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Eclipse Arc, or: I'm getting paid to be alone on a space station, so I'm playing VRMMOs

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Boy, luck is tricky to figure out. We seem to have ended up with a real mixed bag of abiltiies, and no way to know what we might be missing out on. This game should hire more staff to work on its documentation!

Felixar: I think people will be happy with Predator, not sure if/how Flameheart might fit with the rest of the build though.
Eclipse Orphan: getting the Astral Mage passive is nice, and then the two core nodes are very plant elf, but are they ones we can work with?
Gun Archivist: the overall traits both seem cool, the specific skill trees maybe a bit less so?
Personal: Perception seems good, Mining is less exciting but I guess works if we want to get into production?
 
Wow. Ok, a lot to process here.

The core node graphic:
The core node artwork is really neat, and there's actually some implied information from the aesthetics of the core node.
- The colours of the central gem: We have gray, green, blue, purple and orange. Rarity colours, I presume.
- The colours of the Hands: Red, Yellow and Blue. Anybody able to figure out what they mean?
- Number of Hands: There are presumably, a maximum of 8 trees per core node. Though there's space remaining inside the gem if the intention is to leave room for something there, and more room in the surrounding.

The build:

So our fighting build is...
Flameclawed, blade-wielding, astral, druidic, farsighted, close-quarters, autoshooting, stealthed, situational-tank, ambush predator.

With our exploration/crafting abilities
Woodshaping, Mining, Herbalism.

Let's see if we can pick a direction.

Felixar core nodes:
Right away, we have a legendary(?) and a common(?).
- We can't reroll the legendary, so now we have no choice but be firecatfox.
- The common core node improves on the Felixar's racial passive, so I'm content to leave it.

Eclipsed Orphan Passive:
Yesss, Stellar Tap from Astral Mage!

Eclpised Orphan Core Nodes:
We got Hicys/Tranquil Village core nodes.

- Druidic Training: I have no idea if woodshaping is a crafting ability or a combat ability. Really, this core node just doesn't mesh very well.
- Floramancy: Not sure if the barkblade is a floating sword or normal sword. If it's a floating sword, then great! It'll go along nicely with our floating gun. If we need to hold it.... we can't hold it. Not only do we have no thumbs, but our claws are on fire. We could hold it in our mouth... but our bite might do more damage since it's on fire too.

It's notable that these are blue and purple. Rare(?) and Epic(?). A reroll here could get us Noble Scion/Astral Mage core nodes instead. I would happily argue for a reroll, except that these two core nodes complement each other quite well. With mutually complementary skills being so rare in our build already, there's something to say for leaving these two as they are.

Gun Archivist:
- Thank fuck for Steel Halo. Something solid we can use as is, that isn't mutually screwy with anything else!
- Close-quarters gunplay wasn't the style I originally imagined, but it's solid, and the skill trees seem usable at any range.

Personal:
- It's mining. I've got nothing against it, it's a reasonable exploration skill if we ever do the space exploration route. But like, well, I bet we could have picked it up in a side quest somewhere.
- Perception is great. Farsighted close-quarters combatant is silly as hell, but silly or not it's still good. I want it.

Luck:
Damn it, I wrote all this to try and find something to re-roll, so we could concentrate on a sensible build. But now I've argued myself into not re-rolling anything.
 
Curtains said:
Felixar core nodes:
Right away, we have a legendary(?) and a common(?).
- We can't reroll the legendary, so now we have no choice but be firecatfox.
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Oh, I read it as "you can reroll it but it will always give you one of the Felixar legendary core nodes", rather than "it's locked to Flameheart in particular". Not sure on a re-read, you might be right.

notthepenguins said:
The Legendary Core Node for Felixar is [LOCKED] to one of the Felixar Legendary Core Nodes, and will never produce an upgraded version of another Felixar Core node. All Felixar Legendary Core Nodes provide distinct visual aesthetics.
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Curtains said:
- Druidic Training: I have no idea if woodshaping is a crafting ability or a combat ability. Really, this core node just doesn't mesh very well.
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Woodshaping is crafting, though it could be used in combat for some utility. It's a kind of nature magic middle ground between a full-on architectural carpentry skill and smaller-scale woodworking. Growing things into shape with magic rather than cutting.

