Ideas for new zOMG! rings, ring sets, and debuffs

[F1reBurn1ng]

Red Kutai

F1reBurn1ng

Debuff: Stunned
Does not allow enemies to perform actions for set amount of time. Enemies will stay Stunned until debuff comes off. (This is the debuff Solar Rays should have [e.g. Blinded in place])

This is essentially a unconditional Sleep, yes? It comes up occasionally and it would probably be useful to have something between Sleep and Fear for at least a couple effects. I don't think it would fit particularly well on Solar Rays as 'blinding' in most games is typically represented by reduced accuracy, not the inability to move. That said, there's still probably plenty of room for Stun effects in the game.

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Debuff: Frozen
Does not allow enemies to perform actions for set amount of time. Enemies will stay Frozen until debuff comes off or when hit enough times to break the ice (the enemy will instead have the Slow debuff [with Frozen still as the debuff] until the debuff comes off)

This seems considerably less versatile. I'd expect to see this more as a specific ring effect than as a general status condition. This can already be achieved more-or-less by causing a Sleep effect and a Footspeed debuff at the same time, causing the enemy to remain slow after the Sleep wears off. Conceptually, I think such an effect makes as much sense for sleep as it does for freezing.

If I were designing a 'Frozen' status, I'd probably include the ability to shatter the target, something like dealing extra damage when the effect is broken. If the bonus damage is percentile (and significant) it would give some advantage to high Damage-per-Hit rings (which don't have much at the moment), and might even facilitate new strategies that focus on freezing enemies and then cracking them open for big damage.

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Debuff: Poisoned
Deals slow DoT. Enemies inflicted with this debuff will deal 1/4 less damage and receive 1/4 more damage

In general, I think the game mostly replaces traditional 'poison' effects with general Damage-over-Time; I'd like to see more extended DoTs, but a status specifically for them doesn't seem necessary. Dealing less damage and receiving more isn't unreasonable for a status condition, but that alone doesn't seem necessarily fitting for a 'poison' effect.

If I were trying to make a poison effect (that doesn't rely on DoTs, which I agree is the most obvious), I'd probably do it as a way of preventing healing - I've seen poison concepted as such in other games, so I think it makes a bit of sense. Probably something like a 100% Armor Pool effect for healing, preventing you from gaining Health until the poison is gone. And considering how much modern zOMG! tactics depend on the ability to heal, I think that would mean significantly changing the way the game plays.

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Ring: Life Drain
Ranged. Deals direct damage. Small percentage of damage dealt is converted into healing for the user. Higher rage ranks increase damage, the percentage of damage conversion, and inflict the Fear debuff. The highest rage rank deals the Root debuff on the target during the attack animation.
R1: Small translucent purple hand trying to grab target's "soul" (essentially the image of the target with its colors reversed)
R2: Slightly bigger translucent purple hand grabbing more of the soul
R3: Bigger skeletal hand grabbing even more of the soul
R4: Portal opens below target and a bunch of hands come out and try to drag down the target itself

Life-draining effects are one of the most often suggested rings, and while they're often flavoured as necromantic or vampiric, I personally prefer sillier animations to more serious ones. My favourite concept for this effect was a Frying Pan ring, which I think would fit zOMG!'s tone perfectly. That's not to say that it couldn't be concepted seriously, but I think you'd need a very good reason to.

Is there a specific reason to include a Root effect for this attack? Neither the concept nor the primary mechanic lends itself directly to Root, so I'm not sure why it was chosen over anything else. I suspect it was just to resonate with the RR4 animation, but I think the animation gets the point across pretty well without it and I don't think it really adds anything significant to the design itself. If I felt that a drain attack really needed an added effect (and I'm not sure it does), I'd probably opt for the vampire design and give it a DoT 'bleed'.

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Ring: Claw Scratch
Melee. Deals direct damage. Higher rage ranks increase damage and inflict Stun and the highest rage rank will also deal the Infected debuff.
R1: A simple swipe
R2: A cross swipe
R3: 3 consecutive swipes
R4: Flurry of swipes with the last hit being a cross swipe

I assume the 'Infected' debuff here is the 'Poison' status from before. I don't think it's exceptionally resonant for a claw-based attack to inflict poison; most poisons in nature are distributed through bites or stings. That's not to say poisonous claws don't exist (I believe the platypus famously has one), but that when most players think of a 'poison' effect, their first thoughts would likely be snake- or spider-bites. I'd probably try there first.

I'll also note that the animation described here reminds me of a ring I've had in my head for a while; I called it "Bear Claw", and it was a simple melee attack that inflicted Fear on critical hits. The animation progressed from a simple swipe at RR1, adding more swipes (and depicting more of the bear) with more Rage. That is to say, I like the direction the animation is going, on its own.

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Ring: Toxic Waste
Crowd Control. Inflicts the target with the Poisoned debuff. Only deals direct damage on center target. Higher rage ranks increase direct damage, damage over time, and start affecting the area around the target
R1: Throw a Barton's "Beautification Can"
R2: Black garbage bag filled with rotten objects
R3: Dumpster
R4: Barrel filled with green/purple/black ooze (with the radioactive symbol on the barrel

I mentioned bites previously, but this version also makes sense. In general I'm not exceptionally keen on CC-only rings; I prefer attacks with CCs tacked on, as I think they make for better gameplay. That said, if you're going to make a ring that is primarily crowd control, it's best just to leave damage off entirely in order to clarify its role. Putting even minor damage on a ring makes it read like a 'bad attack' rather than a crowd control effect, and it doesn't substantially increase its value in the cases where it's used.

I do like the concept, though, and it's goofy enough that I think it would fit reasonably well. If I were trying to design a Poison Ring I'd still probably explore other possibilities first, but I wouldn't be dissatisfied with something like this.

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Ring: Immunization
Passive. Incoming damage will occasionally heal yourself

This seems more like a Reflection effect, wherein the damage is converted to healing instead. I don't really like the way it further obsoletes Deflection, and it seems difficult for the game to support too many more of those effects. What's more, I don't think those effects really lead to good or exciting gameplay, especially not in a passive form. I just don't really see how it makes the game more fun.

