Game Mechanics Aerialist - Parry Replacement/Revamp (plus another new ability)

To start, thank you to @ChrisWildfire for offering lots of help and encouragement in making these new abilities and their visuals. Thank you, my brobot.
Onto the actual suggestion...

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Hi, I'm Elysium and I have some suggestions to revamp and replace the Acrobat ability "Parry". Parry gives you a short damage buff whenever you dodge an attack with Agility. It also makes the next spell cast within 1.5s free of any mana cost. While this might seem pretty strong, it, well, isn't. There are a few issues with the ability, which I will list here:

• It requires you to invest in Agility to get any use out of it. Many builds are completely locked out of this ability for no reason.
• It isn't worth the AP cost. Most Acrobat builds I see totally skip Parry simply because it isn't worth taking compared to, say, Sticky Bomb or Blazing Powder.
• It isn't worthy of being a purple node. Something much more useful could take the place of this ability, something that makes you want to invest in it.

Because of the reasons stated above, me and @ChrisWildfire have devised a replacement for this purple node (and another new ability) to help fill in the gap in Acrobat's tree that is Parry.

Aerialist

my beloved

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How does it work?

Edit: It’s meant to have only 20% cost reductions. My bad.

Once you are airborne for at least 3s, you will gain a semi-permanent buff to both your damage and your mana cost reductions. This will encourage staying airborne for both mid-level Acrobats and endgame players, helping further create Acrobat's intended playstyle of soaring above your enemies to swiftly and seamlessly destroy them.
When you get hit, Aerialist's buff will be sacrificed to completely mitigate the damage dealt to you.

Note: You do not have to touch the ground again to restart your buff, as that would be quite counter-intuitive. Blocking an attack with Aerialist will simply reset the timer, so in 3s the buff will return.

Why should this be added?

I've already explained why Parry is not the best ability it could be, and I will list some reasons why Aerialist would be a good replacement.

• It will encourage staying airborne by rewarding you for soaring the skies.
• It will give Acrobat a bit of extra damage, which is good as the archetype has a relatively low base damage output compared to other archetypes.
• It will help lower the mana regen requirement to fly sustainably, allowing for more *build diversity*.
• It will help make gameplay more engaging.

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Earlier in this post, I mentioned another new ability that will correspond with the new Aerialist. Here it is!

Cloudburst

also my beloved

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How does it work?

After being airborne for at least 3s, casting Smoke Bomb will transfer the energy to your Jasmine Bloom, making it rapidly deal 8 hits to enemies it its range. This range extends vertically along with horizontally, so any opponent in the range of your Jasmine Bloom can also be damaged by a cloudburst.

Notes: Triggering a cloudburst will replace your Smoke Bomb entirely. However, casting Smoke Bomb during the cooldown will throw a bomb as usual.

Also, since the damage is dealt rapidly over 0.8 seconds, it will effectively trigger Weightless's mana gain.

Why should this be added?

• It gives more player interaction and engagement with Aerialist's buff and Cloudburst's cooldown.
• It gives a special use for Smoke Bomb specifically for Acrobat. Currently, Shadestepper and Trickster all have important uses for Smoke Bomb that tie into their playstyles (Marked and Delirious Gas), while Acrobat does not. I mean, Wall of Smoke exists, but it is small enough to not be considered an important node. There's really no reason to cast Smoke Bomb except for the extra mana from Weightless, not to mention that it is very difficult to use against bosses like The Nameless that are in constant motion.
• It's cool as hell.

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The end

That's it for this suggestion. Tell me what you think in the replies and let me know if there's anything you think I should change or fix! Also, remember to vote in the poll. I always forget, so...

Thank you for reading, and I hope you have a great day/night!

 

I am a based shadestepper enthusiast and not an acrobat fan but

neat suggestion. yet another banging thread

 

Thank you!

Edit: Also, thanks for adding this post to your signature, it means a lot.

 

Hate to always be playing Devil's Advocate on this kind of stuff but- I'm just going to throw out some thoughts from reading this

-Aerlialist
Aside from the fact that -30% spell cost is. A lot- this is for the most part just free stats, with a free holy mantle to go along with it, and I really don't think that was the full design philosophy behind Parry. I tend to compare it to Counter on Battle Monk, get some extra damage out for being hit and preserving some of your resources from it. Just as an emergency. It doesn't seem like it was meant to have a passive nature to it.
Parry as it is could probably just have the agility req removed, and some kind of resistance buff tacked on, because deflecting an attack probably makes sense for a parry.

