RPGM Abandoned Black Garden [v0.1.9b Alpha] [FeyRing]

[FeyRing]

Hey there! Thank you for the extensive feedback! Here are some things I should mention in regard to some of your points.

My biggest complaint is a matter of taste as I don't like the art very much myself, the protagonist is especially kind of derpy-looking. Maybe some visual customization for him, dependent on traits?

It's a very old art of him that I did and it will be remade in the future. I do plan to have some transformative traits reflected in his bust sprite, but I'll need to delve deeper into how Ruby Script works to achieve that, so for now it's a placeholder.

Also, maybe the soundtrack, I am aware few people care about it, but I feel the game would benefit greatly by having an original one (I can't tell if some of the tracks aren't already though, but I did recognize plenty of them).

Some of the initial tracks were assembled from various RPG Maker defaults and some free online assets I found, however, all the latest added were tracks I purchased, so there are some original tracks! And by "original" I mean they were purchased and MAY have also appeared in other games if the devs of those games purchased similar packs. I do have an extensive library of tracks that I acquired after my Patreon started making some money so content in the future will also use these rather than default tracks.

I don't think locking the player out from some very basic skills like Cooking and Climbing is necessary. I mean, everybody can climb, or at least try. It's very un-intuitive to even find out where to train skills such as Athletics. It would be fairer IMO to allow every character to climb, but have it require (or require more if it does, haven't climbed yet) VP. Same goes for the other basic skills.

The Climbing in this game is checked for actual difficult climbs. like scaling the vines, which is not something a normal person can usually do (something I can attest to trying and failing irl). Climbing things like ladders won't require any checks. Though in general I get what you mean, the skill acquisition is not presented very well yet. I have been contemplating at least releasing a small guide on the basics for the game to cover this while I work on some better presentation in the game itself. I am also not 100% set on how the skills are grouped in the game so it may be reworked in the future, I have been contemplating merging Climb and Jump into one spec for a while now, but it probably wont happen for a few releases yet.

The inventory management is a pain. Too many sub-categories, and the handy ones are not immediately available. The fact using certain consumables takes you OUT of the menu and requires you to re-navigate it doesn't help.

That's a problem with RPG Maker, one that I haven't really found any convenient way of solving yet. The categories were introduced to combat the absolute chaos that the inventory was initially on release. The reason some Items take you out of the inventory is an RPG Maker thing, these items tend to be more complex in their function and call a common event for processing them so it closes the menu. The only solution I can suggest with this is binding them to the hotbar in game for now.

Identical NPC sprites (goblins) are somewhat boring, but I understand if it's a WIP.

It was mostly done in order to make it easier to find the actual story NPCs and to allow the Sex Scene art to be consistent for them. You can get them looking more unique by giving them different clothes to wear though!

The goblin merchant has too many rotations of too many item types. I have been forced to save-scum and reload repeatedly to finally get items I needed from her for purchase (the fact the rotation resets on reload probably being a bug).

The rotation actually resets once a day when you talk to her, so if you saved after talking to her, her stock would be the same on a reload for the rest of the day. It's not really a bug.

As the game expands I plan to have more specialised merchants, like the Hunter and the Smith that sell non rotating themed stock of items which are always available but may require a small journey to get to.

I understand that's intended for unique playthroughs using different methods, but I'd skill like to be able to achieve some kind of universal build during the early stage of the game. Especially since some content requires combat (monster girl scenes).

My initial plan was to have the player achieve a universal build closer to mid game of the playthrough. None of the content actually requires combat as the monster girl scenes only happen if you LOSE to them, you get no scene for winning (at least not yet)! The only time you kind of have to fight, is during Saffron's quest for Blue Slime, but she does mention you can get some Bombs from a Quest in the Mines and those can clear the encounter for you without needing actual combat skills.

Sex EXP gained should not be downscaled so severely with your Sex Skill. I understand this is for balance reasons, but the higher amount of Sex EXP required per skill level is already enough. There is no need to punish the player with even more severe Sex EXP grinding for the sake of leveling down fetishes, for example. It feels like there is negative progression the higher your sex skill goes and that's always a symptom of bad gameplay IMO. I suppose the same applies to all skills/EXP.

The EXP you get is never decreased with your level, the amount is a random integer between certain values (which depends on the game mode you chose at the start). You do need progressively more EXP to level skills to a higher level though. The current game content wasn't really designed for you to level anything above level 2. Harder content will award more EXP to offset the fact that higher levels require more EXP. The current game stage should all be considered "early game" and represents content for levels 1-2. The max level is currently planned to be level 5 fort the end game. Fetishes also only go up to level 5 and cap there, so it is possible to get to the point where they are maxed and then continue to gain Sex EXP and only lower it once it becomes relevant.