If I wanted a damage-reversal effect, I'd give it a short duration and a long cooldown, requiring players to time the effect carefully to maximise it. That said, I think the same applies to Reflection and probably works better in that case, and I don't see what this version offers to make it more desirable.

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Ring set: Experimental Failure/Abomination
Consists of Life Drain, Claw Scratch, Toxic Waste, Immunity
Minor boost to Health and Debuff resistance

This Set doesn't really feel satisfying to me. 'Experimental Failure' and 'Abomination' are not so evocative that I know exactly what to expect from the set, and yet it somehow feels that it doesn't deliver on the theme either. Probably for the same reasons.

When creating a set, try to start with an immediately recognisable archetype - something that lets you envision what's in the Set before you actually know any of the rings. Then, for each of those rings simply make it what makes the most sense for its theme. This set seems like an example of stretching to make an effect fit a pre-existing set, which is how most of the existing sets were created, but it's also precisely why they feel so disjointed. I think the strongest part of this Set is the Toxic Waste ring, and I think that lends itself most directly to a Garbage Man Set or the like. Not the most evocative concept I'll admit, but it gives something a bit more tangible to work with. From there I'd probably go for a truck/compactor ring, maybe nose plugs, and... Well, the fourth slot's always the hardest. sweatdrop

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Ring: Lightning Bolt
Ranged. Deals direct damage. May Stun targets. Higher rage ranks increase damage, probability of Stunning, and starts penalizing target's Dodge
R1: A small jolt
R2: A bigger jolt
R3: A stream of lightning from the user to the target
R4: Lightning strikes the target from above

Lightning is pretty straightforward, and Damage + Stun isn't a bad effect for it at all. I'm not sure it gains much of anything by penalising Dodge, and it's certainly not the only effect a Lightning Ring could have, but it's a solid design nonetheless.

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Ring: Snowstorm
AoE. Deals direct damage. Inflicts Slow debuff on affected enemies. Higher rage ranks deal more damage and start inflicting targets with the Frozen debuff.
R1: Snowfall around the enemies
R2: More snow and strong winds
R3: Even more snow. Snow starts to build up around the enemies
R4: Snow completely buries the enemies

If you're going to have a Frozen status and a Snowstorm ring, I'd really just attach them directly - there's really no prize for subtlety in game design. An AoE that damages and freezes enemies is straightforward, evocative, and functional. Sounds fine to me.

I do have to agree with gataka here though, that the animations would probably be a bit sillier than you're predicting. Snowmen and igloos and other nonsense would abound.

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Ring: Fire Burst
Ranged. Deals direct damage. Deals AoE damage around the target. Higher rage ranks increase damage and affected area around the target. Higher rage ranks also start knocking enemies away from the target.
R1: Burst of fire around target
R2: More intense burst of fire
R3: Big fire explosion around target
R4: Massive explosion around the target

Explosion Ring. Pretty straightforward, nothing to get really excited about. The Knockback effect needs to exist at every Rage Rank to distinguish it from other rings (like Heavy Water Balloon), but apart from that it's solid enough. That said, if I wanted an explosion effect I'd probably look for a more exciting way to do it - timed grenades, proximity mines, hot potato, something. It's a fair ring, but I'm not convinced it does its effect justice.

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Ring: Black Hole
Ranged. Deals DoT damage on and around target. Enemies around the target will be sucked in to the target. Higher rage ranks increase damage, duration, AoE range, and pull strength of the black hole. The highest rage rank has a tiny chance of instantly killing the target (about 1/100000). Animation lasts throughout DoT
R1: Small black hole
R2: Slightly bigger black hole
R3: Twice the size of R1
R4: Twice the size of R2

I've talked about almost this exact ring before, and I've always been fond of the idea (as I am with all unusual Knockback effects). I'm not sure why you'd opt for DoT in this case - personally I like the idea of it dealing simple percentile damage as Final Fantasy gravity effects do, but that's just a personal preference. What I will say is that there's no point including an effect that activates as rarely as it does on this one. If you want the ring to do something, make it actually do it. I don't think the ring really needs the effect (and so I'd probably save it to be used somewhere else), but if I wanted this to be the 'instant kill' ring I'd probably just make it do explosive critical damage - that way on the occasions that it does hit critical, it will likely kill small enemies instantly just through damage.

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Ring set: Dark Wizard
Consists of Lightning Bolt, Snowstorm, Fire Burst, Black Hole
Minor boost to Stamina and Stamina regeneration

This is in a bit of an awkward spot relative to the Shaman Set - Shaman uses elemental 'magics' and also increases Stamina Regen, making it a bit unclear what each is trying to evoke. There's nothing particularly 'dark' about the Dark Wizard set either, unless you're referring to the traditional Black Mage class. The rings used in the set are more evocative of an Elementalist (like the Shaman) than of a Wizard specifically, and if I were making a Wizard set I would expect it to have very different components. Fireballs, grimoires, turning enemies to frogs - snowstorms and black holes just aren't the most evocative options available.

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All-in-all these are some of the better ring/set designs I've seen; you seem pretty good at reigning yourself in, and as a result they weren't nearly as overpowered or overcomplicated as a lot of what I've seen. Most of the concepts were a bit on the serious side for zOMG!, but as the game rides the fence between serious and whimsical I can't really blame you. Probably the biggest advice I can give you is to keep in mind how your designs actually affect the gameplay - if you're going to add something to the game, it should be because it makes playing it more fun, not just because you can. Keeping an eye on how each addition makes the game more interesting, more exciting to play, is the quickest way to good results. Adding things 'because they're cool' always sounds good, but it rarely ends as well... sweatdrop

I did not expect such a thorough review of my idea since it just came from the top of my head eek . I understand that there is no way any of all the ideas everyone came up with will ever be implemented in the game crying . I appreciate that you took your time to review my ideas. I have to agree that my thoughts for animation are a bit on the darker side (that's probably from the influence of DMS...) and that it needs to be a bit more whimsical. I still have a lot more to learn about stuff like this. But, all in all, a well thought out review that I really appreciate. Thank you biggrin

[F1reBurn1ng]

OK! Got some more ideas for rings, ring sets, and debuffs. Thank you commenters for the inspiring comments.

