almost 5 years ago - Pagan: Absent Gods - Direct link

Transcript (by Youtube)


7s Greetings, Pagans.
8s As some of you Discord folks already know, my name is Tanaram
10s and I am a game designer for Pagan Online.
12s Welcome to another DevLog - Devlog 4.
17s Okay so let's talk a little bit about the current state of the game
20s and more importantly, about the state of our favorite heroes.
25s As many of you know, Dameer is actually notorious for being one of the few heroes
30s who can manage in the post-campaign missions,
32s and achieve these missions without any hardships.
35s This issue is two-fold.
37s The first factor concerns the fact that we have some misplaced difficulty spikes in our game.
43s The other factor concerns the fact that Dameer is not actually working as intended.
47s So regarding Dameer's damage, the nerf we introduced in patch 0.4.0. as well as in previous patches,
53s won't actually affect your gameplay that much.
55s You may have noticed this when you were playing Dameer.
58s The reason behind this is that Dameer's power comes from a bug that we were just recently able to unearth.
64s In fact, Vavvan used to benefit from gear every time you equipped something else.
69s So you get exponentially more damage and end up with a character 100 times stronger than any other character
76s and even than Dameer himself.
78s This is not something that we intended.
80s This kind of lack of control - both on our side, as designers, and on your side, as players
84s is something that we definitely want to avoid.
87s We want you to be really powerful and OP
89s for reasons that have to do with your build and the way that you designed your character
96s not because of some back-end bug that you can't control.
99s However when it comes to balancing, making Dameer on par with other characters just won't cut it.
104s We will have to make all characters, including Dameer, both fun and fulfilling
109s as much as Vavvan's broken shenanigans once did
111s just without the broken part.
113s So while we do have a lot of plans...
115s while we do plan on implementing a complex and meaningful skill tree
119s redesigning items and stats that you can use with these items
122s we won't let you guys fend for yourselves and just for us to implement all of these features.
127s We want you to know that we are committed to adjusting the game and changing the game
131s so you can play it right now without having to wait a long time to get on with your characters.
136s Which brings us to another issue
137s and that is difficulty scaling.
140s Everybody loves beating the impossible.
142s Except when you actually get to beat it.
144s We are aware that our difficulties are a little bit misplaced.
147s They are making a lot of issues for all of our newcomers.
151s This is not something that we intended
153s and we could have just nerfed the whole difficulty settings across the whole board
157s but we have a few reasons that we didn't do this in this patch.
161s Regarding this issue, we wanted to do something more for you.
163s We wanted to make difficulty appropriate for different player goals.
167s For example, if you want to just unlock all the characters and level them up
171s there should be no difficulty that stands in your way.
174s However, if you really want to test your mettle and prove that you have the best gear in all the land of Rod
179s it should require some effort, skill and time.
182s This is the main reason why we didn't simply nerf all of the difficulties.
185s We wanted to make them more meaningful and more rewarding for different player goals.
190s However, we do realize that this is a really big issue for some of you guys.
194s and we will try to ease your pain a little as early as the next patch.
199s Finally, we've implemented the big change to the way you unlock heroes.
202s We've implemented hero souls that actually let you choose the hero that you want to unlock
206s and in the order that you prefer.
208s This is only the first iteration though.
210s We plan to give you guys a lot of different ways to unlock heroes
214s but for now, this is what we're sticking with.
216s I know this change won't affect veteran players as much, and people who have hundreds of hours in Pagan Online
222s but I think we can all be excited for our newcomers.
228s Many of you are impatient for new content and rightfully so
231s smashing new foes and overcoming new challenges are the main reasons we enjoy video games in the first place
237s New acts and missions are already underway in Pagan Online.
240s Most of the story is actually in the final development stages, and some of it is in the testing phases.
246s However, for each day that brings us closer to full launch, we have less and less room for error
250s especially with big changes such as content updates.
254s This is why it takes us a bit more time to iron out all of these production wrinkles when it comes to new enemies, new zones and story arcs.
262s But that being said, we do expect to bring new content to you guys in over the next few months.
268s As the campaign acts come to a close, we will actually be approaching the real endgame for Pagan Online.
273s This is why we’re developing different End Game loops in parallel with our story and campaign acts.
281s While most of these systems are already designed, our tech team is left with the really difficult task
287s of implementing all these systems without burning everything else down.
293s To give you just a taste of what’s to come, we expect to implement in new ways of mixing and matching items with different items properties
299s of level up and adding your skill points as well as gaining them
302s as well as gaining new legendary power for your legendary gear.
307s This is all meant to come alongside new zones and new enemies in future patches.
313s We’re super-happy that the legendary overhaul was meaningful to you guys and that you managed to put all of this gear to awesome new uses.
321s We will definitely keep on tweaking legendaries, especially the non-weapon items
325s so they can fit both in your legendary set, as well as your mish-mash of epics and legendaries builds
331s Legendary amulets and rings are also in the works,
334s and while our artists work on conjuring all of these items you will be proud to call a part of your inventory screenshots
340s we aim to design them in a way that will fit well with the rest of legendary items.
350s Our most important goal with Pagan Online is to make a game that’s about improving yourself
354s staying quick on your feet and sharp in your decision-making.
357s We’ve never wanted to make a game that’s about clicking a bottom to reforge
361s or about meaningless grind.
363s This is why we’re super grateful to you guys for staying with us and sticking with us
368s while we move away from this repetitiveness and get closer to our goal.
371s This would not be possible without your extensive and insightful feedback
374s so we’re committed to improving the game
376s until each and every system in it makes you feel really good about spending time with us.
381s Until next time! See you on the Pantheon.