I had this happen and I think the calculation boosts the level capacity before turned over to a preset 0 (it even looks like it w/the animation), so it also skips card choices.
It would be nice for some intended bonus, be it for extra score or remaining turns (or even free board space?).
This is really neat! I like the balance between slapping down high-scoring tiles as efficiently as possible, and trying to set up combos even if it means maybe not laying things down as densely as you might otherwise.
Thank you so much! We're starting to wrap up development on it for now, but I think we're going to have one more update to round out the art and take care of bugs.
We appreciate the sentiment! Its a little more complicated than just making it responsive, as we're making it in Unity. Unfortunately we just don't have time to optimize it for mobile (plus we'd have to redo a bunch of the controls to make that work). I'm glad you're enjoying the game enough to want to play it on the go, though!
Thanks! Roguelike might be a bit of a stretch, but we feel that it fits with modern deckbuilding roguelikes, like Slay the Spire and Luck be a Landlord. There's a commitment to synergy and discovery, there's randomized runs, there's "permadeath." It doesn't exactly follow the Berlin Interpretation but we feel that it's close enough to label it as such, especially because I think fans of roguelikes are most likely to like this game.
Ah, actually that is intended! The metaphor is meant to be that you're building a "deck" of tiles over the course of 6 "rounds" (or cities). So you get to keep the cards between rounds! We could do a better job explaining it though
Although I did not finish the game, I really enjoyed the multiple playthroughs I had to reach where I'm at! It took me a while but I'm glad to say I have finally reached round 5 once.
I enjoyed finding synergies between different cards and how I can mix and match them in the placement. Still trying to find a strategy to win the game but I really enjoy the buildings deck I made! Had a blast and I am going to continue to try and find a way to win!
Beat it. Golems are very strong at present, being able to transfer both the #Blood and #Fire tags in chains around the map, while also being very common cards in the purchase phase. Furthermore, all of the enabling cards they need either start in the player's deck (ghouls, rivers) or are common (Hellfire/oilslick, cinders, Yagahut). This seems to make them significantly better than 'rarer' cards like Cerberus, Ghost, or Rat King whose enabling cards are either significantly rarer and more expensive or very limited in number and entirely outside the starting deck. Most of the current drawbacks to golems-- the way points are counted in the final turn of each round before all the points you might expect from golems are fully calculated, the way the triggering order for multi-golem chains in a single block is complex and somewhat intractable (and the same for river conversion, if your golem is dependent on to gain its #Blood tag), the way they don't gain tags when tiles are placed adjacent to them after they have been played-- are mostly only significant penalties because they are unintuitive and unexplained. It seems like, provided the player is capable of predicting the behaviour of golem tiles and planning accordingly, every deck should include golems, which I think is a sign that they are a problem for balance presently.
Thanks for playing and the in depth feedback! Those are some really good insights. The point counting on the final round is a bug, and triggering order / the way they interact with the blood rivers are things we need to do a better job of explaining.
The plan for trigger order was that abilities that are "tied" for execution order (like golems and other golems) would execute top to bottom, left to right (like how you read a novel), but that is both unexplained and I think currently not working correctly :D
About the golems and blood rivers, those are another thing we should explain better. Just for your sake now, and if there's anyone scrolling into the comments to see how it works, all "when placed" abilities, like golems, rat kings, etc. trigger first. Then "every turn" abilities happen, like rivers checking for #blood, or rats checking for other rats.
Thanks for the reply, and for making a fun game! The top to bottom, left to right thing is what I eventually figured out and it works ~90% of the time, but it definitely doesn't work 100% of the time; good to hear that's a glitch. I've not seen a golem chain propagate right to left in a single block, but I've seen it trigger the bottom golem first several times. Is there a chance rotation might be messing with it? I don't think it's happened when I've not rotated a block but I suspect that's just a coincidence or it would be happening a lot more.