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Debuff: Confused
Affected enemies will ignore players and start attacking fellow enemies for a short time

Debuff: Stagger
Enemies will (for a very brief amount of time) only receive critical hit damage

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Ring: Whip
Melee. Whip your enemies into shape and deal damage to them. In addition, you make them realize their errors and make them feel guilt, penalizing Willpower. Higher rage ranks increase damage and Willpower penalty.
R1: Fly swatter
R2: Rolled-up newspaper
R3: Meter/Yard stick
R4: Harisen

Ring: Paper Plane
Ranged. Throw paper planes at your enemies to deal damage. Higher rage ranks make bigger, better planes and deal more damage.
R1: Thrown paper plane
R2: Biplane equipped with shooting machine guns
R3: Fighter jet launching missiles
R4: Stealth bomber... you know

Ring: Class Lessons
CC. Perform class lessons as you watch your enemies getting Confused. Higher rage ranks start affecting the area around the target and increase the chance of the enemies getting Confused.
R1: Literature Arts
R2: Biology
R3: World History
R4: Calculus

Ring: Ball Throw
Ranged. Throw balls at enemies to deal damage to them and have a chance to knock them out cold (Sleep). Higher rage ranks increase damage and probability of knocking them out.
R1: Baseball
R2: Dodgeball
R3: Football
R4: Basketball

Ring set: Teacher
Consists of Whip, Paper Plane, Class Lessons, and Ball Throw
Minor bonus to Willpower and Accuracy

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Ring: Tool Box
Melee. Grab a random tool from your tool box and bonk your enemies with it. Higher rage ranks increase damage and start knocking enemies away from you.
R1: Tire iron
R2: Wrench
R3: Shovel
R4: Sledgehammer

Ring: Bombs, Bombs, Bombs
Ranged. Throw explosives at and around your enemies to damage them and cause them to Stagger from shock. Higher rage ranks increase damage, area affected, and chance of Staggering the enemies
R1: Grenade
R2: Thrown C4
R3: Stick of dynamite
R4: Holy Hand Grenade

Ring: Hard Hat
Buff. Wear a hard hat to stop some of the damage (Persistent Armor) from hitting you. Higher rage ranks equips you with better hard hats and actually increase your Accuracy.
R1: Simple hard hat
R2: Hard hat with small flashlight on its side
R3: Hard hat with flashlight on the center
R4: Hard hat with a spotlight stuck above it

Ring: Rockfall
AoE. Make rocks fall from above onto your enemies do deal damage. Higher rage ranks increases damage and extends the affected area further.
R1: Falling pebbles
R2: Bigger rocks
R3: Even bigger rocks
R4: Rocks with the PWNED rock, Rock Armor rocks, and the rock puppy in the mix

Ring set: Miner/Digger
Consists of Tool Kit, Bombs, Bombs, Bombs, Hard Hat, and Rockfall
Minor bonus to Luck and Maximum Health

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I hope you will like the idea biggrin .

[raggedy grrl]

I decided a few hypothetical rings sounded fun this morning, but I'm still drinking my morning coffee, so these might be exceptionally bad...

Ring: Yank

Target an enemy at a distance, then leave. Pull enemy into next frame with you.
Has debuff effect on enemy, reduces their aim.
Good for plucking one monster out of a crowd.
Long recharge time.


Ring: Aiding and Abetting

Passive. When wearing this ring, any buffs or heals you use apply to monsters in vicinity as well.


Ring: Pet

Reduce aggro by fussing over your enemy.

• R1: Pet / Scratch behind ears or earlike protuberances
  
• R2: Belly rub
  
• R3: Treat
  
• R4: Fetch (can massively reduce aggro the longer you play)
  

Ring: Mess Wi' Chu

Passive: Randomly augments the effects of buffs and heals when applied...or reverses them [debuff or damage]...and this can apply not just to you / your crew, but also if you like to randomly buff strangers.

Ring: Road Rage

Extreme knock back with AoE

• R1-R2: knocks varying distances within frame
  
• R3-R4: 1-n monsters into next frame
  

Generates undying hate from monster(s), lets them follow you across levels...think of that unrelenting truck in Spielberg's Duel. No matter where you are, that pack of angry wolves is hunting you...even deep undersea.

Maybe R4 makes it so they can even wait for you in between rounds. Sign in, step out of Null, and get set upon by angry Licky Lanterns in Old Aqueduct...at high noon!


Ring: Salad Shooter

Shoots vegetable material at animated or group. Ground becomes slippery, disrupting their movement and aim...and yours, too, if you step in the mess.

R1-R4 have varying amounts and kinds of stuff that shoot out...cucumbers, lettuce, tomatoes, olives, chickpeas, bacon bits, fruit, tiny gnomes...


Ring: Big Little

You briefly double in size, HP, stamina, accuracy, everything. Then, you shrink to half your size for a much longer time with corresponding reductions in HP, stamina, etc. until ring recharges.

R1-R4 determine duration of doubling, but longer you remain at double size (up to 10 seconds), the longer it takes to recharge...10:1 for R1, 20:1 for R2, etc.


Ring: Spin the Bottle

Use in a mob. Bottle appears, spins. If it stops on an animated, they join your side and fight against the other animated for a duration based on the rage level. May stop on no one or yourself / crew member; that's a miss.

[Red Kutai]

gataka

Let me clarify: enemies hurt us but I doubt your'tato would; portable cherry fluff ain't your style.
Aye, technically I doubt it's hard, but it's still an odd mix of behavior.

Again, I'm not sure how it works, but enemies can hurt other enemies (a la P3s), but their AoEs don't normally do so (a la Bladed Vases) - there's obviously something there already. I'm not sure exactly how they 'flip the switch' between the two, but I'm pretty confident the switch exists to flip.

I may have been a bit misleading with how I presented it though, as I only meant "enemy" in the technical sense - that is, its object class would be enemy, like you mentioned with the trash bins. I wouldn't describe it as an 'enemy' conceptually or in-game, I was simply trying to convey the type of object it would be implemented as. sweatdrop

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Really, being the result of a ring with a physical presence and some HP, could easily be seen as a summon of sort. Then buff/healing comes naturally.

Now, the way it looks, the way it is mind and motion-less, the way it reacts to the simple mechanic of A PUNCH to the FACE keeps it grounded in simple object reality.

