Try tempting one with a innocence core vun and approaching them in person. It was the easiest to do for me tbh
Java Corrupted Saviors [Release 61b] [CSDev]
- Oct 28, 2017
- 1,770
- 2,146
I`d like to distort judgement as an aversion forsaken. Any tips? since the angels and judgement escape at triple speed i dont have any idea how to do it (also my current second in comand with maneuver is ...splendor -_-)
I haven't used the Despair distortion yet. Does it automatically trigger when the final battle starts (assuming I have the requirements), or is it a the end of the battle?
I think I read somewhere that it's at the start, which makes is impossible to get an Aversion distortion on a different choosen in the same loop, am I understanding that right?
I think I read somewhere that it's at the start, which makes is impossible to get an Aversion distortion on a different choosen in the same loop, am I understanding that right?
you dont need to do it at the start or at the end and it doenst trigger inmediatelly. As long as you have the requirements an "accuse" button will appear, you click it when you want to, and the chosen`s resolve goes to zero
Ah, thank you, that helps planning the next loop. Started a new run to get ready for the new boss.
Me too, I tried to fight judgement too soon and distorting her as aversion, but that is a lot harder than using Tempt
I had to change the fight to Victory because I softlocked myself
I actually meant Reign, who will appear next update. Getting a save that's a few days in to transfer to the next version.
- Oct 14, 2020
- 179
- 606
The abilities are pretty fundamental to being able to train your Forsaken to do what you want, so I don't want to lock them behind bosses. If they're too strong, then I might just tone down the numbers somewhat.
I think that these will feel better to use once the game's balance is finalized, with the base Demon Commanders being stronger and then explicitly making them weaker at one of the early "ascension" levels.
Well, they all get higher and higher as you go higher in the loop number. I don't want to have the city choices be too different in difficulty from each other, even if the harder one offers extra Influence, because it could end up causing a sort of difficulty spiral where taking the harder loop makes it easier to take future harder loops and throws off the game's difficulty curve. It would make it so that taking the easier loop is just setting yourself up for defeat down the line.
Playing through an entire campaign mode run is already quite lengthy. If the game were balanced around doing multiple campaign mode runs, then it would take even longer to get anywhere.
(That said, if you enjoy this kind of game, then you should be looking forward to the side project I'm releasing at the end of next month.)
Belated thanks for the save! It was very helpful for fixing the bug.
This is the Angel move that stands the greatest chance of being completely reworked in the next balance pass. There's probably a better way of using the idea of "resolve an ally's damage" which wouldn't be as finicky.
This was tricky to track down. What was happening is that the Castigation message only displayed when the Devil and the partner were using actions which generated the exact same amount of Evil Energy, even when it was indeed the Castigation ability that was stopping the partner from doing a more sinful action. This is fixed in R60 so that the player can see what's actually happening.
Thank you for the feedback! It's funny that you suggest Judgment taking away your Forsaken for awhile to punish them, since that was actually part of my original draft for her! But overall, I think it's expected that you'd find Judgment easier than Victory - your own playstyle puts a big emphasis on making your Forsaken stronger in the long term even when it's more difficult in the short term. Players who don't make as much use of Punisher buffs won't gain as much strength between the Victory fight and the Judgment one.
That said, some of the later "ascension" modifiers will probably focus on making the lategame harder (and even adding whole new abilities) so that making good use of your Forsaken is actually required.
Thank you for the feedback here as well! It's interesting to think that Love's T3 redemption is probably more of an issue the lower your Punisher achievements are. Loop 25 is pretty much as late as you can reasonably fight her (Loop 30 will be the latest, but it will require facing Reason first, which will probably be pretty rare), so it might be more of a factor on most playthroughs. I might also just need to change how the difficulty modifier scaling works in later loops, since that's been on the table for awhile.
Another thing I'm curious about: What do you think about the difficulty of 1 Devil + 2 Angels versus 2 Devils + 1 Angel? Which one is more synergistic?
Thank you for the bug report! This will be fixed in tonight's release.
Reign does have the standard boss immunity to being targeted first in battle (Love is the only exception, since she forces you to target her first instead). But yes, in general, things that add flat damage are quite good against her.
This sounds like a bug that was fixed in a previous release. Are you sure you got the latest release from my website? The one on f95 is sometimes out of date.
