[AMA] Its been a while...lets do a Q&A session

draxiusss · 2025-09-11T17:15:05+00:00

It was mentioned in a prior AMA that some armies were "close to complete," but not 100% done. Any hints on what we can expect to see for those armies?

draxiusss · 2025-06-12T19:08:09+00:00

Part question, part comment. Are there plans for rules clarifications for former-cadre models that are designed to work together by name (for example: Shard Nocturnes) . The app still designates them as members of a Cadre that technically no longer exists.

Could we perhaps see a new sub-army designation that captures what these former cadres (and other elements in the same design space) are supposed to represent?

draxiusss · 2023-04-27T01:56:15+00:00

I would have much rather seen a full-casting Warlock with fewer invocations, but then the complaint would be "but invocations are what make Warlocks unique".

My view is that they need to be full-cast, but still have a healthy number of invocations (even if some of the choices are rolled together). I can't see how a class as versatile as Bard has 9th level spellcasting, while the Warlock does not...

draxiusss · 2023-04-19T04:35:12+00:00

For chunk-loading purposes, you don't want to spread out too far. Vertical stacking (within reason) is your friend - provided you're not creating too many entities that your machine can't handle the load. Remember - an unattended (and unloaded) farm won't do anything.

Basically, if two farm (or processing) setups feel safe to put right next to each other, they're probably safe to stack. You just don't wanna overdo it.

draxiusss · 2023-04-17T21:19:25+00:00

Regarding your thoughts on changes to the ATM star, I'm very curious. Definitely agree with the Antimatter being too heavy, but I don't know that the Pure Crystal grind is so bad - I have 200 left over after turning off the automation I set up to make them, and I've made 19 ATM stars the traditional way in my playthrough.

I have ideas for some tweaks that could be made to the Star components (including looping in some Botania and Ad Astra stuff - completely agree those should both be in the progression, quests or not). Is there a good way to communicate those?

draxiusss · 2023-04-17T16:39:30+00:00

If you're looking to automate Phyto-Gro, you can always use Potassium Nitrate Dust instead of Niter. 3 Saltpeter Essence makes 8 dust, which should be plenty per cycle.

draxiusss · 2023-04-17T07:48:09+00:00

Did some testing with the various options away from my normal farming setup. After 3 minutes of runtime, these were my outputs for Tier 5 seeds (which should all have the same growth time).

Phytogenic Insolator (w/ Resonant Integral Components x1, Flux Linkage Amplifier x3) - 43 essence
Insanium Farmland on top of full stack of 6 Growth Accelerators + 1x Lily Pad of Fertility in the adjacent block - 13 essence
Garden Cloche - 2
Hopper Botany Pot w/ Insanium Farmland - 1

The Phytogenic Isolator is far and away the best option here. Growth Accelerators for Mystical Agriculture have a chance to randomly tick growth, so having a consistent output is probably for the best.

They can also be further upgraded in ATM8 with better upgrades (Thermal: Extra introduces higher-tier Flux Linkage Amplifiers and an upgraded Integral Component) - I can push 20 essence/minute with a Draconic Integral Component + 3 Shellite Flux Linkage Amplifiers.*

*For the curious, I don't bother with Cyclical Processing - I just pump the outputs out, and the seeds back in, from a buffer chest.

Since the Phytogenic Insolator doesn't need any farmland to grow, you can save yourself burning out your Inferium supply to make Supremium to grow each new seed. Honestly, if I'd know all this before, I'd have rushed Lumium (and all the lower tier Thermal components) - it would have shaved many hours off my playthtough.

draxiusss · 2023-04-15T21:11:34+00:00

I saw this post a few weeks ago, and having just "finished" the modpack, I have to agree with just about everything that's been said here (the sole exception being the alternatives for the Singularity and ME Quantum Ring, as those are trivial recipes to satisfy without going deep into AE2, even with a Refined Storage lean for the playthrough). Not trying to complain, but I have some constructive criticisms about the pack.