-Cloudburst
You remember that time you asked Shurikens to activate life steal/mana steal, since it was activated with melee? I feel like I could attribute that here.
Smoke bomb's integration into Acrobat feels fine as it is, with the (as you already stated) synergy between Wall of Smoke/Weightless shoveling mana into your mouth (and sticky bombs is just an awesome perk, which solves about every issue Smoke bomb normally has).

-what was I saying again?
Right. Shurikens. The gimmick of having Shurikens replace your melee attack doesn't truly incorporate melee into Acrobat, and you suggesting adding life/mana steal to them could have possibly worked to remediate that. Likewise- having Cloudburst activate by replacing your Smoke bomb doesn't actually incorporate it into Acrobat outside of making you need to cast it. The actual Smoke bomb has been removed, and doesn't really address the ability itself. If there were some gimmick to make Smoke bombs stronger/larger with more Jasmine Bloom stacks, it could be more properly integrated (and again fix the DPS cope problem with Acrobat).

In short. I, regrettably, don't really like either of these. I feel like they fix some of the issues with Acrobat by replacing them rather than rebalancing them to better fit Acrobat.
(Also, play Weathered Acrobat like me! It's good, you have to trust me!)

 

Thanks for the big reply! Weathered is my favorite weapon with Acrobat, too. I’ve wanted it since I started playing Wynncraft and I’m so glad I have it. Surprisingly strong, with lots of mobility and survivability.

First, I would like to mention that the goal of this post was indeed to replace Parry, not change it slightly to make it better. That might explain why Aerialist is so vastly different than Parry.
The spell cost reduction was meant to be -20%, my mistake. It’s still a lot, but a bit less overpowered.
Aerialist is a rather passive ability, which is why I added Cloudburst so that you can use that buff as a bit of a resource instead of just another stat buff. Not as much important as, say, Arcanist’s mana bank, but a bit more interactive.
I definitely like the idea of a counterattack ability for Acrobat, but I don’t think Parry fit this role as well as Battle Monk’s counter does. It just isn’t strong enough to be a purple node, IMO.

You are definitely right about Cloudburst not being a true integration for Smoke Bomb. I never really thought of it that way. I just want it to do more than throw three bombs, yknow? Despite Cloudburst not really being a smoke bomb, it makes the spell do something more interesting than just the default ability, and adds something new to the table that isn’t a passive stat buff.

Anyway, thank you for the feedback!
weathered supremacy!!!

 

ChristWildfire and Elysium try not to collaborate on a post challenge (Impossible)

Banger suggestion as always, make acrobat epic or else.

 

i think that flying isnt that hard as acrobat so this would jsut be a free 20% dmg buff and easier mana sustain(acrobat does not need that lo), prob only a problem in tna because u can jusrt avoid getting hit dfurignt the boss lo
and if u get hit too often bc of a ranged mob or smth it leads tot he issue of it never being active
i do agree that parry is kinda goofy rn, esp since it only works if your build has agi

 

acro loving side speaking: YES PLS GIVE ME THESE DEATH ABILITIES

rational side: uhh too overpowered. with the overflux of mythics nowadays, my averagr oblivion build with no crafteds or mythic boots can shred lootruns with just a decent amount of sustain and tank boons and although aerialist would be a helpful buff to acro sustain, cloudburst would make acrobat do waayyy too much damage. or maybe im just overestimating that number

good post though

 

ok i just had a minor suggestion for this suggestion: it would be nice if you put the ability desc you were talking about replacing so it'd be more convenient for people reading the thread.

but i'll put it here rn cuz i just brought it up:

 

This looks super cool and very well thought-out. I'm curious whether dodging an attack with agility would count as "getting hit" for the purposes of Aerialist. If it doesn't, then I think it's cool that the replacement ability for Parry still interacts with Agi in a way that rewards it. But yeah the new ability's design looks really good, because it now rewards non-agi builds and Acro is an archetype that often doesn't even need agi (or defense) investment due to being able to naturally avoid most attacks.

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Numbers of course can always be tweaked for balance purposes, but concept-wise this looks phenomenal!

 

That’s a good idea!

 

Yes, getting enough sustain can be fairly easy build-wise. The purpose of Aerialist’s mana cost reduction is not to help with flying, but to lower the minimum amount of mana regeneration you need to fly sustainably. You’ll be able to invest more skill points and/or items into damage or EHP instead of just mana regen.

