ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

(For reference, this is based off of Beta 23 and played mostly using a dwarf berserker on 'roguelike' difficulty. A time of writing, I was level 29 and had just finished Dreadfell.)

The most significant mechanic that makes ToME 4 stand out is the use of COOLDOWNS FOR EVERYTHING. This does have a good impact on player tactics - you can't just spam attacks, offensive play needs to be balanced with defensive against stronger foes, and there tends to be a lot more movement and flow to battles rather than just standing still and hurling allegedly epic attacks at each other. Fighting a strong mob of enemies can require much more thought than a lot of other roguelikes, but ...

... in practise, this wasn't usually the case. Most dungeon encounters were trivial because I could just throw all my abilities at them; other limits (stamina) only became a problem in extended battles and resting between fights was very, very rarely a problem. Most roguelikes have a penalty for overusing abilities - be it a hard number of uses of ongoing problems like hunger - but these kinds of cost/benefit decisions are missing in ToME4. This leaves it with a little less depth to an average battle. Alternatively, giving enemies a much more aggressive AI to search out the player would force the player to consider the risk/reward of using up their talents at once.

And while mob situations were tactically challenging, most boss fights were straightforward. You just smack them with everything as your talents come back up. Maybe run away for a bit if their damage outweighs your healing. The only really interesting ones were those that could teleport or summon.

Equipment shuffling was engaging, with an impressive number of stats and resistance and such to choose between even from the first dungeon. Although it does feel kind of weird when NON-ego items are the rare finds. Color coding equipment based on value was a nice touch, it could have even used a couple of extra shades to judge the power at a glance. The rareness of some equip types felt off - it took me forever to find even a crappy cloak. Infusions/runes more or less function as equips but are much less interesting than they sounded in theory. I just know every character I play is going to end up with the same healing/regen/teleport setup.

The lack of scrolls, potions and all the usual consumables was a little disappointing. I understand that it focuses the gameplay on tactical battles rather than allowing the player to hoard heals and grind through tough fights, but at the cost of cutting out inventory resource management altogether. Trips back to town were boring (did the stores even ever restock?) and I ended up tediously dumping loot for the sake of the Power is Money talent. Aside from a few crappy wands, it also meant that the number of options open in battle was always the same comparatively small number of talents.

What is the POINT of the Orb of Scrying? Just take out the identifying system altogether, or you might as well give the player a Rock of Not Being A Rock (allows the character to automatically breathe) for all it adds to the game.

The talents ... are okay. On the upside: there are enough that my Generic Warrior Guy had interesting choices beyond 'hack up baddy' and 'slash up baddy', and you're able to play around with different opening focuses if you get killed a lot. On the downside: that each talent only equates to a single usable skill, the difference between each talent level can be very mild, half of them are passive, and you only get two points per level up ... progress feels painfully slow at times. It particularly hurts that you can't check how powerful a talent will be at max level until you're nearly there (makes for wasted points), and some of them are all but worthless at 1/5.

The end result of most of the above is that while an individual fight may be fun, very frequently (and regardless of how well I played) I'd come out of a string of them in the exact same shape with the exact same resources as before, except maybe now my spinning attack would do 10% more damage. It's not very satisfying.

Anyway. Enemy variety was good, particularly when I started getting hit by their talents and various status conditions. The wall of stats in your face when you look at them takes away some of the excitement of seeing new ones. Mind you, enemy levels felt really non-indicative of their power; often I could take down enemies whose levels much higher than my own (L13 me vs several L35 trolls who were in the middle of a large mob was the most extreme case), other times archers of lower level would take a serious bite out of my health in one turn. The dungeon level feelings were fairly useless for this reason.

And bosses give WAY too much exp, IMHO. All of the times I can recall nearly dying with my current character were vs mobs of standard enemies, usually in difficult quest events, but not against bosses.

Ally AI felt underdeveloped. They run straight into known traps, don't always step around obstacles to engage enemies, tend to flitter awkwardly around the end of your leash range ... Hopefully they'll be touched up in a later beta. Escort AI is obviously suicidal, but I guess that's kind of the point, LOL.

