Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

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gesseritt
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Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by gesseritt » Fri Sep 11, 2020 4:29 am

It looks like the acid damage per second at Path to Phlegethos/Baator got a major bump? 20+ damage when before it was below 10, I think?

A group of high epics I was with tried to do the area, but the rain made it next to impossible. Healing kits evaporated and elemental resistance spells would fade quickly. There were casualties.
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AstralUniverse
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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:10 am

Intentional.

It's been like that for a while now and it is indeed a road block for some parties but there are ways to get through it. Most obvious, just run through it hasted, if you know the way. Other ways would be an abjurer who can spam endure elements on everyone as their only job. Healer's overheal. Fiendlocks are effectively immune and it makes sense. There's also quite a selection of anti-acid gear these days.
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I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by ReverentBlade » Fri Sep 11, 2020 10:30 am

Are the rewards really worth that much trouble, though?

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by andthenthatwasthat » Fri Sep 11, 2020 1:33 pm

It was one of the funniest epics wipeouts I have ever seen. :)

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by NauVaseline » Fri Sep 11, 2020 3:36 pm

ReverentBlade wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 10:30 am
Are the rewards really worth that much trouble, though?
Snuggle a Bugbear no IF you don't have a means of disarming locks and traps

There were always better dungeons, but I used to really enjoy mowing down devils and occasionally getting wrecked by them. I would never go there now.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Sep 11, 2020 4:34 pm

ReverentBlade wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 10:30 am
Are the rewards really worth that much trouble, though?
Maybe I'm out of date here but there used to be addy and runic container past what is one of the easier epic bosses we got in the module. So that's a pretty good reward if it's still the case.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by NauVaseline » Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:04 pm

No addy. it's either zinc, iron, mithril or zinc, sometimes zinc.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:07 pm

The boss is still relatively easy for epic loot. I can only assume the devs decided to buff the difficulty of reaching the place, rather than buffing the mobs. It used to be one of the most crowded epic dungeons in the module if not ~the. Talking about Minauros of course.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by chris a gogo » Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:16 pm

Honestly it's more trouble than it's worth forget RPing along the way well apart from lets move fast speech before you transition into the area.

I would never go there for "fun" only if i had to get to a place connected to it and i had no other option.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Wrips » Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:23 pm

Aurilites, Styx and RDI are all short dungeons with epic loot and relatively easy bosses. Minauros now is just outright obnoxious.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:57 pm

Wrips wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:23 pm
Aurilites, Styx and RDI are all short dungeons with epic loot and relatively easy bosses.
I find this quite incorrect. There's nothing stopping you from going into those places (except RDI which takes gold/a ship/yoink one time per character), unlike say, an island that can only be found by RNG, or acid rain most characters just cant endure by themselves. The bosses on those places you've mentioned are actually some of the stronger bosses we got (on a scale of 1 to Paush) and most certainly stronger than the boss in Minauros. If you take out the acid rain you really are left with too easily accessible epic loot container.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by gesseritt » Fri Sep 11, 2020 6:04 pm

chris a gogo wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:16 pm
... forget RPing along the way well apart from lets move fast speech before you transition into the area.
This. The area is really just unassailable for like 80%+ of epic parties. I suppose an abjurer constantly casting endure elements ... maybe ...

By the way, we were extended mass hasted. Still couldn't get through.

