Frosty Friend Needs a Rebalance in Arcade Mode

Should Frosty be Nerfed


  • Total voters
    4

Chaldo

Rabby
The Problem
Arcade mode is supposed to be the challenging version of the game that takes skill to excel at, but recently it has become a place where people can show off their dodging and running "skills" while Frosty does all of the "heavy lifting" by aggroing enemies to the point where nothing is attacking the player. It should not be possible to use Frosty to get to the top of the leaderboards by running around the room or sitting in a corner and casting spells because it takes no skill, removes the challenge from arcade mode, and makes the leaderboards frivolous.

Semi-Autonomous Player (G)
Making Frosty a highly skill-based semi-autonomous player. Frosty would move around and attack/aggro enemies on his own, but he has a set amount of hp that scales with the player's, and it cannot be regained until the player gains a health orb/potion. For example, if the summon button for Frosty is set to A, then you would use that button to summon him. You could time the press of A when an enemy attacks, and it would act like a perfect guard. Holding down A would simply act as if Frosty was holding up a shield (omnidirectional since you can't control the direction he faces). The hp regenerating mode would be replaced with a toggleable shield button that has a set amount of hp, and if it breaks, Frosty comes out of the mode and cannot perfect guard until the shield regenerates. The other two abilities would just act as normal being activatable skills at the specific charges. If Frosty dies, he will be unsummonable until a form of health is obtained to heal him. In order to prevent people abusing Frosty's desummon during combat, it should take around five seconds to desummon Frosty during combat.

Limited Aggro
Removing all of Frosty's aggro makes him a completely unoriginal spell that is essentially just a worse version of the Cloud, so a better way to approach it is to remove Frosty's aggro of specific enemies that change the difficulty of the game. If the only enemies that Frosty aggro'd were fodder, it would keep his main ability while keeping most of the gamemode's difficulty. This is currently being tested with a command that removes some of Frosty's aggro including all bosses, minibosses, and powerful enemies. All enemies that don't aggro the player have not been included (Toxic Tulip, Larva, etc.)
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Score Nerf
The Main Idea
The mechanics of Frosty should be changed in a way where using him in arcade mode allows non-skilled players to use him to advance their own skill while deterring players who want to score hunt from using him, so the top of the scoreboard is based on skill rather than luck and running.

The Solution
The way to make Frosty a useful utility and deter players from using him for easy scores is to force a score reduction to players that use Frosty. If using Frosty gave a score reduction that was impactful enough, players who are only trying to get better at arcade will not care because they have no use of a higher score while it deters players who are score hunting from using it because it would not get them to the top of the leaderboard.

The Mechanics
The best way for this mechanic to be put into place is to have a permanent score reduction to players as soon as Frosty is summoned, and the reduction would only work once per player that summoned Frosty, and it should not be reversible. There are a few ways to handle the score reduction. One way it can be handled without changing Frosty's current mechanics is by causing each summoned Frosty to reduce the score in stages, so each extra player that summons Frosty lowers the score by x amount. The first frosty would have to have a significant impact on the score because a single Frost affects a lot of gameplay while the next ones that are summoned don't have to impact it as much as long as the first is significant enough. This change would keep the scoreboard mostly clean of people who rely on frosty while keeping some difficulty for casual players. Another way it can be handled is to force a permanent 50% score reduction whenever any Frosties are summoned, but he would regain his previous mechanic of aggroing ~4 enemies. If this method is used, it ensures that any Frosty reliers will never be on the top of the leaderboard while keeping arcade mode fairly casual to people that use him.

Conclusion
Frosty creates an imbalance between the skilled and unskilled players because it allows the unskilled players to ease their way to the top of the leaderboard even though it is the opposite of what was intended for the gamemode, so Frosty should be changed in arcade mode to stop unskilled players from rising to the top out of sheer luck and the ability to run and hide rather than actual skill.
 
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I certainly agree that there should be some kind of "fix" for arcade mode. Either Frosty Friend would have to be nerfed (aggro-ing NO enemies), or the score would have to be altered. I'm not sure which way I lean yet. One way involves changing the mechanics of frosty (which I doubt anyone truly wants), but the other has its own issues. Players will still want a way to get their x2 S trophies. And a significant nerf to score caused by frosty could bring challenges with that.

I think nerfing score is the easiest way to handle the problem. That way people won't get as upset about frosty being completely changed. But the score nerf should be applied at the end of the run, to the final score, so that players can still get their dank trophies and such. I think a 20% score decrease should be the minimum.

Edit: For clarity. I think that the "20%" score decrease should be applied on a per-frosty-used basis, as Chaldo suggested. So if 3 people in a 4P run used frosty, then at the very end of the run, a 60% score reduction would be seen in the final score.
 
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Own

Moderator
Frosty is essentially an HP damage soak on crack. Barrier already reduces your score for using it, so I don't mind Frosty doing the same thing but in a different way.

1 player using Frosty Friend: -5% to end game score. 2P both using frosty: -10%. 3P all using frosty: -15%. 4P all using frosty: -20%. Or 10, 20, 30 and 40. I'd like for him to stay mechanically the same, but it's hard to deny that every single build benefits in some way from at least a point in Frosty Friend. Given his absolute dominance, providing people who don't use him a leg up in potential overall score adds competitiveness back into the arcade leaderboards.

If the current best strategy for hitting #1 is "Sit in a corner with earthspike and let frosty clean house", that's both boring to play and watch, the same as chain lightning spam. These 'passive' builds should be how to get to the end of arcade safely, not secure a spot on the top 10 leaderboard.
 
1 player using Frosty Friend: -5% to end game score. 2P both using frosty: -10%. 3P all using frosty: -15%. 4P all using frosty: -20%. Or 10, 20, 30 and 40. I'd like for him to stay mechanically the same, but it's hard to deny that every single build benefits in some way from at least a point in Frosty Friend. Given his absolute dominance, providing people who don't use him a leg up in potential overall score adds competitiveness back into the arcade leaderboards.

