Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Beta Durability/Repair feedback.

When playing games, I really dislike being in a situation where I'm afraid to use my favorite pieces of equipment because I know that repeated use will eventually make the item unusable. That, to me, is the opposite of fun as it makes me feel like I have to hide my best gear away until it's really needed. I don't want to lock my best equipment in a vault.. I want to wear it.

Durability damage that can be completely repaired is fine, but permanent damage.. not so much.The characters themselves, after all, can suffer an endless amount of near-death beatings without suffering any permanent effects. They can always be restored to "good as new" status. As such, I prefer it when the equipment works the same way.

If permanent durability damage has to be in, then consider perhaps only applying it when the equipment reaches a durability of 0/# (i.e. hasn't been repaired in a long while). Then it's a penalty for neglecting your tools and not keeping your equipment properly maintained, allowing it to fall into a state of disrepair. But don't do it every time someone repairs their equipment. You seem to be punishing players for repairing their gear, rather than making Repair a desirable skill and rewarding them for repairing often.

Edit (suggested fix) :

Perhaps a solution rests with the repair (hammer) tool itself. The trick with durability is that there has to be a consequence preventing you from repairing your gear whenever you want. Otherwise, skills like Lockpicking lose their usefulness as getting through locked doors and containers only requires patience and multiple clicks of the Repair function on the weapon you use to bash these obstacles with.

The current deterrent for that behavior is the permanent reduction of max-durability every time you repair it (it makes you not want to use your weapon unless you really have to). If that is removed (and that's what we all seem to be looking for) the deterrent is gone - and that's bad for the Lockpicking skill.

What if, instead, we address that flaw by making the repair tool itself an item with durability that can not be repaired? It would lose durability every time it's used to repair an item, and the repair tool itself would eventually break, requiring the purchase of a new repair tool (which needs to be frequently stocked on vendors). In that way, the price of replacing the repair tool would deter players from damaging their weapons via breaking down locked doors and containers too often.

On top of this, you can still have the current mechanic where higher levels of durability loss on an item require higher ranks of the Repair skill. And perhaps we apply the idea that higher levels of Repair skill equates to a reduction of durability lost on the repair tool itself (meaning your repair tool lasts longer as you become more skilled at repairing items).

In short, we would end up with this:

• Items suffer temporary durability damage as used, excluding the player-purchased repair tool. There is no limit to how often these items can be repaired.
• The repair tool suffers permanent durability damage when used, and can not be repaired. Eventually, new repair tools have to be purchased. They should be frequently stocked on vendors.
• The cost of a repair tool should be substantially lower than the cost of repairing items through the vendor's repair function, encouraging players to invest in the Repair skill.
• Increased levels of temporary durability loss require higher levels of the Repair skill, encouraging players to either keep their equipment in good shape by repairing often, or investing even more points into the Repair skill instead.
• Permanent durability loss on the repair tool is either based on the amount of durability points restored on an object, or based on frequency of use. I prefer the latter approach because it greatly improves the usefulness of the Repair skill as it allows players to use the repair tool less often, while being able to repair greater amounts of temporary durability loss.

Going that route, we 1) make the Repair skill attractive, and 2) preserve the attractiveness of the Lockpicking skill, while 3) removing permanent durability loss on all equipment (save for the repair tool itself). Thoughts?

This.

Agreed, especially on the point that the repair skill appears to be more punishing than helpful.

I'm going to have to agree with this as well. If I repair something once, it reduces the durability, but what happens if I repair it two, three. five times? Will the maximum durability keep getting smaller and smaller?

Leave the maximum durability alone, and make the cost for low repair skill a cap on how much you can repair, so that you can repair that sword with Repair 1, but it'll only get up to 20% of its maximum, so it'll break sooner.

Even worse, I think that the more damaged an item is, the higher Repair skill you even need to start work on it, meaning that you can't repair things that are too damaged until you sink more points into it. It just makes Repair seem worthless compared to having NPC's do it.


