Desktop Dungeons

[DMT]

Love the new version! Thanks a lot guys :)

You are probably aware of this, but I've not seen it mentioned yet, so I'll add it:

Activating and deactivating BLUDTOPOWA counts as glyph use and gains piety with Mysteria, so you have unlimited piety right away. It's totally broken so I assume it's not supposed to be like that.

All the new gods are great, except the Glowing Guardian. He is useful for the full heal you get when you join and the other that costs 50(!) piety, but even in the crypt I was unable to get enough piety for his 100 piety boon. If the HALPMEH glyph doesn't spawn it seems impossible.

Basically you'll only ever have enough piety for one boon, almost never enough for his ultimate boon, and the death protection is almost never useful when the full heal is the same price. (And you can get death protection a lot of other ways).

Other than that, having a blast! :D

[dislekcia]

Love the new version! Thanks a lot guys :)

You are probably aware of this, but I've not seen it mentioned yet, so I'll add it:

Activating and deactivating BLUDTOPOWA counts as glyph use and gains piety with Mysteria, so you have unlimited piety right away. It's totally broken so I assume it's not supposed to be like that.

All the new gods are great, except the Glowing Guardian. He is useful for the full heal you get when you join and the other that costs 50(!) piety, but even in the crypt I was unable to get enough piety for his 100 piety boon. If the HALPMEH glyph doesn't spawn it seems impossible.

Basically you'll only ever have enough piety for one boon, almost never enough for his ultimate boon, and the death protection is almost never useful when the full heal is the same price. (And you can get death protection a lot of other ways).

Other than that, having a blast! :D

The BLUDTOPOWA bug's been fixed. Re-download the game ;)

Appreciate the feedback on the Glowing Guardian. Part of the freeware strategy is to find out how complex things like the different gods work out for players so that we can be totally clued up when the full version comes out.

[sagittary]

The BLUDTOPOWA bug's been fixed. Re-download the game ;)

Appreciate the feedback on the Glowing Guardian. Part of the freeware strategy is to find out how complex things like the different gods work out for players so that we can be totally clued up when the full version comes out.

I actually had a situation where the death protection worked out better for me than the full heal (though as a caveat, in any mostly to pretty successful run, I tend to rack up either a lot of piety or very little). I don't remember the specifics, but I was mostly ready to fight the boss. I think it was the goat? At any rate, the boss had triple digit damage - well more than I had hit points. I had figured out that with my current mana and the mana from a level up plus mana potions, I could -almost- kill the bugger... but I'd be short something like 20-50 HP with no real way to do that (exploration would just heal more than I'd be able to deal damage and I was low on exploration squares anyway).

But then I noticed that my melee damage was just about enough (and I may have had a mana shield)... enough so that with the level up, I'd probably have enough damage. So I took Death Protection, popped Burnz, leveled, and used DP to survive the boss hit and return a melee hit to win. In this case, the full heal would have not helped at all and I wasn't in a situation where DP was available in any other way.

Which isn't to say that GG isn't a little subpar compared to the other gods; I've tended towards the other ones primarily (though with randomization of everything, that's pretty subjective since finding X god early can be different than if you find 'em late).

Unrelated note, I've noticed with the new god system, I've done less gold farming (not that I did much before) - at the very least, I've gotten further into dungeons before realizing I couldn't win (or screwed up beyond recovery).

[rugzhltstirc]

On new Tikki Tooki:

I take it boon granting 10% dodging bonus being one-time bonus is an expecting behavior? To prevent us getting 60-70% of dodging?

I can live with it, but why Tikki's second biggest boon is "poisoning"? I just don't get it. Poisoning implies prolonged battle (2-3 strike exchanges), which is the exact opposite of what Tikki is about.

On new interface:

It doesn't show bonus' exact numbers (or it does i just can't figure out where it is exactly).

[Twinge]

I think the scoring for the time it takes to kill the boss is backwards. I played a game this morning but then left it for several hours. When I came back to complete it, I received half a million points for killing the boss alone (I think it was around 564,000 points). I played another game where I only got 749 points for killing the boss in 8:22, so it seems as though the scoring has a big problem.

This was the main thing I was jumping on here to post about. See my high score on the list for an example; it racks up pretty quickly.

My main hope - that gold-grinding between games would be removed - hasnt happened.

...And this was the second. The current implementation is purely a grind with no redeeming value to it whatsoever; it's a jarring piece of awful game design amidst a sea of good design. Simply starting with maxed gold each game is probably also not ideal, but would be drastically better than the current implementation.


I'll also toss in my agreement that Glowing Guardian is awkward currently. In addition to being impossible to get reasonable piety without healing, there is no message indicating a piety gain when you heal (or use Sidestep). In addition, it seems like the counterintuative method of taking a lot of damage before worshiping GG to start with a higher piety will generally give you more piety than following early and getting the bonuses from killing undead/leveling up.