The reason I suggested a minimum 20% score decrease is that the amount of imbalance lies in the ability to easily S floors. To that extent, small percentage gaps don't have much of an effect. Even with a 15% gap between the run Chaldo and I had (180%) and the run Arik and Boom had (165%), they still surpassed our score by a long shot. Of course, our score wasn't the absolute best. I'm confident a better run could've easily given us a solid 4mil. But even then, it would not compare to Arik and Boom's score. S-rank floors have an extremely strong influence on a highscore. I think a 20% nerf for the first frosty is necessary, regardless of how many players are active. Perhaps an exponential score decrease would be more fair (20%, 30%, 35%, 37.25%). But even then...the game is extremely different with several frostys out, especially in 3P/4P. Maybe a 20% start and only 10% afterwards or something.

Bear in mind that curses tend to make S-ranking a floor -- let alone passing it -- harder...hence the score booster. Summoning more and more frostys exponentially reduces the difficulty of S-ranking floors. That's where the problem lies. Even x2 health orbs give you a 20% score nerf. If that's the case, it's completely reasonable to employ a 20% minimum score decrease when any frosty is used.

If the current best strategy for hitting #1 is "Sit in a corner with earthspike and let frosty clean house", that's both boring to play and watch, the same as chain lightning spam. These 'passive' builds should be how to get to the end of arcade safely, not secure a spot on the top 10 leaderboard.

Definitely agree that "passive" builds should not secure your position in the leaderboards. I think Earth Spike and Ice Spike have more "passivity" to them due to the stunning aspects. But it's all the same effect with frosty in the end.
 

Yoruichi

Green Slime
a % score decrease is such a terrible idea for this game. if a skill is overpowered it should be reworked/rebalanced. the entire point of arcade is how far you can get + highscore + survival. you're allowed to use ALL elements which include all skills, all potions, all weapons etc etc. decreasing the score would be such a weird design choice. the game's arcade wouldn't be streamlined any more. it would feel like such a strange exception to all of the skills. "hey this skill is too strong so ur score goes down lul".

They could rebalance the frosty friend by making it more squishy initially, but make it's regenerative stance regen faster. when he gets knocked out he doesnt regen hp anymore. you gotta stand next to him (like you can do now to speed regen up). this will make the frosty friend more skill based and it will punish you for not reacting with his defensive stance fast enough.

This is just once suggestiong but they could overhaul the skill and come up with something cool and balanced while still keeping it a summon/ice skill. but the % score decrease would be such a weird band-aid. makes no sense at all.
 
a % score decrease is such a terrible idea for this game. if a skill is overpowered it should be reworked/rebalanced. the entire point of arcade is how far you can get + highscore + survival. you're allowed to use ALL elements which include all skills, all potions, all weapons etc etc. decreasing the score would be such a weird design choice. the game's arcade wouldn't be streamlined any more. it would feel like such a strange exception to all of the skills. "hey this skill is too strong so ur score goes down lul".

They could rebalance the frosty friend by making it more squishy initially, but make it's regenerative stance regen faster. when he gets knocked out he doesnt regen hp anymore. you gotta stand next to him (like you can do now to speed regen up). this will make the frosty friend more skill based and it will punish you for not reacting with his defensive stance fast enough.

This is just once suggestiong but they could overhaul the skill and come up with something cool and balanced while still keeping it a summon/ice skill. but the % score decrease would be such a weird band-aid. makes no sense at all.

I almost entirely disagree with you. I agree that it’s a bit weird to respond to something OP with a percent change, but I disagree with implementing no points nerf AND leaving frosty as an aggroing enemy. I have 2 accounts in the top 10 and I’ve seen tons of videos of other people who reach top 10 or get there for some time. Most of them spammed ES and frosty and it was completely OP because frosty aggrod while ED stunned. *Any* amount of aggro is OP in arcade. You learn that as you get more familiar with that challenge mode, especially in hardmode.

If frosty continues to aggro, there should definitely be a score nerf. The best arcade player in the game agrees that frosty needs a nerf. And many of the other good arcade players fill the same (though not necessarily all). There are really only 2 options: 1) A score nerf or 2) A frosty rework that removes aggro. Most people would despise the latter, so we suggested the former.

However, G had some interesting ideas about reworking frosty fairly while removing aggro. I’d be interested in that since frosty doesn’t really need to have aggro. After all, story is easy. And in arcade frosty is unbalanced. Could have just been a design flaw that could be changed by making frosty stronger while removing aggro.
 
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Yoruichi

Green Slime
I almost entirely disagree with you. I agree that it’s a bit weird to respond to something OP with a percent change, but I disagree with implementing no points nerf AND leaving frosty as an aggroing enemy. I have 2 accounts in the top 10 and I’ve seen tons of videos of other people who reach top 10 or get there for some time. Most of them spammed ES and frosty and it was completely OP because frosty aggrod while ED stunned. *Any* amount of aggro is OP in arcade. You learn that as you get more familiar with that challenge mode, especially in hardmode.

If frosty continues to aggro, there should definitely be a score nerf. The best arcade player in the game agrees that frosty needs a nerf. And many of the other good arcade players fill the same (though not necessarily all). There are really only 2 options: 1) A score nerf or 2) A frosty rework that removes aggro. Most people would despise the latter, so we suggested the former.

However, G had some interesting ideas about reworking frosty fairly while removing aggro. I’d be interested in that since frosty doesn’t really need to have aggro. After all, story is easy. And in arcade frosty is unbalanced. Could have just been a design flaw that could be changed by making frosty stronger while removing aggro.

There are possibilities to rebalance frosty while removing has aggro. I think u misunderstood me. My idea was merely a suggestion but I agree aggro should be removed.

Now back to the score part. I have NEVER seen a game that fixes ANY issue this way. The ideal situation in the arcade mode is that u can use any skill without treats/curses and always get 100%. Thats just logical. No matter what any pro player says. Using this bandaid % fix just destreamlines the entire arcade mode and repels new players from getting into the game.

