Mod - Combat Overhaul

[normalguy]

The new mod, DREAD is now at http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=70490.

[size=6]Features[/size][b]
-Stronger Enemies
-The amount of experience needed to level has been reduced
-Devotion shrines are all battles
-Removed player level requirements from items
-Increased the EXP lost on death

I don’t prefer mowing down many enemies on the screen at once, and most enemies die rather quickly. So what I’ve done was reduced their numbers, but balanced this by increasing their damage and health. I also made the player’s strikes stagger the enemy when hit so it feels more forceful – and some of your attacks can even send enemies off their feet giving you that brief moment to “zerg” them during those grueling fights. It’s also just a cool implement and feels so satisfying when it procs. Your attack speed is also reduced. This is to balance the enemy adjustments, and do I dare say, make the combat a tad realistic. Attack Speed+ is now more relevant.

Another change I made was how enemies aggro. It always annoyed me how enemies would link to you from across the screen, like there’s no way to avoid a fight, and even if you did want to avoid fighting to reach a destination, they will stop chasing you after a few steps. Now, enemies can be avoided and will only aggro when you’re close enough. To balance this aspect, I’ve made enemies chase the player for greater distances, so accidentle aggros can be dangerous. Also, enemies can now be pulled individually with ranged or magic attacks without linking.

[/b][b][size=6]Boss Battles
Boss summons/pets have increased recast timers. This is to prevent pets from constantly being spawned into the fight. Because pets have high HP, attack, and defense, this could become a nuisance when constantly being spawned – once killed, you will have time alone with a boss before another is summoned. This helps rid those weaker/squishy classes/builds from tedious boss fights while still providing a challenge.

Multiplayer
Increasing enemy HP and damage while slightly reducing player attack speed will encourage players to rely more on teamwork. The goal is to prevent free-for-all like gameplay, and let the player feel they are an important asset to a party by requiring their assistance. Accidental linking could prove fatal for even the toughest warriors. Having someone gear to tank while the other(s) are DD is recommended.

Misc. Changes
-All mobs, excluding humans are larger
-Mobs have a 50% chance to be a champion
-You can pull enemies without linking
-Enemies can chase you for greater distances
-Muted player from announcing cooldowns
-New Camera adjustments
-Faction rates increased
-The Gravestone is slightly larger
-Small visual change to how blood splats the terrain
-Scaly, Thorny, Meaty Kills[/b][/size]

[b]

Update 1.0.0.6[/b]

[b]Some very cool features and changes have been added. To start, the size of chests now give a better reflection of the loot inside. The drop rate on material from monster drops has been increased to help balance the lower enemy volume ; no longer will you have to deal with 3% value drops. Enemies have also gained a boost in becoming even more of a threat! Monsters and humans alike have gotten smarter, and now aim for your weakpoints to stop you from attacking! Not only that, but there’s now a new and pleasuring way to claim loot from defeated foes – now, defeated monsters will no longer drop loot spheres, instead, they will drop crates! There are different crates to symbolize the value of treasure inside. Of course, these won’t just open; you’re going to have to put some bruising on those big boys to get in.

That’s not all – all classes have had their previous modded and core skills adjusted. This was done to help balance gameplay and increase choice between damage and utility. Even more, each class has a skill that, when reaching the base mastery cap, give a small chance for a very high bonus.[/b]

Thanks

I want to give a big thanks to NateATon, ASYLUM101, and WareBare on the Grim Dawn forums for sharing some invaluable information that helped me speed the modding process and edit the skills. The information can be found here and here.

DOWNLOAD

Attachment: 20160920123308_1.jpg

[wolfmane]

I’m not sure about the combat changes. I like the frenzy feel the way it is now. However, the lighting change effects sound pretty awesome.

[normalguy]

I’m not sure about the combat changes. I like the frenzy feel the way it is now. However, the lighting change effects sound pretty awesome.

When I was making it, I was thinking something like Dark Souls mixed with my favorite MMORPG enemy health… then it just turned to this… I love it. Thanks for the comment

[Kunzan]

Played this for a bit with new char and I gotta say the stagger gave too much advantage. It feels like an exploit for melee and ranged who stack attack speed. They are standing statues when you have high attack speed. Don’t know about spammable magic damage skills, but I’m sure it will stagger them as well. Veteran feels like normal mode without veteran because I think I see same amount of mobs even in Veteran as to normal.

