Instant death situations are not fun at all

[alpasy]

So i loved the original Hammerwatch 5 years ago and although i'm not a big fan of rogue-lites i didn't even mind the grindy part of the game all that much: every time i was beginning to feel slightly bored, the game threw at me a new exciting mechanic, a new building, new set of skills and further progression and so on.

What totally killed it for me though is 'almost-instant death from full health' situations. I'm not playing glass cannon, my ranger got 122 base HP, i don't drink stuff that lowers your armor or res, i tend to avoid the fountain, but then and again i find myself insta-killed by some stuff and i have to start over.

My last perfectly good run was ended in about 0,75 seconds when i accidentally landed myself between two of those damned fire tiles next to a confusion block on magic library floor. I think i had about 190 HP, 5 full shots of a potion and i couldn't even press X on time before i just died in there, burying a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of gold and ore with me.

And that wasn't even a first time. Instant death from 5 arrows merged on top of each other so you see it like a single arrow, instant death from several of those homing spikes by one of the Lich Triad (which, again, merged together like a single shot). It gives you no chances, it teaches you nothing and it's just plain frustrating.

I didn't have this problem with Diablo games in my ~500 hours experience, and i think that if you, as game designer, can't avoid high spike damage to a player for some reason — you should implement simple invincibility frames, like all those little arcade games did for decades. And they still do, because very few people enjoy playing a character with 1 point of effective HP.

[Abbe]

I quite agree that instadeaths aren't as fun, the balance of the game could be much better in that regard.
Learning traps and where and how you can be aggressive is a big part of the game in the early stages and if you have low armor and resistance you WILL die to them quickly.
Bosses are the same, range and movement is your best bet to stay alive. :)


As for help with ranger's survivability:
Passive spreading shot (cant remember skill name, the one where the shot might split and become two) is wonderful for killing power.
Your rightclick is your survivability and you have extra dodge and speed built into it.

But your best survival skill is your killing power, and for that i recommend stacking base damage on your weapon, flail, magic dagger, etc. which just skyrockets your damage as you get more attack power.

here's an example of how much damage you can do with lots of attack power, lots of crit chance(s) and just adding more and more base attack damage:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/563689080907366402/570360479696814120/20190423232206_1.jpg

[bumbaclad]

Only way they could make it so you likely wont be one shot ever is to give an invuln time so multiple projectiles wont register. But that is the core of the game; for instance on my wizy I use my burst ability to destroy projectiles.

[Sparks]

With the way it is balanced, invincibility frames would not work. The life steal mechanic would make everyone essentially invincible.

I-frames, or life leech, pick one.

[Flavorable]

Originally posted by alpasy:

And that wasn't even a first time. Instant death from 5 arrows merged on top of each other so you see it like a single arrow, instant death from several of those homing spikes by one of the Lich Triad (which, again, merged together like a single shot). It gives you no chances, it teaches you nothing and it's just plain frustrating.

The instances you say aren't "insta-death situations" at all though. I mean, I am no way an expert, I've owned the game for about a week or two now, but it seems to me if you're getting killed because of arrows merging into one another etc etc, you're just not paying enough attention to where monsters move and when they shoot. This is why there's generally more than enough time to dodge out of the way. You can't merely stand still and tank shots while killing thinks and expect to survive as a Ranger, you're not a tank.

[alpasy]

Who says i'm standing still? 100% of the time i connect with enemy arrow is when i moved out of the way of another projectile. If you can avoid everything flying in your direction in this game you don't need HP bar at all, just switch your HP to 1 at the fountain and reap your just rewards.

I'm not saying this game is too hard or anything, my point is if you happen to have a HP bar, it shouldn't behave like your HP=1, even in a very few situations, because those few situations are not fun to encounter and they feel like the game cheats you.

[Mawdesty]

Originally posted by Flavorable:

You can't merely stand still and tank shots while killing thinks and expect to survive as a Ranger, you're not a tank.

Sentences like this are disingenuous and make you seem like a jerk. Removing nuance from real gripes about an issue tries to oversimplify the issue without caring what the problem really was.

That being said, I frames really can't work past a certain level. Life steal drink is too good at topping people off and once you get past a point you'll have drinks to increase damage and survivability that make it even more viable. But why couldn't we consider I-frames being a thing that exists at NG 0? The time where players have the least health potions and poor regen. They lose 70% of hp from that stray arrow? They now have a good window to actually use a potion. You could have the I-frames fade out with new game plus levels. Or even just remove them instantly after a certain new game plus point.

Where I am in the new game progression the potions do near nothing and almost don't exist as a mechanic. I can use them to run through a trap without bothering with the mechanics but most times I die potions were not an option. From full to dead before you can blink. The number of full potions I've held at a loss makes me wish phoenix feather was a base line item. It would enable the heck out of this mechanic that sees little play. I also don't recall using them much in the early game either. Insta deaths were there too. Fresh characters losing all their health from a single hit meant taking two hits was guaranteed dead. If I somehow survived the first one. There was however a short sweet spot where I had armor and health to get wounded but not die. Still the new games lower my armor more and I gain more health. I gotta figure at some far off point stuff will always just one shot me. Maybe more so to wizard who gets the least health

[YellowAfterlife]

Stopping by to say that I had a pretty decent run with priest - lots of regen and defense - to the point that I've not had to use a single potion through the entire run, made it through acts 4, 5, and 6 for the first time and from the first try, got to that dragon boss, boss was barely scratching me with attacks, got the boss to 2/3 health... and got shot point blank with icicles, ending the run instantly.

