[phpBB Debug] PHP Warning: in file [ROOT]/includes/bbcode.php on line 120: preg_filter(): The /e modifier is no longer supported, use preg_replace_callback instead
[phpBB Debug] PHP Warning: in file [ROOT]/includes/bbcode.php on line 120: preg_filter(): The /e modifier is no longer supported, use preg_replace_callback instead
[phpBB Debug] PHP Warning: in file [ROOT]/includes/bbcode.php on line 120: preg_filter(): The /e modifier is no longer supported, use preg_replace_callback instead
[phpBB Debug] PHP Warning: in file [ROOT]/includes/bbcode.php on line 120: preg_filter(): The /e modifier is no longer supported, use preg_replace_callback instead
QCF Design Community • View topic - MY thoughts on stuff!


MY thoughts on stuff!

All things Desktop Dungeons

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby xspeedballx on Tue Jan 24, 2012 8:36 pm

Conceptual and UI stuff:

A lot of what I have to say is about damage done and damage received. Having the game have us do math to accomplish puzzles is great. Number of hits taken vs given. Number of spells + damage etc. Addition, substraction and a bit of multiplication. But Lets stop the math at third grade! Ok I am joking but really percents are a nightmare at time to figure out how much I am going to do, and how much I am going to take. Don't get me wrong, the bars on the mobs? Awesome. So much better than before. But I have commented on a few classes that just do an extra percent damage sometimes. We have a nice damage calculator but it doesn't tell us things in these cases. One of those cases is a tier 1 class. It is frustrating. Same goes for taking damage. I have 10% resist. Ok I can get 10% of a number. However, now I am asking myself is it rounded up or down? Is there carry over? I don't know. The bar says I can only survive one hit, but it is relevant one whether or not I am 1 hp away from taking two hits or 5 or whatever. When percents become things like 12% this is just busted and I am whipping out a calculator. Blah on calculators. The game should TELL me how much damage I am doing to the target(minus some features which are not directly related to my attack, like reflex hits, or mana shield, both of these can be done by hand and that isn't a bad thing). The game should tell me how much damage I am taking. I think some more strategies around finesse and fancy item/glyph usage might form with this information. Or maybe I am thick and lazy!

I believe I mentioned it before, but knowing what type of monsters are or could be in a dungeon before entering would be neat.

I already stated an opinion in another thread about "are you sure?" however I would like to say again that this should be an early crutch built into the game. Partially because while you are learning after you die, you may not have enough feedback to realize what went wrong. Tutorials can cover a lot of bad status effects. Death is a weird thing to learn despite being so frequent sometimes.

Game flow is nice currently. However I think hard dungeons actually might pop up a little too fast. I know vets are going to cry because that is what they want faster, but I think the game should encourage players to spend a bit more time in the directional dungeons(like it does with den of danger quests) before opening up the hard dungeons. Maybe higher money requirements for a quest so some early farming is encouraged. Or quests to get certain badges in the directional dungeons. (Intro to badges/money making with them.) I think currently it is like 4 normal dungeons runs after the tutorial and you see a hard mode. A total of 7 and you see a lot of hard modes. Not sure the unwashed masses picking this game off of steam deals will be prepared.

Questing: I like quests. I like goals. I am terrible at making goals for myself in a game. Just how I am. Fully realizing that this game has to get released someday, but more quests that showcase individual classes in rough and tumble situations would be fun. Because feeling like you are following a story for your class AND the game is a lot of fun and provides interesting goals. On that same thought I was looking at the status screen and based on the statistics there are a lot of neat goals that could be created. I kept waiting for a badge or a goal for having a positive average kill level. Or even a positive 1 average kill level. Or a goal to do a certain amount of damage and win.

