That's probably a memory issue - which device were you on? 1.05 should reduce the memory usage somewhat. Hopefully that's enough; I guess we'll see.
A feature request comes to mind: when you tap on the monster in the map view, have a button to take you to the corresponding bestiary entry. This would help beginners and advanced players (took me 20 runs to find out I could access the bestiary during a run).
Some other usability suggestions as well: - when zoomed in on a card during a battle, have button to play it, and buttons/ways to move to the other cards in the hand. Same goes for stores. -not sure if feasible, but it would be great to have a small summary of the basic effects of the cards when zoomed out, in the card (like +2 card, +1 action, 1 dmg), with icons. Just a thought. Other than that, not much to add!
I was at 3400 points after playing *many* games and about to buy the Professor... and it's 10,000 now?? Really? You know how much grinding that is? Thumbs down, man. Also, I'm finding the randomness in the game more frustrating with more plays. Just played 30+ games with the Thief, and building a deck like is described in the strategy article, and though I can get to the 3rd level and fight the boss there sometimes, I'm still losing often on the first level to dumb luck and bosses that can't happen to be countered at the time. I mean, that happens frequently, which seems ridiculous and a big waste of time at this point. Heck, I've even lost before the boss a few times on level one. That's not fun at all anymore. Didn't I read before that some bosses were being moved out of the first level? I don't see that on the update list. Anyway, I'm subtracting a star for that randomness, and maybe another for the grind bump. 10,000?!
Yes, and also when you're fighting the monster, if you tap on it's picture, the bestiary text should come up. That's when you really need it, and sometimes for ambush monsters that's the only chance you'll get.
That's how rogue-likes work, it's a lot of trial and error and luck plays a big part. If you don't like that part of it, they probably just are not for you, but marking it down for something that is core to the genre is pretty odd
Just played about 10 more Thief games. Made it to the second floor once. Unbelievable. Granted, I made a dumb mistake in one of the games. But in others, I really didn't see a better path that would have made it through, especially against the Genie, who I got three of the times. (Can anyone really be expected to beat the Genie on the first floor with the Thief without some really dumb luck? If so, I'm all ears.). And for the time spent on my last run, I earned a whopping 13 points. At that rate, with about 5,000 points now, I'll only have to play 384 more games (and crappy games where I randomly lose on the first floor) to get to 10,000.
It's core to the game to completely waste your time just to get killed on the basic floor, by dumb luck? Where's the fun or *game* in that? Would you have fun whacking yourself in the head with a 2x4 over and over? This is also a deck-building game, with the potential for your decisions and strategy to improve your chances to be more successful. I felt that in a great way to begin with, but it seems lately it's just the dumb random death over and over on the first floor, with no real reward (13 points?) or fun in that. With some better balance I think it could still be a very challenging game where you will need to improve over time in order to be more successful, but it also won't waste your time so frequently.
The more you play any roguelike, the better you learn it's systems. While I have yet to truly beat the game, I can beat the first floor bosses with almost any class pretty consistently. Have you read the devs strategies for the 4 base classes or looked at the hints in the bestiary on how best to deal with each of the foes discovered so far? Here is a link to the dev's very thorough strategy guide (although he only gets into the 4 base classes): http://www.pockettactics.com/features/winning-ugly-still-winning-peter-whalens-guide-dream-quest/
I've been to the third floor boss many times. Haven't beat it yet, though. And as I said earlier, I'm following the dev's guide for the Thief. But still, through dumb luck it would seem, I'm dying again and again and again on the first floor. No fun in that, anymore. Perhaps it's a particular thing with the Thief. I don't know, but it's become tedious to play this 10 times for the one time that all of the build up work I do on level 1 can actually be applied to the later levels.
Btw, I've rated it 3 stars, down from 4. The grind bump to 10,000, when you earn a mere 13 points per failed first floor run, justifies that alone for me, the rogue like random death notwithstanding.
Few things: I've played too much thief but will can't claim to be great at it but I can say that quite early on I've manage to figure out how to consistently get through lv1. The only times I failed lv1 is because I refused to get any cards due to refusing to adapt to any strategy as of yet. Which comes to the next point... If you're not flexible when it comes to strategies, I'm not surprised that you're crying foul and claiming that one needs a lot of luck in order to get through lv1 consistently. There are shops and treasure chest drops for you to choose from and if you either decided to pick nothing, pick the wrong things or pick everything, of course you'll fail... . Regarding the genie, he's easy. I can't really say how to beat him as it really depends on the situation you're in. But one very obvious thing is... the longer you drag the game, the more likely you'll lose. And the only reason why the game is being dragged long is most likely because you're not taking any or enough damage cards to begin with, as the thief. And finally the professor, maybe it's easier if the developer makes it so that the achievements are only possible through, you know... actually achieving them? I think that it's a luxury that one could "buy" them instead of achieving it the proper way and to dish out a poorer rating based on this is akin to throwing a fit just because you can't get what you want. I would like to add that said points would be much better used for reviving your hero in case of horrible dice rolls and you think your hero still has a good chance of reaching the end. And regarding points, you can get a few hundred per run IF you are competent enough to consistently get through lv1. Also, maybe you just suck at using thief. I find the priest very interesting as well but I keep dying at lv1 too... :/ So far, I've very consistently got through lv1 for thief, warrior, wizard and ranger and have won with all of them before but I'm having great difficulty with the priest now... .