[normalguy]

Played this for a bit with new char and I gotta say the stagger gave too much advantage. It feels like an exploit for melee and ranged who stack attack speed. They are standing statues when you have high attack speed. Don’t know about spammable magic damage skills, but I’m sure it will stagger them as well. Veteran feels like normal mode without veteran because I think I see same amount of mobs even in Veteran as to normal.

Of course the beginning of the game with a new character is easier, with much of the enemies having slower attack speed and scaled damage to the player level. Thanks for trying it out and feedback

[system]

The download link says its hidden. Is that intentional?

[adoomgod]

This is very cool conceptually. Once I have more free time and you’ve developed it further I look forward to trying your version of combat pacing :].

[Kulverstukass]

[SPOILER]File hidden
normalguy
Last Activity: 06-21-2016

Nnnnnoooooo

Kunzan, anyone who downloaded when it was available - care to share please :)[/spoiler]

Last edited by normalguy; Today at 04:51 PM.

There is hope!

[system]

Hi normalguy, would very much like to see this realized again for 1.0.0.5. I didn’t get a chance to get your earlier version but everything you’ve described is everything I took issue with in vanilla - frenzy fast combat, hordes of (not very imposing) Heroes, no proper ‘pull threat’, the rotating shadows… and those darn cooldown announcements.

Very much looking forward to seeing more of this project.

[Kulverstukass]

Great news!
I’m personally would like to ask for removing level requirement from equipment with exception for medals and such that has only level requirement at all.
“Grim legion” does that, as example, so I hope there is no need to manually go through everything.

[normalguy]

Great news!
I’m personally would like to ask for removing level requirement from equipment with exception for medals and such that has only level requirement at all.
“Grim legion” does that, as example, so I hope there is no need to manually go through everything.

Sure, I could look into that and take a shot at it (^u^)b

[Kulverstukass]

Welp, first impressions.

-Enemy health increased
Works and leads to “need to chop down every enemy”, especially at start. Not that bad at all as, with increase size, adds to immersion about “how could those pesky pests made such a mess”.

-Enemy damage increased
Seems not working, as only 2 exceptions were posed at least somewhat noticeable threat - ‘Fury’ zombie (and i guess “aetherspawn” would pose a threat too, haven’t seen it yet), because of it’s attack speed and life leeching; I’ve already thought that it’s unkillable at all as it was healing faster than I was hitting it with 2h maul, but spending all MP twice on ‘Primal strike’ and ‘Lightning nova (item)’ w/o bothering with auto-attack brought it down; and Aether Crystal/Cluster - their much bigger HP pool turned them into violently reflective hedgehogs, at least for melee-oriented characters.
Not a single Hero or Boss monsters ain’t done anything to my (newly created) character’s HP, comparable to Fury and A-Crystals.

-Enemy defensive ability increased
Somewhat noticeable.

-Enemy attack speed increased
Somewhat noticeable, still not posing any threat. Maybe they need increased Offensive ability?

-Enemy pets reduced
Yep, first hero (from under tree) spawned only 1 pet-zombie, and i haven’t seen any “swarm of flies” through the whole Wightmire.

-Every class has the opportunity to knock an enemy down.
Noticeable, even with very slow 2h melee, Primal strike KO enemies ain’t that rare.

-Enemy sight view halved
Zombie blindly wondering around looks good, but not that much for more ‘normal’ monsters, maybe increase a bit?

-Enemies can chase you for greater distances
Hard to say, there is not much of situations, where you need to run far away.

-***Tripled EXP rate
Too much, i was 15-16 when enemies was just 11, w/o any grind. Maybe x2?

-All mobs, excluding humans are slightly larger.
Looks great, except for aether zombies that basically humans. But i guess they’re in a first place are “aether corruptions”, not a “humans” by game classification, and can’t be excluded.

-Mobs have a 50% chance to be a champion
I’ve started w/o Veteran (and gonna start with it after this post), so it doesn’t seems affecting gameplay at all. Mb with more mobs it would make difference. Maybe advance even further, to 33/33/33% to normal/champ/hero?

-You can pull enemies without linking
/See previous/

-Footstep volumes increased
-Enemy sounds increased
Great, can find wondering loners from afar.

-Muted player from announcing cooldowns
QOL changes always welcome.