Suggestion: Repairing should repair durability up to a cap of 20% * [Repair_level]. Repair Hammer items should be consumed when repairing, but you get [Repair_level] uses out of each hammer, so the higher your Repair skill, the more use you get out of each hammer, and the better your repairs will be.

Something like this would have my vote. And I haven't actually put 5 points in the repair ability to see what that gets you currently, but someone who invests that many points should be rewarded with something a little cooler than just the ability to repair an item to its original 100% durability - like additional durability/damage/etc. over the 100% value.

Thing is, there's already a small window in which a Repair skill of 1 can be used. These aren't exact numbers, but the way it works right now is that if an item has 69/70 durability it requires a level 1 Repair skill to fix. If it has 50/70 durability, it requires a level 2 Repair skill to fix. I'm assuming it continues to get more demanding from there as you neglect repairs longer and longer.

So, you can't really cruise along on a Repair skill of 1 forever. A single battle (if you take enough damage or use a weapon often enough) can create a scenario where a level 1 Repair skill is completely bypassed as an option.

Hi, I too agree that its not the way to go about the max. durability on things.




If well balanced, this sounds like a good idea.

Or maybe make it so Repair 1 would fully (or almost fully) repair "simple" equipment (I don't know, a basic knife/dagger or whatever?), while you would need Repair 5 to fully (and then some?) repair the most powerful/magical equipment.

I'm just thinking that only being able to repair anything (even very basic equipment) to 40%/60% durability after investing even 3 or 6 (scarce!) ability points in Repair (for ability level 2 or 3) is kind of weak. Don't get me wrong though - that would still be way better than the current system, which actually punishes the player for investing in the ability, as noted above.

Yes, my green weapon went to 0 really fast (maybe 3 or 4 fights) and was obliged to have a repair skill of 4 to fix it, wasn't even able to find a merchant able to repair it.

I am agree with the initial post indeed. I really don't like when items have a Damocles' sword over the head. A repair cost, no problem at all, but a limit to how many time you can repair it, no.

I agree with additional damage/armour for repairing with a level 5 Repair skills.



Another reason why investing in Repair as a PC skill isn't as good as having NPC's repair your stuff, because if you aren't micromanaging your repair. Plus you don't know what values you can't let the thing slip below to repair. Once it does, then because of the Ability point costs, it can take several levels before you can get enough points to repair something, and that's if you neglect points in other areas.

i agree with OP, i dont like this as well

I don't really looked much at the repair yet, do have 1 broken sword (bashing vases in the tutorial dungeon and it was a goner, oops).
Finding repair NPC's is hard, and I really hate having to just give it a try and always get 'repair level too low'

I figured the endurance penalty was just for vendor NPC's and the PC's skill would NOT impose that same penalty? (Though I have not gotten someone to 2 to test). As I said 2, I agree weapon degredation require high repair skill very very fast.

I personally would probably go more for the opposite. Statistics (efficiency) decreases per about 25% endurance dropped. Repair 5 allows you to keep weapons in top shape 24/7, while lower repairs only prevent and fix the inevitable, but still suffers you with reduced efficiency until you get it better fixed.
Of course I really hate durability, but *if* it had to be in; that way.

Reducing the bonuses a piece of equipment possesses as it loses (temporary) durability is also an interesting route to go, although it can be tricky to balance as your characters gain an extra, growing level of weakness as a lengthy battle progresses.

That aside, perhaps a solution rests with the repair (hammer) tool itself. The trick with durability is that there has to be a consequence preventing you from repairing your gear whenever you want. Otherwise, skills like Lockpicking lose their usefulness as getting through locked doors and containers only requires patience and multiple clicks of the Repair function on the weapon you use to bash these obstacles with.

The current deterrent for that behavior is the permanent reduction of max-durability every time you repair it (it makes you not want to use your weapon unless you really have to). If that is removed (and that's what we all seem to be looking for) the deterrent is gone - and that's bad for the Lockpicking skill.

