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QCF Design Community • View topic - Items, Items, and more Items!


Items, Items, and more Items!

All things Desktop Dungeons

Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Darvin on Fri Jan 18, 2013 7:08 pm

In the spirit of examining everything in the game (down to the kitchen sink) it's time to discuss items.

In order to keep this concise, I've edited out my brief blurbs about items that I really don't have any issues with. Feel free to bring them up if you have something to add. I won't be discussing the venom dagger since poison is in flux. Subdungeon items will also be skimmed over here; subdungeons are another discussion in and of themselves.


Blacksmith Items

Sword - I've always disliked that it's basically balanced around a bloated gold cost to synergize with the transmutation seal. It really should stand up on its own merits... which are basically those of an oversized spoon.

Shield - same problem, but to a much lesser extent, than the sword.

Slayer Wand - how many people use this anymore? Ever since it got changed to cap out its XP bonus, I really haven't seen much purpose to it outside of Dragon Isles. Everywhere else it's just not worth lugging around a large item.

Perseverance Badge - This item is just plain better than the other blacksmith items. Its effect is awesome (for orcs it can exceed the power of the sword as early as level 1!) and it's a small item. It's not so powerful as to completely overshadow the others, but I probably prep it about twice as often as every other blacksmith item combined.

Really Big Sword - while functional, it's a real pain to lug around and its niche applicability means it's rarely a consideration. It really needs something on the side. At very minimum make player slow beat monster slow so it doesn't effectively disable the WEYTWUT glyph...


Basic Items

Spoon - 1 gold for 1 base attack is a superb deal, but the shop density is horrific. I realize it's much too late to revisit the issue of shop density, but it still irks me that something so inconsequential (even if it is exceedingly well priced) is in my shop pool, potentially keeping out other cool things.

Tower Shield - as with all resist items, I dislike that it's so mediocre for your standard 0-resist character but can be game-changing for someone already resist stacking. It'd be nice if there was some way to make it a bit more appealing to 0%-ers without pushing it overboard for stackers, but it's probably too late for that kind of thing.

Troll Heart - a bit too expensive and a bit too dependent on finding it at a lower level. Not a deal-breaker, but a bit niche for my tastes unless I'm a rogue.


Quest Items

Piercing Wand - a much more interesting item now that it can chip away resistances of any kind, but still a tad overspecialized. It would be nice if it had slightly better conversion value.

Rock Heart - you know, this item is great if you're using knockback attack or PISORF as part of a melee attack chain, but I just never seem to be able to find it when I'm doing that sort of thing. I think that's more an issue of the limited availability of wall-breaking in the game. At least it's got good conversion value.

Crystal Ball - both overpowered and underpowered at the same time. As an item you pick up in a shop, it's just too expensive to activate. Between its 15 GP cost at 5 GP cost per activation, it just gets ludicrously expensive and will suck up pretty much all your cash. If you prep it ahead of time and work it into a larger game plan, that gold cost is totally manageable and its true overwhelming power shines through. I really feel the gold cost needs to be toned back or removed and a different penalty instated.

Witchalok Pendant - a bit too expensive and low CP for its rather limited effect. Needs some help in that regard.

Battlemage Ring - a pretty powerful item, but suffers from a very steep cost and low CP value. Tweak one or the other and it'll be fine.

Hero's Helm - pretty good for low-level characters, but pretty damn expensive and is largely inconsequential for higher-level characters. The big problem is that +1 MP on its own isn't very useful; with only one exception (WEYTWUT) no glyph really benefits meaningfully from going from the 13 MP to the 14 MP baseline.

Platemail - getting around the "slow" effect is pretty tough to pull off. While I think it's gone in the right direction, it's gone from too powerful to too weak. It needs something to bring it up a bit. At very minimum a bit of extra CP and making it function with WEYTWUT would be nice.

Trisword - halflings and gnomes shall hate me forever, but this weapon really is too powerful. Pretty much all of the game's other "super preps" have been nerfed down to size, but this one remains and sticks out like a sore thumb. A simple fix may be just to cap the effect at +3 per level. That's 15 potions over the course of a dungeon; totally doable for a purist halfling/gnome or anyone who preps for it, while eliminating low-level power-attacking and the more obscenely broken trisword stacking (+40 on naga city, anyone?)

Balanced Dagger - much too niche; killing same-level enemies leaves you in a strategically challenging situation later in the game. Great for Vicious Gaan-Telet where most of the dungeon is carving your way through hordes of level 10 monsters, largely pointless everywhere else.

Mage Plate - overspecialized in its current state, and pretty much requires you to be playing human, gnome or assassin to get good value out of it. Very few classes can afford that kind of significant attack bonus penalty

Blue Bead - same problem as the spoon; poor shop density, but a no-brainer for its cost.

Vampiric Blade - absolutely wicked item. The double-effect on lower-level monsters means it can be used to harvest a lot of health. With all the recent vampire talk I've realized just how powerful lifesteal is in its current state, and this item seems to be really strong now.


