Update 0.4

Was busy with lots of non project related things this week so didn't get nearly as much time to work as I'd like but here's the first major update. Some bug fixes went in earlier in the week which I'll list as part of this. This is still super early so a lot of this is, especially balance, is tentative experimenting to see how various changes play out.

Its likely apparent to everyone that the development has been very 'uneven' with some stuff getting a lot of attention while other stuff has not been touched at all. Definitely assume that a lot of stuff that has been left unchanged is simply due to a lack of time so far. Similarly, the project went through a lot of fluctuation in the first few months before I started to settle onto some of the core design principles I'm now pursuing so a lot of changes were made prior to this tightening of vision. Finally a lot of stuff was changes just to see what happens and has never been reassessed.

That being said, as has already been stated, Human is the only race that will release with the Web Version so lets try to focus our testing there since I won't be adjusting the other races until EA. I'm currently focusing most of my player balancing on global changes that effect all classes or specific changes to talents for: Barbarian, Ranger, Storm Mage, Fire, Mage and Necromancer. So these classes have gotten the most attention so far and will continue to receive the bulk of the attention. I'd like to get them to a decent state before using a lot of the knowledge gained to adjust the other classes. This doesn't mean not to play the other classes as they will be worked on for Web Release, but this should make it more clear why classes like rogue have not had abilities adjusted to follow the ability power changes.

Likewise, I'm slowly working my way through zones redoing generators, mixing up the monster lists, adding new content and assets etc. Zones like Upper Dungeon and Sunless desert have received a lot of attention and are at least in the ball park of where they should be for Web Release. All the other zones range from a bit of work, to none at all. Yendor and the last 3 branch zones for example have receives practically no real work yet.

Anyways, so this is all just to say that the inconsistencies will be worked out over time. Don't read anything into the wild differences in some content. So onto the update!

VERY TENTATIVE BALANCING:

Got lots of good feedback on attribute balancing with lots of analysis and several different suggestions to try out. This will likely change quite a bit over time. So this is an attempt to: make each attribute roughly equal value, to discourage or prevent speed points from climbing past 5-6, to generally try to make single attribute focused builds less optimal and to make it easier to engage in a bit or a lot of multi-classing.

• Attribute Points are gained every 3 levels with talent points on all other levels.
• Class bonus is now +1 Attribute (instead of +2)
• These changes mean that, from leveling and class choice the player now gains 6 Attribute Points, and 11 Talent Points instead of the previous 10 Attribute Points and 9 Talent Points. You will simply be unable to max, say DEX, quite as high, and in order to put even a single point in one or the other attribute, its a bit more of a hit to your primary attribute.
• Talent costs have been reduced, lower than the changes to attribute points would suggest. To get the 2nd Rank of the Tier-1 talents and to get the 1st Rank of the Tier-2 talents now only takes an attribute score of 12. Most classes will take at least 1 point in a secondary attribute and then your only 1 point away from having access to lots of talents. This should make it easier to multi-class and there is less pressure to keep maxing your primary attribute just to unlock talents.
• Ability Power per INT is now 20% which seems extreme and will require some work on abilities to balance but seems to be roughly in line with 1 speed point.
• 10HP per STR which also seems in line with speed points.

LESS TENTATIVE BALANCING:

Still highly likely to change but less of a total experiment then the above.

• High level archers had their cooldown set to 0 which felt to strong and negated the effects of Arrow-Storm. This is now 1CD which is still a buff from RFIII's 2CD.
• Mage attack CD1 =>2. For comparison RFIII's was a whopping 4. These changes were made to reflect these monsters being 'damage' arch-types, but were made before later changes to regen and other stats.
• Traps had their damage cut in half since a lot of them were just absurd.
• Energy shrooms have had their effects cut in half.

ABILITIES:

There is a bit of power loss with the attribute point changes, notably basic attacks falling behind in damage a bit. To compensate, and as part of a general theme of trying to make lots of different abilities get used more often the following changes have been made:

• Trying out all cool-downs going from 8/6 => 6/5. This is probably too short.
• Added a Jump ability to DEX classes to jump over a lot of the new cover type terrain that's everywhere.
• Flame-Portal and Blood-Portal MP 6=>3. I want to play some games where this ability is very cheap to use and see if it gets used more frequently.
• Shield of Flames gives both fire and cold resistance (I feel like its the worst of the first caster passives).
• Mediate no longer uses a turn. I feel like a lot of the charged abilities, that are often 'oh shit' buttons should have this property so that they are almost always relevant in every 'oh shit' moment.
• Meditate now gives +25%, +50%, and +100% ability power on the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd turns respectively. Using an ability however ends the effect. So you can sort of 'charge up' into a combo ability.

LEVEL GENERATION:

I'm going to try to keep plugging away at the simplest possible generators I can make that exemplify the new, smaller, tighter level designs. Eventually with more time these should become more complex and varied but for now I'll keep cracking these out with the goal of replacing most of the level gen by Web-Release

• Added Orc-Feast-Hall generator and vaults
• Added Orc-Training-Hall generator and vaults

ITEMS:

Trying out converting more procs to item abilities. This is another area I want to just keep working at bit by bit. Getting a lot more item abilities implemented.

• Serpent Fang Dagger: poison ability instead of proc
• Slime Covered Harpoon: poison ability instead of proc

MISC:

• H for [H]ealing is now the default 'go to closest healing shroom button'.
• Added slightly more clear indicators when attacking into Ice and Force shields (UI and descriptive text needs a ton of work everywhere).
• Nerfed Ice-Shield so that it simply adds +max HP to npcs instead of making the invulnerable.
• Stairs and doors (the open door frames) are now unstable. 

BUGS_AND_CRASHES:

• Added jump and poison attack to Flame-Spinner-Queen (same as little ones)
• Fixed cold/toxic resist on Robe of Death
• Added shrooms to Core (was an oversight)
• Fixed some level generation with unconnected rooms.