Thank you again for the extensive feedback, hopefully I have addressed some of your concerns at least partially! The game is still very early in development so a lot can still change!

 

[0nymous]

The EXP you get is never decreased with your level, the amount is a random integer between certain values (which depends on the game mode you chose at the start). You do need progressively more EXP to level skills to a higher level though.

Yes, I realized after I played more that it seems I got unlucky with some rolls on exp received immediately after leveling Sex to 3, and ramped down exp gains don't actually seem to be the case. So it just seemed as if I was having negative progression. My bad!

Thanks for reading my entire post and your extensive reply; are you fine with feedback here or do you have a dedicated platform for it somewhere else?

Also, a question of great urgency: while I understand the game's emphasis is on femdom, will we see the opposite of such content as well? It's very disappointing that the monster girl scenes are lose-only...

 

[FeyRing]

Thanks for reading my entire post and your extensive reply; are you fine with feedback here or do you have a dedicated platform for it somewhere else?

I try to check here once a day and also have a Discord server link on my Patreon page where I post too. There is also my itch.io game page. Though this site seems to have had the most feedback so far.

So whichever is more convenient for you!

Also, a question of great urgency: while I understand the game's emphasis is on femdom, will we see the opposite of such content as well? It's very disappointing that the monster girl scenes are lose-only...

Some of Saffron's scenes do offer the option to take a more active role by pushing her down on the bed instead.

I also do plan to have some male dom scenes for winning, I just don't have any yet. That said, not all Monster Girls will have that option. For example, it would be pretty much impossible to have a male dom version for the Blue Slime as being in contact with her paralyses the player by default.

There are also three different scenes (though the same CG) for each Monster Girl enemy upon loss, depending on whether they are a Virgin, Normal or a MILF. The win scenario will likely only have one scene for all three types of girls though with very slight variations to their reactions.

After I finish the current version I plan to expand the Werewolf caves. The Heroine that dwells there will have two or three relationship routes, one of which would involve the player being dominant in the relationship, but this route will likely require you to beat her in combat though.

Normal Werewolf encounters also have a Win Sex Scene planned.

 

[0nymous]

Well, after a couple more days of gameplay, here goes...

Bug: putting maple leaves into the turkey house doesn't actually detract the maple leaves from your inventory. This provides an exploit that lets you fill in the turkey house with leaves at no cost.

Bug: the fruit tree in the Emerald Road map provides minimal Craft EXP. Until I leveled up my botany it consistently provided 0. This, however, may be intentional for balance reasons (to prevent abusing gobbling down apples for free VP). Somewhat related - how does the Gluttony Flaw gain mechanic work exactly? Is it related to the item TYPE (as in, normal, Unhealthy, Very Unhealthy) or the specific item itself?

Suggestion: the game DESPERATELY needs some kind of storage function. Part of my earlier gripe with inventory management could be alleviated if we would just be able to get rid of all the stuff we don't need to have at hand. That and it gets annoying when it turns out a resource you've been grinding was stuck on the capped quantity of 99 for a while. Bonus points if we can get specific storage furniture for specific items (wardrobe for clothing, shelves for books, etc.) - though that's hard scripting work.

Suggestion: there are currently very un-intuitive methods of making Sugar, Oil, and Flour. These are critical for crafting and I've yet to actually find out how to make them. I'm unsure if the Mortar And Pestle tool is bugged, as the menu for grinding oil is always empty despite me having plenty of seeds. Then again, I may be an idiot here in which case please forgive me.

Suggestion: FISHING. Every game of this type has fishing. I am 100% sure there are at least 5 different scripts out there for fishing mechanics in VX Ace.

Balance: Fine Sand grind really needs to be adjusted considering the amount of it required to make glass tools and materials. I would highly suggest some kind of sand "deposits" and a sieve tool to be able to "mine" them regularly - depending on your Geologist skill you could also find extra ore and gems in them.

Balance: IMO the way wood and mining deposits work should be changed. They should not respawn daily, and instead would provide more than one daily use for the player. So you could mine an ore deposit, say, 3 times immediately, and it would respawn in 3 days. This alleviates the feeling of grinding severely, since you can stack up on whatever you need to gather instead of running back and forth every day. The trees themselves should also not grow in a single day on your farm.

