Focused Feedback: Enemy Group - Kallisti Wharf Skulls

[The Curator]

Use this channel to discuss and provide feedback regarding enemy group critter balance for the high level Skulls enemies encountered in Kallisti Wharf.

[jkwak]

Saw Skulls spawned at 3 level higher than surounding mobs in a couple of places and comletly obliterating them even without a player coming close to trigger a fight, forgot to make a screencap on where it happend though, i will make one next time i explore the improved KW

[High_Beam]

Saw some level 45.  It just makes no sense placing them and certain other mobs that cap at certain levels here.  There are plenty of other higher level fish here that you don't need to pile on with padding like this.

[StarkWhite]

My understanding is that every enemy group you run into in KW is there for a story reason. This Page is only the first part of what is planned to be a continuing story in the zone, so even if it seems like certain groups are just there to be there, there are plans for them.

[ViridianDev]

15 hours ago, jkwak said:

Saw Skulls spawned at 3 level higher than surounding mobs in a couple of places and comletly obliterating them even without a player coming close to trigger a fight, forgot to make a screencap on where it happend though, i will make one next time i explore the improved KW

 

This is a working as intended feature; there are some brawling enemy groups throughout the Wharf, Skulls are one of them.

[High_Beam]

So, things I liked.  I liked the new Skull types, Death Knight (name isn't great though), Volkhv Priestesses are cool as are some of the others.  If you are going to lean into the Slavic deities and thematic laid down my the Petrovics then call them Banniks or something.  But I digress.

 

My problem is they don't belong there, they are way over level range with no explanation for their massive jump in power.  I get the statement that there is a movement in story for them but there is no real reason for what amounts to a 30+ level skip.  And if you follow the Lords of Death Arc, it makes even less sense their becoming more powerful.  now if they were bumped up to a follow-on zone from KR like say . . . Skyway and given their new power models, there is some sense,  their relationship with Atta and the Trolls relating tot he sale of Superadine would make sense their being there.  But KW?  It makes zero sense (like several of the other villain groups).

 

I haven't had a chance yet to test the story arcs but it is really irrelevant in this case because of the over leveling.

 

But

 

As I said, the addition of new enemy types in the Skulls is nice.  Most are cool and an interesting fight so thumbs up there.

[Velvet Violet]

There will be stuff in the next page that explains the power jump. It is not in this page because my story arcs (particularly Erin West) are complex and required far more debugging than I initially expected. I cannot promise that you will like the explanations, but I tend to have a high standard for writing and believe it will all make sense.

[High_Beam]

Okay additional feedback on the upgraded skulls.  Please please if you you are still gonna call em buckshot and slugger and slammer then stop with the dark noir negative energy attacks and instead improve their weapons because they are all popping off like Bone Daddy's and Death Dolls which makes them just sloppy reskins.  If you are gonna do that then make them newer costumes like the Priestesses and such and not call them Sluggers and Slammers, call them something like undertakers or since they wanna lean into Slavic pantheons, Banniks (sp).

 

to @Velvet Violet, I hear what you are saying and will of course have a degree of "benefit of the doubt" factored in but if your explanation is additional story content at lower levels then you should have waited with this and done that, it breaks the flow of a character leveling up; exposed to the enemy, continuing to fight them, them becoming a arch or nemesis of sorts, and then the further up the food chain they progress they find out bigger and broader.  Not, "wow these guys got powerful, I guess I need to call Mender Lazarus and go back to when the change happened."  I am doing the Arc right now (just finished mission 2) so I will feedback over there.

 

And please, don't take this as disrespecting your or others hard work but you asked for constructive feedback and I am trying to give that.

Edited May 29 by High_Beam
Spelling and grammer as usual.

[Velvet Violet]

5 hours ago, High_Beam said:

Okay additional feedback on the upgraded skulls.  Please please if you you are still gonna call em buckshot and slugger and slammer then stop with the dark noir negative energy attacks and instead improve their weapons because they are all popping off like Bone Daddy's and Death Dolls which makes them just sloppy reskins.  If you are gonna do that then make them newer costumes like the Priestesses and such and not call them Sluggers and Slammers, call them something like undertakers or since they wanna lean into Slavic pantheons, Banniks (sp).