-Decreased the visual speed of HP & and MANA bar
Not quite sure how it’s differs.

-New camera adjustments
Haven’t noticed.

-Player attack speed slightly increased from previous versions
Feels a bit better than it’s in vanilla, at least with slow 2h weapons.

-The world is alive; Enemies are no longer in cages
Feels good to see them wandering around.

-More loot
Judging by 6 “Isaac Spaulders”, and overall loot piles emerging from any crate, a bit too much. I would also suggest to change Devotion shrines from requiring resources to “always fight for it”, as again in Grim Legion, as resources are in abundance now.

-Faction rates increased.
Noticable and gotta help with more heroes appearing earlier, as i’ve become Despised with Aetherials before even get into Burying Hill cave and Hated before went through Wightmire. Fun times ahead, as i’m gonna be their Nemesis may be even before Warden, heh.

On the bad note - GD become heavily unstable fro me with CO (-NILR), 4-5 crashes already, looks random, like open transfer storage (it was empty), or went into personal rift, or purely were walking w/o anyone around. Not repetable, too.

Overall it’s looks and feels very good, especially as opposite concept from “more cannon fodder waves” mods.
Thank you for NILR option, seeing items being outdated due to high LVL requirement, while being low on STAT requirements always grinds my gears.

[Kulverstukass]

Posting just to separate it from previous wall of text
After a bit more playing, I’m taking my words about “need more heroes” back, as in Veteran mode there is plenty of mobs anyway and heroes usually stand in pair, or even trio.
Due to their nature champ mobs do some damage too, like butchers/thrashers and such, while generic ones are still pretty harmless and just require some chopping. Heroes, especially that outlevel you, dangerous even for over-equipped me, as single Hero-harbinger made me retreat from chtonian-cult hideout (with locked door), and he was 26 vs 21 me.
So, again, everything looks good.

[normalguy]

Welp, first impressions.

-Enemy health increased
Works and leads to “need to chop down every enemy”, especially at start. Not that bad at all as, with increase size, adds to immersion about “how could those pesky pests made such a mess”.

-Enemy damage increased
Seems not working, as only 2 exceptions were posed at least somewhat noticeable threat - ‘Fury’ zombie (and i guess “aetherspawn” would pose a threat too, haven’t seen it yet), because of it’s attack speed and life leeching; I’ve already thought that it’s unkillable at all as it was healing faster than I was hitting it with 2h maul, but spending all MP twice on ‘Primal strike’ and ‘Lightning nova (item)’ w/o bothering with auto-attack brought it down; and Aether Crystal/Cluster - their much bigger HP pool turned them into violently reflective hedgehogs, at least for melee-oriented characters.
Not a single Hero or Boss monsters ain’t done anything to my (newly created) character’s HP, comparable to Fury and A-Crystals.

-Enemy defensive ability increased
Somewhat noticeable.

-Enemy attack speed increased
Somewhat noticeable, still not posing any threat. Maybe they need increased Offensive ability?

-Enemy pets reduced
Yep, first hero (from under tree) spawned only 1 pet-zombie, and i haven’t seen any “swarm of flies” through the whole Wightmire.

-Every class has the opportunity to knock an enemy down.
Noticeable, even with very slow 2h melee, Primal strike KO enemies ain’t that rare.

-Enemy sight view halved
Zombie blindly wondering around looks good, but not that much for more ‘normal’ monsters, maybe increase a bit?

-Enemies can chase you for greater distances
Hard to say, there is not much of situations, where you need to run far away.

-***Tripled EXP rate
Too much, i was 15-16 when enemies was just 11, w/o any grind. Maybe x2?

-All mobs, excluding humans are slightly larger.
Looks great, except for aether zombies that basically humans. But i guess they’re in a first place are “aether corruptions”, not a “humans” by game classification, and can’t be excluded.

-Mobs have a 50% chance to be a champion
I’ve started w/o Veteran (and gonna start with it after this post), so it doesn’t seems affecting gameplay at all. Mb with more mobs it would make difference. Maybe advance even further, to 33/33/33% to normal/champ/hero?

-You can pull enemies without linking
/See previous/

-Footstep volumes increased
-Enemy sounds increased
Great, can find wondering loners from afar.

-Muted player from announcing cooldowns
QOL changes always welcome.

-Decreased the visual speed of HP & and MANA bar
Not quite sure how it’s differs.

