Topic: City of skulls rewards feel lacking? (Read 8132 times)

ultimate26 · « **on:** March 19, 2012, 13:58 »

I dont understand why we get a 2nd BFG after the halls of carnage, I feel like i am working too hard on that level without getting any relevant reward...

skulls are disposable so i dont see them as such a big deal besides being semi conditionally useful in the mortuary.

Why dont we get something like a "Staff of skulls"

Same fatigue consuming staff like arena masters except when you trigger it, it gives you the effect of a random skull.

everytime you use it, it consumes your stamina.

otherwise i feel like skipping this level.

Pricklyman · « **Reply #1 on:** March 19, 2012, 14:09 »

Quote from: ultimate26 on March 19, 2012, 13:58

Why dont we get something like a "Staff of skulls"
Same fatigue consuming staff like arena masters except when you trigger it, it gives you the effect of a random skull.
everytime you use it, it consumes your stamina.
otherwise i feel like skipping this level.

I don't disagree at all - but...

The XP you get from City of Skulls is reasonably significant - due to the amount of (already spawned) enemies.
The second BFG can be used to hold power cells - moreso if you slap B mods on.
That Staff sounds really OP, simply as a gibber of corpses.

I do think that City of Skulls needs a nerf - either in difficulty or in increase of rewards...

Ashannar · « **Reply #2 on:** March 19, 2012, 14:45 »

At the very least, it'd be nice if there were more shells to replace the ones you lose clearing the level.

spacedust · « **Reply #3 on:** March 19, 2012, 18:02 »

If the change to number of shells found is made (http://forum.chaosforge.org/index.php/topic,5382.0.html), that would sort out the replenishment of shells somewhat.

Zalminen · « **Reply #4 on:** March 20, 2012, 00:37 »

I agree with the OP.

Earlier the only situations when I even tried clearing City of Skulls was 1) Vampyre build 2) trying for Conqueror.
In any other case it just wasn't worth the effort.

After the Vampyre changes I've just skipped the level unless I'm using it as a AoPc shortcut...

Zecks · « **Reply #5 on:** March 20, 2012, 01:17 »

But the vampyre change was reverted for now??? :>

Zalminen · « **Reply #6 on:** March 20, 2012, 01:23 »

Ah, I must have missed that. I've been chasing other badges so it's a long time since I've done a Vampyre build.

Ander Hammer · « **Reply #7 on:** March 20, 2012, 02:40 »

How many shells do you burn through in City of Skulls? I've done it with shotguns a few times and never ended up with ammo problems in the end.

Pistol and non-mAC rapid builds, on the other hand...

Pricklyman · « **Reply #8 on:** March 20, 2012, 03:25 »

Quote from: Ander Hammer on March 20, 2012, 02:40

How many shells do you burn through in City of Skulls? I've done it with shotguns a few times and never ended up with ammo problems in the end.

Enough - enough to feel like there should be more shells dropped...

ultimate26 · « **Reply #9 on:** March 20, 2012, 06:17 »

by the time i get to City of skulls, i have 5-6 stacks of 70 plasma, along with hyperblaster and almost no ammo for anything else.

I dont want to burn my plasma on skulls :(

On top of that i had a focused double shotty which did not had the wide spread i needed... died with a really good character because of my "Must do all special levels" mentality.

AlterAsc · « **Reply #10 on:** March 20, 2012, 06:43 »

I believe rewards correspond with the difficulty - so no cheese for easy level.

Sirdec · « **Reply #11 on:** March 20, 2012, 07:39 »

Let's assume HNTR, that gives us 43 Souls and 5 Pain Elemental if the wiki is still correct and a tactical shotgun, THE shotgun to carry around.

At 5 shells per elemental, we will use 25. The souls an elemental spawns are mostly killed during a shotgun blast, but let's say each elemental manages to still spawn 3 souls we have to deal with.

43 souls + 15 = 58. That's another 58 shells at 1 per soul, this is calculated veryyyyyyyyyy large here.

Thus 58 + 25 = 83 shells used.

If my memory is good there are 7 or 8 stacks of shells in the level 7 * 8 = 56.

For a net loss of 27 shells before the agony elemental spawns.

It's clearly not as bad ammo wise as you make it sound, if planning on use shotguns at all, 2 stacks should be caried at all times imo. And it's not like there aren't power cells either. The level is very easy unless on AoMr, AoB can be tricky as well as some other angels.

ultimate26 · « **Reply #12 on:** March 20, 2012, 11:36 »

Can we just have better rewards please?

Getting surrounded by Skulls is never fun :(

Rocket jump/phase device

Otherwise, massive loss of health anyways.

Pricklyman · « **Reply #13 on:** March 20, 2012, 14:21 »

Quote from: Sirdec on March 20, 2012, 07:39

<Calculations>

I would like to point out that a) Most pain elementals will spawn more than one set of souls...

and b) The agony elemental will use another AT LEAST 50 shells, to kill him and all the crap he spawns...

Ashannar · « **Reply #14 on:** March 20, 2012, 14:42 »

Yeah, plus 8 shells minimum per pain elemental, not 5.

AlterAsc · « **Reply #15 on:** March 20, 2012, 14:50 »

Look from another viewpoint.You lose shells, but you gain three skulls and BFG.Shells are common, while skulls and BFG are not.Skulls' usage is situational but hatred skull is a blessing in UC without Ber and all three are useful in Mortuary.
And you know - if you don't like the level feel free to skip it.

Pricklyman · « **Reply #16 on:** March 20, 2012, 22:28 »

True - but in many scenarios, the skulls usage is too situational to warrant carrying it around. I agree that they rock face re: Mortuary, and the hatred skull being great in UC, but by the same token, other special levels of lesser difficulty (such as Spiders Lair) give rewards that far exceed their challenge. (Such as the Nuclear Plasma Rifle - which is pretty awesome in any build, in any situation - and is a nuke at the least!)

All I feel is that scale-wise (dlevel wise and difficulty) the challenge and resources spent far outweigh the gain.

But I play on HNTR so don't listen to me too much! ;)

ultimate26 · « **Reply #17 on:** March 21, 2012, 08:22 »

I HAVE AN IDEA!

How about instead of giving a BFG, give a unique or assembled shotgun a double shotty preferably because of the spread and more skull crunchability.

This would be the "Shotgun special stage" since skulls are weak against shotty shells!

plus, is it really necessary to have BFG shots destroy ammo and items? i always hesitate to use explosives and bfg shots because of this... limits my gameplay :(

Random City of skulls unique item idea:

SKULLCRUSHER
Melee weapon

Whenever the Player attacks it does area of effect like this:
X
@X
X

AOE melee weapon ftw!

Ander Hammer · « **Reply #18 on:** March 23, 2012, 00:35 »

I don't agree with giving a shotgun, especially a double shotgun, because they're better for lost souls. Shotguns are good against them, and so are ammochained plasma rifles, and so are blademasters. The double shotgun has likely spawned like eighty times by the time you've reached the City, anyway.

I do agree with not dropping another BFG, especially since Halls of Carnage is so easy. What I'd kind of like to see is perhaps an armory-like spawn - more than one random weapon shows up scattered with the ammo, along with a higher chance to be exotic than normal.

The skullcrusher is right out. Melee is already wonderful with just an appropriate master trait and a chainsaw.

ultimate26 · « **Reply #19 on:** March 23, 2012, 12:28 »

Easy solution, a mod that has a chance of being exotic?

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Author Topic: City of skulls rewards feel lacking? (Read 8132 times)