Vault Hunters HermitCraft: IS RANDOM BAD? - Behind the scenes
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- Опубліковано 19 вер 2024
- Behind the scenes from the HermitCraft vault hunter series between episode 18 and 19 - iskall talks about Random and RNG in games, and Etho joins in!
NOTE, this video is NOT edited!
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Gotta keep getting all my etho content from Iskall
Amen
I want etho to do a vault hunter series like he did with project ozone so badly. I would watch that over and over
Etho's next vid will have him at Lv100...
@@davidhenry31 I'm really hoping Etho and Iskall do a skyvault playthrough together.
No offense to Iskall. But I agree! Gotta get some Etho!
Iskall: "I am going on real holidays so I won't play"
Also iskall: " Sooo... let's play some vault hunters"
i think this is all 1 or 2 sessions lol
He's definitely a fiend for it 😅
*Best friend asks to sleep over and play games*
Also Iskall: "Gotta Vault"
"uploads pretty much everyday" :D
@justaregularrhino6529 so far it's his 2nd session this behind the scenes
Iskall was standing right next to the new vault portal in his office and still flew down to the beach to use the old one.. I feel personally attacked.
A solution to the treasure key door is to have the gem shape on the door for those who can't see the different greens and those who are colorblind . Or when you hold the key and the door is in your line of sight it gets hilighted.
That's a great idea
you can also change the shape of the keys, make sure the same color keys are very differently shaped, would do this between colors too for accessibility, but def make sure those of similar color are very diff shapes to each other. Would add on that the doors should feature same the shape as the keys or some way to match the keys besides color.
As someone with red-green colour blindness I love this idea.
Yes! Shapes are good!
@@seerm1744 or an option for like, a texture that has the gem with a smaller key icon on the corner or vice verse
Hearing etho and Iskall talk dev stuff is the best part of etho finally playing vault hunters like every single time they play together I can’t help but stop what I’m doing and listen to the conversation
I don't mean to be the grammar police, but you used "there" as in "over there" instead of "they're" as in "they are."
@@Game_Blox9999 🤓
@@Game_Blox9999 and it actually should be their, grammar police
They are so interesting
@@aelin88 Yeah, I guess I deserved that. You know what they say, you reap what you sow.
Iskall talking game mechanics with Etho is one of my favorites things right now
as someone who plays. Diablo, WoW, FFXIV, vault hunters and many others.. as well as have thought about games.
Rng is a good thing in games.. but it also needs a bad luck protections. my favorite ones are things that you can either a. win with rng.. or b. through the work of time. get exactly what you want. for example. in ffxiv. you can 100% rng get a mount to drop from a trial. but theres always the odd change you do not get that mount to drop for years (looking at the WoW drop for the mount invincible the mount from ice crown raid that i still dont have after running it often for 4 years.) in FFXIV the answer to this is each time you run. you get an item for killing that boss. and after you have beaten them a number of times (for FFXIV this is 100) you can then get the mount from an vendor. allowing you a way to get around the rng should life decide to not allow you that win. so you always are working twords the goal. i think all games need this kind of answer.. a way to get to the end of an rng grind. no matter what rng is giving you.
Vault hunters i do feel does this fairly well. some of the points i think its still lacking on is like.. bad luck on generation of vault player gems. and such. or the fact that you can only target one crafted stat onto a gear.. when maybe ide like to craft all of them for a increasing cost per stat at some point. or things like that. power to the player can be there along with rng. and thats a very. fine line to talk. your doing amazing iskall! vault hunters is amazing.. and if it wasnt a part of minecraft. i would have bought into it just as much as i have.
I agree, this is a mod pack not a huge company so it will not have the same level but I agree that some lessons taken from other games that rely heavily on rng (roguelikes, mmos etc) would be helpful, for me I’d like more clarity with rng weights and exact number chances of things especially more on gear. Lucky hit has been something I’ve been toying with but I don’t really get its weights… other things like how item rarity affects things etc in wow I know I lost a 1-100 dice roll but even though I’m enjoying VH it’s not super clear on the rng layers and reasonings it has, like why did my brother roll a lot of omega gear wearing picture of a lucky goose? Is gear rolling apart of rarity? Idk. I love the mod pack and appreciate the effort for sure! Just chiming in things. Also allowing more rerolls on things I have found helps ‘rng’ feel better, so like above stat rerolling at an increasing cost feels better than just limited stat changes.
eyo, what's your favorite tank in ffxiv? ;)
@@melsunday1991 for me to play. Gunbreaker. For me to heal? Pally. XD but they are all quite fun
You should add some simple parkour or something to the first room of the vaults, that people can do for fun while they’re waiting for their friends! You jumping around while you were talking to Etho was driving me nuts, even though I’m a very restless person, haha.
I still wanna see what a brainstorming session with both Iskall and Gem looks like XD
Idk if your going to read this Iskall or if it is even possible but I have an idea about the treasure treasure doors: you can make the keys start to glow or change appearance when near the corresponding door, I believe that it could resolve the problem of the color of the doors
I really like this idea!
And/or give the keys a unique shape for each gem, since the doors already kind of have their own look for each one. Would help with accessibility too, for the colorblind players
@@Entarra yes that would be a great idea
But that requires you to sacrifice one hotbar slot and there are only so many items one can fit into these 9 slots
@hunterbshindi2310 That's very true, but this is largely a problem when you have only one key. If you open your inventory or a chest, you could also see the glow.
But yeah, it would be a significant problem.
For fixing the treasure room doors, I see two solutions.
1. The doors could be made visually distinct in ways that are not color coordinated.
Playing around with different patterns on the texture of the different doors would be a massive step in the right direction.
I could also see a world where the doors are a 3x3 with a picture of the vault ore in the center.
There are gems on the doors already, but its not enough to be able to distinguish it at a glance.