Balance: this is a far stretch as far as suggestions come, and I don't expect you to even consider it, but I think the game would benefit greatly of the way time mechanics are re-vamped. I would make time itself a valuable resource (just like real life!) - by that I mean I would change the natural time progression to REAL time (so 60 real life seconds are an in-game minute passing) and instead have EVERY gathering/crafting action take a certain amount of time, dependent on your respective skill - similarly how the "Talk" and "Flirt" actions work now for generic goblins. I haven't checked which time progression script is used in the game, but I think it's do-able - though as I mentioned, it's HELLA not feasible, because it's a tremendous amount of work changing every event to this mechanic in the game. Still, I felt like I should mention it.

Implementing this would also allow a different approach to balancing regarding just how many resources you get from each gathering node, since, as I mentioned, they'd now consume time as a mechanic. This could be another method of alleviating the tedium of grinding, and provide an additional incentive of leveling up skills.

Balance: by far the grindiest part of the game is the Combat EXP. There is just no efficient way of gaining it, except throwing bombs at slimes. I'm not sure how to improve it except buffing the exp gain. OR maybe let us craft some kind of combat dummy that would let us convert Craft EXP into Combat EXP by training once per day?

Suggestion: Combat should get more skills. Specifically, weapon types should get their own skills (for example "Sword Mastery", "Shield Mastery" etc.). Or they could be Specializations for the currently existing "Arms" specialization that would become its own skill.

 

[Evangelion-01]

Balance: by far the grindiest part of the game is the Combat EXP. There is just no efficient way of gaining it, except throwing bombs at slimes. I'm not sure how to improve it except buffing the exp gain. OR maybe let us craft some kind of combat dummy that would let us convert Craft EXP into Combat EXP by training once per day?

There is a combat dummy in the barracks in the SE of the Goblin village (2nd floor atop the prison)... but the gain is minimal.

Suggestion: Combat should get more skills. Specifically, weapon types should get their own skills (for example "Sword Mastery", "Shield Mastery" etc.). Or they could be Specializations for the currently existing "Arms" specialization that would become its own skill.

Personally I would like to see weapons increase the str of the player slightly as armor does with endurance... many of the weapons are barely feasible as they only unlock 1 average combat skill based on str
After unlocking the goblin punch by impregnating 100 Goblins that skill deals 3-5 times more damage than a long sword and double attack

 

[FeyRing]

Quite a bit of feedback there! I'll try to dress it one point at a time!

Bug: putting maple leaves into the turkey house doesn't actually detract the maple leaves from your inventory. This provides an exploit that lets you fill in the turkey house with leaves at no cost.

Thank you, I'll make a note of this and fix it in the next update!

Bug: the fruit tree in the Emerald Road map provides minimal Craft EXP. Until I leveled up my botany it consistently provided 0. This, however, may be intentional for balance reasons (to prevent abusing gobbling down apples for free VP). Somewhat related - how does the Gluttony Flaw gain mechanic work exactly? Is it related to the item TYPE (as in, normal, Unhealthy, Very Unhealthy) or the specific item itself?

I'll look into those trees, I think I accidentally made them give out exp in the same way as farm grown trees.

Glutton Mechanic is a bit complicated. Eating a food identical to your last meal has a 10% chance to increase your Gluttony score by 1. Eating an Unhealthy food decreases your Health Score (not Gluttony Score) by 10/20/30, similarly, eating a Healthy food increases your Health Score by 10/20/30. If your Health Score (which starts at 0) reaches 100, your Gluttony Score gets decreased by 1 point. If your Health value decreases to -100, your Gluttony score increases by 1 point. Once your Gluttony Score reaches 100 you will get the Glutton Flaw.

Suggestion: the game DESPERATELY needs some kind of storage function. Part of my earlier gripe with inventory management could be alleviated if we would just be able to get rid of all the stuff we don't need to have at hand. That and it gets annoying when it turns out a resource you've been grinding was stuck on the capped quantity of 99 for a while. Bonus points if we can get specific storage furniture for specific items (wardrobe for clothing, shelves for books, etc.) - though that's hard scripting work.

This is rather hard to do. I am looking into a possible dedicated storages but so far I have not figured out how to make them without them occasionally losing all items stored in them.

Suggestion: there are currently very un-intuitive methods of making Sugar, Oil, and Flour. These are critical for crafting and I've yet to actually find out how to make them. I'm unsure if the Mortar And Pestle tool is bugged, as the menu for grinding oil is always empty despite me having plenty of seeds. Then again, I may be an idiot here in which case please forgive me.

