Steam News31 July 202621d ago

Development Log #24 - Insanity Rework

Hello Survivors. Mauroth's power bleeds out of the places he still holds, into the walls, into the air, into anyone who stays too long. This is what that presence does to the body, and what it takes to walk out alive.

In this update3

Full notes

Full Lost Isle update

Read the full published notes in a cleaner layout. The original post stays linked below.

Repeated intro

Hello Survivors.

What changed

0 fixes0 additions22 changes0 removals

Balance

changedLosing Your MindInsanity is a slow bleed that scales with how compromised you are. When it's above zero, you lose HP. As long as you are exposed it doesn't matter whether you're inside a zone or halfway across the Isle. Armor doesn't stop it. Magic resist doesn't either. It's true damage.

changedLosing Your MindThe damage

changedLosing Your MindHP lost per second = 0.05 × current insanity.

changedLosing Your Mind10 insanity: 0.5 HP/sec (30 HP/min)

changedLosing Your Mind25 insanity: 1.25 HP/sec (75 HP/min)

changedLosing Your Mind50 insanity: 2.5 HP/sec (150 HP/min)

Lost Isle changes

changedInsanity is a slow bleed that scales with how compromised you are. When it's above zero, you lose HP. As long as you are exposed it doesn't matter whether you're inside a zone or halfway across the Isle. Armor doesn't stop it. Magic resist doesn't either. It's true damage.

changedThe damage

changedHP lost per second = 0.05 × current insanity.

changed10 insanity: 0.5 HP/sec (30 HP/min)

changed25 insanity: 1.25 HP/sec (75 HP/min)

Mauroth's power bleeds out of the places he still holds, into the walls, into the air, into anyone who stays too long. This is what that presence does to the body, and what it takes to walk out alive.

Losing Your Mind

Insanity is a slow bleed that scales with how compromised you are. When it's above zero, you lose HP. As long as you are exposed it doesn't matter whether you're inside a zone or halfway across the Isle. Armor doesn't stop it. Magic resist doesn't either. It's true damage.

The damage

HP lost per second = 0.05 × current insanity.

10 insanity: 0.5 HP/sec (30 HP/min)
25 insanity: 1.25 HP/sec (75 HP/min)
50 insanity: 2.5 HP/sec (150 HP/min)
100 insanity: 5 HP/sec (300 HP/min)

How it builds

Insanity ticks up every second while you're standing inside a corrupted zone. Each zone has a base rate and a resist threshold.

Low Zone 0.25/sec
Mid Zone 2/sec
High Zone gain 3/sec
Extreme Zone gain 5/sec

Partial resist reduces the gain, but there's a floor. You always take at least 15% of the base rate until you cross the threshold. Cross it, and the direction flips. Standing inside the zone actually clears your insanity at 0.5/sec.

An Extreme zone, for example:

0 resist: gaining 5.0 insanity/sec
23 resist: 2.5 insanity/sec
39 resist: 0.75 insanity/sec (the 85% floor)
46 resist: losing -0.5 insanity/sec, you're clearing it

The same resist number is worth wildly different amounts by zone. 15 resist is near-total mitigation in a Mid zone. It's about half that in a High one.

Two things to know:

Some pockets are unmitigable. They force at least +0.15/sec regardless of your resist.
The sanity tier bonus (gained from the main story quest) shifts the threshold you're measured against down one tier. This means with 31 resist you fully shrug off an Extreme zone.

Leaving isn't safe

Once you leave, insanity decays at 0.5/sec. You keep bleeding the whole way down. Because damage scales with insanity, the total is quadratic.

Total HP lost after leaving = 0.05 × (insanity when you left)².

Exit at 10: 20 seconds to clear, 5 HP lost
Exit at 20: 40 seconds, 20 HP lost
Exit at 30: 60 seconds, 45 HP lost
Exit at 50: 100 seconds, 125 HP lost
Exit at 100: 200 seconds, 500 HP lost

So even if you leave early, the bill will follow you out.

Building Resistance

There are five tiers of sanity resistance. Every armor piece on the Isle carries some amount of it. What you can walk into depends on what you're wearing.