The ID still needs some improvement

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Mel
Higher
Posts: 67
Joined: Sat Feb 08, 2014 11:14 pm

The ID still needs some improvement

#1 Post by Mel »

So, I've been playing a lot of ID lately (finally got past floor 50 on Insane, yay) and I believe while it is definitely more fun to play than before, there are still some issues that plague the whole thing.

- Let's start with the biggest problem, an oversight so glaring I can't believe it's not been adressed yet. Currently there is no way to access the Mirror of Swag in the ID, and my characters are stuck looking like trash. Please, add a chance for a Mirror room like there is already a chance for a Vault Orb room.

- Another problem that I think is an oversight and not a feature: you can't respec your character in the ID (unless playing on Exploration mode) because it has no "towns". Even though I despise the whole respec limitation thing and would like nothing more than its complete removal from the game (it only adds tedium, not strategic planning), I don't think that will happen, so a workaround will have to be found for allowing respec in the ID somehow.

- The early ID is still super painful, even more so with weapon-based classes with no ranged abilities. There are no shops (unless you find one of these rare Embers tinker merchants), so you're stuck with entry-level gear and terrible infusions, with no other way to get better things than to find them on the floor. I believe 1.6 will at least adress the infusion problem partially (let's hope it will mean I'll never see another 40 hp healing infusion again), but currently the early ID with melee classes is often akin to a coin toss which will determinate whether you'll find good weapons and armor quickly or not. Apart from adding shops now and then with a guaranteed one on floor 1 I don't really see how to fix this.

- Currently there is no purpose to money in the ID. So that's another point in favor of shops. A mechanic that enabled you to turn money into XP would be amazing, but harder to implement.

- I have never seen any small vault in the ID and I often see greater vaults on early floors, even as early as floor 1. Unless you're playing some seriously overpowered build it's pretty hard to clear a greater vault early, and unlike the main game there is no way to come back later when your character is stronger. I think allowing smaller vaults, with a higher probability on the first floors, would smoothen the early game a bit.

- Originally I was not a fan of the alternate dungeon layouts (call me old-fashioned but seeing forests in an "Infinite Dungeon" felt super weird), but after a lot of playthroughs I think it's a good feature, although some layouts are hard to make out (Heart of the Gloom shroom party + Wilderness layout is particularly hard on the eyes), and seeing "Geometrically Ordered" (Embers final area layout) for the tenth time starts to become a bit boring. Apart from these two small gripes I think that feature is fine as it is.

- Quests are a good idea, but there are currently not a lot of them so they repeat often. Unlike some people I think Rush Hour and Pacifist are not completely terrible (they're optional, and in later floors completing them instead of clearing the level will often reward you with stats or talent points quicker). On the other hand, the pink artifact rewards are absolutely terrible. On the early levels, they're often useless (most of the time, they're out of your build, and with the amount of randbosses guarding stairs you can find something better very quickly). On the later levels, when you're sporting uniques and randarts all over the place, they're useless 100% of the time and getting a crappy pink when you spammed Track for half an hour to find that elusive enemy you're missing for Exterminator is infuriating. These artifact rewards need to go. Awarding XP instead (like a set % of what you're missing for the next level, which would be useful from floor 1 to floor 500) would benefit all builds.

- On later floors (50+) the amount of drakeling spam in some levels is absolutely incredible and makes the game lag like Hell. Send some drake hunters in the ID please :/

- Is there some reason why importing a character from AoA or Embers into the ID doesn't allow them to level past 50? Since the whole point of the ID is reaching really high levels it kinda defeats the purpose.

If you actually read everything, you're eligible for a reward:

Code: Select all

Gnukmurf the torque of nothingness [power 1] (999 cooldown)
infused by psionic forces
20.0 Encumbrance

Type: charm / torque ; tier 0

It can be used to waste a turn, putting all charms on cooldown for 999 turns.

Torques are made by powerful psionics to store psionic powers. Except this one, which stores nothing.

anp
Halfling
Posts: 108
Joined: Mon Nov 04, 2013 1:28 am
Location: St.Petersburg, Russia

Re: The ID still needs some improvement

#2 Post by anp »

Half of mentioned problems are solved by using Infinite500 add-on (namely, shops, which makes melee starts easier; respec points;no idea if it adds small vaults, but i've seen a few during my ID runs).

As for pink items quest rewards I think it's intended and you always have a chance to win literally nothing being that rare tier 2 axe, it's just russian lottery.

All other mentioned ones are present, I sign up.
Topics of my winners:
[39106] [39570] [40395] [40528] [41077] [47980] [48042][48533]
My characters: https://te4.org/user/77557/characters

Drazhya
Wayist
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Jan 31, 2016 9:58 pm

Re: The ID still needs some improvement

#3 Post by Drazhya »

Agree on all points. There are some specific changes I'd like to see, some of which you've mentioned:

- Town Vaults. Areas with no enemies, several shops and access to the Mirror and Item Vault, and possibly other things (an end-game money sink would be nice). Either as walled-off areas on standard dungeon floors, or as areas in-between floors (chance of a stair leading to a noncombat town floor, before moving back to a normal floor. Town floors would not advance floor number or enemy progression). Maybe allowing respeccing in these areas as well (in which case I imagine it would be better as a separate floor). Also, a guaranteed Town Vault of either sort before dungeon level 3.

- Some way to access escort categories. Either actual escorts as with the I500 mod, or purchased from NPCs in Town Vaults, or some other solution.

- Stricter control of enemy progression, both with normal enemies and with vaults. No more mages and big cats on level 1, no more major vaults before level 10, and so on. Stricter quality control for later levels could be nice as well. More variety in vaults and level layouts would also be nice. In particular, the concentric circles layout is annoying to keep running into, and the 'bunch of houses' layout bothers me when it's made of trees. I'd also kind of like levels to (very) slowly get larger as you go deeper.

- No more item-only rewards for quests. They're enough of a bother that if items are to appear at all, they should be paired with something guaranteed to be useful. Also, experience rewards for pacifist and rush challenges. Wouldn't hurt for the items to be higher quality as well - even extremely good items will often not be used due to wrong weapon type, arcane disruption, wrong stats, etc. I'd also like a 'reveal all enemies' feature for exterminate missions when there are only 2 or so enemies left. And the pacifist objective is really annoying when any kind of death - including enemy friendly-fire or destroying one of your own summons - fails the objective.

- Fully-lit floors for the first 10 levels or so. Wandering around in the dark with a +2 lite is not fun.

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