Northelm (Guard Follower) Needs at LEAST 2x More Gear Storage Growth

Early Access Archive Early Access Game Feedback
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I was able to get into the restricted PvP tournament for the first time this week with 3 other people. It got me looking at the level 50 tournament that no one is currently partaking in, and it is easy to see why.

To properly take place in the Elite Tourney a person would at minimum need the corresponding weapon in the corresponding color. Assuming the tournament always asks for the same color/weapon combo, that is 15 weapons the player would need (if it doesn’t that is 75!).

It would be assumed that a person would want to wear something for every equipment slot. While this is not required, it generally would be to have any good chance of winning. This is 11 x 5 for 55 total required equipment.

This means a person would have to use upwards of 70 slots to properly partake in the Elite Tourney PvP mode (130 if the color for weapon can change for tourney requirement).

Assuming Northelm continues to gain 1 gear storage space per level, it would require a level 45 legendary Northelm to have the minimum storage space to partake in every possible Elite Tourney with a full set of colored gear, assuming colored weapon requirement always calls for the same type/color combination.

That means a late game player who has a level 50 legendary Northelm would only have 5 spare gear storage space for ascension duplicates, gear switches, and anything else they want to keep. A person who is 100% maxed would only have 15 total spare space (unless followers keep leveling to 100).

If Northhelm had 2x the gear storage rate specifically (pet and spell storage growth rate seems a bit more balanced), it would require a level 23 rare Northelm for the same result. Assuming the tournament doesn’t always call for the same color/weapon combination, Northelm would have to be a level 53 mythic to have 1 copy of everything needed to partake in the Elite Tourney with a 2x gear growth rate.

The current system assuming a constant 1 gear growth rate, level 100 cap, and color/weapon combination can be all 5, this would result in the current system with a level 100 Northelm NOT having enough storage for 1 copy of everything. It would be a 125 storage when 130 is needed to partake in every possible combination of the Elite Tourney PvP with a full set of colored gear.

In contrast, only 10 pets and 20 spells are needed in these same instances.

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#BuffNorthelm

/20char

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100% to this.

Besides the numbers that Tacet has given to show the problem with gear storage, it’s also worth thinking about a large chunk of the audience that will play this game. I am not ashamed to admit I have a number of quirks which make collecting things very appealing and I am not alone. Many of my friends from the GoW community enjoy complete collections. I have found it very difficult to salvage all new common and uncommon gear I get to ensure I have space for the coloured gear needed for Elite Tourneys. Will I ever use these common and uncommon items… Probably not but I want to keep at least one of each and then I would feel comfortable salvaging extras

In addition to the increase needed to gear storage growth from Northelm so we can compete in the restricted Tourneys, I’d be keen to see a ’ gear vault’ where you can archive one of each item to a museum.

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Got some more data.

With completely random drops, I now have 38/37 rare equipment pieces for the first time.

To put this into perspective relative to the other 3 storages, here are all the breakdowns for rare+ for the 3 categories that guard raises:
Gear: 38/37 rare+
Spells: 7/37 rare+
Pets: 9/37 rare+

WHY DID ANYONE think having gear grow at the same rate of spells and pets was a good idea when gear gets multiple times more drops? And when can we expect a fix for this? @Salty

A level 100 guard can’t even hold 1 of every equipment item in the game, let alone the spares needed for ascension. Based on drop rates, it needs 4x gear growth rate increase. At absolute bare minimum needs a 2x increase.

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Ideally, Northhelm’s Guard growth rates per level would be:

Pets: 1x per level
(This is the same as it is now. With only 40 pets, he is already pretty competent by uncommon/rare.)

Spells: 2x per level
(There are around 85+ spells in the game, many of which are viable to have 3.)

Gear: 3x per level
(There are 12 slots that fit this category, inflating the number accumulated and needed drastically compared to other categories of drops.)

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I wish the devs will give their comment about this issue.

Every day there will be more and more early access players who progress further in the game and will get into this gear & spell space issue.
And I’m quite sure this matter will be a major issue in the near future (if not already).
I still do not understand why the gear (& spell) space is very limited if we look at the other system implemented in the game (evolve system, pvp weapon & element requirements, combined gear space for all heroes in one account, etc.)

Hopefully they can fix this issue by adding more spaces soon.

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After having Legendary guard for a couple days now, can confirm storage is STILL horrific.

End game storage is getting nearly unplayable from the lack of space after only 2 months.

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I really hope this is scheduled as a priority change. It sucks to have to scrap so much usable gear

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Do you know the ironic thing here?
The devs set a very low limit for the storage for everything.
Until now we still do not know what is the reasoning behind this unreasonable design - especially since the evolve system in this game requires many duplicates too.

However during this early access they expect us to report any bugs in the game, including those related to gears & spells.
And if you notice I believe every single bug fix/patch/nerf related to gears & spells done by the devs so far are those reported by the players.
I don’t remember there is a fix/patch/nerf that is made by the devs due to the bug/issue with a gear or a spell that is found by the devs themselves.

