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About this mod
The mod improves Axii sign logic and balances it, mostly Axii puppet, so that it gives a lot better game experience.
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Improved Axii
The mod improves Axii sign (mostly alternate cast) and makes it more pleasant to use. In vanilla, Axii puppet is actually one big bug. The main improvements and fixes:- Axii puppet lasts longer to counter AI random failures in puppet quickly attacking non puppet
- Axii puppet vs. non-puppet hits and vice-versa have now variable damage resistance. Using my own invented formula for that calculations. That makes the puppet behavior more consistent and makes it more like a crowd control spell not "seek, destroy and/or die" or "fail to find a target" spell. This also fixes the problem of puppet degradation with Geralt's level increase along with longer duration.
- Added sign power dependency, but for the damage bonus. In vanilla you would have to have extreme sign power on quite low level for puppet to actually last longer, except animals for which duration scaled ok, because of much higher base value
- Certain monster will resistances have now a noticable effect
- Shorter cast will result in shortened Axii puppet duration, unless it is below certain threshold, which is influenced by the Axii suggestion skill. If you see that an enemy is about to hit you and you won't make it to the full cast, just release the button before you get hit!
This mod is integrated into Signs Overhaul, which is integrated into Grand Balance Repair.
Detailed description of changes:
- Axii alternate cast, so Axii puppet works the following way depending on the skill level:
- Level 1: Axii puppet lasts 12, 24, 15 seconds for humanoids, animals, monsters accordingly. Hitting puppet breaks puppet with 100% chance.
- Level 2: Axii puppet lasts 14, 28, 17.5 seconds for humanoids, animals, monsters accordingly. If Geralt hits the puppet, there is 35% chance it won't break.
- Level 3: Axii puppet lasts 16, 32, 20 seconds for humanoids, animals, monsters accordingly. If Geralt hits the puppet, there is 70% chance it won't break. This one is actually reduced from vanilla, where there is 100% that the puppet won't break, but that was overpowered. Now it means you can deal about two strikes to puppet on average before it breaks, which is a lot in comparison to only one in basic Axii version. - Axii puppet scales with the sign spell power. The Axii spell power, divided by 3 (vitality enemies) or 2.0 (essence enemies, so damaged with silver), is now added to the charmed enemy's attack power. The scaling on spellpower > 2.2 becomes logarithmic. Why not scaling duration? Because that doesn't make sense in constant combat mechanics during the whole game. Scaling the duration would either have negligible effect or would make the sign extremely overpowered if cast at the strongest enemy in pack. Instead attack power scaling have more evened and balanced effect.
- Axii puppet skill itself no longer affects monster attack power (the value set to 0). Instead: see point (2)
- Axii puppet stamina cost is increased by about 35%.
- If the Axii alternate cast is incomplete, the spell suffers penalties (instead of just failing like in vanilla):
- There is minimum threshold which is required for the Axii puppet to be cast at all. Below that threshold the cast is considered as failed.
- Then the Axii charm time is proportional to the casting time, up to the full cast time.
- If Geralt has Axii Suggestion skill on level 3, the failed Axii puppet cast will result in stagger.
- The threshold for puppet cast is 1.4 seconds and the total cast time is about 2.4s (vanilla). If Geralt has Axii Suggestion skill on level at least 2, then those values are lowered and the threshold is 1.1s and the total cast time about 2.3s (vanilla). - Axii puppet (will) resistance per level set to zero for monsters and NPCs. Particular creature's resistances remain as in vanilla.
- Axii base cast base effect duration is lowered from 5s to 4s. Also the scaling of duration above 120% Axii spellpower is now logarithmic. Those changes are done to balance the removed per level will resistance.
- NPC mini boss will resistance raised from 0.2 to 0.25.
- Enemy bonus level high will resistance lowered from 0.5 to 0.4. Exception is non NG+ NPC level high, which has as in vanilla 0.3 resistance.
- Axii power skill raised from 5% to 10% per level.