I would suggest to remove the aggro and add a % chance on frosty to chill enemies (since he's an ice spell).
 
There are possibilities to rebalance frosty while removing has aggro. I think u misunderstood me. My idea was merely a suggestion but I agree aggro should be removed.

Now back to the score part. I have NEVER seen a game that fixes ANY issue this way. The ideal situation in the arcade mode is that u can use any skill without treats/curses and always get 100%. Thats just logical. No matter what any pro player says. Using this bandaid % fix just destreamlines the entire arcade mode and repels new players from getting into the game.

I would suggest to remove the aggro and add a % chance on frosty to chill enemies (since he's an ice spell).

While other games in existence can certainly be used for inspiration, they certainly aren't the final say in what a particular dev team can or even should do. I never said that the best player agreed with a score nerf. I said he agreed with some form of a nerf. I haven't gotten his full thoughts on that yet. The reason the % nerf was suggested was that a lot of people enjoy frosty's current mechanic of aggro-ing enemies. If the community truly raged in response to aggro entirely being taken away, then maybe it's best to just have a score nerf so that people have an easier time with arcade. After all, the things that make your arcade gameplay significantly easier generally tank your score. As I said, those are options. You and I both have opinions about simply reworking frosty being a better idea, but that doesn't necessarily indicate that the idea is indubitably better.

The first suggestion you gave said nothing about removing his aggro. So you never gave the impression that you agreed with how OP it was. Making a squishy frosty that recharges HP more quickly still leaves us with a problem. That's because familiar players know how to spam the defense form to keep him alive. I also disagree with the idea of giving him the percent chance to chill (or freeze) enemies. I know he's an ice spell, but that doesn't mean he needs to chill or freeze enemies (yes, I know you didn't say freeze). For instance, flamethrower doesn't burn enemies, but it's still a fair move. No other summon introduces status effects, and if frosty gets his aggro removed then he'd likely need an attack buff. That plus chilling/freezing capabilities would still be unusually powerful imo and make him the preference over all other summons. So we really don't get anywhere. On the bright side, it would remove aggro so I guess that's something.
 

The G-Meister

Giga Slime
I'm with @Yoruichi here, at least on the topic of the score nerf. You guys know my stance on it already, but I'm not the only one now and so I'll pipe up about it a bit more.

While other games in existence can certainly be used for inspiration, they certainly aren't the final say in what a particular dev team can or even should do.

Of course, however at that point we should be considering why you might want to nerf score in the first place. Yoinking ideas from other games is completely fine, you just need to make sure you consider it in the specific situation you introduce it.

The thing that gets me about a hard nerf to score (as in, you put points in frosty and you get let's say 20% score knocked off) is it completely wipes frosty from competitive play. Now I know that with you guys being at the top of the leaderboards without him that'd be something of interest. The reason I don't like the objective score nerf though is that it doesn't fit within the game's systems. I'm even opposed to barrier having a different cooldown between story and arcade, but that's besides the point. Furthermore, a hard nerf is also an appalling way to do game dev. It's a thing I picked up on a while ago where you're forcefully saying "no frosty on the leaderboards" rather than putting some juicy effort into making a balanced skill that encourages players to be like "Hm, maybe I need to tweak that frosty build a bit with a more risky skill to get some more DPS off, else my time score is gonna sit in the gutter" - which is exactly what I'm about it get onto.

The reason I've been blabbing on about a "soft nerf" is because it does fit within the game's systems. You take the mechanics you already have and tweak them to achieve that nerf you want, as other mechanics also affect score. What a soft nerf would entail is matching the safety of using frosty to his damage output. The less enemies he kills, the slower the room goes and the less time score you get. Easy. However that leaves us with one problem - what happens when we remove his single aggro draw?

Well at that point, another thing I mentioned on the Discord was that his HP bar effectively becomes redundant at that point. When enemies don't directly attack him it's rare he'll get hit, at which point his defence skill is pretty useless. So by now we've removed two or three core mechanics from him and he's looking pretty bare. At that point I feel like it's almost better to rework him rather than rebalance. Without the aggro draw he effectively becomes Cloud Strike. I think something should be added to distinguish him. What the something is I don't quite know yet.



P.S. Just gonna throw this out there, imagine a frosty with his 1 aggro draw, no HP regen, heals to full at the start of each floor and his defensive form is just like you shielding. So he takes damage until he breaks, and can perfect guard. Theorem without proof (as in I don't have time to consider it fully but you guys are welcome to shit on/tweak it if you feel like taking the work off my hands)
 
I'm with @Yoruichi here, at least on the topic of the score nerf. You guys know my stance on it already, but I'm not the only one now and so I'll pipe up about it a bit more.

A problem that comes with considering the laziness in game design and such is that arcade's purpose has evolved over time -- even beyond the original intentions of the mode. And it's still unique, as it has aspects like rewarding you for avoiding damage. Now obviously some people have feelings about damage rewards being placed in, but it does reinforce the now-present idea of arcade being intended to test your skill, intended to improve your skill, and intended to rank players according to their skill. The current treats penalize you according to the "amount of effort" (vaguely measured) it takes away from the gameplay. The problem that everyone misses is that the aggro is OP. And people who aren't so good at the game (no I'm not trying to dab on people) won't understand since they can easily die on any lower floor with frosty on anyway. That's why I suggested the score nerf, as it was [arguably] consistent with the game's existing arcade mindset. At the time, things like earth spike were nowhere near as OP without frosty. In fact, that spell was quite difficult to use alone.

Without the aggro draw he effectively becomes Cloud Strike. I think something should be added to distinguish him. What the something is I don't quite know yet.

For one thing, it's not too big a deal to me if summons are similar. lol. Ultimately all summons are the same at their base: They give the player the safest form of dps. But realistically, frosty would still have unique abilities if his hp and defense move were removed. He has his happy ground pound and his angry consecutive punches. Moreover, there are other things that can be added to both frosty and cloud to make their abilities unique. You can make the cloud more than a floating dps. Maybe let him buff the player or debuff enemies. You can add things to frosty (that preferably don't include chilling/freezing because that would be a little crazy lol). So on and so forth.

