Alright I just wasn’t sure, since during the thread thralls being OP was mentioned at least as much - if not more - than them being weak.
Or more like poison.
Either way, if you feed them the correct food, they’ll be much better off.
This is where over 90% of the players having thrall issues simply fail as they’re not giving enough consideration to the healing effects of food…
They’ll go ahead an do fights with Grilled Steak on their thralls, because “it give a vitality bonus”… not paying attention to the fact that it heals a mere 2 HP / sec as opposed to the Enhanced Gruel I used in that video, which heals 9 HP / sec so almost 5 times as fast…
The thrall was lacking ~1k HP at the end of the fight, but you can be sure it took more than double that amount of damage.
There are also perks in Authority, like Commanding Presence, which players ridiculously underestimate, because somebody who didn’t know better once told them “it’s bad”, when in actuality it’s one of the best perks in the tree.
However… to put all your complaints into perspective…
Would you feel the same way about thralls not having enough HP if you could revive them if they “die”?..
Because what you may not know is that Funcom has been working on a revive system for quite a while now and it’s pretty much ready to the point where they could turn it on at any point. It was planned for Sorcery Chapter 2, but obviously that didn’t happen, so one must wonder if they plan to launch it now.
If that’s their plan… then I don’t see any issue with the thrall HP nerf and in fact it makes perfect sense.
Out of curiosity, how does Commanding Presence work btw? What are the values etc?
I did pick it when I tried an Agility + Authority build before they nerfed the Skelos Cultist Master armor, and it felt great but I don’t know the numbers
To sum this up - I do believe that this game is still too easy, I do use commanding presence and proper food, I create my char based on my own experience, not some yt vid or other popular opinions - I of course sometimes like to play with least effort. That’s not the case - I’m just disappointed, that one of the ways this game could be played is gone and even more disappointed with keeping remains of this old way in game (authority skill), which make no sense. I don’t want to have immortal terminators, but at the same time I don’t want to loose thrall like they were cannon fodder. Quality over quantity - but this is no longer possible. I believe many players are kinda attached to their favourite thralls and current meta requires them to be even more cautious with using those companions or just forget about it and mass produce them. This game unique feel was that you were able to catch slaves and those new changes makes them as obsolete as animal pets, I just don’t understand why FC decided to “kill” that unique feature.
Revive option could be nice - good thing they are at least working on some new things - maybe there will be reputation system one day, proper trading, interactable npcs etc.
That’s what I do to have it harder.
Try fighting a level 20 Arena Champion, with heavy bulked armor on the beams above the gateway to the Well of Skelos. That was my fun an hour ago.
It works both ways.
Not really, in fact, usually I try to account for “bad player skill” / “casual players” as I agree that the game should hold some options for less skilled players as well, not just the “ultra elite”.
But I honestly don’t see an issue here, what I see is a LOT of unfounded complaints though and quite often people making very silly mistakes (like going to the bathroom in a hostile zone… ) and then try to blame Funcom for it
The game is not meant to play itself, so while I DO account for less skilled players, I don’t think it should be an auto-play walk in the park either.
Sorcery imo had it pretty much right, thralls still had slightly more HP than needed, but it was useful in those tight situations and when bugs happened here and there (I disagree with the notion though that we should be “fixing” bugs by pumping up the HP of thralls, but a small buffer can’t hurt ofc, which we did have during Sorcery)
So I generally recommended stuff and solutions that can work for a player of any skill…
You might remember how everybody was afraid of Rockslides so I recommended Archery / Authority builds where they can kill it in a very safe manner with a simple Berserker wearing non-epic armor. It’s not something super crazy where you have to go and break the skill limits… (like killing him solo with mounted archery for example which is entirely possible without taking a hit)
Are thralls a bit crazy now in AoW? Sure! they are, but I’m not worried about their HP, I just think it looks a bit crazy that the fastest leveling low tier stuff does the most damage… and imo a bit too much…
Wildlife got nerfed to the ground in this update a wolf has as much HP and armor as a boar used to have… and while Corrupted Wolves still hit quite hard… their damage per hit was reduced by like 60 and they have lower HP and armor.
It directly heals your thralls by 5% of the raw collision damage you deal (so without perks or armor mitigation on the target etc. which means it’s useful even on high armor bosses like the Arena Champ)
So it’ll heal your thralls typically several hundred HP during an average bossfight and more and faster when you’re fighting a mob and doing multiple hits per swing.
You can argue the opposite too. There are more casual players playing this game then “pro” players. So why should they suffer because the minority wants everything to become harder in the game?
I am by all means not happy with the update and my posts show this very clearly. I do not like the direction they have gone with the update.
But a game should be and needs to be enjoyable for the regular casual players first and foremost because that is the biggest group of players. Otherwhise you will get problems paying the bills as a company.
The nerfs to thralls and animal pets is the biggest mistake Funcom could have made. Its the one keyfeatures that sets this game apart from the rest. Thralls and pets should be reliable companions. They need to be able to kill for you, no matter if bosses or other AI because that is what the majority of people wants.
If thralls are making the game too easy for you then don´t use them. Fight everything by yourself. Otherwise let people have their thralls so they are happy. Its as easy as that. If people are happy then they stick with the game. And a happy player is a happy customer.
So was the feedback about the foundations. Ignored. Their decisions are always awesome, aren’t they?
Disposable legendaries that you can get right out of the desert. Idiotic aggro range and ridiculous short leash from spawn, etc.
They have an amazing track record of doing this sort of crap. Doesn’t mean we got to like it. Thralls are too frail. You get limited to handful viable ones and that’s it.
I’ve been saying that for a while.
The moment another game introduces thralls, arrivederci! I’ll fly there. That’s what keeps me playing this game. Not combat. Well, and building. Building is quite cool.
