suggestions

The last time Ender added weapons and armors, those were designed and suggested by Rene and Myriad. They were working on a new block formula to add new shields but then Rene retired and all that work was gone.

So, we can continue that work to add new shields or we can just suggest new weapons, which would be the easiest option to implement.

I want to hear your opinions and feel free to suggest names, damage and required stats.

New weapon idea is great but I think we need new shields more that new weapons (in my opinion)

But I'm all for anything that will help higher levels to progress further

A new wep would make most sense IMO maybe similar stats to TA but with higher str requirement, the problem with shield is if you are going to increase the block cap of 70 percent then it would make a lot of tourneys pretty obsolete which maybe isn't a bad trade off or you could increase the absorb I guess instead, but since most high levels have around 600 dex and the highest shield has dex requirement of 400 it does seem as though there should be a higher one.

Shields could probably use a full rework. Most dex builds massively overshoot the 70% block cap while using a shield which weakens them substantially compared to Bal/Str bots that can get the full benefit from the shield (in some cases reaching 70% block cap) while having access to better armor.

Here is my suggestion of the stats for new dex and balanced weapons (feel free to purpose new weapon's names).

Dex Weapons       | STR | DEX | min-max |
shadow enforcer   | 294 | 496 | 204-516 |
blood crescent    | 314 | 540 | 219-554 |
total annihilator | 336 | 590 | 235-595 |
*new dex weapon 1 | 360 | 646 | 252-639 |
*new dex weapon 2 | 386 | 708 | 270-686 |

Balanced Weapons  | STR | DEX | min-max |
raven claw        | 482 | 468 | 262-458 |
emerald katana    | 506 | 508 | 279-489 |
ruby katana       | 536 | 546 | 296-515 |
*new bal weapon 1 | 560 | 582 | 314-542 |
*new bal weapon 2 | 586 | 614 | 332-567 |

Yeah I like it, and so does TheCause :D

On a serious note this would help loads as it would speed up current trains and make Ultra X and Scorpion realistic choices, whilst having something to aim for in the last Dex wep instead of just pumping con for the sake of it and a little dex for keeping 70 block.

bump

Does anyone want to propose 4 names for the new weapons that I've proposed?

Btw, I didn't propose new str weapons because almost nobody is going for the current last str weapon and it already has a very high str requirement.

Dex weapons:

Silent Requiem | Apocalypse Blade

Balanced weapons:

Celestial Doombringer | Royal Monarch

Monarch is a shield so when I read your suggestion I associated that name with shields. Katana is a name for balanced weapons, maybe some suggestion including katana?

Windstrider katana? Idk, just coming up with names lol.

Zulfiqar, Adamantium Katana

Ultimate Nullifier, Soul Eater

Ebony Blade, Dawnbreaker, Andúril, Orcrist, Ulfberht Blade, Skofnung, Wuuthrad

Netherite works also as as material. Netherite Sword or Netherite Katana.

Vibranium, Azbantium, Unobtanium, Carbonadium, Uridium, Mithril are all suitable material names to design weapons and armor from.

Alright, we already have plenty of names to choose from.

Btw I chose the stats taking into account the progression of the last weapons in each path, that's why I included existing weapons on the table. I think it could be balanced this way but if anyone wants to take a look and check if it could be improved feel free to do so.

The only parameters that left to be set is the price and rarity but I think that's pretty easy to do.

I wouldn't mind some STR weapons aswell, I am working on a RBH build and would be nice to have something to look forward to after that weapon :)

I'm very open to adding new gear. I'd like to have a space where I can collaborate with a few knowledgeable players so that I'm closely involved in the details of the process and have the ability to quickly iterate with players that understand the tradeoffs well. That space is probably Discord, which I'm still in the process of setting up for the game (building some game integration stuff, hence it taking longer). So I'll come back to this later.

To be honest Ender, it is really time to do something. I understand that migrating to discord is on your list and could be nice, it should be lower on your list.

You say you are open to this idea, but it feels like you are using migrating to discord as an excuse to not implement new weapons. If you really want to implement new weapons just form a group and talk about it on an IRC channel, more of us can have irc always online and can read back. Hence, you could just make a personal discord for the time being. Or just make a forum tread. Multiple options to just do this instead of waiting on another point is done.

I agree with Peet. Doing a specific discord channel to talk about this is easy and would make adding new content to the game quicker.

Although I would enjoy seeing new high-level weapons, in the grand scheme of the game, that would only benefit a very minute number of bots. Only 100 bots above the level 300 mark, and only about 130or 140 if you include the 300s, add in the 250s+ and your number is higher, but still a fraction of the bots that are in the game. Where the majority of the player base is 150 and below, adding high-level weapons to the game does seem to only benefit a very small minority.

That minority is probably 50% of the playerbase :)

^^ Good point

The reason I stopped leveling because I equiped TA and after that there is nothing more just another level =[

That minority is probably 50% of the playerbase :)

Would disagree with you based on clan race. Not a lot of those players scoring at lvl 350.

The reason I stopped leveling because I equiped TA and after that there is nothing more just another level =[

Would say this is likely the main reason a lot of people stop leveling. It is rough when all you have to look forward to is 4 more con or maybe 3 con 1 dex.

you are using migrating to discord as an excuse to not implement new weapons

Definitely not my intention! You can take what I say at face value, so "I'm very open to adding new gear" means exactly that. To give a bit more insight into how I think about bots4 stuff, I'm generally optimizing for the long-term, not getting things done as fast as possible. You're right that I could create a throwaway Discord server right now, send links in bmails to a few folks, and call it a day. What I'd like though is a proper Discord server that's thought-out, has in-game integrations, and has the right structure for getting player feedback not on just this idea but others in the future that would benefit from a space different than these forums.

that would only benefit a very minute number of bots

I hear you on this. This is one of the reasons I've focused mainly on QoL and bug fixes this year - trying to benefit as many players as possible. That said, I still want to carve out time for more niche stuff as long as the effort can be reasonably time-boxed (the majority of the effort with new gear is balancing, and I'm hoping a second/third/fourth/etc. set of eyes will help spread the load). In the long run, I don't think it's a zero sum game, but I acknowledge that some updates should be prioritized over others.