Similarly to topic author, my previous attempts had the tendency to randomly end on act 3 or 4 due to arrows stacking, getting surrounded by a bunch of skeletons, getting stuck inside a spearman (or do they stun?), and so on.

This would have been okay if this was an arcade game or a coffee-break kind of roguelite (<20-minute sessions), but you can play for 2-3 hours and still have it all end all of sudden. Most people aren't going to stick around for NG+ if they already have a bitter aftertaste after game robbing them over and over.

This could be approached in plenty of ways - for instance, the game could limit maximum damage per interval for projectile types that are shot with large spread in large quantities (either hard limit or just apply a reduction formula once the player got enough damage), or add actual iframes for most damage sources (except DoT, ofc.) or do a thing that Unexplored did and add a "automatically drink a potion if below X% health" option (instead of pointing out that you had a potion left on the death screen)

I don't think I'm going to stick around either, as acts 3-5 were way too same-ish (a grim reminder of first campaign in original Hammerwatch) while arenas are just a kiting hell (and you also miss out on gold/ore, making your run net negative if you die early in the next act).

Ultimately my time with this game had been kind of regrettable.

[bumbaclad]

You should see the amount of projectiles there are with more players; mobs and or bosses shoot way more stuff. Also in multiplayer you can soul link with people bringing them back from the dead.

[YellowAfterlife]

Originally posted by bumbaclad:

You should see the amount of projectiles there are with more players; mobs and or bosses shoot way more stuff. Also in multiplayer you can soul link with people bringing them back from the dead.

If this was directed at me, I was at first playing with a friend (Paladin + Ranger), but they called quits after our few failed attempts at councilors while making little to no progress in terms of town/upgrades. Things didn't look too bad at regular levels, was only apparent that some bosses shot extra projectiles in MP. And I think arena didn't spawn extra stuff at all?

[bumbaclad]

Originally posted by YellowAfterlife:

If this was directed at me

No. I was talking to the OP.

[MoonMoon🐺]

Originally posted by Muffinatorz:

Feather isn't bugged. It is getting a buff soon though.

The feather previously didn't use multiple pots if a single hit did more than double your HP. Next update should add that. Not sure if stunned will still prevent its activation though.

That... sounds like a bug honestly. And a bug fix.
I feel like the Phoenix Feather pretty much does for you what energy tanks do for Samus in Metroid. That just becomes your health pretty much, incremented by that total health if that makes sense. Something doing twice the damage than your health should probably just use twice the potions, if not just negate anything larger.

Originally posted by YellowAfterlife:

This would have been okay if this was an arcade game or a coffee-break kind of roguelite (<20-minute sessions), but you can play for 2-3 hours and still have it all end all of sudden. Most people aren't going to stick around for NG+ if they already have a bitter aftertaste after game robbing them over and over.

I often suspend my runs after a time for short breaks during a "long haul" of trekking through all three floors and the boss levels on my way to the end. You can do that in single player you know, and in multiplayer unless you're setting yourself for a solid one-shot-through run, then you should expect to at least go until you do die. Then you upgrade in town and can try again after a short break.

Least, that's how I've approached it. You can't save your progress in the levels in multiplayer, but I also have multiple characters in their own instances as well.

[bumbaclad]

And if going for distance make sure to do portals instead of the levels.

[MoonMoon🐺]

Originally posted by bumbaclad:

And if going for distance make sure to do portals instead of the levels.

Besides saving time, I think depending on your fountain settings you also end up with more items. It's not without risk though... Back in the first run with a Thief, I had an easier time trudging through the levels and bosses than I did trying to batter a rubik's cube apart as a shortcut.

*First run as in "before starting NG+1"

[2bizzyTOULOUSE]

Originally posted by alpasy:

Who says i'm standing still? 100% of the time i connect with enemy arrow is when i moved out of the way of another projectile. If you can avoid everything flying in your direction in this game you don't need HP bar at all, just switch your HP to 1 at the fountain and reap your just rewards.

I'm not saying this game is too hard or anything, my point is if you happen to have a HP bar, it shouldn't behave like your HP=1, even in a very few situations, because those few situations are not fun to encounter and they feel like the game cheats you.

If you move into a larger area of the map you can certainly avoid all of the projectiles by circling around the block of enemies repeatedly. Avoid any change in direction and make sure to keep you combo nova going.

In the end it comes down to skill, patience and overall time invested in the game. I am NG+14 with my ranger (without owning the DLC which makes things even easier).
The right build and starting items certainly help, but I can honestly say that 90% of my deaths are me being overconfident, 5% not paying enought attention and only 5% due to what I consider unavoidable situations.
That does mainly include a bad map layout in the first 3 floors, the first two bosses on a run with mediocre items found, or the ice breath of the dragon catching you in a bad spot.

But I also have 400+ hours invested because I like the game.

[Muffinslop]

Originally posted by YellowAfterlife:

Stopping by to say that I had a pretty decent run with priest - lots of regen and defense - to the point that I've not had to use a single potion through the entire run, made it through acts 4, 5, and 6 for the first time and from the first try, got to that dragon boss, boss was barely scratching me with attacks, got the boss to 2/3 health... and got shot point blank with icicles, ending the run instantly.

Icicles? Is that supposed to be the dragon's ice breath? I dunno about this point. I think everything should die if you stand point blank on his breath. He's a final boss c'mon

Edit: the attack is also very telegraphed. There's no reason for anyone but themselves if they get hit point blank.