Caves of Qud (ROGUELIKE) - coming December 5th

[MisterStone]

Naw I meant build like "this is my 3.5ed Dungeons and Dragons Wizard/Thief/Fighter/Barbarian multiclass build." Character build. I picked a mutant for a game and had a million choices in character generation that I don't really want to learn the nuances of cold. Whereas in URW you get achievement-based tutorials (e.g. "dry some fish, build a hut") that kinda instruct you on the groundwork of the game (and I had to resist putting "game" in quotes for URW). I like getting thrown straight into games that are meant to be games like Crawl, but for simulated world sandbox type stuff with no obvious point I like to know what they've implemented and how they expect you to mess with it before I start ad libbing.

Well in order to familiarize myself with the game, I've just been playing a marauder build (basically a barbarian melee class- they start with axe proficiency, charge skill and butchery as a survival aid). Playing with one of these is a pretty simply roguelike experience, just run up to stuff and bash on it. As I play like this I begin to notice other features in the game, and I think this gives me clues on how other classes/builds work. The nice thing about the game is that, like crawl, none of the starting proficiencies are unique, and they can be picked up by anyone later in the game, although often it would require a very heavy investment of skill points to do so. For instance, to learn the charge skill that the marauder class starts out with, I think you normally have to learn a high tier skill first, and then the charge skill. But if you start out as a marauder, you just know the charge skill without learning the high tier skill required to 'unlock' it.

So really if you want to get into the game, just play as a marauder, warden or some other melee class and start hackin'.

 

[Albers]

Well I thought the terrain was decent, but the monsters are sort of hard to notice in my experience.

Yeah, you're walking through a green field surrounded by six different kinds of green plants and trees and then *bam* something takes half your health away in one hit. Oh, it's a green crocodile.

 

[Mackerel]

I had the same problem until I disabled floor textures in the options.

 

[Lightknight]

My GOD this game is slow dotNET shit.
No negatives other than that but GODDAMN its the dotNET garbagecode !

 

[SkeleTony]

Fuck ascii.

Unimaginative excuse for laziness in development is unimaginative.

 

[7hm]

Fuck ascii.

Unimaginative excuse for laziness in development is unimaginative.

Pretty sure unimaginative refers to the person who can't play with ascii graphics.

 

[Zoopy Joobles]

Excellent game, ignore the casuals and graphics whores on this site and do give it a try.

 

[tindrli]

and how is it now?? anyone still playing it?

 

[Damned Registrations]

So this thing still has it's hooks in me, and I keep finding more and more effective ways to break the early game. Spoilers on doing that ahead. My previous strategy was burglaring Grit Gate with mutations (phasing being the cheapest in terms of mutation points, though teleport + clairvoyance could work too), which tends to get you a decent set of loot, but I've now discovered the fungal jungle, which can easily supply you with enough cash to just buy out every merchant you ever meet. My next character is going to start with at least 26 int and focus on making some insanely high tech bullshit after buying dozens of data disks. I'll worry about my other stats after I can shoot down security doors with my scoped phase cannon and manufacture eater nectar. I've also come to the conclusion that melee really is just non-viable past the early game. Rejoinder and a good knife+shank will wreck the shit out of basically anything in range, but once the mid game starts up, everything starts spamming ranged attacks, often ones that ignore your DV like grenades or flame breath or whatever. So I'm thinking heavy armour is the way to go instead. Maybe carapace for the frost/fire resist, not sure how that plays out in the endgame.

 

[Fowyr]

So this thing still has it's hooks in me, and I keep finding more and more effective ways to break the early game. Spoilers on doing that ahead. My previous strategy was burglaring Grit Gate with mutations

That skulk tonic can phase you too.
Also fulcrete walls could be destroyed with vibro weapons on critical hits.

fungal jungle, which can easily supply you with enough cash to just buy out every merchant you ever meet.

How? What do you harvest there? Pretty sure that I can't make it in my old version, but still interested.

I've also come to the conclusion that melee really is just non-viable past the early game.

Dunno, vibro blades are always viable.