Regarding your suggestion, even if frosty became left for dead in a battle until the next room, it still raises questions. Aggro is still extremely insane. As it is, you can still do crazy things at the beginning of most rooms with just frosty and earth spike spam. You can do the same at the end of rooms too. Frosty can easily outlive those first few hits so it would have an extremely large impact on arcade runs. Of course, frosty can be used with other builds as well. A few players who left arcade some time ago are bringing frosty back in with full force.

Using your suggestion also strongly affects story mode. What you end up with is a frosty that's pretty trashy because he's dead most of the time in fast-acting spawn rooms (where you don't have time to go for the revive) and insane boss battles (where even if you could revive, it probably ain't worth it...yes frosty is useful for some bosses). And he's still too stronk in arcade because he affords cheesy players those few seconds of aggro at the beginning of the room (possibly more if the player is smart).

People have to remember that the meaning of arcade has vastly changed since the beginning. At first it was just supposed to be some fun side stuff that gives you a "grindy feeling". Now it's some competitive skill-testing aspect where this idiot rages all the time. Any build can still be used to complete a run. But the idea of every skill being viable and competitive is long gone. You can try to balance all classes in this regard, but not all skills/spells. (Thankfully, 2H, 1H, and mage all have their own strong metas...though there's room for improvement, of course.) If certain things like frosty get removed from a competitive play, that is a good thing. Why? It's because anything that significantly makes the game easier and negates the current purpose of arcade should not be competitively viable. It is very easy to argue that frosty friend is a better asset than a time crystal for an experience player. And experienced players (the good kind) are the only ones who should be on top of the leaderboards (minus the amazingly good rookies...but none of those really exist right now). The fact that so many people who have no idea what they're doing in arcade are on the leaderboards or close to it is ridiculous. It's not a measure of good competitive play or impressive use of spells/skills. It's legitimately hiding in a corner and spamming spells while frosty aggros and/or using frosty's aggro at the very beginning as an opening to wipe out the room.

Barrier should stay how it is. And frosty should be nerfed. We have to get out of the mindset of closely tying story to arcade because at this point they're completely different worlds. In a place where survival and skill are stressed, the much larger barrier cooldown in arcade is completely reasonable. In a story mode where you can heal and rely on other survival tactics, its barrier cooldown is reasonable. The awesome thing is that both skills where balanced without putting collateral damage in arcade or story. Barrier is still 100% barrier and 100% usable, only with some variation in cooldown time. It's time to consider the same thing for frosty. The score nerf provides a way for players to still enjoy him. And it prevents collateral damage to story mode. No skill that aggros enemies should be allowed on the leaderboards. Again, it's the strongest and most ridiculous thing in the game. With aggro, a score nerf is non-negotiable. Without aggro we can talk about frosty changes, but there will be collateral on the story side of things. And the changes will have to make sense without feeling awkward. This is not a result of devs being lazy after they made a spell intended to be used in arcade (because they didn't). This isn't like when Bayonetta was first released into smash 4. Why? It's because the framework of the meta didn't even exist yet.
 
As a shorter version for anyone taking the time to read these (but not for you G): Secrets of Grindea is composed of 2 dynamically created modes. Originally there was story. And arcade was just something put in for extra content. Now, arcade has been transformed into a test of skills. With all abilities blindly being imported from story mode, you're bound to run into problems. This is why barrier got nerfed in arcade post-import and potions got readjusted in arcade post-import. But no one complained about that (at least not en masse). People understood that the worlds of story and arcade are married but are extravagantly different. Recklessly changing one can cause collateral damage to the other. Thus, it makes the most sense to give skills/spells their own abilities for both worlds and apply minor tweaks in the arcade universe for fairness. Anyone closely familiar with the game understands that aggro is too strong for arcade. Simultaneously, anyone could agree that aggro is useless if your source dies in 2 hits (and I mean that literally). So making frosty squishy isn't a solution and ignoring aggro isn't a solution either. A score nerf restricted to the arcade universe harms no one's ability to play and makes the competitive game much more fair and reasonable. If aggro stays, a score nerf (or some separation between the people who rely on frosty and the people who don't) is a necessity. If aggro goes, I'm 100% okay with that, but the collateral damage on story and summons as a whole will have to be considered.

Story is not arcade. So there are limits on how you can balance a skill/spell on its own without causing collateral. Not every skill or spell can be competitive, nor should summons be competitive to any extent -- especially if they aggro (excluding plants because they don't fit the typical "summon" category).
 

Yoruichi

Green Slime
While other games in existence can certainly be used for inspiration, they certainly aren't the final say in what a particular dev team can or even should do.

And why do you think game development companies copy development choices from eachother? Because they are good design choices. No matter how much you twist and turn the context of Grindea. Nerfing the score on one particular skill is just bad gameplay design and very bad for the game in the long run.

I think we should just trust the developers on this one and let them make a rework. Rome wasn't built in one day but there is a suitable rework for frosty in arcade. One that still will be good in story as well. Game development companies often make choices that dissappoint the community. But sometimes these are choices they have to make in regards to the game's health. Communities of games always tend to "cry" about certain aspects of the game while they know its bad for the game.

Here's another suggestion for the dev's: remove aggro and change frosty's second skill to a temporary aggro (1.5 sec?) with a 25 sec cooldown. This still gives playes that like the aggro the aggro part while giving it a significant cooldown. This way its not OP and its a good tradeoff. You must consider if it's worth speccing into frosty this way.

Reducing score? Might as well remove frosty from arcade then. There are always healthy options for a game's design. Reducing score is not one of them and we should all just agree to that so we can brainstorm with the dev's and actually make progress.
 
And why do you think game development companies copy development choices from eachother? Because they are good design choices. No matter how much you twist and turn the context of Grindea. Nerfing the score on one particular skill is just bad gameplay design and very bad for the game in the long run.

