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 DRL (0.9.9.8a) roguelike post-mortem character dump
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 John Romero, level 21 Cacodemon Warrant Officer Marine,
 completed 100 levels of torture on level 100 of Hell.
 He survived 524150 turns and scored 703070 points.
 He played for 4 hours, 51 minutes and 34 seconds.
 He didn't like it too rough.

 He killed 1902 out of 1902 hellspawn. (100%)
 This ass-kicking marine killed all of them!
 He was an Angel of 100!

-- Special levels --------------------------------------------

  Levels generated : 0
  Levels visited   : 0
  Levels completed : 0

-- Awards ----------------------------------------------------

  Medal of Prejudice         Won with 100% kills
  Experience Medal           Reach experience level 20+
  Armorer Silver Badge       Discover 30 exotics/uniques

-- Graveyard -------------------------------------------------

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  ...................................................X......#
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  ###########################################################

-- Statistics ------------------------------------------------

  Health 55/55   Experience 448988/21
  ToHit Ranged +6  ToHit Melee +6  ToDmg Ranged +0  ToDmg Melee +0

-- Traits ----------------------------------------------------

  Class : Marine

    Finesse          (Level 3)
    Tough as nails   (Level 3)
    Son of a gun     (Level 5)
    Eagle Eye        (Level 3)
    Dualgunner       (Level 1)
    Intuition        (Level 2)
    Whizkid          (Level 2)
    Badass           (Level 2)

  SoG->SoG->DG->SoG->Fin->Fin->WK->WK->EE->EE->EE->SoG->Bad->SoG->TaN->TaN->Int->Bad->TaN->Int->Fin->

-- Equipment -------------------------------------------------

    [a] [ Armor      ]   red armor [6] (OP)
    [b] [ Weapon     ]   pistol (2d7) [6/6] (A1P3T1)
    [c] [ Boots      ]   Enviroboots [0]
    [d] [ Prepared   ]   Trigun (3d6) [6/6]

-- Inventory -------------------------------------------------

    [a] tactical shotgun (9d3) [5/5] (P1)
    [b] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [c] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [d] 10mm ammo (x16)
    [e] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [f] shotgun shell (x27)
    [g] shotgun shell (x50)
    [h] small med-pack
    [i] large med-pack
    [j] large med-pack
    [k] large med-pack
    [l] power mod pack
    [m] power mod pack
    [n] power mod pack
    [o] technical mod pack
    [p] agility mod pack
    [q] bulk mod pack
    [r] bulk mod pack
    [s] 10mm ammo chain (x250)
    [t] 10mm ammo chain (x250)

-- Resistances -----------------------------------------------

    acid       - internal 20%   torso 20%   feet 100%
    fire       - internal 20%   torso 45%   feet 100%
    plasma     - internal 20%   torso 20%   feet 20% 

-- Kills -----------------------------------------------------

    120 former humans
    152 former sergeants
    194 former captains
    84 imps
    39 demons
    250 lost souls
    109 cacodemons
    70 hell knights
    201 barons of hell
    83 arachnotrons
    5 former commandos
    36 pain elementals
    110 revenants
    129 mancubi
    166 arch-viles
    18 nightmare imps
    37 nightmare cacodemons
    20 nightmare demons
    27 nightmare arachnotrons
    5 nightmare arch-viles
    4 elite former humans
    7 elite former sergeants
    2 elite former captains
    1 elite former commando
    23 bruiser brothers
    6 shamblers
    1 lava elemental
    1 agony elemental
    2 Cyberdemons

-- History ---------------------------------------------------

  On level 7 he found the Trigun!
  On level 12 he found the Enviroboots!
  On level 16 he assembled a storm bolter pistol!
  Level 21 blasted him with an unholy atmosphere!
  On level 21 he found the Grammaton Cleric Beretta!
  On level 39 he encountered an armed nuke!
  On level 40 he stumbled into a complex full of revenants!
  On level 40 he assembled a tactical shotgun!
  On level 43 he stumbled into a complex full of revenants!
  He sounded the alarm on level 47!
  On level 53, hell froze over!
  On level 53 he found the Hellwave Pack!
  On level 56 he stumbled into a nightmare cacodemon cave!
  Level 63 was a hard nut to crack!
  Level 65 was a hard nut to crack!
  On level 67 he encountered an armed nuke!
  On level 68 he ran for his life from acid!
  On level 73, hell froze over!
  Level 74 blasted him with an unholy atmosphere!
  Level 82 was a hard nut to crack!
  On level 84 he was stumbling in the dark!
  He sounded the alarm on level 88!
  On level 89 he stumbled into a nightmare arachnotron cave!
  On level 94 he stumbled into a complex full of mancubi!
  He sounded the alarm on level 96!
  On level 98 he stumbled into a nightmare arachnotron cave!
  On level 100 he was stumbling in the dark!
  He activated the Angel Arm on level 100!
  On level 100 he finally completed 100 levels of torture.

-- Messages --------------------------------------------------

 You enter Hell, level 100. There's the smell of blood in the air! This floor
 is pitch-black!
 You swap your weapons instantly!
 Do you want to use the dangerous Angel Arm?? [y/n]
 You activate the Angel Arm! Your life is drained! You feel relatively safe
 now.
 You feel your invincibility fading...
 You feel vulnerable again.
 You swap your weapons instantly!
 You dualreload your guns!
 There are stairs leading downward here.
 You did it! You completed 100 levels of DRL! You're the champion! Press
 <Enter>...

-- General ---------------------------------------------------

 46 brave souls have ventured into Phobos:
 37 of those were killed.
 And 4 couldn't handle the stress and committed a stupid suicide.

