Post date: Jan 12, 2018 9:16:38 AM
After some delay, I finally got Sakuya Izayoi done!
Initially, I'd had some good ideas for her, but after having a lot of trouble doing Youmu and Reisen, I ended up being overly cautious on this one.
(Speaking of Reisen, I also modified her a bit so that she's more streamlined, but I'll talk about her later on)
Sakuya basically puts out lots and lots of attacks. On the opening round, she can put out upwards of 300 damage on average if all of her attacks hit, thanks to the extra turns granted by "Time Stop", "Celerity" and "Sakuya's World", allowing her to get up to 8 turns on the first round. After that, it drops back down to 3 or 4, depending on how she uses her Legendary Actions. She'll either blitz unprepared characters, or get locked down and taken out quickly. She's a glass cannon, in a way. She's likely to get at least some damage off if she decides to use her initiative 26 turn to activate Time Stop, allowing her to get an alpha strike of 15 attacks.
I'm not sure whether to give her "Legendary Resistance". She's not really a final boss type of character, and I feel like without it, it can come down to whether she passes a Hold Person save on the first turn or not, due to her low HP and high damage. On the other hand, she might be a little too strong with it, since if she has it, she can get several turns of attacks off, basically forcing her opponents to burst her down as fast as possible before she kills them.
It might actually be more interesting to force the casters to take damage spells, rather than Hold Person all the time.
On the changes to Reisen Udongein Inaba.
Initially, I tried to cram in too much of her features into one character; her wave-bending powers, her military-style combat, and the drugs provided by Eirin. However, that made her too difficult to do, so I took out the drugs and moved them to the "Items" section; this cleared up Reisen's page, as well as allowing creatures other than Reisen to have access to them when needed. Items can be equipped to creatures anyway, like having a goblin pick up a crossbow, or a +2 sword.
I also ended up taking out her psychic powers, outside of "Discarder", and simplified the rest into "Wave Manipulation" or removed them. As a result, her combat style ended up revolving around being versatile; she's got a tool for just about any job. Except for dealing with monks, though monks can only really be dealt with through brute force anyway, and she does pack some firepower. She's got a decent ranged attack, and can suppress an enemy in close combat if she needs to. She's also got good maneuverability, and her "Wave Manipulation" can also be used to keep certain individuals out of the way while she deals with her first target.
Anyway, I'm getting the hang of these midrange CR characters. The aim with each one is to make it feel like one is playing the character when they show up. I'm considering adding a sub-page for each character that details their full abilities, while having the main ones for their combat powers, since I don't want to clutter up the combat page with non-combat abilities when they're not needed. This would certainly make characters like Yukari and Cirno much easier to do; characters who typically use a weaker version of the same power during a fight. I don't want to have Cirno's power to freeze someone on the combat page if it's a skill she wouldn't use on an opponent during a fight, but is still an application of her ability.
Well, if I do decide to add them, they'll turn up.