 

to @Velvet Violet, I hear what you are saying and will of course have a degree of "benefit of the doubt" factored in but if your explanation is additional story content at lower levels then you should have waited with this and done that, it breaks the flow of a character leveling up; exposed to the enemy, continuing to fight them, them becoming a arch or nemesis of sorts, and then the further up the food chain they progress they find out bigger and broader.  Not, "wow these guys got powerful, I guess I need to call Mender Lazarus and go back to when the change happened."  I am doing the Arc right now (just finished mission 2) so I will feedback over there.

 

And please, don't take this as disrespecting your or others hard work but you asked for constructive feedback and I am trying to give that.

 

No disrespect taken. The order of creation for stuff was out of whack, I agree. West and Kogan were supposed to be finished last page and I was going to have the other arcs finished this page. It was bad planning on my part, that's it.

[Super_Sark]

So are we finally going to get a continuation of the storyline from King's Row with the Skulls?  That story felt like it had more left to tell.

[BasiliskXVIII]

On 5/28/2025 at 5:41 PM, Velvet Violet said:

There will be stuff in the next page that explains the power jump. It is not in this page because my story arcs (particularly Erin West) are complex and required far more debugging than I initially expected. I cannot promise that you will like the explanations, but I tend to have a high standard for writing and believe it will all make sense.

 

I would say that it isn't uncommon in comics that an enemy is suddenly significantly more powerful, but especially if there is a justification on the way I think it would be more true to the setting to add atmospheric dialogue (or *more* atmospheric dialogue) from NPCs such as in the street fights or some mention in missions about where someone goes "WHY ARE THEY SO POWERFUL, THEY'RE JUST SKULLS?!"

This would give context to the fact that yes, this is a change, and yes, it is a departure from the status quo. These aren't intended to be the same group of thugs that you ran into at low levels.

[ViridianDev]

23 minutes ago, BasiliskXVIII said:

 

I would say that it isn't uncommon in comics that an enemy is suddenly significantly more powerful, but especially if there is a justification on the way I think it would be more true to the setting to add atmospheric dialogue (or *more* atmospheric dialogue) from NPCs such as in the street fights or some mention in missions about where someone goes "WHY ARE THEY SO POWERFUL, THEY'RE JUST SKULLS?!"

This would give context to the fact that yes, this is a change, and yes, it is a departure from the status quo. These aren't intended to be the same group of thugs that you ran into at low levels.

 

There are breadcrumbs of information that allude to the rise of the Skulls' power in Kallisti Wharf through overworld dialogue, the story arcs, and their critter bios. As VV mentioned above, a true explanation will be revealed later, but for now we're building plotlines and keeping players partially in the dark.

[PBiz]

So I tested out in the AE with these level 50 skulls on my fully kitted out Dark Melee/Rad Armor Brute. I played on +4/x8. I'm aware that this is not the intended way, but I think it's worth discussing my findings.

 

This was absolutely one of the worst times I've had playing this game. Fighting one group was torture. The terrorizes stacked and were endless. There's shades that stack terrorize on a target, and then there's one Lieutenant that also stacks terrorize on a target. But for melee, this was just not fun at all. Furthermore, all of the -ToHit stacks. I normally never have a problem with being able to hit enemies, but this was just impossible. My base ToHit is 81% and my Accuracy is 1.25x. I have Beta Decay for -Def on always, and then Soul Drain for +ToHit and Ground Zero to do -Def. I could NOT hit these enemies at all because the stacking -ToHit was entirely too much.

 

I feel like this is just going to be torture for any melee characters to deal with, especially for a tank since they'll be targeting you exclusively. You'll be chain terrorized and then not be able to damage anything.

 

My recommendation is to tone down the terrorize mag or duration on a lot of these moves, and to also tone down the -ToHit value on a lot of them too. This was just way too much.

Edited May 31 by PBiz

[KaizenSoze]

8 hours ago, PBiz said:

So I tested out in the AE with these level 50 skulls on my fully kitted out Dark Melee/Rad Armor Brute. I played on +4/x8. I'm aware that this is not the intended way, but I think it's worth discussing my findings.

 

This was absolutely one of the worst times I've had playing this game. Fighting one group was torture. The terrorizes stacked and were endless. There's shades that stack terrorize on a target, and then there's one Lieutenant that also stacks terrorize on a target. But for melee, this was just not fun at all. Furthermore, all of the -ToHit stacks. I normally never have a problem with being able to hit enemies, but this was just impossible. My base ToHit is 81% and my Accuracy is 1.25x. I have Beta Decay for -Def on always, and then Soul Drain for +ToHit and Ground Zero to do -Def. I could NOT hit these enemies at all because the stacking -ToHit was entirely too much.

