Decline boon/element alternative

[Zero]

Several days ago, I encountered a situation that should be handled much better than it does currently (I am sure it matches the current design, but a proposed new design will be offered after describing the scenario for full context). I was in a fear (or whatever the technical term for heat level) 16 run that included the vow that prevents a shown boon from being shown again in future offerings. The run was challenging, but overall going well. My boons reached a nice level of synergy and I entered the final Charon room with a 93% chance at victory (factoring in the boons I had, the weapon used, and my current skill level). I had the coin to spare, so I purchased a boon from the final shop. There were only 2 options and they were both forced replacements that would be a run ending destruction to the synergy of the other boons. If I took either, Chronos would win with 99% certainty. I spent 6 dice to reroll 3 times and the same 2 options were given. There is no way to reject the boons offered, so I had to take my chances with task killing Hades 2 (a random chance on being put back in the final shop before attempting the purchase or the game treating this as a give up was better odds than accepting a run ending boon and losing to Chronos) and of course I landed back at the Crossroads on loading back in.

A run should not be murdered in such a way. At the very least, we should have an option to decline the boons offered and walk away empty handed. If you are feeling particularly generous, an alternative would be having an evergreen (always available every time and can be selected multiple times in a run) option to get a raw 1-2 points in the dominant element of the God (Hestia = fire, Posidon = water, ...). In this latter option, the player still rejects the offered boons but at least gets a little something for their troubles.

In Hades 1, this was far less of a problem. The cross dependencies were far less pronounced (no actively needing multiple specific effects active on a foe at the same time for a ringer 3rd effect to take place) and there was always something offered that will be neutral to take at worst. With the Hades 2 introduction of being able to reach situations where you can lose all of your offence by all new boons offered being an active detriment/dismantling of the established build of the run, a way to defend against that (that does not involve the player manually taking notes on what boons were shown and what is left in the pool) is needed.

Thank you for reading and I hope this leads to an agreeable outcome.

[Lapideus✨]

I'm pretty sure the possibility of a scenario like this is an intended part of the Vow of Forsaking. Don't get me wrong, it sucks that you got screwed over like that, but I highly doubt they'll change it.

[Zero]

Originally posted by Lapideus✨:

I'm pretty sure the possibility of a scenario like this is an intended part of the Vow of Forsaking. Don't get me wrong, it sucks that you got screwed over like that, but I highly doubt they'll change it.

100% disagree. The intent was to make early boon decisions hard (do you take the projectile cast because that is the only way you will ever bother with casting, or take some other boon you wish you could eventually have both of). If they really expect us to keep track of every boon seen in a run in a spreadsheet (like the dark ages of TES4 Oblivion, where you needed to map out every last level's worth of skill ups to actually reach max level), the heat value would have to be at least double whatever it was.

This feels more like an oversight/unforeseen consequence.

[Omicron-0B]

I think they less expect you to track every taken boon on a spreadsheet, and more expect you to not take as many boons, period, end of statement,

Vow of Forsaking should lead you at a certain point to think "I don't need more boons from that god, I maybe don't need more boons at all, I'll take Centaur Heart / Soul Tonic / Gold / the express route through Tartarus instead".

[baileybtw]

I would greatly appreciate an option to decline a boon.
I have been in a similar situation when trying to complete the prophecies in order to get all of the legendary boons offered. Ive had multiple instances where the wrong Olympian is offered but I am forced to take due to being out of rerolls - to find that the only boon offered (after using the the vow of forsaking) will replace one that I need as a prerequisite for the legendary of a a different god I had been trying the whole run to get.

Originally posted by Zero:

option to get a raw 1-2 points in the dominant element of the God (Hestia = fire, Posidon = water, ...)

Now that would be helpful ....

[hilfazer]

Declining a boon is rude and should result in a trial.

[The Sojourner]

Wow, such surprisingly mixed responses!

Originally posted by Zero:

...At the very least, we should have an option to decline the boons offered and walk away empty handed. If you are feeling particularly generous, an alternative would be having an evergreen (always available every time and can be selected multiple times in a run) option to get a raw 1-2 points in the dominant element of the God (Hestia = fire, Posidon = water, ...). In this latter option, the player still rejects the offered boons but at least gets a little something for their troubles.

I like this option the best, as at the least it could potentially empower any Infusion boons. Forced replacement boons should NEVER be a thing with this Vow. Another alternative is to always have a "spare wealth" option whenever there are less than 3 boon choices possible (this currently only happens when the boon pool is completely empty).

Really it would be cool to see an intermediate form of this Vow, where only 1 unpicked blessing is forsaken per choice instead of 2 (there are other intermediate forms of Vows missing as well, and I kinda get that it ties into the current UI, but still...).

Also, re-rolls should not even be possible when there are so few options, as they are 100% gonna be wasted, and everyone in and out of the game knows it. There was always an "unalterable" note in the original game, but not (yet) one for this sequel.

[Pauma del Sol]

I agree that OP's scenario shouldn't be allowed to happen, but to that end I just hate ever being offered more than one replacement boon.

I like the ideas stated about being able to receive elements instead or be able to enter a trial, or maybe both, that asking for their elements instead of a boon REQUIRES a trial to be able to earn the choice. But I think, even with fear elements, it's just tearing at the enjoyable mechanisms of the game to avoid boons themselves.

To that end I had many Heat effects in Hades 1 that I didn't use normally but I eventually got all of them, and maybe it will be the same way here, but I also feel like the Fear and Chaos effects of Hades 2 are too esoteric or they were made too discrete from Hades 1 items when what they already were was simply appropriate for the mechanic.

[Rum Tum Tugger]

It does get disappointing toward the end of runs when they just start giving you money instead of boons because everything has already been picked or eliminated - I'm not sure what would be an alternative to this, though.