World map encounters were weaksauce. Dungeon traps were equally uninteresting - I can't recall ever being seriously hurt or threatened by one, and their effects were nothing special so far. The lore scattered around the place was nice. I mean it's no Legerdemain, but it was interesting if often predictable. Dreadfell's has been my favourite so far.

Achievements. Really? Really? This is a roguelike game; just beating the thing is an actual achievement, and pops up telling you that OMG LOOK AT ALL YOUR MONEYS are quite frankly patronising. Locking most of the starting options is not great either, especially without any indication of when/how they're unlocked. Natural progression is for early game content to unlock late game content ... but the way it is now, a player unfamiliar with roguelikes could get bored before even seeing most of the beginning game content. While the experienced player has to invest significant time in content they might be bored of (or just not as interested in) in order to try out a cool new class. It's not great.

The different starting locations were a nice touch. I felt a bit undirected after completing the first dungeon you're plonked in, though. You're given a list of possible locations to move onto, but I found that the first few I tried I had to back out of due to increasing danger. After I'd gained a few more levels I was able to take down a couple of bosses and explore more smoothly. The sandworm tunnels were neat at first, but kind of annoying when you just wanted to get to the stairs. The mazes were exactly as dull as they sounded, but the layout there was where I was first able to get used to taking down over-levelled enemies. Running from air bubble to air bubble in the Lake of Nur looked like it might have been awesome, but I'd found a helm of depths by that point SO WHATEVER. The variety of dungeon layouts is good. The ruined halfling complex was my favourite!

The temporal rift sequence was interesting. At the time, it felt like a bit of a dick move to spring on me, but the nature of the cooldown mechanics / lack of inventory resources means that you could actually get away with flinging the character around more often without screwing them over, or even feeling unfair if it was more commonplace.

The end of the slaving ring dungeon WAS a dick move, though. Way to take my gold and then do nothing because I'd killed the obvious boss monster in front of me. The event after leaving Dreadfell was both the kind of subversion that risks taking away the player's faith in core mechanics in a way that might seriously cause them to mess up later AND mean.

Technically speaking, the game ran fine most of the time (I use XP on a not-fantastic laptop). There were occasional lua errors (mostly regarding the brotherhood of alchemist quest), but nothing that crashed the game or screwed over the character. The engine did, however, hang FOREVER when entering previously visited towns or levels. In one case it literally took over ten minutes to start Old Forest 6. In addition to Legerdemain and Desktop Dungeons you are ALSO NOT DWARF FORTRESS and I would love to know what fantastic details you are actually processing here.

Oh, and the UI feels buggy and terrible. That is all I will say on that topic at this time.

~ OVERALL ~

ToME 4 is ... good? The mechanics are different enough that it's worth playing long enough to try out a few classes. But even putting aside the parts that are obviously still WIP, the game feels too dumbed down for me to enjoy in long playing sessions like eg. ADoM, and at the same time too slow for me enjoy in short playing sessions like eg. DoomRL. I am having fun with my buffed up, two-handed maiming whore, but ... there's no way I could bothered playing through the same class again if this one dies.

Still, looking forward to future releases!

Keep in mind that this game appears to be made not just to satisfy the hardcore roguelike fans but to be a fun and accessible game by itself. So yeah, achievements may not mean much to you, but mainstream gamers like them and I thought they were a fun touch.

I had some very interesting battles using the archmage (b21), with both bosses and sometimes with monsters, especially on certain levels. But in past, with older versions, I played with the dwarf fighter and it was straightforward and boring (I think b13).

Yet even with the archmage isn't always interesting. It's still a bit dumbed down in some aspects in respect to other roguelikes. No food, no divinities, no good traps, not the immense variety of effects that many roguelikes have.

To me it looks like a cross between a roguelike and diablo, with a lot of unique nice ideas. It would really benefit to be a 3d game, perhaps would render certain phases of the game a bit less boring. Well that's pretty obvious. But it won't happen so, as it is now, it's interesting mostly for the variety of classes.