But let me reiterate that this is close to a summon: even if da bomb itself is kept in object realm, the door's open for the invocation of livelier stuff. Punching any would be pet robot puppy makes little sense... for most people...so how do we keep all this clean?

I like 'summon'-style effects, and I'd actually be happy to see some as rings - that said, I don't really see the obstacle. The 'flag' in Coliseum protection battles is functionally the same object as the Barton trash bins, with an 'attackable' switch turned 'off'; I've never seen either trip anyone up. And in each case, the mechanics are piggybacking on the concept - you can kick a grenade but can't heal or buff one, whereas you can buff and heal a friend but you can't (or shouldn't) kick them. They're mechanically close but conceptually distinct, so as long as players have a pre-existing awareness of the difference between their friends and an inanimate object, we should be safe. wink

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Btw, about that contractual boss immunity: dirty exception based design talk2hand

In general, yes - and I'd actually like to eliminate it if possible, by changing how Crowd Control effects work. That said, as inanimate objects are genuinely immune to status effects and don't really have a Willpower score to overcome, I consider this the one appropriate place to use it... 3nodding

[Red Kutai]

F1reBurn1ng

Debuff: Confused
Affected enemies will ignore players and start attacking fellow enemies for a short time

'Confusion', to me, has always indicated that the character has a chance of attacking either foes or allies - if I wanted it just attacking allies, I'd theme it as 'mind control' or 'taming'. I may be splitting hairs, but I'm always a bit dissatisfied when confusion is effective control, rather than high-variance randomisation.

One thing to think about: for the most part, CC effects go both ways, applying equally to enemies and players. This is an effect that would be very difficult to apply to player characters, and if you want to evoke 'confusion' you may want to find a way that can apply to players as well. Possibly a visual effect where the sprites/names/etc. for enemy and ally characters on the screen are randomised for the duration of the effect. I've wanted visual aspects for other CC effects in the past, but this is the first one I can recall where it would really be necessary to get the point across.

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Debuff: Stagger
Enemies will (for a very brief amount of time) only receive critical hit damage

This is actually a really nice, simple effect - I remember designing ring that did something similar (an Aim effect, 'the next n attacks you make against the target are critical hits.'), but I never considered it as a general status condition. This is probably the first effect I've seen that makes me question my 'control' definition of Willpower-based effects, since it seems like an obvious choice for being Willpower-based but clearly isn't control-related at all. It's really quite interesting, and the way it demands an immediate change of tactics (switching to the offensive to take advantage of it) also makes me think it would play rather well.

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Ring: Whip
Melee. Whip your enemies into shape and deal damage to them. In addition, you make them realize their errors and make them feel guilt, penalizing Willpower. Higher rage ranks increase damage and Willpower penalty.
R1: Fly swatter
R2: Rolled-up newspaper
R3: Meter/Yard stick
R4: Harisen

Mantis is already a basic attack that adds a Willpower debuff with Rage; that said, it makes almost no sense on Mantis and would actually make at least some here. I'd like to see more Willpower debuffs in the game, as they require you to have a particular setup to take the best advantage of them. At present one of the biggest difficulties they pose is Rage distribution - using a RR4 Willpower debuff and then a RR1 Crowd Control effect is generally less useful than just using the RR4 Crowd Control effect in the first place. I'm not sure what the best way to work around this is, but it's an issue to be aware of if you're going to play in this design space.

We've discussed before how best to represent Willpower debuffs, and an attack that is designed to demoralise more than damage seems like a particularly good option. I'd be tempted to move the rolled-up newspaper down to RR1 (because it seems like the most evocative animation - "Bad dog!), and possibly find something else to fill the gap (being that 'flyswatter' is evocative of a different effect entirely).

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Ring: Paper Plane
Ranged. Throw paper planes at your enemies to deal damage. Higher rage ranks make bigger, better planes and deal more damage.
R1: Thrown paper plane
R2: Biplane equipped with shooting machine guns
R3: Fighter jet launching missiles
R4: Stealth bomber... you know

This is one my favourite ring designs I've ever seen. You got it just about as perfectly as I could've hoped for. emotion_kirakira

The only thing I'd be at all inclined to add is a minor 'bleed' effect (i.e. paper cut), as it's standard for rings to push into a second effect at higher Rage Ranks.

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Ring: Class Lessons
CC. Perform class lessons as you watch your enemies getting Confused. Higher rage ranks start affecting the area around the target and increase the chance of the enemies getting Confused.
R1: Literature Arts
R2: Biology
R3: World History
R4: Calculus

If it were me, I'd probably make this as simple as throwing a book at them - it's a little hard to animate 'teaching', and getting conked on the head with Advanced Thermonuclear Hydraulics in 8 Dimensions is bound to induce some confusion on its own. Higher Rage Ranks increase the number of books, eventually culminating in a pile of books burying the target. At least one level needs three books, titled 'Reading', 'Riting' and 'Rithmetic'. At any rate, I like where the concept is going. 3nodding

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Ring: Ball Throw
Ranged. Throw balls at enemies to deal damage to them and have a chance to knock them out cold (Sleep). Higher rage ranks increase damage and probability of knocking them out.
R1: Baseball
R2: Dodgeball
R3: Football
R4: Basketball

Probably my least favourite in this set, both because the others are all pretty good and because this one isn't particularly evocative - ranged attack plus Sleep isn't anything too original, and the theme isn't exactly unique to it. I think I mentioned last time that the 4th slot is always the hardest, and I think this is an example of that difficulty.

After Discipline, Paper Plane, and Book Learnin', my first thoughts would be... Eraser, Pencil Sharpener, ideally something buff-ish. I think there's enough to reach for inside the classroom, before we need to stretch any further.

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Ring set: Teacher
Consists of Whip, Paper Plane, Class Lessons, and Ball Throw
Minor bonus to Willpower and Accuracy

Willpower, Accuracy, Teacher? It makes as much sense as anything else, I suppose. I don't blame you, it's hard to make anything very interesting under the current system. Making Set bonuses 'cooler' is one of the things I'd be most keen to change.