 5 souls destroyed the Mastermind...
 3 killed the bitch and survived.
 2 showed that it can outsmart Hell itself.

--------------------------------------------------------------

So I just cranked out my very first masterless win on Ao100 (actually my very first masterless win period), and I decided to go pistolero.

I got the Trigun shortly after I opted to go Dualgunner, but when it's your main gun in a dual-wield setup, you can't dual-reload because Shift+R (the key that does dual-reload) is what activates the Angel Arm. Since I wasn't crazy about switching guns every time I had to reload, I stuck the Trigun in my prepared slot and used another pistol as my main gun. The Storm Bolter and Grammaton Cleric Beretta got left behind because rapid-fire eats ammo like crazy on top of the dual-wielding, and you don't have access to Ammochain if you're doing a pistol run as it is, so I opted for a gun that had three power mods, one agility mod and one tech mod as my main pistol-wise. Dualgunner really is the way to go if you're doing a masterless pistol run, and I was doing enough damage with my guns near the end with Son of a Gun 5 to blow Mancs, Viles, Barons and other enemies back even without Son of a Bitch, so I didn't put any points into that trait.

With the Enviroboots and some onyx-modded red armor, I didn't have to worry about standing in the bad or getting my armor wrecked, so my main concern was 1.) keeping myself in health, and 2.) keeping myself in ammo. The former wasn't much of a problem once I power-modded my armor and sunk a few points into Badass and Tough as Nails (I badly wanted to get my hands on a Nano mod so I could assemble another Cybernano Armor, but I didn't get a single damn one the entire run). As for the latter, Former Captains drop enough ammo to last you a while, and they can be found even in Hell and Beyond.

My most hated enemies by far were the VMR and the Nightmare Arachnotrons (which came probably the closest to ending me in the second big cave near the end). I ended up using a Hellwave Pack to even the odds against a mess of Viles and Mancs that were too tightly packed together for me to get at the Viles easily. I also ended up having to fight two Cyberdemons near the end of the run, one on an island level where he was right in the lava, and another in a regular level, and in both cases, they took two full double-mags to bring down.

I entered the final level on an Invulnerability, and since it was another Pitch Black level, I decided fuck it and busted out the Angel Arm for the first and only time on the run to finish things off with a bang.

BETA 3 is up!

The big one is a change to how barrels behave and move. You can slide them around much more freely, and slide them over items, through doors, etc. But most importantly you ALSO move with the pushed barrel. And it looks smoother too!

Speaking of smooth, several small visual improvements have been done - including improvement of reticle rendering and a bump animation for melee.

The usual suspect bugfixes were also made, most importantly I think I finally fixed the melee count bug affecting Lightfoot badges. See below for the rest of changes.

There's also a linux build - untested, but if it works it should have less abusive requirements towards glibc etc.

Report all errors and give feedback on the changes!

DoomRL 0.9.9.9 BETA 3 Windows LQ
DoomRL 0.9.9.9 BETA 3 Linux LQ

Code: [Select]

0.9.9.9 BETA 3
[new] -- GH#149: settings - you can now clear a keybinding using Backspace
[new] -- GH#188: settings - you can now disable mouse rendering and interaction
[new] -- GH#094: barrels can be moved much more freely now!
[new] -- GH#094: you move with the barrel now!
[mod] -- GH#192: G-version - auto-target reticle now follows enemy sprite
[mod] -- GH#193: G-version - melee bump animation added
[mod] -- GH#193: G-version - smooth barrel movement
[mod] -- GH#017: you can invoke the combat translocator to self-phase for a higher cost
[fix] -- GH#018: player info will show level name instead of "level X of Phobos Base"
[fix] -- GH#191: fixed overdraw on diagonal movement
[fix] -- GH#197: fixed lut correction
[fix] -- GH#183: fixed melee kill counting (fixes Lightfoot Badges)


This post is to organize new bugs and issues found in the 2nd beta of 0.9.9.9.

*Various audio issues

In addition to certain sounds having defaults that have always ignored any new sound you try defining for them in the sound.lua and now audio.lua files (such as the Nightmare Cacodemon and Lava Elemental projectiles using the default fireball sound regardless of what you put in for them, or the Revenant's projectile using the Rocket Launcher's sound even if you try giving it a different sound), I have found new sounds that ignore what you set for them.

*The Shambler's projectile now always uses the default fireball sound, ignoring what you set it for it in the audio file.
*All melee weapons use the default fireball sound when attacking with them, not only ignoring what you set for them but also the default sounds that were already assigned to some of them.
*Activating levers uses the powerup sound, rather than what you set for them nor the default switch sound (this does not apply to levers in special levels however, which are correctly using the switch sound).

One other minor audio issue is when releasing the Shamblers in Hell's Armory and Deimos Lab, their act sound upon releasing is distance-based. This is fine for Deimos Lab when you're right next to the spot they spawn when hitting the lever to release them, but in Hell's Armory, since the Shambler is released on the other side of the map, you don't hear it at all. Maybe you could argue it's better this way, but previously this sound wasn't distance-based.

*Warning messages are not colored

Self-explanatory, warning messages for when your armor is damaged/destroyed, when a nuke countdown is happening, or simply from killing everything on the level, are no longer colored. You can see a screenshot of it in this Discord message.

*If an item's name gets too long, it'll take up two lines of space in your inventory menu, and push other items off the screen.

Also self-explanatory, you can see a screenshot of it in this Discord message.

*If a run earns enough unique medals to earn one of the Heroic badges, you won't be awarded said badges until the next run you complete.

So like with the Technician badges, it appears the Heroic badges are also bugged to not be awarded on the actual run you earn them in, with the game instead giving them on your next run you complete, as seen in this Discord message. I assume this issue will also apply to the Armorer badges.