-New camera adjustments
Haven’t noticed.

-Player attack speed slightly increased from previous versions
Feels a bit better than it’s in vanilla, at least with slow 2h weapons.

-The world is alive; Enemies are no longer in cages
Feels good to see them wandering around.

-More loot
Judging by 6 “Isaac Spaulders”, and overall loot piles emerging from any crate, a bit too much. I would also suggest to change Devotion shrines from requiring resources to “always fight for it”, as again in Grim Legion, as resources are in abundance now.

-Faction rates increased.
Noticable and gotta help with more heroes appearing earlier, as i’ve become Despised with Aetherials before even get into Burying Hill cave and Hated before went through Wightmire. Fun times ahead, as i’m gonna be their Nemesis may be even before Warden, heh.

On the bad note - GD become heavily unstable fro me with CO (-NILR), 4-5 crashes already, looks random, like open transfer storage (it was empty), or went into personal rift, or purely were walking w/o anyone around. Not repetable, too.

Overall it’s looks and feels very good, especially as opposite concept from “more cannon fodder waves” mods.
Thank you for NILR option, seeing items being outdated due to high LVL requirement, while being low on STAT requirements always grinds my gears.

Thanks for the feedback, Kulver. One thing I changed in the original file was the the enemy’s defense. I was using my Ultimate character and noticed that my chance to crit was always 0. Their DA was just too high that even with the best gear and stats, it may have been impossible. Reducing it was good deal.

Speaking of the Fury, every time I saw one, I just said, “nope”, lol. They were so annoying when you first start.

Also, maybe I should touch their OA, as you suggested. My Shaman is on ultimate, and I’m thinking about nerfing Briarthorn. Mines currently have 49K HP with +stats invested, and he feels like a super shield paired with the healing totem. Enemies can still kill him, but I think it needs to be adjusted. One thing though, the enemies in Ultimate are level 88-92 at level 85(only reached old arkavia so far), hit hard, and are a good challenege even with my few legendaries… So if I do increase OA, it has to be the right dosage, or I may only be hurting new chars.

With the loot, I agree, there is a lot when you first start. I was actually thinking about toning it back down because of seeing all those whites drop. The reason I increased it was to help new characters gear faster because it was really slow (no iron, low chance to find weapon, enemy HP). Once you increase loot filters to Green+, it’s less distracting.

With the EXP, I changed it to 3x so people can choose to sneak by enemies without later feeling like they need to grind enemies to reach a new area. It does began to deteriorate and slow your progression down, so that’s a plus. I can look into it, and maybe we can agree to 2.5
With the camera, when you “zoom in” the angle will adjust, so it’s not always facing the ground. Hopefully this pleases people who prefer the vanilla cam and for others who want their cam to a little more personal.

I can look into the devotion shrines, as I do prefer fighting the mobs than putting items in. I can’t make any promises because I never tried it, but it may be easy.

Finally, I may just allow items to not require player level at all, it’s something to think about and shouldn’t complete OP new chars because of the stat requirement. I did not update the CONILR to the original. I suggests using that one for now; it fixed those green aether crystals mobs name I can’t remember, and adjusted enemy DA as what I talked about earlier. Sorry, I was really lazy and didn’t want to go through the files to upgrade the optional mod you reauested. That’s why I may just make your request in the original file I suggests the upgraded file for now, but it’s totally your call. Download both to play it safe (^u^)b

Thanks again for the feedback!

[normalguy]

Posting just to separate it from previous wall of text
After a bit more playing, I’m taking my words about “need more heroes” back, as in Veteran mode there is plenty of mobs anyway and heroes usually stand in pair, or even trio.
Due to their nature champ mobs do some damage too, like butchers/thrashers and such, while generic ones are still pretty harmless and just require some chopping. Heroes, especially that outlevel you, dangerous even for over-equipped me, as single Hero-harbinger made me retreat from chtonian-cult hideout (with locked door), and he was 26 vs 21 me.
So, again, everything looks good.