So it’s kinda funny and sad right?
The devs don’t know the bugs/issues in the game - maybe it’s because they are busy in developing other areas (and maybe future content) of this game.
Basically they wait for our reports to fix these bugs or issues.
But on the other side, they design so that the player will have very limited space.

That’s why the bug reporting related to gears and spells is relatively slow and only reported by some players.
Because not many players have lots of space to try to use and check the effect of those gears & spells.
Moreover they also design so that elite tourney will demand hardcore players to prioritize in storing weapons (75 space slot is required for this).
So if a gear/spell has a relatively unappealing effect, most of the time it will be salvaged even before being used & checked.

The devs already had some opportunities to fix this space issue when they updated the game client in the past. However they chose not to do anything.
I’m really curious now whether they will fix this issue when they release 0.3.5 or they will ignore this major issue once again.

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I’ve started playing PQ3 like it was an idle type of game. The storage space is one of the major reasons. I got so tired of having to salvage minions & spells after almost every chest I opened. I had to make sure I kept a slot opened just in case I forgot to check my vaults for available space so I wouldn’t lose a chest.
I’m just going to keep collecting from my followers, having them craft and leveling them. That’s it. My interest has quickly diminished, but I know this game isn’t in its final form, so I don’t want to be quick to judge.

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On her last PQ stream, Salty did say that she hoped to plan a stream somewhere in the future, closer to hard launch, where the design team devs would discuss design decisions made about the game. Nothing set in stone until it happens (or not), though.

Just because forum users consider something to be a significant issue means that the devs see the situation in the same way. For all we know, the strict inventory management currently in-game could be working as intended from their perspective.

I very strongly doubt the devs are ignorant of the bugs and issues in the game currently.

They just aren’t communicating what they are planning to the player base at the moment. I can tell you from years of experience being a public beta tester for GoW, that this is normal behavior for them. They are not obligated to obtain our approval for changes made to the game about any system. We are not their parents, nor their bosses. They do not bend their knees to us on anything.

When they are ready to present their planned changes, the devs will let us know.

That said, the game is in a pre-release state currently (pre 1.0). In this state, everything should be considered to be highly subject to change at anytime for any reason. There’s plenty of evidence out there (both in-game and through Tacet’s videos) showing all sorts of issues with the game. The devs know this (Salty has alluded to this multiple times on PQ streams) and are almost assuredly working on fixes to all of these issues. They are going to stay quiet on these fixes until their release because these changes are almost guaranteed to be unpopular with a significant portion of forum users.

We’ll have to see what changes 0.35 brings to the game.

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There will be no player base left by 2022 if current inventory issues are left unchanged.

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Yup I doubt that they are ignorant about the bugs and issues.
But my argument is that every single patch/bug fix/nerf related to gears & spells so far are those which are reported by the players including the bone ring nerf.
That’s why I said that it’s ironic that until now they somewhat rely on the players to find and report any bugs or issues in the game so that they can fix them but on the other hand, they put a very low limit on storage.

If they didn’t rely on the players’ report to fix the bugs, I won’t post this.

So basically my point it just to state the irony in current situation.
On one hand, the devs still rely on players related to gear & spell bugs - maybe due to the limited time they have since as mentioned by Cyrup/Salty last time too that they need to develop other areas of the game.
But on the other hand, the devs put super low limit on storage - so how can many players try/check these gears & spells then?

I hope what you meant here is not only focused on end-game content. Because there are many more players who are stuck with the story progression, more limited storage issue, evolve system, limited shards (as you mentioned in your past posts too) during the early-mid stage of the story.

Yup I’m really curious on what 0.35 will bring. :smiley:

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Not at all. Though what passes as end-game meta in early access is absolutely going to be nuked from low-orbit space station death laser before hard launch. The devs can absolutely balance the early-game and the late-game at the same time.

The devs have already said that tweaks are coming regarding the difficulty curve of the game and the shard economy because they believe that both are too harsh currently.

Regarding the inventory situation, AFAIK, there has not been any public statements as of yet by any dev that they perceive the inventory issue to be a problem needing correction. The restrictive inventory situation is very likely intentional. The only real question is whether if the devs have a slight change of heart and give a few additional inventory slots because they believe that the inventory restrictions are tighter than they want them to be for the hard launch of the game .

Sure, I’m not going to say no to more inventory space. But, until I see/hear a dev directly provide a statement towards that end, I’m not expecting much on that front.

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I understand that there has been no communication on this issue, but that is to be expected. I think the whole community believes that the inventory situation is untenable for long term play. If after 2 months of play everyone is maxed for usable space then there is a sever problem.

As Tacet has said, there is significantly more gear than spells and minions and it’s nuts they have the same growth rate.

