It just popped on my mind.
People that usually use Chaos are people that know how to dodge, right? People that have some skill.
So, would Chaos set be less viable if it had MSD on each piece? Or wouldn't have changes? I'm curious.
I know that it sounds like a suggestion, but I really would like to see the opinion of experienced players like Bopp, Fehzor, Krakob, Zeddy, Holy-Knightmare...(and the list goes).
@Bopp
Yes, I wanted to mean low on each piece. Thanks for answering.
And... with defensive posture, do you mean dodging?
This is one out of an endless amount of balance changes I thought about when the chaostostrophe first happened. It makes sense, balance-wise.
Lore-wise, one would have to explain why a piece of cloth slows you down more than standard cobalt armour, which looks a lot heavier.
Then you would in turn have to consider black kat cowl, which chaos is currently balanced with, which has msi low.
Yeah, "posture" is vague. Basically I mean the overall planning of the wearer. "Equipment strategy" might be a better phrase.
Chaos offers extremely powerful offense (compared to other armors, trinkets, etc.). So, for it to be balanced, it should offer extremely bad defense. As it stands, the defense is like this:
* The damage defense is not bad at all. It's comparable to many other armors. So Chaos could be nerfed a bit by decreasing the damage defense. But damage defense is arguably less important than...
* The status defense is pretty bad. But Chaos could be nerfed by making the status defense even worse than it is. And the penalties can be overcome with UVs, leading to Chaos that's not bad at defense at all.
Decreasing movement speed would hurt the wearer's defense in a way that's important, valued by optimizing players, and impossible to fix with UVs. If a knight wears both pieces of Chaos, then she (or he) has to devote her sprite perk to movement, just to get back to regular speed.
@Sir-Pandabear
Zeddy, it's your alt, right?(or aren't you Zeddy?! :O)
Lore-wise, one would have to explain why a piece of cloth slows you down more than standard cobalt armour, which looks a lot heavier.
Maybe we could say that its mysterious power make it heavier. The description of Chaos Cowl indicate that's it mysterious. Possibly we could use that as argument.
Then you would in turn have to consider black kat cowl, which chaos is currently balanced with, which has msi low.
On terms of balance, between taking off the MSI and reducing the damage bonus to medium, I would take off the MSI. I think that just changing the damage, people would pair Black Kat Cowl with Chaos Coat and bring back the move speed and the damage of a full Chaos set. So you would see even more clones of BKC/Chaos coat. So, taking off the MSI, people would try to hybridize BKC and Chaos with another pieces of sets.
@Bopp
Thanks for explaining :)
Lore-wise, the wearer of Chaos armor is weighed down by guilt and shame.
Lore-wise, we could always say the cloak is made of an impractically-heavy type of easily-burnable, conductive fabric.
The Chaos imbuded fabric makes this cloak harder to move about in, but can boost ones abilities.
I have discussed the possibility of taking a pair of Scissor Blades and splitting the Chaos Cloak into 3 class based armor sets.
http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/104202
While your idea does affect Chaos Cloak users it still doesn't fix the fact that it is an overpowered armor (especially in statusless floors).
Adding MSD to increased status debuffs, lack of elemental defense, and a decreased CTR/DMG would certainly make those who play it have some serious doubts.
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Lore wise Chaos Cloak should be defensive...
"A forbidden mantle said to grant the wearer protection within the nameless realm where all elements are said to converge into one and divide into all. "
"A hood of dubious origin that shrouds its wearer in both mystery and elemental protection. "
Chaos cloak doesn't have defenses SK/OOO
An almost negligible defense increase from the miracle set and a universal low status resist (with no offensive perks) would truly fit lorewise.
The real issue isn't chaos, it's unique variants and status effects. Chaos set is far more balanced than people admit, the exception being on statusless levels and those statuses that don't pose a real threat, along with unique variants providing magical stats from nowhere. None of this breaking it into three bits or giving it strange stats business, as we've already tried nerfing it several times and I've already stated my case as to why chaos is needed as a hybrid armor.