Curtains said:
- Floramancy: Not sure if the barkblade is a floating sword or normal sword. If it's a floating sword, then great! It'll go along nicely with our floating gun. If we need to hold it.... we can't hold it. Not only do we have no thumbs, but our claws are on fire. We could hold it in our mouth... but our bite might do more damage since it's on fire too.
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The fire is controllable, you're not gonna like, light everything you touch on fire. If it's active it is a fire hazard, of course.

Barkblade is a normal sword, though you could conjure it and make it a [Bonded Weapon]. It doesn't actually need to be a sword, though; any standard-complexity melee weapon is valid.

Also you do have thumbs! They're just clumsy. You can open doors, but you're not assembling a PC anytime this century.

Ripley said:
Oh, I read it as "you can reroll it but it will always give you one of the Felixar legendary core nodes", rather than "it's locked to Flameheart in particular". Not sure on a re-read, you might be right.
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Nah, you're right. There are other Legendary Felixar Core Node options, and you will always roll one of those rather than, say, a version of Natural Predator bumped up in rarity (which can happen with sub-Legendary rarities, though it's relatively unlikely). They all have their own distinct looks though; think Eevolutions. Kind of.

Edit:
Curtains said:
- The colours of the Hands: Red, Yellow and Blue. Anybody able to figure out what they mean?
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They're the overall orientation of the tree: Offensive, Utility, Defensive. Few trees are all one thing or the other, but it gives a general sense of what you're gonna find.
 
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[X] [LUCK] Spend 1 Luck on Felixar

Flameheart doesn't feel like it does very much for us right now. I'd be up for rerolling Eclipse Orphan perhaps too if anyone else is keen.
 
notthepenguins said:
Close-Quarters Gunplay
Firearms deal increased damage at close range.

Initial Trees:
Deadly Focus
Unlock: Reduces the effect of negative statuses when in combat. Affected by [Firearms] skill.
Rapid Tuning
Unlock: May take craft actions with Firearms to alter damage type. Substantially increased maintenance required while effect is active.
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This skill buffs firearms, so

notthepenguins said:
Felixar Flameheart
Natural weapon attacks gain the Fire trait.
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What if
we set
our arms on fire.
 
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Looks at Fireheart, Bonded Weapon and Close Quarters Gunplay

Flamethrowers count as a close quarter firearm, right?

BRING THE HEAVY FLAMER!

Some types of wood make a lot of smoke, even without leaves, with those and some fire we could make smoke grenades, probably, or make some kind of multiuse abomination that makes smoke screens too.

Herbalism = We can add plant toxins to some ammo, probably.
 
With Bonded Weapon and Close Quarters Gunplay, Fireheart's improved natural weapons might be a bit more synergistic than it seems at first glance; if we bond with a shotgun or smg or whatever, well, we were getting close and personal anyways no? And Reactive Strikes makes it so we can focus on the fight rather than having to micromanage our gun as well. Or just be a gun-mage. That is something we can do with this setup.
 
[x] [LUCK] Do not spend Luck.

Ehh. The only one worth changing is maybe Mining, and I like perception enough not to bother.

Also prefer Environmental Absorption, Reactive Strikes, Deadly Focus, and Danger sense in terms of initial trees to develop.
 
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I have to say, I'm both pleased with how willing and interested you guys are to roll with what you've got, and mildly confused at the lack of desire to reroll and see what else comes up.

I'm not sure whether that means I did a good or bad job?
 
Something you did quite well: I feel like the main character's thoughts and feelings really reflected the process we went through of voting and discussion that lead to her choices. I really liked that. She quickly dismissed things that we quickly dismissed, and thought hard about things that were close. So, it feels like we're building who she is and how she thinks and what she wants collectively, all together, even including those who wanted something different. All of that went into the story. I think that's really neat and satisfying.

The work you put into the graphics is also definitely cool. I haven't had the time to try to pick it apart and figure it all out myself as much as some others have, but it's a neat element. It definitely adds to things.

---

Regarding our rolls and choices:

Felixar stuff - I'm neutral about Flameheart. I think it could be neat, and I'm not against it, but I'm also not especially attached to it. On the other hand, I don't feel that a reroll would necessarily produce something I'd like any better, so I feel like leaving well enough alone, especially since - I like natural predator, and I wouldn't want to risk losing it.

