I wanna talk about the auras in the trees. I ain’t gonna be talking about survivaltst aura, I ain’t going down that rabbit hole.
so the purpose for my ideas is to further aline the auras with the trees specific playstyle.
So for the aura, close and kill, instead of 5% movement speed, we get expertise: 40% swap speed.
It fits how the tree want you to play by swapping between the two weapons. bolters and plasma gun come out in resonable times and super fast weapons like pistals and knifes are almost instant. It benefits a select choice of weapons in others too. Flamers and other orgyn weapons come out faster and psykers swap between three thing all the time.
For fire team, I was going to give it elite damage, but psyker already has that. So perhaps something more unique. I wager Bolstering: Adding 5% to the other players aura. For example someone is running survivalist, normally it give 1% max ammo. With Bolstering, It gives 6% ammo. Beacon of purity now heals 6.5% instead of 1.5%. Loner gets nothing because it helps noone but oneself
For loner, I thought something a bit more spicy. It is still inherently selfish but powerful for a variety of situations. During your ability, allow you to phase though enemies. Kinda like ghost from lol or phase boots from dota for the moba people. Charge towards the person you want dead, relic through entire groups for that crowd control and invis to get to that gunner pinning the team in a hole or get that clutch revive. Will it cause technical problem, probably. But it be cool.
i agree that the auras should be either supportive of the role or help others be more effective at helping the role it is from.
But imo, the auras are all rather minor, they matter but are kind in the background not very noticeable.
So I rather had a whole rework on auras
(and before anyone says anything yea its low priority, doesn’t mean we can’t talk about it).
All the auras atm give a small permanent boost in some way to all in coherency players.
apart from loner ofc
There’s definitely a design space that could spice things up a bit.
I think all auras should still work as a coherency mechanic, so I wouldn’t touch that at all.
one example could be that each ally in range grants 1 stack/s at 100 stacks → big effect for everyone in range
another could be each in coherency ally (melee/range) kill grants one stack at x stacks → big effect
Yeah I don’t think it’s actually an issue, since auras are often not terribly consequential anyway, but that would be a nice addition to loner that would probably address most complaints people have with it.
I hate loner, i feel often forced to pick it for point efficiency since TWBS is very hard to pass by.
Even if auras are not providing enormous value for the team anyway, i still feel kinda a freeloader when I’m in coherency.
That aside, it’s mathematically the worst aura in the game, while all other auras are constantly providing benefits loner is only working sporadically (provided that you are not being an a*sshole to your teammates)
At least it should be added a toughness regeneration boost to teammates in coherency.
Love the initiative thinking about new ideas but these are way too much imo.
Regarding the swap speed aura:
+40% equip speed is potentially +40% DPS, especially with Agile Engagement & Weapons Specialist
The right tree is specifically tied to swapping and balanced around some weapons (like Helbore & Bolter) being ill suited for it, a change like this could have massive overall balance implications
Bolstering aura:
A flat +5% buff to other auras would be beyond ridiculously overpowered
+500% to Survivalist would make it exponentially worse than before, +~335% to BoP would trivialize all corruption mechanics in the game. Etc.
I like the idea, but even if you changed this to relative +50% instead (so Survivalist 1 → 1.5%, BoP 1.5 → 2.25 etc.), look at oggy auras. Whether it’s 20 → 30% dmg against suppressed, or 25 → 37.5% toughness regen, the auras were designed to not stack for a reason.
Bolstering would reach many new breakpoints with obvious and unpredictable balance implications
It would by far favour premade teams with builds planned to work together, while punishing pubs where between quickplay & joining ongoing missions we’d risk effectively not having most or any auras at all
Auras are designed to be minor & complementary, not something you’re forced to build around or even avoid entirely, especially with limited talent points and the aura-adjacent talents
And finally, regarding Loner:
I’m sorry, but the people calling it self-centered period don’t know what they’re talking about. Having someone who can exit coherency to deal with hard to reach enemies, loot, scouting etc. is obviously good for everyone. But it goes beyond that.
The AI significantly increases horde & special+ spawns the longer people are out of coherency. Loner always counts as “in coherency” and prevents that entirely, resulting much less spawns for everyone and far fewer risky situations in general.
Coherency regen takes a 3s break the moment you exit coherency (or take dmg). This is why the curio perk 3x +90% coherency regen is so strong: it both almost doubles the regen while cutting the delay in half. Normal combat movement & looting has people momentarily exiting coherency (or taking dmg) all the time, which is why in practice, that perk will increase your passive toughness regen by orders of magnitude. Loner never exits coherency in the first place, so for them that regen is always active as long as they don’t take dmg, which benefits even those zellies who stay with the team and play normally.
Bad players are going to be bad ofc, and it’s not hard to see why that Loner stereotype exists. But personal experience with people and this game tells me at least a part of that stereotype is just people being people: petty, tribalistic, jealous, quick to blame others for its own sake. Not pointing fingers here mind you, just musing about how it usually goes and where these exclusionary rumours & random stereotypes typically stem from.
So ironically, I think it’s not the zelly selfishness but the opposite that’s the problem here: People see an aura that doesn’t directly benefit them > they blame the zelly & Fatshark rather than try to figure out the indirect benefits instead. So I believe adding a team buff like say, +1.5-2.5% to the base toughness from melee kill (base 5% → 7.5%), or +10-20% dodge recovery rate etc. would be enough and benefit everyone.
The “Bolstering” Aura definitely needs to be VERY specific about what buffs it provides to different Auras, I do agree. I say that because 6% Survivalist is extremely broken even if it is only with Coherency… maybe Survivalist could only brought up to either 1.5% or 2% instead?
Loner, however, needs to be gutted and replaced with something else entirely because it is absolutely rotten to the core. I am unmoving on this one.
The usefulness brought by loner is really minuscule even in the situations that you listed, especially considering how much mobility, TDR and immediate toughness regeneration the zealot has at his disposal.
as for loner, its fine, but it should have a consequence, not just a benefit
loner should allow you to retain coherency auras for roughly 15 seconds.
The idea of “leave the group, get behind enemy lines, then come back” is what is implied by the descriptions and penances - therefore the “come back” part should be enforced.
What if the cost of it being the worst aura for the Zealot himself is also a factor already? I agree though it should be a +1 to coherency for everyone with the same maximum of 4. It wouldn’t be veru useful but it would at least fit the aura mold. Rename it Emperor’s Council or something Zealoty.
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