Stoneshard Update #51 – Pyromancy

The latest development update for Ink Stains Games’ roguelike RPG Stoneshard informs us that the game’s skill system has been drastically overhauled recently and can now boast multiple specialized skill trees spread across three distinct sub-categories. And if you’d like to learn all about this new system, with the game’s Pyromancy tree used as an example, and in the process check out a series of neat-looking animations, you should click the link above.

Here are the text parts:

Hello!

Finally, we’ve polished our first abilities branch well enough, so this devlog will be completely devoted to the mighty fire magic – Pyromancy. Beware though: many heavy GIFs!

First we’d like to tell you how the ability system has changed in general in a recent year. As you remember, the Prologue used a so-called Tier-system – all ability branches were divided into 4 tiers, with each including one active and one passive ability. By investing a single SP you could unlock both skills at once.

However, the feedback was mixed, so it became clear for us it wasn’t our best idea: many players wanted more flexible system of levelling. Perhaps the old system would be just great if we were making short-sessional dungeon-crawler of some sort… But we aren’t, therefore we decided to take a more traditional approach.

Thanks to this, we made trees more diverse and interesting, since we were no longer strictly limited by rigid linear progression of exactly 8 abilities. Now each Sorcery branch contains 14 abilities – 7 active and 7 passive ones. Weapon and Utility abilities branches have fewer abilities: around 8-10.

And now let us explain the design philosophy behind the abilities branches – especially magical ones. There were lots of heated arguments over the general vision, but in the end we concluded that we should aim to make all magic branches as tactically different as possible. After all, it’s very boring if every magic school uses the same pattern of 2 AoEs, 2 nukes and some occasional debuffs, or something like that. So we tried to diversify magic branches in terms of intended playstyle.

For instance, Pyromancy is all about powerful AoE-spells, dealing tremendous damage when used at the right time in right combinations. If you love killing crowds of enemies with just several skillful casts, look no further – this’s the branch for you.

So, the most interesting part – the actual abilities! Also, unbelievable truth: we managed to do just great without even a single fireball.

Fire Barrage

Fire Barrage is the only non-AoE pyromantic ability. It consequentially launches three firebolts at the target, each dealing some minor damage. However bolts do increased damage, if the target is already on fire – so if you’re lucky to have your target set aflame by the first bolt, the other two will deal much more damage. Or maybe you’d set the target on fire with some other spell. It’s up to you, really.

Hellbreath (aka Firewave – RIP 2018-2019)

Prologue’s not so silent workhorse, the Firewave, has been reworked. This spell still deals decent area damage, but the shape of the zone was changed. We’ve also improved it with an interesting property: each target damaged by Hellbreath reduces active cooldowns of other pyromantic spells by 1 (including Hellbreath itself). An irreplaceable spell for keeping your spell rotation always ready for action.

Flame Ring

Doomsday weapon of some sort. This spell sets all neighboring cells aflame– along with the enemies, of course. Enemies affected by Flame Ring also have their Fire Resistance significantly reduced. You need to use this spell wisely – the pyromancers aren’t fully immune to fire, so an unthoughtful cast could lock you between the raging flames and cut off all possible retreat routes.

Melting Ray

This spell releases a fiery ray into the target tile, igniting and damaging everything on its trajectory. At the end point the beam explodes –the more targets were hit during the ray phase, the more damage the explosion would cause.

Incineration

Incineration is quite an interesting spell. It allows you to extinguish the selected enemy … and then use the released thermal energy to cause an explosion of terrible power. The longer the extinguished burning lasted, the stronger the explosion – and the higher the chance that it will set aflame all affected enemies.

Magma Rain

Fiery rain covers the chosen area, leaving a magma puddle afterwards. Each turn enemies caught in the magma take minor damage and have their Fire Resistance slowly reduced – with a chance to be set aflame.

Inferno

Finally, the apex spell of Pyromancy – a terrifying Inferno. It creates a fire storm in the large area, dealing great damage each turn – what’s even better, the more enemies are trapped within Inferno, the hotter are the flames.

And, of course, some passive abilities insight:

• Feed the Flames – if the enemy’s on fire, each Fire Barrage’s bolt increases burning duration for 1 turn.
• Flame Saturation – restores some energy each time an enemy is set aflame within the vision range.
• Scorch – causes Hellbreath to debuff Fire Resistance of all damaged targets.
• Excess Heat – each enemy killed with Pyromancy restores some energy.
• Safe Distance – increases casting range of pyromantic spells by 1 tile.
• Baptism of Fire – taking fire damage reduces the duration of all active pyromantic cooldowns.
• Pyromania – increases Magic Power and Crit Chance for every burning enemy in sight (yes, casts can also become critical).

Well, that’s all for today. Can’t wait to show you the other branches and some other progress we’ve made. So stay tuned, and until the next time!