Also I just found legion for the first time and it doesn't work with Golem (and I'm guessing other on-place effects either, since doppelgangers don't grant turns when becoming clocktowers but do cost turns to remove). Also if you get two or more level ups simultaneously, like for example by playing legion on a hellfire or other high-value card while having lots of available blood river space, the animation plays several times but you only get one level up, at least if you decline a card.
The balance patch seems to have tweaked a lot of things in a good direction, but there are some more bugs:
Werewolves eat ghouls placed next to them, but not yagahuts.
Werewolves don't eat other werewolves, which is certainly important for their ability to trigger, but contradicts their absorption text and their having #monster.
Cabins count off-map spaces as empty (which is probably good for balance, but not what the text says)
And some of the changes were detrimental imho:
There's no longer an indication of how many points you need to get your next upgrade past what's needed to beat a level. (The bar does look snazzy, though, so I wouldn't suggest going back)
Yagahuts don't get the chaos tag anymore, which sucks hard since that was pretty much the only reason to take them :( I see that the building tag is rarer now, and tenements have been very significantly buffed, and some of the new cards care about #building but the broken synergies will be sorely missed.
the additional cards makes the game more rng heavy (which is constrictive on the diversity of strategies), since even common cards aren't going to reliably show up with your allotted rerolls now. I'd recommend increasing the rerolls per upgrade by one or allowing players to permanently remove a card from the supply when Declining or something.
Great job designing the playstyle of this game! I love how the cards interact with each other and it isn't hard to find combinations that you personally favor, for me that's definitely Rat/Rat king/River. I'd love to see an algorithm added to allow the game to continue indefinitely, progressively increasing the total required for victory but I understand that at a certain point rats and blood river are the only way to win. A larger board or boards with obstacles could be fun but overall, great game and I look forward to seeing future development if there are plans as such!
Funny story about the infinite mode. That was how the game worked until like, a week ago! The problem with it, as you anticipated, is that if the game goes on forever the only good strategies become the "exponential" ones. We like having the balance of more "linear" strategies being viable as well. Maybe we'll add it as an option at the end later!
Larger boards and boards with obstacles are definitely something we've considered, as either "characters" or "ascensions" - we're trying to get in the core tiles first though.
I loved the build variety in such a small game. One bug/nonsensical thing though, the golem adding a fire tag did not work for the cinders 'card' which seems unintentional do to cinders wording, and you might want to check that golem works as intended when it gathers other tags. Loved the game anyway!
Works now, although golems and cinders are still very buggy (multiple golems in a single block trigger in a random order, and golem point gain can't cause you to win if it's obtained via a simultaneously converted blood river on the last turn, and golems only gain tags when they themselves are played, and cinder demons leave cinder graphics on the field when changing levels that do nothing but can be checked as if they were there and they don't count as destroying cinders nor do they have the monster tag, etc.)
I'll admit up front that deckbuilding games are not always my strong suit. That said: I do really like this, but I also found it very hard to build a deck, because the card-gaining was slow (and random), but a lot of the cards only work in synergy. Vampires are only useful when you get a cluster of five of them, so taking one vampire card feels like it's just a waste of space until you get one more. Werewolves are only useful when you have vampires...and so on.
Thanks for playing and taking the time to write up your thoughts! I hear you about the synergies, thats something we want to work on in the next couple weeks as we update the game. I think you're right about werewolves being too specific.
Vampires have another function that's not well highlighted right now in the game. Because they have the #blood tag, rivers will become blood rivers when next to them, which is very useful! We're trying to make the tag system in general more clear, but hopefully this tip helps in the meantime :)
About the deck building feeling random, I'm curious how often you're using the reroll feature? That is something we added so it hopefully would feel a little less random but I'm not sure how many players find or use it.
Anyway, thanks again for playing and I hope you like the next update!
I hesitated over the reroll feature for the first few games, until I realized I wasn't getting past level 3 anyway so there was no need to preserve resources--at which point I learned that it's three rerolls per upgrade, not per game. Once I knew that, I started using them more, and it did help somewhat. Of course, once of the things about the synergies is that swapping cards not only means "pick up a vampire and hope you start getting more", but "give up a ghoul/tenement to get it", which was a small blow to the existing synergies in the deck....
