Difficulty of new monsters

The Queen's null is currently set to 2.1 seconds, which is equivalent to a null entropy+6 weapon.
Should I knock this down to 1.6 seconds then (same a null entropy +4 weapon)?

I'd suggest bumping it down to the null +3 ... that I think would be closer to doable.

You come to realize that the bigger monsters having any kind of freezing/null ability mean something close to insta death the more chances there are for a player to get hit by it.

+3 would be around 1.4 seconds, +2 just under 1.2 seconds.

One thing i noticed recently is the damage that is dealt by the queen when the web explodes seems enormous. It's hectic on wave 16, but it seemed like it took off 250-300 HP when it exploded. That's with my medic who has Advanced DR. So, maybe thats why it seems like insta death. Also, sometimes when they shoot the webs, they seem pretty massive, larger than the scorpion's. Maybe they are shooting out more than 1 shot. I've tried to get a good screen shot of BIG webs, bet it can be difficult. This is the best I've been able to get.(attached)

As for the null length, I think +4, or +5 null would be good. You are getting wrapped up by a web.

edit:
yeah, i just saw a queen shoot 3 webs in a row(of course I wasn't able to get a SS.

Each projectile on the web if it explodes does a basic 25 damage. This compares to the scorpions web where each projectile does 65 damage. The queen fires up to 9 projectiles in a web. However, it is not likely that all of them will hit you. So even if 4 of them get you at once, you should only get around 100 damage.

If the queen gets you with a stab attack, that could be 110, but still significantly less than the 250-300 you are suggesting.

It is wave 16, so perhaps if only high level players were left, the DB/DR difference might cause it?

Or perhaps a combination of the stab attack and the projectiles exploding?
Or perhaps some other attack which hits you and at the same time causes the web projectiles to explode?

I am not sure really what might be causing it, but the web alone shouldn't cause that much damage. If it is, it needs to be toned down. It wasn't supposed to instagib.

3 shots in a row could do it. You could easily end up with 10 projectiles close to you.
Once it has someone stuck in the web, the queen isn't supposed to fire again for a while. Did the first 2 shots miss? Or were they all fired before the first hit?

Fro13 wrote:

Also, sometimes when they shoot the webs, they seem pretty massive, larger than the scorpion's. Maybe they are shooting out more than 1 shot. I've tried to get a good screen shot of BIG webs, bet it can be difficult.

The largest web is fired at an angle of 56 degrees I think. As it travels, it will grow. So it depends how far it goes before it hits something.

I was watching somebody else get attacked

. The shots were fired one right after another. All were fired off before before the 1st web was even half way to the player. I didn't see the outcome, i was thrown across the room by a couple titans. The queen wasn't too far from the player. I could easily just from one to the other(double jump), maybe a little longer. If the queens are close and nothing is in the way, all those projectiles are going to hit and wrap around you.

oh, and when I was dealt that damage, I'm pretty sure there were some "lower" level player on. at least below 100. It was wave 16, and a lot going on, So I'm not too sure about all the variables.

Szlat wrote:

3 shots in a row could do it. You could easily end up with 10 projectiles close to you.
Once it has someone stuck in the web, the queen isn't supposed to fire again for a while. Did the first 2 shots miss? Or were they all fired before the first hit?

I've been hit with 3 or 4 projectiles in a row from one queen (she is still firing when the first one hits), wrapping me up in the null field, and before I can get away, if I can, I've seen my 200 shield go to zero and my 450 health to less than 100 in about 2 seconds.

Most of the time it's not just the queen doing the damage. The webs hold you up like a pinata at a six year-old's birthday party. Skaarj, warlords, and everything else nearby with an angry disposition is wailing away at you. Add more than one poison queen into the equation and forget about it. If the queens need to be modified it should be the null timing. +3 or +4 in my opinion.

I'm with Echo, in terms of a null queen alone, you can generally deal with it just in terms if nailing it with whatever gun you have and recouping health with vamp (if you are LW), but in a crowd, if you're nulled for 3 seconds you are toast. The only way I can get out is by using my trans, but because of you being in a null state you will be lucky to leave the area with 150 health.

Thanks for all the feedback.

So it may be worth changing the webs such that:

There is a maximum of 7 projectiles in a web rather than 9, so people get hit by fewer projectiles. (The projectiles are the bright nodes in the web)

The spread comes down from 56 degrees to say 45 degrees to reduce the length of the webs. This will tend to mean people get nulled less.

We reduce the null from the equilavent of a +6 to a +4

The projectiles each do 15 damage rather than 25

Perhaps have the queen not firing quite so frequently, so you will not get three webs in the air at the same time

That's quite a big nerf.
(7/9) * (45/56) * (4/6) * (15/25 ) * ( 0.8 ) = 0.2
Just one fifth of the danger the webs are now.

On the nulling side, I was assuming people would get hit by one part of the web only, and occassionally would get hit by two. So the null timing is 2.1 seconds for the first hit, then +1 sec for each subsequent hit.

If people are getting hit by 5-7 projectiles (i.e. bits of web) then the null could be very excessive - up to 6 seconds. Again this was not intended.

So, I think we still need the additive null of secondary impacts, to signify how severely you are wrapped in the web, but it could be reduced to just 0.1 seconds.

In a way it is difficult testing my own monsters. I know what to avoid, and so never get the worst of it. Since there will always be new people playing, it is this initially testing by yourselves which is so important. So thanks for the feedback. It is so important to get the balance just right.

Szlat wrote:

In a way it is difficult testing my own monsters. I know what to avoid, and so never get the worst of it. Since there will always be new people playing, it is this initially testing by yourselves which is so important. So thanks for the feedback. It is so important to get the balance just right.

No, thank you for coding these new monsters! Gameplay is never dull around here thanks to you and everyone else in the coding gang.
But I'm scared to try and imagine the creatures you would come up with without supervision

ECHO wrote:

Most of the time it's not just the queen doing the damage. The webs hold you up like a pinata at a six year-old's birthday party.

It's too bad though that I fixed the Loaded Artifacts spewing on death thing. It would be so entertaining to watch an AM drop all of his artifacts after being pounded on, particularly if he was in mid jump when the null caught him ...