Anyway many interesting things comes after a certain level, and maybe simply put certain classes are more boring than others.

PhoenixToME wrote: Yet even with the archmage isn't always interesting. It's still a bit dumbed down in some aspects in respect to other roguelikes. No food, no divinities, no good traps, not the immense variety of effects that many roguelikes have.

Anyway many interesting things comes after a certain level, and maybe simply put certain classes are more boring than others.

Fun traps are still a much wanted addition to the game. However I think DG wants to avoid screw the player totally traps (like blasting and what not in angband and it's variants) so a middle ground needs to be found between stuff that's challenging and stuff that can ruin a character.

As to berserkers, I just gave up on a promising one because the class doesn't suit me (found it very boring). Other people love them. Different strokes for different folks.

I can kinda relate to the OPs comment about not playing a character through a second time. I keep wanting to play another fighter but every time I start one I can't get back into it. On the other hand I've played a number of mages to mid levels and two wyrmics to high levels. So again I think it's about the class and what appeals to the player.

Again to the OP, especially the dick move comments. This is still beta and some things that go into a beta release are untested or unbalanced. If you have a suggestion on how to improve it then suggest it. Don't assume that someone that's making a game for the sake of his own love of creating something like this and his own love of sharing that experience with other people is doing something just to piss people off. It's very possible the 150g thing after you kill the Blood Master was an over sight.

Anyway, I can't help but feel like I and the other members of the community are being trolled here. There may be some constructive criticism in the OP's post but it's laced with so much venom and sarcasm that it's hard to take anything good out of it.

LOL, and here I thought scattershot (archer skill) was going to reviewed. - It certainly was an AOE stun effect.

OneMoreNameless, did you want us to reply to any of these things? Because a lot seem to be design decisions (cooldowns, lack of consumables, etc.) that you have issues with, and these are things that probably won't change. And I personally find it refreshing and a relief.

Other things, as has been mentioned is still beta.

Edge2054 wrote: It's very possible the 150g thing after you kill the Blood Master was an over sight.

Yes, that would be a bug, and has been reported afaik (I don't think it has it's own thread). Not sure if it's fixed in b24.

I apologise if I came across as 'venomous' ... my intention with this review isn't to overly criticize or expect sudden change, but to detail my personal experience with the game for the more active community to consider (or not) as the game develops. This is a beta after all, so I was expecting there to be a few bugs and less developed areas. Most of the references to other games or UNNECESSARY CAPITAL LETTERS should be read as slightly tongue-in-cheek. I don't expect much specific reply.

It isn't strictly the case that my issues are with core design decisions. (Except class unlocks.) Heavy cooldown is part of what made ToME 4 worthwhile playing at all, and I'm assuming it's not going to change. But that doesn't mean that the weaknesses of these decisions can't be identified and improved or covered for in other areas!

Maybe this will make more sense if I do give some quick suggestions.

Problem: Talents are easily abused against average encounters.
* Allow the AI to search aggressively for the player when resting.
* Add a 'focus' or 'style' guage that drops from talent use and rises from basic kills.

Problem: The focus on battles can get repetitious.
* Spawn more ego items with activations.
* Increase the number of different AI behaviours.
* Add random dungeon events.

Problem: Character progress feels slow.
* Give an exp bonus for killing overleveled enemies.
* Include more shorter quests as landmarks.

Problem: Achievements can come across as pointless.
* Replace the obvious statements with jokes or bad puns.
* Unlock related lore for each achievement.

Problem: There are bugs and lag.
* Fix the bugs.
* Optimise the lag.

And so on.

(I did figure the 150g thing as a bug, but the area is still unfair because the player is given no indication that not killing the boss is even an option. The obvious solution is to swap the places of the orb and boss, or have the boss offer a dialogue box when you approach.)

OneMoreNameless wrote: * Allow the AI to search aggressively for the player when resting.