A couple of things: Floor 1 as a thief. I don't remember what's in the guide, but I'm pretty sure the class sections were more on archetypes than specifically getting through floor 1. There's no one strategy, but if you want to beat floor 1 every time, pick up some powerful cards that don't scale well. Execute comes to mind. Other than that, you can't have a lot of air in your deck as the thief for floor 1 since you can't capitalize on it that well (since Backstab is kind of mediocre at that point), so either go for the Strike plan or spend your pre-floor 1 boss gold on a couple of tier 3 elemental slashes - they'll serve you reasonably well in the future, but also on the floor 1 boss. Try this strategy: pre-boss on floor 1 only buy elemental slash cards of at least level 2 (or that you can level at a blacksmith), protean, circle, or strike (if you have enough base actions for the strike). In chests, only take those cards and any card that is +action and +card (like Swiftness). If you're in the air level, don't go for the strike plan (just pick up the elemental slashes) in case the boss is Cumulo. In combat against the boss, wait until he has a 3 card hand and use your combat ability the first time that happens. Against the Genie, don't give him +card and don't take -card yourself. You can take -action (especially if you can chain circles or picked up a base action somewhere), damage, poison, him healing. Always take +action as your level up at level 2/3 if it's offered. This is not going to always be an optimal plan for floor 1, but it should get you through pretty much every time. Also, take health as your floor 1 talent and at lemonade stands if you see them. The 10 gold delete from monasteries is also worth taking if it doesn't conflict with a circle/protean/elemental slash. I actually just tried this strategy 5 times (Cumolo, Genie x2, Shark x2) and had to deviate only once. On the Cumulo spawn I just didn't get any elemental slashes above level 1, so I took an Infect and a Venom instead which was fine. I wasn't doing exactly the same things as I normally do, but it was close enough that I think this won't really hinder your floor 2+ chances. Also, make sure to get a tier 2+ elemental slash - it's more important than a circle if that's the choice you're making before the boss. On the professor unlock: the reason the point cost went up is that I don't want people unlocking it via points. The professor/bard/dragon aren't particularly fair classes for various reasons, so I could either nerf them away from being fun or make their unlocks very late. I'd rather make them late to unlock - in the professor's case you can get him by beating all the bosses. If you're making it to floor 3 a fair amount, you should be almost all the way there. The hope with pushing the point cost to 10k was that people would say "oh wow, there's no way I'm grinding that, let me unlock it the normal way", but with the point cost there just in case you can never, for instance, find the Kraken.
Grudunza, what sort of choices are you taking from the genie? The most dangerous choices to take are 4 curses, +1 genie card, and -1 card. A lot of times you get offered these 3 on the first wish, and choosing which one is least scary really depends on your deck. That being said, I don't think the genie is an especially difficult boss for thief on first floor. The storm cloud is much scarier in general with his physical resist, and the gelatinous cube can be a close fight if you're relying on just a few key cards that get slurped.
Yeah, as te thief I find the jelly the hardest to fight against especially when he slurps your key cards even though you've played all your attack and action cards first and only so happen slurped the last card you played that happens to be really important. Grrr.
Wierd. After putting in a couple of hours, I was able to consistently crush the first floor with all characters. Hope you stick with it. I have to echo the many others and say dying frequently is a key concept for any rogue-like.
After a while you'll see that many of those "completely arbitrary deaths" are in fact based on decisions you had made earlier on your run. A real basic example that comes to mind might, without giving any specifics away, be how you find out as a fighter there are several creatures either completely or partially immune to basic physical damage or times the typical, "hit them so hard they can't hit back" brute force style of a fighter will not win you the battle. Since you only have the ONE deck you need to design something that can stand up to the many unique gimmicks your opponents will throw at you and not rely on merely a couple of specific strong combos to win every battle.
@legendaryferret - nice hints, and I hadn't realised that the monsters you encounter depend on the environment, makes sense. Speaking of difficulty, it is kind of hard but not overly as the games are so short. I have 50 runs now with 2 wins (warrior and professor unlocked when it was cheap) (beating third level boss and descending). What is the general mileage, what percentage of games do you guys win?? Anyone there having beat the game with all classes? Or what about the achievement where you begin a combat with no cards, anyone got that - I have no clue how you would get this without trying specifically for it for about 100 games...
