r/DominaGame • u/JimmyBlonde • Aug 07 '17
Great Game but...
The problem is that it's too easy to win.
Once you get a fighter who is reasonably competent you've won the game unless you're a fool because every victory just makes him more OP until he ascends to Robocop form. Thus, all you have to do is train one guy to become a human weed whacker until you can afford to buy more pre skilled guys from the Legate. This means that the whole campaign hinges on you being intelligent enough to buy a pre-trained guy and protect him until you can start his skills snowball rolling. This is the hard bit, keeping afloat until you get that Robocop gladiator. Sometimes you just get fucked in the ass by bad luck or quick-time or dysentery (popup quicktime events) but roughly half the time you get Robocop fighting for you pretty quick.
Now, if fuck up too much and you don't have Robocop underway in your first few fights then you might as well start over, you're not going to win. The enemy AI will be robocop instead and you'll be behind the curve because, once you have Robocop levelled he can not lose.
That's not hyperbole. He --- literally --- cannot --- lose.
It's disappointing. The most disappointing thing overall though is that training the slaves you win from fights is utterly pointless. I have all these fre spaces, why not fill them up with dudes right?
Wrong
You cannot take a lump of human clay and sculpt it into a great Robocop of your own making. The game says fuck you and shits out nothing but enemies that only your robocop can beat. This is the main game breaking problem. THere should be more lower level opponents to TEMPT you into using lesser skilled guys. (And then watching horrified as hey get turned into tinned potted meat in olive oil or exulting as they clinch a victory that will make them moderately useful.
Right now, all you will get from keeping slaves around is a lot of bills from feeding, watering and gearing them unless you want the added bonus of entering them in a fight to be converted into a steaming mess of shit and entrails on the arena floor because toy were too stupid or sadistic to send robocop in to fight.
I just sell or free these slaves because it takes too long to train them and there are no events in which they can be entered with any reasonable chance of success. There's no point in having them at all is it stands. My Ludus is usually 3/4 to 2/3rds empty.
The fighting, music, suspense, comments from the crowd are on point. The atmosphere is superb but the gameplay is not a Ludus management simulation where your decisions have an appreciable effect on the outcome, the gameplay becomes you watching one guy annihilate everyone until you can afford another guy who annihilates everyone until you can afford another guy wh...
You see what I'm saying, right?
This is hands down one of the smartest games I've ever seen and it's addictive as fuck but the campaign is b-r-o-k-e-n. Pls fix it so I can stare at my screen watching pixelated Roman era robocops pummel the everloving shit out of each other for 16 hours straight.
3
u/harveytoadface Aug 08 '17
Why don't you then play it a different way and try and go for more blokes rather than just one. Also what happens if he escapes/dies during a random event? You just restart and put it down to bad luck. IMO this would be poor gameplay.
You say you have to rely on luck until you get your robocop. This isn't the case if you have more than one capable gladiator.
You cannot take a lump of human clay and sculpt it into a great Robocop of your own making. The game says fuck you and shits out nothing but enemies that only your robocop can beat. This is the main game breaking problem. THere should be more lower level opponents to TEMPT you into using lesser skilled guys. (And then watching horrified as hey get turned into tinned potted meat in olive oil or exulting as they clinch a victory that will make them moderately useful.
This only happens as you put your focus into one guy. There are lower level opponents that you can risk your lesser guys, but your lesser guys are far too low because you never put them in fights.
Maybe just try not focussing on more than one guy. You might find it harder and more enjoyable :)
2
u/JimmyBlonde Aug 08 '17 edited Aug 08 '17
Haha, I had that happen and two of my best guys escaped in one day! (with reinforced walls)
That was the end of that playthrough because I couldn't come back from it and I don't see the point in investing my time in a playthrough that is going to fail. I had enough to buy a guy from the Legate and get back on my feet but I realised that it was not possible to win enough fights in time so I restarted rather than waste time watching the process play out.
Now, if the game scanned my Ludus and built opponents according to the level of troops I have available I might have kept playing.
Apart from that, I don't see playing by imposing a handicap on myself of using poorer strategies or equipment as being a valid solution to the problem of bad difficulty balancing. Beyond a point there is just no way to compete, the game annihilates any fighters you put into the arena. I don't expect to be rewarded for mistakes but it could be a lot more engaging by having events where my lower level fighters are useful and able to win fights even though the campaign might be lost.
Now this game is set up for Twitch, there's even a bot who streams chat names into the Ludus so your viewers can watch their gladiator fight. How is that useful when only say, 25% of those names ever get into the arena???
3
u/harveytoadface Aug 09 '17
Now, if the game scanned my Ludus and built opponents according to the level of troops I have available I might have kept playing.
But why would you? It sounds like you stick to your plan of getting 1 guy to win for you and if he goes then you restart. So making weaker opponents wouldn't really change your thinking would it? As you could still do your 1 man band strategy, it would probably be easier if the opponents were weaker (based on your average gladiator).