I hope you find Reign interesting!You know i just gotta say i love when games do what CS is doing with Reign, it's difficult to put this into words because it's one of those things that game devs have to really sit down and plan it ahead first before actually start implementing it. In games we have enemies, mini-bosses and bosses. With bosses and mini-bosses we usually get the weak-point approach where the boss will end up having an opening where the player will either have to use one of the game's already implemented and (sometimes) refined mechanics, parry or perfect parry or charge this or whatever else. It's rare to find a game that goes and tries to actually have a boss that actually behaves like one instead of being overpowered, incredibly big and/or a literal bullet-sponge.
I love the approach with Reign because here you're dealing with an enemy that will not behave like one of your other enemies or bosses in terms of mechanics, they share similarities but if you go and treat Reign as a normal boss battle you might be setting yourself up for a toe-smack. I love variety when it comes to bosses, i don't mean to say that the examples i cited here are bad, they're good setups for bosses, but i love seeing bosses that trick you into believing that they're using the same interface and system as all the other bosses. You guys remember Psycho Mantis? I thought it was really awesome how that boss used non-conventional means to trick you. The interface showed you a boss health bar and everything, first timers would go in and treat it like a really tough boss, but it was a boss with its own bag of tricks that didn't behave like you expected at all.
I'm really excited to see Reign in action, this is the kind of boss that i really get excited to see how the dev's gonna be setting up the bag of tricks for the player to try and figure out.
Thank you for the bug report! I've added a fix in tonight's release which should let you continue to play on this save file.
Thanks for the ideas. Some of these would require some pretty major modifications to the current gameplay loop, but it's on the table as an optional thing if a lot of players are interested in supporting it.
I've noticed that a lot of save corruption is a result of people closing the game while it's in the middle of writing to the save file. The code isn't well-optimized, so sometimes it seems like the game has crashed when it actually just needs more time.
If you can paste the specific text that's getting cut off, I can fix the spot where it happens.
The weirdness when continuing in single play versus a team you've converted to Forsaken is pretty hard to fix, since the Forsaken and the Chosen have the same ID. It's definitely possible to fix every case where the game gets confused as to which of them you're dealing with, but it's a pretty low priority, since it's intended for you to take those Forsaken and use them against different teams.
There's nothing in the code to strictly prevent it from happening, but it can be practically impossible depending on their personality and such. It'll become easier as custom sex scenes get more actions and other options like fetishes, since it'll be more likely that they have some trait you can exploit to get them to consent.
I recommend you to not do that. Most bosses already feel underwhelming when you get them.
Since I discovered notorious/hardworking publicist, tempted undead forsaken ( I was using undead as my hard hitting forsaken , undead demon knight) I dont want to go back! its like day and night! one is around 30 to 100 times stronger than the other
If people find something powerful, instead of toning it down , it is a hundred times better to lock it behind a hard to reach goal.
It gives the feeling of "oh god that was hard, but soooo worth it".
My balancing suggestions are with 2 goals in mind: Make the game feel better to play (not easier, not long or short, not harder feel better)
And have an easier time giving the player different curves of difficulty without giving you a headache
I wish I understood your intent behind the upgrade tree, it makes me think it is an artifact of the way you designed the game before you introduced distortions (or maybe I dont understand where you are going with the distortions)
Thing is, they dont have to.
For example the game already changes just because animalistics, undead, angels and devils makes you do different things
and that is a lot more interesting than what the superior chosen does
making the player change his choices and how to aproach a game ( you want to trauma the undead as fast as possible, while with devils you want to focus the devil first as fast as possible while not touchingthe other 2 too much) Is much more interesting than " you need to do 10 times as much damage to this for it to work"
That is not really a problem. Most games can be infinite if you give them replayability and progression
You give me the impression that this is your line of thinking: "7 bosses, 5 loops to defeat each one. totaling 35 "
but you could balance it to 14 loops , or 20 at most no sweat.
