So, point by point:
The South:
The south has the most glaring issues to me (probably because I've been playing it the most for whatever reason).
1) From a flavour standpoint, moving Hex ruins to being a second directional dungeon, and Ick Swamp to where it is never made sense to me. I'm sure it wasn't done for flavour reasons, and I know that the current Ick is more difficult than Hex ruins, but there's something that breaks my suspension of disbilief in the following landscape progression: "Light Marsh - Ruined City - MOAR MARSH - Ruined city again". A much more logical, from the flavour perspective progression would be "Light Marsh - Heavy Marsh - Ruined City - split between Really Ruined City and Ruined City Heart". Or the one I suggest below.
2) Second issue ties in with the game mechanics reasons which probably mandated the unlogical flavour progression in the first place. Namely Ick Swamp is a really wrong dungeon to be scumming for subdungeons in, especially as one of those is one which unlocks EM. Would be silly in a plant heavy level, especially with incremental costs on clearance. However, South has a really, really annoying "mandatory subdungeon" cascade which made me puzzled just about every time I started a new profile. Doubly so because a part of it is only present in the south, apart from other regions.
In the South we have:
- TT subdungeon
- EM subdungeon
- Goblin Subdungeon
- Potential for Pactmaker Subdungeon (which has always annoyed me and robably could do with a change anyway)
- Potential for Crusader Subdungeon, and probably any other "can spawn anywhere" story subdungeons (if there are any)
and the very flavourfull but probably endlessly noob puzzling:
- Naga challenge subdungeon
Just about any of these is either/useless or actually detrimental to any effort people are putting into beating the level where they spawn. And you HAVE to find the Naga Challenge Subdungeon to unlock further progress in the south (which is something that only happens there and nowhere else, and is not really advertized anywhere).
All of this ties in to the south being very frustrating, and warrants repeated Tinker Scumming runs at some point just so you can concentrate on playing the actual game, and I'm also sure the dev's are aware of all this.
MY SUGGESTIONS:
1) Swap Ick Swamp and Slime Pits (and tweak/rework slime pits). Slime pit's can be scaled down in difficulty easier than Ick, and this way you can remove Ick from the path to VICIOUS, and have a sensible flavour story of a journey to the heart of a ruined city, with a sidetrack int the deep jungle for whatever reason. Having Slime pits as an "assasin dungeon" should work fine considering assasins should have no problems with fat monsters because of swift hands, and fat bosses because of in built poison. And you'd remove Ick Swamp from the "mandatory subdungeon heavy" southern progress path.
2) Lighten the subdungeon load in the south by either removing, or having the "Naga Challenge" subdungeon spawn in addition to any other subdungeons in Hex or Ick/Slime/Whatever untill the player triggers it once, to avoid the progress being halted because you have to enter a subdungeon. I like the flavour of the whole thing
Ok, so, that's about it for the South, and I hope some of this gets addressed eventualy. No hurry, and I bet you guys have been discussing it.
The North
I don't really have too many thoughts on the north. Since the tileset's change, more of it makes sense from a flavour standpoint. I miss the old Eebliss dungeon (the flavour was cool and the desertification effect was properly annying), or rather, I'm not really feeling the crumbling in the crumbling subdungeon (either doesn't affect it enough, or there's somethign about my playstyle or whatever). I may have played the shifting passages about once or twice, and I had my issuses with the DL - which, again, I sort of played for the avater's symbol really.
The lack of a "sidetrack harder than hard" subdungeon also breaks the symetry a bit, but it's been explained that Gaan'Telet was at some point ment to be part of the north. I wouldn't mind a level like the old Eebliss "desertification" one being added as that "sidetrack" dungeon at some point, to round stuff up nicely. It would be a sensible place to find the Battlemage Ring, seeing as the north is all about magic.
The East
Not my favourite playground, and I don't see much need for the Vicious Halls of Steel. I also don't like the "traps you in" form of Dracul's subdungeon (I actually purposfully avoided reporting a bug where you could exit it immidiately if you didnt move, when doing the minimalist unlock thing). Berserker Camp makes little sense as a sidetrack dungeon, but that could be rectified by adding a small number of berserkers to creeplight ruins, or whatever.
Apart from that, forzen undead plague lands is pretty cool, and I personally don't have too many gripes with any of it. The Namtar finale is just perfect although descending into the Halls of Steel just to "emerge into the icy wastes, again, breaks suspension of disbilief. I know that the monster layout of the Namtar's lair is "snow monsters", but from a flavour standpoint, I would feel a lot better if once you descend after the Creeplight ruins, you kept descending. Especially with the finale being the way it is.
The West
Not much to say here, really. Beastlands, druids and all that. The only gripe from the flavour perspective is that the quest rewards are not what a west focused player is really looking to find. I think i've played it the least of all, but the whole "mining" thing makes good use out of Binlor while interrupting the "lush forest" theme, and sort of breaks flavour in half. It wouldn't be so glaring if Dragon Isles weren't Isles but Peaks of the Mountain you were climbing, and changing the tileset there would go a long way to suggesting to players just how claustrophobic that level really is. And be the mirror oposite of the descent into Hell in the East.
But then again the "forest" tileset is sunny and underused, so, I don't know how to balance the two.
Also, Goblins are sort of "Fighter" race these days, rather than thief, and their mines are in the west so finding goblins there, with their "gold cost" would fit from the flavour perspective, and lessen the load of "unlock" subdungeons in the south.
Wether to move Orcs South (their cost is a status debuff which fits in with all the status debuffers south, they could be out looking for trophies, tea and a challenge, great-white-hunter style), North (just because) or not at all is another thing. Just throwing it out there.
Well, there's all that then. I'd love to hear whatever anyone thinks about any of that, any thoughts about the directions I'm not too familiar with, other usefull (or more usefull) veteran observations, and dev explanations about things