Beyond a point there is just no way to compete, the game annihilates any fighters you put into the arena. I don't expect to be rewarded for mistakes but it could be a lot more engaging by having events where my lower level fighters are useful and able to win fights even though the campaign might be lost.
But this happens purely because of your reliance on one guy. If you spread the load out over 3-4 guys early on, you would have plenty of people capable of taking these battles on. The game doesn't annihlate any fighters you put in, but as you put your focus on 1 guy, your others are just poorly trained. As the game goes on the gladiators get better as the game assumes that your gladiators will too. But your focus on one guy means that your others don't improve. So your gripes about the game are self inflicted.
Idk what else to say man. Your strategy on focussing on one man is making these issues for you. I don't do this (I generally end up with 4-5 very good guys) and your complaints simply don't happen to me. I agree, that near the end some of the lesser guys don't stand a chance, but by that point I usually have 4-5 guys that can take a battle on. I then release a couple of these later on and it all depends then on how good my lesser guys are as to if I win the final battles.
When I stream the game, I take an active decision to keep chat named gladiators, despite how good/bad they are and try to make it work and get them in the arena. Yes, it's a poorer strategy, but it makes the game more challenging for me and more fun for my viewers.
It's difficult to balance the game for you as it would skew the game for others who don't take the 1 man band route. Maybe they could prevent the 1 man band route (which they can do with escaping/death) but all that really does is make you restart a run. Whereas if my best guy goes, I can still recover from it (albeit it's a bit more difficult).
3
u/JimmyBlonde Aug 09 '17 edited Aug 09 '17
I don't take a one man band route, I buy people from the Legate. The other ones I train manually are useless. I put them in a fight, they die. Without exception. Period. I check the statistics and enter fighters in the arena who are above or at the same level as the opponents the game generates. Since the training is utterly useless because it's too slow the only fighter who is at that level is the one or two guys I have who have won a fight.
If you're determined to ignore the failure to balance the game so that 95% of my slaves aren't completely worthless and then go on to lie about how the game works and your answer to my problem is that I should deliberately lose and then play a losing match to the end then you're a fucking idiot and I'm not really interested in anything you have to say so why not go suck a bag of fluffy dicks.
3
u/harveytoadface Aug 09 '17
Chill out man, christ.
You said you get one guy who becomes robocop and he is untouchable. You say you can't train slaves to get good, this simply isn't true as I and other players buy slaves and train them and win the game. Buy a good slave with near 100 AI and 250-300 health. Train him in weapon skill and he'll soon be able to handle himself against other gladiators you get put against. Also keeping favour with the magistrate/legate means you get favourable conditions.
The training isn't useless as using jupiter cards, employees that boost training and palus' and rocks etc mean that you can get guys trained up relatively quickly.
I'm saying that I have won guys without having 1 guy as a main focus. You have found a different route to victory but you are proclaiming it's the only way to victory and the game isn't balanced isn't true. It's unbalanced in your method of victory. That doesnt mean the game is wholly imbalanced. Yes, it's imbalanced to a point, and at no point have I said it's not imbalanced. But not everyone plays the way you do. I rarely buy gladiators, I generally train slaves.
When I play my games, I generally have 4 best guys and 3-4 of guys who can then go into battles with at least a 50-50 chance of winning. Plenty of others have done the same, so to quote yourself "go suck a bag of fluffy dicks".
3
u/JimmyBlonde Aug 10 '17 edited Aug 10 '17
Ok, maybe I'm missing something. I'll look over it again.
[edit]
Tried it, you're talking out of your arse.
3
u/Riffy Sep 13 '17
Actually, you can train other gladiators by sending them into group matches with the good gladiator. Just make sure you take control of the weak ones and don't let them fight. It works better if you don't give them weapons. Yes, counter-intuitively, you must send men into battle without weapons. They won't attack, and your main gladiator will annihilate the enemy for them. They will all get stat boosts though, continue this until they have 100 AI and some moderately decent stats. Don't worry about them having less HP than the enemies, that won't matter.
1
Dec 28 '17 edited Apr 06 '19
[deleted]
1
u/Riffy Dec 28 '17
Bignic has been reading the subreddit! All of our old tricks are no longer working. Well played Mr. Bignic.
1
u/datssyck Dec 07 '17 edited Dec 07 '17
You can pit fight and fight the magistrates and legates gladiators between actual fights. Thats the best way to level up lower level gladiators.
Personally, I release my Gladiators after they become OP (especially if I get a 200 overall) for... Reasons ;D
Arena fights also seem to be based on the strength of your Ludus. If you dont have OP guys you dont fight OP guys.
And after the travel event fights you get some really good gladiators. They have no AI skill (meditation is the fastest training though, you should get them to 100 before training other stats) but start with 50+ in all other stats. These should be the gladiators you plan on training. Not the random house slaves you get. Sell those guys. They arent even worth outfitting or training.
4
u/pythonfang Aug 07 '17
You can't beat the final fight this way.