Initial thoughts would be to at least make unholy kills give 2 piety instead of 1 and drop the cost of a full heal from 50 to 35 or 40. More/different fixes would likely be better, but that would be an easy tweak that would make GG more viable and not overpowered.

[dislekcia]

Thanks everyone, the score bug is fixed. We'll upload a new version tomorrow after we do some talking amongst ourselves about the gods ;)

Regarding the "gold grind": Gold was never intended to be necessary to clear a dungeon, it was sort of seen as something that would add a bit of persistence to the game and give players a helping hand now and then if they'd been dying a lot. The Goblin and Tinker were added to explore the angle that gold gave the game after it was put in. Suffice to say that in the full version, we're planning to mollify players that feel they always need a positive gold return on their runs in a number of ways ;) We're also doing a couple of things to add other ways that players can obtain benefits from runs that can be carried over to future playsessions, because that's the real "problem" with gold at the moment: Max gold lets you take advantage of options that you wouldn't otherwise have, yet it's a difficult decision every time exactly because you don't start with maxed gold. If it didn't cost time to earn that gold, players would simply buy everything and the delicious "Should I, shouldn't I?" that is the core of DD would be taken down a notch.

@Twinge: Aargh, I could have sworn there used to be a message on the GG's spellcasting piety rewards! Were you casting with keys or clicking the slot?

@rugzhltstirc: Yeah, we didn't want players getting too high dodge stats this time around. It's funny, but if any probability in a game goes over 60% we transition from not expecting it to happen (and feeling rewarded if it does) to expecting it to happen (and feeling robbed when it doesn't). Dodge at higher percentages isn't as fun.

Also, you can mouse-over the damage icon to see your current damage breakdown :)

I'm curious to see if anyone has been trying the transitions between gods at all...

[Lekon]

I'm curious to see if anyone has been trying the transitions between gods at all...

That was how I beat the factory with Bloodmage finally. Went from Mysteria to Pact Maker and had mana out the wazooly. I kept expecting it to say "2 hit combo!" at the end.

[fall_ark]

Max gold lets you take advantage of options that you wouldn't otherwise have, yet it's a difficult decision every time exactly because you don't start with maxed gold. If it didn't cost time to earn that gold, players would simply buy everything and the delicious "Should I, shouldn't I?" that is the core of DD would be taken down a notch.

Well I can always do 2-3 rounds of goblin wizards between runs....It's not a difficult decision, just time-consuming. I DO ponder before spending on expensive items before making sure I've got a decent map setting and they do not conflict with other items, but for those non-one-shot items lower than 30 golds I almost always buy on sight.


I've suggested a min. gold / max gold system before (you raise your starting gold by achievements, but there are always some room for collecting in game), and I still believe that a better balance can be achieved in that way than in the current system.

[XuaXua]

If you've already ditched the appropriate glyph, EarthMother and that other god don't regenerate the DestroyWall/StoneSomeone glyphs.

If you have ditched it and join the associated god, I recommend they DO generate the glyph, but you should get penalized (or double-penalized) your stat bonus for ditching.

[Chainsaw]

Not sure if this is intended, but if you use APHEELSIK on a monster and then attack THAT monster (even with BURNADAYZ), the poison wears off. Now I'm sure it's only supposed to wear off after attacking a DIFFERENT monster. Amirite?

[SkinkLizzard]

Not sure if this is intended, but if you use APHEELSIK on a monster and then attack THAT monster (even with BURNADAYZ), the poison wears off. Now I'm sure it's only supposed to wear off after attacking a DIFFERENT monster. Amirite?

no, at least not from what I understand from this:

Apheelsik's been re-balanced. As soon as you deal any damage, poison wears off. It's still effective, but shouldn't allow high level kills too easily.

[Chainsaw]

:<

Tbh, I think that's an overly harsh nerf.

[SkinkLizzard]

dunno I mean it still allows you to attack, fireball, poison, run off and heal then come back and repeat, or attack, fireball,(whatever), poison, run off and find easy kill to level, level and provided you don't uncover any more blocks come back and repeat. It just means that the level difference in the kills comes down a bit unless you have some serious mana backing. of course I started again so haven't unlocked the poison glyph to test it yet.

[Delvin]

The poison nerf doesn't affect a player's performance at all when all you're using is poison because hp is the limiting factor against higher level monsters. You'll easily regen enough mp while refilling hp to keep applying poison per every melee hit.

Glyphs are what the nerf actually affects, poison+fireball being the greatest victim. You'll essentially be using twice the mp for same damage as before. And fireball already does far less damage than melee - I definitely prefer HALPMEH + high atk on a mage in the average dungeon. It's very efficient and allows you to outheal most enemies a few levels above you even without poison.