This already happens. Bosses, once awakened, will path directly to you no matter what. Other monsters may or may not. I know for sure I've been "hunted" by the sentient crystals in the cavern even after running around a corner out of their line of sight. They'll phase door until they have me back in line of sight. It's pretty impressive for a crystal.

Problem: The focus on battles can get repetitious.

It's a roguelike game. You're supposed to mow down thousands of monsters.

* Add random dungeon events.

If you have specific ideas, I'm sure the developers would be interested....

Problem: Character progress feels slow.

A few betas ago, a decision was made to decrease monster XP and increase boss XP. You typically gain 1 or more levels for every boss. The point of this was to reduce grinding.

(I did figure the 150g thing as a bug, but the area is still unfair because the player is given no indication that not killing the boss is even an option ...

I ranted about this too, over on the Spoilers forum.

Yeah, there's a few threads started already for more in game dungeon content, not just vaults but vaults with more of a purpose or theme to them like dragon liars that contain randomly generated unique dragons and stuff like that. Any specific suggestions you have would be welcome.

Imho random interesting minibosses are a good idea to give more life to the sometimes tedious hack & slash from the start of a dungeon to the boss (yes there are already minibosses but to my knowledge they're not random so they're prevedible), perhaps also squad of random elite monsters that work in sinergy one with each other. And yes, there are already monsters that behave differently and hunt you down like they're coordinated.

There could be plenty of random dungeon events, there are already some (take valuts or escorts), I guess it's only a matter of time. Some already have been proposed on other threads. But it has to be done properly or maybe they can be tedious, if too frequent.

Also I'm thinking that this game lacks curses and polymorphism, or I didn't discovered them yet. Temporary polymorph could be fun (I don't think that polymorphing permanently into a dragon or a titan, like I did in nethack, is a good idea in tome), or curses. There could be a funny way to put off a curse (taken by a trap, a mob, an item) like a quest or a sub-quest. It sounds to me really in tone with tome. I'll check the forum later if someone has proposed something like this.

Just a note - I hope everyone keeps in mind that the majority of non new class and non new items code work is done by DG - alot of stuff like that requires new functions in the engines and then a lot of time actually coding it all up. Yes, t4's over a year old now, but that is still extremely new for any game in development; just give thanks that we have as much as we do, and that we keep getting more.

There are currently a handful of rare unique monsters, though personally I am happy they are so rare. Though more is always nice.

Thanks.

I appreciate your view of the game as just a recent visitor to the world of Maj'Eyal, which is refreshing compared the squabbling over minutiae I'm used to enjoying with the other hardcore players.

For the matter, I didn't see so much as a drop of venom in anything you wrote.

I'd recommend you have a go at the Insane difficulty mode. Most folks around here seem to consider it as some goofy sideshow, but I'd like to push it as a legitimate and enjoyable mode of play. Progress can become even quite breezy on this one around the middle of the game, though you might have to enter and re-enter your race's starting dungeon over 20 times to get a viable opening layout.

The Arena mode too, may sate your thirst for lightning-paced, intensely tactical play. We're working on improving the options and range of difficulty modes for that one, I believe.

Do just dig a little bit deeper before moving onto other realms to look for greater treasures of tactical gameplay, as I'll warrant there's enough here to provide at least an irregular staple of your roguelike enjoyment.

EDIT:

I hear you on the monster patrols and the value of summoning on bosses.

I've been meaning to push for a better handling of the way foes confront you in this game- thanks to a "chaining"-based aggro approach, it's often either a million-to-one or one at a time. The fact you could be swarmed by ten or twenty assorted trolls, snakes and insect swarms in the Trollmire and be expected to survive (discounting the always-fair option of fleeing!) suggests there is something off about the difficulty level of individual monsters. I'd like to suggest a nicer way of tilting the numbers against the player's favour from time to time, namely with a system of "patrol" or wandering monsters, but I've been holding back until I have a more rounded opinion on the subject.

Also, bosses could have "retinues". More about this later.