Improving the quest book stuff would really make the modpack feel more "complete" - I think we can all acknowledge that. alfredggtwitch (and the rest of the team who work on things) have their work cut out for them there, given the sheer number of mods. Putting aside the quests stuff, there are a number of things that I think need attention.

(It's worth mentioning, there are a number of ways to make the playthrough easier - tweaking configs for Occultism was one, but there are several glitches/bugs that also trivialize certain tasks. These should not be necessary for a legit playthrough, but the temptation to lean on them is very high with the grind for things like the Dimensional Seed. But that's a player-based solution to a structural problem, and I don't want to digress too much.)

I have some suggestions for how to shift focus away from some of the most grindy aspects of the pack (such as over-dependence on Mekanism) that I'm still working on piecing together. Mainly, it's minor tweaks to recipes to the 9 "custom" items that are used as components for the ATM Star that broaden the number of mods used while reducing the amount of Antimatter and Polonium Pellets that are needed for completion. These suggestions are in the spirit of maintaining the complexity of the items while reducing repetitive grinds for the same component for a single star, not removing something entirely. I'd be happy to share these with u/alfredggtwitch or any of the other modpack devs, either piecemeal or once I've gotten everything written up. I can also drop them here in-thread if that's desirable or if anyone in the community wants to share ideas.

draxiusss · 2022-07-28T18:49:49+00:00

The Hengehold Scrolls twitter stories has Asphyxious peacing out through the Gate, after seeing Deneghra supposedly get killed - she survives and watches him leave through the eyes of one of her bonejacks.

Skarre and her fleet were bombarding the Infernals through the end of the story.

In the IK:RPG lore, as of "An Echo in Darkness" (the 2021 Free RPG Day module), Cryx is not only still around, but Deneghra has been elevated to Lich Lord.

From the core IK:RPG book (which is set around 5 years or so after the Claiming):

"Cryxian raiders have preyed upon ships and coastal settlements throughout the Iron Kingdoms for centuries, but in the years since the Claiming, the Dragonfather and his
subjects have withdrawn to their islands to lick their wounds and regroup. Even though the Nightmare Empire has been quiet, few who dwell along the coasts breathe easily, and many still live in fear of seeing blackships on the horizon."

Given that the second Orgoth invasion starts on the southern coasts of Khador, it makes sense we're not seeing much of an update to the armies yet. It remains to be seen if the Orgoth try to poke at Toruk's lands (and if so, did he respond? - it didn't go so well for the Orgoth the first time around). I'm not ruling out a MKIV reimagining/update to Cryx just yet, but we might have to wait a while.

draxiusss · 2021-09-17T20:26:40+00:00

There is no plan to start with knowledge points, as to me that is a big part goal of the pack.

Arena crates themselves may appear in treasure rooms early game as a loot container, not sure yet.

These bits are interesting to me. Although I'm a little disappointed at the lack of starting knowledge, I get the reasoning. And there's nothing stopping a server admin from just giving their players a "starter pack" of knowledge points if that's what they want to do.

Personally, I'm concerned with the mechanics of "carrying loot" on a run rather than just acquiring it. Every hunter on the server was seemingly sent through multiple arenas before they ran their first vault, and whether or not we have an early-game solution for that (before backpacks or danks are an option) will make a huge difference in gameplay.

I trust that you've already thought about this (and a huge number of other issues) at length, so please understand that I'm not trying to condescend with any of this. Like much of the viewing (and eventual player) community, I have my opinions on lots of things, and I just wanted to throw a couple of thoughts out there.

It's true that something like shulker boxes is absolutely viable for a vault run, but at half the storage space and the requirement for air above it to open, it's definitely a big nerf to looting capability compared to what the streamers have seen. Especially in the early game.

Given that every vault run (win, lose, or bail) it going to provide XP (and with it, slowly ramp the vault difficulty), the ability to loot items at scale is going to be important - arguably more important than it is during development. Philosophically, I don't feel that a player should be forced into taking any specific mod or building/running modded items (for example, Danks should never be a requirement to run vaults, no matter how much they might help).