2. Add some sort of color blindness feature to the settings of the game, or even create a browser based resource pack customizer (similar to Xisumas vanilla tweaks) that lets you change the color of different assets.
OH! i really like your idea of 3x3 treasure door with like picture of the vault ore in the center, I also really badly want gem blocks, so for example would be super awesome to be able to make a block of sparkletin or iskallium
I'd love the treasure keys to sparkle if it's in the vicinity of a treasure door. And it could have varying levels of sparkliness depending in if you're close.
The colorblind thing is big big big, I really need it xD
Hey, Iskall since majority of the hermits had played through The vaults u should do a vault with every hermit and ask them how they fell about the game what they don’t like, what they do like and etc to see what you can improve or take out from the game
That would make very interesting vodskall content. Would love to watch their perspectives.
I like the rng idea and I like how it's implemented in vh but its always nice to be able to just choose to work harder for the item, like spending 50 gold instead of gambling 5 with a small chance
For the doors, one solution could be to put an outline of the gem on the door(and key, so people can reference). That way theres a non-color way to differentiate them.
This is a very good idea
@vodskall85 a way to figure out the color without looking at the color is great for colorblind people too
The handle of the keys could literally be the shape of the unique gem it was crafted with, and the doors could have a decoration on the corners of the door that would match the key handle.
It so much fun seeing Etho enjoy the modpack, you must be having the best time playing with him seeing him love it so much
5:30 I agree with this, the mods being a side-feature. I unlock RS and drawers to handle my loot. I unlock Create and iSpawners to make altar goodies. I unlock Waystones to get to my friends so we can run vaults together. You have a very strong gameplay loop going with the core VH mod
I love this sort of video more so than the polished, edited stuff, they feel so much more genuine and sincere
It is such a joy watching iskall and etho hanging out :)
My take on RNG in games like diablo and vault hunters, is when you have to grind grind and grind more to make meaningful growth. It becomes more tedious than fun. Especially in a game where the durability eventually means you'll lose the gear you've meticulously crafted, and now need to rebuild all over again.
Its really two balancing points to find:
1st The point where the lowest new gear you get naturally, is nearly equal to the old gear you've maxed, so even if you need to start over, you're not suffering to do so.
2nd: The point where the amount of effort it takes to max out your gear, is still a better/smarter use of time and resources than only going for higher level gear.
If your game has these two points well balanced, rng feels rewarding. If it doesn't, rng feels punishing
These two bounce off each other so well. Really gives you a peek behind the curtain of Vh. I've really enjoyed watching. Iskallman to the rescue once a again 😂 (no shame in that at all 😂)
RNG is a fun mechanic but should always have a workaround
Like you should be able to decide you're too unlucky and get what you want another way. Give either a workaround or a guarantee.
Everything should be obtainable from more than rng, always give options.
Thats my opinion tho.
“Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get”, this is my feelings towards rng, and I love it that way. I feel like playing a game with the same outcome over and over doesn’t seem appealing to me when it comes to adventuring. Nothing makes me feel like my effort is worth it than to get that one piece or gear I needed, even if it has a sprinkle of luck involved.
Also RNG to me encourages experimentation, for example, I got a chaining sword with good stats instead of more attack like I wanted, so I decided to try it and now I love chaining! Without rng making that “decision” for me, I wouldn’t have found something I like.
Love your vids Iskall! Continue to enjoy your break!
just a thought for another use of chest scrolls:
similar to dummies, where you can test your attack damage and speed, there can be “dummy _____ chest” in which you can see how fast a chest can break. they’d break entirely but respawn after a few seconds. this can be a good way to test your tools in the overworld.
Iskall idk if you will read this or not but quick question: Are there any plans of getting a "Audio team" part of the VH dev team, or do you at least like the idea of it? Having music and custom sounds would make VH so much better and it's something I really miss right now.
I'd love that
Ohhh yes! But theyd have to fit in with the vanilla mc soundtrack, its just too good and iconic
(written at about 8 minutes into the video)
I love the rng in vault hunters, but balancing can be tricky. The tool crafting system is great, and like you said, the gear crafting system could learn a lot from that. I did the math of gear crafting recently. because you only get .1 or .2% towards mastery, that means it takes anywhere from 500 to 1000 crafted pieces to gain mastery in just one type of gear. I think even just adding the potential to get .3% while gear crafting would make it more worth it. maybe make an expertise that can raise the number to .4 or .5. that makes the math go to between 1000 and 334 for normal, and from 1000 to (potentially) 200 to finish a mastery. prices for crafting could also be adjusted.
Another possibility is to incorperate faceted foci into gear crafting. crafting gear causes you to lose the potential for legendary modifiers. what if crafted gear, when crafted with a faceted focus, could have that focus permanently seared into the gear. whatever it rolls is what you get, so it still has an rng element. it couldnt be chaos focused into being better (or worse).
so as an example, you craft a chest plate and use a health faceted focus. you roll it into a rare, and the health rolls a 4 (out of a possible 9). that prefix cannot be changed no matter what, but you can still rng the rest of the weapon as normal.
(written at about 32 minutes into the video)
Maybe a way to fix axes is by making them both better and worse at the same time. a sword is naturally and stereotypically a nice, fast, one handed weapon. Axes can be more powerful sure, but they are normally wielded with two hands.
What if vault axes were like that too? start them at between 10-12 damage at level 0, let them have a much stronger base damage than swords, with the drawback being that you cant use an offhand. with less access to ability power and block chance/thorns damage, you have the potencial to build a set up that's way more focused on how hard you hit. Give axes a chance to have a small percentage of lucky hit added as an implicit. This gives players the change to make builds that don't focus on mana or ability power as much, letting them focus more on movement and shielding.
