For the first statement, I hesitated initially (and stupidly) from buying this game because of that. The whole unlocking and accomplishment thing could end up bringing a lot more people to this game. It's good to know even though you didn't beat your high score, you still did something worthwhile. For the second statement, I may not be the norm, but I'm actually one who used to read manuals. I like descriptions and instructions, not learning a game from trial and error. Looking forward to the updates~!
Another possibility is Skill Elixir with the other three. My high game on Normal of 39K had that combo. It doesn't help you in that tight Spiky spot, but it help you raise levels like crazy, and the high Luck and Life Leach you can get from all the upgrades makes potions less needed, and more usable to convert to XP, continuing the cycle.
I agree that is a possible alternative to Heal, and it serves a similar purpose, which is mostly about getting the potions out of the way. (I can heal with life leech, if I can just set up the big attack chains, so the blocking function of the potions is more of an issue than the healing function.) One problem is the longer cooldown; I'm trying to cast Dazzle/Scavenge/Boost Armor almost every 5-turn cycle, and Heal could keep up with that cycle, while Skill Elixir can't. A second problem is that it doesn't help much with the bosses and bad drops, which is really how I tend to die; I'm clearing an entire screen of almost all shields, and I have to survive random drops of a completely new screen, and getting some extra XP isn't going to do it. The third problem is that I just don't see level-ups as that useful, in the endgame. Life leech maxes out very early at 25% and so you'll never get any more of that. Luck is definitely worth something, but I still tend to choose even +5 HP over +1 Luck, it's not that important in the long run, when I'm getting most of my HP from my gigantic attacks and life leech. The main advantage of Skill Elixir would be generating more XP in the early and middle game so I can get the skills I want and have them maxed out quickly. I'd probably take it if I could get rid of it later. I don't know how a Normal score of 39k compares to my Hard score of 82k. Is there a multiplier? The leaderboard seems to have much higher Normal scores. The fact that it's "polluted" with scores from earlier versions that were a bit broken, makes it less appealing to me to play a long game to see where I would rank. But I will probably try one game on Normal eventually, just to see what score I can get.
The problem is doing this at a reasonable level of difficulty. It's clear that one of the successes of Dungeon Raid is that it maintains its appeal even though some of its fans are much better than others. A campaign that would be even slightly challenging for one player would be impossible for others. I guess you could have multiple levels of difficulty for the campaign, just like multiple difficulty levels now. It still seems hard to balance, though.
At least now with the 10 classes with 10 levels that is like 90 achievements (there are no levels to the initial Adventurer class) to unlock. So while it isn't really a campaign, it gives you a lot of stuff to work on. While you can unlock the 10 classes playing any of the other classes (even playing the Adventurer class), to work your way through the 10 levels of each class means you'll need to play a several games as that class. I also love how leveling up in a class doesn't just allow you more options when playing that class, but is the key to unlocking that classes' race and unique skill for use with the other classes. Eventually you'll be able to play as an Orc Paladin with the Rogue's unique skill (no clue if this would be a particularly powerful combo, it's just that you'll be able to mix stuff up).
I havent played this in a long while, and am really looking forward to the update to mix it up again.
Yes, I can see that working, I guess Looking forward to it, though I'd still ask if it's still in the backlog or if it's no longer being considered, out of curiosity. Regards, and keep up the great thread. Paulo Tavares
God, I hope not. If this is true it will be enough to really turn me off for the game. From Fireflame's description, I'm hoping I'll have to play at most one per class to max it out. I find a typical game takes a few hours. Several of those just to unlock one character seems really excessive.
Congrats on the fantastic game and it's success. I was a day one downloader and have loved it ever since. The "uniqueness" and "simplicity" of the game really remind me of the old school game "Rogue". (It's simple, basic, yet very deep and challenging, making you think about your moves.) I'm concerned about the direction of the updates though... While "new" content sounds fantastic, part of me is really saying, "If the formula isn't broken, don't fix it..." By adding classes and much more, I'm afraid you might be going away from your original vision, adding some depth that may scare some casual people away. Me, personally, I welcome the new content, adding replay value. But, just my thoughts and thanks for making the game.