Eclipsed Orphan stuff - I'm not that crazy about anything that rolled here. This is where I would spend luck if I were going to do so... *but*, I think it's a great reflection of why some of us (including me) wanted this combination - it's part of a compromise that lets people who didn't like our species / profession choice get some of what they want, which these options *really* do. And it's not like I hate them or anything, they're neat enough and could be fun. So I'm not going to vote to roll it away unless that's what our Hicys / Astral Mage / Noble Scion people want. If enough of those folks chime in saying they *want* to reroll this between now and my bedtime, I'll change my vote.

Gun archivist stuff - There's no reason I'd want to reroll this. Steel Halo is locked and clearly required for our species/class combination (and I'm quite pleased with it). Close-Quarters Gunplay I'm *thrilled* with, because I wanted a close-up combat character to begin with, this makes me very happy.

Personal - Neutral about mining. I can see the utility and it could be fun, but I'm also not that interested in it for us. I might consider a reroll, but I'll second what others have said: I'm unwilling to risk losing Perception, which will be great for us. Farsight is good - it will help balance us and make us effective at both long and short ranges, so we can do whatever works best per the situation (and I think it's fun to have a balanced gun-using character that is good both close-up and at long distances); we'll also be able to detect threats and targets from further away. It makes thematic sense for both our class and species. Danger sense does, too.

---

One other thing that I can comment on about what I see playing out with the luck votes for both myself and others: If we get an option we really like/want, it looks like we're unwilling to reroll a set of two options if it risks that option, especially if we're at least neutral about the second option. Which... makes sense to me. I also personally tend to be a little risk-averse and am more likely to stick with presented options unless I have a particularly strong preference for a change.

More broadly, I think you're doing a good job! I think you actually have the balance about right. Yes, the options are interesting enough that we may be disinclined to reroll, but also, they're such that we all seem to be able to see reasons why you might *want* to reroll: You're making us think about it. That feels about right.

[X] [LUCK] Do not spend Luck.
 
The Gun Archivist trees are basically perfect for branching out (specifically the auto-telegun), Firefox gives us a cool branch in fire magic or melee, the Eclipsed Orphan gacha spat out two things that seem like they pair VERY WELL with each other (and is yet another branch), and as pretty much everyone pointed out Mining is Meh, but Perception is likely very good as a stealthy gun user.

Honestly, I'm closest to rerolling Eclipse Orphan for potential Astral Mage stuff, but the combo we got is something highly unlikely to be replicated, and there is the possibility of prying a few more of its skill trees in the future anyway yes?
If I could reroll only Mining I'd put more thought into it, but well...

[X] [LUCK] Do not spend Luck.

Overall, we're a bit all over the place, but we have skills that make being a bit all over the place more viable right out of the box.

EDIT: By the way, given the flavor text for Steel Halo, and the name of the 'One Thousand Shining Points' tree... This is totally the 'hey man, wanna see my gun collection?' tree isn't it? Just mere speculation.
 
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notthepenguins said:
I have to say, I'm both pleased with how willing and interested you guys are to roll with what you've got, and mildly confused at the lack of desire to reroll and see what else comes up.

I'm not sure whether that means I did a good or bad job?
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You did good. Enough of the results that came up were interesting enough that for most people, it seems anything they don't like is outweighed by what they do. Like, the only one I would actually change is mining and perception more than makes up for it. When roughly half of the players don't get the option they were aiming for and still end up satisfied enough to not try and play around with the build it means the quest mechanics work and that your CC was a success.
 
Nemonole said:
EDIT: By the way, given the flavor text for Steel Halo, and the name of the 'One Thousand Shining Points' tree... This is totally the 'hey man, wanna see my gun collection?' tree isn't it? Just mere speculation.
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It's not commonly used for guns actually! It's not in the Gun Archivist node listing under ordinary circumstances. More telekinetic sword stuff.

Edit: Oh, if you meant "can you expand your number of simultaneous Bonded Weapons?" yeah, you can.
 
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[X] [LUCK] Do not spend Luck.