I love axes, I want to use axes, and I feel like this could be the thing that pushes them into being a viable weapon. I feel like part of the problem is that their being treated as sword 2.0 when they need to be treated as their own weapon. giving them a much harder hit at the cost of being slower AND having no offhand can defiantly do that. This could even be supported by adding either new skills or new specializations into skills we already have that work based on your damage rather than your ability power. example, a subset of fireball called firefist that does a percentage of your damage on your next hit. mana shield could have a subset called mana thorns where your mana drains while its up, but when a mob hits you it takes a % of your strength as thorns damage.
(written about 48 minutes into the video)
the door color thing isn't just a skill issue, its an issue of accessibility. I imagine the colors being so close really can be upsetting for those players that are colorblind and literally cant tell the difference between the doors. Another way to fix it without changing it all together is to add an accent color that is colorblind friendly. (i know you said it should be fixed potentially but still wanted to add to the discussion)
I love that you're willing to discuss RNG! Of course, your Pyder loves VH. I'm OK with RNG up to a point. I prefer having input into my destiny (i.e. gear building), but would love to have more choice and customization. If I can gather lots of materials to be able to build or craft an omega item, it's far more satisfying than randomly rolling for weeks until I get it.
I personally love the gear RNG in this game! I could honestly do with a little less RNG in the Vault Objectives themselves though. I find I fail a lot of vaults just due to bad RNG and not skill, and that's a little of a "feels bad" moment.
sometimes for me it feels like they are getting rid of the good rng stuff and keeping the bad stuff xD like getting rid of the mystery boxes, i LOVED those and would really like to see those back, but for the RNG on gear I think ONE thing that would make it WAY better is just have a void orb that you can combine with a faceted focus and then you could use that void orb that has been turned into a "Void Orb ( healing efficiency) " then when you use it on a gear peice then it would ONLY remove that healing efficiency and not take something else that you wanted to keep
I'm not 100% sure what you mean here because you CAN set the objective by using a seal. Though I believe you mean the fact that it's technically possible to not get all the things you need because of the RNG of spawning!
I also have NO issue with the gear randomness, especially with the addition of the... Modifier Workbench(I think that's what it's called)!
100% this. The Gear RNG is great. Objective RNG, not so much. Losing a vault because the altar wants wizard wands but the vault wants to give you gilded chests does indeed feel bad.
@@akfek Exactly this. The RNG of the vault itself (which I enjoy) can negatively effect the RNG of the objectives
Iskall / Etho runs have become my favorite VH content!
Hey Iskall! Love all the behind the scenes videos.
About your rng question; I think there’s definitely a place for it in Vault Hunters, your main point about how it provides variety and replay value make a lot of sense from a game design perspective. And I think rng can let you have a lot of fun with the gambling side, rolling that perfect modifier on a piece of gear is a pretty good feeling. Of course the opposite is also true, when you have to grind forever rerolling something just for that one stat you need, it can get exhausting.
That’s where the Minecraft perspective comes in, I’m not sure how much rng is necessarily welcome by people more use to playing standard Minecraft. I know for me personally, I generally try to eliminate as much rng from my game as possible, be it using librarian villagers instead of enchanting, using lighting to stop random mob spawns, or even building nether hubs so I don’t have to deal with the chaos of random ghasts. But that’s because in regular Minecraft I’m more interested in the building side than the grindy one and want to make that side as convenient as possible so I can spend more time building. Which doesn’t necessarily apply to VH, it just seems like generally rng and convenience are at odds with each other. And most players seem to prefer a more convenient experience, like you were saying to Etho in the last bts about game difficulty, how a lot of people want the game to be on the easier side.
It’s definitely a tough line to walk and I can sympathize with you and your team. Maybe if there’s rng, there can also be a more expensive but less grindy option? The reworked enchanter you guys made comes to mind, instead of rolling and hoping for the right enchants, you can just pay your emeralds and xp for the exact enchants you want, trading currency for expedience. Obviously for vault gear and everything you’d want the cost to be pretty high (vault gold, gems, etc) but it could be a good balance for the different types of players.
Sorry for the long reply, it’s just my two cents lol. You’re doing great and I can’t wait for next year and all the vaulting to come.
PS- and the Etho carrying lol
I think ONE thing that would make it WAY better is just have a void orb that you can combine with a faceted focus and then you could use that void orb that has been turned into a "Void Orb ( healing efficiency) " then when you use it on a gear piece then it would ONLY remove that healing efficiency and not take something else that you wanted to keep
Thank you! Good comment! I think RNG is necessary in a game like this, and I dont think its in a bad place at the moment, but it can definately use some love here and there
I think they key is giving people a way to bypass the RNG at a price, like how in POE you can use bench to 6l an item while paying a bit more. @@vodskall85
@@vodskall85 Yeah I agree, even with some of the grindier parts I’ve never found myself wishing it was removed from the game or anything. And that feeling when everything rolls just how you want it to is pretty hard to beat. I do think there’s some merit to a less grindy but more costly rng alternative for more casual players. I wouldn’t say it’s something that would necessarily be a straight improvement, just a different approach.
Even if nothing changes your rng systems are still far more fun than rolling villager trades lol.
I like RNG for the same reasons you mentioned! Namely the replayability and not knowing what you're gonna get. It's exciting!
Maybe Iskall needs to look into how PSO2 dealt with gear. You could merge together gear with a high amount of randomness that you could minimize with a large amount of resource use. This way you could get what you wanted without hitting a 1 in a million drop chance.
No it didnt , Dudu and Monika can burn in heck
I think ONE thing that would make it WAY better is just have a void orb that you can combine with a faceted focus and then you could use that void orb that has been turned into a "Void Orb ( healing efficiency) " then when you use it on a gear peice then it would ONLY remove that healing efficiency and not take something else that you wanted to keep
@@Lakosius Dudu did nothing wrong. Come back when you get doom break 3 on an 8 affix weapon.