I think we should just trust the developers on this one and let them make a rework. Rome wasn't built in one day but there is a suitable rework for frosty in arcade. One that still will be good in story as well. Game development companies often make choices that dissappoint the community. But sometimes these are choices they have to make in regards to the game's health. Communities of games always tend to "cry" about certain aspects of the game while they know its bad for the game.

Here's another suggestion for the dev's: remove aggro and change frosty's second skill to a temporary aggro (1.5 sec?) with a 25 sec cooldown. This still gives playes that like the aggro the aggro part while giving it a significant cooldown. This way its not OP and its a good tradeoff. You must consider if it's worth speccing into frosty this way.

Reducing score? Might as well remove frosty from arcade then. There are always healthy options for a game's design. Reducing score is not one of them and we should all just agree to that so we can brainstorm with the dev's and actually make progress.

EDIT: I missread your last paragraph and thought you said removing aggro makes frosty useless, which in turn affected how I responded. I can’t read apparently. ‍♂️ So if you see certain parts of this and are like “...The heck is this idiot saying?!? I didn’t say that at all!” Well that’s why. Sorry. LOL. I might delete it or some portions of it. I’ll have to read over it again. But I’m lazy and work is about to start sooooo

My mans, this is the problem I have with most people who like frosty and are so fixated on tradition. They often ignore the core argument I’m placing forward and use straw man arguments. I never said devs could not use other people’s ideas or patterns. My point was that ultimately they can make a decision — and some times their decision can make more sense even if it deviates from the norm. I always get antsy when I hear people *only* refer to past design choices because it’s like people don’t have the capacity to think for themselves. Wisdom says observe previous examples, but it also says cater them to your community and your liking such that the experience benefits every person (or as many as possible). There are clearly some ways in which SoG is derivative and some ways in which it is unique. It’s an amazing game, but without its own unique aspects it likely would not be as amazing.

Moreover, the way you’re trying to close out the conversation is completely illogical. What you’re basically saying is “Just shut the discussion down. This is so complex we should leave it to the devs! Oh! But I hate the idea of frosty losing aggro entirely. So devs, here’s an idea on keeping aggro.” which is inherently intended to sway the devs towards keeping aggro to some extent. (Obviously that’s not literally what you said. But that's just about how I perceive it.) This is a suggestion forum. The point of this place is to suggest ideas and discuss them — to the benefit of each other and especially the devs. It’s counterintuitive to make a suggestions forum only to ignore it and do what you want. They are free to read whatever they want and respond accordingly. I’ve said things before, Teddy has disagreed with me, and what he’s said makes sense. That’s more useful than just shutting a discussion down.

Aggro on any ability is completely overpowered. Even a small time of aggro can change a lot in a game. Again, I’ve played the game somewhat intensively and I know others who have as well. Those most familiar people feel the same. If you aren’t even willing to consider the *possibility* of frosty’s (or anything’s) aggro being OP — let alone the logic and experience of other players that prove how ridiculous it is — then there’s no point in you continuing in this discussion. No, that is not intended to be rude. But if you’re going to ignore everything I say and wrap up with “keep aggro or he’s useless” then you aren’t helping the discussion.

Frosty DOES NOT need to be balanced AROUND HIMSELF. (Sorry for the caps. But I’m on a phone and too lazy to scroll up to hit the “bold” modifier.) Frosty needs to be balanced AROUND THE GAME. For instance if there was an ability like zerk that literally made you invincible, gave you infinite ep, and multiplied your damage by 500. That would be ridiculously OP. It would defeat the point of experiencing a challenge and putting real effort into the game. Now, let’s say the devs nerfed it to the state of the current Berzerk so that you’re no longer invincible and your EP drains BUT you can gain EP by doing regular hits and you have a decent damage boost. They also attach a caveat that the damage you take is increased. Now, that would absolutely suck, but it would be good game balance. And by your logic, because Berzerk would be so much weaker than its original OP state, it’s an entirely useless skill now. That’s false. Why? Because Berzerk still has uses WITH RESPECT TO THE OVERALL GAME DESIGNA. (Again, too lazy to scroll up and tap bold. Sorry. Lol.)

Frosty does not need to be reworked with respect to himself. He needs to ne reworked with respect to the game. If aggro stays TO ANY extent, then the score nerf is a MUST (again, no bold). But as I’ve already said over and over, I agree that it’s a lazy fix and avoids the true problem with frosty. Thus, I’m for a change, hence me mentioning I was interested in G’s idea. You’re free to suggest actual fixes not involving aggro if you want. You’re also free to debate with me on aggro being OP should you desperately want to discuss aggro ideas (bare in mind you’ll be arguing with some of the best players in the game, and while I have 2 positions in the top 10 I don’t necessarily mean myself). However, you’d have to suggest reasonable things. If you’re trying to rework frosty so that he maintains his current usefulness (eg by giving him insane power and/or freeze capabilities) then that’s not possible. His current usefulness is OP, and so to preserve that degree of usefulness will innately fail to fix the problem. A rework that makes him USEFUL period is what is needed. If you’re going to just keep saying he needs aggro and ignore the points I’ve made then — as I said before — this discussion will go nowhere. And there will be no point in continuing it with you.
 
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Yoruichi

Green Slime
Frosty does not need to be reworked with respect to himself. He needs to ne reworked with respect to the game. If aggro stays TO ANY extent, then the score nerf is a MUST (again, no bold).

Yea, no.

The point of thisnplace is to suggest ideas and discuss them — to the benefit of each other and especially the devs. It’s counterintuitive to make a suggestions forum only to ignore it and do what you want. They are free to read whatever they want and respond accordingly.

We've both made our suggestions btw. So nothing is counterintuitive. But there is no point in repeating ourselves.

And by your logic, because Berzerk would be so much weaker than its original OP state, it’s an entirely useless skill now.

?????????????????????????

Here is another reason I'm not continuing this discussion. You assume and imply so many things I can't even follow you. I'm really trying to understand your points but it's so unlogical. Also, you're only busy pushing the score nerf idea. Not even coming with alternatives or other suggestions. This discussion is going nowhere and I've said my part.

