Lordgek is correct! The scroll names are created from random letters, and the potion colors are swapped all around every time you start a new game. This is one of the original aspects of Rogue, when combined with the random dungeons that made it almost infinitely replayable. The types of items and magic scrolls, potions and so on can be found at my website if you want to study it (link is in my sig).
Are we gonna see another update? If only to tone down the graffiti and do those other little maintenance features?
Yes, there are a few more features I plan on adding as well. Things I started working on many months ago before my day-job made me put all development on hold... You will like the results I'm sure
Since the dev is on here, I would just like to say that I've purchased this game, and am extremely satisfied with it. There's still a lot I don't understand (What the strength rating does/why it goes down, what the different +1+1 things mean, and such), but it's still quite the fun experience.
Why thank you magihiro! I appreciate the kind words, and am glad that you are enjoying it. To fill in some gaps in your knowlegde: Strength acts as a few things- a measure of how much damage you can do when attacking, as well as somewhat influencing your ability to actually hit monsters. A strength of 16 is pretty average, and what you start off with (unless you play as some of the secret characters). Without getting into detail of the calculations, obviously the stronger you are, the better you can defend yourself! Weapons have two values for a specific reason. Let's pretend you have a +1,+3 Mace. The +1 value is a bonus to your ability to actually hit monsters. The +3 value means that if you hit, you do +3 points of additional damage on top of the base weapon damage, your strength damage bonus, and other potential magic bonuses like fire, ice, etc... Hope this little bit of info helps your dungeon diving
Awesome, thanks for that info! One more thing, what causes strength to go down, and how do you bring it back up?
Strength can go down in a few major ways: 1) Get bitten by a rattlesnake 2) Drink a potion of poison 3) Get hit by a poison dart from a dart trap To get your strength back up, the best option is a potion of restore strength (when you drink it, the text says "it makes you feel warm all over"). You can gain one point at a time by drinking potions of gain strength, but generally you want to drink those when you are already at your peak strength, so that you get *even stronger* A good way to avoid the strength problems is to find a ring of sustain strength, but those are a bit uncommon... plus wearing one all the time will increase your hunger a bit. There are always tradeoffs in rogue
No kidding. I consider Rogue to be a game of "managing a plan gone wrong." Very rarely does the game present you with helpful circumstances; something will always be going wrong, and the way to succeed is to know how to work around each failing part of your well-laid initial plan. This is much different from resource management in other RPGs, where you are managing the success of your plan; in Rogue, you are properly managing your plan's failure.
I bought Rogue Touch ages ago when it was all the rage here at TA. Having never played the original Rogue games when I was a kid (although I had certainly known about its legendary status since I was playing games influenced by Rogue, such as Temple of Apshai on Apple ][), I don't quite get the appeal of Rogue Touch. It's a fine app with nice polish, to be sure, but when I hear people say Rogue Touch is "too hardcore", I just don't get it. I love hardcore games. But Rogue Touch inevitably turns into a "find the secret door to pass this level" or "oh shit I need food I'm getting weak" sort of tedium. And then you walk into a room and get swamped by 4 monsters and you die and you start over. You have no idea what each of the potions do, and/or when to drink them. You have no idea what basically anything does except for magical weapons. I guess I'm not finding it too enjoyable, although it's certainly not terrible, I just don't see it as the classic that it is. So what am I missing?
Chespace, It's perfectly possible that the game is simply not for you. Not all games appeal to all people of course, but knowing and playing games from that era makes me think you should enjoy it more! As to "what you are missing": You point out that you don't know what the potions do, the scrolls, the staves and wands... that is actually a pivotal part of the game, learning how to identify what you have found (even without identify scrolls) and how to put it to best use in order to stay alive (or at least delay the inevitable!). Once you get to that point, and stumble into a room with four monsters as you say, it becomes a more of a turn-based strategy game. How can I best handle this group with what I have? Should I use cancellation on the wraith (to prevent level draining) or on the troll (to prevent it regenerating)? If you're fumbling through a pack full of unknown items at that point, you'll most certainly die. Rogue definitely has layers of complexity and interaction that take time to discover. Try reading some of the strategy that other people have posted in my forums for ideas. There's some extremely clever people in there Hope you give it some more time to get into the depths, and please ask if you need any more specific help!