Buffing the mobs instead of the rain would be much better, IMO.
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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Sep 11, 2020 6:10 pm

There was one time we had a warlock in the party so the warlock went down and cleared the passage and then we all ran through hasted. Yeah, we didnt type during running for one minute but we had plenty of RP while waiting for the warlock to return and prepare for the painful sprint with ankheg items. I liked that RP and we dont have anywhere else like that afaik.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Wrips » Fri Sep 11, 2020 6:35 pm

AstralUniverse wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 5:57 pm
There's nothing stopping you from going into those places (except RDI which takes gold/a ship/yoink one time per character), unlike say, an island that can only be found by RNG, or acid rain most characters just cant endure by themselves.
I think it's just a case where I don't think that a dungeon that "Stops you from going there" is a good feature. If you do, fair enough.
The bosses on those places you've mentioned are actually some of the stronger bosses we got (on a scale of 1 to Paush) and most certainly stronger than the boss in Minauros. If you take out the acid rain you really are left with too easily accessible epic loot container.
That doesn't really mean anything when they all have glaring weaknesses that makes the fight against them relatively easy and, at RDI, you even have access to adamantine, too.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by NauVaseline » Fri Sep 11, 2020 6:57 pm

Juggernaut was buffed too Astral.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:02 pm

NauVaseline wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 6:57 pm
Juggernaut was buffed too Astral.
I didnt notice. Maybe it changes the picture. Maybe it doesnt. I'm just trying to say over that I think it's good that some places in the module are hard or even nearly impossible to reach without the proper set up.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by NauVaseline » Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:06 pm

my last character could reliably solo Aurilites, Avernus bosses. Juggernaut's the only one that won a few times (mostlybecause my attention was split and the results were unforgiving).

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia » Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:41 pm

Hi. This one is on me to fix; the acid rain used to be 1d6/round which was, frankly, so negligible that it may as well not have been there. I hooked the function into the Minauros weather systems with the intention of making it more dangerous, but also more variable. A heavy rain is more dangerous than a light drizzle; along with the change, the dungeon needed additional sections to cover against the rain to complement the existing counterplay, as well as commensurately higher rewards for the trouble.

However, two complications arose in implementating the changes to the rain: A.) the weather system governing wind, humidity, exposure etc. across the server have proven rather opaque on an area-by-area basis and I have not been able to usefully estimate the value ranges they use, and B.) the long-standing bug where damage script occasionally fires twice was a non-issue when it did 1d6 damage, but is a critical concern when damage gets higher.

Personally, I'm very much a proponent for making dungeons more unforgiving across the board, but they all need to be fair in their toughness. The job on this one was not done.

Reading this thread is a bit oof but the points raised are not without merit. I did the initial changes concurrent with my work on Dis, but in full admission that project has burned me out on doing Hell stuff for a while. While I've made intermittent adjustments to the acid rain since I still had to switch to other projects for my sanity's sake after Dis. Among those adjustments were debug tools I added to retrieve the hard weather system data I needed.

I'll deal with this tonight. If I can't determine a damage formula I like with the new data, I'll just flat reduce it again to help playability until I can find the time and will to really bring Minauros to a place I like. That this pain point was not addressed sooner was a lapse on my part, for which I appreciate your patience. As always, the Forum updates thread and Discord announcements channel will have the latest on when it goes live.

Done.


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Hazard » Fri Sep 11, 2020 9:56 pm

Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:41 pm
Hi. This one is on me to fix; the acid rain used to be 1d6/round which was, frankly, so negligible that it may as well not have been there. I hooked the function into the Minauros weather systems with the intention of making it more dangerous, but also more variable. A heavy rain is more dangerous than a light drizzle; along with the change, the dungeon needed additional sections to cover against the rain to complement the existing counterplay, as well as commensurately higher rewards for the trouble.

However, two complications arose in implementating the changes to the rain: A.) the weather system governing wind, humidity, exposure etc. across the server have proven rather opaque on an area-by-area basis and I have not been able to usefully estimate the value ranges they use, and B.) the long-standing bug where damage script occasionally fires twice was a non-issue when it did 1d6 damage, but is a critical concern when damage gets higher.

Personally, I'm very much a proponent for making dungeons more unforgiving across the board, but they all need to be fair in their toughness. The job on this one was not done.