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Ring: Tool Box
Melee. Grab a random tool from your tool box and bonk your enemies with it. Higher rage ranks increase damage and start knocking enemies away from you.
R1: Tire iron
R2: Wrench
R3: Shovel
R4: Sledgehammer

This is... A little bit all over the other rings' toes. Bump is Knockback + Damage. Hack is Damage + Knockback. Shark Attack is Damage + Knockback + Range, and isn't generally regarded very highly already. This needs something to set it apart from everything else: if you have a hard time referring to something as 'The _____ Ring', there's a chance its identity is too vague. Bump is 'The Knockback Ring'. Hack is 'The Damage Ring'. What is this one?

Luckily, 'toolbox' actually lends itself immediately to an effect - the term is used at least occasionally in games to refer to strategies that are able to pull out what they need, when they need it. This actually brings to mind something I suggested a while back, inspired by the move 'Metronome' from the Pokémon franchise. Somehow I never applied the toolbox concept to it myself (though 'Swiss-Army Knife' was pretty close), but I think that's probably ideal for it.

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Ring: Bombs, Bombs, Bombs
Ranged. Throw explosives at and around your enemies to damage them and cause them to Stagger from shock. Higher rage ranks increase damage, area affected, and chance of Staggering the enemies
R1: Grenade
R2: Thrown C4
R3: Stick of dynamite
R4: Holy Hand Grenade

My first inclination is that this effect doesn't really need Stagger. It doesn't particularly contribute to it conceptually (yes, being blown up by a stick of dynamite would stagger me, but it would also drastically reduce my Willpower, Footspeed, and probably my Weight as well - we simply don't include them unless they're especially notable), and it seems contrary to its design - this ring feels like it wants to deal lots of damage in an area of effect, meaning it's what you want to use when your opponents are already Stagger'd. Having it also do the Stagger'ing means you need to include more high-powered attacks in the same build to take advantage of it, which is a bit counterintuitive.

As we were discussing a grenade-style thrown bomb effect earlier, I'd probably avoid having this one depict quite the same thing. If it were me, I'd probably simply have it work via Wile E. Coyote-style TNT lever connected directly to the target enemy. It could deal a lot of damage to the primary target, 'splash' damage to anything nearby, and Knockback centred around target's location.

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Ring: Hard Hat
Buff. Wear a hard hat to stop some of the damage (Persistent Armor) from hitting you. Higher rage ranks equips you with better hard hats and actually increase your Accuracy.
R1: Simple hard hat
R2: Hard hat with small flashlight on its side
R3: Hard hat with flashlight on the center
R4: Hard hat with a spotlight stuck above it

I really like this version, as it gives a great excuse for combining defensive abilities and offensive ones. I'd probably opt for Deflection over Persistent Armor, but then I'd opt for just about anything over Persistent Armor as that field is pretty full at this point. There's an argument to be made for the gameplay of Armor Pool, as in order to take advantage of the Accuracy boost you'd have to keep the effect from 'breaking', but it's a little bit less attractive conceptually.

I think we could probably push the animations down a rank or so, each - start with the basic miner's hat, and work our way to more absurd contraptions from there. RR2 could be double-'headlights' (sound/blinking effects from a car would be a plus), RR3 the whole spotlight, and RR4 a vast array of differently-sized lights covering every bit of the hat. I'd probably repeat the car sound effects here with an engine-rev thrown in, because you'd certainly need some way to power all that. wink

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Ring: Rockfall
AoE. Make rocks fall from above onto your enemies do deal damage. Higher rage ranks increases damage and extends the affected area further.
R1: Falling pebbles
R2: Bigger rocks
R3: Even bigger rocks
R4: Rocks with the PWNED rock, Rock Armor rocks, and the rock puppy in the mix

This is probably where I'd move the Stagger effect to, personally - a rockfall just screams 'unstable footing', and being pelted by rocks from above is certainly staggering enough to justify it. That was my first thought when I saw the name, at least.

I'd probably have it progress like so: series of small rocks, series of stalactites, one large boulder, and then the cartoonishly oversized pile of rocks you describe. Rage Rank progressions can be a little tricky, because each one wants to be the 'punch line' for all preceding ones - if the RR3 animation just follows the pattern set by RR1 and RR2, it's not quite as satisfying. Real success comes when RR3 can make its own joke, while RR4 is able to be even more absurd to top it off. But then that's just my perspective. sweatdrop

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Ring set: Miner/Digger
Consists of Tool Kit, Bombs, Bombs, Bombs, Hard Hat, and Rockfall
Minor bonus to Luck and Maximum Health

Gold Miner gets a Luck boost? I dislike Luck boosts in general, but that one's almost funny enough to justify it... razz

[kitsunen]

F1reBurn1ng

cnoisy

As good or as bad as your ideas may be, the chance of any of these even being considered is slim to none. This is because Gaia has pretty much thrown zOMG into the folder of forgotten things, and is no longer working on improving the game. At least as far as I can see.

Yeah. I wish they would continue developing the game. So much potential for a decent MMO.

In the beginning zOMG was the first MMO flash game. Such a shame their just wasting the potential.

[Red Kutai]

raggedy grrl

Ring: Yank

Target an enemy at a distance, then leave. Pull enemy into next frame with you.
Has debuff effect on enemy, reduces their aim.
Good for plucking one monster out of a crowd.
Long recharge time.

This is a cute effect, but something about it just feels 'off' to me - possibly that it conceptually recognises 'frames', which is a fourth-wall concept. Yes, your character does it at least once in-game, but those exceptions are what prove the rule. I like reverse-Knockback style effects in general, and I've toyed with Lasso and Fishing Rod designs that have done just that; but pulling enemies specifically from one frame to another seems... Well, I don't know. Maybe I'm just being narrow-minded. whee

I should think Taunt would achieve something similar to this, and if I were trying to achieve the same, I'd probably use that method - making the enemies follow you, pied-piper-style. The effect would need to turn off line-of-sight aggression and the effect would probably break if the target was damaged along the way, but it would do much of what this is trying to. It's not as cute as 'Yank', and arguably not fit for a ring slot (and thus better as an item of some sort), but it's something.

EDIT: I'd actually be really tempted for a 'pied piper' effect to require manual input to maintain; something DDR-style, to represent musical rhythm. I've been thinking that Gaia should try a an avatar-based DDR-style minigame for a while, and if they ever did I'd be quite comfortable with this as a crossover ring. That said, that sort of effect seems like it would want to affect more than one enemy at a time. And even then, that's something like a triple-if, so it's not exactly a reliable suggestion. sweatdrop

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Ring: Aiding and Abetting

Passive. When wearing this ring, any buffs or heals you use apply to monsters in vicinity as well.

