Sil: What are your least liked features of Sil?

[Scatha]

Thanks for the feedback. Yes, it is useful to get impressions from new players as this is something we can have difficulty accessing. We're unlikely to put too much weight on your balance suggestions at this stage, but it's good to know the general feeling and impressions you have of various parts of the game.

[TJS]

I've had some time off this week and have starting playing Sil finally. I'm not very good at it though so not sure if you want views from someone who doesn't know the game very well.

The stats/skills/abilities thing is a cool idea (especially non-levelling up hitpoints), but it is a little bit unintuitive. Constitution and Strength are conceptually different from Dexterity and Grace as far as I can see as the first two are essentially skills that can otherwise not be levelled up through experience once the game starts, whereas the other two are really just bonuses to 4 other skills each.

Then you can level up skills themselves by using experience which grants you skill points, which can be spent on abilities which then also require experience too. It feels a little bit unwieldy to need both for abilities.

Also I find the abilities quite beginner unfriendly, although I'm not really sure if that's a problem or not. I guess a lot of them are really useful when you know how to use them, but I find it difficult to see how for a lot of them. Double block rolls for shields when you don't move? How can you ever do any damage or escape then? Or they will work well with other abilities that you can't afford to get for ages (eg. I imagine that Dodge and Flank work well together, but I've not managed to get that far). Also the pre-requisites have a similar problem in that you have to take less useful (to my eyes anyway) abilities before taking the one you actually want. It also reduces flexibility.

Is strength underpowered? It's probably just the fact that I don't know the game well enough, but it just seems to buff damage a bit as its main function. Whereas dexterity helps you hit stuff, helps you evade, increases stealth and also increases damage through more critical hits. And it unlocks a load of abilities. Another nerf to strength seems to be the way heavier weapons are less likely to score a critical hit. You'd think that the weight and power of a hit could cause a critical through shear force as it tears through armour or breaks bones.

Forges - I just have a bit of trouble with the whole idea of being in a lethal dungeon where you are barely surviving and then you can just suddenly stop and use a convenient forge to create a nice piece of armour. It's like stopping and cooking a roast in an abandoned oven or something. This is probably almost certainly just me though. Also on my version I couldn't seem to create anything as forge selection menu cycled through the type and then item and when I went to select it by pressing return it jumps back to the start of the menu again (even when I have the necessary skills).

Throwing weapons - I also have a little bit of a problem with these conceptually (have there been any fighters in real life that throw axes about instead of holding them? Imagine carrying a load of axes about just to throw once each.) and without a quiver type slot for them they are too much hassle to use. Dunno this is probably just me again. I wouldn't suggest adding a quiver for them though as that would seem even more odd.

Getting experience for seeing stuff. Not sure about this really as I kinda like getting it, but am not sure it feels quite right. Like getting really good at sports by watching the TV all day. It feels a bit like a gameplay mechanism purely to allow pacifist characters.

The usual Roguelike minigame tropes that I don't like all that much - ID, light turn management, food, sticky curses. I find the ID and food ones particularly frustrating as a beginner when you don't know all the possibly bad types that are available. I've been killed a few times by eating the only herb I have left that basically makes you starve to death. It also doesn't help that food is essentially invisible on the map.

UI wise I don't like having to hit * to see anything in my inventory etc. and keep pressing escape to clear messages all the time which brings up the menu. And you have to pick up stuff to see how much it weighs. Would also be nice to have Angband style information about how much damage on average a weapon does or armour absorbs when you examine it.

Too many orcs.

The game is ace by the way and I'm going to be playing it loads despite all my complaining.

[half]

I forgot: I like how monsters can push you out of the stairs (a lot actually), but not how they come in groups. It happened to me once that Boldog's full pack came down, about 15 or 16 guys surrounded me in one turn and killed me on the next turn. elliptic mentioned they should come through one by one which is a good compromise, I think.

Yes, that would be better and we ideally wanted to do it that way, but it would require a lot of special code. Our very limited dev time is currently going on things we think players will find to be of higher value.

[Patashu]

I forgot: I like how monsters can push you out of the stairs (a lot actually), but not how they come in groups. It happened to me once that Boldog's full pack came down, about 15 or 16 guys surrounded me in one turn and killed me on the next turn. elliptic mentioned they should come through one by one which is a good compromise, I think.