Knowing the vampires/#blood thing definitely makes a difference! By the time I encountered the vampires, I'd internalized the rule about rivers being "if they're connected to the original blood source" and hadn't thought at all about their literal text.
Speculating on a vampire isn't too big of a cost since it is worth 2 base, the same as a gargoyle. If you replace a gargoyle with one there isn't much downside.
Hi there, I am DragonExplosion and I am a Youtuber. If you like my videos, please leave a like and subscribe at my channel.
This was a fun horror strategy card game which involves a lot of thinking and consideration on how to place the cards within 20 moves strategically to beat the game. In the video that I have made above, I did not manage to clear the game but I will be continuing my efforts in completing the game as I really want to beat it XD. Would be cool if there were more sound effects and music, maybe an entire storyline can be created for the game as well to enhance the entire experience as a whole. Moreover, more types of cards and unique artwork for the cards would make the game even more interesting as well.
Thank you for reading my comment and I wish you good luck in your future endeavours.
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I managed to get so many points in one play, that I skipped an entire level! Temple can be a funny card lol.
I had this happen and I think the calculation boosts the level capacity before turned over to a preset 0 (it even looks like it w/the animation), so it also skips card choices.
It would be nice for some intended bonus, be it for extra score or remaining turns (or even free board space?).
Sorry about this! We're not in a spot where we can fix bugs on this project currently but if we ever are, this will be the first one we fix!
This is really neat! I like the balance between slapping down high-scoring tiles as efficiently as possible, and trying to set up combos even if it means maybe not laying things down as densely as you might otherwise.
Thank you! We enjoyed those tradeoffs too as we were making it
It's an interesting concept.
Thank you!
I love the new art, as well as the ability to trash any card from your deck when selecting a new one! Keep the updates coming, this game is a gem.
Thank you so much! We're starting to wrap up development on it for now, but I think we're going to have one more update to round out the art and take care of bugs.
How about making it responsive? Then it could run on mobiles.
We appreciate the sentiment! Its a little more complicated than just making it responsive, as we're making it in Unity. Unfortunately we just don't have time to optimize it for mobile (plus we'd have to redo a bunch of the controls to make that work). I'm glad you're enjoying the game enough to want to play it on the go, though!
Neat game but how in the world is this a roguelike in any capacity
Thanks! Roguelike might be a bit of a stretch, but we feel that it fits with modern deckbuilding roguelikes, like Slay the Spire and Luck be a Landlord. There's a commitment to synergy and discovery, there's randomized runs, there's "permadeath." It doesn't exactly follow the Berlin Interpretation but we feel that it's close enough to label it as such, especially because I think fans of roguelikes are most likely to like this game.
when you click "win" the cards are not dealt fresh. so you continue playing with the reamining cards from the previous stack. probably not intended.
Ah, actually that is intended! The metaphor is meant to be that you're building a "deck" of tiles over the course of 6 "rounds" (or cities). So you get to keep the cards between rounds! We could do a better job explaining it though
managed to clutch a win with 79 point "collector" and then a lucky "river" + "vampire" block
replaced my common blocks for church for good scaling
Ooh nice! When we added the collector we knew this would be possible but weren't sure if anyone would find it hehe
Although I did not finish the game, I really enjoyed the multiple playthroughs I had to reach where I'm at! It took me a while but I'm glad to say I have finally reached round 5 once.
I enjoyed finding synergies between different cards and how I can mix and match them in the placement. Still trying to find a strategy to win the game but I really enjoy the buildings deck I made! Had a blast and I am going to continue to try and find a way to win!
Thanks so much for playing! I think you're getting really close to winning, from the video :)
Background music sound like something that wouldn't be amiss in Blood. Very reminiscent of Unholy Voices. Very fitting.
Thanks! The main ambience is a chorus, run backwards and pitched way down :D
Awesome game. Its super fun to play. Too bad I suck.
