QSP Jack-o-Nine-Tails [v2.3] [ImperatorAugustusTertius / qwertyu12359]

[kkkohut]

Thanks for the ransomware!

 

[way2co0l]

I really want to like this game, but I seriously cannot understand the mechanics. Next patch needs a full walkthrough and guide.
I've spent as much time trying to learn this as something like EU4 or CK2/CK3 and I got no where.

I get the other stats up but I break the slave. I then see the slave breaking and I try to react to fix it while following some suggestions on like about the birdcage and stuff. It continues to fall until Mind broken.

The game can certainly be tough considering all the variables and options. I've personally found some of the guides from the games wiki to be quite helpful. They're mostly outdated, but still pretty helpful to give you an idea for how to make progress even on the hardest difficulties, which should lead to a much easier time on lesser difficulties.

 

[qwertyu12359]

Thanks for the ransomware!

Antivirus warning or did you actually caught one? If so, the former, false positive. If the later, you probably caught it from another software

What makes you think JONT is the responsible?

Put the entire folder on virustotal and it should come clean

Edit: Yep, seems fine

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

The dev version has been updated with reduced rental costs for normal and easy game difficulty, increased initial sparks for normal starts and increased default and maximum sparks for normal custom starts. Download links here:

You must be registered to see the links

This update also addresses the problem with item refusals reported here: https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-7851395

With each update making the game overall harder then it previously was, I highly doubt that. And it feels very much the opposite.

I still don't know why you're seeing your slaves' obedience getting worse over time. That is the opposite of what is supposed to happen. That's a problem independent of economic changes and we don't know what's causing it. If you can make it happen again, please tell me how or give me a save so I can investigate it.

You showed how you could have prevented something that happened to you, mentioning magic, potions, and other things that you don't have at the beginning of the game. So "how to prevent something that happened in the early game if it happens to you when you already have tools at your disposals" is not a solution.

The scenario was that I created a problem (suicidal slave) by raping the slave repeatedly over a short span of time. I wanted to avoid the slave killing herself. I mentioned that there are other ways to prevent that later in the game, but most of them were not available at that moment. Giving her a reward, however, solved the problem.

As I also mentioned, her decision to kill herself that particular night had a random element, and another slave in the same situation might not have picked that particular night. In that case, instead of giving her a reward, I could've simply ended the day and then done things the following day to raise her mood. Or I could've let her end the day unpunished to start the next day with a mood boost.

I think it is more than time to stop asking at what players did only to tell them you succeeded where they failed, so that means it's possible and then that the game is fine... And actually start realizing and I'd even say admit that there is a real problem with the current state of the game, to stop trying to argue whether this or that is fine, and comply with the feedback of the community, which is screaming like crazy that the game became bullshit nonsense of unecessary complexity with a tremendous amount of knowledge required. <<<<<<< you can also take that as my final review.

When have I said that the game is fine? I'm saying the opposite: help me understand, specifically, where the problems are, so we can fix them.

Note that I just released a revision to reduce time pressure for normal difficulty. I'll discuss it more below.

But I really liked this fucking game, and I'm genuinely grateful for the work you guys are putting in it ! So please, I beg you to make something about it because what would make me even more irritated and frustrated than I already am, is to never be able to enjoy this game ever or even worse, to keep reading the same things I've been reading about difficulty for a long time. I think it is not time for little tweaks here and there anymore, but to take drastic mesures to make the game fun again. And I will take side of what someone said previously for that.. Stop making players worry about money.

Things should be like that ;

Easy mode : Basically, you never look at your money and couldn't care less, slaves are easy, game is.. easy. Perfect for beginners, to get accustomed to the game, mechanics, discovers all the possibility, the areas.. But still with a real experience, not some cheat game where you press one button to win.

Normal mode : Here, well, you look at your money only when you realize it's been a long time or want to buy a few pricy items. As long as you don't do anything crazy such as buying every top clothing, weapons and armors just starting the game, it should be fine, it shouldn't be a problem after a few decades tho.

You must not worry too much about your money as long as you don't decide to spend it like you were in easy mode.

Hard mode : Slightly easier than the current normal mode (lol). Honestly I would be totally fine if it's the current normal mode.

