Part 25: Status Effects

Update – Statuses

Hello everyone! This update will cover statuses. Like a great many RPGs, the statuses in this game run the gauntlet from useless through devastatingly lethal. So I'll start with what I think are the most important ones and work my way down from there.

Bless / Curse

These two status changes are the opposite of the other, so I will cover them both at the same time. Blessing is represented by two yellow crosses with a 'B'. Curse is represented by Black inverted crosses with a 'C'.

Unlike most other statuses, these ones are stackable. I haven't observed an upper limit to how far they go. And this makes them incredibly, incredibly effective, especially when dealing with gauntlets and other long battles. So, what does it do? Well, every 'level' of Blessing inclemently improves a person's combat ability by +1. That being +1 damage (on each equipped weapon), +1 Defence (both +1 to avoid being hit, and +1 to reduction in damage), and +1 (or +5%) to hit the opponent.

Doesn't sound like a lot now, does it? Well, two things work in favour of Blessing. First is the aforementioned stacking. Two Blessings is double the bonuses. Three is Triple! And they last quite long – about 20 turns to boot. Secondly is that casters such as Art, as they advance in Levels, bestow multiple levels of Blessing per casting. So at Levels 1 through 10, it's +1 levels of Blessing. At 11 through 20 it's two. 21 through 30... three.

And when weapons deal less than 20 damage baseline, all those bonuses add up.

Now Curses on the other hand? Take everything positive I've said and make it a negative. I will gush on and on about the usefulness of Blessings to the ends of the world. I will fight with everything I can to avoid being Cursed. Negatives across the board only make your defeat come faster. Oh, and yes, to make it certain – levels of Bless and levels of Curse cancel each other out.

Slow

Wait, why am I putting Slow before Haste? It's due to the way the two are programmed. It is represented by a pink 'person' with one arrow beside them on the status screen.

I've mentioned before how AP in combat works, and the more you have, the more you you can move and act in combat. Well, when you Slow, your first thought would be that the target gets their AP halved, right? So from 4 to 2 per turn?

WRONG.

The first 'step' of Slow cancels every second turn. So in combat, the very first thing Kai-Lyss does is to move forward three steps and cast Slow Group. This means that every enemy within 10 tiles of him is going to miss their next (first!) turn. That gives every one else, except for any enemy casters that spawned a bit further back, a chance to sit back and watch as I get effectively two turns in a row.

The second layer of Slow actually does what would have seemed intuitive, reducing AP by 50%. So now you're losing both alternating turns, you're also only getting half your actions.

So yes, Slow is more powerful than Haste.

Haste

But that doesn't mean that Haste is useless. Represented by a yellow person on the status screen with three yellow arrows.

Now the thing is, Haste does exactly what you would expect it to. It doubles, then triples your AP while in combat. This is a great way to over come Slow (as one proper casting of Haste cancels a casting of Slow and visa-versa), in addition to allowing your casters multiple opportunities a turn to throw out their spells.

It can also be useful for our melee characters to allow them to run up past the defending meat shields and get to the squishy wizards.

Poison

Oh dear god poison. A green 'splotch', you need to check if the letter 'P' on the inside is in black or red. If it's black, you have some time, if it's red, you have to act!

Anyways, poison deals damage over time, and degrades of the same. When a character is poisoned – by Marsh, by Alien Blade or by spell, or any other method, a hidden ticker is added to this status. Every turn, there is a chance of that character taking some damage, and that is rarely more than 10% your maximum HP for minor Poison.

No, what makes poison so important to deal with is Major Poison. Green and Red means you are in for a world of hurt. Major Poison can deal up to 50% your maximum HP in damage, every second turn in combat, or move out of combat. Please note that this is related to the MAXIMUM HP, not the CURRENT.

The spells that 'Cure' poison, they don't. What they do is downgrade the severity of the poison, as well as reduce the hidden duration ticker. The more Intelligence on the caster the greater the change in duration.

Everything Else

Dumbfounding: This status reduces the maximum spell level a caster can throw out. Recall that there are seven levels of magic, so each application of Dumbfounding reduces that by one. Restore Mind is a Tier 3 Priest spell, so you need to keep an eye on them to prevent then from being unable to restore themselves! It will be a worry later in the game, I can tell you that.

Disease: Truth be told, I'm still not sure what this one does. It doesn't drain ones HP like poison, nor does it harm SP. If any one of you can tell me, I'll edit in here!

Fangz posted:

Disease is basically a longer term version of poison that inflicts you with random status effects instead.

Webbing: Every level of this reduces your AP by one in combat. Click on your active character with this status to cause them to use their turn to 'Clean Webbing'. Against spiders or the like, this can be an annoyance, but don't forget Webs can block LoS, and do persist over time.

rodomontade posted:

Worth mentioning how webs can actually lock the game up if you've got one character left as the monsters just continually web you over and over and either you get murdered or they can't touch you so you have to eventually force-quit the game. Happens a lot if you play with a solo character like I do.

Also, in addition to status effects, disease can actually drain a small amount of experience. Not a huge deal since it's really easy to hit the level cap, even with a full party with lots of advantages, but still annoying. I don't know how much it ends up being but it happens.

TooMuchAbstraction posted:

Something that's useful to know about webbing is that you can hit the Use key while next to a webbed tile to clear it without getting webbed. Otherwise you have to move into the webbing, get covered in gunk, and then spend a turn cleaning it off.

I can't remember if you can do this in the middle of combat, though.

(yes, you can.)

Sanctuary: This one protects the person under its effects. I've never used it, but it's supposed to prevent the enemy from targeting them and reducing area-of-effect damage in the process. Damaging the enemy voids this effect.

Envenomed: How do you know you'll deal Poison damage via your weapons? Well, this is the Status that shows you've got vile gunk on your weapons either through the Poison Use skill or the spell of the same name as this status.

And that's it. If I've missed something, it's probably because the status is so irrelevant that it has completely escaped my mind. Naturally, I'll add follow-up comments to this Update as they come in.