Combat is not polished enough and it will never be. Now I’m creating my own adventures on SP. I rediscovered how to make enemies out of former thralls that don’t despawn. It opened a wide avenue for creativity.
Idk I’m just saying it how it is lol… I don’t necessarily agree with all the decisions they make. I also think some of them are a bit… “out there” and I’ve been very actively scolding them for some of them (like ruining pets… )
However, there’s a difference imo between not liking decisions being made vs. presenting it as some ultimate scarecrow doomsday scenario where the game is suddenly “unplayable” - which is most certainly not the case.
If anything, it became much easier… to the point where I think it’s too easy.
Yesterday I strolled down on my level 13 character from Sepermeru… to Thugra’s stand… zero danger whatsoever… I had my old pre-War RHTS galloping behind me (he wasn’t really needed thou at any point) But with the stamina regen we have now you only have to release sprint for a second and then can carry on… it’s very close to perma-sprint…
I knocked out a Thugra… and while I’d normally set up a wheel in the area… I figured with this much sprint I can literally drag him back on a chain lol… so I did just that…
The whole process took like 15 minutes… walking through half the map with no horse… knocking out the thrall… dragging it back to the gibbet…
Guess what… in 20 minutes with my taskmaster it was done and ready so yea, I think they made it quite easy… if he dies… he dies… I’ll go get another one… the thing hits for 50+ with a mace that has 18 written on it
Building, slaves and nudity - combat is, was and will be clunky (I’m not conviced about those “new” uninterruptable combos and predictable stun lock moments). Now it will be building, slaves (displayed behind stormglass window) and nudity
Same here - went for ritualist yesterday, ended running to Sepermeru with her, because why waste time looking for map room or tp.
Again, this is not about game becoming unplayable, it’s about “killing” some kind of uniqueness of getting “precious” thrall, it’s no longer satysfying, because “if he dies, he dies” - like it was with animal companions, they are now just a decoration, flower planter. My point wasn’t that it will be impossible for me to play without help of my thrall, I could and still can do everything solo - it’s just sad that this becomes the only way.
From the rest of what I said, I think it needs a middle ground that’s all:
If you play casually, you should not able to kill the hardest bosses in the game, or have a mechanic that allows you to do so with ease (Thralls and Pets should not be able to kill everything)
You can have a walk in the park and let your thralls do the work for half of the map, but it should not be the case for 100% of it.
It’s as simple as having a large part of the content accessible to everyone casually, while keeping some extra challenges for less casual players.
And who knows, maybe when the casual player gets bored of their routine and decide to take on the challenge, they may find it enriching and entertaining, rather than simply another walk in the park with different fluff on top?
The nerfs to thralls and animal pets is the biggest mistake Funcom could have made.
Now I’m not sure about thralls, I think the overall balance of factions is off but thralls are quite viable in most cases as demonstrated above. But I totally agree that making animal pets decorative was a tremendous mistake. I might be a bit biased on that because I always preferred having an animal companion over a thrall, but instead of nerfing them because “they’re too accessible” they should have made them less accessible in a way that isn’t just pure RNG
Meanwhile, they also made thralls more accessible, because you knock out everything at light speed XD
I don’t know how many contradictions Funcom can make, but it’s certainly not the end of it.
My point is that strong thralls were always optional. I don’t even need an efing thrall to wreck all content. But I don’t impose my playstyle upon anyone.
That was always my point. You get thralls as strong as you wish. There were many weak thralls in game. If you had an OP one, it was your choice.
They tried to solve a problem that simply didn’t exist.
All they had to do was nerfing Teimos.
Pvp servers should have different settings, that’s all.
Since we cannot repair the legendaries anymore, I equiped the legendary weapons I used to keep for myself to my thralls, equiped whatever first decorative weapon I had on my walls to my inventory instead, then just wait on the side during a combat that my thralls kill the ennemies for me.
I’m not 100% a sidekick since I dance in joy to cheer for my thralls while they are fighting, but I don’t feel as involved anymore.
You should see my new batch.
But as I’m on SP mode, I gave myself monsters. I keep them in an outpost, because they would kill everything if I left them loose on my base. If the purge happens to hit the outpost, I’ll just go there to watch the carnage.
Gladly the treasure room will prevent it on chapter 2.
And obviously I’ll play online to get a taste of their idea for the game.
Yes, I 100% support Funcom’s decision to deliberately destroy thousands of players’ earned resources. I’ll take that stance for the sake of argument. Hell, I’ll take credit for the suggestion. I sent them an email telling them exactly how to change the foundation meshes to achieve the result. That was me. I was the reason everyone lost their stuff.
Now we can move back to the subject of the thread.
This is where the adjustments need to be made. Some thralls are too easy to get and too strong. Some are too hard to get and too weak.
The effort of obtaining a thrall should be relative to the strength of the thrall. I have suggested in the past that thralls be more or less normalized. Meaning a T1 thrall in the desert is equal to a T1 thrall in the volcano, and everything in between. The strongest thralls would be the named thralls (T4). But they would also be the hardest to get.
That means a T4 thrall that is from Darfari Maneaters, Votaries of Skelos, Relic Hunters, or what have you is just as hard to get as any T4 thrall. And to account for harder areas being harder, the harder the area, the more likely higher tier thralls are to be available.
So for Exiles, there might be one spot to get a T4 fighter, but you’re not likely to be able to get to it as a low level. And T1 volcano thralls may simply not exist at all due to the area they typically dwell in.
I just wasn’t sure, since during the thread thralls being OP was mentioned at least as much - if not more - than them being weak.
I rediscovered how to make enemies out of former thralls that don’t despawn. It opened a wide avenue for creativity.
(like ruining pets… )