And if you truly want to keep the extreme challenge.. Well the answer is in the title ! Just add an "hardcore / extreme" difficulty !
Only extreme difficulty should require extended knowledge of the game as it currently does.

Keep up the great work !

Easy custom game starts with 10,000$, rental costs are a fraction of normal (an even smaller fraction with the dev update), and by default the obedience difficulty setting is the same as in the tutorial. It also gives access to the cheat menu. But to your point, you don't have to use cheats, and 10,000$ is only 2000$ more than M'lord now starts with on normal.

Normal starts have a range of difficulty depending on the character you choose. Immediately renting an apartment in the city also increases the difficulty, in some ways, while reducing the difficulty in other ways. Some of the normal starts in 2.2.2 do not have enough starting sparks to reach a sustainable cashflow loop without supplemental income.

With the latest the dev update, that should no longer be the case. Moreover, with the latest dev update, rental costs for normal starts are reduced.

The expectation is that normal starts labeled "simple difficulty" will be able to achieve sustainable cashflow without any income other than guild contracts completed on time, and will have a generous margin of error.

Normal starts labeled "normal difficulty" will have a smaller margin of error but still should be manageable with guild contract income alone.

Normal starts labeled "high difficulty" or "very high difficulty" or "maximum difficulty" will probably necessitate some time in the Slums before renting an apartment. I'd be interested to know if anyone can find a shortcut.

Custom games with normal difficulty are similar to normal starts. Just as there is a range of difficulty for normal starts, with a custom game the challenge level depends on your selections.

The "hard" difficulty setting for custom games is now labeled "extreme" difficulty to clarify that it is a challenge mode. It's unchanged, for now, but we can consider adjustments to it as you suggested. However, I'm not sure we need to introduce another level between normal and extreme, because normal already has some more challenging options.

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

the problem is not that it increases it, I did it intentionally, the problem is that she does not reset, before, if I am not mistaken, during any sexual acts, she reset arousal to zero or to one

I'm not understanding what you mean here. The screenshot shows that she followed the rule. She has F- oral skill so it probably wasn't very satisfying for the master.

Are we talking about the slave's arousal or the master's?

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

What are the exact conditions to unlocking Julia? I've spent most of the morning trying to read back through old posts but they don't really state anything decisively and there appear to be some conflicting facts and I'd really rather not have to restart after figuring out I missed something obvious. lol.

Play as Johny (normal start) or use his avatar (custom game, any difficulty). Become a patrician, by any means, Pope optional. No time limit. The event chain will start a few days later. You need to be without a slave, but you'll be reminded of this at the appropriate time if you have one. Having an assistant is fine.

And playing as Johny to unlock her wouldn't lock me out from the other special NPC's would it such as Felicity?

Felicity is always available.

 

[way2co0l]

The dev version has been updated with reduced rental costs for normal and easy game difficulty, increased initial sparks for normal starts and increased default and maximum sparks for normal custom starts. Download links here:

You must be registered to see the links

This update also addresses the problem with item refusals reported here: https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-7851395

So I'm not a super experienced player by any stretch of the imagination. I also align with a particular kind of playstyle and gravitate towards games that require a great deal of knowledge of game mechanics to do well that may not reflect many other people so take what I say with a grain of salt.

I personally can understand what people are talking about with the game being rather difficult to pick up. The easy option is there, though unfortunately I think most of us that consider ourselves "gamers" are loathe to start with it, especially considering the massive cash bonus it starts you with as it just feels like we're cheating.

So the changes you made to make a normal start a little more forgiving seem to be a big bonus. The rental costs start off as the biggest financial sink and nearly every guide suggests we get a place right away but that also puts us immediately on the clock with little time to experiment at first. So adding extra time through the additional funds and reduced costs for that major expense will allow a lot more room to grow.

I can also endorse the name change from "hard" to "extreme" considering what it's meant to be. Personally the only reason I'm jumping into it is because I want to unlock Judith and based on what I've read to date it's required, so I'm going to have to learn quick to do it. I also understand that by choosing that option that I'm effectively doing it to myself and have no right to come in here complaining about it being too hard when it's my own fault for choosing a difficulty I'm ill-prepared for yet. But I also enjoy the challenge of learning and figuring it out so I'm confident I can do it, especially using the guide of the "nerd to patrician in 50 days" as a general guideline to follow.