You sort of listed the reasons people think Rogue is "hardcore". Every game you start you know almost nothing about the nature of the objects. Learning how to properly identify and use those items is a big part of the fun of the game for me. Learning how to not get hungry all the time or how to determine where the secret doors are most likely located without searching every tile comes with experience playing the game. Rogue is an insanely difficult game, although CD was nice enough to tweak this version a little bit to give players a little better chance. Compared to Rogue's big brother, Nethack, Rogue is a fairly light and accessible game which is part of what drew me to it. I have played Nethack on and off for years and never ascended a single character. I have ascended a few times in Rogue Touch and every time I did it I felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment. I think Rogue-like games take a little bit of time to get into. You need to learn enough about the game to make it fun rather than frustrating. That learning experience however is a very large part of what makes these types of games so satisfying to play.
Thanks for your responses guys. I will give it another go with this renewed insight. BTW, how do you identify objects? Only through trial and error? Will the game remember the object type once you've already identified it? How do you identify rings?
Most items in Rogue Touch will be identified automatically on first use, rings are an exception, as are a couple of scroll and potion types. Of course, the scrolls of identify are the easiest and safest ways to figure out what other items are, but you have to find them (and use one first) to know what they are! Some helpful hints on identification of various types: 1) Scrolls: If you have two of something, read one right away. If it's an immediately identifiable type you will be able to go into the inventory and see what it was if you were not sure. 2) Potions: Same idea here as scrolls, start drinking and reading these on earlier floors, so that by the time you get to the 10th floor or so you will know what a number of them are. 3) Staves and Wands: If you're lucky enough to get them early on, try zapping monsters in the first 5 floors or so with them. That way if one does something bad, hopefully it won't be impossible to fight back! Note that you can find out what a wand or staff does in most cases like this, but not how many "charges" it has, so you won't be sure how many times you can zap a monster until you get an identify scroll. At least you will know what all staves or wands of that type are! 4) Rings: These are the only items that don't auto-identify upon use or wearing. Some types of rings you could see an effect from wearing (Add strength for example, Protection, and regeneration if you pay attention to your HP). Personally I would not put on a ring until you identified it with a scroll of identify. That way you avoid cursed rings, or wearing a ring you don't need to at the moment, which causes you to use up food faster. Weapons and armor are pretty easy, you simply wield or wear it, and in the case of weapons once you hit a monster with them the weapon's magical properties are revealed. There are 4 different secret characters in the game, each one is a "master" of one of the four types of magic items listed above. That means any time he or she finds an item of that type it is automatically and fully identified! Go to my forums (link in my sig) if you want to know their names, or the names of other secret characters....
Just got this yesterday after much waffling over which Roguelike to buy first. I figured I'd start at the beginning, and I'd been enjoying the free version of Rogue for a while...but this one is really much much better. Not buggy, easy to play within the interface, so you're able to concentrate on the strategy of the game rather than fighting with commands and menus. I must say, the game is like crack for me. I've played it about 6 of the last 24 hours. That could be a record for me on my iPod. I usually will play two or more games in that 6 hours rather than just the one. A shout out to those talking about Nethack in here...I've also really been enjoying iNethack as well, although that game is insane...it's not that uncommon for me to die in a game of Nethack within the first 2 floors! I haven't ascended yet in Rogue, but my games are being measured in hours compared to being measured in minutes in iNethack. A belated thanks to Commander Data for delivering this classic in such a fun and playable state!
I have also just started Rogue Touch - though I have only dabbled a bit so far. So, maybe you can enlighten me re: scrolls. Like - how do I find out what they do? Is it just random experimentation? Do the inscriptions reliably indicate what kind of a scroll it is? I.e. is it possible to link inscription to function once and for all? Or do I need to either identify each and every one every time or just use them blindly? TIA.
The names of the unidentified scrolls and potions offer absolutely no clues! A red potion this run could have a very different effect next session. This being said, however, once you use a specific potion (say the red one) in this game you will be told what the potion does and next time you see a red potion in this session it will go by its true title (like "Potion of Confusion").
Thanks. Does the same apply to scrolls? BTW, are potions or scrolls used for identification and do they only identify one item at a time? And how will I recognize a scroll of Identify? TIA.
Same applies to the scrolls. You pretty much will just have to take a chance and read a scroll to see what it does! It could be a scroll of identify, and if so then you'll be able to identify one item. The good news is that once you've identified the scroll/potion you'll recognize them when you find more or when you see more in your inventory. I always identify things I have in quantity when given the opportunity for this reason. Hey, can anyone help me with this: http://www.chronosoft.com/RogueTouch/RogueTouchEquipment.html Just with the weapons, what does "1d4" for example mean under melee? And what do those same numbers mean under Thrown/Shot?