I generally try to avoid 'griefer' effects, and that's essentially what this is - it allows you to make the game harder on other players. While this could certainly be used to make the game more fun for yourself and your friends by knowingly increasing the challenge, I suspect it would be used much more often to harass players who are simply trying to make it through the game. If we can find a way to allow one without the other, I'd be okay with it - but even then it seems like having the effect just because we can. redface

One thing I would consider would be an effect that allows you to switch all the buffs/debuffs currently on you with a target enemy - I prefer to avoid allowing potentially negative 'buffs' to be used on anyone but yourself (for the same 'griefer' reasons), but something that allows you to swap them off onto enemies would open up another avenue for those effects, while also serving as an effective way to shed troublesome debuffs and changing the value of all-upside buffs. This has some potential for abuse, but it would require a high investment for such a small effect that I'm not too concerned about it.

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Ring: Pet

Reduce aggro by fussing over your enemy.

• R1: Pet / Scratch behind ears or earlike protuberances
  
• R2: Belly rub
  
• R3: Treat
  
• R4: Fetch (can massively reduce aggro the longer you play)
  

I've suggested hate-reducing rings in the past, but in general I'm not a huge fan - if they're able to reduce hate below 1 they can make the game unfun, and if they can't they feel like they're failing their only job. It's nice when healers can drop unwanted aggro, but even then it rarely feels like it's really worth a ring slot. I feel like it's an effect that should exist, but I'm not entirely sure how to go about it.

The one thing that I can think to do is manipulate the priority system that already exists for status effects - a user under the effect of a status condition is treated as a lower priority on the enemy's hate list. Doing this would have no effect while solo-ing (which isn't a strike against it on its own), but would actively prevent the affected enemies attacking you while in a crew. This is often more effective than simply reducing hate because it will turn all enemies away from you regardless of the hate you already have. This makes it less an interesting decision and more a 'panic button', but its uses are already so limited that that's probably more fitting. From a technical perspective it would probably be easier to keep it line with other priority effects, meaning it would be easiest if it afflicted the user with a 'blank' CC - as a result, it would probably be concepted as making the user an unappealing target ('Gym Socks', 'Garlic Breath', 'Nice Personality') rather than winning them over individually.

I do like the idea of a 'Fetch!' effect, though - similar to the grenade effect we discussed earlier, it could generate a temporary 'entity' with an increased aggro priority, temporarily distracting nearby enemies until they catch it and return. Balancing it to be effective - but not too effective - might be difficult, but it seems fun and silly enough that we could work something out.

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Ring: Mess Wi' Chu

Passive: Randomly augments the effects of buffs and heals when applied...or reverses them [debuff or damage]...and this can apply not just to you / your crew, but also if you like to randomly buff strangers.

This one seems like an obvious and intentional 'griefer' effect. As a rule I tend to avoid allowing anything potentially negative to happen to anyone but yourself - if those players want the effect, they can equip the ring on their own; if they don't, you're just interfering with their enjoyment of the game. And unfortunately, this sounds much less interesting when it affects only you.

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Ring: Road Rage

Extreme knock back with AoE

• R1-R2: knocks varying distances within frame
  
• R3-R4: 1-n monsters into next frame
  

Generates undying hate from monster(s), lets them follow you across levels...think of that unrelenting truck in Spielberg's Duel. No matter where you are, that pack of angry wolves is hunting you...even deep undersea.

Maybe R4 makes it so they can even wait for you in between rounds. Sign in, step out of Null, and get set upon by angry Licky Lanterns in Old Aqueduct...at high noon!

Curious effect, and I'm trying to think of a way to make it really 'work'. sweatdrop

Knocking monsters into the next frame sounds easy, but it's actually not - I think the game could figure it out, though. Normal Knockback effects don't do this though, so being able to do so would be a special effect on its own. I'd probably make that this ring's 'thing' on its own, and leave the tenacity bit to something else a bit more directly resonant. But that's the more curious part of the effect, so that's the part I'm more interested in.

I remember discussing the idea of a 'Starseed Ring' (a la Monster Galaxy) a while back; you use it on an enemy and if their Health was low enough, it would remove the enemy and record their data attached to a 'buff'. The next time you use the ring, if the buff is active, it spawns the enemy you 'caught' previously based on the data it has stored. It's actually pretty simple, and it allowed for short term storage of a specific enemy, which was very reminiscent of the game it was referencing. This effect could work essentially the same way.

I'd probably concept that effect as something explicitly 'haunted' - while I get the reference to overly tenacious truckers (and if there were an 18-wheeled Animated in the game, I would expect it to exhibit it), I think part of the resonance is lost in translation. However, an effect that allows you to dispatch enemies more quickly at the cost of facing them again later sounds interesting on some level, if a wee bit overcomplicated. Perhaps if there were something very specific it could reference to justify it, we could pull it off - otherwise it runs close to 'doing it because we can', and I try to avoid that. whee

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Ring: Salad Shooter

Shoots vegetable material at animated or group. Ground becomes slippery, disrupting their movement and aim...and yours, too, if you step in the mess.

R1-R4 have varying amounts and kinds of stuff that shoot out...cucumbers, lettuce, tomatoes, olives, chickpeas, bacon bits, fruit, tiny gnomes...

This reminds me of something. Oh well, no matter.

Vegetables don't seem inherently linked to movement or aim - indeed, if you're shooting carrots at your enemies their eyesight should improve. I'm not really sure what a better effect for a salad shooter would be, though. eek

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Ring: Big Little

You briefly double in size, HP, stamina, accuracy, everything. Then, you shrink to half your size for a much longer time with corresponding reductions in HP, stamina, etc. until ring recharges.

R1-R4 determine duration of doubling, but longer you remain at double size (up to 10 seconds), the longer it takes to recharge...10:1 for R1, 20:1 for R2, etc.

This has trouble with the 'Turtle effect' - when rings have powerful effects at a short duration in exchange for a long recharge time, they're generally simply passed over for something that it more often worth a ring slot. In this case the effect not only has a substantial cooldown, but a penalty while you wait - it's not even a wasted ring slot most of the time, it's a negative one.

