Suggestion:
Nerf Rage of Sparta as follows:
- Disable ammo regeneration while ANY shield is in place.
- Increase ammo regeneration speed (i.e., such a base Rage of Sparta with no other blueprints has the same maximum shield time per time period)
I would also suggest reducing the ammo count to 2 and/or dropping the buff time by 25%.
Why:
Currently, it's very easy to get blueprints such that a player is always able to refresh Rage of Sparta on first shield blink (i.e., well before the shield runs out). For example, by combining Rage of Sparta with Quick Breath. Similarly, Other shield buffs (Vitamin D, Blessings from the Bronze House) make it very likely that a player can complete a stage without ever letting their shield vanish.
In contrast to the perpetual spear generator, this combo is not particularly fun, since it basically means the player is immune to all damage.
Alternative approach, which is perhaps complicated enough to deserve a custom mode rather than a pick-up:
After picking up Rage of Sparta, immunity (regardless of source) behaves as follows:
- Being hit sets the shield timeout to 0.25s (unless the timeout is already below 0.25s).
- Being hit with a shield turns the shield red.
- If the player attacks while the shield is red, the shield buff immediately ends.
- When a red shield ends (either due to timeout or due to attacking), the player is temporarily buffed with lower melee cooldown, higher attack, and increased defense. The attack scales logarithmically based on how much damage the player blocked with the shield. I'll note that this scaling is a bit of a risk-reward payoff, since typically using the shield to soak a ton of damage runs the risk that some of the damage will be soaked without the shield.
- Using the rage of sparta attack just gives the player a shield (which behaves as described above.
Obviously I've provided way too much detail for a proper item description. So I'd use a description more like this:
"Replaces ranged attack with temporary invincibility. Player cannot attack during damage immunity, but blocking switches immunity to a massive buff.
Below is a screenshot of my Rage of Sparta setup.