Elite Items

Dwarven Gauntlets - These things have the same problem as the troll heart; you really need to find them ASAP to get the most out of them. As a result, they're primarily used as a preparation rather than an in-dungeon purchase. At that price point, the HP gain really needs to be retroactive. They'd be very well-balanced if that was the case.

Orb of Zot - much harder to leverage than Yendor. I rarely use it, but then again it's so rare that I rarely have the opportunity to use it, so that's not entirely a fair judgement. Anyone had success with this item?

Alchemist's Scroll - a bit on the expensive side with its gold activation cost, and also suffers the same problem as a lot of the "per level" items in that you need to find it early to really leverage it the most. What's more, the effect is front-loaded and really at its best at the lowest levels. This makes it rare as an in-dungeon purchase while still being incredibly potent as a preparation. It'd be nice if there was some way to make it more approachable without strengthening it for characters who prep and min/max around it.

Wicked Guitar - tricky to use, but wicked sick when it works. It really could use some better CP, but I can understand why it has the number it does.


Potions
Strength Potion - a little strong at low levels, a little weak at high levels. I've always thought it might be cool if this potion got curse cure so it had a more distinct role for high-level characters.

WHUPAZ - not nearly the "must-have" it used to be. Most scenarios now have multiple weaker bosses rather than a single strong one, and HP bloat has been toned down enormously. This is actually a really tame item now, and I only use it on Naga City, Slime Pits, and Dragon Isles.


Vicious Items

Avatar's Symbol - lackluster compared to the Dragonshield. The charge-up attack bonus just doesn't mesh with resistances. It'd be nice if it dropped the resists and swapped them for something else.

Dragon Shield - still a bit on the strong side, but that's primarily resist-stacking. I wish there was some way to reconcile its power for resist-stackers and everyone else, but I suspect it's much too late for that.

Naga Cauldron - weird item. I concur with the others that this would probably be neat to have in your shop pool, but not so much as a locker item.


Miscellaneous (lockerable) Items

Dragon Soul - basically dragonshield mini. Useless once you unlock the real thing, but kinda neat until then. There's some talk about revamping it as a potential shop item, which I approve of.

Sensation Stone - at its 150 value it'll never be locker worthy; it might be cool to try bringing it back up to some of its former values now that stacking orcs are long history, but I'd understand if you don't want to tempt transmutation scroll shenanigans.

Mass09 Ledger - interesting item, but just not good enough to be lockerable. Like most subdungeon items, it's cool to find but not really competitive with the real top-notch locker items.
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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Lujo on Fri Jan 18, 2013 7:23 pm

This thread has now been offically approved by the local textbombing society, by order of chairman Lujo. I'll give it a long read after I'm done with reconciling with my wife who just returned from a long trip.

And after a quick look, I can see you missed some, but have no time right now to pad the list out. Plus, I got thoughts different than yours on some of them, while I agree wholeheartedly on some.
I almost got pwned by Shifty Brickwork!
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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby q 3 on Fri Jan 18, 2013 8:08 pm

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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Darvin on Fri Jan 18, 2013 8:33 pm

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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby The Avatar on Fri Jan 18, 2013 8:53 pm

I wish they had either trinket or blacksmith stores as a shop prep. It would work like an apothocary (have 6 items, either small or blacksmith) and it would be in addition to shops.
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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Lujo on Fri Jan 18, 2013 10:18 pm

I almost got pwned by Shifty Brickwork!
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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Darvin on Fri Jan 18, 2013 10:57 pm

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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Lujo on Sat Jan 19, 2013 1:30 am

I almost got pwned by Shifty Brickwork!
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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Blovski on Sat Jan 19, 2013 2:25 am

My main thoughts:

RBS + Platemail, if player slow beats monster slow they'd be acceptable, as is Slow is just too serious a penalty.
Slayer Wand is good in my book. Balanced Dagger is a cool item to have in there, I occasionally manage to get use out of it. Trisword is probably a bit too powerful overall as a prep - it is the ultimate lazy prep item. Crystal Ball I haven't used recently, I imagine it's still a bit of a monster. Fireheart doesn't really need a change as is... it's much more management heavy than other specialist prep options, and while it's not a first-pick item for non-preppers I kind of think it's an OK item for a gradual advantage if you don't have a specific synergy ready - useful for spiking poisoners and odd things like that.

(The GG Healthmonster's a very decent generalist - sort of think as it stands more or less any good prepped combo will flatten a hard or lower level - think he's a bit less set-and-forget than the really high-power prep combos we've got at the moment (Orc Rogues and Bloodmage Crystal-ballers stand out) but on the other hand the virtue of focussing on health and %-based spiking is that he's not really weak to status effects...)
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Re: Items, Items, and more Items!

Postby Darvin on Sat Jan 19, 2013 2:50 am

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