Haha good to hear

EDIT: aaaannnnnd… updated one last time with your requests, thanks for the ideas, they’re a welcome implement
now I should be good to relax

[system]

Hey normalguy,
Played with this for awhile and my impression is I’d love to play this with all the changes made reduced by half - just reduce each of these changes made by 50% across the board:
-Enemy health increase
-Enemy damage increase
-Enemy defensive ability increase
-Enemy attack speed increase
-Enemy pets reduction
-Every class has the opportunity to knock an enemy down. (Keep this.)
-Enemy sight view reduction by 50% (change to ‘reduction by 25%’)
-Enemies can chase you for greater distances (Reduce this slightly.)
-Experience increase by 200% (change to ‘increase by 100%’)
-All mobs, excluding humans are x% larger (change to 1/2x% larger)
-Mobs have a 50% chance to be a champion (change to 25%)
-You can pull enemies without linking (Keep this)
-Footstep volumes increase
-Enemy sounds increase
-Muted player from announcing cooldowns (Keep this.)
-Decrease the visual speed of HP & MANA bar (Keep this - barely noticeable)
-New camera adjustments (Keep this - very nice)
-Player attack speed x% reduction (change to 1/2x%)
-The world is alive; Enemies are no longer in cages (Keep this)
-More loot - increase by x% (Reduce to 1/2x%)
-Faction rates increase

The most noticeable and imo needed changes would be to the player attack speed reduction and the enemy health/defense increase. I like the idea here but it’s just too much for me to see completing a playthrough this slowly. FWIW my two cents, do with it what you will.

[normalguy]

just reduce each of these changes made by 50% across the board:

I don’t want to misinterpret these

-Enemy pets reduction
Just making sure, you want to reduce the reduction by 50% to make enemies have more pets? If so, I’ll make them spawn a max of 2

-Experience increase by 200% (change to ‘increase by 100%’)
I just want to say the EXP rate was already tripled in the previous files and I made a late edit to the change on the front page, but if you feel like you want it Quadrupled (4X) from what it is now, no problem at all.

-Player attack speed x% reduction (change to 1/2x%)
I’ll speed this up for you.

I’ll edit this post later with a link to a separate file with all the changes for you. I suggest hanging on to the new updated file too, simply because you may become too strong and want a greater challenge later on.

Edit: Just realized you probably played with the old file the whole time; the reason fights took so long was due to critical hits on enemies were next to impossible. It took me a while to realize this because I don’t play with the “Show critical hit multiplier” ticked on in the options menu. That has been changed and the difference is very noticeable.

I’ll still make the the separate mod for you that you requested, but you will probably go back to the original after that change =)

Edit Edit: Sorry, scratch what I said earlier; the file I’m uploading should help deal with the slow pace that may have bothered you. You may have missed it when I updated the file soon after. As I said earlier, I think you may have been using the file where critical hits were near impossible to achieve. If even after those changes, and things still aren’t pleasing, the mod may not be up your alley. Thank you for your feedback, sonophilos.

[system]

I don’t want to misinterpret these
Just making sure, you want to reduce the reduction by 50% to make enemies have more pets? If so, I’ll make them spawn a max of 2

–Yes. Reduce the reduction.

I just want to say the EXP rate was already tripled in the previous files and I made a late edit to the change on the front page, but if you feel like you want it Quadrupled (4X) from what it is now, no problem at all.
I’ll speed this up for you.

–Here I was actually suggesting to slow the XP gain down - whereas it’s currently tripled (+200%) I was suggesting doubled (+100%)

Edit: Just realized you probably played with the old file the whole time; the reason fights took so long was due to critical hits on enemies were next to impossible. It took me a while to realize this because I don’t play with the “Show critical hit multiplier” ticked on in the options menu. That has been changed and the difference is very noticeable.

–Yes, I was playing with a much older file.

Thank you for your feedback, sonophilos.

You’re very welcome normalguy. I look forward to trying your updated/separate(?) file. I’m not seeing it in your post here though…

Edit: oic, you meant ‘scratch what I said earlier’ and spoilered it out. I’ll try your updated file in OP and report back.

I’ve tried your updated file in OP and I still find myself wanting for that ‘half as much’ file with the slower XP gain as I clarify above. Any chance of that still?

[normalguy]

I’ve tried your updated file in OP and I still find myself wanting for that ‘half as much’ file with the slower XP gain as I clarify above. Any chance of that still?

Hope you like it – they’re your changes after all
Just pretend I’m now on vacation for a while

[Somerled]

I wanted to try this out but it looks like the main file got deleted. I’m gonna plug in Mega if you want to keep your files for some time.

Looks good though, a good change of pace might be what I need to get back in Grim Dawn.