Gods and Queens – Bullet Hell Mod
Gods and Queens is a mod that brings new bullet hell mechanics into the game with over 1000+ new projectile references added to the game and overhauled bosses. 13 Months and 600+ hours of work has brought 47 Weapon Skill overhauls, 27 Talisman changes, all Demigods, Gods, most bosses, Sorceries, and Incantations to have been overhauled.
Gods and Queens is a mod that brings new bullet hell mechanics into the game with over 1000+ new projectile references added to the game. With 13 Months and 600+ hours of work has brought 47 Weapon Skill overhauls, 27 Talisman changes, all Demigods, Gods, and most bosses overhauled. Additionally, nearly all the Sorceries and Incantations were overhauled excluding self-buffs. The Sorceries and Incantations changes feature functional differences between charged and non-charged states of spells. Unlike other overhauls, the mod changes are not minor, as this mod changes the whole balance of the game through enemy overhauls and player weapon/spell changes. Be wary Tarnished, thou shall not underestimate this challenge…
Major New Mechanics
This mod also adds new mechanics into the game such as Frenzied Flame debuff, which always applies from any Frenzied Flame source. It provides a 20% physics damage buff and a 10% fire damage buff with a frenzied flame DoT effect for several seconds. Some status effects have received nerfs: Bleed and Frost to their retrospective % hp damage as they do about 7.5% per proc now. Blight effects from the player now apply Blight Doom Stacks (aka Blighted Flames), which does 1 true damage per stack in a set interval (varies on blight source). These stacks do not go away and can indefinitely stack, but these are very difficult to get high numbers with, especially in NG+1 and beyond. Death Lightning, Fia’s Mist, Eclipse Shotel, and Prince of Death’s Cyst apply Blight Doom Stacks. All bosses and some open-world mini-boss enemies without a boss bar receive enrage at 50% HP. This envelope the boss in a black flame effect boosting their damage, damage resistance, and break recovery.
The most important change is the bullet hell mechanics. All demigods will teach you set patterns that will have different iterations throughout the game. You may eventually find your effort will pay off when fighting Radagon or Melina…
It is recommended to start a completely new character, and understand melee may suffer early on.
Difficulty Scaling Changes
The difficulty of the game overall has increased. NG+0 now has NG+1 scaling, and a slightly lower soul rate. That being said, all proceeding playthroughs get significantly harder. NG+7 is 558% increased HP and Stamina. Along with more significant buffs to status resistance and defense. You will also find some normal enemies with new attacks, that perhaps could even be seen as annoying.
Overhauls for Players
Bows, Crossbows, Talismans, Sorceries, Incantations, and Weapon Skills all have been overhauled. Bows and Crossbows have received a rework. Crossbows now have scaling, and values on bows and great bows have been greatly increased. Additionally, reinforcement costs and values of unique weapons have been increased. Spirit summons have also received some major changes. Including some spawn number changes and scaling HP changes. You will also find more bolts and arrows through vendors, with infinite stocks. As I personally found crafting most of the ammunition was problematic, especially now in a mod with mass difficulty adjustments.
Perfumer overhaul is bound to happen, you may find some changes such as the talisman. However, the overhaul for this section isn’t fully implemented. I’m currently testing multiple versions of the idea.
Extra Information
You can find change notes for Talisman and Weapon Skills included in the mod folder. It’s formatted in Excel sheets that can be converted for google sheets.
This is V1 of the mod release and is bound to have some issues including potential balance issues and exploits. These will be patched out over time with community feedback. I am one person and cannot balance all this on my own without community feedback. Given how much was changed and added into this mod, it is very difficult to have one person make this truly balanced.
Potential Bugs
Notable bugs that may exist and I am working on fixing (some of these I have to ask some mod community members about):
-Radagon has a rare attack slam that can spawn too many shockwaves (thus lagging the game). This may be fixed! Still testing
-Hoar Loux has a rare crash (should be patched, but I put this here in case it happens, testing is in progress)
-Perfumer Recipes could be bugged (do not cheat them with the cheat engine).
-Hit instances can be a little too much, this is a balance issue being worked on.
-Radahn fight post meteor phase can cause invisible projectiles to spawn (this may also be fixed on release, but testing is still required).
-Renalla, Rykar, and Godfrey briefly may cause players not to able to cast anything with projectiles (including bows) due to engine limitations. This shouldn’t happen anymore, but it could, as I continue testing and investigating this issue. Check the limitation section below for a full explanation as to why this happens.
Limitations
All projectile changes have bullet limit IDs added to the game. Each entity independently has its own limits. That being said, this exists to prevent crashes and performance issues and does make some fights easier. However, it’s a necessary optimization and is used to prevent the effect limit from being reached. In some rare cases (most of these I have patched out), you will find projectiles you cast won’t spawn temporarily in certain boss fights after high-intensity attacks due to engine limitations on effects.
Roadmap
-High Priority:
-More balance adjustments (these should roll out every other mod patch).
-Add more weapon skill overhauls (This is in current works, should rework nearly all weapon skills by the end)
-Some base stat for some non-bow weapons. Currently Flowing Sword is next on that list.
-Just updated the mod from 1.7 to 1.9 regulation file (the merge may have caused issues), next few weeks will roll out small balance changes, weapon skill additions, and investigation any issues caused by the merge.
-Low Priority:
-Potential rework for Rykard and Renalla Overhaul (both these bosses when in development have received 3 complete overhauls, and I’m still not sure if I’m happy with the state of their overhauled boss fights, the current version is fine…but could be better).
-Special FX additions and optimizations
-DLC Support (whenever that comes)
-New spells with set locations or vendors.
-NG+ Only effects for bosses, unique for each boss.
Q&A
-Q: Can I play this online?
-A: NO YOU WILL GET BANNED
-Q: Will this mod impact my performance?
-A: Yes, and I highly recommend you lower effect quality quite a bit when playing this mod.
-Q: Why can’t the spells or bosses be on their own mod instead of combined?
-A: This is intended to be a full overhaul of the game. The spell changes are necessary.
-Q: Does this work with Seamless Coop
-A: More than likely it will not work. It’s not recommended to play in Coop, but this can be tested if you are curious. Some spells or bosses may suffer issues, however.
-Q: Does this work with randomizers
-A: Yes, as there are no map changes or item placement positions have been changed! I have not tested this yet, but it should be fine if you use the merge setting in the randomizer menu. Let me know if there are any issues!
-Q: Are all bosses possible?
-A: Yes, during play testing on multiple characters, I was able to defeat all bosses regimentally. This mod takes a clear understanding of both the Vanilla boss moves and the new triggers added.
Installation
Place the regulation file in the mods folder of mod engine 2. This mod can technically work with any other form of mod engine, as long as regulation files can be loaded.
If you have complaints or suggestions please leave a comment regarding your thoughts. Any mentions of exploitable builds should mention everything you’re using including talismans, and how you achieved the exploit, thus I can thoroughly investigate these matters.