But as a less experienced player, I can say one of the biggest issues I faced at first was understanding exactly how many options were available to me in the first place. An example would be the knowledge that most residents in the game are willing to buy so if you spend some time looking around you can find someone that'll pay decently for a relatively poorly rated slave. In my most recent game, I acquired a rather decent looking slave and managed to earn her obedience and got her up to c+ before I ran out of funds. Partially because I had no real plan on where to sell her, no clue what her worth would be in general so it was difficult for me to make such a plan, ect so I was mostly just doing it to familiarize myself with the training process. I knew I was going to run out of money but was planning to start a new game at that point anyway. lol I've since spent the past 2 days looking through guides, the wiki, ect and feel I have a much better understanding of what I'm supposed to be doing, but without that research I knew the basics of how to train and what I was aiming for in that regard, but I had no real direction in what I was training for, who I would sell them to, and what kind of profit/loss I would ultimately be looking at to help establish a timeline I needed to get them to a certain level by. Without that knowledge I was basically just training aimlessly. lol.

Something in the game encouraging you to get out there and find potential buyers with more obvious potential payouts that could give us a target to shoot for would probably be helpful for people that just jump right in is basically the point I'm shooting at here. lol

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

I can also endorse the name change from "hard" to "extreme" considering what it's meant to be. Personally the only reason I'm jumping into it is because I want to unlock Judith and based on what I've read to date it's required, so I'm going to have to learn quick to do it.

Extreme difficulty does not gate any exclusive content. https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-7857877

The easy option is there, though unfortunately I think most of us that consider ourselves "gamers" are loathe to start with it, especially considering the massive cash bonus it starts you with as it just feels like we're cheating.

M'lord on normal start now begins with 8000$. Easy start with 10,000$ is only 2000$ more. If you don't want the free assistant, you can uncheck the "patrician" box under the avatar portrait on the custom start screen.

I also understand that by choosing that option that I'm effectively doing it to myself and have no right to come in here complaining about it being too hard when it's my own fault for choosing a difficulty I'm ill-prepared for yet. But I also enjoy the challenge of learning and figuring it out so I'm confident I can do it, especially using the guide of the "nerd to patrician in 50 days" as a general guideline to follow.

Where's that guide? I suspect it's very outdated.

But as a less experienced player, I can say one of the biggest issues I faced at first was understanding exactly how many options were available to me in the first place. An example would be the knowledge that most residents in the game are willing to buy so if you spend some time looking around you can find someone that'll pay decently for a relatively poorly rated slave. In my most recent game, I acquired a rather decent looking slave and managed to earn her obedience and got her up to c+ before I ran out of funds. Partially because I had no real plan on where to sell her, no clue what her worth would be in general so it was difficult for me to make such a plan, ect so I was mostly just doing it to familiarize myself with the training process. I knew I was going to run out of money but was planning to start a new game at that point anyway. lol I've since spent the past 2 days looking through guides, the wiki, ect and feel I have a much better understanding of what I'm supposed to be doing, but without that research I knew the basics of how to train and what I was aiming for in that regard, but I had no real direction in what I was training for, who I would sell them to, and what kind of profit/loss I would ultimately be looking at to help establish a timeline I needed to get them to a certain level by. Without that knowledge I was basically just training aimlessly. lol.

Something in the game encouraging you to get out there and find potential buyers with more obvious potential payouts that could give us a target to shoot for would probably be helpful for people that just jump right in is basically the point I'm shooting at here. lol

The master has an objectives tab. Normal difficulty has some tutorial messages, which you probably never saw if you started with extreme difficulty.

 

[joeshmo828282]

EDIT: the new version was not posted when I started typing this. I may have to revise this post when I am done looking at it.

edit edit: So yea the new version halves rents for everything not hard, which should make the game a lot more reasonable, and certainly makes rent payable for all not-hard.... which has been renamed to extreme, which again I think solves a ton of problems. Ill leave my post up, because I think my analysis might still be interesting, but certainly less valuable now with the patch.

So... again. just trying to keep up with the discussions.

According the the dev, and with my own experience: Training B+ slaves and selling them to the very specific guild auction is about enough to pay the bills, with maybe a bit of extra profit left over.

