So, after seeing another yet thread about constantly finding Flashy Staves and Bolt Eruptors, I decided to take a look at how the different item types were distributed by level. And looking at the data*, even just for weapons, it's far more imbalanced than I thought. There's a massive imbalance towards swords, with RotDG alone giving them a little over 50% of the amount of staves in the base game. At the same time, the Flashy Staves and Bolt Eruptors are the only two out of three post-10 weapons added. And the third ones a craft-only crossbow. YHTNTEP doesn't help much, really only adding a few new artifacts and some bolts/throwables. So, I want to compile a list of mods that add new weapons to some of the areas that are lacking. Later, I'll probably go through and make similar list of armor with an additional separation by what "class" the armor should be, but I want to start with the weapons for now. *This list was compiled by looking through the xmls and adding them to the list manually. Due to human nature, it may not be 100% accurate, but even if it isn't, it should still represent a decent view of the current weapon proportions.
Looking at the data: Oh, crap. Ahem; so I see where I should focus things a bit, eh. (And even better, just wait 'til Daggers and Polearms messes everything up! A bunch of swords have been moved to daggers, which is fine, but a bunch of staves will become polearms, which may be troublesome.)
Just took a look at it. It's still skewed towards swords a bit, but not by much, and it looks like it should at least make Flashy Staves less prominent. There don't seem to be any crossbows, though. And relating to the base game a bit, there seems to be a lack of craftable staves that are equivalent to the crude/rough/(none)/fine iron/steel weapons in the other categories. I'd also like to know how the Sword/Dagger and Staff/Polearm split is going to work exactly. Will they stay as their old types until you have the expansion, or will they be changed in the base game as well?
Because we really ought to make the stuff we charge for ourselves. But yes, enthusiasm is appreciated -- go make mods, people. ... Now I'm going to draw some insane weapons to pad things out.
Then again, if Fax wants to add things, it's not like you can't update the second expansion pack. For a modder like him, getting more of his things in the game is kind of an ultimate prize of the whole thing, and since the second expansion pack is free, it would be a good way to circumvent the "stuff we charge for" thing. Though I do agree that it'd be better if Fax made a mod for that - if anything, it's things from already existing mods that were liked that got added to the game as the second expansion pack, and that is different from merely making a contribution.