*You are unable to equip autoequip weapons from the ground if you are already holding another weapon, even if you have inventory space for it.

Yet another self-explanatory issue, you can see a screenshot of it in this Discord message.

*Gunrunner's autofiring is bugged.

So with the new JH targeting opening up the possibility to control Gunrunner's autofiring when running instead of only firing at the closest enemy, I thought to try testing if it worked that way now... only to find that Gunrunner's autofiring doesn't work at all. You'll run, and the targeting cursor will go to the closest enemy if you have it targeting a different enemy, with no firing happening. And even if you were pre-targeting the closest enemy, it still doesn't autofire. A pretty crippling bug that needs to be fixed ASAP (and hopefully Gunrunner will gain control over where its autofire shoots when that is fixed).

*If you reload a save, when you run -> wait with enemies revealed, you cannot stop it manually.

Normally, if you do run -> wait when enemies are revealed from a Tracking Map or the enemy revealed mechanic, you are able to interrupt it before whatever max wait time you have set in your config file. However in the current beta, if you save and then reload it, you are unable to stop it until an enemy gets in your vision or it hits the max wait time, and any inputs you do try inputting seemingly get "buffered" to get inputted immediately after you reach the max wait time. Weirdly this bug seems to only be present when you reload a save, as I have not encountered it on any run before saving.

*Cerberus Boots have a flat 50% plasma resistance, rather than giving +50% resistance to the base boots with a cap of 100%.

Not a bug, but something I noticed when making Cerberus Plasteel Boots, they had 50% plasma resistance rather than 60%. This isn't a big deal in this particular instance, but the main reason I bring it up is if you were to make Cerberus Boots out of the new Blood Boots, the resulting Cerberus Blood Boots would have 50% plasma resistance rather than 100%, which makes no sense. Since the only other moddable boots with any plasma resistance is Plasteel boots, this change would mainly just allow you to make Cerberus Blood Boots that retain their blood immunity (and make Plasteel boots a slightly better option for Cerberus Boots, which isn't a bad idea to help differentiate the resulting Cerberus Boots based on which boots you use, as otherwise they're all identical aside from Cerberus Gothic Boots having 200% durability).

*Blood Boots (almost) cannot be obtained outside of A100/666

I noticed in the source code that Blood Boots have a minimum depth of 25, which considering boots cannot spawn in vaults, this make Blood Boots almost unobtainable outside of A100/666 (I say "almost", because you can obtain them in Lava Pits/Mt. Erebus since item spawns there are based on floor 25, but your chances are very low that you'll get them there). I imagine this was intentional, given blood is primarily an A100 feature, with its only standard game appearance currently being in Limbo and rarely in caves on UV/N!. However, making Blood Boots an almost A100 exclusive makes it a particular pain in the ass for the Armorer badges, as now you cannot possibly get Armorer Gold without playing A100 or getting very lucky in the one special level you can find them, which isn't a big deal, but the bigger pain comes in that you now wouldn't be able to get Armorer Diamond without playing A100 at least three times (and likely more as you can go entire A100 runs without ever finding the Blood Boots), or otherwise getting very lucky with them spawning in Lava Pits/Erebus three times. And Blood Boots could still be useful in the standard game, so being able to get them if you're lucky could be nice (whether to make Limbo easier or as a life saver if you get a really bad late blood cave on UV/N!). A minimum depth of 17 or even 20 for the Blood Boots can work. If these boots must be kept an A100 exclusive, I wouldn't mind the Armorer badges being overhauled however to be less of a pure grind.

_________________________________________________________

The following aren't bugs/issues, but a couple more balancing ideas.

*Lessen the speed penalty on heavy boots.

A new mechanic added is fluids slowing your movement down by 20%. I like this change, but I think this change is excessively punishing on heavy boots that were given a big movespeed penalty to previously compensate for their ability to run through fluids with little to no damage, back when there was no speed penalty from fluids. For example, when playing a Scout wearing Cerberus Boots with no Hellrunner, you will have an abysmal 1.48 second movement speed in fluids with no armor on (or armor with no speed bonus/penalty), and an abominable 1.77 second speed when wearing Red Armor that wasn't agility-modded on top of those boots (better hope there's no speedy enemies around or you might get triple-attacked). And of course those numbers would be even worse for the Marine and Technician, while if the N! enemy speed bonus is added back on top, maybe a quadruple attack could be possible... As such, I propose the following move speed adjustments:

Gothic Boots: -15% -> -10%
Environmental Boots: -25% -> -15%
Enviroboots: -25% -> -15%
Lava Boots: -30% -> -20%
Cerberus Boots: -30% -> -20%

I'll also note that these new values still make these boots slower in fluids than they were in versions prior to the fluid-slowing moving mechanic, and they're still slow enough that you would rather wear movement-boosting boots normally, even after agility-modding them (-10% speed Cerberus Boots vs +25% speed Tactical Boots is no contest for what you want to be wearing at all times).

*Buff Tough As Nails to give +5% inherent energy resistances per level in addition to +1 inherent protection, nerf the Marine's inherent energy resistances to 10%, nerf Berserk's resistance bonuses to +50%, change Vampyre's SoB block to TaN, and change Malicious Blades' TaN block to Badass or SoG.