And, my own experience, and seems to be the experience of pretty much everyone else here: Training anything short of B+ slaves is probably not enough to pay the rent.

I haven't really looked at higher grade slaves yet.

Now the guild auction has always been sort of... outside of my view. for whatever reason. I knew it exists, but it never seemed obvious to me that it is the 'earn most money here' button. I have no idea why this is... maybe I auctioned a slave without increasing her charm, and thought 'this place makes no money, never again'. maybe the guild people need to mention it more often. Maybe you could pay someone a tip to ask them 'whats the best way to sell slaves' and they say 'B+ slaves with multiple specializations and high charm at the guild auction duh!'

So. The problem becomes: The game constantly wants you to NOT train b+ slaves.... when you start, the little goals say
"train a D+ slave to increase your brand rep" and "sell a D+ slave to each of these 4 people",
THEN
"train a C+ slave to increase your brand rep" and "sell a C+ slave to each of these 4 people."
THEN start messing with B+ slaves.

Kinda sorta same thing with guild contracts: Do a D slave, to unlock C slaves to unlock B slaves... But right now as it is, guild contracts look incredibly inviting to new players... money up front, leveling up your guild rating... It looks like the way to go. But guild contracts are simply not viable at all, at least on hard. (Again, in the old version, doing a guild contract on time was enough to pay the rent. Now it is not even close.)

So. If the cash flow balance is centered around B+ slaves at auction... which really seems to be the best way to get money... But the in game and out of game prompts (

You must be registered to see the links

is probably the most visible thing that says train D slaves for quick money) to new players is to not do that at all.

Does that make sense?

If. maybe. Id like to think at least... You should be able to train and sell D ranked slaves and make rent in the outcasts district, C ranked in the anthill, B ranked in Bull, A ranked in necropolis, and S ranked in white town. And that should be (rent(no extensions)+ forced living expenses + 40 dollar food bill ) * the time the game tells you how long it should take to train a slave.

which is:

contract_time[0] = 0 &! F-
contract_time[1] = 40 &! D-
contract_time[2] = 45 &! D+ $500
contract_time[3] = 50 &! C-
contract_time[4] = 55 &! C+ $1000
contract_time[5] = 60 &! B-
contract_time[6] = 65 &! B+ $3500
contract_time[7] = 70 &! A-
contract_time[8] = 80 &! A+ $5500
contract_time[9] = 100 &! S-
contract_time[10] = 120 &! S+ $8000

So if we were to calculate, rent+living expenses(no assistant)+F ranked food bill(no assistant) in the outcasts should be ~125
Anthill should be ~200
Bull should be ~600!! (actually close to what it is on hard I think)
Necro should be ~700 (how are the undead so rich and prestigious anyway? i never quite got that part, until I looked at the code, i always thought of the bull quarter as the cool kids club .)
White town should be ~650???

ah! And I think here we might see the problem. B+ slaves are far above the curve when it comes to payment vs time required to train. Now, that might make sense lore-wise, because there are probably a much higher number of B+ buyers compared to the high nobles who want the higher ranked slaves. But when it comes to game balance, If you are balancing around the high point, every other point is going to fall short, as it does.

Maybe you could do something else to smooth the curve until players are able to start training B+ slaves like... just spitballing some stupid ideas here: You dont get the free assistant (free assistant op plz nerf) until you move into the bull or better. The free barn in the outcasts Is such a herring because you need to have been able to get a whole bunch of slaves all trained up in order to use it... Id take it away and lower the rent by how much the barn is 'worth'.

TLDR: B+ ranked slaves are by far the most profitable slaves to train, but the game steers players away from both them AND the best way to sell them, hence everyone thinking the game is very hard.

 

[way2co0l]

Extreme difficulty does not gate any exclusive content. https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-7857877


Where's that guide? I suspect it's very outdated.


The master has an objectives tab. Normal difficulty has some tutorial messages, which you probably never saw if you started with extreme difficulty.

Yeah just saw your reply to my questions after posting this. Thank you for clarifying! I'm still tempted to try on hard anyway, though again I understand that's a "try at your own risk" proposition. lol.