Reading this thread is a bit oof but the points raised are not without merit. I did the initial changes concurrent with my work on Dis, but in full admission that project has burned me out on doing Hell stuff for a while. While I've made intermittent adjustments to the acid rain since I still had to switch to other projects for my sanity's sake after Dis. Among those adjustments were debug tools I added to retrieve the hard weather system data I needed.

I'll deal with this tonight. If I can't determine a damage formula I like with the new data, I'll just flat reduce it again to help playability until I can find the time and will to really bring Minauros to a place I like. That this pain point was not addressed sooner was a lapse on my part, for which I appreciate your patience. As always, the Forum updates thread and Discord announcements channel will have the latest on when it goes live.
Dis is awesome and among my favourite places in the module, already. It gives me Planescape vibes!

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Wrips » Fri Sep 11, 2020 10:23 pm

Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:41 pm
snip
<3

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by andthenthatwasthat » Fri Sep 11, 2020 10:55 pm

Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:41 pm
Hi...
I found it fun, even if it was a mistake. :) Up until that point playing a Warlock was like easy mode.

It could have been that we went there on a very strong rain day. I couldn't even tell how fast it was firing. It felt like more that once per round if that is even possible and each hit could have been between 20 and 30 damage (somewhere in
the 20's for sure considering my character's acid resistance). It was quicken flare, energy buffer, move few steps, then repeat.

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia » Fri Sep 11, 2020 11:20 pm

Well the debug tool is what was needed. Apparently those areas will hit Humidity values significantly higher than I thought were possible to exist (I was expecting "Florida," not "literally the surface of Venus"). So... That definitely explains why the damage never quite fit my estimation. Can worry about the mystery later, but a change to the damage math there is in the pipeline for now.

Done.


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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by andthenthatwasthat » Sat Sep 12, 2020 2:32 am

Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 11:20 pm
I was expecting "Florida," not "literally the surface of Venus"
:D

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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by gesseritt » Sat Sep 12, 2020 8:12 pm

Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:41 pm
Hi. This one is on me to fix; the acid rain used to be 1d6/round which was, frankly, so negligible that it may as well not have been there. I hooked the function into the Minauros weather systems with the intention of making it more dangerous, but also more variable. A heavy rain is more dangerous than a light drizzle; along with the change, the dungeon needed additional sections to cover against the rain to complement the existing counterplay, as well as commensurately higher rewards for the trouble.

However, two complications arose in implementating the changes to the rain: A.) the weather system governing wind, humidity, exposure etc. across the server have proven rather opaque on an area-by-area basis and I have not been able to usefully estimate the value ranges they use, and B.) the long-standing bug where damage script occasionally fires twice was a non-issue when it did 1d6 damage, but is a critical concern when damage gets higher.

Personally, I'm very much a proponent for making dungeons more unforgiving across the board, but they all need to be fair in their toughness. The job on this one was not done.

Reading this thread is a bit oof but the points raised are not without merit. I did the initial changes concurrent with my work on Dis, but in full admission that project has burned me out on doing Hell stuff for a while. While I've made intermittent adjustments to the acid rain since I still had to switch to other projects for my sanity's sake after Dis. Among those adjustments were debug tools I added to retrieve the hard weather system data I needed.

I'll deal with this tonight. If I can't determine a damage formula I like with the new data, I'll just flat reduce it again to help playability until I can find the time and will to really bring Minauros to a place I like. That this pain point was not addressed sooner was a lapse on my part, for which I appreciate your patience. As always, the Forum updates thread and Discord announcements channel will have the latest on when it goes live.
Thank you so much! Looking forward to what you come up with. Totally fine with the rain not being 1d6 anymore, but it's current value is bonkers! How even the Devils survive it is beyond me!
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Re: Acid Rain at Path to Phlegethos/Baator

Post by Batrachophrenoboocosmomachia » Sun Sep 13, 2020 1:35 pm

Changes are live, please let me know it plays for you guys.

@gesseritt, devils are immune to both fire and acid damage!

Done.


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