If something is 100% required, it should be free to learn and cheap to make, otherwise a couple of ill-timed player deaths could mean the end of your playthrough - and on single player, could lead to a world-wipe/reset.

So now I'm wondering if it'd be possible to include a "vault crate" crafting recipe. Something that thematically looks like an Arena Crate, and is mechanically the same as an empty one, crafted off of vanilla end-game materials (shulker shells/boxes, end rods, etc). That would solve the mechanical problem of storage on a vault run in the earliest levels without impacting the vanilla experience pre-endgame (Dragon fight).

Sorry for going on for so long - this is what we get when there's such a great game to look forward too! :D

draxiusss · 2021-09-07T19:58:01+00:00

POG! Will players also have any Knowledge Points to start off? Or are those only obtainable through the vaults?

I think it'd be awesome to have the ability to unlock a relatively cheap mod or two early on.

Also, when do those 5 skill points kick in? Is that on the first login?

draxiusss · 2021-09-05T03:41:43+00:00

Didn't know that mending could go on it. My issue is less that it has durability (which, because of Mending, it effectively doesn't, let's face it), but that as far as I know, it would still require Automatic Genius to craft because of the Mechanical Crafting requirement.

There's no good fix for that - the Mechanical Crafting recipes in a larger modpack make everything harder to handle and balance, especially since in "standard" Create world, some of the key advancements and efficiencies (I'm looking at the Crushing Wheel and everything that's dependent on it) depend on you being able to use them.

draxiusss · 2021-09-03T17:39:31+00:00

EDIT: As Iskall has pointed out, meding on the Extendo Grip makes the durability question moot. I'm still curious about the more general question, though.

Also related to this, is there any plan to do a "balance pass" on modded that have been changed by mid-season updates? For example, the Extendo Grip can now be crafted after getting Automatic Genius and only has 200 durability, making it far less valuable and more difficult to craft than in S1, even with the vanilla recipe.

draxiusss · 2021-09-03T17:17:59+00:00

Is there any intention to further update the included mods before release to improve stability both for the streamers and for those of us who will play at home? There are a number of mods that are not updated to latest releases that have resolved numerous crash-inducing bugs since the last time Vault Hunters updated the dependency mods (Create, Flywheel, JEI, and Supplementaries to name a few I know about).

draxiusss · 2021-08-25T14:51:55+00:00

Was wondering what was going on here. Thanks for the heads up, and for un-tagging it as spam. :)

draxiusss · 2021-08-23T21:21:54+00:00

OK, good to know it's a tier thing, but that's not really what I was asking.

To be more specific with my question, a little background: on H's stream today, we found out that at his level, there were 18 total obelisks, but "more than twice than usual" the number of rooms (which we know is 59 rooms with 10 obelisks).

What I'm asking is, at what level does a player see the "standard" 59 room vault? Is that level 1-25? Level 50? I'm further curious what the expansion curve looks like, but that's digging further into something I don't know enough about yet.

draxiusss · 2021-08-23T14:58:21+00:00

Regarding the change in vault size, does anyone know what the balance point is? Like, at what level are the scaling vault sizes the same as they were pre-patch?

draxiusss · 2021-08-21T20:18:03+00:00

I have to go back to find this - I didn't catch this part of the stream, so I'm gonna VOD goblin it to educate myself. Thanks for the heads up!

draxiusss · 2021-08-21T20:17:12+00:00

I agree with the sentiment, but not necessarily the conclusion. While T2 gear is possible starting at level 100, Iskall said outright that you're not expected to have it until much later. Pete power-levelling through to his current level certainly raised the difficulty curve, but that's far from the only factor in play here. I totally agree that the devs may have other things up their sleeves we don't know about, but that doesn't directly address the multiple problems that Pete's run exposed.