The guide is linked here. (87) [QSP] - Jack-o-nine-tails [v2.2.2] [Old Huntsman + Community development] | F95zone
And yeah, it's nearly 2 years old so undoubtedly dated and I don't plan to use it strictly as a "how to" but reading through it did help give me a pretty decent idea for how a lot of the mechanics worked. Some of the options available to deal with issues I wasn't even aware of prior to that.

Also I did start with normal difficult (after reading through but not doing the test from the tutorial) so I did get those tutorial messages. And I do recall it mentioning options to sell, but honestly it didn't convey to me how important it was for me to line up a potential buyer or what kind of money I would likely get from any specific ranking, and ultimately I think that was the main reason for me failing (beyond me treating that first game effectively as my tutorial) is I was training aimlessly without any real plan. I didn't know what I was ultimately training them for, who I'd ultimately try to sell them to, or what kind of price I'd get for the time put into it. I was reluctant to spend money on gifts or to do anything because I was pretty certain that me keeping her for 40 days and paying rent on the place for that entire time would already make her unprofitable.

Obviously I understand my errors now and I'm in no way trying to fault you guys. lol. I think you do a good job trying to convey a ton of different pieces of information that the player is going to need, and it's just a sad fact that not all of it's going to stick at first and not everyone is going to be willing to put the extra work into figuring it out for themselves. It's simply me sharing my own personal fail point here in the hopes that it may be helpful for you guys to know. In my specific case (and possibly others as well) I really needed to give myself a direction earlier on. To find a specific buyer that I was aiming to sell to, and a better idea of what the price points were if I couldn't find a specific buyer so I knew what my worst case scenario would be in terms of selling for a profit, or at least as minimal a loss as possible. I've found price points by digging through the wiki, so now I know (though I believe those are outdated now as well but at least I have a rough idea) but while I was in game I really didn't know what the value of my slave currently was or the potential increased value of putting the time in to increase her a grade or 2. That led to my training blindly without a goal or financial plan and my failure in the end. lol

Also, looking into the changes from this dev update, I agree with the idea behind them but I personally think the extra gold on normal start is too much. Something closer to double the starting gold would feel more appropriate to me, but the changes you guys went with is closer to 3-4 times for most starts and that just feels like way way too much to me.

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

Now the guild auction has always been sort of... outside of my view. for whatever reason. I knew it exists, but it never seemed obvious to me that it is the 'earn most money here' button. I have no idea why this is... maybe I auctioned a slave without increasing her charm, and thought 'this place makes no money, never again'. maybe the guild people need to mention it more often. Maybe you could pay someone a tip to ask them 'whats the best way to sell slaves' and they say 'B+ slaves with multiple specializations and high charm at the guild auction duh!'

The guild auction is mentioned in the "how to sell my slave profitably" objective for the master. The way to optimize it, however, is not.

So. The problem becomes: The game constantly wants you to NOT train b+ slaves.... when you start, the little goals say
"train a D+ slave to increase your brand rep" and "sell a D+ slave to each of these 4 people",
THEN
"train a C+ slave to increase your brand rep" and "sell a C+ slave to each of these 4 people."
THEN start messing with B+ slaves.

If you follow these, you'll make more money than you would from guild contracts.

Kinda sorta same thing with guild contracts: Do a D slave, to unlock C slaves to unlock B slaves... But right now as it is, guild contracts look incredibly inviting to new players... money up front, leveling up your guild rating... It looks like the way to go. But guild contracts are simply not viable at all, at least on hard. (Again, in the old version, doing a guild contract on time was enough to pay the rent. Now it is not even close.)

...

If. maybe. Id like to think at least... You should be able to train and sell D ranked slaves and make rent in the outcasts district, C ranked in the anthill, B ranked in Bull, A ranked in necropolis, and S ranked in white town. And that should be (rent(no extensions)+ forced living expenses + 40 dollar food bill ) * the time the game tells you how long it should take to train a slave.

I think the latest dev update fulfills this expectation. If you find that it doesn't, please let us know.

So. If the cash flow balance is centered around B+ slaves at auction... which really seems to be the best way to get money... But the in game and out of game prompts (

You must be registered to see the links

is probably the most visible thing that says train D slaves for quick money) to new players is to not do that at all.