 

[Damned Registrations]

It has various pools of fluid there. Pretty much anything you can think of, including lava, which is stupidly valuable (and not exactly easy to harvest) but a half dozen skins full of wine, primordial soup, cider, etc. will sell for a ton of money unless you have an ego of 10 or something.

And the issue with melee isn't damage, but being able to survive the 10 turns it takes to get to something before it kills you. I've been killed by something like 11 tiles away infinitely chain stunning me with a rocket launcher or some shit, never even saw what was firing. Psychics are also incredibly dangerous. I can kill even something as insane as a saltback in melee reliably with the right equipment, but even a few grenade chucking goatmen are a serious threat.

 

[Fowyr]

And the issue with melee isn't damage, but being able to survive the 10 turns it takes to get to something before it kills you.

Sprint or force bracelet is often handy in these situations.

I've been killed by something like 11 tiles away infinitely chain stunning me with a rocket launcher or some shit, never even saw what was firing.

Oh, that's "8" robot with energy weapon that works like rocket launcher. It's a deathwish. Worse are only chrome pyramids.

 

[Damned Registrations]

At any rate, given how easy it is to get ammo, it seems to make way more sense to just use guns if you want an agility build (which you definitely do) and spend your skillpoints elsewhere besides a melee tree. I may not be able to kill a slumberling in a single round or wipe out a horde of pygmys by standing in place while they gut themselves on my knife, but a carbine will still kill pretty much anything in a few bursts, and it'll do those few bursts several turns before you could get there in melee, from a safer position near cover, instead of out in the open getting sniped from all sides.

Oh, does anyone know what a nullray pistol does? No useful info on the wiki, and I couldn't see any effect in game either.

 

[Fowyr]

Found a phase cannon, very nice thing, but there is a catch.
It's too powerful for solar and chem cells and even antimatter cells are used in 20-30 shots. Price of recharging antimatter cell is 65 scrap power systems. Ouch. For reference, price of recharging chem cell is only 3.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Can vendors recharge it for you?

 

[Fowyr]

Can vendors recharge it for you?

Yup, but they take around $30 with Ego 10 for chem cell. It would be probably $1000 for the antimatter.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Eh, that'd be easy enough for me. Vials of lava sell for around 1600$ and I have effectively 24 ego, so it'd probably only cost 100$ or so anyways.

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

Fell into a shaft (near the Arch) which I thought were stairs, now there is no way out of the dungeon...

 

[Thonius]

You don't have recoiler? If not that it's time to restart since you know you're 10 minutes deep in the game (tops)

 

[Damned Registrations]

If you're feeling bad about losing your snapjaw dudes, trying snagging an Equimax from the flower fields. If you can pull that off you'll be set for a good long while, those things are mean.

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

Randomly ran into mutant hating templars. Teleport ftw, saved me and bot followers who did follow this time on map change.

You don't have recoiler? If not that it's time to restart since you know you're 10 minutes deep in the game (tops)

How about several hours. And no battery in sight.

Equimax aggro on Beguile, tried twice.

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

Snapjaw warlords of level 8 met their match with Goatmen Savages...
Who sport 30 Str, 20 Agi, 22 Tou, ~17 all mind attributes. 60HP. Shield skill. Level 15 though, so no mutations to gain or maybe its possible to get another 4 levels. Right now T&J are still a match for em but retirement is close...

edit

In a close encounter of the first kind a snapjaw with axes skills chopped of an arm of a goatman sower, who sows seeds which explode...

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

"You took 48 points of damage from Goatfolk Shaman's disintegration"

Good thing I stopped playing ironman in the cave...

 

[Damned Registrations]

How sad is it that even with stats like that goatmen savages are still just harmless fodder compared to a dagger build with only 1 decent stat instead of 3.

 

[Ziem]

Development of this game progresses almost as fast as grimoires

Will check back in 10 years to see if autoexplore still ignores turrets (resulting in them having free turns, possibly killing you), what kind of new stupid mutation/item/implant/anything-but-actual-content was added, and whether there is a new quest before the "lol gaem not finished" message pops up. It's quite likely that my little adventure will be ended by a random out of depth bullshit chrome pyramid next to the starting village, or on some bugged dungeon floor which features no exits