You need 20 Seeds of a single type (iirc) for the option to show up. The reason the options are hidden by default is because there are too many seed types and the list would clip through the bottom of the screen if it didn't just check if you have enough to craft it.

Suggestion: FISHING. Every game of this type has fishing. I am 100% sure there are at least 5 different scripts out there for fishing mechanics in VX Ace.

I planned on this but I want to first find an interesting way of adding it in so it would actually have a relevance to the game. So it is planned but with no eta.

Balance: Fine Sand grind really needs to be adjusted considering the amount of it required to make glass tools and materials. I would highly suggest some kind of sand "deposits" and a sieve tool to be able to "mine" them regularly - depending on your Geologist skill you could also find extra ore and gems in them.

You get sand from grinding Quartz in a Mortar & Pestle, so technically there already is a deposit for it!

Balance: IMO the way wood and mining deposits work should be changed. They should not respawn daily, and instead would provide more than one daily use for the player. So you could mine an ore deposit, say, 3 times immediately, and it would respawn in 3 days. This alleviates the feeling of grinding severely, since you can stack up on whatever you need to gather instead of running back and forth every day. The trees themselves should also not grow in a single day on your farm.

Getting things to respawn on a longer than a one day timer for things like nodes is currently pretty hard to do. Some time in the future I want to try and write an actual dedicated script for it. Though. I don't really agree with the whole mining one node multiple times a day approach personally. You can increase the amount of resources you gain from a single node to riddiculous levels already if you increase your Luck stat and the specific Spec you are using. For most nodes you get +1 Resource per point of Luck and +1 per point of Spec.

Balance: this is a far stretch as far as suggestions come, and I don't expect you to even consider it, but I think the game would benefit greatly of the way time mechanics are re-vamped. I would make time itself a valuable resource (just like real life!) - by that I mean I would change the natural time progression to REAL time (so 60 real life seconds are an in-game minute passing) and instead have EVERY gathering/crafting action take a certain amount of time, dependent on your respective skill - similarly how the "Talk" and "Flirt" actions work now for generic goblins. I haven't checked which time progression script is used in the game, but I think it's do-able - though as I mentioned, it's HELLA not feasible, because it's a tremendous amount of work changing every event to this mechanic in the game. Still, I felt like I should mention it.

Implementing this would also allow a different approach to balancing regarding just how many resources you get from each gathering node, since, as I mentioned, they'd now consume time as a mechanic. This could be another method of alleviating the tedium of grinding, and provide an additional incentive of leveling up skills.

I considered this approach very early in development but decided against it. In many ways it breaks immersion in some circumstances. For example, if you are chased by a Werewolf and stop to harvest a node, the game pauses to let you carry out the action and you manage to harvest the resource before the Werewolf continues it's pursuit of you. If I did it with the time mechanic it would mean the Werewolf would somehow patiently wait for 30+ minutes for you while you gather a random Iron node.

When conversing with NPCs in town, there is no danger of being attacked so the option to pass time while talking is implemented in those cases.

The system didn't really feel right to me when I tested it initially, but it was the approach I was going to take when I first started making this game.

Balance: by far the grindiest part of the game is the Combat EXP. There is just no efficient way of gaining it, except throwing bombs at slimes. I'm not sure how to improve it except buffing the exp gain. OR maybe let us craft some kind of combat dummy that would let us convert Craft EXP into Combat EXP by training once per day?

There already is a Combat Dummy, they are found in the Goblin Tower. You can train on them to grind combat EXP with no fear of losing, however, it is very inefficient and is mostly used to allow players with no combat specs to gain their first combat skill without participating in combat. Alternatively you can buy multiple copies of Black Magic manual in the Brothel, every copy after the first will give Combat EXP instead of a skill (since you already learned it), so you can buy your way through Combat Exp as well.

Suggestion: Combat should get more skills. Specifically, weapon types should get their own skills (for example "Sword Mastery", "Shield Mastery" etc.). Or they could be Specializations for the currently existing "Arms" specialization that would become its own skill.

The whole combat system along with it's skills are currently a work in progress. I want to get a few difficulty levels in before I settle on the whole combat system so I have some more perspective on how to approach it. For now I've been sort of throwing things at the wall and seeing what will stick. The combat system in general will likely face a big overhaul in the future along with it's skills. For now I'm making notes on all these suggestions for it!

Great stuff there, thank you for the bug reports and the suggestions!