This sort of effect seems to get people's attention though, so I suppose it's worth looking into - if it were me I'd probably make it Stamina-based, with the buff draining Stamina over time and eventually wearing off when it's depleted. If you want to retain the 'shrink' effect, I'd probably have it active after the first buff is removed (when you hit 0 Stamina), until the character has enough Stamina to use the ring again (say, ~20 Stamina). That way the player isn't just floundering helplessly in a shrunken state, and actually knows what needs to happen to fix the effect. There's some possible negative interaction between Stamina-based duration and Superchargers, but that can be mitigated by making the Stamina loss slightly exponential. I do like the fact that this has a visual cue and I suspect a lot of players would enjoy using it just to see themselves change size.

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Ring: Spin the Bottle

Use in a mob. Bottle appears, spins. If it stops on an animated, they join your side and fight against the other animated for a duration based on the rage level. May stop on no one or yourself / crew member; that's a miss.

Alright, so the bottle appears, spins, then stops on a random frame in the animation - the screen is divided into parts corresponding to those frames, and when it stops it determines the nearest enemy within the section it stopped on. That enemy is affected. I suppose it's somewhat feasible.

From what I hear - not that I would know redface - Spin the Bottle generally involves kissing; luckily, we already have a ring that indicates to some degree what kissing does: Sweetheart. Going on the Health-improvement theme (and trying to keep it relevant mid-combat, where the effect is most interesting), I'd probably make it a small healing effect; if you hit another player it heals both of you, otherwise just yourself. I'd avoid letting it heal enemies (those monsters simply don't understand true love meaningless displays of forced affection), but a personal healing effect that occasionally grants a two-for-one is still something. Not the simplest way to do it, but it works... sweatdrop

[raggedy grrl]

Ring: Yank

Red Kutai

This is a cute effect, but something about it just feels 'off' to me - possibly that it conceptually recognises 'frames', which is a fourth-wall concept. Yes, your character does it at least once in-game, but those exceptions are what prove the rule. I like reverse-Knockback style effects in general, and I've toyed with Lasso and Fishing Rod designs that have done just that; but pulling enemies specifically from one frame to another seems... Well, I don't know. Maybe I'm just being narrow-minded. whee

Not at all, I agree. I wasn't entirely happy with this, and I like the Fishing Rod idea much better. I think that's much more like what I had in mind (and would have some very fun animation possibilities...if you miss, you bring back a boot or an old tire, for example).

As for the fourth-wall effect, yes, I thought it would be fun to play with the notion of frames (as I do below). biggrin

Red Kutai

I should think Taunt would achieve something similar to this, and if I were trying to achieve the same, I'd probably use that method - making the enemies follow you, pied-piper-style. The effect would need to turn off line-of-sight aggression and the effect would probably break if the target was damaged along the way, but it would do much of what this is trying to. It's not as cute as 'Yank', and arguably not fit for a ring slot (and thus better as an item of some sort), but it's something.

EDIT: I'd actually be really tempted for a 'pied piper' effect to require manual input to maintain; something DDR-style, to represent musical rhythm. I've been thinking that Gaia should try a an avatar-based DDR-style minigame for a while, and if they ever did I'd be quite comfortable with this as a crossover ring. That said, that sort of effect seems like it would want to affect more than one enemy at a time. And even then, that's something like a triple-if, so it's not exactly a reliable suggestion. sweatdrop

Delightful! And I agree, a cross-over effect would've been good. Even in the short time I've been here, I've noticed the story coherence that permeated the site has been gradually falling apart. That was one of the features I found impressive here, and I'd like to see that resurrected.

Yep. Yank is a long-distance Taunt without AoE.

Ring: Aiding and Abetting

Red Kutai

I generally try to avoid 'griefer' effects, and that's essentially what this is - it allows you to make the game harder on other players. While this could certainly be used to make the game more fun for yourself and your friends by knowingly increasing the challenge, I suspect it would be used much more often to harass players who are simply trying to make it through the game. If we can find a way to allow one without the other, I'd be okay with it - but even then it seems like having the effect just because we can. redface

Good point, no need to give the people prone to in-game bullying more tools to use.

Red Kutai

One thing I would consider would be an effect that allows you to switch all the buffs/debuffs currently on you with a target enemy - I prefer to avoid allowing potentially negative 'buffs' to be used on anyone but yourself (for the same 'griefer' reasons), but something that allows you to swap them off onto enemies would open up another avenue for those effects, while also serving as an effective way to shed troublesome debuffs and changing the value of all-upside buffs. This has some potential for abuse, but it would require a high investment for such a small effect that I'm not too concerned about it.

Many times, I've targeted an animated for a buff accidentally, and I've thought it would be fun if I could buff them...with my clumsy skills, this would make the game much more 'interesting' (in real life, I hesitate over swatting mosquitoes, and I'll admit the odd pang of guilt over killing zOMG! animated...I still can't bring myself to kill the coral fluffs who worship the Eye when I solo Shallow Seas).

Ring: Pet

Red Kutai

I feel like it's an effect that should exist, but I'm not entirely sure how to go about it.

Yes. This was a holdover from thoughts on the WTF event, but doesn't really integrate with z!.

At the same time, on a higher level beyond the aww-inducing effects, I like the idea of this moral ambiguity where you can potentially befriend animated in one context, and then have to kill them in another.

Red Kutai

From a technical perspective it would probably be easier to keep it line with other priority effects, meaning it would be easiest if it afflicted the user with a 'blank' CC - as a result, it would probably be concepted as making the user an unappealing target ('Gym Socks', 'Garlic Breath', 'Nice Personality') rather than winning them over individually.

rofl

Ring: Mess Wi' Chu

In hindsight, this ring was just...dull. emotion_zzz

Ring: Road Rage

Red Kutai

Curious effect, and I'm trying to think of a way to make it really 'work'. sweatdrop

...[tenacity is] the more curious part of the effect, so that's the part I'm more interested in.

This was my personal favorite of the ideas. I was trying to find something that could actually be unnerving, if not actually scary (in a game with flamingos, fluffs, and adorably tiny kokeshi).