- Puppet vs. non-puppet strikes (and vice versa) now have significant damage resistance that depends on victim vitality or essence and victim level. The goal was to make Axii puppet work as a relative "damage redirector" from Geralt onto one of his enemies. So the damage resistance when puppet hits non puppet or vice-versa depends on: the victim vitality or essence, the victim level, which is used to approximate the Geralt's vitality and average damage resistance on that level. This way fights involving puppets work much better in extreme cases (low HP, high attack power or high HP, low attack power), scale properly with Geralt's level and maintain particular enemies characteristics (up to the certain limits) and Axii sign power dependency. The game difficulty level also influences the puppet vs. non-puppet damage, as the "relative damage redirection" should be weaker with increasing difficulty. Why introducing my own, quite complex formula was necessary at first place? Because in vanilla NPCs HP and damage scale vs. fights with Geralt not for the NPC vs. NPC fights. So Axii puppet in vanilla works terribly.
- Adjusted glyphwords Usurpation and Possession (the ones that make the Axii effect pass to another enemy when the axiied dies) effect, so that the Axii puppet is not prolonged on death. That is to counter the overall longer Axii puppet duration.
- Adjusted glyphwords Beguilement and Possession (the ones that prolongs Axii puppet when puppet hits an enemy causing damage). The duration is prolonged by 1 second instead of 2 second per hit. That is to counter the overall longer Axii puppet duration, so 1 sec is still a lot, considering how many hits can be dealt.
- Certain monster's will resistances will now have a real effect. Because the minimal duration time set to 8s in vanilla is removed. There aren't many enemies that have will resistance higher than e.g. 25% with the per level resistance increase removal. Some enemies have puppet block (so like 100% resistance) though. But that makes sense for e.g. one to one combats.
- Axii Dominate skill adjusted. No penalty on first target. The second target suffers both spell effect (base duration) and spellpower penalty: 40%, 30%, 20% (skill level 1, 2, 3).
- Lowered the chance of finisher on alive, axied enemy. Now it is equal to 100% - percentHP, so the lower HP, the higher chance.
Compatible with 1.31, Hearts of Stone, Blood and Wine and NG+.
Incompatible with standalone version of Enemy Scaling for 1.30 use as Signs Overhaul with Enemy Scaling module from Grand Balance Repair instead.
Installation (manual):
Unzip the archive into: <game_installation_folder>/Mods/
If you update, delete the previous mod folder first: <game_installation_folder>/Mods/modImprovedAxii
After installation (manual or NMM) or update, remember to use script/file merger to check for conflicts (unless you don't have other mods): File merger
After update, make sure you delete all merges of files modified by this mod and make them again.
This way you can make the mods that modify the same file work. Also you can more-less see whether those mods are compatible - if there are heavy conflicts, there is high chance they aren't.
Axii alternate cast vs. base cast bug workaround:
In vanilla there is unfortunatelly still an input bug related with Axii sing. If you have Axii suggestion skill on level at least 2 and Axii puppet then randomly, at high rate, the input is misinterpreted and Geralt casts base Axii instead of puppet. There is a workaround however that seems to not have any side effects fortunatelly:
Find every 'CastSignHold' entry in your input.settings file (located in MyDocuments/The Witcher 3). Change the 'IdleTime' value from default 0.2 to 0.01.
Recommended mods:
Grand Balance Repair - or at least Enemy Scaling module. This mod works best if enemies attack power/damage and HP are well balanced. There are many situations in vanilla when they are not - e.g. base game part human enemies on NG+ - extreme damage and very low HP. Many essence enemies all over the game - too low attack power. You can balance that out with the Enemy Scaling module. Enemy Scaling must be used together with at least whole Signs Overhaul.
Feel free to report bugs or post suggestions.
Recent updates
Version 1.06
Various Axii balancing and bugfixing.
Reduced significantly the possiblity of finisher on axied enemy. The chance is changed from fixed 75% to 100% - health percentage. So the lower the health the higher chance.
Fix for a bug where Axii puppet attack power bonus would be applied incorrectly when using Enemy Scaling custom enemies params modifiers (counts for SignsOverhaul and GrandBalanceRepair).
Axii balancing - sharpened damage normalization function for levels > 50.
Fixed a small bug with Axii puppet general attack power scaling - the threshold from which logarithmic scaling starts should be lower.