There will be more on diverse topics later as well. Several things I haven't fully fleshed out in my head.
xspeedballx
 
Posts: 260
Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2011 9:04 pm

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby gjaustin on Tue Jan 24, 2012 8:57 pm

I agree on the damage calculator. I think I'm actually going to go post the most egregious one in the bug report thread... (Thief)
gjaustin
 
Posts: 1113
Joined: Mon Aug 29, 2011 1:29 am

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby Lujo on Wed Jan 25, 2012 8:22 am

Some thoughts to add, if I may:

On Meatmen - I used to like them as a newbie (who doesn't), but preps and purposfully buffed and easily acessible "testing phase" items made them early game fodder, but I find them more and more annoying if I go late game TT in a level that has them, zombies, goos and AA's. It does wonders to make abusing TT have a cost to it, but it's still anoying. Not saying I want it changed, just saying that there might be some need to reevaluate how much end game resource hog monsters ARE there in vicious dungeons. (This is quite apparent in the dragon Isles, resource hog lvl 9's and 10's seem to be the theme there)

More on Wraiths - the thing is, I don't mind them so much as they are a mixed blessing of sorts, but their boss has the unintentional (hopefully) scaling physical resistance, and the Monk bussiness could've thaught us all that 60% physical resists sort of turns a popcorn boss into a SMM light. Couple that with undead and mana burn (regen fighting counters), and the overall underwhelmingness of BURNDAYRAZ unless really putting effort into it, and with the fact that wraiths do physical damage, what you get is a sort of "good at everything" boss. Lately I like running into Frank, Bleaty or tower of Goo more than I like running into this guy.

Maybe if wraiths dealt Magic damage? It would be another nerf to Monk, sure, but he's still really strong, and I sort of feel that the game could use another early game magic damage user (we got warlock and dragons, compared to 10 physical guys, unless I'm wrong). I know it's not possible as they are ment to be a balancing factor in unlocking the Berserker class, but they seem to me a bit too good in what they do (or at least their boss does).

About the UI - agree with most of what you said, I'd say Mana Shield should also be included in there somehow.

About the game flow - I've been saying this for a while now (it was one of the things that I felt got ignored before I decided to acquire some attitude problems), and the new victory screen is a great step in that direction. The difficulty slider of some sort that the dev's are saying they will/might implement is also a good thing probably, but I'm guessing a ring of "harder than normal, not quite hard" dungeons after the directional ones (in Magma Mines, Slime pits and all that manner), if codable in time, might do the newbies a world of good. Once all the big things are tested out, and a proper balance curve eastablished, ofc.

And as for Misclicks - wait till you discover Gaan'Telet. Or a dungeon that takes a long time and a lot of effort that makes you play Warlord. Among other issues with that class is that it's so incredibly easy for me to missclick with it that I consider it a manual dexterity hazard class. If there was an "Options menu button" that you let you turn missclick indicators on and off, It would be on whenever I'm playing warlord, and whenever I'm doing Gaan'Telet.
Last edited by Lujo on Wed Jan 25, 2012 8:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
I almost got pwned by Shifty Brickwork!
User avatar
Lujo
 
Posts: 3793
Joined: Tue Aug 02, 2011 8:47 am

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby TigerKnee on Wed Jan 25, 2012 8:27 am

TigerKnee
 
Posts: 563
Joined: Fri Jun 03, 2011 8:54 am

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby Lujo on Wed Jan 25, 2012 8:34 am

I almost got pwned by Shifty Brickwork!
User avatar
Lujo
 
Posts: 3793
Joined: Tue Aug 02, 2011 8:47 am

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby TigerKnee on Wed Jan 25, 2012 8:46 am

Sorcerer actually isn't too bad. Elf Sorcerer is one of the more common Sorcerer choice, for one thing. As long as you don't immediately convert Fireball on sight once you pick up Halpmeh, the Sorcerer's additional 5 mana helps a lot in just fireball spamming the Wraith boss to death. In an endurance situation like the Naga City I can see an issue, but for regular single/double boss dungeons, not so much.

As far as screwing over Paladins and Monks... well, they do need bad matchups.
TigerKnee
 
Posts: 563
Joined: Fri Jun 03, 2011 8:54 am

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby Lujo on Wed Jan 25, 2012 9:53 am

I almost got pwned by Shifty Brickwork!
User avatar
Lujo
 
Posts: 3793
Joined: Tue Aug 02, 2011 8:47 am

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby xspeedballx on Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:13 pm

Well to a real degree I am fairly certain the devs are keenly aware of resistance scaling and the effect that is has for monsters and players. If for no other reason than some resistances on bosses most notably tower of goo were toned down. 75% resistance instead of what I believe was once 90% means doing 2.5x more damage than before.