something like: loop 1 normal, 2 superior, 3 human boss,4 animalistic/undead, 5 splendor/victory, 6 recurring boss+angel/devil,7 splendor/victory ,8 recurring boss+angel/devil, 9 judgement, 10 recurring boss,11 love,12 recurring boss,13 basis,14 recurring boss,15 reason, 16 recurring boss, 17 reign, 18 recurring boss, 19 whatever, 20 crown
50 days, no luxuries, no damage mitigation, balance the game for that. THEN you add the extra dificulties and give bonuses for the people that want to try it
Right now you have these sets of resources: EE, influence, forsaken , strategic advantage and achievements. Half of it is lost between loops (like strategic advantage and EE) While forsaken achievements and influence are kept trought the campaign but lost at defeat
Take another extra step, let the player keep something after defeat, either strategic advantage, forsaken, influence or a sums of all of it, and that way balancing wont be that much of a problem because every lost campaign the player gets something new
(I think you can keep forsaken, but reestarting a loop with forsaken for a 35 loop sounds daunting)
that way, grinding doesnt feel like a grind (because you dont need to wait for 10 loops for things to start changing)and 20 loops sounds less than 35,and each loop there is something different (that are not numbers) for the player to deal with
My question for you is: Do you want a game where losing is the end, or losing is just another step towards eventually winning?
dessign philosopy is very important, and the fact that the power of your demon is time jump...makes me think you were aiming for the later
Sorry for the brick of a post I hope im not getting on your nerves
New update, a new dive into mechanics.
so, what's the deets on Reign? Let's take a look at unique boss abilities first;
Let's start with Demonic Resonance (first/second/etc. harmonic). After every Vulnerability break, they immediately escape surround/capture, set all current trauma and circumstance damage to 0, reset unresolved trauma and ANGST to 0, and take an increasing 1/10th circumstance damage for the remainder of the loop. You also cannot win a loop without first either triggering a new vulnerability break, or have at least one total vulnerability break.
Additionally, that circumstance damage reduction is something that's increased each time you encounter them in later loops. First harmonic starts at 1/1, second at 1/10, third at 1/100 up to the sixth harmonic. And this damage reduction is multiplicative, so 5 vulnerability breaks + second harmonic will have the same damage reduction as the sixth harmonic would.
Next, let's look at their second ability, Fisher King. As a boss, Reign cannot be the initial target of a day's battle. Additionally, they get access to unique and more powerful forms of the standard Slaughter, Fantasize, Detonate, and Striptease abilities that they can start using at Vulnerability Lv 2. Additionally, Punisher progress rate increases at 1/20th the normal rate, but never less than 1%. Initial starting resolve in the final battle is x5 the normal amount, applied after other reduction. They cannot be killed or kill during the final battle. Each vulnerability break on Reign increases chosen trauma and circumstance damage by 25% on this and future loops (this bonus also applies to Reign). Additionally, this ability has different long term bonuses depending on what distortion is currently in progress (does not need to be finished).
Edit: Reign's Superheated Resentment was updated in v.61, I'll be updating here to reflect the change.
so, what's the deets on Reign? Let's take a look at unique boss abilities first;
Let's start with Demonic Resonance (first/second/etc. harmonic). After every Vulnerability break, they immediately escape surround/capture, set all current trauma and circumstance damage to 0, reset unresolved trauma and ANGST to 0, and take an increasing 1/10th circumstance damage for the remainder of the loop. You also cannot win a loop without first either triggering a new vulnerability break, or have at least one total vulnerability break.
Additionally, that circumstance damage reduction is something that's increased each time you encounter them in later loops. First harmonic starts at 1/1, second at 1/10, third at 1/100 up to the sixth harmonic. And this damage reduction is multiplicative, so 5 vulnerability breaks + second harmonic will have the same damage reduction as the sixth harmonic would.
Next, let's look at their second ability, Fisher King. As a boss, Reign cannot be the initial target of a day's battle. Additionally, they get access to unique and more powerful forms of the standard Slaughter, Fantasize, Detonate, and Striptease abilities that they can start using at Vulnerability Lv 2. Additionally, Punisher progress rate increases at 1/20th the normal rate, but never less than 1%. Initial starting resolve in the final battle is x5 the normal amount, applied after other reduction. They cannot be killed or kill during the final battle. Each vulnerability break on Reign increases chosen trauma and circumstance damage by 25% on this and future loops (this bonus also applies to Reign). Additionally, this ability has different long term bonuses depending on what distortion is currently in progress (does not need to be finished).