Regarding the people who aren't thrilled by Mining, it's probably going to greatly reduce the cost for our maintenance needs from Rapid Tuning. Because we're able to find a bunch of the raw materials needed to craft the parts needed for maintenance. We might not be able to convert the raw materials into the actual maintenance parts ourselves, at least initially, but it means we can probably make trades where we give the raw materials to someone in exchange for the finished products. Rather than needing to either purchase the higher-than-base-value raw materials ourselves to trade in or just put up with someone selling those parts for an even higher price.

The fact it comes combined with Perception which definitely works with our build just reduces the desire even more. That said, regarding the Natural Weapon effects...

Can we at some point make it so our gun counts as a 'natural weapon' for us? And if so, does Rapid Tuning changing the damage types mean that we can have a gun that is always doing Fire damage and something else? Well, so long as the target isn't healed by fire damage in which case we'd definitely be making sure the fire damage boost doesn't kick in...
 
Pyro Hawk said:
Can we at some point make it so our gun counts as a 'natural weapon' for us?
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Not with the trees you currently have unlocked.

As far as the combination, you'd have to test that in game. The default state of Flameheart replaces the damage type of your natural attacks when active, but who knows how it interacts with other damage replacement effects?

To be clear, I encourage you to try to push in-game mechanics and see how things interact! Try to break things! The devs may patch or balance change particularly egregious things, but you're not going to be punished for the attempt.

I mean, unless the attempt is something really dumb like, I don't know, "hey what happens if I throw these potion ingredients together and chug it." But even that is just a death and respawn or an annoying debuff, so.
 
Burning jungle does have some synergy now that I think of it. But I'm considering rerolling the Felixar cores and trusting the Devs to make some kind of stealth common in Felixar cores, and we could always pick up a common core node somewhere else.

[X] [LUCK] Spend 1 Luck on Felixar

There's some low-hanging fruit in what steel halo counts as a bonded weapon and how the telekinesis works.

Can we sit on the weapon and telekinetically 'carry' it into the air? That's flight.

Can we designate other people's weapons? That's a disarm.

Can we designate a natural weapon? On ourselves, flight again. On others, first, stop punching yourself. Second, that poor monster is now a bludgeon.
 
Curtains said:
Can we sit on the weapon and telekinetically 'carry' it into the air? That's flight.
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If we designate a seated turret gun, maybe? I think it would be kinda slowed down by our combined weight and make us an obvious target though. This is more a self directing weapon that hovers in our general vicinity and attacks on it's own discretion than unlimited blade work style rocket swords launching across the battlefield.

Curtains said:
Can we designate other people's weapons? That's a disarm.
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No I don't think so, not often enough to be useful. It's once an hour at best after we have put some work into developing it and most enemies worth disarming are going to have more than a single weapon.

Curtains said:
Can we designate a natural weapon? On ourselves, flight again. On others, first, stop punching yourself. Second, that poor monster is now a bludgeon.
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Not really how it works if your paying attention to the description at all. This is passively directed floating weapon that follows the PC around, not a rocket sword/gun that soars across the battlefield by itself or with a rider taking potshots at distant enemies as it goes.
 
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notthepenguins said:
They entered the galactic stage when they, rather infamously, repelled a full-scale invasion from the Dirrimaz Federation, inflicting ruinous financial costs on the invaders with their mastery of illusion and trickery.
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Well we are more of a gun toting, flame imbuing, druidic Felixar hick than the illusive or tricky type. Our solution to a problem is to have our floating gun shoot at it while we drink some moonshine herbal healing water.
 
Randino Treviani said:
Well we are more of a gun toting, flame imbuing, druidic Felixar hick than the illusive or tricky type. Our solution to a problem is to have our floating gun shoot at it while we drink some moonshine herbal healing water.
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And if you want to be that, that's fine. But Curtains was rerolling Felixar based on the premise of sneakiness being common for them and not getting screwed out of stealth stuff on reroll, and well... yeah it's kinda a big part of their Deal.
 
notthepenguins said:
And if you want to be that, that's fine. But Curtains was rerolling Felixar based on the premise of sneakiness being common for them and not getting screwed out of stealth stuff on reroll, and well... yeah it's kinda a big part of their Deal.
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Which will make it funny when we rock a none stealth Felixar so hard we change the entire species reputation.

Not trying to disparage anyone's reason for voting, just making my counter argument that this build is just as fun none stealth. Honestly wasn't expecting such an entertaining build from the vote option I was least interested in. Another win on your end for amazing quest design.
 
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