Soul Mantle

Just a thing, but i the way that the soul mantle armor works is when ever you place a totem it counts as its you killed it. i thin that when you "replace" a totem it shouldn't give you a curse. it states that when a totme "dies" you get a random level 20 curse. but, the fact of replacing a totem i dont think sould count as killing it, thus giving you a curse.

Point of the story, chaang soul mantle armor so that replacing a totem does NOT give you a curse.

i play maps with friends and when we are running the map we are constantly moving. so, the simple act of casting a new totem mean that i get a new lvl 20 curse every few seconds. i understand that this was the intent to an extent but i don thting that having a constant 5 curses on a player at a given time was the overall intent.

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GooberFH wrote:

but i don thting that having a constant 5 curses on a player at a given time was the overall intent.

Yup, pretty much.

I was worried that replacement/expiry wouldn't trigger the curse and asked for clarification because that'd allow you to bypass the drawback too easily. As a possible "fix" if it didn't, I suggested that it could trigger a curse on cast instead of on death, but that would have been a bit rougher on folk. Fortunately, it works on death/expiry/replacement.. ;)

Nice to see you're using it in maps though.. folk seem pretty divided on its viability there.

Its simple. invest in potions that match your character ;)

Just out of curiosity - why Enfeeble was included in the list of curses? Basically, without it there is the obvious positive side (+50% damage from the 3rd totem) and the obvious payment for it (general weakness from all the curses). On the other hand, as it is now you are supposed to have Enfeeble on most of the time, which gives -33% damage, thus exactly negating the positive effect from the 3rd totem.

Was that an intended effect (so the only good side should be from the "virtual 7-linked totem" feature) or it was a minor oversight that would probably stay this way for consistency now?

I wouldn't mind running with all the other curses combined all the time (even as a constant effect - why not?), but completely nullifying the damage from the third totem is a huge turn-off for me.

Of course, if it's an intended effect, no problem - diamond supporters certainly deserve to implement what they like. Still, I keep hoping somewhere deep inside it was an oversight :)

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Mark_GGG wrote:

Because it was all the curses, not 'all curses bar enfeeble because some players dislike that one more'.

Hey, hey, no offence was, obviously, intended, I was just asking a question and even worded it as politely as possible trying not to offend, even accidentally - but feel that I failed at that somehow :) The question was mostly to Durentis himself, as the wording and the idea was, probably, his.

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Mark_GGG wrote:

No, you're supposed to keep the totems alive as long as possible so you're not cursed as often, as a trade-off for having more of them. You can certainly play in such a way that you get new curses often enough that that particular one is up most of the time, but you don't have to.

Keeping totems alive includes not repositioning them as much as possible, so not moving much through the map while other people are running ahead non-stop :) So, you are strongly motivated to play alone and lure monsters to your rarely repositioned totems. Which is very different from being extremely careful about not dying (for any combination of other curses), but moving with other players.

As I said before, if it's intentional - that's great, of course. If it was an unintended and/or unforeseen side effect - well, maybe someone would find some way to mitigate it, that's all. From your answer I see that it's been thought through and fully intended to be like this - cool then! :)

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EpicFail42 wrote:

Keeping totems alive includes not repositioning them as much as possible, so not moving much through the map while other people are running ahead non-stop :) So, you are strongly motivated to play alone and lure monsters to your rarely repositioned totems. Which is very different from being extremely careful about not dying (for any combination of other curses), but moving with other players.

Many parties reportedly race through areas unreasonably(?) quickly, often even leaving valuables behind so I wouldn't say the drawback of your being forced to reposition totems quickly is necessarily a problem with the unique. More a problem in the way the party chooses to move given your build. Though I can't really speak from experience here, perhaps it's more of an issue than I think it.

I think having to place totems well (and so not having to reposition them so frequently) and/or otherwise managing the curses is part of what makes the unique interesting. (And what makes the drawback so effective.)

I definitely feel that the curses need to happen on replacement and expiry as well as death because otherwise the drawback could be too easily avoided entirely.

And I don't have any problem with Enfeeble being applied. As Mark says, there are still other benefits beyond damage. Even just splitting the damage source/type is a big bonus. (Just had this thought, but say, one totem of each element with Elemental Equilibrium and Proliferation? Hrm..)

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Mark_GGG wrote:

No, that idea was mine, Durentis signed off on it (or so I am told - Qarl was between us in this process, I did not talk to him directly). I suspect you'd have liked most of his ideas a lot less, as they tended to be much harsher and affect other party members as well (at least the ones I heard about). We were concerned about the griefing possibilities, although we agreed with him it should be a significant penalty, as the extra totem si a very big upside, and we worked with him to find something that fit both our desires for what we wanted in the game and his vision of the item. I certainly hope he's happy with the end result.

Yes, I very much like both the end result and the design process as a whole - you guys are awesome. The random curses capture, in some ways, the general theme I was initially after better than how I had hoped to do it. And at least this way there's no chance for griefing, which I think most everyone will agree is a good thing.

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My early drawback ideas, for those interested:

• Periodic minor damage of random type to self and allies enough to be annoying and disrupt shield regeneration, but not too lethal. --This, as Mark and others have pointed out had some serious issues. It captures what I had in mind, but in a bad way.
• One or more curses (Vulnerability, Temporal Chains, ...) as a permanent Aura centered on the wearer of Soul Mantle. --Better, as the unique doesn't deal damage to other players itself, but still somewhat open to griefing. I still think the party dynamic of having to stay out of range or manage LoS would have been interesting but, realistically, most likely the wearer of Soul Mantle would, in fact, just be kicked from most parties.
• Random curse on cast. --This was after Mark's suggestion for random curse on death just in case replacement/exipiry didn't count as death and making it work with replacement/expiry wasn't trivial. Much harsher than the end result though, since it front-loads the curses. More of a what-if.

That said, from my perspective everything I think about Soul Mantle is just "in theory" or "as it fits the theme I had in mind". I haven't been able to test/play with it at all yet so I have no practical experience with it. Still hoping for a drop or the price to come down (doesn't help that I play in HC). One of these days.. but, in the meantime, I'm sure others will come up with some fun builds around Soul Mantle if there aren't any already.

Anyway, not a bug. Just a bit derentis. ;)