Gameplay vs immersion. (Spoilers?)

[Drobodur]

I'll start by telling, that I enjoy the game so far, especially after breaking immersion a bit, and unlocking god's boons.

To try and get my point across, I'll start with my thought process and the result of it.

I started game, and trying 100% the farm map found 1st dungeon. After dying couple of times, I cleared it, learning to run away a bit, and spending like half of available healing resources.

One of the items told the story of collecting stuff that is sinful, when there is no moon, so god would not be pissed.
*Internal thought: Ok, so gods are always watching, unless the moon is absent.

Then I travel to neutral capital, and learn more lore. Gods seem terrible from the immersive perspective, because I am thinking that they are always watching, and I will piss them off just by gameplay, because:
1. Wolf says you can't run. I will just die in any fight (from my experience so far), if I will not run away a bit, to let poise recover.
2. Technology is lost, and guys working for the god, that manages that are called oculists. I can't study what the stuff does, unless I use the magic rock, that they sell for a steep price, and at that moment I thought that I'll loose path of "resistance to gods", if I'll use it. My thought process was that as there is 6th secret god, I'll be able to identify stuff into other items, than with "sanctioned" magic rock, and that will be my power progression (because almost all equipment in shops require stats, given by gods.)
Also that he tasks follower to find stuff, to destroy evidence or potential concurrents.
3. Alchemy lady says I can't eat.
4. Angels will make you blind.
5. Clowns are clowns, and require me to hand draw town map, to look for words in the walls, that are just not there.

At this point I was on the path of figuring "the serpent's eye", and thought that there is two major ways to play the game - follow the gods, and as soon as they see you, you are f*cked in some way, or reject them entirely, and as long as you are dreamless, and don't follow any you can have both of your eyes, can eat, study stuff and so on.
Also everything that they gave you, they can take back, if any confrontation with them (or their plans) occurs.

But the basic game play available to me was just not very fun or engaging. Yes I cleared some cave, after buying shield that did not require stats, but it was slow, painful crawl, without many options.

After that I went to read forums, and turns out you following the god's is the only way of meta progression. (You can't even avoid it, because killing 100 enemies will trigger wolf's boon)
Also It is super unclear, but you can't sin, unless you are devoted to a god, and you are not automatically forced into a build that
1. can't eat
2. can't use potions
3. can't run away
4. must only use daggers or pointy sticks
5. fundamentally reject stealth.

Turns our you can get stats and quest from all 5, and stay neutral, or press obscure button to devote yourself to 1 of 5, for big passive bonus (-50% cost on skills, and passive boon), with sin downside, and that is just game meta progression mechanic.

I stared playing using this stuff, and game is much more fun, and less constrict in the options of engagement (not even mentioning power level rise from gear), but I am bit conflicted.

On one hand there was oppressive narrative, that I was super engaged with, but it turned out to be mostly in my head. (I don't even think that there is option to farm, even if item descriptions speak of it).
On the other - gameplay is just better, if you go standard Isekai munchkin loot goblin. I found one dungeon, that dropped 3 Rosetta stones, and just cleared it 5 times to identify all of my sh*t. And it was fun, because I had a "free" ranged option, could see traps and even invisible enemies. Turn's out Roche is not even a good guy, because of description on road of darkness.

My only though was that maybe you could add some npc in the first town, that straight up says "You can't get far in this life, if you try to ignore the gods" (even If it will trigger contrerian gamer instincts in some), or even "God's don't care about your sins, until you devote yourself for their cause", because with their boon choice and meta progression of quest, game is just much more fun to experience (at least for me).

[Mog]

There is a thread on the Discord for NPC conversation suggestions. But for me, I think it's fine for a game like this to raise questions about how to get ahead in life, and whether or not the gods care.

[Mharr]

This is a broken, sunless world spinning under the gaze of too many strange gods, and you were not born here. It is intended that you start not knowing any of the rules.

[Tabakkey]

Well, I got an impression of the gods as not so trustworthy, so I ignored them all intentionally. I like the absence of railroading the experience of players, tho some other might find it a bit frustrating

[Mharr]

Aye it's a love letter to the Ultima series which entranced a generation by being Like That.

[Syrel]

Fundamentally the fact that you don't have to follow the tenets unless you devote yourself should become clear when you compare and contrast the Lords of Dust and Lady Sanguine, one makes medicine as its core thing, the other rejects it, and its not like everyone is Blind due to the Angels

Cowardice btw is specifically about escaping to another map while enemies are around, not about tactical retreat within a dungeon or field map

[Mharr]

How does Cowardice feel about maps with enemies you can't reach, or being driven off a map by knockback?

[Syrel]

Originally posted by Mharr:

How does Cowardice feel about maps with enemies you can't reach, or being driven off a map by knockback?

I actually have no clue, I think the former is fine since I think you have to be engaged/see the enemy, not just fail to have the All Enemies Killed thing, knockback I have no clue on

[Neostorm_X]

the game has some of the worst tutorial and one of the most unintuitive designs i've ever seen. it manages to be even WORSE than caves of qud in some ways, which is insane, since that game doesn't even explain like how anything worse.

[Mharr]

That's intented, I think. It's a love letter to the early days of Ultima style RPGs when the experience was going in blind and just trying to figure things out by trial and error. As an old git I've really enjoyed reliving that experience. Moonring would have been less fun for me if I'd gone in pre-armed with any knowledge.

To be fair, those old games did come with extensive paper manuals and novellas to kick your experimentation off in the right direction, but maybe we didn't always discover them in ways that gave full access to that.

[Bigga Boy]

One of the paths thats laid out is the archon path. But its considered hard, and it is, in a way.
you can pick abilities and even use tears without DEVOTING yourself to a god. Im playing through the archon path. I dont have a god. sure, i dont get "auto identify all devices" from the lords of dust devotion. or making potions from just 1 vial. but i can also eat and run away and not worry about sin.

the other benefit is using the abilities at half energy, which is cool, but you can play around it. Archon is supposed to be challenging. But i have the most options. i can eat, use potions, escape combat (running off the side of the map to escape).
its a bit more boring at the start but now its fine. i feel like im utilizing all the resources.

you can progress by claiming those abilities. they give you stats, that is the progression.
the clowns writing on the walls IS a thing. theres one wall in each city that has a clue. it looks different from the other walls and you bump into it. the capital one is on the right side of the graveyard
DISCLAIMER: i dont know about god quests, do they talk to you or do you just mean the gods missions like "repair a robot". idk

[K0rp0]

I find it unfair to say this game has the worst tutorial - in fact, if one reads all the tutorial notes you get practically a better manual than most games have. Typically these tutorial notes appear when you first encounter something.

Example: "Gaze effects - Some creatures have Gaze abilities that will affect you continuously while they are within sight. Break their line-of-sight with a wall, or even blind yourself to avoid their effects!"

That wouldn't even have occurred to me! There's a few things I didn't know right there because I didn't read them and just figured my way through. But the tutorial was given.

[Stinkyjim]

The tutorial is fine. It's just the one part with devotion that isn't properly explained and I feel like that fits the religious theme pretty well. A religious person who feels like a certain action is the worst thing anyone could possibly do isn't going to say "it's okay to do that as long as you don't devote yourself to my god"