What if, instead, we address that flaw by making the repair tool itself an item with durability that can not be repaired? It would lose durability every time it's used to repair an item, and the repair tool itself would eventually break, requiring the purchase of a new repair tool (which needs to be frequently stocked on vendors). In that way, the price of replacing the repair tool would deter players from damaging their weapons via breaking down locked doors and containers too often.

On top of this, you can still have the current mechanic where higher levels of durability loss on an item require higher ranks of the Repair skill. And perhaps we apply the idea that higher levels of Repair skill equates to a reduction of durability lost on the repair tool itself (meaning your repair tool lasts longer as you become more skilled at repairing items).

In short, we would end up with this:

• Items suffer temporary durability damage as used, excluding the player-purchased repair tool. There is no limit to how often these items can be repaired.
• The repair tool suffers permanent durability damage when used, and can not be repaired. Eventually, new repair tools have to be purchased. They should be frequently stocked on vendors.
• The cost of a repair tool should be substantially lower than the cost of repairing items through the vendor's repair function, encouraging players to invest in the Repair skill.
• Increased levels of temporary durability loss require higher levels of the Repair skill, encouraging players to either keep their equipment in good shape by repairing often, or investing even more points into the Repair skill instead.
• Permanent durability loss on the repair tool is either based on the amount of durability points restored on an object, or based on frequency of use. I prefer the latter approach because it greatly improves the usefulness of the Repair skill as it allows players to use the repair tool less often, while being able to repair greater amounts of temporary durability loss.

Going that route, we 1) make the Repair skill attractive, and 2) preserve the attractiveness of the Lockpicking skill, while 3) removing permanent durability loss on all equipment (save for the repair tool itself). Thoughts?

You can also use magic spells and things to knock down doors too. I used a Summon Wolf spell to chew through one. That would also make Lockpicking useless, regardless of what is done to Repair.

I essentially agreee with the idea of the repair hammer needing durability. My suggestion on that front was to give the hammers a number of uses equal to your Repair skill, after which they break. In fact... why not make the amount of durability that the Repair Hammer does equal to 20% repaired per use?

Sample Item with 0/100 Durability:

With Repair 1, you can use a Repair Hammer once, bringing it up to 20/100. The Hammer breaks.
With Repair 2, you can use a Repair Hammer twice, bringing it up to 20/100, and then again to 40/100. The Hammer breaks.
...
With Repair 5, as a bonus for getting it that high, your items get, say, +50% durability. You can use a Repair Hammer five times, bringing it up to 150/150, The Hammer breaks.

If you do it that way, then deciding which stuff to use the hammer on could be another choice the player has to make - do they restore 20 points to two things, or 40 points to one thing?

I see where you're going with this, but considering the scarcity of ability points and relative abundance of gold, you'd have to make repair hammers either really rare or extremely expensive (both of which situations would be pretty strange) for this to work.

Instead, something simple like having the Repair skill only fully/mostly repair "simple/tier 1" equipment while only minimally/not at all repairing "complex/tier 5" equipment at ability level 1, but at ability level 5, you could repair (and even improve upon) pretty much anything.

That's a very good point.



How well this works depends on how the item tier system works. There are several different tiers of quality, but I'm not sure if the code can easily be put in place to check during repair.

Given that you can find a fair amount of magical items, and magical items are almost always superior to non-magical stuff, you'd also have to be careful to not make Repair of magical/rare stuff too useless or else it's back to the problem of "I need to put in a ton of points to make Tepair actually useful". Hmmm...

How does this sound:

Mikus System A:

Repair 1:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 50% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 33% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 25% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 20% Durability


Repair 2:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 67% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 50% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 40% Durability


Repair 3:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 75% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 60% Durability


Repair 4:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 80% Durability


Repair 5:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 150% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 140% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 120% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 110% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 100% Durability

These numbers sound a bit too good, actually. Let me try again:

************************************

Mikus System B:


Repair 1:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 60% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 40% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 33% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 20% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 10% Durability


Repair 2:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 70% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 60% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 50% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 33% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 20% Durability


Repair 3:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 85% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 75% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 67% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 50% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 40% Durability


Repair 4:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 80% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 75% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 60% Durability


Repair 5:
- Tier 1 Equipment (non-magical) is repaired to 150% Durability
- Tier 2 Equipment (Magical) is repaired to 130% Durability
- Tier 3 Equipment (Rare) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 4 Equipment (Legendary) is repaired to 100% Durability
- Tier 5 Equipment (Super-Awesome) is repaired to 100% Durability

Thoughts?

