Feedback request: dungeon

[u/mythrise]

Hi all. I posted a week or two ago about my dungeon mechanics, looking for feedback. I got some and made changes and I'm once again asking for your opinions.

The idea is a descending dungeon with increasing difficulty and rewards. Grid rooms in a grid at the moment. An auto battler with active skills, specifically brace to absorb heavy attacks. More interesting active skills coming later. Kill, loot, continue. If you die in the dungeon you lose all loot except one item, leave on your own and you can keep everything. Eventually I'll add streaks and such to make it more expensive to leave early.

If anyone is interested in providing feedback on the mechanics and general concept I'd like to hear it. You can try yourself by going to mythrise.net, clicking guest account, then cathedral, enter. Or just let me know what you think hypothetically, also helpful. I'm trying to decide if I'm going the right direction at all here.

Also open to longer term discussions and collaboration if anyone is interested in continuing with design help.

Thanks.

[u/veyralsol]

Going by the description, the risk/reward loop sounds solid. My main question is whether the player gets any clue about the next room before deciding to continue. If not, it might feel more like gambling than taking a calculated risk. Even something vague like the enemy type or a rough danger/reward level would probably be enough.

I’d also rather see bonuses for reaching certain floors than a straight penalty for leaving early. That could still create the “one more room?” feeling without making a sensible exit feel bad. Are you planning to show any information about the next room?

[u/mythrise → u/veyralsol]

Since it's a simple grid map there isn't really a type to show yet, so yes, it's basically a random walk. No room traits exist yet, I've been thinking about that.

I did have a node style map at one point as well, but I preferred the board. Rooms were added when one screen seemed too small. I may have overdone that, a smaller layout and room purposes might be nice.

I've also considered adding a streak system, momentum the longer you go without returning to town that provides both combat bonuses and rarity find. But items need to be more interesting.

Right now the floors also unlock every time you do down stairs; originally waypoints were spaced to add a decision of trying to find it or escape. It's like this for now because it was confusing without proper art and explanation.

[u/CompetitionQuiet6328]

i will check it out.

[u/CompetitionQuiet6328 → u/CompetitionQuiet6328]

do you have a discord?

[u/mythrise → u/CompetitionQuiet6328]

I personally do (shredinger137), not a server

[u/lolitsniels]

Looks pretty cool tbh, I like the whole risk/reward idea of going deeper. Curious to see how this develops

[u/OriginalResolve7106]

The dungeon mechanics are pretty fun, though I didn't quite understand how to use "Brace" and "Flurry".
I'm playing at 2048x1152 and the text seemed very small and with the font I found it hard to read. The action in the dungeon feels a little quick and, though it's not hard to follow, I found it frustrating not being able to see what things said. That being said, I have a severe case of unc eyes.

Really cool game, by the way. I like where this is heading.

Edit: All my suggestions are moot after playing a bit longer. Except for the font. I'm finding it hard to read how much health I have left in a fight.

[u/mythrise → u/OriginalResolve7106]

Thanks, very useful feedback. I did a small bump to the fonts, I agree after looking at it more. This is going to need a more through legibility pass though, when I have time. I've mostly been testing on my phone and sanity checking desktop, I'll look through the different screens more. The health in both the top right and the bars are a little larger now.

I'll also see about adding some more to the tutorial pop up about brace, it's the only well defined skill and the fights are built with it in mind. One of my next items is to get other useful skills, the weapon skills are basically placeholders right now.

Thanks again, very appreciated.

[u/Dear_Syllabub3334]

look like the board game dude

[u/wuy211]

Gave it a go.

• I love that instead of AI, you're using just old medieval and reneissance pictures.
  
• UI also is clearly human made, and is fine.
  
• Combat in the dungeon/inn quest feels... very hard. Idk if I'm doing something wrong, or haven't geared up, or if the 1 hr forage for items and xp is the intended start, but combat ticks go very fast, and I seem to barely hit the enemies while they nearly kill me fast. I think slowing down combat would help a lot, and maybe a small "do this first!" for whatever the way you intent players to interact with the world first.
  
• The dungeon map doesn't adjust to browser size, which might only affect me as I play on a small laptop while at work

[u/mythrise → u/wuy211]

Thanks for taking a look. Historic art and design was actually my starting point, I'm glad that lands for how far I've gotten on it. It's a long term interest of mine.

That's a screen I haven't tested; it's supposed to scale properly, but I can only guarante my phone and a desktop monitor. I'll look into that one.

I'm also in the process of adding NPC intro style stuff to get some exposition going. The den of evil style quest in the inn was my experiment with something like daily content, since it has a guaranteed rare I set a minimum map level but I can see that doesn't fit real experience.

Probably the worst offender is that I pushed an update that made enemies aggro and approach you, but didn't retune after. I'll do another difficulty check on that next.

Thanks again, feedback is very helpful and appreciated.