Iskall, have you ever thought about making some elements of Vault Hunters into a separate mod? The tool system and skills are basically one of the best, I'd want to play with them in other modpacks as well.
when his team first made the animal pens mod, he did say he would have that mod being its seperate mod so that others could use it for things like skyblocks ( i know this doesnt asnwer your question and wasnt what you were asking, i just remember him saying that about the animal pens mod )
I'm hoping he makes the Animal Jars a separate mod! I believe when they introduced the jars someone asked him and he seemed open to the idea. That would end up being one of the most popular mods I think.
iSpawners might be nice too, though they would also have to move Mystery Eggs(or do something to make it work) to it so people could actually use it. I suppose Cagerium could work as well though that ends up with a VERY similar problem!
I love the way that VH has its gear crafting and rolling. I, myself, am not a huge gambler when it comes to rolling equipment but it is always exciting to get that next upgrade or make the build you are aiming for. When it comes to the RNG of the game, I do have a few ideas for you to think about to potentially do more / make the system feel nicer
1) double down on the faceted foci: By combining multiple (say 4) of the same kind of focus + other crafting materials, it creates a supreme faceted focus of the same type. The supreme focus, when applied to a gear piece, will always have the max rolled stat (plus maybe a small chance at a legendary roll?). This will take the luck aspect out of rolling a gear piece in exchange for a noticeable cost.
2) Gear luck research: add a research option to create a table where the player can either choose a number of prefix + suffix modifiers to either remove or make rare for vault gear. For example, if the player doesn't want shocking hit chance on their sword, they can lessen the chance of it rolling by using the table. Obviously, the table would need research + be very expensive for this power but it would help better tune your gear rolls + remove the feel bad of getting a roll you don't want on late game equipment.
And I love the videos…you and Etho playing are so good to watch
What would be cool for hunter, would be to have it so that if when you go into a vault you have the respec of it connected to a "challenge" so for example when you go into a vault and you have it spec'd to gilded but you wanted it for living ( because you forgot to unspec before entering ) make it so that for example every 200 mobs you kill you COULD respec it into something else or every 80 ornate or gilded or living then it would allow you to respec it, and also when you exit a vault make it auto unspec
Prob one of my fav episodes from you ever. I’m not kidding at all! I so enjoyed every aspect of this video. Conversation, topic, and of course the vault. You’re doing a good job. ❤
The secret with rng is that you need to supply methods to mitigate bad luck. For example, a scav vault that rolls a set of items that physically don’t generate is not fun because it is unwinable. But if you are guaranteed those items are in the vault and obtainable within the 25 minute time limit, that is mitigatable rng. I think my biggest frustration with vault hunters right now is that I’m trapped on level 28 without access to gear that can help me survive a vault and not enough vault resources to get more gear. I feel trapped because I enter a vault to get the resources, get pinned by a giant mob of enemies and killed, and I am at the point where I cannot afford my revive any more. (I am playing on a solo world as I don’t know anyone else who plays).
I personally am always interested in hearing more of your thoughts on the game, and for you to give those thoughts in a laid back, zen way.
Something interesting about your stats being determined by RNG is that they did a study and found that when an outcome is determined by 90% skill and 10% luck, most of those sampled that meet a threshold will have high luck even though it does not contribute nearly as much as skill. I do appreciate games that allow you to push a big portion of stats by using good skill or over-analyzing a scenario, but if there is always a possibility that the boss can send an insta-kill toward the healer, then over the course of the battle you need a significant amount of luck. For how you set up armor, having it initially roll all its stats and having the potential to totally be garbage is fine I think because there are many other ways to "re-roll" for better luck. I definitely think it is good to occasionally be able to force the specific stat you need to complete your strategy, but also keeping the stats in ascending tiers make min-maxing more efficient because you are guaranteed something better will come eventually and all decisions are short-term.
Door color: is it possible to do something with the texture? (like the ores in vanilla) That would be the ideal solution when it comes to accessibility. From what I remember, if you want something to be clearly distinct, it's better to design it in black & white, and then apply the color for an even better distinction.
Makes sense to me.
Also, I turn on Jade, so it's not a concern personally 🤷
It feels like etho is someone who gets Iskall and I’m glad he has that for a sanity check and just to bouncy things off of
Rng is simple the best as long as it scales with your progression. Nowadays, people absolutely love having everything to beat the game as soon as possible, in my opinion, that's simply bad because it takes the skill very much so out of play and everything basically relies on gear. So, long story short, I don't think rng is so bad :)
I agree, as long as its scaling then RNG is fine. It actually adds to the challenge. I think that more options to modify, like being able to choose which specific prefix or suffix would be nice, rather than leaving it completely up to chance (although this may already be a thing and I've just not unlocked it).
I'm not exceptionally into the ARPG genre but I am big on roguelike games so I love the rng, so long as there is some form of mitigation for bad luck. From my single player experience of vault hunters I find it to be close to the perfect balance of RNG and non-RNG.
I appreciate the videos over your holiday break! Hope your holidays have been enjoyable
Personally I love the rng experience for the gear I really like the way it’s done. The gear system is a fun challenge when I redo my gear
one way to address the RNG aspect - particularly if the goal is to address the needs of more casual gamers - is to limit a non-RNG option to the easier game modes. So - if you play on easy or normal, you've got a way to craft the characteristics you want but your replayability is limited. But, if you want to maximize your replayability and you choose a harder setting, the ability to craft modifiers onto gear is removed.
Im a big fan of the concept of building your own gear like the tools. I like to control my focus and it can be very frustrating rolling gear until you get what you want.