It does seem a lot like adding classes and chrome to Rogue. Wait, they did that, and it turned out to be more successful than its ancestor. So I guess we have to give it at least the benefit of the doubt.
Enh, it may take a while, but unlike some unlockables like expecting you to complete the ENTIRE Campaign to access another mode, just continual play will eventually unlock everything. Even if you never make it past your second special playing as a Rogue, play it enough times and you'll still max out the Rogue. I find myself having way too much fun trying to dream up my ultimate combos of not just skills, but trying to find a class, race, and set of perks/flaws the will allow me to dance into highscore fame!
If you just play as the Adventurer you'll be playing the same standard game for the most part without the perks, class abilities, and unique class skills. You can only play as a human (so no mortal enemies) and unlike other classes, will be able to choose from ALL currently unlocked skills (so from all skills in the game except for those class uniques you haven't unlocked yet).
I usually play on Hard, and compared to Normal the scores get higher at a quicker pace, but I also die much much more quickly. My high of 39K on Normal compares to my high of 14K on Hard (Ack!) A lot of the problem on Hard is related to your initial point -- sometimes it's just too hard getting the right skills. I find on Hard I have to often "settle" for a skill that's not ideal, just so I can stay afloat. After getting scores that high on Hard, you'd probably find Normal boring. I probably could have gone a while longer, but I got sloppy. (That often is the problem, isn't it?)
i look forward to whatever extra content gets dropped into the game. whether its utilized by me or not, the appreciation is there and i thank FireFlame for the continued support. some devs dont do updates as frequent or as large as these guys. thanks again.
Will there be different leaderboards for different classes? Also, I think leaderboards may need a wipe/reset since most of the highest scores are from before the "cap" and balance update.
It's possible, but it's hard for me to distinguish retrospectively between "got sloppy" and "took a calculated risk that didn't pay off". It's always possible to play safer, and live more turns, but score much less well and build up less power for future levels. There were hundreds of turns in my 82k Hard game where I had no real risk of dying, unless I pushed the envelope. But still I'm always taking risks, to maximize my gains for when the skulls catch up with me. I do think a huge part of scoring high is not just surviving to get the skills I want, but getting them early so I can maximize their payoff during the midgame where I'm not particularly threatened but I want to power up as much as possible. I played a second Hard game with the same strategy, I thought I would do better since I had a plan from the beginning, but I topped out in the 60k range because I didn't get my skill combo going early enough.
I can't find an explicit discussion of this online, but I can't believe it's impossible to reset the Game Center leaderboards. I know that designers of other games have been able to delete forged entries.
I'm not sure how that will be handled in Game Center but know FireFlame has done a cool job of giving each class its own local scoreboard of best scores in Normal, Hard, and Harder right there in the Class Edit Screen details of each class (this is the screen where you configure your character before starting a run). There still is the old highscore system listing all of your top scores (not sure if class is listed in there yet) and this Class Edit screen technically only comes up if you want to change anything from the last time you ran a character in that class, if you want to just accept whatever you last configured you can still just launch the game from the title screen once you've picked your name, difficulty and class.
Oh, some minor touches I forgot to mention that are really cool and completely unrelated to the new class system! 1) You can now see what difference your traced path of coins, shields, or potions will be right their in their respective containers before you submit the move! So now you know if that group of coins will be enough for a trip to the shop or how close that group of shields will bring you to your next upgrade by seeing a semi-transparent shadow of the new total before the move is completed. Pretty handy. 2) Maybe I just missed this before but now you can see your current score in Stats! A neat way to know, even before you finally die, if this is shaping up to be a major Hall of Fame run already.
It's very rare that I care. The only case it sometimes matters is if I'm really desperate and am wondering if I can get an upgrade that might give me extra HP to survive the round. Does it work for skulls and XP also? This is in the current version. I would still like to have a turn counter also.