Anyhow, if you're interested, here's an abbreviated story with the genesis of this idea:

I grew up on a farm, and among our other critters, we had a fair number of chickens roaming around. Since I was feeding them, cleaning out the chicken houses, getting the eggs, and occasionally chasing down the occasional chicken that decided to take to the woods, I was allowed to pick out the varieties...and I went for fancy breeds; Blue Andalusians, Araucanas, Polish chickens with big feathered headpieces, and more. Some of the prettiest breeds, however, were also close to their wild roots...especially the roosters.

Most were quite nice. Chickens have very individual personalities, and can be quite intelligent. We did have one, named Pigeon, that would deliberately target my grandfather whenever my grandparents would come for their annual visit. The rooster when they were coming somehow; it wasn't just the sound of the car, because this happened after they purchased a new one.

The door would open, and Pigeon would race to the driver's side. The first ankle out the car would get hit by his spurs...WHAM!, followed by my grampa cussing. I'd come running, and the rooster would just sit down and wait for me to pick up and carry him off. His work was done here.

He never bothered anyone else.

And then, there was the white rooster, Monster. I started trumpet at around 7 or 8, and I used to go outside to practice in warmer weather.

We had several roosters roaming the yard. The c**k of the walk was a big beautiful copper red rooster, then Pigeon, followed by various other roosters (we probably had 5 or 6). Low in the pecking order was a young, sleek white rooster, a mix of leghorn and Araucana.

Normally, he just gave the evil eye, but he hated my trumpet playing more than anything else in the world.

He would hunt me down no matter where I was, and either attack me immediately (a white streak parting the green orchard grass), or, if I was in the hay loft, he would pace back and forth under the ladder, waiting for me to come down.

Sounds silly, but he was unrelenting...very large, with probably 3-4" spurs, and I was small for my age; he could put his spurs into my thighs (once, he hid in an apple tree next to the corn picker, jumped down and nailed my eyebrow...still have a faint scar!).

I grew to hate him with the same intensity he held for me, but I never had a chance; if I tried to kick him, that just meant I put leg out there as a target, and I didn't want to take a stick to him out of fear of seriously hurting or killing him.

But I did take a fiendish delight in finding places to play my trumpet where he couldn't get at me (usually lasted once or twice...he even figured out some elaborate path to get up to the hayloft; I remember climbing up the ladder and suddenly coming eye to beady red eye with him).

Anyhow...apologies for the digression, but he was sort of the model for this effect!

// Still love chickens, and I never stopped playing music; this was strictly a personal grudge between us.

Ring: Salad Shooter

Eh, this was strictly for silliness. Kinda dull. emotion_zzz

Ring: Big Little

Red Kutai

This has trouble with the 'Turtle effect...

Probably could tweak that cool-down time, but definitely not intended to take nearly as long as Turtle.

Red Kutai

...if it were me I'd probably make it Stamina-based, with the buff draining Stamina over time and eventually wearing off when it's depleted. If you want to retain the 'shrink' effect, I'd probably have it active after the first buff is removed (when you hit 0 Stamina), until the character has enough Stamina to use the ring again (say, ~20 Stamina). That way the player isn't just floundering helplessly in a shrunken state, and actually knows what needs to happen to fix the effect. There's some possible negative interaction between Stamina-based duration and Superchargers, but that can be mitigated by making the Stamina loss slightly exponential. I do like the fact that this has a visual cue and I suspect a lot of players would enjoy using it just to see themselves change size.

I like, I like! smile

Ring: Spin the Bottle

Red Kutai

Alright, so the bottle appears, spins, then stops on a random frame in the animation - the screen is divided into parts corresponding to those frames, and when it stops it determines the nearest enemy within the section it stopped on. That enemy is affected. I suppose it's somewhat feasible.

From what I hear - not that I would know redface - Spin the Bottle generally involves kissing; luckily, we already have a ring that indicates to some degree what kissing does: Sweetheart.

Could easily be a roulette-arrow kind of thing. Yes, I never played "Spin the Bottle," either, too far in the sticks. I suppose I could've done this with the horses or something, but I doubt that would've been the same. biggrin

Red Kutai

I'd avoid letting it heal enemies (those monsters simply don't understand true love meaningless displays of forced affection)

In zOMG! 2.0, we will have a much more elaborate AI. Animated will even be able to date each other (Tiny Terrors and Kokeshi, Gnomes and Anchor Bugs)...*waves hands*

Red Kutai

, but a personal healing effect that occasionally grants a two-for-one is still something. Not the simplest way to do it, but it works... sweatdrop

[The lucky Jew]

Qocks

I would like one ring to rule them all

Integ o;

[Lauren Caroll]

gataka

Red Kutai

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Ring: Fire Burst
Ranged. Deals direct damage. Deals AoE damage around the target. Higher rage ranks increase damage and affected area around the target. Higher rage ranks also start knocking enemies away from the target.
R1: Burst of fire around target
R2: More intense burst of fire
R3: Big fire explosion around target
R4: Massive explosion around the target

Explosion Ring. Pretty straightforward, nothing to get really excited about. The Knockback effect needs to exist at every Rage Rank to distinguish it from other rings (like Heavy Water Balloon), but apart from that it's solid enough. That said, if I wanted an explosion effect I'd probably look for a more exciting way to do it - timed grenades, proximity mines, hot potato, something. It's a fair ring, but I'm not convinced it does its effect justice.

Acme / Cartoon styled:
Ticking sticks o'dynamite.
Sizzlin' big black round bomb.
Keg of powder, cross and bones stamped on it.
DA NUKE... Or maybe lots a fireworks... Fireworks strapped on a nuke, problem solved :U

With all the Bang!!, BOOM!!, KABLAAAMOBAMABANG!!!!, you can think of, shroom clouds and other cartoon tropes included.

I'm still waiting for this one :U

Ring: Boom Boom

Your enemies are now officially demolition
dummies, as you throw sticks of dynamite
and explosives! Higher Rage Ranks knock
them back and create bigger explosions!
Boom! Plow! Kaboom!

R1: A stick of dynamite.
R2: A stack of dynamite sticks with a timer.
R3: 2 big black bombs.
R4: A dynamite detonator box that makes a small nuclear explosion.

How's that?