3mo ago

Just lost my perfect score warrior, AMA

This really felt like the run that was going to get a Warrior with all 9 challenges and maximum score to the surface. Had a Ring of Haste from Sewers and a Blazing Spear +2 from Ghost quest, bought Ethereal Chains from the Sewer merchant, transmuted the Wandmaker Wand to Blastwave. Still had the Sewer and Caves Ankhs in case anything goes wrong. Fully mapped all floors, did all quests, sacrificial fires, and animated statues up until this point. And then during the second Dwarf King phase a ghoul steps into an unexpected tile, and I get attacked by the Warlock, ruining the score... Run is still winnable of course, but what is the point.

I have to say, Warrior feels terrible to play at high challenge compared to the others. Faith Is My Armor invalidates the main class mechanic, one entire subclass, and a couple of the shared talents. Wish it would either get reworked or replaced with something that affects the classes more evenly.

7 comments

Will you continue to try to get a perfect run with warrior or switch to another character?
I don't enjoy playing as warrior in general. His advantages don't feel significant to me.
- I think I'll switch to duelist for a breath of fresh air, weapon abilities might open up some other strategy than "pray for haste and a reach weapon".
  Warrior definitely is the least interesting to play, but aside from challenges I don't think he is too weak. Being able to upgrade armor early and carry that +1 throughout the game always feels quite impactful.
To be fair, when you're playing multi-challenges, particularly 9, the other classes get crippled as well; not just warrior. Barren Land and hunter for example. But I agree, warrior is pretty decent without FIMA.
I don't think much will change since the dev has mentioned the game isn't really balanced for multi-challenges. But he was open to tweaking the warrior after the rework and now is probably a good time to tighten the class. So maybe if you present a more thorough case, something could change.
- I don't think it is quite the same, huntress is more defined by the bow, with the plant/dew interaction being kind of a secondary mechanic. I actually think she is the easiest class to do 9 challenges with, as you get a scaling ranged option for free. Regrowing grass is still extremely useful, and even warden gets some relevant utility by seeing through tall grass for trickshots. To hinder the other classes similarly to warrior, It'd have to be more like
  Mage: Remove scaling from wands
  Rogue/Cleric: Remove scaling from rings and artefacts
  Huntress: Remove ranged weapons and tall grass
  Duelist: Remove scaling from weapons
  I don't think it is the warrior that needs to be changed, I'd rather see the challenges reworked. Badder Bosses and Hostile Champions are designed really well by adding challenge to the environment, instead of removing options from the player. Barren Lands, and Faith Is My Armor completely remove options (planting seeds, putting upgrades into armor), so those I'd replace. The other challenges seem fine to me. Some ideas for what could replace them:
  Curses: Curses are more common on weapons and armor (or even all are cursed?). Scroll of Remove Curse only weakens the curse on weapons/armor, another one is needed to fully remove it. Talisman trinket is disabled.
  Hostile Lands: A small percentage of tall grass and all naturally spawning plants are randomly replaced by vine lashers. These don't drop seeds when defeated. Could use the same logic as for the wandmaker quest to ensure there is still a safe path from floor entry to exit.
  Fragile: Equipment is destroyed upon unequipping (might be too harsh on mage?). Thrown weapons have lowered durability. Wands are destroyed on zero charges.
  
  Personally, I'm flexible with changes to the challenges but I imagine some might be up in arms if changes were made here. Maybe as additions; we've been getting new classes and mobs, why not challenges? I think I like Curses the most but this just empowers the cleric even more and I'm of the opinion that the class should be taken down a peg or two. Hostile Lands seems like a good newbie challenge but could also be annoyingly run-ending early on. I would think the mage would be, next to hunter, best suited for Fragile. Duelist tears.
  
  I strongly agree with the things you say, the challenges could really use a rework. Warrior suffers too much from it.
  Removing fun options in the game like barren lands + pharma feels awful. We could just nerf potions instead of removing all of them including heal bombs/aquatic rejuvenation/etc. Skills and trinkets like Blood Vial rely on potions, and the challenge ends up removing too much from the game. Barren lands also remove Warden's skills, as well as the entire game's strategy with seeds, plants, etc. Here's hoping for a challenge rework someday, it'll keep the game fresh! The old challenges could stay as a hidden option in the settings.

7 comments