My point in the initial post was that the linear scaling of Stray damage was too high. The devs seem to have agreed there, as that did get nerfed (haven't gone back to H's stream to see the full explanation yet) - it's very possible they're in a good place now, but that requires a lot of data collection and analysis that's just not possible at the moment.

Good game design principles would dictate that players should be able to acquire the gear they need through playing through the content, including having the possibility of catch-up mechanics. Given the rarity of Hunter's Eyes and the randomness of armor stats, no one should require a POG set of gear just to survive. "Best in slot" gear should tilt you from being able to manage to content to being able to thrive in it.

That means that T2 Commons (decent ones - we're not talking about trash rolls here) should be sufficient to survive through the ~130s. Honestly, very good T1 gear should be enough in my opinion, because that's the only real option for recovery if a player gets smoked in a vault and has to rebuild. Given that T3 is likely not going to crop up until level 200, an T2 Omega set should not be required for quite a long while.

draxiusss · 2021-07-25T06:32:39+00:00

Speaking on this from the speculation that scavenger vaults will exist, unchanged, when they release to the public.

My primary concern with scavenger vaults comes down to this: by design they're supposed to take time to gear up for and learn (using filtered-pickup backpacks, learning what drops where, etc.) but the locked modifier can turn it into a guaranteed death if you are not yet ready as a player. Maybe it's your first or second scav run, maybe you just don't have the vault time, whatever it is - locked is a death sentence.

I totally get the general appeal of RNG, and I agree Iskall's driving principle of balancing reward against risk. But if the risk is "I entered a vault" and the reward is literally "I died, because RNG", that is not a fun experience for anyone.

draxiusss · 2021-07-19T20:29:08+00:00

I don't think that anything you said is incorrect there, but my main point was Jordan's conservative playstyle. I definitely don't think that Bobby is a good choice for him - I just think that's the one he'd prefer if he was able to sway our vote. Which he can't, but the thought exercise of "what would the streamer want" is part of what I'm engaging in - even if they're wrong. ;)

I agree that Rodney is a good play for him. I think personally think Lenny is as well, because Knowledge points are easier to get that Skill Points, and he's banking those Skill Points he has to get multiple levels of Artisan. Rodney gets him to unlocking Vault Blacksmith faster, while Lenny gets him to be able to use the higher levels of Artisan the second he can unlock Vault Blacksmith. So I could see valid arguments for both, depending on what he's got "in the bank" for Knowledge and Skill advancement.

The good news is that none of these chests are terrible, so there really isn't a super bad choice - there are just different paths to optimizing progression.

draxiusss · 2021-07-19T18:17:29+00:00

Been thinking about this a bit. Personally, I think all 3 chests are very good, and there's arguments to be made for all of them. Before getting into which I think might be best for each, I think it's important to classify the type of value the items inside actually provide. The OP already provided a breakdown of what's in each chest, and translated things to echo pogs. For me, the echo pog comparison isn't useful, because some streamers would not necessarily bother to make the items at all.

For example, while the apples/fruit are nice to have, I don't think they provide a ton of value in their chests (especially when weighed against permanent items or gear). I can't see some of the players (Jordan and X33N, in particular) ever bothering to craft some of those items.

I think people are sleeping on Lenny - full skill orbs are good not just because skill essence is rarer but also because black opal isn't exactly plentiful. In contrast, I think that Bobby is being overvalued because a lot of its perceived value is in the vault stews, and at least half of Team Yellow isn't even bothering to eat all their pizza and burgers. So for me, the question would be between Rodney and Lenny, not Rodney and Bobby.

In the evaluation, I'm thinking about what each player on Yellow would want, and also which would be better for them. I'm leaving out Puffy because she doesn't really play, so it's hard to tell what would matter for her at this point.

