Thomasdut

Newly Dead
OG 2020
Oct 31, 2020
5
1
3
So, if a weapon was at 100, and Bob uses it till it reaches 0, can someone repair it back to 100 or will it now only be repaired to 90, then a few repairs later the max would be reduced to 70 and so on. Is that part of your idea?
 
So, if a weapon was at 100, and Bob uses it till it reaches 0, can someone repair it back to 100 or will it now only be repaired to 90, then a few repairs later the max would be reduced to 70 and so on. Is that part of your idea?
Welcome to the forums! :) We are not sure if we will have weapon decay systems in the game; the team has mixed feelings about them; if I missed something in the discussion above, my apologies, as the forums are getting busier by the day.
 
Welcome to the forums! :) We are not sure if we will have weapon decay systems in the game; the team has mixed feelings about them; if I missed something in the discussion above, my apologies, as the forums are getting busier by the day.
Weapon decay on death as a penalty/consequence of dying is cool.

Weapon decay based on use is a bit iffy but manageable if it is not too quick would not want to start a raid and get to the boss and your best weapon is only at 50% because you used it to get you through the earlier battles.

Would not like weapon decay like @Thomasdut suggested where your weapon can never get back to 100%. Part of the promise of DHS was that being part of the first age and making legendary weapons would make those weapons more powerful later in the game as the ages progress. This mechanic would make that impossible.
 
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Welcome to the forums! :) We are not sure if we will have weapon decay systems in the game; the team has mixed feelings about them; if I missed something in the discussion above, my apologies, as the forums are getting busier by the day.
Perhaps the sentient weapons don't decay but rather transition as their durability in certain realms is depleted and not maintained. A sword with a broken blade might be less effective in the physical since its length has been reduced but it now projects an etherial edge from where it broke to take the place of what broke off, increasing its effectiveness against the more essentially inclined.
 
I don't think weapons should decay. Durability systems are either gold sinks, monetization strategy or a means to force you to constantly change up weapons.

An example of the first would be Diablo 2 where you constantly have to repair and that theoretically keeps your gold balance in check. In reality it does nothing of the sort and repairs are just kind of annoying. Unless the weapon is ethereal and cannot be repaired but it has 50% increased stats. Which is why nobody used those for a prolonged period. Unless you wanted to make a rune-word on it that besides everything else made the weapon indestructible and this clearly overpowered. So in the end we just ended up with no durability system and balancing issues.

An example of the second would be something like Black Desert Online where max durability does decrease mostly on unsuccessful enchantment tries. You can generally replenish that with a duplicate of the same weapon or a, surprise-surprise, a cash shop item. Of course the super rare end-game weapons could not be easily repaired with a duplicate so you had to use the cash shop items. So in the end it ended up as a pretty scummy system that was after your money and left a very unpleasant taste in your mouth.

An example of the third would be Breath of the Wild. And as good as that game was it had a major problem with weapons breaking too fast and constantly having to change weapons which became quite annoying. It also forced you to keep good weapons for boss encounters while using trash the rest of the time. It was okay, mostly because BotW is not really an RPG but an action adventure game with some minor RPG elements. Still... annoying.

I am not saying that a durability system could not be nailed in terms of balancing but... what do you gain from it? People generally want to use the best item they have and do not want to constantly change weapons or armor because its durability is low and I think that there are better gold sinks than equipment repair costs - things that you want to buy and not things that you need to buy. As a monetization strategy... no thanks, there are better ones as well.

As for the idea that @Livin suggested - I think that's cool but it should be intentional choice of a comprehensive crafting and weapon modification system and not a byproduct of a durability system.
 
Yeah, I currently play an MMO that uses durability and it’s absolutely a cash shop trap. I would much rather be constantly looting new gear or upgrading the best gear with rare crafting materials or something like that than deal with durability. I want to constantly grow my power without worrying about repairs. Save monetization for cosmetics or VIP perks.
 
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Right off the bat, I would like to say Nobody likes weapon decay.

Having that basic point out of the way, there are lots of ways in which a weapon decay system may add to a games economy.
As an example, Ultima Online weapons had durability and could lose max durability when repaired. Later on, there was also a way for crafters to increase the max durability of items. They would fill NPC orders as a kind of quest and sometimes they would get a reward called Powder of Fortification, it had 10 charges and would increase max durability by 10 when used, for a max of 100 durability. This gave crafters a way to use their stockpile of base mats that weren't good for much and turn it into an item people needed.

It really all depends on what kind of in game economy you want.
 
In all the games i played where this feature was present it ended up being a time sinking activity at best, a time sinking AND a money sinking at worst.

Implementing it gives the game more realism i guess but at the expense of fun witch should be, at least in theory, the main point of a videogame (also many people with little time to play would probably want to spend their experience in the game in other ways).

Ultimatlely it's the team call, but imho it makes the game gain points in few secondary aspecs and lose them at the important ones.
 
Hitting the right point in Weapon Decay is hard. Thinking of Dark Souls 2 here, weapons decayed FAR to fast, and upgrading weapons was expensive for both materials and souls, since enemies had a limited spawn. Dark Soul 1, had weapon decay, but it was almost negligible since by the time it was even close to at risk of breaking, you'd already have found either better equipment or upgraded it resetting the durability. Same with Dark Souls 3. Demon Souls the original (I have no idea if this is still true for the rework) weapons and armor breaking was basically game ending. If a player invaded you with stuff meant to break your stuff, you'd learn to just jump off the nearest edge and kill yourself, because however many souls you had wouldn't be enough to repair any of your broken equipment if just one broke. As for weapon decay in Deadhaus, I don't think it would fit because what self respecting undead would care if their sword is rusted? It just means you can give them an additional ailment if they somehow survive.
 
In Dark Souls 2 You could basically break someone equipment in PvP by throwing acid bombs or something like that at them and even some NPCs could break equipment as well. The question is that what does it give? In World of Warcraft it don't give much at all, in Dark Souls 2 you found ways to cheese the AI and in PvP it was simply something to troll people and give them a bad day to waste souls.

I don't know, weapons degrades feels like sink more than an interesting game mechanics in game.
 
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