Stabbey - yeah, I like where you're taking this; in addition to being much better in terms of game balance, this system would make a lot more sense than the current one (e.g. someone who's slightly skilled in Repair should still be able to do a pretty decent job fixing up a mundane dagger - and definitely shouldn't break the thing!)

So I think something close to your second list could work. I also think (small) additional damage/armor bonuses in addition to extra durability points at the higher repair ability levels would be cool, but the devs would need to be careful not to make it too overpowered. Still, anyone willing to dump 15 ability points (or let's say 10, with other Repair-boosting gear) to get to level 5 should be rewarded appropriately, right?

That sounds like it should be a bug. Doesn't that make the Unlock spell rather pointless if mages can blow apart locked doors and containers without point-investment or equipment penalty?



I'm struggling to understand what the drawback of a low Repair skill is with this setup. Let's say I have a magical piece of equipment and a Repair skill of 1. So, I repair the item to 40% of it's maximum durability. Ok.. so when that 40% wears out I just repair it back up again? Seems like I just have to repair more often and that's it. What's my incentive to continue raising my Repair skill?

I must be misunderstanding something, and I'm concerned the system is getting too complex. This has got to be something that new players can understand easily because the game can't point them to a forum post the first time they realize they need repairs.

Maybe a dev could answer that, but I'm not getting the impression that magic being able to open doors and such is a bug.

You seem to think that having multiple solutions to opening a door is an error, when it seems more likely to be a design choice for roleplaying purposes.




All right, maybe it could be impossible to repair Tier 3+ items with Repair 1, only Tier 1/2 (Normal/Magic [Blue]) items could be repaired, and the Tier 2 ones a lot less. With Repair 2, you can now repair Rare items [Green], and so on.


But if you try and go much farther in forbidding what you can repair, here's my concern: it can take several levels just to reach Rank 3 in a ability - level 5 at the earliest. By that time you've probably already got a bunch of Tier 2 and a couple Tier 3 items. Given the limited number of ability points, is it likely that you have spent them all on a support ability like Repair by character level 5? Not really. Repair is not a primary ability and never will be, it's a support or roleplaying skill.

That means that realistically, it'll be a few more levels before you have enough points to throw towards abilities like Repair. During that time, you'll have accumulated even more gear, which will require higher levels in repair just to touch. If low levels in Repair are worthless because the majority of your gear is so advanced you need to have NPC's repair it anyway, people have no reason to invest in it.

I realize a big part of the game is about having options, but there seems to be a balance issue here.

- Using lockpicks to open a locked door or container requires an investment in the Lockpick skill and having lockpicks on hand (which is a financial cost).

- Using weapons to bash open a locked door or container requires sacrificing durability on your weapons, which requires either a financial payout from an NPC to repair it, or an investment in the Repair skill. Doing this often enough makes the weapon worthless, so essentially you're throwing money at the problem as well.

- Using random damage-based spells (or a summons) to open a locked door costs you nothing. It doesn't cost you real time since this happens out of combat, there is no mana resource that has to be regained, etc. That doesn't seem out of balance to you? Why invest points into Lockpicking and money into lockpicks when all anyone has to do is buy a level 1 offensive spell and be set for the remainder of the game?

I'm not against magic opening locked containers or doors, but I thought that's what the Unlock spell was for. My thinking is that if you use magic to open a container (fireball a locked chest, for instance) then the contents hidden within should be destroyed. Sure, you "opened" it, but without the proper spell you lack the finesse necessary to do it right. That wouldn't help doors, however.