This is several different things but I'm putting them all under the same entry, as they're tied together, addressing TaN being an underpowered trait whose block means little to any mastery that blocks it, a requisite Marine nerf that would be needed if TaN is buffed to keep Marines from getting too tanky, addressing the overpowered defenses granted by Berserk and the Berserker trait, and a way to farther nerf the currently broken Vampyre, while giving the currently underpowered Malicious Blades something. I wrote up a big post explaining the rationale behind these changes in the JH Discord, but in case the person reading this isn't in the JH Discord or don't want to open Discord up, I'll repost it here under the following spoiler tags:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Wondering if Tough As Nails could get buffed. It's the basic trait i pick least by far, and I find it to be a "whatever" block for nearly every mastery that blocks it, while Ironman is the usually more useful filler defensive trait. Aside from general "offense > defense", some particular issues with it:

*1 point of protection matters little against bigger enemies, unless you already have such good armor that you can reduce their attacks down to around 5 or less damage.

*It is applied separately from your armor in damage calculation, which means TaN does not reduce the damage your armor takes, unlike inherent resistances will.

*TaN1 literally does nothing against plasma damage, since it's applied separately from armor (meaning it can't stack on armor with odd value protection to save an extra point of plasma damage) and gets rounded down to 0. TaN3 additionally provides no extra benefit against plasma, since it still can't stack with armor and will get its protection rounded down to 1.

*If you have good enough armor to reduce damage to 1, then any additional levels of TaN does nothing.

Just letting it stack properly with worn armor in damage calculation could be an idea to help address issues 2 and 3, though I don't know if that would be a pain to program, and it would also buff enemies that find armor, which could be either good or bad depending on how you see it (though that would only apply when a Hell Knight finds a Green Armor or another 1/3 protection armor, as now it would take 1 less damage from plasma hits, other enemies that can wear armor already have even value inherent protection and so gain no benefit from it). Another idea is to take a page from Ironman's buff and have each level of TaN give you +5% inherent energy resistances in addition to +1 protection, which will let it make more of a difference against the big hard-hitting enemies, help reduce the damage your armor takes, and will make TaN1 + 3 actually matter against plasma damage. If the latter idea was to be implemented, you would need to nerf the Marine's inherent energy resistance to 10%, or at least 15%, which would end up serving as a slight indirect nerf to Ammochain (which is blocked TaN).

I'm also thinking berserk's resistances could be nerfed to +50% rather than the +60% it is now. Aside from +60% being a weird number, Berserker itself is a very powerful defensive trait without even considering the offensive benefits of berserk; take any hit that deals 16 damage or more, you automatically reduce it by at least 60% (which stacks with whatever armor resistances and other inherent resistances you have), while you then get 20 actions performing all actions 50% faster and will reduce any farther damage by 60% during those actions (while getting even more berserk actions if you take any subsequent hit that deals 16+ damage), which you can utilize to kill the threat(s) much easier or escape without depleting your tactics. It's so good that in A100 and Nightmare runs, I find it well worth going out of my way to get Berserker shortly after I get my mastery + WK2 even if I'm not intending to use melee (though since berserked melee is so strong, having a competent melee sidearm is always handy). Reading old forum threads, I see once upon a time, berserk's resistances were briefly +50% after being nerfed from whatever it was prior, but people freaked out about melee being "nerfed too much" and so it was made +60%, don't know if people overreacted as I wasn't around for those early versions, but in current DRL, I think +60% resistances is too strong and melee would still be very powerful with berserk resistances toned back down to +50%. This would partly help Malicious Blades being grossly outclassed by Berserker too (though I think Malicious blades would still need help to be worth not being able to get Berserker).
 
If you implemented the TaN buff, the Marine inherent resistance nerfs, berserk's resistance nerf, and then changed Vampyre's SoB block to TaN, that would go a long way to reign Vampyre back in, without hurting the other non-Ammochain Marine builds. For some number crunching, with 10% inherent energy resistances + 50% berserk resistances + 12% fire resistance from a Nanofiber Red Armor, berserked Vampyre would have 60% acid and plasma resistances in addition to 72% fire resistance. This results in the following new damage calculations

*An Archvile zap gets reduced to 4 damage (currently it deals 1 damage)
*An average Revenant and Mancubus rocket gets reduced to 2 damage (currently 1 damage), and max damage Revenant/Macubus rocket gets reduced to 5 damage (currently 1 damage)
*An average Cyberdemon rocket gets reduced to 4 damage (currently 1 damage), and max damage Cyberdemon rocket gets reduced to 8 damage (currently 1 damage). This damage calculation also applies to intentional facerockets to trigger Berserker.
*An average Baron acid ball gets reduced to 3 damage (currently 1 damage), and max damage Baron ball gets reduced to 6 damage (currently 2 damage)
*An average Hell Knight/Cacodemon plasma ball gets reduced to 2 damage (currently 1 damage), and a max damage plasma ball gets reduced to 4 damage (currently 1 damage)
*An average Shambler bolt gets reduced to 4 damage (currently 1 damage), and max damage Shambler bolt gets reduced to 7 damage (currently 3 damage)

With these numbers, Vampyre would now need to get much more rare indestructible/regenerating armor in order to achieve near-IDDQD status than just building a Nanofiber Red Armor. Vampyre could put a power or technical mod on Nanofiber Red Armor to reduce nearly every energy hit to 1 to 3 damage, but then it would sacrifice the much needed agility mod it can currently put on to mitigate Vampyre's lack of Hellrunner, meaning it takes a bit more chip damage when rushing in to hordes. If you made these changes and also disallowed Vampyre from healing over 100% and/or made its prerequisites harder, I think that would knock it back down to the A tier without going as far as preventing berserk resistances from stacking with the Marine's or other inherent resistances. For one more note, if TaN was buffed and Vampyre was blocked it, I would suggest letting Malicious Blades get TaN, both to alleviate so many masteries blocking it and to farther help give Malicious Blades something over the other two melee masteries (change the block to Badass or Son Of A Gun).

Nice summary, I'll go through it in detail when I plan to do another run. Question though - what do you mean by floors and ceilings?

