Post by Vio on Aug 1, 2021 7:56:20 GMT -5
Hey, everybody!
Now that the Activity Check is over, we thought we’d share our thoughts on some up-and-coming changes to Bon Voyage’s systems! With work on the Bases system mostly wrapped up, you’ll have that to look forward to at some point in the near future, but we’ve also been looking at some other features that we deemed need sprucing up! Remember, these are just us sharing our thoughts on what we think are healthy changes for the site, so you might not see these coming into play too quickly or in exactly the form they’re shown in!
Without further ado, let’s get to it!
Fine-Tuning Haki Advancements
I know most people aren’t there yet, but when it comes to Haki, we agreed that we may have significantly overshot the runway when it came to progression costs. While we’re entirely happy with the systems regarding Raw and Trained Haki, it was our Advancements System that was nagging a little, and here’s why.
Regardless of how quickly you manage to accumulate X-Poinz, the fact is that the system at present needs some pretty extraneous X-Poinz amounts to upgrade Haki, with a fully upgraded Colour of Haki costing a whopping 4,800 X-Poinz. Now, this isn’t really a problem on its own, but we deemed the combination of high benchmarks and high costs to be a little too oppressive, even in the late game, where you’d already need an immense 15,000 Total X-Poinz to get to that point!
We’re going to be putting those costs on the chopping block, keeping the cost for Trained Haki at its current 300, but pulling the other costs down to more reasonable numbers — a steady increase of 600 for the first, 900 for the second, and 1,200 for the third. This brings the total for a fully advanced Colour down to a more manageable 3,000 X-Poinz for what is still a “late game” sink.
The Trait Shop!
It’s mentioned somewhere amongst the current rules, but this was an idea that was meant to be implemented, but never was. At the time, it was slightly superfluous based on what we’d got, but it’ll be coming into play at some point after further discussion. The concept’s simple enough! Once a character hits “S” Class, they essentially hit a glass ceiling, unable to further develop outside of enhancing their FiSts and learning Haki.
This will allow people to break that proverbial ceiling once they’ve surpassed the “S” Class threshold, enabling people to unlock additional Traits at an X-Poinz cost. This will represent the ability to push oneself beyond regular limits — that further physical development is possible but needs more intensive training to exceed them!
Clarifying & Quantifying Zoan Abilities
Forever lingering in a strange place where they’re simultaneously the strongest and weakest, Zoans are a class of Devil Fruit that we felt needed some further clarification and a bit of a helping hand. This isn’t entirely a system change — no numbers will be directly shifted as of yet — but it should give all your shapeshifters out there a bit of assistance when coming up with ideas.
The specific case here are Forms (sometimes called “Points” after Chopper’s usage), which have long been an anomaly, so here’s the breakdown of the treatment they’re getting. For Regular and Ancient Zoans, Forms will offer a bonus likened to a Trait whenever the user is in that state, but typically more focused. A prime example would be Chopper’s various Pre-Time Skip Points — Arm Point would offer “Increased Strength”, while Guard Point would offer “Protective Coat”. Similarly, Improved Forms would instead offer two of these enhancements. For Mythical Zoans, because of their much more supernatural effects, these bonuses can be like Aspects.
Overall, these bonuses are also going to be referred to as Qualities, thus bringing their terminology in-line with their already shared costs with Equipment! With this, we’ll also lock them into the same marketplace location as Equipment, rather than floating around the Dojo as they do now.
Don’t Touch That Dial…?
Actually, yes, we will! Dials have always been a minor anomaly on the scale of Techniques and Equipment, so we’re going at them with a hammer (but not like Sanji did in Skypiea)! We’re going to be cutting their costs down to match with Techniques, given that — at least on their own — that’s all they really are. In lieu of this change, that will also have an impact on Equipment that uses them, and to represent this we’ll be talking about another system change on the table just below.
Before that, here’s the lowdown on the low down! Different Dials will still have different Ranks, but we’re going to be representing modifications to Dials that allow them to function a little differently by providing a means of increasing the Rank. This is especially relevant to Dials that produce types of Cloud, whose power is mostly useless outside of the high altitudes of the White Seas. By increasing a Milky Dial’s Rank by 1, you’d then be able to produce those Milky Roads just fine at low altitudes!
Now, about that other system change…
Equipment Qualities Reviewed!
Talking the system through usually raises some interesting questions, one of which was how we’d treat Equipment Qualities! Currently, Equipment gains a Quality at Rank 2, and again at Rank 4, but that means Ranks 3 and 5 are mostly superfluous. We plan on changing that up entirely, as well, introducing a streamlined and more flexible system that reflects upon how our changes to Zoans are working!
Qualities will be divided into two categories — those that are like Traits and those that are like Aspects — and this will affect how much they change a piece of Equipment’s costs. Those that are like Traits (e.g. being so heavy that they increase the damage when swung) increase an item’s Rank by 1, while those that are like Aspects (e.g. being so sharp they can cut steel) increase it by 2. There’ll even be the potential to enhance an existing Trait-like Quality to an Aspect-like version of itself!
Some Love For Overdrives!
Overdrives have been in a slightly unusual state for a while now, so it was time for a review — a review they got solely because they also fit with the system mentioned above! Much like Equipment, Overdrives will be getting a fresh coat of paint to bring them forward and make them more readily understandable. The same “Trait-like” and “Aspect-like” system will be applied to these all-important transformations, with the primary difference being the fact that Overdrives offer persisting passive benefits for as long as they remain in effect.
An additional layer will come in the form of Drawbacks — facets of the Overdrive that make them difficult to use or otherwise punish the user after the fact — which will knock the Rank down by 1. Just as they are now, Overdrives will be eligible for upgrades, including removing or replacing Drawbacks, gaining additional Enhancements, or levelling up those that already exist!
Robot Maintenance
As one of the most unusual race options on site, Robots suffer a little in regards to what they’re allowed to do, especially as they can’t develop Haki due to not being a living thing! We’re going to be looking into this one in greater depth to help give our automata friends some much needed love, hopefully making them a little more unique than just Heavy Cyborg without Haki, but there’s still much we have to talk about on this front!
Anyway! That’s all for now, folks! While there’s a few more articles on the table that haven’t been mentioned here, I don’t want to ruin all the surprises! Until then, look forward to these system changes as they come into play!