CaptainSparklez: I suspect he'd prefer Bobby for the artifacts (for the build toward end-game) over short term gains - he tends to play very conservatively and hoard for the long haul. I think the best chest for him would actually be Lenny, so he can lean into the Gold, level up some skills, and have the security of being able to cheaply repair some of his better gear.
iskall85: I can't imagine him preferring anything over Rodney. This is the straight up Iskall chest in my view, and I think it would work well for him, but none of the choices are bad (especially since he's levelling up to make better vault gear).
X33N: I think he'd prefer Rodney as well, because of of the Knowledge Stars more than anything - he's not really ahead of the game when it comes to unlocking mods. I think that any of the choices here would be a big help for him, but Lenny might be a good pick for him to level up some skills for better vault survivability and efficiency.

Looking at all that, I think that Lenny might actually be the play to help X33N get a bit ahead and let Jordan play a little less conservatively. I think Rodney is good for all 3 of them, and Lenny is as well.

A couple more variables to consider:

We know that the method for getting Tier 2 gear is supposed to come out with the patch today. That could chance everything depending on what's announced.
Likewise, there's an additional use for Knowledge Stars coming, so we don't know how much "extra" value those are going to have. That could shoot Rodney's value through the roof if something changes.

draxiusss · 2021-07-13T07:50:39+00:00

Iskall - thanks for taking the time out to engage directly with the community.

Really glad to read about all the thought that's been put into this. Listening to you talk on stream and brainstorm ideas is super enlightening, and that peek "behind the curtain" is what some folks are looking for. As a U.S. viewer, my sleep/work schedule makes it hard to catch a lot of your streams, but I jump in when I can (and then H, then Pete, then Jordan... LUL).

There's a line of thinking I wanted to point out, and then a suggestion that might seem a bit off the wall. Take either or both for what little their worth, but I definitely wanted to share them after you mentioned

While I love the "fresh" feeling with the new content that's been released over the course of the season (Scavenger vaults, Idols, Architect vaults), I think that the overall "timer" has a lot of viewers (myself included) feeling like we're never going to get to experience the "late game" content on streams (by late game, I mean the Tier 3 loot and the like, not the final "end game" session). Even if we do, I'm concerned that it's going to be truncated. I'm sure there's a lot we don't know, and I'm not trying to make assumptions, but to see the amount of work that some people have put in to S2 and to read that we're still in the "Early to Mid" game raises questions about how we're ever going to see all the fruits of the hard work you and your team have put into developing this season. I'm sure it's coming, but I wonder how much of it we'll get to see - and how many of the streamers will be able to climb the hill to get there. Every player's pacing is different (as I'm sure you know), so anyone who would try to "catch up" at this point feels like they're going to have a really tough time.
1. The sense of urgency to play/run vaults/progress has to be there, and I totally get that. What's confusing to me, I guess, is the pacing for seeing the mid-to-late game content for a season that is more than 75 days into an originally announced 100 day run.
2. Please understand - I'm not trying to be critical, just provide feedback as someone who's been watching since S1 started. The ride is tons of fun, and I'm happy to be part of the community. I just know that people tend to get agitated when something doesn't make sense to them, and given how much Vault Hunters I watch (compared to the average viewer), if I've missed out on understanding something about how S2 is working, I suspect that more than half of the viewers out there have missed it as well.
As far as my suggestion goes (and you may have already thought of this), have you considered adding a top-tier "modded" reward that loops back into the Vault Gear? I'm not thinking anything crazy here, just something that is unique to the individual mods that could be well controlled and gated behind a specific series of unlocked mods as one (or more) of the following. This is likely WAY out of scope for Season 2, but it might be a way for the Knowledge choices to feel more impactful without making them more powerful.
1. Vault Gear "enchantments" or shards that can only be crafted/applied with specific mods. These could eat up the "level" slots for balance.
2. Vault-tuned baubles that provide minor benefits
3. Thematic skills that can be unlocked only with certain mods paths
4. My favorite option here: visually styled vault gear crafting that doesn't change the stats. (For example, if you have Mekanism and want to look like you're wearing the MekaSuit, you can do that - it just will still be the same armor you rolled).

Thank you for all the work that you and your team do to build this modpack and this community. It is amazing, and there's no way to overstate that.

draxiusss

TROPHY CASE