Wow, nice compilation. Thanks for all this work.
I just discovered 0.9.9.8 and completed my first game (UV, kept my 0.9.9.7 player.wad)
Most suggestions I've seen here looked relevant to me.
After reading most of this thread (but about nothing else yet), here's my 2cts hot-feedback, for you to consider/inculde/ignore :)
note : While I notice the improvements, I rarely send flowers about what's good. What I focus on is always the issues.
Nice to see you back, and any feedback is welcome! I'll also note that 0.9.9.9 is on the horizon, and we have active beta tests going for it if you're interested (check out the #doomrl-testing in the Jupiter Hell Discord server).
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No quick selection keys anymore for weapons is extremely painful.
My usual run uses no more than shotgun/chainsaw(scythe)/plasma(laser) rifle/tac RL. I don't want to bind them manually every game, which even seems to need de-equipping them first so they are in invertory.
The old system where every weapon could have its quick key (and I did bind every one of them) was MUCH more efficient. Its only issue was quick-keying did give a movement-cost reduction, which was nonsense and shouldn't be paired with what is just a UI feature.
I find the manual ingame quickkey binding to be very quick and second nature once you get used to it, and for people like me that used to frequently change the quickkey weapons manually to use them with exotics/uniques, I've found this to be a very welcome change. Perhaps though an optional setting could be added that automatically sets the quickkeys to the old defaults, would have to ask Kornel if that is possible to implement.
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Is keybindings.lua not meant to come back ? I also had some bindings to use items. Especially both medkit and phase devices. Having to open inventory for this is an annoyance
The settings.lua file keeps the information for your settings, including keybindings (you can modify settings ingame, but you can also still modify them in this lua file, or copy it over to other versions to not to have readjust your settings ingame again). I'll also note that you can still set the quickkeys to items ingame.
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And a BIG annoyance, since I now also have to scroll manually to item slots. I've read that for some technical reason, inventory bindings would be complex to keep (I wonder why, yet), but remain surprised by such sacrifices. I think this will hamper playability too much for me and while I'll try a few more games, may very well end-up sticking with 0.9.9.7 if UI remains like this in the future.
I personally hated the old inventory system, as far too often I would misclick some random key on the inventory screen and end up wasting a medkit or worse (I also use a mouse for faster item selection). If you do really want the legacy inventory system or at least the technical explanation, you'll have to take it up with Kornel directly (alternatively, if you got the programming skills, you could try your hand at implementing it, DRL and the latest beta are open sourced, and additional programming help would be appreciated).
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Oh, and having to press space to go downstairs feels weird. First roguelike I play where I can't press > for it.
I can deal with this, but knowing I'll someday mistakenly go downstairs because I accidentally pressed spacebar is a bit more annoying. Secondary for sure, but a small loss remains a loss.
From experience, it was weird at first but I got used to it. If you want a workaround, you could set the general action key to ">". Otherwise, you can see if Kornel can add a dedicated key for descending to the "legacy" keybindings (where some other old inputs like opening/closing doors and saving were added).
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Shoudl'nt "blood boots" be "Butcher's boots" ? Could even pair for a set with some cleaver ♥)
The Blood Boots were added without any specific inspiration, to give a rare means to obtaining immunity from the new blood fluid. I would like more sets and so would be fine with this if a good idea comes up for what the set will do (maybe it'll let you ignore the fluid-slowing mechanic in blood, useful though a bit mundane).
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Phobos lab might be too early, or maybe we need some more ego pistols and get a random one. (Lack of variety is a bit sad here).
Thing is : the issue is more how pistols work than the drop itself. Guaranteed or not, CP is always useless unless you're a pistol freak.
SoG has been changed to +3 damage/-10% firing time, and even the basic Pistol will be outputting serious power (at the expense of weaker DPS in the lategame), so a stronger more commonly available pistol isn't really needed anymore.
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Alternatively, some rewards (pistols or other) could depend on picked skills. E.G. you could get a guaranteed pistol in HA if you skilled at least SOG2.
Hell's Arena already has challenge-specific rewards, so it should be possible that Phobos Lab/Military Base have the Combat Shotgun replaced in AoB/AoMr, or Hell's Armory/Deimos Lab could have two of the weapons in the weapon cache be guaranteed to be pistois or shotguns if you're playing AoMr or AoSh respectively (making all four be pistols or shotguns may be a bit much though, since that would give you great odds at multiple exotic/unique pistols/shotguns).
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As a side note, I never pick-up a combat shotgun anymore. And I always play mostly shotgun all game long (unless I get a nano for my plasma rifle).
I genuinely think regular shotgun with SOB2+ and/or P mods is MUCH more powerful. Hence, I don't agree with it being of any more use than a pistol.
... except maybe for the 5 ammo I salvage from it :)
I strongly disagree with this, but this isn't the place for arguments on tactical differences :p
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I strongly disagree with arbitrarly disabling powerups: Messing with normal flow of the game in ways requiring to die-and-retry is painful.
