NL QoL: Increase Shadow Star's Duration Back to 3 Minutes

Preface: Apologies if this has already been suggested, but I did a search and couldn't find anything on this topic. I know some people are going to roll their eyes at a Night Lord asking for an easier time, but I'd love to discuss the impacts of this kind of change, and buff duration alignment in general.

Edit: It’s been clear that a lot of people feel this is unnecessary. Thanks for everyone’s feedback!

Suggestion:
I am proposing a quality of life change to Shadow Star's duration from 2 minutes to 3 minutes. This would align the durations of Night Lords' three attack buff abilities. In addition, to address the impacts to meso sinkage as a result of the suggestion, I am also proposing a change to
1) The amount of stars Shadow Star consumes on cast, and
2) The max capacity of certain star sets.

Alternatively, instead of changing Shadow Star’s cost of stars and max capacity, a change to the recharge cost of popular 4th job star sets could achieve similar results. However, this would affect 1st to 3rd job players using these sets.


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Context:
Shadow Star has historically been a 2 minute buff in ML as well as GMS. After the Shadow Star bug was fixed in the Anniversary 2021 patch, its duration was increased to 3 minutes to "accommodate players and their newly found frustrations regarding star usage". The duration was then reverted to 2 minutes in the Anniversary/Summer 2022 patch, because of star demand and prices settling, as well as the meso sinkage being imbalanced for Night Lords compared to other ammo recharging classes.

Therefore, this QoL suggestion accomodates for meso sinkage.

Proposal:
Shadow Star duration increased from 120 seconds to 180 seconds.
Shadow Star star cost increased from 200 stars to 300 stars.
Ilbi Throwing-Star and Balanced Fury maximum capacity per slot increased from 800 to 1000 stars.
Magic Throwing Knife maximum capacity per slot increased from 1200 to 1300 stars.

Alternative Proposal:
Shadow Star duration increased from 120 seconds to 180 seconds.
Ilbi Throwing-Star, Balanced Fury, and Magic Throwing Knife recharge costs increased by 50%

Explanation:
The proposed changes are intended to better align buff durations, while minimally impacting the economic impacts associated. The max capacity change of popular star sets like Ilbis, Furies, and MTKs also helps prevent having awkward amounts leftover.

Since an increase in Shadow Star duration results in fewer star recharges needed, the overall ammo usage cost of a Night Lord will be affected as well. Thus, the proposed increase in Shadow Star star cost aims to preserve the current star usage of 100 stars per minute, removing any impact to star recharge meso sinkage.

Ilbis and Furies have a max capacity of 800 in a set, up to 1000 with Claw Mastery maxed. The proposed changes to Shadow Star star cost would leave these sets with an excess of 100 stars after three uses of the skill. This isn't a problem if a player has multiple recharged sets in their inventory, but the last set will always have 100 leftover. Increasing their max capacity to 1200 with Claw Mastery would allow for four uses of the skill per set and 0 leftover in the last set. Similarly, increasing MTK to 1500 with Claw Mastery would allow for five uses of the skill per set and 0 leftover as well.

The aforementioned alternative proposal is to increase the recharge cost of Ilbis, Furies, and MTKs by 50% to compensate for 3 minutes of Shadow Star consuming 200 stars only. This would achieve similar results meso sinkage wise, but only towards 4th job Night Lords.

Impact:
The proposed changes would:
1) Allow Shadow Star, Claw Booster, and Shadow Partner to be casted together every 3 minutes, and
2) Slightly lengthen the period between each recharge session.

The first impact would allow for the three skills to be put together in a macro without wasting an extra rock every 6 minutes (Shadow partner every 2 mins vs 3 mins). It would also be more clear when Shadow Star has run out, since all three skills will start flashing together (the most noticable impact).

The second impact would increase each set's usage duration by 7 to 20%.

It is also worth nothing that since the cost of stars per cast is increasing proportionately to the duration increase, the actual meso cost per minute of Shadow Star usage on any given throwing star set is not affected. Only the time before a needed recharge is affected. This addresses the meso sink issue, which was the main reason the duration was reverted back to 2 minutes in 2022.

Currently:
Ilbi and Fury: 10 min per set, 68k mesos to recharge per set, 6.8k mesos per minute
MTK: 14 min per set, 117.6k mesos to recharge per set, 8.4k mesos per minute
Proposed:
Ilbi and Fury: 12 min per set (+20%) 81.6k mesos to recharge per set, 6.8k mesos per minute
MTK: 15 min per set (+7%), 126k mesos to recharge per set, 8.4k mesos per minute

At just 1-2 minutes per set, the recharging impacts are very minimal. Furthermore, players tend to recharge before all sets have been depleted anyways. So while they have a little more time before a recharge is needed, nothing changes much for a player recharging after every few bosses.

The adjustment to star recharge costs are aimed towards Night Lords, but Rogues, Assassins, and Hermits could be affected by increased costs if they use these sets without the benefit of Shadow Star. It is not a perfect alternative, but it removes the effects of a buff to Night Lords’ maximum star count.

Potential arguments against proposed changes:

• Night Lords already have some of the easiest gameplay!

I understand that Night Lords already have a very comfortable playstyle compared to other classes, but I think aligning buff durations where it can be done for other classes can be explored as well.

I'd like to reiterate that Night Lord game play will always be too easy and unengaging due to absurd avoidability. In my opinion, that doesn't mean inconveniences should be disregarded. It wouldn't make sense to worsen Night Lord's QoL because they have it so "easy". So why wouldn't it make sense to improve it?

• Buff uptime management is part of what make a good player skilled!

This a valid point but a weak one in my opinion. While it may be true that buff management is an important part of performance, I don't believe it contributes to the fun of the gameplay. Would the game be more fun if every single buff skill had a different duration? I would argue that it would just be an example of artificial difficulty. Satisfying fun should be derived from the gameplay itself of each monster/boss, not navigating through inconveniences.

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Conclusion:
The reverting of Shadow Star duration from 3 minute to 2 minute in 2022 reintroduced an unnecessary inconvenience to the QoL of Night Lords in response to the meso sinkage issue. The proposed changes relieve these inconveniences while preserving the original intent of 2022 update. The resulting impacts are quite minimal, while the QoL of impacts of buff duration alignment would be very beneficial.

I would love to hear people's thoughts on the topic and constructive feedback for my proposal! Feel free to disagree, but please let me know why and what changes you'd like to see that would change your opinion. Thanks for reading!