I have a suggestion for vault gear! - I want to start off by saying that Vault Hunters is my favorite modpack ever! I think the normal difficulty and ability to adjust it up or down depending on your skill level is perfect. I started a multiplayer server with friends and they agree it's incredible but they get irritated at things you and I enjoy. They are the kind of player that wants to invest time and energy into the creative aspects of building and gaining more power than a vanilla experience provides. Specifically they hate scavenger vaults because they rely heavily on RNG. We'll always get 90% there and have to escape because we're missing one thing. I think that the time investment aspect is extremely relevant too. Running 5 vaults to every 1 my friends do gives me a completely different experience from them. It's nice to have people to respond to your questions in videos but to better help your team prioritize changes and improvements, it would be nice to offer surveys to get more data from your player base if possible.
Regarding vault gear improvements though, I think it would be amazing to (expensively) enchant books with the modifier of choice from a piece of vault gear. You can add RNG if desired but I think destroying the original piece of gear it was on would be perfect. Make it cost a large amount of crafting potential too, It'll incentivize people to do less rolling and more gathering of materials. I think this would provide a clear path for hardcore and casuals alike to optimize vault gear intentionally instead of relying strictly on RNG.
Absolutely love the series, content, and you being good to yourself by taking a break. (even if we still get to see what you're up too through vods) 😁👍
People often mistake skill issues for RNG issues.
People often mistake RNG issues for skill issues. It cuts both ways.
Ooh a double-edged sword!
@@Bob_Smith19 over the course of an entire playthrough the RNG likely will work itself out to average. Yeah if you go to a microscale like a single vault it won’t but over the course of the game it will.
At least from what I have seen on the subreddit a decent amount of the complaining on the RNG is either on a single vault (mainly scav items) or something that clearly is a skill issue that they are putting as RNG (saw a level 50 something say RNG made it so he never had a dungeon)
@@thomassexton6783 It's still ABSOLUTELY NOT fun to have a "perfect"(quotes because there's no such thing as a perfect build) build for whatever vault type you like but not be able to finish it because you RANDOMLY don't get what you need!
I'm unsure if it's changed but at one point Iskall ADMITTED that it was THEORETICALLY possibly to NOT be able to finish a Scav vault in Version 3 because of the randomness, and back then you could end up with a LOCKED vault as well, so if you got REALLY unlucky you wouldn't be able to ever leave because you CAN'T find what you needed to finish, even if you had INFINITE time in a vault! Now that's not PROBABLE but it IS POSSIBLE!
@@JacksonOwex and they eliminated the perms death on vaults. If you run a “perfect” vault and fail you are still gonna have enough gold to make it through.
As someone who in the last eight years haven't played anything other than minecraft, a Love vault hunters and the progressive feel of it!
Luck based games are so fun, if it's always the same thing it eventually gets boring
BUT, some things shouldn't need rng, like for example, the clouds and stuff, which they don't, which is good. I feel like aside from the need to have a great computer to play and needing a lot of vault coins and mayyybe not enough vanilla in crafting recipes, vault hunters is more or less perfect
Etho being part of the community has actively made it and the game better. Love to see it
I love the RNG in vh. I wish there was more! (VH2 cake vaults were always my favorite)
rng in an arpg setting, and in something like VHs especially, is amazing. I adore the gear crafting, it's my favourite part of the game
Need more developers like you 😢😊
One of my favourite sayings "RNGesus take the wheel!" Most of the time he turns and drives off a bridge
I have an idea for vault hunters in general. Correct me if this breaks some consistency part of the game, but I think it would be great if the general durability stats of armor and tools were buffed. This would make it less so you don’t have to create a whole new set of tools and armor every couple of levels because they are running out of durability, and more that the vaults are getting harder and it would be easier if you level up your gear. Or maybe there is more durability for lower level stuff, and that extra durability gradually fades the higher level you go, making the endgame more about repairing and crafting new sets of tools and armor, and keeping the early game leveling up if gear more vault difficulty focused.
When it comes to rng, its a few things, but to me, the 2 main things that make it frustrating are:
- When there's multiple layers stacked together to get something that is required for a build.
- When there's a high chance to completely brick a piece of gear that you've been working on and put a lot of resources into.
You've mostly solved the first by having crafter gear being a thing and the specific focus that guarantee a specific modifier, but cradting in general needs a bit of a buff, especially if you are going to introduce unique gear via looting.
As for the second point, the idea to be able to lock modifiers sounds really good, but it shouldn't be super rng to get those. Having materials required as a focus would be good, but having an expertise option for it would help too.
Something like "Blacksmithing" expertise, with say 4-5 levels, that does a few things, but only unlocks after level 50 or 75.
1. It allows you to lock additional modifiers on a piece of gear above the base 1 modifier (+1 per level into the expertise)
2. It gives you a small chance to roll a legendary modifier when you craft a piece of gear above a certain quality (e.g. crafting gear at smith level or higher grants +1 percent chance to roll a legendary modifier when you identify the crafted gear per level of expertise skill unlocked.
Since you're introducing unique gear, this would be a good balance between crafted and looted gear, similar to how path of exile does it, where crafting has the chance to get top tier modifiers, but the unique gear is only really obtained via looting. This way you can craft generically strong gear, but to go for the niche but super strong unique stuff, you still have to loot and run vaults.
Absolutly love these unedited BTS vods
One way to fix the treasure door problem would be adding the corresponding ore on the door, like how mob doors have the mob icon on them.
Rng is very fun, but it becomes frustrating when if feels like you put a lot of time in and, because you rolled badly, you made no progress. That's why, imo, incremental systems where you can see slow, steady progress towards what you want are a great complement to RNG-based gear systems. That's why I like the VH gear crafting system- you can put resources in and see yourself getting more proficient and working towards that piece you really want.
I think VH has the perfect amount of RNG. You get the fun of rolling for cool gear, but a bad roll doesn't ruin your game.
Maybe a less popular opinion; I also like that a good roll doesn't make it feel like God mode.
I've played modded for years, and this is possibly my favorite mod pack. It's a very nice switch up from yet-another-kitchen-sink pack.