I get we shouldn’t hope for it to change, but it is close to the most common complaint in every game channel, here, global chat, and discord

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Let me drop the bomb on this Lack of Storage issue.

Here are the screenshots:

Screenshot_2021-05-22-20-50-10-26_aebe98ad7d7a8529ca6c0fe655bccdd7
Screenshot_2021-05-22-20-50-10-26_aebe98ad7d7a8529ca6c0fe655bccdd72400×1080 368 KB

IMG_20210522_212059
IMG_20210522_2120591094×880 152 KB

(No upgrade button on Eveline after evolving her to Mythic)

Screenshot_2021-05-23-08-03-33-57_aebe98ad7d7a8529ca6c0fe655bccdd7
Screenshot_2021-05-23-08-03-33-57_aebe98ad7d7a8529ca6c0fe655bccdd72400×1080 365 KB

IMG_20210523_080832
IMG_20210523_0808321121×885 99.4 KB

(No upgrade button on Guard after evolving him to Mythic)

And the best part: Evolving Guard to Mythic will crash the game & Selecting a Mythic Guard will not give you any text and can crash the game too.

So basically we can conclude that what Lyrian thought about this limited storage issue is most likely correct.

Because if it is not intentional, it won’t make any sense that in the current state of the game where there are 90 different gears and 85+ different spells, the devs put a hard cap of 75 space only.

Good luck to those who want to enter the PvP Elite Tourney week in week out.
Good luck to those who want to become a collector who owns every single item in this game.
Good luck to those who want to have 5 different colors for every gear slot.
And good luck to all the players in this Early Access.

I won’t talk too much and just leave it there.
I just hope that the devs will communicate to us more about this issue soon. :slight_smile:

Notes:
I took this suboptimal path in upgrading my followers because I constantly need more gear space and I also want to know whether the storage limit set by the devs is 75 or more. There was a hope that the level cap is set to Lv. 100 similar to the enemy’s level but apparently it’s not.

I know that this is early access so everything is subject to change.

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That’s what I was expecting, sadly.

Expecting the Guard to just grant the extra chest slot and that’s it. Also hope that’s not the case, but my expectations are also about absolute zero on that.

Going back to the side note I wrote, I’m deeply suspicious at the moment that the only real functional difference in gear between a Legendary 50 piece and a Mythic 50 piece is going to be a very small bump in that gear’s stats, skill buffs, and special effects. Not enough to be meaningful to the vast majority of the playerbase, that may or may not ever get to the Mythic ascension screen. But, meaningful enough that for the hardcore players it will likely make the difference in something hyper-competitive, like Guild (err… Kingdom) Wars or a World Event where those minor extra stats might allow a player to make it one or two matches further than a player who only has Legendary gear.

Not sure how I really feel about that. I have very mixed feelings on this.

During the recent GoW dev Q&A, during the PQ3 section of the stream Sirrian suggested that he wanted a way for players to change gear elements/colors. That would probably work as another follower, which means something like that might come in the first expansion to the game (in which Salty mentioned that the writing for that was already being planned out).

On the collection side though, yeah that’s rough. I think that part of the plan of slowing players down is to force players to throw away desired gear pieces because they can’t hold them for later upgrading, which requires them to go and re-farm those pieces again at a later point in time. Players would not have had to do that if there was inventory space to hold those pieces for later use.

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Personally find this completely unacceptable.

When I asked that question to Sirrian during the QA stream, it seemed like it was more of an afterthought to him. He mentioned the feature definitely wouldn’t be out before launch, and based on how they normally roll out features could be 2-3 years until it happens.

Even once it does, it changes the weapon capacity from needing 75 weapons to needing 30 weapons. One that is optimal coloration for every weapon type and then another that will shift to the correct color if needed. This still eats up around half the storage between saving weapon spares for upgrades and the amount needed to elite pvp. I am 8 storage space from max inventory and half my storage is already weapons and even with it I have still missed 3 elite tournaments.

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This or remove the limits entirely

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That’s what it feels like to me, also. But wow, what a misguided way to slow things down.

A game like this has:

  1. A limited story to get interested in and engaged with.
  2. Pretty limited mechanics in terms of active player input.
  3. Some degree of strategic play to progress.
  4. Collecting virtual junk.

I would go on record and say that most people will not be playing this to be stunned and awed by the epic story. Nor will too many be hitting install because they just gotta match some gems, today!

The actual game is going to be down to the strategic play and the virtual junk, and those two are co-dependent. You have limited drops from chests, limited rarity of chests, limited chest storage, limited keys, limited no-key opening via timers and cooldowns on minions. Limited storage on top of all of that is just nuts.

Getting the stuff is the hook. Getting the stuff and having to destroy it and go get it again? Interesting variation, sure. One that I predict will prove to not hold or attract players much less spenders.

On a positive note, I think the story writing has been fun. I think the mechanics are just fine. Strategy element has potential if they totally revamp shard economy and storage.

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