 

I feel like this is just going to be torture for any melee characters to deal with, especially for a tank since they'll be targeting you exclusively. You'll be chain terrorized and then not be able to damage anything.

 

My recommendation is to tone down the terrorize mag or duration on a lot of these moves, and to also tone down the -ToHit value on a lot of them too. This was just way too much.

 With no sarcasm intended. I tested a bunch of different ATs against Skulls. If you're soloing Skulls at 4x8 without enough defense aka resist builds, heavy status resists, or toHit buffs/resists.

 You will need to pop insp to get over some of the effects. Pulling them to corners to limit that amount ranged attacks also helps a lot and gets them into your damage AOEs. and fear auras.

Edited May 31 by KaizenSoze

[Monos King]

On 5/28/2025 at 4:41 PM, Velvet Violet said:

There will be stuff in the next page that explains the power jump. It is not in this page because my story arcs (particularly Erin West) are complex and required far more debugging than I initially expected. I cannot promise that you will like the explanations, but I tend to have a high standard for writing and believe it will all make sense.

 I have to tack on that I am very much super not in favor of the sudden power level jump for Skulls. The skulls needed a more native, natural progression in power. This was being built upon by the past arcs, and there was set up for this kind of progression. 

 

A sudden, mysterious jump in power from mook to monster is very effective sometimes. The way that it was done with The Snakes is a great example of this. They went from the likes of an easily culled group to a powerful cult with potentially divine origins. But this worked with the Snakes for a couple of reasons. Spoilers below for Operative Grillo if that's a concern.

 

For one, The Snakes did not have a greater narrative that was being built up to. They didn't have really any story from the level when they were introduced, allowing an essentially clean slate for later expansion upon. They weren't established as a weak group with reasons for staying weak, they just happened to be weak. Furthermore, they had an existing narrative that could easily allow a power climb. The plaques discussing the legends of the Children of Enos planted the seed of intrigue in the players, keeping them open to an eventual re-introduction to this low-level group.

 

All of this makes it not only agreeable but interesting that the Snakes end up so powerful. And we find out what is really going on; what seems like a sudden power explosion is actually closer to the group returning to their roots. There's an actual Goddess involved.

 

Not the case with Skulls. For one, their placement in the world is well established. They are intro magical guys. They are mere thugs, they run an illegal business, they depend upon other groups like the family for their supply, and they possess a piffling understanding of magic that leads them (and hellions) to manipulation. We find out that they actually do possess access to more impressive, knowledgeable members in their leadership, and that these people had big plans in the future. 

I had always looked forward to this being something that leads to actually powerful, high-level skulls. But like...Levels 30-40.

 

That's the biggest issue here, it isn't Skulls are getting a power increase. As I said, I am actually very much in favor of that. I've even been talking about it a lot, because the existing lore is there to permit something happening. But we should really be using the existing lore. The current Skull situation leaves an entire arc, a very insightful one, pretty much dangling off a roof. It is something that needs to be addressed before the Skulls advance in strength and significance. 

 

And the other issue is that the Skulls got a power increase...to level 40-50. That's insane. That's Banished Pantheon tier. Even I had a hard time convincing people this should happen, and I was saying it would be like level 38 tops. 

 

Skulls at 40-50 is kind of insane. I'm not saying there's no way Skulls could be made to that powerful, far from it, but with this big a jump, there needed to be exposition before the fact, not after. As it stands, it will likely be jarring and strange even with the future explanation, as well serve to undercut or even abandon the Kings Row arcs. It wouldn't even make sense to connect them to the Kings Row arcs, because this big a level gap between the arcs is impractical from a story following perspective, not even considering the power jump. It would be difficult to follow that story during natural progression, and sort of limit the amount of story that could be added during said progression as well. The growth of the skulls could easily take place from levels 14 all the way up to 40, not unlike the Signature Story Arcs.

 

This one might end up having some undesirable consequences. I appreciate the inspiration and passionate work, and I will be following the storyline closely however it ends up moving. Though I am heavily against these developments, as they currently stand.

[Monos King]

On 5/30/2025 at 1:59 PM, ViridianDev said:

 

There are breadcrumbs of information that allude to the rise of the Skulls' power in Kallisti Wharf through overworld dialogue, the story arcs, and their critter bios. As VV mentioned above, a true explanation will be revealed later, but for now we're building plotlines and keeping players partially in the dark.

Don't think this is the way to handle the Skulls for reasons highlighted in my above post, but I'll have more feedback as it comes together.