We're using the front page of the wiki for download links, but the rest of it is extremely outdated and full of incorrect info.

In 2.2.2, my expectation was that players would supplement their income in various ways. Arena, races, fog battles, extended rentals, etc. That's still my expectation for "extreme" difficulty, but with the latest dev update we are no longer assuming that players will do anything other than guild contracts for normal games.

how are the undead so rich and prestigious anyway? i never quite got that part, until I looked at the code, i always thought of the bull quarter as the cool kids club

Undead live for a long, long time. So they have time to collect a lot of money, treasure and political capital.

B+ slaves are far above the curve when it comes to payment vs time required to train

How long does it take you to train a slave from B+ to A+? Considering that, do you still think the value is disproportionate?

Maybe you could do something else to smooth the curve until players are able to start training B+ slaves like... just spitballing some stupid ideas here: You dont get the free assistant (free assistant op plz nerf) until you move into the bull or better.

I suspect we'd have another community rebellion if we did that.

The free barn in the outcasts Is such a herring because you need to have been able to get a whole bunch of slaves all trained up in order to use it... Id take it away and lower the rent by how much the barn is 'worth'.

That would go against the goal of making each district more distinct from the others. You can put slaves in the barn right away, no training required for egglayer or cow, just surgery. Although a cow that isn't trained first will be impacted harshly, there are mechanics designed for that, like locking the cow in the barn so she can't run away.

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

The guide is linked here.

That doesn't seem to be the right link.

Also, looking into the changes from this dev update, I agree with the idea behind them but I personally think the extra gold on normal start is too much. Something closer to double the starting gold would feel more appropriate to me, but the changes you guys went with is closer to 3-4 times for most starts and that just feels like way way too much to me.

We figured we'd err on the side of too much and we can adjust down again if needed.

The normal starts with Taurus district reputation are still facing a relatively expensive cost of living, more than can be covered with D or C guild contracts. The extra sparks give more time for the player to advance their guild rep enough to access B-level contracts.

 

[joeshmo828282]

Thanks again for the responses. I did type that out before the patch as I mentioned, but your responsiveness is certainly very welcome. I also need to thank you for the item refusal fix, although I haven't gotten to test it yet. Ill be sure to tell you how it goes.

And since the wiki is so out of date... How does one gain access to edit the wiki? Because I would be willing to at least start on updating it with some of the harder to understand bits.

 

[way2co0l]

That doesn't seem to be the right link.


We figured we'd err on the side of too much and we can adjust down again if needed.

The normal starts with Taurus district reputation are still facing a relatively expensive cost of living, more than can be covered with D or C guild contracts. The extra sparks give more time for the player to advance their guild rep enough to access B-level contracts.

Oops, you're right. Got my guides mixed up there so used the wrong name, but that is the correct guide I've read through and am using as a reference. I see it's one you put out there too so while dated I'm sure it'll still be helpful!

Fair enough. It will definitely give new players a larger cushion to work with and give them more leeway to screw up their first couple slaves and more experienced players that want less money can just use the custom start to create the challenge they want. That's exactly what I'm doing right now with my current game. Copied Johny's exact stats and money for the custom extreme start and we'll see exactly how badly I fail at it. That is how you learn though!

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

And since the wiki is so out of date... How does one gain access to edit the wiki? Because I would be willing to at least start on updating it with some of the harder to understand bits.

That would be great. You first need to register an account. I don't recall the steps beyond that.

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

Oops, you're right. Got my guides mixed up there so used the wrong name, but that is the correct guide I've read through and am using as a reference. I see it's one you put out there too so while dated I'm sure it'll still be helpful!

Maybe it's just me, but clicking the link in your post doesn't take me to any guide. Maybe you mean this? https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-6821403

 

[way2co0l]

Maybe it's just me, but clicking the link in your post doesn't take me to any guide. Maybe you mean this? https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-6821403

Link taken directly from the wiki. https://f95zone.to/threads/jack-o-n...ntsman-community-development.390/post-4604613

Page 206 from this thread, 8th post down.

 

[krustus]

I really like this game and followed the thread for quite some time. It is fascinating seeing you discuss the development. This Game has something special to it what other games here lack. And i am really excited to see what its future holds.