I love PoE and i can tell the devs love it too. Crafting bench, prefixes, suffixes, harvest reforge prefixes and suffixes, exalt slamming, divine orb, blessed orb, chaos orb, etc. I love gear crafting in vault hunters just as I do in PoE
Having chase items like HH and Mageblood uniques would be so, so good
I can listen to Iskall and Etho talk game mechanics for HOURS!❤
So glad Etho has joined this little SMP and shares his honest feedback to this mod. And suggesting new ideas!
Love the content❤🎉
Developing is always a tough gig and with creating anything from games to music to films or just anything at all one problem thats always faced is that you cant please everyone. Me personally i love the RNG of vault hunters, even any games alike i just love the tough situations that you can get into if things go south, I love when you hit the jackpot and i also love the "Puzzling your character". When i played Diablo 4 i remembered i always changed my build whenever i got new gear and or higher levels to suit the new enemies to make great builds.
I always thought that a way vault hunters could give players more control is something similar to classes or a vault god skill to focus on when the player hits the level of god alters kinda like a secondary skill tree system depending on what god builds they wanna make, giving the players points every few levels or something or just every level from then, where it would be like a tug'a'war system between the gods where putting points into a web think, +1 points into Idona gives the player a good perk like when being hit by a mob has a chance to send of an explosion doing x % damage and knocking mobs back but it takes away a perk from Velara which could of been when being hit by a mob you have a chance to get regen 1 for 3 seconds and giving you 5% damage reduction. Or a point into Tenos giving a perk of completing bounties in a vault will boost the xp gain by x % but it takes away a perk from Wendarr where completing bounties in a vault will give 120 extra seconds to the vault. Basically just like picking one perk to sacrifice another perk from another god.
As someone who has never played any of the games mentioned at the start, and not even vault hunters (unfortunate I know, I'm working on it), I can 100% say that the RNG element makes it more entertaining to watch, and I would assume that transfers to play but like I said I have no experience there, but as purely a spectator it adds an unexpectedness to the videos (some would even say randomness), and for that reason I enjoy the RNG. Hope this helps, keep up the good work👍
It cuts both ways. It’s more entertaining but becomes hell if you end up in a bad streak. Your gear can be quickly out scaled. As an example, I rolled twenty swords yesterday. All of them had min rolls for attack damage and two of them had additional prefixes that were low rolls as well. Attack damage is extremely important for AD builds and those rolls will literally kill you in a vault. There is no guarantee you can fix them in the modifier workbench because it’s completely random as well.
I think I can speak for a lot of people when I say that I don’t like flat RNG, but I do enjoy RNG that I can influence in some way, it gives a sense of control and accomplishment rather than being at the mercy of the dice gods
Funny thing is, in this play through I got a treasure chest scroll on my first room. Only took me 4 seasons, the really remarkable part was I found a key in a merchant room, rolled it, found the door 2 rooms later. Sometimes the RNG gods are stingy, and sometimes they rain down their favor!
Iskall Vault Hunters is everything I wish Minecraft could be. I love how you’ve kept the Vanilla aspect of Minecraft while adding the whole adventure/dungeon element. The possibilities this adds to the base Minecraft game are limitless. Basically, I love your vision. I am glad i first discovered you on Hermitcraft and found you again on Vodskall. I hope one day Hermitcraft/Vaulthunters will be a season. Love you all and all my best wishes for the lot of you in 2024. Thank you Iskall, Hermitcraft peeps, and all the Vault Hunters team.
I love Vault Hunters but haven't played any of the games you mention. I have played and love Rougelikes so I do agree that there are types of rng that are better than others. I think, as you mention tool crafting is really fun, hard (in a good way), and rewarding. Gear on the other hand does feel rough sometimes but I honestly have no idea to "fix" it
I like the RNG, it makes the game more exciting to randomly get gear etc. Yes, it can be frustrating at times to not get what you want. However, it makes it even better when you get what you want. Sometimes I do like a bit of a grind in a game, prolongs gameplay and in Vault Hunters enables resource gathering. Thank you for VH Iskall and team
Petezanite, Tubium, and Iskallium all start with a different letter... maybe it''s a good idea to just put the starting letter of each unique gem on the treasure door? All of the unique gems actually start with a different letter. Another suggestion would be to let everyone know they can turn on tooltips using the 1 on the numpad, and read what door it says it is on the top of the screen!
The day after Iskall discusses the biggest controversy yet - the 3 green ores/treasure rooms being indistinguishable from each other - xB posts a video in which he and Hypno go vaulting and open up both a Tubium AND Petezanite Treasure room right after the other in the same vault. Luckily for them, they had both keys xD
I really enjoy these videos, thanks for making them! I hope you had a good time over the holidays and the draw to Vault Hunters was for the fun, not for an obligation.
RNG is one of the many things I think VH does phenomenally. Early game almost everything is left up yo chance, but as you progress you start to get more control over the randomness, which allows for some level of satisfaction and control in our playthroughs.
TLDR Gear Suggestion - Make a vault grindstone to remove a prefix or suffix and put it into a special book. Make the books expensive but attainable and make them use a lot of crafting potential so you'd still want to rely mostly on rolling a good set of modifiers and then adding your must have enchantments.
Also side suggestion. I like the idea of the modifier workbench being able to craft over a rolled stat if we can craft it better. There have been many times where I have a great start on a piece of gear but then get a low extra durability roll or similar and don't want to take the 20% gamble of removing the right modifier.
In general being able to have a clear path to your goal is fantastic even if it's a long journey. OR you can gamble in the hopes of getting something amazing. But having the choice is what makes people feel empowered to play the game their way.
As both an avid Tango and Iskall watcher this topic has quite fascinated me, since you are both at opposite ends with your opinions. I can see both work, literally, both have been a huge success.
