Supporter newsletter 63

Issue
This is a copy of Eternal and Diamond Supporter Newsletter #63, published by Grinding Gear Games.

Hello Supporters,

I am away today, so I am writing this on Friday. This week Rory will give you a preview of a newspost he has written for later in the week on the creation of Molten Strike.

Carl

Skill Design - Molten Strike

Today I’ll be telling you the story of Molten Strike. It started with the need for a Melee skill. While Glacial Cascade was in development (Called Upheaval at the time), I had seismic activity on the brain, and the idea of a Volcano themed attack appealed to me. Creating flying projectiles that did area splash damage was the logical realization of the concept.

Here is my initial “concept artwork”.

http://i.imgur.com/u1cNdEu.jpg

This skill moved much faster than usual between concept and completion, as the combination of a strong theme and the need for a new Melee skill in the game caught the imagination of many of the developers involved in approving new skills. We soon had a prototype ready to play with, using the Glutinous Gull/Avian Wretch blood projectile as a stand-in effect.

The initial prototype had the projectiles only doing the fire damage of the attack. Though this was appealing because it created a unique support gem conundrum for players and synergized well with Avatar of Fire, we ended up changing to a more mundane “reduced damage of projectiles” mechanic to enable greater build diversity, and let the skill be more powerful at lower levels.

Originally, projectiles picked locations in a 360° circle around the enemy. This was later changed to a 180° arc to prevent these projectiles landing on top of you, but when used this felt like 90°. It was changed to the current 270°, which if you’ve played with the skill, feels a lot like a 180° arc.

The prototype also had Increased Area of Effect modify only the size of projectiles, not the area they could be placed. This was changed as well, as the damage to a single target from overlapping explosions when you had increased Area of Effect passives was too powerful.

Here is a diagram showing the change that was made:

http://i.imgur.com/gburV7f.jpg

Russell created the rock effect for the skill, which gave it the nickname “Popcorn Strike” until the rock colour was darkened and he added the molten magma bursts.

QA spent some time with the skill, discovering and ironing out the kinks, and pushing the skill to its limits.

http://i.imgur.com/9gSs2rA.jpg

QA and and the balance team tried out the item with simulated characters. The balance of the skill was deemed to be in a good place - Not the most powerful leveling skill, but still an enjoyable and most importantly a unique experience with a variety of possible builds to use with it at end game.

Final touches were placed on the skill, 2D art was created for the gem and the skill icon, and it was placed as a Hillock quest reward so players could obtain and level with it from the get-go.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little insight into the skill creation process, and that you enjoy playing with Molten Strike!

Rory

Insider Info

This week, we’ve got a staff profile on our newest Effects Artist, Ivan. Ivan began working for Grinding Gear Games in November 2013. Previously, he had studied 3D animation and visual effects at Go-Academy in Malaysia. He graduated as a character animator, but later developed a passion for CGI effects.

He has worked on TV commercials (Strepsils, 7up), film (Beyond The Edge) and TV series (Spartacus) over the past 7 years before coming to GGG. He now works on a variety of weapon, armour, spell and environment effects, and did some work on the Sacrifice of the Vaal trailer.

He can be seen here in his natural habitat:

http://i.imgur.com/pK4ZW1U.jpg

Rory