Just going to add my thoughts to the difficulty discussion;
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Read your ideas and i like your thinking, you have good points, maybe we'll get some clarification in further logs from the dev?
It caters to a wide range of fetishes sure, but the game hasn't really hidden itself with regards to difficulty (hell the game has a built in reset button to battles and you're told to take advantage of it to figure out the best way forward). Unless campaign mode didn't start with the ramping increase in damage reduction/preparedness between loops, the game has always clearly shown that difficulty would increase as the campaign goes on. This is also not exactly a well disguised spreadsheet/puzzle game, it's kinda part of the core design of the game that eventually things will get so difficult that the "puzzle" will only have a handful of solutions. Also, you cant really judge a game by it's early development, obviously things like difficulty wont be in line with what is intended early on when the focus is more on getting the game's foundations set up.
Not really no, but sure, if you want to think so go ahead. As far as i feel from playing it, currently at least, it has a nice system set up for battles, it can get obnoxious from having to do things "exactly" as distortions requirements want you to do, but it's not really a true puzzle game, it's just planning your strategy during a battle. The timer not being able to be extended is quite a nuisance though. Secondly, i actually can judge a game by it's early development, yes. That's called feedback, especially for features that are supposed to be tested for balance, bugs, if it's clear to be player what it's supposed to be, on and on. This also includes what is good for the people playing it, like for example, players that want more difficulty, players that feel that the difficulty is just fine and players that want to have an easier time. It's all part of the feedback process, dev gets to gauge how things are currently received by all types of crowd. Then finally it's up to the dev to strike the hammer, some will be displeased and leave, some will stay. It's all part of the process.
Sure, just adding a difficulty button that will change how the damage reduction/preparedness modifiers grow between loops would be pretty easy, but that's a lot different than asking to add an entire new system like "prestige" and stuff, which will then also have to be balanced. Adding more things that need to be balanced is not a quick way to solve the issue of balance.
The whole idea of a prestige system is to start at 0% extra additions to calculation or bonuses. It's meant to always increase by a small percentage, like 3% or 5%, so the player can add it themselves how strong they wish to start their next campaign. Its them that's doing the balancing, not me, you or the dev. That's the whole idea of it. I didn't say the dev would have to keep testing it for balance, it's meant as a tool to let themselves tip the scales to where they want, from increasing damage, barrier growth rate to total extermination bar value. Every time they lose, they gain a prestige currency they can use to get a little stronger, like for every 1 loop completed, get 10 points or something. "Here you go, go spend it to get extra bonuses if you want."
I didn't say don't play campaign, I said if you don't like how the later loops of campaign play then just don't play the later loops and instead stick to playing the earlier loops. Also... yes you can say "if you don't like difficulty don't play campaign", perhaps it's a tough pill to swallow, but campaign is obviously designed scale up in difficulty and before very hard in later loops, that's an intended feature, if you don't like that then don't play the game mode designed with that idea. if you're just interested in the "story" play with cheats enabled.
That's basically what you're telling the players to do though. You're telling them that they'll eventually have to stop playing a game mode filled with content, including the lore, to stop playing it and go play a single-round mode or something else. The campaign is where you'll find the most content of the game, including the story, just because you don't like the idea of discussing for a way to reach a compromise, so we can all have a middle ground to be able to enjoy the main game mode, which also has city conquering, forsaken training, all the content the game has to offer? Was there an attempt at finding a compromise? Were there discussions if could be done or are we just declaring it without even trying "Nah, we're not gonna do that, can't be done, no way." ? And we're talking about difficulty here of all things.
The option of "don't increase difficulty while using cheat mode" is a one hit kill button. If the Chosen don't scale up between loops then you'll just annihilate them instantly. Like, just look at Skippy's posts about the super late loops that CSdev hasn't properly designed and aren't intended to be played yet which are super unbalanced with the loops being 20 days and the damage reduction approaching 50%, and those being doable. Without difficulty increases after you get out of the first few loops you'd basically have the T4 breaks in under 10 days as long as you have a general idea of how to train Forsaken.
Correct, and your issue with giving me the option to choose myself, a player, if i want it enabled or not in my game is?
Distortions... if you don't like them don't use them? One does not accidentally trigger a distortion, those things require a lot of deliberate effort to set up. The only Distortion I can see someone accidentally triggering is Rampancy because it's pretty easy to do a 10 turn surround with HATE higher than INJU without even thinking about it early on. But Temptation and Negotiation can only happen with a deliberate press of a button, and getting a 10 turn Orgy for Aversion will probably come pretty late, so the odds of you somehow not doing the T1 DIG Break yet would be insanely unlikely. Relationship vignettes are not random, they happen between the two Chosen that share a Vulnerability as their Core and Minor (so the Chosen with Core Morality and the one with Minor Morality will have the Morality relationship vignettes happen between them). If you're getting annoyed with distortions and relationship scenes getting in the way of your roleplaying, then it's pretty easy to just avoid triggering Distortions and the T3 rivalry vignette.
That's strange, because sometimes they "do" trigger accidently on my games, and not only rampancy. Good to know they don't happen to you though, nice. That's fine by me though, it's not that big of a deal for me, also they're part of strategy planning for the battles as well as the charm of the game, so i can do fine with them the way they are.
The changes you suggest aren't a "balance update", they're the inclusion and entire new gameplay mechanics and systems, which would then require a lot of balancing to work with the game without making things too easy or the systems too worthless. The game could use a balance update, but it doesn't need an entire new system to add an out-of-campaign upgrade system to make things easier, you can already do fine in later loops as long as you understand how Forsaken work. If anything I think a proper tutorial for Forsaken would do a lot more for helping with later loop difficulty than some major balance patch, since understanding Forsaken is the big wall between doing fine in later loops or getting bodied by your first Superior Chosen.
Good, you got it. They're "suggestions" for the dev to take into consideration, as well as your feedback, it's also your personal suggestion and take on this matter. That's why we're discussing this particular shitstorm of a debacle, isn't it? We all here have suggestions, different takes and stands on balancing something. Some people want it harder, some like it just fine the way it is, some want things easier. It's always like this when the discussion turns into "proper balancing". Either way this goes is fine by me, whatever the dev decides i know i'm not gonna start a flame storm here in the thread. Will i be disappointed that the game turned into more of a stressful experience with too many disadvantages on my side that takes the enjoyment out of the game for me? Yes, especially when you invested into it so much. That's fine, there are other projects to follow, i'll move to another one just fine. But you know what truly is always a true sack of shit that annoys the hell out of me every time? Especially in a game of this genre? It's how when you suggest "possible", Key word here, "Possible", alternatives se we can all find and reach a compromise, a middle ground so everyone can find a way to enjoy this game together, people just point fingers at one another, throw shit at one another, attack one another, all the fun stuff. In the end, it turns out it's an impossibility to share the fun, people leave and voila.
Regardless of how this shitstorm's gonna end, the dev's gonna be reading all of our takes, suggestions and analysis of how loops are working out. Skippy's being doing good work on that part. So we'll see what the dev finds impossible to do, what cannot be done, what could be done and what is planned to be done in the future.