I'll repeat my stance once more: there are thousands of different ways to rework frosty. I might've not found one yet but I'm sure the dev's and the community will. Thats a designer's job. Simply trying to force a score nerf is just odd and makes 0% sense. I trust the dev's and their decision making. I know they wouldn't implement such a weird idea. So that's why I suggested all of us to think about potential reworks and actually progress.

Score nerf is most likely not happening (when looking at the dev's previous design choices). Let's make this thread actually useful and suggest some things ;)
 
Yea, no.



We've both made our suggestions btw. So nothing is counterintuitive. But there is no point in repeating ourselves.



?????????????????????????

Here is another reason I'm not continuing this discussion. You assume and imply so many things I can't even follow you. I'm really trying to understand your points but it's so unlogical. Also, you're only busy pushing the score nerf idea. Not even coming with alternatives or other suggestions. This discussion is going nowhere and I've said my part.

I'll repeat my stance once more: there are thousands of different ways to rework frosty. I might've not found one yet but I'm sure the dev's and the community will. Thats a designer's job. Simply trying to force a score nerf is just odd and makes 0% sense. I trust the dev's and their decision making. I know they wouldn't implement such a weird idea. So that's why I suggested all of us to think about potential reworks and actually progress.

Score nerf is most likely not happening (when looking at the dev's previous design choices). Let's make this thread actually useful and suggest some things ;)

Hopefully you saw the edited version. Lol. As I said, some things I said were after missreading your post. But I’m legitimately concerned about whether or not you’re reading what I’m saying. If you’re actually paying attention, you’ll know I’m open to other ideas. The score, as I’ve already said, is only a necessity if frosty doesn’t get changed. Specifically, it has to stay if aggro stays. I haven’t suggested an alternative yet because I haven’t developed one worth putting forth yet. However, I did state multiple times that G has had some interesting ideas and that I’m interested in those if he would care to mention them. I know I say a lot but please do read what I say if you’re going to accuse me of just being *solely* for a score nerf (I know there’s some irony in saying that after my previous post, but I acknowledged my mistake). If you read my edited statement and then the zerk one, you’d understand what I was saying. G and others also agree that a score nerf would be reasonable if frosty wasn’t changed. And we all agree that aggro should be entirely removed. HOWEVER, we both acknowledge that greater solutions exist than nerfing the score and that those solutions should be pursued. G and I are programmers so we know the difference between lazy and good solutions.

It shouldn’t be that hard to follow me. If you’re talking about assumptions on what’s OP, they aren’t assumptions. I am more familiar with arcade than the average frosty lover, and I know people who are even more familiar. All of us have experienced how insane it is, and it’s why we all agree that it’s important to nerf frosty. It’s also why Teddy approved of us adding this (yeah this post here) to the list of highly important arcade rework suggestions. What’s weird is when people less familiar with arcade suggest otherwise when they are hardly good at regular arcade — let alone cursed arcade. That may not be you. But if you don’t have the experience and you don’t have suitable logic to support that aggro isn’t insane, then you don’t really have a reasonable argument for keeping aggro. Of course, if you don’t intend to keep aggro anyway then this aspect of the discussion isn’t necessary
 

Chaldo

Rabby
I'd just like to point out:
My idea was merely a suggestion but I agree aggro should be removed.
change frosty's second skill to a temporary aggro (1.5 sec?) with a 25 sec cooldown. This still gives playes that like the aggro the aggro part
Contradicting yourself.

Frosty does not need to be reworked with respect to himself. He needs to ne reworked with respect to the game. If aggro stays TO ANY extent, then the score nerf is a MUST (again, no bold).
That was a great counterargument.

We've both made our suggestions btw. So nothing is counterintuitive.
Here is another reason I'm not continuing this discussion.
Not continuing a discussion because others don't agree with you is completely counterintuitive.

I'll repeat my stance once more: there are thousands of different ways to rework frosty. I might've not found one yet but I'm sure the dev's and the community will.
You just debunked yourself. If you claim that there are so many ways to rebalance Frosty, you clearly have the experience to give me some of those examples right? In case you haven't been around for long, Frosty's balance has been a hot topic for years now, and we haven't found a good way to balance removing his aggro without making him completely useless.

"hey this skill is too strong so ur score goes down lul"
Just to clarify, we don't want to nerf the score because it's strong. We want to nerf the score because it is strong without having any difficulty while using it. For example, Cloud Strike does very little damage because it is a completely passive skill while Static Touch does a lot of damage because it is an active skill that forces the player to attack opponents head-on.

Using this bandaid % fix just destreamlines the entire arcade mode and repels new players from getting into the game.
The only thing the percent score reduction does is repel players from using Frosty if they want to get a highscore. If anything, not touching Frosty's aggro while nerfing your score when using him would attract players into arcade mode because they would know that they have a buddy to rely on.

Frosty used to aggro up to 4 enemies at once in combat, so he was nerfed to his current state of only aggroing one enemy. Many people disliked the power gap between the two which caused a lot of irritation. Skills are meant to be proportional, meaning that skills that are more difficult to use are also the more powerful skills. Removing Frosty's aggro and buffing him would make him an invincible damage machine that has no counter, and it would allow the player to indefinitely run away from enemies while allowing Frosty to slowly kill everything. This would make arcade mode trivial in most respects while infuriating many players who relied on his aggro.