Floor means how good the build will be at its worst with bad RNG (particularly regarding item drops and generated EXP pool), and ceiling means how good a build will be at its best. So a good floor means the build will still function well even if you're getting repeated difficult bad levels while stuck with nothing more than common items and whatever you can get guaranteed from special levels, and a good ceiling means the build becomes that much more exponentially powerful when you do get all the good stuff.

Nice summary, I'll go through it in detail when I plan to do another run. Question though - what do you mean by floors and ceilings?

I posted this 0.9.9.8 (and early 0.9.9.9 beta) build tier list on the JH Discord and was asked to post it here so I could include the short summaries I wrote explaining my rationale for each ranking.

This tier list factors how the build does at every point in the game and overall consistency, not just ranking on potential (what good is potential if you'll always die before reaching it or will almost never get the rare equipment you need for it?), nor how likely a build gets you past Phobos (sure Phobos is usually the hardest part, but Phobos deaths are much less painful than deaths in Deimos and especially Hell, so increasing your odds of not dying in Deimos and Hell is still important), and considers how much the build actually helps you clear difficult levels and survive arduous combat situations (any build can 100% clear a level without damage with a perfect corner shooting spot and a Tactical Shotgun, but rarely will you find such ideal conditions, especially on harder difficulties, so the less you have to depend on ideal conditions the better). Tiers are ordered, but the ordering isn't super important.

S tier

(Clearly broken and needs to be nerfed)

*Vampyre - Trivializes the standard game when it gives you near-IDDQD even in Angel Of Max Carnage and is by far the easiest option for most challenges/badges. Strategy with Vampyre also often amounts to little more than "run into enemies, mash click until they die", with maybe some rocket jumps in there to close gaps and calculated facerockets to trigger Berserker before rushing in. Its only weaknesses is a mediocre early game (that is mitigated with the free trait you get and being a level 6 mastery), and the Hellrunner block makes it not so ideal for any time-sensitive challenges, but it's so strong it could probably still work in those. The gap between Vampyre and every other build grows even farther on Nightmare, when melee is very powerful at corpse handling and Vampyre can abuse respawns for a full health refill whenever needed. It also requires nothing more than a mundane Nanofiber Red Armor and Chainsaw (or even just a Chainsword) to break the game, no need for rare or otherwise hard-to-get equipment, so it's super consistent and its floor is greater than nearly every other build's ceiling.

A+ tier

(Borderline broken, might need a nerf but doesn't outright trivialize the game)

*Ammochain - EE block makes typical rapid fire weapons unreliable and not being able to get WK1/2 until level 10/11 minimum without putting off Ammochain sucks, but consuming 1 cell per plasma burst is so powerful, both ammo-conservation and combat wise (other builds can't do more than five consecutive shots with a Plasma Rifle + TH2 without needing to go through a long reload or building a Nanomachic Plasma Rifle, while Ammochain can do 40 consecutive shots with a vanilla Plasma Rifle without reloading), and having Reloader makes Shotguns a very reliable fallback, while that in addition to the Marine's durability makes the early game easy too. Also has the uncommon ability to get both HR + Berserker to make it even more powerful late game, and its non-EE blocks are irrelevant. Overall has a very high floor with one of the highest ceilings (just needs a Hyperblaster to crush the game, while getting any of the rare mods, a Laser Rifle, or Nuclear Plasma Rifle sends it into the stratosphere), with few special levels and challenges posing any issue.

A tier

(Very powerful and often optimal builds, but have enough drawbacks to usually not make the game a cakewalk)

*Shottyhead - One of the strongest mastery effects despite its simplicity, while also having very strong prereqs, being able to get WK at a reasonable level, doesn't require ancillary traits but still retains strong post-mastery options like Berserker and Intuition, and has probably the easiest early game of any build. Its only stumbling is the SoB + EE block makes any sort of Plasma Rifle much less effective, but this isn't a big deal unless the RNG is very stingy with shells when you essentially got rapid fire shotguns. It has one of the highest floors with one of the highest ceilings, while being good at every point of the game and rarely being worse than a solid pick for any given challenge, but being vulnerable to ammo concerns without a Nano mod keeps it from the A+ tier.

*Scavenger - Essentially plays like a masterless build, but gets more mods than usual and a lot more of those very coveted rare mods, that combines very nicely with the Technician's inherent abilities. While luck dependent, it'll usually get better equipment than other builds around the midgame, and is far more likely to obtain the super equipment that will trivialize the game. While it has the fewest blocks of any mastery and two of the blocks are pretty irrelevant, the Berserker block is painful and can leave the build somewhat vulnerable lategame without good armor. Like masterless builds, it can also lack power in late Phobos and early Deimos before you get the aforementioned buffed equipment, but is usually no worse than solid for any challenge that doesn't require immediate power.

*Cateye - The best build at damage avoidance, while it also offers a level of flexibility not seen in most other masteries, and has a good effect that benefits any weapon type, making it more of a "generalist" mastery than the actual intended generalist Scout mastery. Can have the problem of wanting too many traits however (particularly being unable to fit Int2 + WK2 + EE + HR in a timely manner), and Cateye can be lacking in power when damage avoidance is not possible, which cannot be alleviated by getting Berserker either as it's blocked (which also makes the build more fragile in the lategame). Often a viable pick regardless of the challenge, and does have the particular perk of being brokenly good in Angel of Max Carnage.

*Blademaster - No other build can clear floors faster, and Berserker in general is very strong, while its power scales up the higher the difficulty as its ability becomes more useful the more enemies there are. Its early game is on the weaker end and the late Whizkid acquisition sucks, while its effect doesn't really do much against isolated enemies, keeping it from being broken, but it remains consistently good floor and ceiling wise, and it remains an optimal pick for many challenges/badges, or when you just want to rush through the game with more power than a masterless build offers.