- Temptation (Peaceful Surrender); +2 surround duration. This does not effect captures. As such, targeted demon commanders and forsaken do not receive the +2 duration, but basic commanders that just trigger a surround should. NOTE - I haven't tested this personally, so let me know if this isn't the case.
- Aversion (Contagious Angst); ANGST cannot be reduced below 1G, this ANGST does not contribute to Devil chosen damage reduction.
- Rampancy (Superheated Resentment);
+0.5% damage per unspent EE.During downtime after suffering a vulnerability break, perform the "most sinful" action possible. I.E. the highest EE generation action, respecting vulnerability breaks, ignoring current trauma. - Negotiation (Bargaining Policy); Adds the ability to release captured chosen, this causes the target to fly regardless of the current battle circumstances. Their remaining surround duration is divided between the remaining surrounded chosen. (this may result in lost surround duration, if released when at an odd number of remaining surround turns)
- Despair (Collapsing Order); The downtime actions that would normally produce +50 EE (the total break actions), instead produce +150 EE. This is per chosen, so group actions are +300 and +450 EE instead of +100 and +150 EE respectively.
- Megalomania (Shared Selfishness); When only one chosen is surrounded, that chosen takes double damage.
- Sovereign Slaughter: All currently surrounded chosen escape next turn.
- Sovereign Fantasize: For the rest of the battle, completely negate damage to FEAR/DISG/PAIN/SHAM. This only effects Reign, and can only add one new negation per use, like normal fantasize.
- Sovereign Detonate: Escapes immediately and either destroys the commander (consumes all captures), or forces the forsaken to retreat (stuns for 9001 turns, effectively the rest of the battle).
- Sovereign Striptease: surrounded chosen take no damage until they escape.
Edit: Reign's Superheated Resentment was updated in v.61, I'll be updating here to reflect the change.
Last edited:
Yes, all releases were downloaded directly from your blog under an hour before my message, including when I tried with the earlier versions.
I also just tried with the newest version (aka. Release 60), and I´m still getting the same issue. Downloaded 10 minutes ago, simply sped through the creation process, froze in the exact same spot as with versions 57, 58 and 59.
Those do look really strong, but would limit how many of the +25% damage buffs you could get. That's an interesting tradeoff.
EDIT: The harmonic stuff worries me a bit, if I understand it right. It might be possible that you get stuck in a later loop, where the higher harmonic level means that you won't be able to get any new break on her at all, especially if you got all the easy breaks in earleir loops.
Alright, got me a bug during character creation. Here's how i got it: Go in normally and make a male forsaken (composition made of 3 male chosen), went through the quiz and chose eastern names. Started designing the character's outfit and weapon (weapon type: Shoot). After finishing this step, it will freeze in this state, you being unable to click on anything:
Keep in mind, you don't need to get new breaks if you've gotten a total vulnerability break. So if you've gotten a single T4 break, you don't need to make new breaks to progress. But you might run into issues if you've already triggered all 4 T3 breaks, and they don't have enough progress to trigger a T4 break. My read is that you should probably try and get 1 T3 break during either the first or second encounter, so you can be building that resonance up over time. I also think that Detonate is probably the worst pick here. Trying to go for an Confidence T4 break when that can trigger at T2 isn't going to be easy.
From the looks of all that, it seems that your choice of what to do with Reign influences what strategy you're using to win loops. Temptation helps secure Aversion breaks, Aversion helps secure Negotiations, Negotiation helps trigger initial Rampancy and Despair snowballs itself. The other 2 seem more generic and helpful to most options at varying degrees. Rampancy in particular is worthless if you rely on a Rampancy Undead forsaken.
And based on how much easier a distortion path is to get than a total break for her, as well as limiting the number of Sovereign moves to deal with, my guess is you'll always want to pick a distortion path for her (and maybe transition to Megalomaniac if you want to later). At least, my presumption is that an active distortion path counts as having a total break for purposes of beating her.
It's interesting, as I can see it being better to go for a T3 break early (encounter 2 probably) as that would lead to easily breaking the associated T2. And presumably you could stack multiple T3 triggers and have those breaks happen together as the move itself causes the break and reset, right? My guess is the reset will also remove T3 triggers, for balance reasons, but won't know until it's tested.