We're still working on the balance! :D
Legion is too OP with cinders, turn 1 win possibly for the final stage
Woah good find! Balance patch will be out tomorrow with (hopefully) a fix for this :)
can be... hard and much rng, i get round 3
Look forward to a balance patch tomorrow!
Beat it. Golems are very strong at present, being able to transfer both the #Blood and #Fire tags in chains around the map, while also being very common cards in the purchase phase. Furthermore, all of the enabling cards they need either start in the player's deck (ghouls, rivers) or are common (Hellfire/oilslick, cinders, Yagahut). This seems to make them significantly better than 'rarer' cards like Cerberus, Ghost, or Rat King whose enabling cards are either significantly rarer and more expensive or very limited in number and entirely outside the starting deck. Most of the current drawbacks to golems-- the way points are counted in the final turn of each round before all the points you might expect from golems are fully calculated, the way the triggering order for multi-golem chains in a single block is complex and somewhat intractable (and the same for river conversion, if your golem is dependent on to gain its #Blood tag), the way they don't gain tags when tiles are placed adjacent to them after they have been played-- are mostly only significant penalties because they are unintuitive and unexplained. It seems like, provided the player is capable of predicting the behaviour of golem tiles and planning accordingly, every deck should include golems, which I think is a sign that they are a problem for balance presently.
Thanks for playing and the in depth feedback! Those are some really good insights. The point counting on the final round is a bug, and triggering order / the way they interact with the blood rivers are things we need to do a better job of explaining.
The plan for trigger order was that abilities that are "tied" for execution order (like golems and other golems) would execute top to bottom, left to right (like how you read a novel), but that is both unexplained and I think currently not working correctly :D
About the golems and blood rivers, those are another thing we should explain better. Just for your sake now, and if there's anyone scrolling into the comments to see how it works, all "when placed" abilities, like golems, rat kings, etc. trigger first. Then "every turn" abilities happen, like rivers checking for #blood, or rats checking for other rats.
Thanks for the reply, and for making a fun game! The top to bottom, left to right thing is what I eventually figured out and it works ~90% of the time, but it definitely doesn't work 100% of the time; good to hear that's a glitch. I've not seen a golem chain propagate right to left in a single block, but I've seen it trigger the bottom golem first several times. Is there a chance rotation might be messing with it? I don't think it's happened when I've not rotated a block but I suspect that's just a coincidence or it would be happening a lot more.
Also I just found legion for the first time and it doesn't work with Golem (and I'm guessing other on-place effects either, since doppelgangers don't grant turns when becoming clocktowers but do cost turns to remove). Also if you get two or more level ups simultaneously, like for example by playing legion on a hellfire or other high-value card while having lots of available blood river space, the animation plays several times but you only get one level up, at least if you decline a card.
The balance patch seems to have tweaked a lot of things in a good direction, but there are some more bugs:
Werewolves eat ghouls placed next to them, but not yagahuts.
Werewolves don't eat other werewolves, which is certainly important for their ability to trigger, but contradicts their absorption text and their having #monster.
Cabins count off-map spaces as empty (which is probably good for balance, but not what the text says)
And some of the changes were detrimental imho:
There's no longer an indication of how many points you need to get your next upgrade past what's needed to beat a level. (The bar does look snazzy, though, so I wouldn't suggest going back)
Yagahuts don't get the chaos tag anymore, which sucks hard since that was pretty much the only reason to take them :( I see that the building tag is rarer now, and tenements have been very significantly buffed, and some of the new cards care about #building but the broken synergies will be sorely missed.
the additional cards makes the game more rng heavy (which is constrictive on the diversity of strategies), since even common cards aren't going to reliably show up with your allotted rerolls now. I'd recommend increasing the rerolls per upgrade by one or allowing players to permanently remove a card from the supply when Declining or something.