*Masterless Scout - The unequivocal best stair dive build, and the ultimate flexibility combines nicely with the Scout's inherent abilities. For more complete playthroughs however, its lack of power in the mid and late game can hold it back in difficult combat encounters and harder special levels, and generally specialization towards something will be more useful for any challenge/badge that isn't a stair dive. Still remains A tier for its stair diving dominance and the fact you can never really go wrong with it.

B tier

(Powerful builds with their fair share of drawbacks that keep them from being top tier picks)

*Masterless Marine - Generally outclassed by Masterless Scout and other Marine masteries, which fulfill their respective roles better, but it still has the strengths of versatility in a masterless build, and has a strong niche when you need a bulkier build than Masterless Scout while also needing said masterless versatility (particularly if you want Hellrunner on something bulky, which all non-Ammochain Marine masteries block, without having to make a detour for Triggerhappy as Ammochain would require).

*Survivalist - It fulfills its role well as the tank build, at the expense of having the worst offense in the game and a painful Hellrunner block. Usually terrible offense would tank a build's viability, but Survivalist makes tanking actually viable and gives you a big margin of error to play with, allowing you to get away with repeated mistakes and bad RNG rolls that would be fatal for nearly any other build. The lack of offense and speed can still get it overwhelmed though, and it's bad for any time-sensitive event, which alongside being generally outclassed by Vampyre, keeps it from being top tier.

*Masterless Technician - Mostly outclassed by Scavenger if you want to make the most of a generalist Technician, and mostly outclassed by the other Masterless builds if you want to make the most of having no mastery, as the Scout and Marine have stronger innate bonuses (particularly in the early game). But as a masterless build it's still pretty good, and it does have the niche of a generalist Technician's advantages that retains access to Berserker (which is particularly relevant in Angel Of Humanity).

*Army of the Dead - Probably has the lowest ceiling of any build, with probably the weakest mastery effect in the game (aside from Entrenchment) that becomes irrelevant with Nano-Shrapnal and Plasma(tic) Shotguns, and is probably never an optimal pick for any challenge/badge. But it has a good early and mid game with Shotgun specialization, Marine's durability, and relatively quick access to Whizkid, while Shotguns never become bad and it can still spec into a Berserker sidearm to help in the lategame if needed. With a high consistent floor that depends little on equipment/item luck, this build is rarely an outright bad pick outside of any challenge/badge that requires Hellrunner.

C tier

(Functional but held back by serious flaws, could use a buff)

*Sharpshooter - One of the strongest mastery effects in the game, and thanks to Technician, doesn't need to invest in Finesse to get Whizkid, which is very useful for a Pistol build. As a result, it has one of the strongest mid games and a still impressive late game, which is also boosted by it retaining access to the Good Stuff to bolster it farther in the later game (with the SoB block being its only real painful block). However, due to Pistol specialization and awful prereqs, it has an absolutely abysmal early game, the worst of any build, which gives it an awful survival rate in Phobos on harder difficulties if you're not very good at the game, and makes it very unideal for any challenge/badge where early power is needed. Such a polarizing mastery can be hard to rank, on a pure winrate basis it would be possibly the worst and generally Phobos is the hardest part, but since Phobos deaths are much less punishing time-investment wise, a build that offers such good mid and late game consistency still has value.

*Gunrunner - Has one of the highest potential ceilings in the game, being able to effectively get Pistol firing rates on Shotguns and Rocket Launchers while firing/moving/reloading all at the same time, and any combination of HR + Fin + Rel gives it an easy early game. But this mastery requires significant ancillary investment as it needs Shottyman to actually do anything worthwhile, which combined with a very late Whizkid acquisition and requiring the generally unhelpful Dodgemaster, gives it a very weak mid game. Gunrunner itself can also be rather finicky to utilize and is very ammo hungry whenever you use it, while the Brute block prevents you from effectively using a melee backup, as well as leaves you always frail. It can feel very good to wipe out a nasty horde in a quick run rampage, but deaths in Deimos are always painful and Shottyhead generally outclasses it (which you'll need to actively forego as you build to Gunrunner + Shottyman, as it overlaps Shottyhead's prereqs).

*Fireangel - Its defensive benefit is potentially very handy and no-damage rocket jumps is a nice benefit, but it offering no sort of offensive boost, while also blocking SoB and EE, leaves it with one of the worst offenses in the game, and the defensive benefit is not so good as to be worth the tradeoff. It has a tantalizing ceiling with being able to blow up everything with the Mother-In-Law, Nanomachic Tristar Blaster, or a nano-modded BFG 10K with no risk of blowing yourself up, but you'll very rarely get such weapons and often won't even get a Nano mod just to build a Nanomachic Rocket Launcher, which is necessary to take extensive advantage of rocket launchers offensively since rockets come in such small ammo quantities. It retains access to Berserker to compensate for the lack of offense, but besides not being easy to fit in, Fireangel removes the ability for you to get Berserker procs off of facerockets and barrels, making it not as strong as Berserker is in the hands of other builds. Overall it's not that bad, and has a decent early game thanks to Shotgun specialization, but it's never really any good either, outside of a particular niche with the Gatekeeper badges.

*Malicious Blades - The mastery effect is decent, but its offensive and defensive benefits are almost entirely outclassed by those of Berserker, which it blocks. The mastery has the benefit of its defense-boosting effects being usable with non-melee weapons, which when combined with it not blocking SoB like the other melee masteries, allows it to function more effectively as a hybrid-melee build, but such a build requires a ton of traits that leaves it weak for a long time, and having to keep a blade in your prepared slot to get said defense-boost prevents you from utilizing ammo boxes, hurting it farther in a hybrid build. Whether as a pure melee Technician or hybrid melee build, you are better off going masterless and getting Berserker instead, and a build specializing in blades specifically would still do much better with the other melee masteries. I don't see any challenge/badge where this is a remotely optimal pick, but it's never bad enough to rank it in the lower tiers.

