The tale of ye old brokene CYDSTEPP. Facultative.
Posted: Thu Jan 31, 2013 8:51 am
Ok, so, having got on some peoples nerves with all the talk about things that might be intended noob-tube features, I'd like to take a moment to retell the story of CYDSTEPP for the benefit of anyone who cares to read a textwall.
Hear ye, hear ye:
So, as it happens, sometimes earlier in the beta the devs seem to have decided to test out the conversion mechanic, and how far can they take it. The didn't tell us, ofc, but they simply made the CP ammounts on "low-hanging fruit" a bit too good across the board to entice us to try it out and see what we'd do, and what can be done if given copious ammounts of CP readily available. To give you an idea, old Troll Heart used to give 1 HP per level, but had a lower gold price and gave out a whooping 75 CP (If I remember correctly). The old sensation stone gave out 225 CP, more if you combined it with the old alchemist seal which gave you bonus conversion. The sensation stone was an auto-beeline, and coupled with the Dragonshield, seemed almost mandatory to be able to even begging grappling with ye olde power curve.
But it took us ages to even notice the CP goodnes laying about, along with many other things, because the average pro, vet or layabout was going around destroying everything with Tri-Sword wielding CYDSTEPP Rogues. Now, this strat involved scumming, but that seemed ok - most people were taking it for granted as what you're supposed to do in the endgame. It wasn't necessarily the most powerful strat, but it was so dependable if you could scum for CYDSTEP, that, if I remember correctly, intentionaly overbuffed features were not even geting noticed.
Case in point - the first Gaan'Telet, the one before the one before now, was doable with every class. Yes, even the old alpha fighter, but it wasn't doable with the CYDSTEPP Rogue. So it was considered undoable, before one guy, Subanark, simply picked up the old Monk, who people thought of as in need of buffs, and beat it with him. Then it turned out that if you stack enough resists you could beat it with anything - even the Rogue. It took removing the repeatable functionality of CYDSTEPP, and then reworking Drac to stop people from forcing the functionality back into the glyph, for people to venture out of their comfort zone and discover what is actually the game of Desktop Dungeons.
It's a lot like Plato's story of the cave (google it in case you're not familiar, philosophy's your friend) - the world outside turned out to contain many an abusable feature, so much stuff that needed attention and so many things and challenges to discover that parting with that strat was very much worth it. Without the Rogue setting the standard many classes were adjusted and the disparity between them is lower than ever. With the proper understanding of how much such an overpowering strat affected the expirience, Monks could be brought down to everyone else's level (they were stronger than Rogues all along). Vicious dungeons and tricky challenges were adjusted in difficulty to be more doable outside of broken shennanigans and don't force you to cheeze nearly as much as they used to.
A bunch of terminology was discovered too - and gods were understood a great deal better by the players. Regen fighting got some early game love, and Sensation stone isn't hogging too many locker slots. People had a reason to even look at Dodge and Reflex potions, complain about unclear tooltips, and once those were cleared up discover the CYDSTEPPLESS rogue and figure out just how crazy that guy is on his own. Curse was invented, and it works as a res stacking detterent much better than everything before it.
But none of that could happen before the CYDSTEPP took a hit, because too powerful features lead to developing a habit and shaping the outlook of players. And at one point in the development, what it took to see further than Trilings and CYDSTEP ment not unlocking the Warlord on purpose, just so the Trisword and the CYDSTEP don't obscure your vision of everything else - just to see if there is indeed anything else out there.
Anywho - this expirience, of seeing a nerf do so much good for the game, is what assures me that at least some of the things in the game could take them like bosses and not hurt but enrich the overall experience.
Hear ye, hear ye:
So, as it happens, sometimes earlier in the beta the devs seem to have decided to test out the conversion mechanic, and how far can they take it. The didn't tell us, ofc, but they simply made the CP ammounts on "low-hanging fruit" a bit too good across the board to entice us to try it out and see what we'd do, and what can be done if given copious ammounts of CP readily available. To give you an idea, old Troll Heart used to give 1 HP per level, but had a lower gold price and gave out a whooping 75 CP (If I remember correctly). The old sensation stone gave out 225 CP, more if you combined it with the old alchemist seal which gave you bonus conversion. The sensation stone was an auto-beeline, and coupled with the Dragonshield, seemed almost mandatory to be able to even begging grappling with ye olde power curve.
But it took us ages to even notice the CP goodnes laying about, along with many other things, because the average pro, vet or layabout was going around destroying everything with Tri-Sword wielding CYDSTEPP Rogues. Now, this strat involved scumming, but that seemed ok - most people were taking it for granted as what you're supposed to do in the endgame. It wasn't necessarily the most powerful strat, but it was so dependable if you could scum for CYDSTEP, that, if I remember correctly, intentionaly overbuffed features were not even geting noticed.
Case in point - the first Gaan'Telet, the one before the one before now, was doable with every class. Yes, even the old alpha fighter, but it wasn't doable with the CYDSTEPP Rogue. So it was considered undoable, before one guy, Subanark, simply picked up the old Monk, who people thought of as in need of buffs, and beat it with him. Then it turned out that if you stack enough resists you could beat it with anything - even the Rogue. It took removing the repeatable functionality of CYDSTEPP, and then reworking Drac to stop people from forcing the functionality back into the glyph, for people to venture out of their comfort zone and discover what is actually the game of Desktop Dungeons.
It's a lot like Plato's story of the cave (google it in case you're not familiar, philosophy's your friend) - the world outside turned out to contain many an abusable feature, so much stuff that needed attention and so many things and challenges to discover that parting with that strat was very much worth it. Without the Rogue setting the standard many classes were adjusted and the disparity between them is lower than ever. With the proper understanding of how much such an overpowering strat affected the expirience, Monks could be brought down to everyone else's level (they were stronger than Rogues all along). Vicious dungeons and tricky challenges were adjusted in difficulty to be more doable outside of broken shennanigans and don't force you to cheeze nearly as much as they used to.
A bunch of terminology was discovered too - and gods were understood a great deal better by the players. Regen fighting got some early game love, and Sensation stone isn't hogging too many locker slots. People had a reason to even look at Dodge and Reflex potions, complain about unclear tooltips, and once those were cleared up discover the CYDSTEPPLESS rogue and figure out just how crazy that guy is on his own. Curse was invented, and it works as a res stacking detterent much better than everything before it.
But none of that could happen before the CYDSTEPP took a hit, because too powerful features lead to developing a habit and shaping the outlook of players. And at one point in the development, what it took to see further than Trilings and CYDSTEP ment not unlocking the Warlord on purpose, just so the Trisword and the CYDSTEP don't obscure your vision of everything else - just to see if there is indeed anything else out there.
Anywho - this expirience, of seeing a nerf do so much good for the game, is what assures me that at least some of the things in the game could take them like bosses and not hurt but enrich the overall experience.