Is there any advantage for pure supports like Dancer, who has range 3, on having an elevated range?
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For pure supports?
Yes
For Dancer?
NO
Dancer is completely useless as she only has one type that is already covered by Bard, who is the best support unit in the game, and unlocked three quarters through the map where as Bard is unlocked at the very beginning of the game, which means that you are highly likely to have poured tons of levels into Bard by then to the point that leveling Dancer would be pointless!
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I mean the dancerās pretty useful in this fat farming thing I have going on
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What about Engineer and Merchant? They also have range equal to 3. Do they benefit from it in any way?
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Range doesnāt do anything for pure supports, so their range is just whatever number I happened to put in that field for their code.
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Thereās something I know wonāt get added in but I think itās funny enough to say: What if there was a āmerge fatā thing like if you press it it would take all of your extractions but it would take all the fat from everyone and puts it into the one with the most fat.
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The power increase from being fat is additive and doesnāt benefit much in later levels and higher fatness. I wish itās a constant increase like its cooldown drawback or be a multiplicative increase.
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Oh yeah weird thing I found during the point of when the fat is being added up (AKA the end of a level) you can boost other characters nothing game breaking just intriguing
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I donāt know if I want to make the bonus power from fat too good. Honestly Iām not sure I even like the mechanic at all.
I probably should fix this but since its not destructive its not a very high priority. Iāll throw it on my to-do list and get around to it sometime.
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https://www.patreon.com/posts/future-features-124063860
Hello! I wanted to have a discussion about future features to be added to Eat the Dungeon and Iām interested in your comments and feedback.
Approximately 10000 standard years ago, I wrote a roadmap for ETD that you can access from my patreonās About page. Iāve been following it very loosely for a while now. Among the things I put on there was āHard mode/Endless Modeā, two ideas Iām no longer super into.
So Iām thinking of replacing them with other features, but Iām having a hard time weighing the pros and cons of them. Iād like to gather feedback and see what everybody else thinks, and use that to inform my decision. I will probably implement 1 or 2 new features.
I will list my ideas here along with my thoughts about them, but I also want to hear your suggestions.
Hard Mode
I originally wanted this because I was worried ETDās gameplay was too āmushyā, mainly that there were too many viable party compositions to beat levels. My idea for this was that each hard version of an enemy would be limited to exactly one defense (weapon, magic, faith, sneak) so that success would only be possible if you had the exact correct team composition I designed the level for.
First off, would this even be fun? ETD is already a game about trying to read my mind and guessing what team comp I wanted you to use, and having some wiggle room probably saves it. Moreover, recent enemies have had smaller number of defenses (like 1 or 2) which kind of already does this. Honestly I donāt like this idea at all.
Endless Mode
I thought this might be like a fun āchallengeā: all your characters are set to 0 weight and you are sent to a dungeon that can go on forever. The idea is that thereād be some unique fail condition (like half the party is KOād or you take too long on a room) and you could see how far you get for bragging rights.
I think this is all kind of obsolesced by the uncapped rpg stats of ETD. How far you get is basically a function of how highly leveled your team is. I guess I could standardize it to 10 for each stat, or give you a budget of xp points to build your team, but at that point I feel like Iām making a second game. I think my time is better spend elsewhere.
Passive Special Abilities
Now, on to the new ideas.
These would be unique passives for each character. They would be simple bonuses and alterations to make the characters play slightly differently. Overpowered characters would receive weak passives and underpowered characters would get strong ones. Here are some examples to illustrate what Iām aiming for:
- Ranger- Sniper: Deals double damage to enemies in the farthest column
- Illusionist- Trickery: Adds three seconds to enemyās current attack timers
- Dancer- Alacrity: Doubles the cooldown reduction on support targets.
Unique abilities is something thatās been requested from time to time and Iāve been hesitant to do it because I was worried expanding the design of the basic gameplay. It could introduce a bunch more bugs and making fixing bugs a huge pain. Iāve worked on several game projects that rapidly went out of scope and became an absolute nightmare to maintain. So Iāve been extremely (perhaps too extremely) gun-shy about adding new features to ETD I hadnāt originally planned for.