My personal thoughts on RNG elements is that they are needed to a certain extend. I used to play Hypixel Skyblock a lot and that, in the beginning especially, is a HORRIBLE example of RNG in Minecraft. Having to put in actually hundreds, sometimes thousands of hours doing the same thing to get something is just not fun. But they solved that by putting a cap on it. They said "Ok, if you do X amount of runs of this you are GUARENTEED to get it at least once" and you could select the reward that you wanted to grind for. Now, I don't see vault hunters as nearly as grindy as that and the RNG we have in VH these days is pretty solid. Although having a meter to get a Omega gear piece would be nice (as someone who has actually gotten from level 0 to 70 without any omegas on the official servers).
The only thing that might need a bit of a update is that you guarentee the player at least 2 gems when you break a ore with fortune 5. Having the possibility of breaking down 10 echo and not getting 1 gem from it is very demotivating.
But yeah, you are doing a great job Iskall and dev team! #trusttheprocess
idk about the others but, these kinds of "episodes" are just awesome. just iskall rambling about things. and about the RNG it can be so frustrating but to me it is just part of vault hunters, its really exciting to get good gear, and am not even talking about just omega gear, legendaries on lower rarities can be really the difference from me scrapin that gear to using it
Love watching you and Etho, wish you guys did more together. was so hyped when you guys started doing that modded series ❤
i think another good idea for the doors could be to put the first letter of the gem name on the door, that way it’s easier for colorblind people to see as well. when they see an “I” they’ll know it’s Iskallium, etc. and i can’t think of any letters overlap but you could use different designs !
Vault Hunters bringing RNG/Rogue likes etc to Minecraft just makes it amazing to me... I love everything about it... I mean does RNG make things hard/grindy sure but I think over all it makes the Vault Hunters fun especially now that we have plunderer vaults that we can "farm" better gear without dying constantly.
Hey Iskall! I am one of the types of players you mention here, gamer dad. I get maybe an hour or 2 a night to play and VH is my game of choice! I am for the RNG but I take advantage of a lot of the gamerules that have been implemented in VH3 to lessen the pain of that. If you do anything to the RNG, I urge you to make it a gamerule like you have other loot systems.
But Artifacts, OMG I hate trying to complete the puzzle, it feels impossible with the current RNG.
Adding stripes or other patterns to the doors and keys might help clarify the distinction between them without having to change the base colour of them. It would probably also help with making it more colour blind freindly.
I just want to say I love Iskall's thumbnails, both for episodes and his in between episodes. Whoever does them (might be Iskall or an editor) is awesome!
First off, I love VH and love seeing how far it has come in the last few years. You and the team have been doing a great job! As for RNG, I am somewhere in the middle. Right now, you use RNG loot to craft RNG gear, that overwhelmingly is just getting scrapped immediately because the stats on the gear are bad. Yes, it does feel good when you finally get something good, but you have to sink so much time and resources to get that feeling on a piece of gear that is going to get out-scaled relatively quickly. Random drops do make finding or crafting something good feel awesome, but the vast majority of the time it just feels like a waste.
I think implementing a secondary crafting system where you can gather items to craft gear with specific stats would be a pretty neat way to go about it, even if this crafting system is much more expensive than it is now. For example, you could find gear-crafting resources in the vault as uncommon or rare drops. This would be used to craft the customizable gear. Then, you could also find modifier resources that can be used to add the stats you want. This gives you a goal for grinding toward something specific, rather than grinding toward something that you MIGHT have the chance to get if you are lucky. The resources can be quite rare or you need a lot of them, but it gives you an actual end-goal, rather than grind for more RNG. Just my thoughts.
"Oh, Etho joined" i laught so hard that is almost ALMOST stupid
love you iskall and love the RNG that you guys have in VH, its random, but you can have a lot of controll over it. Yeah, maybe sometimes is super sad, but most of the time its super exciting getting that thing you have work for.
As far as the RNG question: I find it nice to have some random elements: but not need to fully rely on an RNG to advance. The jewels are very fun and a way to not rely as much on loot crates and make your own if that’s more your thing, while still using some randomness
Not sure if iskall even reads these comments, but one thing that i feel would probably fix almost everyone of those peoples who say they don't like the RNG when it comes to stats, just bring back the void orb and make it so that you can combine the void orb with a faceted focus and then when you use the void orb on a piece of gear it will guarantee to take off ONLY that ONE stat and not anything else, I LOVE the RNG on gear but ABOSULTY hate that i cant take off specific stuff, specially when I have spent an hour on a piece of gear and ALMOST have it perfect and then WHOOPS it took off the ONE stat that I wanted and now i have to start the whole darn thing over again
OH! also I think one thing you should do is when recycling a gear piece that has a legendary modifier, make it have a low chance that it will give you a faceted focus with that modifier on it, this will do a couple things, it will not make it feel to bad when you get a legendary modifier that MOST of the time is on trash gear that you would never use, AND it would make it feel ALOT better when you actually recycled it and get the legendary focus
BTW Iskall if you do read this, this is my NUMBER ONE most favorite modpack ever, i have replayed this pack 7 times, so just don't want you thinking that I hate the game, I LOVE it and you and your team have done such a tremendously good job on it, thank you!
The number of times Iskall said "I'm out of chromatic iron? ...Oh I gave it all away" is too many for coincidence
From what I’ve seen it works pretty well in making gear fun in the game. I think a fun idea to play with would be, like Etho sort of said, if gear was even more rng heavy but doesn’t break so you eventually outlevel it or get even more lucky. Idk for sure if it’d work well tho.
Rng is great as long as it's balanced. One thing I've noticed on VH is that it is skewed negatively
Example, you need a scav item. You need the rng to play in your favour 4 times.
one: does a poi enabled room spawn
Two: does the room spawn the poi required
Three: does the poi spawn enough chests/ores/mobs
Four: does the thing give you the thing.
