ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

I'll preface this by saying that I (and I assume many other roguelike players) get satisfaction by overcoming the game's obstacles through knowledge and skill rather than from exploiting a particular feature to make a character unstoppable. Its this satisfaction that brought me to the game in the first place, and its this satisfaction that keeps bringing me back.

Today the in-game chat shifted towards the topic of the donator-only item stash feature.

Then people started thinking of ideas of how to break the game by using the stash, such as storing multiple Blood of Life copies, or alchemist reward potions, or sandworm queen's heart, etc.

This concerns me as a player and recent donator because, although I personally don't care for twinking characters, the aforementioned items can break a game for a character that could potentially receive an uncountable number of lives, stats, or skill points.

Are these players ideas about the stash correct?

If so, could this be changed in such a way that only 1 copy of these possibly exploitable items is usable on a character from the stash and 1 copy from the actual game?
Ex. A character could use a Blood of Life from the game and use a Blood of Life from the stash, but cannot use any more.

I feel like that would be an acceptable compromise because it allows the extra twinking but cannot get out of hand.

I don't think that would work for the Blood of Life (though it probably would for potions/heart/bile). IIRC, it's something like drank_blood_of_life=true, not lives = lives + 1. Changing alchemist rewards to a straight bonus instead of an item that you then use, and changing(?) the heart/bile to be 1/character would take care of those issues

I'm more concerned about the effects of reshape weapon/armour, imbued items, and Limmir's amulets. That could give a character the benefits of 15 (or more) generic points, a prodigy, and a quest, without having to make any sacrifices with that character.

Mm... yeah, make a "crafting bot" adventurer with all the necessaries (imbue, crafty hands, reshaping, though I guess just a mindslayer could manage that...) and enough to get high enough level to be able to maximize the effect, then just pass off kit you want improved on some other character.

Very meta. Pass the craft bot the highest bonus stat boosters you can find (and probably stack on inner power, heroism infusions, etc., so forth, to maximize reshape potential) as you go along with other characters so it can kit swap to boost reshape... lot could be done with that.

Shouldn't item vault use be causing massive anomalies or random chronomancer attacks or something? And hopefully it's flagging use in the character dump, yes?

Erm, Yeah I guess. But slots will cost you money. REAL MONEY. If you are willing to pay to cheat "legally" in a single player game, then you know, at least you are paying DarkGod. So you beat ToME 4. Well done. Write it on your CV.

So if you have the patience to play many many games to farm up those items, then you know you deserve the win even I it's just for perseverance.

I'd like it a bit more if items that had passed through the stash system got marked in some way.

Maybe a different color?

It's not necessary, but for the purposes of finding out data about character builds etc., it would be nice to know that a character, say, shored up their build with a bunch of high end equipment.

Canderel wrote:Erm, Yeah I guess. But slots will cost you money. REAL MONEY.

Unless I'm misunderstanding how it works, that doesn't matter at all, after one slot. The way I understand it, you can put an item into the vault with character A, take it out with B, and repeat until you transfer all of the items.

Items ARE marked actaully, with a big red text, cant miss it

Although yeah things like the brotherhood rewards shouldnt transfer. I've flagged them as plot items now so they cant be.

And sandworm queen?

@Canderel Sure, I just don't like the idea of someone "legally" cheating and getting a "legal" winner because of it. Also, I think sandworm queen is already marked as a plot item(?) and shouldn't be an issue.

Thanks for the response dg.

Im the one that started this insanity on the ingame chat actually

My first thought as a stone warden was TWO titanics. It shouldnt happen but I think its possible? Then other ideas started comming to me on how it might be possible to exploit the shared stash.

Do artifacts have a flag? That only one can be generated in a game? If not, they probably should. Just sayin.

Rectifier wrote:@Canderel Sure, I just don't like the idea of someone "legally" cheating and getting a "legal" winner because of it. Also, I think sandworm queen is already marked as a plot item(?) and shouldn't be an issue.

Thanks for the response dg.

Here we go with the 'having fun the wrong way' crowd again.

Let's forbid Adventure mode from the vaults while we're at it.

Seriously, just put a flag on people who used the item vault's account marking them as item vault users, and then let them have their win. It's not like a couple of items from the vault are going to create an instant winner, and it's not like they didn't have to get those items in the first place. I like that the feature exists, even if I'm not going to use it. Beyond that, you can run a lot more concept characters with access to other character's items - like, for example, whip rogues or trident berserkers - without having to install mods to do that. I like that.

belmarduk wrote:

Rectifier wrote:@Canderel Sure, I just don't like the idea of someone "legally" cheating and getting a "legal" winner because of it. Also, I think sandworm queen is already marked as a plot item(?) and shouldn't be an issue.

Thanks for the response dg.

Here we go with the 'having fun the wrong way' crowd again.

Let's forbid Adventure mode from the vaults while we're at it.

Seriously, just put a flag on people who used the item vault's account marking them as item vault users, and then let them have their win.

I think that what's people want. Right now I can easily filter out the adventure winner in the character vault. I can't filter out the stash users.

Some classes are really weak in the beginning so the stash can give them access to infusions and runes that will help them through their weak phase.

Right now I can look at the character vault and see how they used their talent points and stat point but a Arcane Blade with access to a level 30 shielding rune plays completely different then a Blade with a more level appropriate shield.

I have prevented obvious game breakers (like stacking up on aclh potions), and items transfered are marked, so are characters.

I agree with bel, as long as it's obvious if people use it it's fine.
One could easily make an "invulnerable addon" that makes you unkillable, it would still appear on the vault, it's jsut marked as such. So no difference there

Addon idea

Ok just kidding, but coming from me who've created 2 "make the game easier" addons....