But maybe I do need to add something more to it. Iām worried that the gameplay is too repetitive. Iām worried about certain characters being over powered/under powered and not being able to address that with just the current gameplay.
But also ETD is like 90% done! Adding such a big gameplay feature this late might be a huge mistake! Or maybe it isnāt! I donāt know! What you do guys think?
Bestiary
A menu that lets you check out enemy names, stats, art, lore. Thereād be descriptions to flesh out the story and world.
Its pretty straightforward and relatively easy to do. But do people even want it? Would it be useful?
No New Features
Finally, it might also be worth adding no new features at all. The gameās already a year behind my original schedule for it, and itād be great to catch up. Itād be great to finish it and move on to another project. Sometimes you gotta cut content to make your goals. Kill your darlings, and all that.
Please let me know what you think!
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So, my two-cents on future additions:
Hard Mode/Endless Mode
I agree that both seem somewhat redundant. Despite that, Endless Mode could be pretty interesting if implemented well. To that end, Iāll leave my perspective:
- Endless Mode could be a separate game mode from the main game.
- Within that mode, you have access to all the characters youāve unlocked in the main game.
- Characters in Endless Mode start out at level one.
- Every few rooms, you are permitted to extract and level up your characters for the journey ahead.
- As your run progresses, you must pass an increasing number of rooms till your next opportunity to extract.
- Characters cannot be reset during a run. Only by starting over can you respec your choices.
Passive Special Abilities
I think this is a pretty cool idea, and Iād love to see what you come up with!
Bestiary
Yes please, Iām a sucker for knowledge.
No New Features
I must admit Iād be morose if you went this route, but ultimately itās your game; So if this is what you think is best then go for it.
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I would love a bestiary that would be so cool
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Passives & Bestiary (B-EAT-stiary, if you will) are a yes from me, as they could make previously useless units (I.E. Dancer) be actually viable and further differentiate certain units that are notably similar to others. And lore codexās is always a net-positive (just look at the Piklopedia, for instance)
Endless iām indifferent to, theyāre not really my type of thing but it wouldnāt hurt.
Hard mode is a hard pass for me (see what i did there?) as some of the more recent levels (Feaster of Heroes for instance) are already difficult/annoying enough as it is, i donāt need to live in constant fear a multi-hundred HP enemy that i donāt have a damage type for jump-scaring me and making the level take 10 or more times as long!
I agree with dropping both Hard and Endless Mode. The game already has a form of difficulty scaling in the ranking system, and adding a higher difficulty on top of that would probably just end up being frustrating and lacking in engagement apart from trial-and-error to find the exact party comp needed to beat a mission. Meanwhile, in my experience endless modes tend to be not very well balanced and flat-out uninteresting past a certain point.
Passives could be a good addition, but as you said adding them this late into development could have unintended consequences. Iām not simply speaking about new bugs and whatnot, but if theyāre not well thought out I can foresee certain combinations of characters outright breaking the game. At the very least theyād probably require a few balance passes, which may well be more effort than itās worth.
I am 100% in favor of a bestiary though, and really a codex in general. Iām a big fan of lore in these types of games and regular unlocks would be another incentive for those of a similar mind to keep playing. Itād also be completely optional for individuals who prefer their stimulation to be more visual in nature.
Finally, my most essential piece of feedback. One Iāve been wanting to provide for a while, but havenāt been able to on account of lacking an account here. That is, the Cultist is cute and did not deserve her fate.
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i really love Endless Mode
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Yes: Passive Abilities & Bestiary
Maybe: Endless mode & No New Stuff
Yeah no: Hard Mode
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At this point it would be like I was making another game entirely alongside the main Eat the Dungeon game lol.
Yeah my time is better spent making sure the difficulty that already exists is interesting.
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Outta pure boredom if it was possible would you turn ETD into a VR game?
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if there is an ending to this I well be happy to see immobile blobs
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