Yeah, I like the idea of them coming through one at a time - it still performs the intended purpose of making the stairs unusable due to the monsters walking in, and unless you can kill the monsters as fast as they come out they'll still eventually be able to gang up on you.

[absolutego]

I forgot: I like how monsters can push you out of the stairs (a lot actually), but not how they come in groups. It happened to me once that Boldog's full pack came down, about 15 or 16 guys surrounded me in one turn and killed me on the next turn. elliptic mentioned they should come through one by one which is a good compromise, I think.

[Scatha]

Makes sense. Variable forge uses seems like variable starting torches and variable starting sword weight in that it's random for the sake of randomness without adding anything to the gameplay.

It adds a little to the gameplay, in encouraging artificers to sometimes make non-artefacts. But I admit that there are other ways you could achieve that.

[absolutego]

I very much dislike molds. As a matter of design. I can't see what purpose they serve, outside of having squares that are safe for monsters but not for you. Worms do that but also give you a choice (kill them now or risk them multiplying, while being easier to kill), and they also move around which is good because they don't block random corridors or loot/forges for no reason. I think with a bit of redesign worms could take their place.

Another thing I don't like is archer AI. It's very predictable and it makes killing a full pack a rote task in many if not most circumstances. I don't know how to solve this (randomisation? easier fleeing? easy to make it worse).

[locus]

I'm removing 2-use forges from the game. The amount of frustration and road blocks they add to certain builds, compared to the amount of fun 4 use forges add, is astronomical. All forges in my game are now 3-use.

Makes sense. Variable forge uses seems like variable starting torches and variable starting sword weight in that it's random for the sake of randomness without adding anything to the gameplay.

[BlueFish]

I'm removing 2-use forges from the game. The amount of frustration and road blocks they add to certain builds, compared to the amount of fun 4 use forges add, is astronomical. All forges in my game are now 3-use.

[BlueFish]

Good idea. I've added it in the development version.

Thanks, half. Glad he didn't die in vain.

[half]

Actually all that needs to happen is to add status text for webbing the same as the status text for stunning. I never miss "stunned" status because it's right there at the bottom of my screen. Please add this, half and Scatha.

Good idea. I've added it in the development version.

[Patashu]

Actually all that needs to happen is to add status text for webbing the same as the status text for stunning. I never miss "stunned" status because it's right there at the bottom of my screen. Please add this, half and Scatha.

I like this idea a lot. What about also adding 'Unaware' if you attacked or were attacked by a monster you cannot see on your previous turn? After all, it's just as significant a penalty as 'Webbed'.

[debo]

Shortly before he died, I found a War Hammer of Hador's House, 6 lbs, -1 melee and 4d3 damage.

:O

Would have been a fun ~3lb weapon with finesse and momentum

[BlueFish]

Actually all that needs to happen is to add status text for webbing the same as the status text for stunning. I never miss "stunned" status because it's right there at the bottom of my screen. Please add this, half and Scatha.

[BlueFish]

I just lost a really promising and fun game to not realizing I was in a web.

I play with "automatically dismiss --more-- prompts" on. That is non-negotiable. I won't push the space bar 3 times per combat turn, that will never happen.

But it's very easy to not realize you're in a web in that case. And you can die to a spider who you normally expect to be able to easily beat. They're fast, and get 2 attacks per round. They can kill you from full health, with a little luck on their dice rolls.

There needs to be an override for certain situations in this game which gives you forced --more-- prompts. Getting caught in a web would be one of those situations. Falling into a pit would be another. Both situations reduce your character to an infant.

Another way to potentially deal with it would be to color your character a certain way if they're incapacitated. But that's not necessary since the alert system is already built in.

Boy, that was a fun and interesting game. I was playing a 2/1/5/4 nogrod master smith. Tiny melee and evasion and difficult to get going but I found an amulet of blessed realm at 100' and I decided to baby him. I was above min depth pretty much the whole game. I even missed the second forge because I was chased of its level by 12 orc warriors. Didn't find my second forge till 500 ft. Didn't even find 2 radius light source till 400 ft. But i was babying him and I made it through. Shortly before he died, I found a War Hammer of Hador's House, 6 lbs, -1 melee and 4d3 damage. That's an amazing weapon. Cost 43 at the smith. After I found it, I found a forge - next to which was +3 forge gloves. I built a set of gloves of strength. I was doing 4d10 damage. So much fun. What a rare game for this build.