Falling boulders...

[Robot from the future]

These do way to much damage and have almost no telegraph (about .5 sec?). Getting hit once takes 70-90% hp on wizard, which is basically an insta-kill if you're below 100% hp (which is almost all the time), or if you're engaged with enemies (which is almost all the time), or if your dash is on cool-down (which is almost all the time). So, all of the things that kill you are literally just playing the game...? wtf. They do seem to be avoidable if your moving full speed, but, that's not possible to do for the entire level. All it takes to get hit is just attacking once to slow you down, or poking around to find the best way to approach enemies, or looking at your map to see if you missed any items, or taking your hand away from the keyboard to scratch your face.

Every one of my runs has ended from being 1-shot by falling boulders, and every time there was nothing I could've done to avoid it. It was either die to enemies, or die to the boulders. It's such bs I don't even wanna try another run.

If you're not going to provide additional options to avoid/mitigate this, than I feel like correctly utilizing the game mechanics you do provide (dodging/attacking) shouldn't be the reason my run ends.

TL:DR - This seems a bit over-tuned.

[Darkmana]

There's a tile on the ground that will always trigger a set of falling rocks when stepped on. It can be hard to notice at first but they're pretty obvious once you know what to look for.

[Souls Collective]

Just picked this up this evening so only about five hours of playtime so far, but this is 100% my experience to date as well - starting with Wizard, and so far every single run has ended due to 'rocks fall, everyone dies' and no other causes.

Which I guess is thematically appropriate for a dungeon crawler, and yeah, I get the whole 'glass cannon' thing, but at this point I'm kinda feeling like due to the really short reaction window and seemingly random trigger there's basically a mandatory HP investment tax cropping up really early, which is a little frustrating.

[White Adjacent]

Don't stand on the button and you're gucci

[KageWolf]

Like the replies above, there are specific tiles in the dungeons that activate the boulder trap. You can even use this to your advantage because traps hurt enemies and you can lure them into the falling boulders and such.
As for avoiding the boulders you can familiarize yourself with the tile that actives the trap and also be more cautious of using your dash if you need to. Every character being able to dash allows them to have plenty of mobility for things like that.

[Revalopod]

There's way too many boulder traps and they do way too much damage, I keep losing runs because I get one shot by boulders. It's hard to keep track of the tiles when in the middle of combat and running from enemies...

[Ottermax]

the strat is to just dash over them as soon as you see them so you don't have to worry about it anymore

[OkiDokiToki]

I use them to damage enemies

[Chaos]

I actually have to agree. The last 4 runs I've done were ended by boulder traps as well. It's not that they're a real issue it's just that so much goes on and there are SO MANY OF THEM. Literally, the first floor I think had over 30 boulder traps? That's a bit ... much. Either tone down the number of traps so they're not 3-5 per room or tone back the damage from them. It's kind of a lame way to end a run.

Or perhaps increase the response time so you can go "Oh crap I heard that click" and actually have time to move even if you're in combat.

This game seems really tuned for very fast responses and isn't very forgiving which is great if you're a kid, but I'm in my mid 40's and my reaction time isn't that stupid fast despite being a gamer most of my life. Dial it back a little eh?

[Martimus Prime]

Can't see the tile. Boulders hit too hard, and too many of t hem. Way, way too many. Agreed 100%.

[PewPew]

First character paladin, boulders do roughly 50% of my hp if everything connnects. No Problem I heal... But very annoying.

Second character archer, boulder almost kills me. Big problem I cannot heal.

What the hell are these things and why are there so many of them?

[Black Hammer]

I do love instantly dying for no apparent reasons.

"Rocks fall, everyone dies" is not generally considered a good design choice.

[Telzen]

Originally posted by Black Hammer:

I do love instantly dying for no apparent reasons.

"Rocks fall, everyone dies" is not generally considered a good design choice.

The reason is you stepped on a trap and then stood still. They literally only fall when you step on a trigger. And they even have a delay, so you can trigger them and still not get hit if you don't stand there.

[iHaku]

i went trough the cave thrice now, and those arent really a threat at all? do you just randomly stand still when moving over those? i didnt notice them at first either but they've just never hit me because i'm moving my character.

[Revalopod]

Originally posted by iHaku:

i went trough the cave thrice now, and those arent really a threat at all? do you just randomly stand still when moving over those? i didnt notice them at first either but they've just never hit me because i'm moving my character.

Characters stop moving briefly when they attack, which makes you slow enough to not be able to dodge the boulders. At least with the wizard.

[PewPew]

Originally posted by Revalopod:

Originally posted by iHaku:

i went trough the cave thrice now, and those arent really a threat at all? do you just randomly stand still when moving over those? i didnt notice them at first either but they've just never hit me because i'm moving my character.

Characters stop moving briefly when they attack, which makes you slow enough to not be able to dodge the boulders. At least with the wizard.

Same with paladin, and even with the reduced delay with archer, it's still enough to get decimated by boulders if you are backpedaling while shooting.