Comments on Game Design

[Marak]

Not neccesarily so strange. The tentackle faces know how to operate doors, and it could have been one of them about, turning a small room into a prison.

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Except that only Ogres inhabit that part of the dungeon (at least initially, and I don't think anything else spawns there).

I suppose you could then argue that a Goromog wandered in there during Toorum's explorations, and instead of attacking immediately, hid around the corner and trapped him with a Wall Button.

Of course, this still falls into the category of "not only unlikely but counter to the way things react to your Party's presence", and in any case, it's yet another thing that Only Happens To The Poor Souls Sent Here Before You, Because You're Special And Doomed To Win.

[Encephalon]

it's yet another thing that Only Happens To The Poor Souls Sent Here Before You, Because You're Special And Doomed To Win.

True. But it wouldn't be much fun if you're just another of those who's doomed to die in the dark. Sooner or later someone will enter and succeed against the odds.

[Flashheart]

The next time you start a new game, check the ceiling in the entry room. There's no holes in the ceiling of the starting room

The very first thing I did was check the ceiling upon entry (I'm anal like that) - and I'm pretty sure there was a chimney-esque opening for the fall. I was sufficiently contented by it. ???

[Marak]

I retract my previous statement. There is, in fact, a hole in the ceiling where you fell in.

Did they sneak that in in a patch, or am I just completely blind? Because I know I checked the ceiling on my first playthrough(s) and didn't see it.

[Thels]

Up to a certain point, everything on a level can be acquired before you move to the next level. Then they torture you by changing that. It would have been better if they had given a visual clue such as visible stairs coming from a lower level to show the pattern break. Subsequent puzzles could do this without hinting, as the pattern break would have been established.

IIRC, you're talking about an area between levels 4 and 6. There's a basement you can go down to at level 4, and behind a fence you can see some gear lying around, out of reach. However, at that moment you're in level 5, falling down from a pit from level 4. One might think he'd be able to grab it later, at level 5, and not worry about it directly.

I can understand some frustration if you kept track of things and still can't reach it after completing level 5. Up until then you occasionally went to a subsection a level further by pit or even stairs (Slime Basement) before returning, but you don't actually go to a subsection on a previous level until level 6, so I can understand how people think they forgot about a part.

I'm not sure it's that big of a deal. At first I thought I'd see some areas that would be unable to be reached, but it turned out not so.

They could have done a better job balancing how much you would level in a normal play through. There are many cool abilities that most people wont see especially since the replay value isn’t very high.

This kind of depends on the focus. Right now you have an easy time reaching the 50 point ability in one skill tree, if you focus on that skill tree exclusively, but not much else.

I would also like to be able to spread my skill points among multiple trees. It has it's disadvantages, of course. If you can max out 2 trees, pretty much all fighters will go Armors + Axes/Maces/Swords/Unarmed, since the latter four don't stack.

The fact that strength modifies ranged damage and that ranged attacks cant miss should have been communicated up front. Many people built range characters with high dexterity to boost their damage, only to find out it had no affect.

Fully agree here. The fact that the Missile Weapons skill tree provides +Dexterity doesn't help much either. If it wasn't for someone telling me here on the forum that Dexterity was absolutely crap for ranged, I would've probably started off with a high dex character, as it only feels natural.

[Zero]

Good points without being the usual trollbitch.

In Dungeon Master, there were two types of hidden switch. One was common and relatively easy to spot. The other, a fiendishly small 'knob' that you really had to look for. No reason why something even sneakier could be added. Oh and, invisible walls.

[Disasterrific]

Lol, going by all the forum posts of "Argh! Too hard! Brain hurts! I give up!" there are plenty of parties that never made it. Not to mention all the ones that were abandoned for a respec. I doubt there's much rhyme or reason to where and how those guys perished (presumably of starvation and/or stupidity...).

The reason pits have teleporters and not stairs is because you could abuse the stairs to fight monsters - like it is now you can run away but you'll take falling damage. Plus every pit having stairs would end up very samey.

[Spathi]

Someone here said you can kill/frag nme by just going back through a teleport. Never tried though.
I used the pits to drop onto snails then spiders at two stages.
No XP for it though, which may be your point.

The game is designed so that you need to stay in contact with a crystal, stairs to a crystal, a door, an empty room or just stairs I suppose but they always have crystals anyway.

[Lmaoboat]

Not neccesarily so strange. The tentackle faces know how to operate doors, and it could have been one of them about, turning a small room into a prison.

\

Except that only Ogres inhabit that part of the dungeon (at least initially, and I don't think anything else spawns there).

I suppose you could then argue that a Goromog wandered in there during Toorum's explorations, and instead of attacking immediately, hid around the corner and trapped him with a Wall Button.

Of course, this still falls into the category of "not only unlikely but counter to the way things react to your Party's presence", and in any case, it's yet another thing that Only Happens To The Poor Souls Sent Here Before You, Because You're Special And Doomed To Win.

Were you paying attention to the story? Not only does the dream guy say he wonders why they don't trap you, because they control the dungeon and could easily do so, but Toorum mentions in one of his notes implies that they trapped him in there on purpose. Of course why they trusted you and not Toorum, and waited so long to trap him is different story.