D tier

(These builds aren't unplayable, but they're severely flawed and using them makes the game much harder, in need of significant buffs)

*Gun Kata - HR investment gives it a slightly easier early game than other Pistol masteries, but investing in Pistols still gives you a much harder early game compared to non-Pistol builds (and ultimately with pistols, you would rather stack SoG with SoB and get a level of EE early rather than get HR, as getting your combat to something acceptable is of upmost importance, so Pistol builds that don't go with any Pistol mastery still have the least painful early game). Unlike Sharpshooter however, it requires several ancillary traits to be effective; it technically doesn't require SoG3 but you need it ASAP or else your Pistols don't do shit, making Gun Kata effectively a level 8 mastery, but you also need two levels of Fin before you can get WK that's desperately needed for Pistol builds, then you need SoG 4 and 5 after that, still really want at least one level of EE so you stop missing so much, and you would want to fit in Int too... The SoB block without Sharpshooter's guaranteed max damage also makes your Pistols quite weak and unreliable, at least before you get SoG5, or before you get a Unique pistol or an Exotic pistol maxed out with Power mods. You altogether get a build with a weak early game, an abysmal mid game, and a still unimpressive late game, so you're always lagging behind other builds at every stage of the game. Gun Kata's effects itself can also be rendered pointless, as the "shoot faster after dodging" bonus doesn't matter once you reach the firing speed cap (nevermind the unreliability, if not outright impracticality, of utilizing it in typical difficult combat scenarios), and the reloading bonus doesn't matter if you get a Nanomachic Pistol or a Blaster (while being a finicky effect to utilize in general, especially compared to just using one Pistol and an ammo box). If you want to use Pistols with a Scout, you're better off going masterless or even Cateye, which doesn't block SoB and has an effect that is always useful regardless of what Pistols you have.

*Bullet Dance - It has theoretically the highest DPS ceiling of any build, but similar to Gun Kata it requires a grotesque amount of ancillary traits, while having the "Pistols suck in early game" problem exasperated by having to pick an actually useless trait in Triggerhappy, and Bullet Dance itself does more harm than good unless you find a Nano mod to build a Nanomachic Pistol or find a Combat Pistol and bulk mod the crap out of it, which you often won't. Said DPS ceiling is also rather overkill, when a Pistol with SoG5 and several levels of SoB will quickly kill anything before they can retaliate without the ammo-draining drawbacks of Bullet Dance. So you get a very weak early and mid game, for a late game that usually isn't all that hot either. If you want to use Pistols with a Marine, you're again better off going masterless, as you don't need to pick up Triggerhappy nor bother with Dualgunner until it's actually useful, while retaining freedom to get HR and even Berserker if you want extra lategame assurance (particularly in A100).

E(ntrenchment) tier

(Outright sucks, in desperate need of serious buffs or being overhauled completely)

*Entrenchment - Has awful prereqs that makes the early game hard, Finesse block cripples its offense with any weapon, requires a lot of ancillary traits that gives it a very hard mid game, all for a very underwhelming purely defensive mastery that both only kicks in when Chainfiring and gives resistances that are only slightly better than the resistances the Marine has inherently at all times. Then for the cherry on top, if you actually try to utilize it extensively, you'll waste a lot of ammo and quickly empty your clip, where you're then stuck with having to reload weapons that have 2+ second reload times while no longer having your resistances and not even being able to get Reloader to lessen the mauling you'll suffer. So you need to either find a Minigun and tons of bullets, or a Nano mod to make a Nanomachic Plasma Rifle, just to make the build even functional.

[--------------------------------------------------------------]

Yeah I unfortunately wasn't involved much in the community side pre-JH, only making about a dozen forum posts here and then sporadically editing the wiki over the years. Aside from playing 0.9.9.8, 0.9.9.9 just had its first beta come out (check out JH's discord channel to get it), and getting more help with testing it would be swell.

Well seems you built up quite some steam in the meantime, nice work. And thanks for the invite for beta-testing, but one of my personal pitfalls is saying yes to stuff I just don't have time for, so I'll have to politely decline.

I did manage to scrape together some courage and run 9.9.8 for the first time - visuals seem to have been cleaned up somewhat, some of the commands are different than I remember, and I like how you can actually save and quit at any point. And I didn't do too badly either, I just forgot what special level went where, and how much of a pain in the ass the city of skulls can be D:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

--------------------------------------------------------------
 DRL (0.9.9.8a) roguelike post-mortem character dump
--------------------------------------------------------------

 Dee, level 8 Human Private Marine,
 was spooked by a lost soul on level 4 of the Deimos base.
 He survived 142202 turns and scored 42702 points.
 He played for 1 hour, 26 minutes and 18 seconds.
 He didn't like it too rough.

 He killed 452 out of 489 hellspawn. (92%)
 He held his right to remain violent.

 He saved himself once.