Why do I suggest a percent reduction of the player's score? We've already discussed the problems with removing his aggro, so this decision allows us to keep him exactly the same. The aggro in itself is the most powerful and passively used tool in the game. It requires absolutely no skill while significantly decreasing the difficulty of the game. This was touched upon previously by MLG, so I'll keep it brief. The treats in the game make the difficulty significantly easier while reducing the score because it should not be easy to get a highscore. Frosty works in the exact same way as he doesn't act like a normal skill. Normal skills are casted continuously to deal damage while Frosty can be left completely alone and still be overpowered. Treats make the game significantly easier and they must lower the score because of this, so logically speaking, since Frosty makes the game significantly easier, he should lower your score. Your only counter-argument to this was:
it should be reworked/rebalanced. the entire point of arcade is how far you can get + highscore + survival. you're allowed to use ALL elements which include all skills
From what I understand, you believe that all skills should be able to do as well as each-other and all have a fair chance of making it to the top of the leaderboard. I agree that the game should be beatable with any skill, but because of the way that the skills are designed, it is impossible to make every skill applicable to the top of the leaderboards. This ties in to my previous point about skills' damage being proportional to their difficulty to use. Most of the skills were never meant to be the primary tool to make it to the top of the leaderboard such as Frosty, the Cloud, Summon Plant, or Ice Nova because they are incredibly easy to use skills. Since they are incredibly easy to use, they do not do much damage which prohibits their ability to make it to the top.

To sum it all up, removing Frosty's aggro would make him far too useless or far too overpowered while infuriating players. The best solution is to keep his aggro while decreasing the players' score if they use him because it keeps his mechanics the same, so it does not make anyone angry about the change, and the score nerf is justified through the simplicity of Frosty. Nerfing his score would allow players to enjoy using him while still completing arcade mode, but it would keep the top of the leaderboards strictly skill-based as they were meant to be.
 
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I’m on a phone again and am too lazy to hit the reply button. So I’ll just comment here. I mostly agree with Chaldo, but my view on the score nerf (which I’ve stated previously and G has also said he agrees with outside of this post) is that it should be a last resort. Meaning that at the end of the day if frosty gets some changes like less damage dealt but keeps his aggro, there should be a score nerf. Why? Well I’ve said why multiple times, and Chaldo also made a few things clear. But let me tell a story to clarify even further. Right now the highest possible score in the game is about 5.5mil. I think the best players’s best scores for mage and melee respectively are 5.2 mil and 4.9 mil. Long ago, some scrub bursted through arcade mode with earth spike and frosty friend on 165% (he also had 2 time crystals) and got a score of 4.7mil! That’s only 0.2 mil away from the best player’s score (in melee) when he played 180%! And a large majority people never break 4mil (most of the ones that have are frosty users — as you could guess). This guy was not a pro. He doesn’t even have the ability to dodge gun-d4m’s missiles on his own — a very easy task. But because he had frosty for aggro and earth spike for high damage with stunning, he cleared rooms like it was nothing. Other players soon followed in his patterns (or with other builds that still had frosty). And now almost all of the top leaderboard is filled with frosty users who can hardly Pguard a bee or boar. A BEE OR BOAR! That’s what was so infuriating to me. A ton of players work their butts off for a good score but get outclassed by a person who can’t play the game and who relies on aggro. Thankfully the best player’s score is still on top. But depsite his +1000 hours in the game, some random dude who can hardly play but knows how to let aggro AI and stun passively do work for him is 0.2mil away from the best player in the game. That should *never* be a thing for *any* reason! And I’m not trying to dump on this frosty user, but I am trying to make a point about how unfair frosty is to players actually trying to perform skillfully. If arcade is meant to test skill, then the scores should reflect skill to a notable extent (though obviously some builds are still more meta than others). This is why I say a score nerf is absolutely necessary if frosty’s aggro isn’t removed. It’s unfair the players who work and train hard to perform well and score high in the game. No, I’m not complaining for myself. I’m already in the top 10. I’m saying this because I want fairness to *all* hardworking, *better SKILLED* players. (Again I’m on my phone, so you get caps instead of bold font.)

Now, all that nonsense being said. I again want to reiterate that the score nerf is a LAST RESORT. (People keep missing this.) I used to be on chaldo’s side. But some time ago (before G commented here), G convinced me that a frosty rework makes more sense. Why? It’s because this problem with frosty reveals a problem with aggro itself. And it may even show a problem with summons in general (excluding plants), but that’s a different story. Aggro is an unnecessary ability in story, but it’s a ridiculously OP ability in arcade. That already shows a major problem with frosty’s design. And if *design* is the true problem here, then *design* should be the fix. A lot of people will likely be upset if frosty’s aggro gets removed. But that’s just how life is. You have to ignore the illogical complaints and design something that is reasonable, fair, and balanced within the context of the entire game design.

From what I understand from G, the refund mechanic was introduced to discourage players from changing to other meta builds to beat an enemy or boss instead of ACTUALLY LEARNING the boss patterns and how to win. If that was truly their logic, then truly it’s clear that frosty is the same. His aggro is being used to make enemy rooms easier. And players are choosing that over actually learning how to manage enemy arcade rooms. It’s time for a change. A score nerf can deter people from trying to use frosty TO GET ON THE LEADERBOARDS without ruining practice/fun for others. But a BETTER SOLUTION (again, don’t have bold, sorry) would involve a rework.
 
All right that’s a mouthful. But Yoruichi and others seemed to be missing what I was saying. There’s a summary and a story.

Now. Do I *have* ideas right now? No. I said this already. And I said G had some interesting ideas, though he has not posted the ideas I have referred to. I intend to try to examine frosty more closely with any extra time I have this week and hopefully get a decent idea of “fair damage” and such.

In the meantime, aggro really needs to be removed completely in any frosty rework. I’m thinking summons in general should be changed to have a time bar that decreases even more quickly as damage is taken. But I’ll have to think more.
 

Yoruichi

Green Slime
Contradicting yourself.

Nah I merely came with another possible solution. I agree aggro should be removed but I also think it can return in a different lest persistent way.

That was a great counterargument.

Don't need to give a "great counterargument" because I don't need to repeat myself and give the same points over and over. XxX_MLG misreads my post (like he admitted) and just continues to say what he has said before but in a different context.

Not continuing a discussion because others don't agree with you is completely counterintuitive.

Here you implied something completely false. Like I've said before: don't have to repeat myself. neither does MLG and neither do you. I don't NEED you or MLG to agree with me to feel good about myself, as I don't care about that. You guys obviously need others to agree with you or you can't sleep.

