth' is annoying, but might just be a learning curve thing.

The new Necromancy is great. I think it's way more tempting for people and I mean, that was the original point (in part). To be the tempting power. Woo!

My biggest criticism of all is some of the new incants.

I understand the reasoning behind it, but 'With binding force I bind you' is probably the stupidest incant I've ever heard.

I think some of the necromantic incants are not easy to say it comparison to it's healing counterpart. I'm not sure how I feel about the change from Chaos to 'with Necromancy'.

I feel like a lot of the flavour has been removed from incants. I again understand the reasoning behind it, however you are removing a part of the world and for me, the incants were missed. I don't think that should be discounted. It made battle feel, less alive? That being said, adding the numbers to healing/eldritch damage is so important and makes it a lot easier on new players to remember what they're being hit with (without SLIFSLID). I approve.

I like a lot about the new rules. I want to do a huge drawn out battle to better understand resource management and how the new skills will play in those situations. I feel a lot less worried about the changes, now that I have had a chance to play it. Thanks for listening.

TC
 
From my overall experience (of the playtest specifically):

-I strongly agree that there isn't enough magic items options. I think it is a strong framework to build off and would be encourage if more were stated to be coming down the road. I think it is great that there is options for rituals for shields and spell-books. Though I think some of the more fix armor and blacksmithy ones shouldn't be rituals but blacksmith consumables (more on that below).

-Had a short, but brief discussion with Matt about how good production feels. I think this is one of the better changes with 2.0, the value of scrolls, potions, and alchemy. The only one lacking is blacksmithing as it doesn't have desired consumables. Would suggest taking some of the ritual ones and making armor patch kits or even sharpening stones of such. I think it will take some time for the chapter to adjust (people play artisan or the chapter to send in consumable merchants; neither on very exciting play-styles to me on either side of the fence). I can easily see read magic / 4th down scrolls being more common build/production more common across builds.

-I did a 1000 pt Earth Channeling build this weekend as my play-test build (with just 1 spell):
  • Very very easy to back pack heal, cause the inchant is very fast (X Elemental Healing)
  • Mows down armored targets (Undead or Others wearing armor); Elemental Defenses don't seem as common
  • I thought 1000 points was enough, but I tapped on the first logistics. This is mostly from healing from group up to full after each encounter, which is commented as a weird feeling (in a good way I think) cause we are used to 1 body and then living in our armor after this first mod or two.
  • You feel more comfortable throwing healing at bleeding people from across a distance without feeling like you wasted a very limited resource, bonus points if it is a rogue and they spring up behind the enemy.
  • You have no (short of consumables, which I was not prepared with) dealing with take-outs or debuffs. These effects seem super common now (as a carrier more often then not).
  • Not totally sure I agree with Joe if Channeling should be Meditatable. I think there is alot of grey area how much you get back when you are already trying to keep a running total in your head of how much you used.
  • Not sure if I am a fan of hand mark being a high magic only; may be a good target ritual effect or skill that requires X scholar skill. This is from a perspective of pure channeling build though.
  • The lack of lifes being a Earth Channeler is concerning to me. It was offset for me this weekend cause we had a another full Earth Scholar with us. Good or bad; may encourage Goblin'd Spell Stores.
-How do Sylvanborn feel about Weapon Sleep attacks? It is a weird grey area where before clearly poison or magic delivered this (command) effects? (This is more generic discussion on 2.0 then this playtest specifically)

-Another weird one is Weapon (Strike?) Bind from the Phase Spiders; breaking line of sight to get rid of it felt a lot less web-like. Though makes spiders not as rough perhaps as they were before?

-In general, I think there was some confusion/calls on Weapon (carrier) and Weapon Strike (carrier) that I had to help correct. Big differences between those two calls (one where you actually contact the body of the for a valid hit and the other you need to make contact with the person and/or possession).

-I think there is some "playtest" rust; that doing multiple playtests is valid. Forgetting new defenses or magic item effects. New spell inchants. Helped second night remember some of those. Keep those in mind also when validating monsters/encounters.