I have absolutely no idea about development but my memory of starting this game as a newbie is quite fresh so maybe i can share a few thoughts i had while i started this game. I am not really good at english and struggle to find the right words, but please bear with me

I think something that could really help is a rework of the Tutorial because lets be honest: It is not really the best one out there, with a lot of Information presented at once and a lot of trial and error. I needed around 8 attempts to finish the easy tutorial in Version 2.2.1 and even that felt more like a fluke and i felt not really prepared for the Main Game. Which proved to be true as the Main Game kicked my arse a lot before i managed to pull through. But Damn i wanted to quit so many times, many less patient people would just delete the game after few failed Tutorial attempts.

Right now i believe the average experience for a first-time player looks something like this (at least that was my experience): Start Tutorial->See all the different lectures->Read the first one->"Wow, that is a lot of Information"->Read the second one->"I can never learn all of this"->See that there a 2 more whole lectures which are quite long->skim them and say "Fuck It, i just start"->get your ass kicked by the easy Tutorial->Go back and read the lectures->Get overloaded with so much Information at once, without the necessary context to let those Information sink in->Either power through or (most likely) just give up and play something else.

And here is how i think a revamp would really help players without changing too much balance in the Main game. Please keep in mind i have no idea about game design and those are just thoughts. I am certain people with more skill than me can work something much better out.

Make the Tutorial in 3 steps: First the easy Tutorial. It should take the Players by the hand, clearly suggest and help finding one of the many paths to success while gradfually introducing key concepts mentioned in the Wall of Text lectures. It would provide so much needed context to the lessons and the player is not expected to absorb all of it at once without context. The Player can learn the fundamentals stress free and get a feel for the game. Stuff like Fear, Obedience and despair Management and how they influence the Training itself. It should always be clear why and how those attributes work the way they work.

After that the Normal Tutorial: Remove the Handholding provided in the easy one and build upon the lessons learned in the easy Tutorial. Introduce a bit more advanced Mechanics like spoiling, rebellious natures and start explaining how to deal with them with clear cut Tutorial messages and goals to achieve in said Tutorial. Basically shift the Handholding to the bit more advanced portions of the game. Challenge the player to apply the fundamentals themself while helping them learn the Next step. Also maybe Introduce a few Key-mechanics you will engage with in the Main-game in the City. Like, idk, unlock the Trade Quarter or a few shops or so.

And Last the Hard Tutorial: Remove (almost) all the Handholding and encourage the Player to apply all they have learned.

The result would be that the player is not frustrated, can learn in a controlled environment, pick up key mechanics without running against a brick wall. And they don't have to memorize the rather lenghty lectures at once but can learn them gradually in the necessary context. No one wants to die in the easy Tutorial again and again and read the lectures again and again. It is just too much to ask for a completely new player who most likely just looked for a nice porn game.

Make Cause and Effect more clear, and present Key-Information a bit more open for the player and a lot of the problems should vanish. It is true the Game gives you all the Information needed in various Tooltips etc. but a new player can really not apply them really because Cause and Effect are often unclear. Don't throw the player right into the deep water, ease them into it. I mean every game i know with Tutorials does it like that.

I am willing to bet that a lot of complaint about difficulty would be instantly vanish.

That is a lot of Text but i hope my insight can maybe help a little bit. I really hope this game will reach its full potential because at its core it is awesome and i thank you for keeping it alive.

 

[joeshmo828282]

So. Looking at the interior decorations, Gloria always says "budget" or "premium" to tell the player if they will get a housing bonus from the decor or not.... Except for the dungeon, Lab, and Boudoir. Do you think we can add this little hint to those lines?

Acutally... I think I could probably do this myself...

So. I did. I also found some quotes where the descriptions did not match up... one of the 'japans' and one of the 'forts' were incorrectly labeled premium... so I fixed those too.

I have never touched gitgud before, and I dare not without permission, so... here is the updated file, which you can use if you want. or not.

 

[ImperatorAugustusTertius]

I think something that could really help is a rework of the Tutorial

I recently added some hint messages that pop up during normal gameplay when certain trigger conditions are met. But this is reactive, so different from the kind of handholding you suggest. The biggest challenge with this proposal is that it would take a lot of time and effort to create a new tutorial, and there are other things ahead of it on the to-do list.