(New Poison) Soulspitter Cauldron

#1

SOULSPITTER CAULDRON
image image

Used by Malphas to store and collect the souls of unworthy opponents. It appears to still have its arcane properties, but also has no souls left inside. Despite its small appearance, it seems surprisingly big enough to hold an entire arm or head in there, perhaps…

STATS:

Tier UT
MP Cost 100
On Equip +3 DEF +3 SPD
Effect(s) On self: Explosion of 600 damage within 5 tiles.
Despawns Character
On Impact: Spawns Character on Location
Throw Time 0.25 seconds
Cooldown 1.75 seconds
Radius 5 tiles
XP Bonus 6%
Soulbound UT
Feed Power 750

Drops From:

More info:

When I was looking into playing more dagger classes, I found it weird that the assassin didn’t really have any tools to move around better using their ability. The Rogue had the Planewalker, the Trickster naturally has a prism. Sure the assassin could lob their poisons over the wall but it felt like it should also have an option to be able to “teleport” like its other dagger counterparts.

This is why I’m suggesting this idea, how the item actually works would be the assassin fitting themselves into the Soulspitter Cauldron, this makes the cauldron cackle wild magic around the area (the poison/damaging effect) due to having taken in a soul and its body. The assassin proceeds to get thrown out as a grenade projectile (soul-form) then becomes corporeal again upon landing on this plane. The yeeter has become the yeeted.

I didn’t want it to be an outright teleport due to this lore, as well as its gameplay feeling a bit clunky or weaker than a normal teleport by the other classes due to lobbing/air-time as a poison. I still wanted to keep the idea of lobbing poisons since it felt like the style of the assassin.

This is why I wanted to sort of suggest temporarily “despawning” the player’s character until the projectile lands. Making it inoptimal when you want to maximize your DPS with your dagger, as well as making it a bit unique as it provides pseudo invincibility at the cost of damage. Spamming this would essentially also come at a cost of having more and more downtime not dealing damage adding up.

I wanted this to be useful for rushing dungeons or getting over walls, or situations where you’d need a short breather or time to reposition in fights. I’m generally open to suggestions and thoughts about this so feel free to comment what you think about the idea!

Edit History

Edit #1: Changed the spawn-respawn mechanic with stuff already in the game. Still speculating the strength of the ability (unsure on the invincibility mechanic specifically if it can be abused or if it is balanced). Reworded some things and added a few more sentences elaborating what I currently think makes it “balanced”.

Edit #2: Edited some details about invincibility, apparently teleportation invincibility might be a bit different so reworded the ability a bit. Adjusted some of the damage numbers.

Edit#3: Reverted it back to its original form to just despawning-respawning the character to make it more straightforward.


What do you think about the idea?

  • The idea is great!
  • The idea is good.
  • The idea is okay.
  • The idea is bad.

0 voters

#2

This is an idea that I’d like to see in practice. Although I liked the idea of this, the item in practice was making me think a little.

First (and less important in the realm of pure theorizing), I’m wondering if despawning your character outright is possible. Perhaps you could go “invisible” (unrendered?) with an invisibility (and possibly paralysis to complete the illusion) symbol(s) floating where you currently are, then treating the impact area as your point of teleportation… would it ever be possible to teleport with the existing coding without an ability activation? If not, maybe an invisible “portal” could spawn you alone to a destination, but that sounds messy/impossible as well, if not more so. I wish I could test these things.

As for the actual concept, it seems like a slightly riskier item to use for the timing of your landing, but I could totally see people cheesing the invincibility frames. It doesn’t last as long as the Oreo, but this is why I’d want to see this tested. How badly could players abuse this item in fights?

I could see that you were thinking of ways to balance it, so an A for effort there!

TLDR; Invincibility frames concern me slightly without testing, but I like the thought put into this.

#3

Yeah I was also skeptical on this when I made the idea, I was thinking maybe something along the lines of a sort of Petrify and Invincibility (Note: this purposely different from Invulnerability image ). But instead of Petrify changing the character to black and white, it would just lower the Opacity of the player (Like Invisiblity) to the point where it isn’t visible on screen? Maybe change the player sprite into a Pot/Cauldron since this is technically what happens in the ability? Again yeah, it needs a bunch of testing.

Having throw time was something I initially intended as it would still require skills with lobbing projectiles (something the assassin class practices) to effectively use it to around fights, yet still make it viable for rushing normally and stuff.

Although the point of cheesing the I-frames was something I did not anticipate so I really appreciate you bringing this up. I initially thought 0.6 seconds was not really going to be a significant amount of time, Especially when one was essentially “stunned” while traveling. Now though I’m more skeptical about it.

I’m not sure about lowering the throw time as that was the initial solution that came to me. Maybe it could be a fun mechanic or a broken one, so lowering it might remove that. I really wish there was a way to test this as well.

Thanks! I really wanted to make sure it had its viability, but stayed true to the nature of a UT being mainly situational. Really appreciate the input too!

#4

Decided on just making the player into the sprite of the pot with paralysis and invincibility instead of speculating on the whole spawn-respawn mechanic for the player. It fits in terms of how the ability technically works as well. I don’t imagine people would want to cleanse it either even if they could due to it being technically beneficial accompanied with the teleport as well at the end.

#5

It leaves you open, but that hopefully still works! It kind of reminded me of the “Canopic Cocktail” from the Elder Realms, only this is an ability, and you’re throwing your soul, rather than leaving it in a jar and wandering around freely. Kind of neat!

#6

Just looked it up and damn, tempted to try to read more. I wouldn’t really say the player is open since the player is still an indestructible pot. Although yeah this is just to shorten the fact that the player is just Invincible, Silenced and Stunned for the duration of throwing the poison. So its essentially still the original idea but brought down to the current game mechanics.

#7

(Yeah it is was a fun read! That was one of the items I suggested that he tweak originally, though.) I know they weren’t the same, your idea was just similar enough to remind me of it!

As a matter of curiosity (understanding that they are different as an ability and item), which mechanic would you prefer, if both were to be accessible to all classes (like if your idea were to theoretically become an ability instead of a poison)? Just curious! They both seem fun to try out in their own respective ways.

#8

Hmm tough to say, mechanically I’d personally love to see the Canopic Cocktail over the mechanic I suggested in action, I mean I could already see the crazy speed runs it could create. However it seems difficult to balance as it seems it could be either extremely powerful for some classes or too situational for its usage for others. (Not that my suggestion of a “reverse poison” doesn’t have issues with balance itself XD).

This feels like more of a matter of preference but I feel like I’d prefer the mechanic of the Soulspitter Cauldron. This is mainly because I like playing safe and the situations Canopic Cocktail would be used seems too risky for my liking. Considering this would be available to all classes that the 4 seconds of using Canopic Cocktail you’ll have use those 4 to get in AND get out. There’s also a risk of PK’ing people whether accidentally or on purpose when they use Canopic Cocktail by dragging enemies within those 4 seconds to the jar if playing with others.

#9

Yeah, and keep in mind the kinds of enemies in that realm you’re fighting with the cocktail, as well. Absolutely brutal. You’re definitely exposing yourself to the potential for others to take you out, as you said.

Anyway, I’ll let others have a turn dissecting your poison! :sweat_smile:

#10

Reworked this idea to be in the original form, I figured that I didn’t need to go through complicating and make the idea as straightforward as I could.

#11

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