I haven't really ever had a problem with the wraith boss. He is just a target I have often had to carefully plan around. He is one of the few bosses that I find now that still strongly benefits from a mid fight level up. So I just plot one of those. I think the issue and you may have said this already is that mana burn is a larger detriment to melee and the boss already has a detriment to melee, so it is a double whammy. Since the magic game has been historically weaker this made him an annoying boss most of the time. I think the hope is that eventually some of those melee bosses that we like to see will be annoying to see for casters where bosses like the wraith boss will be annoying to see as a melee. With the double bosses in some of the hard modes this forces adaptive strategies which always seemed to me to be the name of the game.

I wanted to say something about Conversion:

I like converting things. I like converting things at level 1, I like converting things at level 10, I like converting things all the time. The problem is I am rarely converting things all the time. Old conversion values + sensation stone very much front loaded a lot of conversion(especially as orcs). There was still some strategy to it obviously but by and large after 240 conversion points passed most non-percent damage increasers just wanted to be converted.

Now I feel I can't convert anything. Mostly because of 2 bosses in hard modes. Oh sure I am still "technically" as powerful if I convert 500 points at level 10 or 500 points at level 1, except I am not. Having to wait until the very end and do it slowly as I knock off targets and tasks means I have expended far more resources throughout the course of the run. The game is much harder in my mind now after the conversion nerfs not necessarily because of the nerfs but because most hard modes require keeping all my glyphs around until I at least find all the bosses and alters. Except even then I actually need to keep certain glyphs around until I find all my glyphs. I won't convert pissorf on shifting sands unless I find endiswall or maybe weytwut.

Oddly this feels a lot more like alpha where you spent more time doing "Wasteful" exploration often. However the tuning is different so it feels more difficult. Obviously this all falls into general dungeon tuning, but I wanted to note from a perspective how conversion feels now.

All that said, most of the time lately I am gobbling up items as I find them. However, I am playing with limited item unlocks and I can imagine all sorts of items that I haven't unlocked that I wouldn't be touching. It is a blessing and a curse that the early items are universally useful.
xspeedballx
 
Posts: 260
Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2011 9:04 pm

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby xspeedballx on Thu Jan 26, 2012 3:54 pm

While playing a bit yesterday on my limited unlock profile I came to an interesting realization. I win more games when I prep the fine sword than when I don't through normal/hard dungeons. I *KNOW* why. It flows into something I have sort of have been harping on throughout most of my posts here. Resources and Opportunity cost. Most classes and especially any with a damage bonus, if I prep fine sword, all I need to do is find a pendant of health and GG both of which are fairly straight forward and common affairs(both can be guaranteed to appear), and 2-3 kills later I am level 2 with 70 hp, 21+ damage, and 3 kills away from level 5+ with enough peity to go to a god of my choice and often 75% of the level left unexplored.

Now I am not the first person to discover this. Lujo has been basically beating up this strategy or similar for the last few weeks. However, my point here is to highlight something that was strongly noted in alpha that doesn't seem to be talked about as much now. How important your early game is to the rest of the game. Even with out GG ,creating an overpowered level 1 even one who is not optimal for level 10 can often and in my opinion DOES often lead to a stronger level 10 if only because of more resources available.

Now most of the vicious dungeons this is a little rougher just because stats on bosses mandate playing optimally for max level. Though some like dragon isles(there is a reason this one is considered the simplest) it's the same concept, especially for berserkers.

These thoughts are mostly just something I found really interesting. The depth of thought in resources is a much more complicated number game at times. Please note I do not think the fine sword is the best prep ever. Tri-sword is clearly superior in every case where the fine sword is great. Mostly because wasting 2 potions off the bat even as a non-halfling won't break you in most hard dungeons.
xspeedballx
 
Posts: 260
Joined: Thu Dec 01, 2011 9:04 pm

Re: MY thoughts on stuff!

Postby dislekcia on Thu Jan 26, 2012 4:01 pm

User avatar
dislekcia
 
Posts: 2321
Joined: Fri Mar 25, 2011 5:58 pm
Location: Cape Town, South Africa

PreviousNext

Return to Desktop Dungeons

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 57 guests

cron