 

[Evangelion-01]

Getting things to respawn on a longer than a one day timer for things like nodes is currently pretty hard to do. Some time in the future I want to try and write an actual dedicated script for it. Though. I don't really agree with the whole mining one node multiple times a day approach personally. You can increase the amount of resources you gain from a single node to riddiculous levels already if you increase your Luck stat and the specific Spec you are using. For most nodes you get +1 Resource per point of Luck and +1 per point of Spec.

Maybe take a look at games like A Zombies live, it's also RPGM XP/VX Ace (not sure actually), but it has a mechanic that make loot spots available every 3 days if I remember correctly

 

[0nymous]

You get sand from grinding Quartz in a Mortar & Pestle, so technically there already is a deposit for it!

Well, that certainly makes sense. I think the fact the option is on the top (so it clips with the time window) hid it from my sight.

You need 20 Seeds of a single type (iirc) for the option to show up.

Does it need to be a stack of precisely 20 seeds? I have plenty of 99 stacks of various seeds and still nothing.

Glutton Mechanic is a bit complicated. Eating a food identical to your last meal has a 10% chance to increase your Gluttony score by 1. Eating an Unhealthy food decreases your Health Score (not Gluttony Score) by 10/20/30, similarly, eating a Healthy food increases your Health Score by 10/20/30. If your Health Score (which starts at 0) reaches 100, your Gluttony Score gets decreased by 1 point. If your Health value decreases to -100, your Gluttony score increases by 1 point. Once your Gluttony Score reaches 100 you will get the Glutton Flaw.

Ok, to clarify further: the Gluttony score doesn't decrease over time, and it's possible to reduce it by increasing the Healthy score to 100 only?
It is also entirely possible to cheese this mechanic by alternating the devouring of Apples and Diced Fruit (made from apples).
Also, another note: I feel like raw food (poultry and red meat especially for example) shouldn't be edible at all before cooking or poison the player if eaten.

Maybe take a look at games like A Zombies live, it's also RPGM XP/VX Ace (not sure actually), but it has a mechanic that make loot spots available every 3 days if I remember correctly

AZL doesn't use real-time progress, so it's a completely different script AFAIK. Wouldn't work the same.

 

[Evangelion-01]

Well, that certainly makes sense. I think the fact the option is on the top (so it clips with the time window) hid it from my sight.


Does it need to be a stack of precisely 20 seeds? I have plenty of 99 stacks of various seeds and still nothing.


AZL doesn't use real-time progress, so it's a completely different script AFAIK. Wouldn't work the same.

True... than maybe compare with Reign of the succubus as it also has some real time survival/management system

 

[FeyRing]

Does it need to be a stack of precisely 20 seeds? I have plenty of 99 stacks of various seeds and still nothing.

No it just has to be 20 or over. Which Seeds do you have? I just checked with a few and it works on my end.

It is also entirely possible to cheese this mechanic by alternating the devouring of Apples and Diced Fruit (made from apples).

It's not really "cheesing" since it was intentional!

Also, another note: I feel like raw food (poultry and red meat especially for example) shouldn't be edible at all before cooking or poison the player if eaten.

Yeah, I've been considering this too, the poison part mostly.

True... than maybe compare with Reign of the succubus as it also has some real time survival/management system

That resets once a day iirc.

 

[0nymous]

No it just has to be 20 or over. Which Seeds do you have? I just checked with a few and it works on my end.

Flax, Apple, Forest, Maple, Lotus. Sure enough I farmed some Garlic seeds to check if it's dependent on specific seed type, and there it was.
In that case I think the text box should specify "Vegetable Seeds" or something to avoid confusion.

Regarding the turkey house bug - it applies to hay as well. I tried some testing to see if it only happens when you have a stack of 99 of either, but no, after I sold some it still failed to detract it.

Bug: brewing requires you to use a bottle and a cork to fill a drink. However, corks are used for crafting bottles in the first place. So you effectively have to make 2 corks per bottled drink? The brewing keg seems further bugged as it didn't add the Cider to my inventory despite consuming the bottle and the cork.

Bug: Linseed Oil requires no flask to craft (contrary to all other liquid-based materials).

Bug: The goblin merchant sells the outdated Torch item ("Torch [False]") instead of the proper one.

Also big oof on the silk grind. I CANNOT get the spider egg to drop from the webs and I've been trying for 20 days straight with 5/5 Entomology.

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[FeyRing]

Flax, Apple, Forest, Maple, Lotus. Sure enough I farmed some Garlic seeds to check if it's dependent on specific seed type, and there it was.

In that case I think the text box should specify "Vegetable Seeds" or something to avoid confusion.

Ah yes, Flax doesn't work because you turn it into Linseed Oil instead. Apple/Orange are too rare so I didn't add them, Maple turns into Flour instead and Lotus seeds are not implemented yet (though they do drop). Forest turns into Forest Essence.