-I think ACE (average challenge encounter) is a bit wonky. I think Chad, Lou, and Chris G did a great job trying to get a handle on it, will try somethings that Chris G suggested at our next event. Overall undead seemed to come in with low ACE that felt alot rougher then higher ACE monsters. Usually these lower ACE undead had Doom in some form that with less amounts of life (again there is some rust that our earth scholar couldn't remember life inchants at the time) is rough. Also factor in Chaos goes through armor takes away half our 'overall body".

-Resolute felt like the new dodge on one encounter. Need to go through and look at this again and didn't pay close enough attention for other reasons oog, but doesn't work against take outs (again not saying this happened cause I didn't pay close enough attention). Only things that reduce you below one. Though I don't know if you could Mettle into Resolute? Would have to look closer.

-2.0 I think overall helps provide healthy adventuring group mix, especially with monsters generally having a exploitable weakness. I agree overall with Inger that PCs shouldn't have a copy of the monster manual, but I also think it could be on a creative PC to make an IG monster manual. I would rather see that CO (Craftsman Other) or OOG knowledge of monsters, cause in 13's eyes all Trolls are like Thrum?/Troll Daddy. Maybe just a roleplaying pet peeve of mine, the OOG knowledge part, that applies just not in larp but tabletop as well.

-I didn't encounter the appears to heal (though we didn't ask either, cause I am busy with other stuff), but did get confirmation in a situation where you would think it would heal the NPC that it appeared to damage it. Glad that happened to keep the moment of the fight too for that player's moment to shine in the string of encounters.
 
-Resolute felt like the new dodge on one encounter. Need to go through and look at this again and didn't pay close enough attention for other reasons oog, but doesn't work against take outs (again not saying this happened cause I didn't pay close enough attention). Only things that reduce you below one. Though I don't know if you could Mettle into Resolute? Would have to look closer.

I'm going to challenge you on this. (Not to say get bent, but rather to look at this in a different light) I used Resolute twice as a big bad guy. A lot of the smaller guys had 2-3 of them too. This clearly was not a good place to be using blade skills. This mod favored prof characters and channelers, and evocation. Resolute/Mettle are not a dodge. You're still doing damage to the monster. and in resolute's almost all of the body of the monster.

In that exact battle, using two resolutes cost me 2 9th level spells to heal myself. You have to plan for that as a big bad now, if you're going resolute heavy. That was 2 corrupts or dooms I couldn't have. Considering life is such a limited resource, I'd say trading a eviscerate for bringing the guy down to 1, forcing him to retreat and wasting a go to dead take out seems like a trade I'd pay every time as a pc.

It's possible people were calling mettles when they didn't have the body for it. It's a confusing skill, and as such NPCS and players are bound to make mistakes.

But, not every battle every build is going to be good for everyone in 2.0. And I think that's ok. This is actually a situation where once the first resolute was called, as a caster I would have followed up with 5 point evos on the folks who just called resolute.
 
But, not every battle every build is going to be good for everyone in 2.0. And I think that's ok.

I agree, that it's healthy for the game. I just want some more exposure to the High body/High Armor mobs w/no martial defenses, to see the slay/assassinate builds shine.

I think within a playtest it's tough to see all those variants, or to have the people who could shine, be on those mods.

Right now, I feel like high swings (10's/15s) are still king of the land. I'm not saying that's the perfect thing in all situations, but in the 2 playtests I've attended I haven't seen a fight where "low damage with per day martial takeouts" was the 'good build' for that fight.

I guess that's what I want to see, more than the monster manual. Stats on monster that make each different build ideal, if the goal is to have different builds shine in different ways. This is not a comment on the event, just a comment on the difficulties of playtesting, since you only fight, what you fight.

-Joe
 
Also I love the meditate idea. Not worried about using my take outs because if they defend them there gone but now can bring them back. With magic items I was down to one minute of roleplay. I find that very satisfying

Jared
 
Not worried about using my take outs because if they defend them there gone but now can bring them back.

If your takeouts are defended against you cannot meditate them back, only if they missed or are blocked. (Which might be what you meant by defended)
 
real quick, Ill collect more thoughts later. Mettle is way better for me than people are giving it credit for. You can mettle ANY delivery type, some asshat vampire is throwing arcane fears from a domain of the defiled? intercept and mettle to make sure no one leaves the front line. aside from the grind on not being able to get to him, that made me feel more useful in the vampire mod than my strikes/damage/armor. But I do indeed see its situational value. Having thrown a bit of evocation around for the first time, I really think that would be a good spot for improvement. I threw around the idea of meditating back defended against "signature spells" to really make celestial feel that value while not giving something ONLY to celestial.I'm not sure if that's the right answer, but I would certainly feel there was more value in my limited spells being damage instead of takeouts if I knew that damage would (eventually) land.
 