Great job designing the playstyle of this game! I love how the cards interact with each other and it isn't hard to find combinations that you personally favor, for me that's definitely Rat/Rat king/River. I'd love to see an algorithm added to allow the game to continue indefinitely, progressively increasing the total required for victory but I understand that at a certain point rats and blood river are the only way to win. A larger board or boards with obstacles could be fun but overall, great game and I look forward to seeing future development if there are plans as such!
Thanks for playing and for the kind words!
Funny story about the infinite mode. That was how the game worked until like, a week ago! The problem with it, as you anticipated, is that if the game goes on forever the only good strategies become the "exponential" ones. We like having the balance of more "linear" strategies being viable as well. Maybe we'll add it as an option at the end later!
Larger boards and boards with obstacles are definitely something we've considered, as either "characters" or "ascensions" - we're trying to get in the core tiles first though.
My brain isn't big enough for half of this but great game lol
You can do it!
Thanks :D
I loved the build variety in such a small game. One bug/nonsensical thing though, the golem adding a fire tag did not work for the cinders 'card' which seems unintentional do to cinders wording, and you might want to check that golem works as intended when it gathers other tags. Loved the game anyway!
Fast response jumpscare
Works now, although golems and cinders are still very buggy (multiple golems in a single block trigger in a random order, and golem point gain can't cause you to win if it's obtained via a simultaneously converted blood river on the last turn, and golems only gain tags when they themselves are played, and cinder demons leave cinder graphics on the field when changing levels that do nothing but can be checked as if they were there and they don't count as destroying cinders nor do they have the monster tag, etc.)
Thanks for the feedback, y'all! Golem and cinders definitely need some work. We'll try to fix it soon!
I'll admit up front that deckbuilding games are not always my strong suit. That said: I do really like this, but I also found it very hard to build a deck, because the card-gaining was slow (and random), but a lot of the cards only work in synergy. Vampires are only useful when you get a cluster of five of them, so taking one vampire card feels like it's just a waste of space until you get one more. Werewolves are only useful when you have vampires...and so on.
Of course, it might just be me.
Thanks for playing and taking the time to write up your thoughts! I hear you about the synergies, thats something we want to work on in the next couple weeks as we update the game. I think you're right about werewolves being too specific.
Vampires have another function that's not well highlighted right now in the game. Because they have the #blood tag, rivers will become blood rivers when next to them, which is very useful! We're trying to make the tag system in general more clear, but hopefully this tip helps in the meantime :)
About the deck building feeling random, I'm curious how often you're using the reroll feature? That is something we added so it hopefully would feel a little less random but I'm not sure how many players find or use it.
Anyway, thanks again for playing and I hope you like the next update!
I hesitated over the reroll feature for the first few games, until I realized I wasn't getting past level 3 anyway so there was no need to preserve resources--at which point I learned that it's three rerolls per upgrade, not per game. Once I knew that, I started using them more, and it did help somewhat. Of course, once of the things about the synergies is that swapping cards not only means "pick up a vampire and hope you start getting more", but "give up a ghoul/tenement to get it", which was a small blow to the existing synergies in the deck....
Knowing the vampires/#blood thing definitely makes a difference! By the time I encountered the vampires, I'd internalized the rule about rivers being "if they're connected to the original blood source" and hadn't thought at all about their literal text.
Speculating on a vampire isn't too big of a cost since it is worth 2 base, the same as a gargoyle. If you replace a gargoyle with one there isn't much downside.
Completion of Game
Wow nice job! Legion is busted haha
This was a fun horror strategy card game which involves a lot of thinking and consideration on how to place the cards within 20 moves strategically to beat the game. In the video that I have made above, I did not manage to clear the game but I will be continuing my efforts in completing the game as I really want to beat it XD. Would be cool if there were more sound effects and music, maybe an entire storyline can be created for the game as well to enhance the entire experience as a whole. Moreover, more types of cards and unique artwork for the cards would make the game even more interesting as well.
Thank you for reading my comment and I wish you good luck in your future endeavours.
Thanks so much for playing! We are definitely going to add more cards and artwork in the next few weeks, so be on the lookout!