[Twinge]

Regarding the "gold grind": Gold was never intended to be necessary to clear a dungeon, it was sort of seen as something that would add a bit of persistence to the game and give players a helping hand now and then if they'd been dying a lot. [...] that's the real "problem" with gold at the moment: Max gold lets you take advantage of options that you wouldn't otherwise have, yet it's a difficult decision every time exactly because you don't start with maxed gold. If it didn't cost time to earn that gold, players would simply buy everything and the delicious "Should I, shouldn't I?" that is the core of DD would be taken down a notch.

Well I can always do 2-3 rounds of goblin wizards between runs....It's not a difficult decision, just time-consuming. I DO ponder before spending on expensive items before making sure I've got a decent map setting and they do not conflict with other items, but for those non-one-shot items lower than 30 golds I almost always buy on sight.

As noted above, there is no decision at all. You should grind out gold between games because it is strictly the best way to go about winning. The best option is boring and tedious, which is where the flaw lies. Whether or not you need the gold is irrelevant - it is better to have more gold, so we will have max gold between games, and its pointlessly tedious to do so.

@Twinge: Aargh, I could have sworn there used to be a message on the GG's spellcasting piety rewards! Were you casting with keys or clicking the slot?

I just double checked, and I don't get a message either from click casting or keypad casting.

Tbh, I think [the new poison] overly harsh nerf.

I think it's a good solution, myself. It was clearly overpowered before - now it is still quite useful but it has a drawback and is a little harder to use. The only drawback I see is that it is a little less intuitive, so it might confuse people at first when the cast poison first and then attack.

I'm also a fan of the new Blood To Power; it's elegant and useful.

[dislekcia]

As noted above, there is no decision at all. You should grind out gold between games because it is strictly the best way to go about winning. The best option is boring and tedious, which is where the flaw lies. Whether or not you need the gold is irrelevant - it is better to have more gold, so we will have max gold between games, and its pointlessly tedious to do so.

Like I said above, it's more an issue of only having the one reward for games after you've unlocked all the normal classes. The reward stream slows down and the emphasis on harder dungeons means that players want to maximise their advantages, gold goes from a helping hand to being a resource. We don't see players grinding for gold until they hit the challenge dungeons, which are meant to be hard.

Obviously we're learning from player behavior like this and we've got some ideas that should help players deal with gold "shortages", if not prevent the resource switch altogether :) (BTW: Only a very small percentage of players focus on full completion, it's those players that have problems with the current gold mechanic)

I just double checked, and I don't get a message either from click casting or keypad casting.

I have no idea what's causing that... The message is definitely being set for every cast. This is what happens when your prototype grows a little too large :(

[Feynman]

I haven't been able to spend as much time with the game as I'd like to lately, but I've got most of the basic unlockables done now, so here are a few more thoughts:

First, as others have mentioned, the new Bludtopowa is great! It also has a lot of synergy with the Halpme glyph. I used to routinely throw it away even when playing as the Bloodmage, but now it's a very useful glyph. I imagine combining Bludtopowa and Apheelsik on a Sorcerer will be extremely entertaining.

Second, to throw my voice in yet again with rugzhltstirc on Tikki Tooki, I agree that his poison boon is pretty useless... the kind of character who would really want such a boon is the kind of character least suited to gaining piety with Tikki.

I also find myself wondering if the Pactmaker is perhaps just a bit too powerful. In particular, his (her?) Learning boon is very cheap, and finding the Pactmaker early on is a huge game-changer, as it makes leveling up an almost trivial task. By comparison, his +10 max health boon is almost twice as expensive, and not really that useful compared to getting +10 max mana... +10 mana is a lot, but the health boon rarely ever makes a noticeable impact unless stacked heavily with other health-boosting items, which requires a great deal of luck to pull off compared to how extremely useful the mana boon is all on it's own.

[XuaXua]

To solve the gold issue

- Instead of a gold carry limit between games, have a gold carry limit in-game and start each dungeon at 0 gold (Tinker class starts with X gold) and have a carry limit. Give more gold in-game but you can only buy from stores based on what you can carry; if they offer rare items that are too expensive, you should have increased your maximum carry.

[XuaXua]

Again I got it. The error is consistent.

This time though, I was moving the mouse.

I move, I reveal a glyph. I click to step on the glyph, and as the icon moves to the glyph, I scroll away from the square almost simultaneously.

And poof, pop-up. The behavior is 100% consistent - every single time, it happens when I click on a not-yet-stepped-on glyph.

___________________________________________
ERROR in
action number 1
of Step Event
for object Interface:

Error in code at line 13:
if (Roomwatch.reveal[floor(mouse_x / 20), floor(mouse_y / 20)] >= 2) {

at position 20: Unknown variable reveal or array index out of bounds

[XuaXua]

Problem: Join Guardian.
Use BLUTOPOWA
It takes 3 times but then you get renounced; the problem is other than the red border around the game, it's not apparent you are failing; it seems more like a problem clicking the button.