Other ones that probably don't work are Grape/Lemon (same reason as Orange/Apple) and Mushroom Spores. Juniper Berry doesn't work either.

All other ones should work.

Regarding the turkey house bug - it applies to hay as well. I tried some testing to see if it only happens when you have a stack of 99 of either, but no, after I sold some it still failed to detract it.

Alright, I'll have this fixed, thanks for the heads up!

Bug: brewing requires you to use a bottle and a cork to fill a drink. However, corks are used for crafting bottles in the first place. So you effectively have to make 2 corks per bottled drink? The brewing keg seems further bugged as it didn't add the Cider to my inventory despite consuming the bottle and the cork.

Brewing is bugged on many levels right now, I will hopefully have it fixed in the next release.

Bug: Linseed Oil requires no flask to craft (contrary to all other liquid-based materials).

Not all of them require a flask, mostly high level potions only, ones that require Acid as a component.

Bug: The goblin merchant sells the outdated Torch item ("Torch [False]") instead of the proper one.

I'll have this fixed, thank you!

Also big oof on the silk grind. I CANNOT get the spider egg to drop from the webs and I've been trying for 20 days straight with 5/5 Entomology.

Based on what you wrote in the Spoiler, you are using an older version of the game, this has been patched since a few weeks ago and should work correctly in the version on my itch.io page!

 

[0nymous]

Not all of them require a flask, mostly high level potions only, ones that require Acid as a component.

For those that require Acid it makes sense since Acid itself requires a Flask to craft. When Ethanol is required as ingredient, they'd also use the Flask used for Ethanol.
Then again, I didn't consider the fact that Oil and Water don't consume any containers either, despite the fact they are the "base" ingredient for some Alchemy crafts (by the icon looks it should be jars). I suppose that's by design to make them available early to the player. A watering can tool could solve this issue for Water.

I am vaguely aware that there is a script out there that "refunds" containers used by the player when consuming potions etc. This would also be a sensible solution to balance out the needs of repeatedly crafting flasks/jars/bottles.

Based on what you wrote in the Spoiler, you are using an older version of the game, this has been patched since a few weeks ago and should work correctly in the version on my itch.io page!

Well... shit. That's a lot of days wasted gathering webs, lol. Thanks for the info!

Several more issues I spotted:

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[FeyRing]

Then again, I didn't consider the fact that Oil and Water don't consume any containers either, despite the fact they are the "base" ingredient for some Alchemy crafts (by the icon looks it should be jars). I suppose that's by design to make them available early to the player. A watering can tool could solve this issue for Water.

Well, Water and Oil can theoretically be stored in other types of containers, like clay jars or even leather pouches or gourds. I am still a bit on the wall as to how I want to approach the whole Potion/Jar/Flask issue. At the moment I am leaning towards using glassware to store more dangerous liquids while basic things like Oil and Water which are used early in the game to not require a specialised container.

I am also not too worried about using up the bottle on potion use as it is understandable that one could break in the heat of battle at least.

Suggestion: Please add feathers of appropriate colors as drops to the turkey house. Not sure if that would include white feathers that I currently have the biggest problem with for the Comfy Bed grind after resolving the silk issue.
There is also currently no way of obtaining feathers of colors other than white and black in the game.

I want to avoid adding too many drops to one farm animal for now. That said, I am rethinking the whole recipe for beds as they seem needlessly complicated at the moment. It's much easier to just buy the Comfy Bed the way things are right now when it's available at the vendor. The reason they even require so many White Feathers in the first place was just a way for me to create a sink for those Feathers as I assumed by the time someone was making that bed they would have had a whole stack sitting in their inventory. I'll rethink the recipe for the beds for sure.

Also, it was rather surprising to me that other feathers could not be obtained yet, I could have sworn I made a way to turn white feathers into all the other types, but now that I checked my recipe list I found that there is indeed no way of doing this... I'll see if I can think of an interesting way for the conversion, otherwise I might just add a bunch of recipes involving dyes.

As for all the other typos and things, I have made a note of them and will address them in the next version, thank you!

 

[Evangelion-01]

Well, Water and Oil can theoretically be stored in other types of containers, like clay jars or even leather pouches or gourds. I am still a bit on the wall as to how I want to approach the whole Potion/Jar/Flask issue. At the moment I am leaning towards using glassware to store more dangerous liquids while basic things like Oil and Water which are used early in the game to not require a specialised container.