-- Special levels --------------------------------------------

  Levels generated : 11
  Levels visited   : 6
  Levels completed : 5

-- Awards ----------------------------------------------------

  UAC Star (bronze cluster)  25+ kills without taking damage
  UAC Star (silver cluster)  50+ kills without taking damage
  Hell Armorer Pin           Clear Hell's Armory/Deimos Lab
  Hell Champion Medal        Clear Hell's Arena
  Technician Bronze Badge    Discover an assembly
  Gatekeeper Bronze Badge    Clear out the Anomaly
  Brick Bronze Badge         Clear The Wall/Containment Area
  Arena Bronze Badge         Complete Hell's Arena

-- Graveyard -------------------------------------------------

  ###########################################################
  ............................................s.............#
  ..........................................................#
  ..........................................................#
  ...|........|..................||.........................#
  ............................................}|.||.........#
  ..........................................................#
  ..........................................................#
  ....................................s.....................#
  ........................................ss.s....sss.......#
  .......................................s.ssO.....X........#
  .........................................sssss..s......>..#
  .........................................s.s..............#
  .......................................+s.sss.O...........#
  ..................................|..|.ss.sO..............#
  ..................|................s......sss.............#
  ........................................s.................#
  .................................s........................#
  .......................................ss.................#
  ###########################################################

-- Statistics ------------------------------------------------

  Health 0/60   Experience 28754/8
  ToHit Ranged +0  ToHit Melee +2  ToDmg Ranged +2  ToDmg Melee +5

-- Traits ----------------------------------------------------

  Class : Marine

    Son of a bitch   (Level 2)
    Reloader         (Level 2)
    Brute            (Level 1)
    Triggerhappy     (Level 2)
    Ammochain        (Level 1)

  SoB->SoB->Rel->Rel->TH->TH->MAc->Bru->

-- Equipment -------------------------------------------------

    [a] [ Armor      ]   nanofiber red armor [2]
    [b] [ Weapon     ]   double shotgun (9d3)x2 [0/2]
    [c] [ Boots      ]   tactical boots [0/0] (100%)
    [d] [ Prepared   ]   10mm ammo chain (x57)

-- Inventory -------------------------------------------------

    [a] high power chaingun (1d8)x4 [26/26]
    [b] plasma rifle (1d7)x6 [31/40]
    [c] missile launcher (6d6) [4/4]
    [d] plasma shield [0/0] (89%)
    [e] Butcher's Cleaver (5d6)
    [f] 10mm ammo (x140)
    [g] 10mm ammo (x68)
    [h] 10mm ammo (x140)
    [i] 10mm ammo (x140)
    [j] shotgun shell (x66)
    [k] rocket (x14)
    [l] rocket (x14)
    [m] rocket (x14)
    [n] power cell (x70)
    [o] power cell (x70)
    [p] power cell (x27)
    [q] power cell (x70)
    [r] small med-pack
    [s] Arena Master's Staff
    [t] 10mm ammo chain (x250)

-- Resistances -----------------------------------------------

    acid       - internal 20%   torso 20%   feet 20% 
    fire       - internal 20%   torso 33%   feet 20% 
    plasma     - internal 20%   torso 20%   feet 20% 

-- Kills -----------------------------------------------------

    94 former humans
    45 former sergeants
    14 former captains
    86 imps
    23 demons
    135 lost souls
    16 cacodemons
    13 hell knights
    4 barons of hell
    2 arachnotrons
    1 former commando
    7 pain elementals
    5 elite former humans
    2 elite former sergeants
    2 bruiser brothers
    1 shambler
    1 agony elemental
    1 Arena Master

-- History ---------------------------------------------------

  He started his journey on the surface of Phobos.
  On level 2 he entered Hell's Arena.
  He left the Arena as a champion!
  On level 5 he stormed the Chained Court.
  He defeated the Hell Arena Master!
  On level 5 he found the Arena Master's Staff!
  On level 5 he assembled a high power weapon!
  On level 7 he marched into the Military Base.
  He purified his fellow comrades.
  On level 8 he encountered the Phobos Anomaly.
  On level 9 he assembled a nanofiber armor!
  On level 9 he entered Hell's Armory.
  On level 9 he assembled a tactical boots!
  On level 9 he assembled a nanofiber armor!
  He destroyed the evil within and reaped the rewards!
  On level 10 he found the Butcher's Cleaver!
  On level 11 he arrived at the Containment Area.
  He emerged from the Containment Area victorious!
  On level 12 he found the City of Skulls.
  On level 12 he finally was spooked by a lost soul.

-- Messages --------------------------------------------------

 The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul
 dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies.
 You reload the double shotgun. The lost soul hits you.
 You use a small med-pack. You feel healed. The lost soul hits you. The pain
 elemental spawns lost souls! The pain elemental spawns lost souls! The lost
 soul hits you. Fire -- Choose target...
 You see : a lost soul (lightly wounded) | pool of blood | [ m ]ore
 The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul
 dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul hits you. The lost
 soul hits you. The pain elemental spawns lost souls! The pain elemental spawns
 lost souls!
 You reload the double shotgun. The pain elemental spawns lost souls! Fire --
 Choose target...
 You see : a lost soul (mortally wounded) | floor | [ m ]ore
 The lost soul dies. The lost soul dies. The lost soul hits you. The lost soul
 hits you. You die!... Press <Enter>...

-- General ---------------------------------------------------

  He's the first brave soul to have ventured into Hell...

--------------------------------------------------------------


Do I count as an oldie? :D I suppose I'm more of a middle era player, although I mostly just lurked for years.

Nice to hear from you again as well! I don't recall you being that active either, indeed, but I do know you did some wonderful work on creating a manual.

Apart from the four of you, things generally seem quiet, but that's ok. I'll just keep sneaking in from time to time and pick up my mod / admin duties as if I was never gone, if the 'forge lets me.

Hotfix 2b released, see above and redownload!

At the moment there's far bigger chances for a DoomRL DLC for that. To do it JH-style would require a lot of time/money for assets, which is a hard ask for a non-commercial niche mod :(

Been waiting since DRL days for a Heretic or Hexen version. I would love to see DLC for Jupiter Hell for either of these. Such a dope universe