Yeah haha I think you might be overestimating a little bit. Shurikens, for example, deal 120% damage per shuriken, for a total of 360% damage if you land all shurikens. Cloudburst would only deal 280% over ~1 second, along with a 4 second cooldown. But I’m not sure, maybe shurikens scale differently.

I’m glad you like the ideas! As a Weathered user, I would really like it if Agility counted as not getting hit for Aerialist, but on the other hand, one of the reasons we made this replacement was to get rid of the limits set by Parry. I personally think that it would be an interaction that is an extra bonus and not at all required to use the ability, which would probably be fine to include.

But yeah, thank you!

 

These are such cool abilities! A bit late to the party, but here I go:

Aerialists mana cost reduction buff would probably be my favorite of these, simply because I mostly just choose mana regen & mana cost reduction for my gear in acro builds. It would allow me to make an acro build I like to play. (Long Live Roiling Ruckus & Dexterity!)
I don't really need much of the damage boosts, but they would be nice.

Cloudburst is nice too! I only use smoke bomb to trigger flow state as normally I find it easier to use other strategies (such as pirouette dash spam), but this would make me able to use it during combat as I tend to move around a ton (and mobs follow you around. The smoke bombs don't.)

Amazing suggestion!

 

I’m glad you liked! The whole purpose of the spell cost reduction was to help make building an Acrobat less limited, so you can use more unique items in your builds without losing your sustain.

I really wish Smoke Bomb did something unique on Acrobat, as it currently doesn’t. As you said, it is also extremely difficult to consistently hit enemies with. I tried to make Cloudburst something that you could use without worrying too much about whether the enemy is moving around - as long as it’s in the range of your Jasmine Bloom, you can hit it.

Thanks for your feedback!

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who picked the last option??? (i am crying rn)

 

Hey y'all! I want to add to the post by addressing some concerns.

This is a good observation! Battle Monk's Counter and Acrobat's Parry function very similarly in that they both trigger from dodging hits with Agility. While Parry made sense in the beginning since acrobats tend towards air weapons, it has since then became less popular after players got used to acrobat's kit and realized that they can just.. not get hit at all and build full damage instead.

Assassins are squishier compared to warriors. Warriors have a lot of built-in defense that allows them to shrug off the damage they would take, and turn it to a strength! On the other hand, assassins have very little defensive capabilities, and resorts to avoiding damage instead. Even trickster, the assassin archetype with the most tank potential, tries to avoid damage with clones and debuffs.

We designed Aerialist while keeping this philosophy in mind, so it ended up looking more like Elusive, a boltslinger ability (another archetype that avoids damage instead of mitigating it).

The damage block is simply to preserve Parry's defensive aspect that comes with its Agility requirement. Although in hindsight, it might be a bit overpowered with how much it can mitigate the risk of building full damage, especially for more-skilled players. Acrobats avoiding damage through sheer mobility alone should be enough, I think.

That's a good point! But yes as Elysium stated, it's simply to make casting Smoke Bomb feel more satisfying and impactful as an acrobat.

Smoke Bomb is really good for early and mid game acrobat because of how strongly it synergizes with Weightless. However in the late game, Smoke Bomb becomes a lot less reliable not only because of the prevalence of mobile mobs *cough greg cough*, but also because of Blade Fury's crowd control (the node also needs some changes made to it honestly).

Because of Blade Fury, Smoke Bomb being stationary became it's biggest flaw for acrobats, which led to a lot of players taking Sticky Bomb (which honestly should be a 1-cost yellow node already because literally every assassin archetype takes it but I digress).

Cloudburst is an attempt to make casting Smoke Bomb more impactful for acrobats in a way that feels connected to their kit, and I think its design is a good start in making Smoke Bomb more reliable for acrobats overall!

Yeah I agree, Cloudburst's damage is pretty high. I would like it to be just a utility ability that would help acrobats trigger Weightless a lot more, instead of an ability made for dealing more damage.


But yes, thank you so much for the feedback everyone! Elysium and I appreciate them a lot!

 

It might be a bit unclear that Cloudburst deals its damage over 0.8 seconds, not instantly. This might result in the damage seeming a bit higher than it actually is. Hope that clears it up a bit!

 

bumper car

 

another bumper car

wait why does aerialist have an aoe

 

no clue

 

no idea lmfao