I am also not too worried about using up the bottle on potion use as it is understandable that one could break in the heat of battle at least.

How about useing the Kegs? they can be build with level 1 Contruction and would raise the players desire to craft them... which would benefit the construction leveling, so players can upgrade the house and build a comfortable bed

 

[FeyRing]

How about useing the Kegs? they can be build with level 1 Contruction and would raise the players desire to craft them... which would benefit the construction leveling, so players can upgrade the house and build a comfortable bed

Kegs are kind of a pain, at the moment they keep breaking and I'm struggling to fix brewing because of it. You can't even pick up a Keg when it has less than max drinks in it as it would be problematic to track how much stuff is left in each Keg... this problem would just carry over if I was to store water in them for transportation. In that sense a Watering Can that Onymous suggested would be better, but then you wouldn't be able to use it in Alchemy, only for watering plants. In which case I will need separate containers for bottled water to use in Alchemy again.

Plus, I don't really want to force the player to take up Construction just so they can carry out Level 1 Alchemy crafting.

 

[0nymous]

It's much easier to just buy the Comfy Bed the way things are right now when it's available at the vendor.

The Comfy Bed is not available for purchase at the goblin vendor. She only has the Simple Bed. The only reliable way to obtain the Comfy Bed at the moment is by crafting it. And you need two, since Saffron wants one as well. So, for two beds that's:
40 iron bolts
40 wood
10 varnish
24 silk (2880 spider webs)
136 white feathers

The non-reliable way to get it is the Forest Chest, but it's nigh impossible to get it to drop without some severe save scumming.

An idea for an easy way to utilize gaining white feathers is to let players catch the background dove NPCs with high AGI.
If we'd get ravens/crows a similar way of obtaining black feathers could be possible, freeing up the loot table of random forest drops a bit if needed.
As for silk... well, it drops from chests as well, which is the only reason I haven't given up on crafting the damn bed.

In which case I will need separate containers for bottled water to use in Alchemy again.
Plus, I don't really want to force the player to take up Construction just so they can carry out Level 1 Alchemy crafting.

IMO the most sensible solution is adding jars (and flasks) to the common drop tables of chests and shops and require them for Oil and Water, despite the implication that jars would unrealistically be the exclusive container for them (which is always going to be a gripe unless there are plenty of alternative recipes supplementing different viable ingredients materials - for example Honey replacing Sugar). Though adding separate items such as "Flask of Water", "Jar of Water", "Bottle of Water" is possible it seems unnecessary and would clutter the inventory further.

Because that would be too tedious for farming though (unless watering plants would also include a line for the aforementioned container recycling mechanic), I'd also once again recommend a watering can tool that would be refilled at the well.

Also, regarding my suggestion of re-using glass containers, it's actually possible without scripts whatsoever and very easy - just set up simple Common Events for adding a flask/jar/whatever to the player's inventory and add them as an Effect for every respective item. The game currently has a common-sense approach to crafting (which I LOVE even though I dislike having so much materials/ingredients in the inventory on me), so I think this would fit. Sure, it's one thing to drink a potion in battle, but why would I lose a flask when I drink it outside one (though at the moment crafting Vitality and Will potion requires no containers since they use water as their base)? This would also let you omit the mechanic for every liquid in a container that SHOULD be broken, like Alchemist's Fire.


And issue I noticed regarding the Black Magic skill:
The manual notifies the user that there are [Fire], [Lightning], [Ice], [Water], [Air], [Earth] specializations with the latter 3 not implemented.
However, there is no such thing as [Lightning] specialization for Black Magic, only the actually implemented [Air] specialization, which is the one teaching the Lightning spells. I assume the skill's functionality got changed but the manual wasn't adjusted to reflect this.

 

[FeyRing]

The Comfy Bed is not available for purchase at the goblin vendor. She only has the Simple Bed.

Good point, I recall I removed it even though it was initially present in the list I think.

The only reliable way to obtain the Comfy Bed at the moment is by crafting it. And you need two, since Saffron wants one as well.

You don't need one for Saffron, she accepts a Simple Bed as well, Comfy Bed will give a bit more Affection on quest completion but would otherwise yield the same results. I initially made the quest to just get her a Straw Bed, but then I realised the player might stupidly give his own bed away to her, so I made it into bringing a "Simple Bed". And since there is no logical reason why she shouldn't accept an even better bed, I added that you can also give her a Comfy Bed for a bit of extra Affection.

I may in the future have the bed actually present in her house and depending on what you gave her, you will be able to sleep in it with better results if you want to regen VP and WP in her home instead of your own... but that's all just in the planning so far.