I once ran a scav and got annoyed at 3 omega rooms pretty much back to back.
Little rebalance is all that's needed. I love VH btw. Keep up the amazing work team
you could always make it that when you do the spin attack it smoothly takes you into third person for a second, them puts you back in first, will also help you see the aoe effect.
As someone who enjoys a number of table top games, my favorite ones are always ones that have complex systems that offer diverse competitive deterministic strategies, but also offer a lot of limitation and variation from randomness. For me currently having played a bunch of VH I think there are pieces that would be improved with more diverse ways to use the randomness that exists, but other systems feel great. It feels like a game that is finished and needs some polish to be better, not a bad game to play.
Mantis shrimp irl can move their claw so fast that it literally lights the water on fire via cavitation.
I recently watched and noted down "the two types of randomness" from game makers tool kit, its a really impressive video that I, as a games artist have noted down and learnt about. It is a great watch for creating games like vault hunters, especially since it tackles problems around those games.
Regarding the gear system, I really, really like the idea of being able to pick a modifier and lock it in. I think that would solve a lot of the RNG "feelsbad" that people might be getting from the current system.
That said, I do enjoy how the system is right now, and I'm in the same camp as you where I don't necessarily like to gamble IRL, but it's really fun when there are no stakes, such as in a video game.
Thanks for making such an awesome modpack and great content for us to enjoy!
Dad gamer here, love the rng. I have been planning Minecraft since beta, and really enjoy how you brought rng into the game. It is more of a challenge for how often and much I can play, but I wouldn’t change it at all. To the detractors I say, “get good” 😂 OP gear is awesome, but the game is totally playable with average roll gear.
First off: Can confirm what Etho said about Canada. Where I am, we had a brown christmas, not even an inch of snow on the ground. Probably should be concerning but I'll take not going below -10 degrees before the year ends (Unless it decides to snow like crazy on new Years but that doesn't seem likely)
Second: "What do you guys think of RNG in general?"
I play, leagues of Roguelike games, so I'm a bit biased, but. RNG can be super, super fun if it's designed around as a core mechanic, and if done well it can make the game extremely replayable, even after you've completed everything there is in it. Of course, usually there's a *lot* of lead-up to that "100%" point, take The Binding of Isaac or Slay the Spire as amazing examples of that. I think Vault Hunters does this well, as well. It has a very big, notable "End point" to it, and it takes a *lot* of grinding to get there, but the game gives you enough loot variety (and loot amount) to keep you going and not make it feel like you're just getting the same stuff all the time.
I think the closest thing I can compare VH to, unironically, is MC Dungeons. MCD has a wide variety of weaponry and armour and enchants, along with its own little "skills" system through artifacts. And while you can generally get most weapons at any point, the main point of progression is upping your player and item level higher and higher, and it sends you through three different difficulty modes to keep getting better and better gear. Despite, honestly, being a pretty small game, it gives you a LOT of variety to work with and is designed so well in how it can keep you playing with everything that's possible. I think you could find a lot of similarities between the two games if you look closely, and probably could get a lot of inspiration from MCD if you're willing to look at it for ideas
Also, I do think you've got a point surrounding the "Minecraft audience" when it comes to VH. A lot of minecraft players aren't used to the "grindfest" type of games that have loads of RNG mechanics, and if they don't play games like that, they won't really get the idea of what RNG is for and be turned away by not being able to just Get what they want without the luck being involved. Minecraft itself doesn't have many RNG mechanics, maybe villager rerolling or enchanting, but those can both be bruteforced (and both are in vital need of a rework at this point), and aside from that there's like, rare mob drops (creeper discs, drowned copper, etc.) and dungeon loot, there's not a lot of RNG that's heavily tied to the main gameplay of MC.
Vault Hunters is going in a great direction, and recognizing that not everyone will like or appreciate the type of game it is is an incredibly healthy mindset to have as a gamedev. You and your team are doing an amazing job, and I'm sure you don't plan to anytime soon, but don't stop with it.
(Oops I got caught up in articulating my thoughts and made an essay, sorry about that)
about your question about RNG, Im studying game design and one of the first class was literally about RNG, and why it is good. The take away from those classes were that RNG was GOOD for the reasons being (literally copy pasting my doc slides for this comment). :
- Reduces boredom caused by constant (similar) patterns
- Lets players feel like they suffer from "bad luck" rather than
blaming the game for being too hard or unfair (literally copium)
- Makes every playthrough feel different (different set pieces,
encounters and rewards every time)
- Can create drama, tension and excitement
- Seemingly optimal strategies no longer "bulletproof"
Makes the game less "solvable" - unpredictability becoming
frustrating because players lack options for "thinking ahead"
- Stops players from mastering your game (too random?)
- Do enable mastery of the mechanics(!) but keep gameplay
interesting by designing some "planned unpredictability"
that's what we've learned, hopefully it helps and is relevant to the question about RNG.
now if you want my take / a random vault hunter player opinion: I think it's fine as it is, i agree on what was we've learned and came to appreciate it more b/c of it. It's not too frustrating to deal with RNG but I do think re rolling for things that are based out of RNG (like re rolling modifiers) should at least be not too expensive as it's mostly RNG based. I love that we have the option to apply the modifier ourself more precisely and have a CHOICE to choose between RNG. and for RNG you get better rewarded where as vs chosen modifiers are limited (unless you find upgraded modifiers in archives).
I always love this discussions with Etho
I like the gamble stats dynamic of vault hunters, I think what people struggle with more is Success dependent on RNG
E.g. scavs, or early game unable to progress because every xeenium ore gave 0 gems and now you’re locked out of pogs
It’s also the “single player experience” - e.g. it’s great in this context of multiple people in a world having a great time and helping people out - but by balancing that it does make a single player world feel so much harder