Phobos lab's exception is terrible-enough already, we don't need more of this ! Isn't anyone fighting an apostle berserk and already steamrolling anyway ?
Plus, these edge cases need specific roguelike luck. From what I see, you currently can't activate a thermobomb in this level ? Well, remove this then. I already lost more than one character due to supid exceptions of this kind in several games --which might include this case--, and unless the game tells you in advance, this shit is just frustrating. Game should just follow the rules, not require you to parse the wiki/forums or die until you know every surprise trap.
Also, this kind of vicious additions removes some tactical play, like fast-diving through 4 levels because you just found 3 invu globes in Hell4 and wanna try some fun ending. Love diversity, let players use rare cool cases instead of inciting them to rely on a generic safe strat ! THIS . IS . ROGUELIIIIIIIIIKE !
You can activate nukes in Hell Fortress against Carmack, only when you're fighting the Apostle that you're unable to activate nukes. As for carrying powerups into Hell Fortress, I feel you shouldn't be able to trivialize Carmack because of lucky invulns, and going for full wins is supposed to be something extra with enhanced risk and difficulty to it. This isn't a suggestion I feel too strongly for though, and I just realized that it could apply to the Dragonslayer's permanent berserk if a specific exception isn't programmed in, which would be catastrophic if you're fighting the Apostle and don't have Berserker (but at least definitely don't let people nuke Carmack anymore).
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Previous case reminds me of my first visit to UC. There should definitely be some warning telling you you can't shoot when entering. It could be as simple as a lone lost soul facing you 3 squares away...
Having a more direct way of letting you know you can't shoot in the Cathedral for the newbies seems no brainer to me, and one of Kornel's goals with DRL's renewed development is making it more newb-friendly.
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I'm not sure. I think killing Carmack shuld be more rewarding for this to make sense. A lot of players probably play it like I do, and just routinely kill it because "100%". The notion of partial wins seems enough to me : it's a fun notion when reading your stats.
We could imagine something bigger (Like what JH has near the end), but it looks decent to me in its current form.
If I wanted a rework, I'd say boss fights after anomaly could be made more interesting (I now always berserk into Cyber and nuke/berserk for ending... yeah, these could definitely use some rework :p)
My problem is that there's currently no real risk with going for the full win, as you'll still be rewarded any badges/medals for winning unless it requires a full win in the first place (I'm reminded of this mortem by apalapan, where he died to Carmack but was still rewarded the Hunter Diamond badge). It also doesn't make much sense to me to get killed by Carmack and the mortem acts like you won; fun fact, there's a unique death message for dying to Carmack ("[Player] was pwned by John Carmack"), but you'll never see it ingame because dying to him counts as a partial win and thus you get the partial win message ("[Player] sacrificed himself to kill the Mastermind at the Hell Fortress"). I wouldn't be opposed to making the boss fights more elaborate, but boss changes would need a lot of consideration, because it could make the hardest badges unreasonable or outright impossible (for example if the Cyberdemon fight got spruced up and made harder, it may no longer be possible to beat him in Archangel Of Humanity without nuking him with invuln).
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Have less restrictions on Dual Angel combinations
Yes, but please, make them a separate category for medals.
There's a small bunch of badges/medals like N! shotty I only got because I Angel-of-overconfidence'd into Dis, probably relying on some luck (be it invu, berserks, or any other great drops trivializing the ending)
This feels absolutely lame, and wayyyyy less deserved than the badges I got for winning say, my first nightmare games (which were also conqueror 8)).
I'm sure medals for dual angels can make sense too, but as long as an angel challenge gives any positive counterpart, we probably need to make them specific.
An alternative could be to note for every badge what were the winning conditions : Soldier class, challenges... could even be linked to mortem.
I strongly agree with finding Sereging to be extremely cheesy and to not be in the spirit of the achievement the badges represent (while also finding it annoying when looking through the Badge Hunters thread for strategies used and seeing most of the Diamonds were gotten with a lame AoOC stairdive and pray or with AoMC), and so I did support disqualifying Dual Angels from earning badges that don't explicitly require a specific Dual Angel combination, but I have wavered on pushing for it. Aside from limiting creativity in winning badges, we would miss out on cool ways to earn badges like Tormuse winning Everyman Diamond by combining AoH with A100. Creating new badges/medals to account for these Dual Angel runs instead sounds excessive though, so I'm not sure that's doable either. I did come up with a compromise of sorts in the new Badge Hunters thread, where I note if each mortem won a badge purely or by mixing it with another challenge in a Dual Angel, so those looking for mortems that didn't Sereg a badge or whatever criteria can find them without having to check each individual mortem.
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and with a properly seeded game to the full replay -- Yeah, I'm going a bit further... but I think replays in these kind of games should always be available. They don't just help us boost our ego, they also help making tutorials or reporting/understanding bugs !)
A replay system would be great, especially as a means of proof for people that don't have the means to record their runs (and would help safeguard against another 2Dev situation happening). it's probably too late for 0.9.9.9, but I'll add it to the OP anyway.