I agree, that it's healthy for the game. I just want some more exposure to the High body/High Armor mobs w/no martial defenses, to see the slay/assassinate builds shine.

Let's try to make that happen next event. I think it's fair to ask to be exposed to some situations.

The undead mod after you left was like this but, they were undead so there was a lot going on there.
 
Having thrown a bit of evocation around for the first time, I really think that would be a good spot for improvement. I threw around the idea of meditating back defended against "signature spells" to really make celestial feel that value while not giving something ONLY to celestial.I'm not sure if that's the right answer, but I would certainly feel there was more value in my limited spells being damage instead of takeouts if I knew that damage would (eventually) land.

You should get someone from ARC to take a go at that idea (@Polare). That'd certainly solve my concerns about raw evocation.
 
I am really enjoying the playtest so far. It has really layered in functions into combat that make me feel every fight will feel less static. That gimmicks and themes are now icing on the cake rather than the driving force of entertainment. This could be solely because it's new but I don't think that is the case.

Some observations and theories:

Slayers:
We were musing over Slayer effects. Chris had a great idea we played with. Instead of swinging body against the target all the time instead the Slayer allows blade skills to be meditated back regardless of the circumstances once a logistics period when used against the intended type of monster. This would require the blade skill to be a "slayer type" call. Like "50 Undead Slayer Body". This allows the NPC to answer with "No effect" if they are not, in fact, an undead. The OOG guessing game comes down to a strike/call allowing it be fluid. Slayers allow those that wield them to unload their skills on the intended target rather that supporting static damage.

Memorization and evocation.
Another idea I heard that I thought has real merit after watching the difference between channeling and evocation is to allow memorized spells of evocation be memorized back until such time that the they land. This would be regardless of the circumstances such as cloak, dodge, or any other defensive skill. If damage was much more guaranteed to land the larger damage spells would have a great deal of appeal and casters could use them more confidently even on large bodied monsters.

Mettle
I'm loving the concept. I saw it a few times I think. One confusion was if you could mettle and then resolute: No. You have to have the body to spend to use mettle. You can't make use of it to just drop to -1 instead of being paralysed. You must be able to survive your own skill. So far I think this is working out very well for our fighters.

Calling an Asked Heal By
This is just shouting more words into the din of a fight. The NPC should respond with "appears to heal me" for anything other than earth or chaos if it applies. This is REALLY unnecessary.
 
I didn't encounter a lot of game mechanics during my event. So here's my one and a half cents:
  • New incants: easier to remember once you grasp the concept (all Healing is "I call upon Earth to...", all Binding is "With Binding force I..." despite I agree the stupid of "WBFIBY", etc). I am in favour of it.

  • Personally, as a guy pretending to be a dual sword wielder that has absolutely no business irl wielding anything EXCEPT a staff, I appreciate the plethora of new skills like Weapon Strike that have been added. I felt I was able to contribute more to the battle, which itself made me more confident and more immersed.

  • Whether as a result of continuing to have character experience, or because of the psuedo-respec that we did for the playtest, I enjoyed Ilarion having two weapon proficiencies instead of just one. That single point of damage per weapon can make a big difference in the heat of a multi-front battle. I like the new system for calculating WPs off CAs, for now at least. Maybe later when it requires 7 CAs to get my next one I'll be a little crankier :p

  • This:
    I hate hate hate, "Are you healed" unless we all get our own copy of the monster manual, we have no basis for "only asking the question when there is a reason" Anything that can get verbally spammed during combat is not a good thing.
    Calling an Asked Heal By
    This is just shouting more words into the din of a fight. The NPC should respond with "appears to heal me" for anything other than earth or chaos if it applies. This is REALLY unnecessary.
    I heard more than just the two of you mentioning it though I also did not personally encounter it. Regardless, I can't honestly see the benefit of having to ask every time just to make sure someone isn't throwing a combat by accidentally healing a monster... basically a repeat of both Joe and Travis.
 
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