This is a thread where everyone can say what the want to say about the topic. I don't need to agree with either of you as well. I think my points are valid either way you look at it. Score nerfing is just a dumb fix. Static fixes in general are dumb because they make developers work around certain elements too much.

I don't need to go into a discussion with either of you. If you'd like so suggest a score nerf to the dev's, that's fine with me. I already know the score nerf is gonna ruin the consistency of the game. Don't need a discussion for that. If you'd like the dev's to ruin the game, then feel free to.

You just debunked yourself. If you claim that there are so many ways to rebalance Frosty, you clearly have the experience to give me some of those examples right? In case you haven't been around for long, Frosty's balance has been a hot topic for years now, and we haven't found a good way to balance removing his aggro without making him completely useless.

Define a "good" way to rebalance frosty? It's relative. I haven't "debunked" myself. I have come up with 2 (or 3?) possible reworks. Are they the best? No. Am I part of the dev team and am I getting paid to brainstorm about it? Also no.

Just take a look at League of Legends for example. Completely different game BUT they have over 500 skills that need balancing. Nearly every hero/champion is viable and when they rework/rebalance a certain skill they have very good ways of explaining the choices they make. They use certain logic that supports a healthy well balanced game. Now look at Dota2. Again, completely diff game but same genre as LoL. They have a hero called bristleback with a passive effect that shoots needles every time you hit him on the back. You have an item in Dota2 that gives you life leech on all of your abilities. When you try to buy the item on bristleback you get the message "Bristleback cant purchase this item". Why? Because it's too OP. League of legends reduces these effects on AoE abilities to 15% and DoT abilities to 20% or something like that. This is why LoL became more popular.

I have played countless games of different genre's and no matter what u say, a score nerf on one particular skill, while not applying it on the rest is just a very very dumb decision. Anyone who can't see that has no clue what they're talking about. Being good at the game and knowing whats good for a game's health are two completely different things. The dev's at least know this (thank god). Thats why SoG has good reviews and a game like Pathfinder: Kingmaker has mixed reviews. The game is poorly balanced (like grindea), but grindea has a fair system. Pathfinder doesnt.

TL;DR: Your points are invalid. Score nerf is retarded.

Also, I won't respond to you (Chaldo) anymore as well. I see you're a "always right guy" and u think by reading and implying things wrong, you can totally negate someone's arguments. Won't go into further discussion with you because of this toxic behavior. Good day.
 
I don't NEED MLG to agree with me to feel good about myself, as I don't care about that. You guys obviously need others to agree with you or you can't sleep.

You reminded me of something Own said some time ago in a different post. I think part of it is what people see forums as. And I guess different people view it differently. In my mind, if someone writes a suggestion and people ultimately say “yae” or “nae” or “here’s another idea” only, then there isn’t much benefit to it...because there’s only a slew of ideas with no clarity on which way the community or a certain subsection of the community prefers.

This is why I tend to lunge into debates here...bcause if there’s a disagreement, people can choose one side, another side, or collaboratively create a new side. But I do get a bit confused when people reject one idea and then state another suggestion...but then also say that all that really matters is just the suggestions themselves. It’s kinda like asking for a debate but also giving a reason to abruptly end one. And an abrupt end is never enjoyable.

In any case, all that is to say that I prefer closure to arguments...even if the closure is “let’s agree to disagree” (btw, that isn’t the same as “I know you're wrong so I’m ending this.”) I don’t “need” people to disagree with me. You’ve been doing fairly well with the mature responses, so you probably don’t want to lapse into immature and irrelevant ones like “You guys obviously need people to agree with you.”

I think my points are valid either way you look at it. Score nerfing is just a dumb fix. Static fixes in general are dumb because they make developers work around certain elements too much.

On that same topic. This is probably what bothered me most and what got me to keep talking most. For the most part, you’ve only been saying our ideas are dumb and that's it. You don’t really address our points. You kinda just push them to the side under the guise of another argument that’s ultimately just your opinion (admittedly, a widely accepted one). I’ve agreed that a score nerf is a lazy fix. But under different contexts, it’s theoretically possible for it to be the best thing. “Always” is usually — though not always (lol) — a dangerous word. It depends on a lot of factors. That aside, you haven’t seemed to give much thought to the other stuff. Even if you simply acknowledged it and just said “I see what you’re saying. It makes sense. But I don’t think aggro is OP because xyz.” That would be fine. (I know you mentioned removing aggro earlier but I got confused when you stated another aggro idea.) Without that proper kind of discussion, we have the conversation that just passed: I push one argument; you pretty much push another; I (attempt to) counter your argument and show mine again because your negligence of mine makes me assume (*assume*) you didn’t read it. The purpose of all my explanations of the aggro issue is to show the importance of nerfing it, which I in turn intended to show the importance of a score nerf *under the assumption that aggro stayed as is*. You say the idea is “obviously retarded” (paraphrase) but you’re the only one here who thinks that (at least here). (Again, G is okay with it if nothing is done. Of course, any logical person would expect frosty to be changed, so that fact is semi-irrelevant.)

I don't need to go into a discussion with either of you. If you'd like so suggest a score nerf to the dev's, that's fine with me. I already know the score nerf is gonna ruin the consistency of the game. Don't need a discussion for that. If you'd like the dev's to ruin the game, then feel free to.

Again. This is where your language gets kinda presumptuous. Not necessary. If you disagree that’s fine. But don’t call an idea dumb if you aren't going to continue a discussion on why you believe that. It defeats the whole point and is usually just bothersome. Quite frankly, it’s just an extremely poor approach to debating. Open minds are key.

As a side note, other games aren’t SoG. And games like LoL are quite different. So referencing them or your knowledge of them is weird...slightly. It’s relevant...but people who know SoG well *and* other games would have better credibility with their words here.

I gave my apologies for the aggression and misreading earlier. Don’t get too upset with Chaldo. He does these weird things in the discord too. Lol
 
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