An idea for an easy way to utilize gaining white feathers is to let players catch the background dove NPCs with high AGI.
If we'd get ravens/crows a similar way of obtaining black feathers could be possible,

I'll think about this! Though it might require a significant rework of the dove event.

In general though, I think dropping down the craft requirements for the bed might be a better solution to this, like maybe requiring 40 feathers in total for the bed. The recipe will deffinetely need to be reworked.

IMO the most sensible solution is adding jars (and flasks) to the common drop tables of chests and shops

Flasks and Bottles can already be purchased from the Goblin Smith, I do plan to add Jars to her when it becomes relevant too! The chest loot tables are pretty extensive at the moment, so adding them in will make them too rare of a drop unless I weigh their probability higher.

IMO the most sensible solution is adding jars (and flasks) to the common drop tables of chests and shops and require them for Oil and Water, despite the implication that jars would unrealistically be the exclusive container for them (which is always going to be a gripe unless there are plenty of alternative recipes supplementing different viable ingredients materials - for example Honey replacing Sugar). Though adding separate items such as "Flask of Water", "Jar of Water", "Bottle of Water" is possible it seems unnecessary and would clutter the inventory further.

Because that would be too tedious for farming though (unless watering plants would also include a line for the aforementioned container recycling mechanic), I'd also once again recommend a watering can tool that would be refilled at the well.

At the moment I really don't want to separate water into a separate Watering Can and Jars. One thing I have been considering is having water be stored in one vessel with the item number representing the number of units stored (and you could fill up jars with it from your inventory... though this too feels somehow rather tedious). This system could in theory change how tools work in general, giving stuff like sickles a number of "uses" represented by the item number before a new set needs to be crafted.

but why would I lose a flask when I drink it outside one (though at the moment crafting Vitality and Will potion requires no containers since they use water as their base)?

Well I suppose you could also consider that the water was initially stored in a water-skin or gourd, and the potion was mixed in the same vessel so the potion is currently stored in a gourd or water-skin, hence using it wont return any container that's worth mentioning. Alternatively the logic could be that you need a sterile container to mix a potion so you can't reuse glassware for it.

I don't want the container to be very refundable though, as that would mean you could buy a large stack and never have to care about it again as it would never get used up. The reason I made bottles refundable for alcohol was mostly a gimmick because alcohol in general is better off sold in most cases.

And issue I noticed regarding the Black Magic skill:
The manual notifies the user that there are [Fire], [Lightning], [Ice], [Water], [Air], [Earth] specializations with the latter 3 not implemented.
However, there is no such thing as [Lightning] specialization for Black Magic, only the actually implemented [Air] specialization, which is the one teaching the Lightning spells. I assume the skill's functionality got changed but the manual wasn't adjusted to reflect this.

Yeah, initially Lightning and Air were meant to be separate specs, but recently I decided to merge them into just Air. I also plan to merge Water and Ice into just Water, so we would be dealing with only 4 elements for Black Magic.

Personally I would like to see weapons increase the str of the player slightly as armor does with endurance... many of the weapons are barely feasible as they only unlock 1 average combat skill based on str
After unlocking the goblin punch by impregnating 100 Goblins that skill deals 3-5 times more damage than a long sword and double attack

Also, I didn't see this point initially as I think it was edited in later? Anyway, I did want to answer this as well!

Weapons of higher Tier will increase Str and Agi stats, the Typhoon Spear and Victor's Sword do this already. The first Tier of Iron weapons just gives access to a skill and do 30% more damage then unarmed attacks against un-armoured targets. You also require these weapons to use skills from the Arms specialisation. The next Tier of weapons will give actual stat bonuses on top of this!

 

[glosh]

or now I only see minor errors although I would like to know what sorcery is for and I would like to know when you are going to add water magic and if you are going to add other types of magic such as white magic or another type of magic that is based on altered states or magic upgrades to climb dodge resistance ect

 

[FeyRing]

or now I only see minor errors although I would like to know what sorcery is for

At the moment Sorcery directly add extra damage to Black Magic attacks.

I would like to know when you are going to add water magic

It's going to be merged with Ice Magic. Probably in the next few updates.

if you are going to add other types of magic such as white magic

This already exists, you have to donate 1 full Gold Coin to the traveling Priest NPC (10 000 Copper Coins). Other ways of obtaining this might be added later.

or another type of magic that is based on altered states or magic upgrades to climb dodge resistance ect

I have some plans for this but no actual eta. It will likely be injected slowly whenever the situation calls for it!