To fix chaos:
Remove elemental protection
Make each penalty to statuses a bit worse, I'm thinking around a -3 instead of -2.
Fix statuses, unique variants (UVs include bombs and their CTR issues)
Unfortunately, if we change unique variants even slightly, people will freak out, act like "Three Rings" has betrayed them, ask why they wasted so much time... but more than that, variants are one of if not the single largest crown sink in the game, which in turn means that the game would likely lose out on cash (at least in the short run) if "unique variants" were reformed into something that actually abides by the original concept of being more of a sidgrade than an upgrade.
The best move on SEGA's part would likely be to change their philosophy on armor entirely during the upcoming gunner update. Armors based around overarching concepts instead of "the stats game" could easily fix all of our armor woes. The idea being that people want for "whole package" armor sets to fill a function as opposed to minute tweaks to random stats that they can manipulate.
Imagine that all armors gave you more stats with more drawbacks, but not in the form of status weakness except in the case of glass cannon armor. As an example of what I mean by this-
Vog: (hat)
Sword speed: high
Gun speed: low
Sword damage decreased: low
Fire + shock + elemental + half a bar of piercing + normal
Vog: (armor)
Sword speed: high
Bomb ctr: low
Sword damage decreased: low
Fire + ice + elemental + half a bar of shadow + normal
Skolver: (hat)
Sword damage: high
Bomb damage: low
Sword ASI decreased: low
Ice + poison + piercing + half shadow + normal
Skolver: (armor)
Sword damage: high
Gun damage: low
Sword ASI decreased: low
Ice + fire + piercing + half elemental + normal
--------------------------------
Vog (hat) + Skolver (armor)
Sword Damage: med
Sword ASI: med
Handgun damage: low
Handgun asi: low
Ice + fire (x2) + shock + piercing (x1.5) + normal (x2) + elemental (x1.5)
The idea being that you are now prepared to be a swordsman gunner hybrid with a focus on handguns that can optionally use bombs. Since there are rarely piercing + elemental on the same level as major threats, you're slightly worse than just using a full set of one. You are no stronger offensively than you are in our current game, except for your handgun bonuses. This is important because it allows the player to branch out and have stats on another weapon type, without becoming SWORD JESUS, the goal of most players in today's game. So why make more of one armor type?
Vog (full)
Sword ASI: MAX
Sword damage: negative med
Handgun asi: low
Bomb ctr: low
Fire (2x) + shock + ice + normal (x2) + elemental (x2) + piercing/shadow (x.5)
This would represent a radically different playstyle, that focuses on fast attacks that do less damage with swords, and enables the player to use bombs and guns to a lesser effect. Chaos would allow a huge increase with these armors, but would really hit the defenses of such sets hard.
Chaos cloak + vog (hat)
Sword Damage: low
Sword Speed: high
Sword CTR: med
Handgun asi: low
....
Negative 3: poison, ice, curse
Positive 1: fire, shock
Normal (x2) + elemental (x1) + piercing (x.5)
You are no longer anywhere near as resistant as you once were to things with such a set, as you are completely vulnerable to one type, and will be taking substantially more damage against the things that you do "resist". Buffing further defensive stats with sprite/trinkets hinders your ability to buff up one weapon type in order to become sword jesus, and you are left requiring Unique Variants to escape the mess, the only problem that we cannot solve.
The idea here being that armor could be so much more than just 'Craft this, use this here. Next level: Use this other thing.' Chaos offers a roundabout solution to a huge number of areas, and that makes it appealing. We shouldn't seek to neuter that appeal, but to instead glorify and spread it.
Yes, movement speed decrease (say, 1 on each piece?) would weaken the defensive posture of this armor. So its status vulnerability would become a bigger deal. This is not a bad idea for balancing the set.