Experimental Balance Update!

Hellscaper » Devlog
326 days ago by Ezra Szanton
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Hey it's an update! After a while! Why? 

Is it bug fixes? no......... yeah I know I need to get on those - but you know what's more fun? MORE CARDS!

OK enough with the leading questions 

I gave a talk recently about deckbuilder roguelikes! In the process of doing that, I interviewed a bunch of smart developers and I learned a bunch! One of the things I realized is that the deck strategies in Hellscaper were way too set. There were basically 3 different decks you could make, and your job was just to assemble them. No more!

I rebalanced all the cards so they have more *cross synergies*. You can still draft a #fire deck (although you'll notice that cinders now only needs 3 adjacent fire, and cinder demon only gives 7 points to compensate), but there are many more options now. How about the priest, who gains a bonus from adjacent tiles with "No Effect"? Or THE TOWER, which checks how many #darkness tiles are _below_ it on the board?  

Everything in the game got a pass with an eye for this. I also decreased your number of rerolls to 1. I know that might be a little sad (rerolls are fun!) but having less rerolls means having to roll with the punches a bit more, and I think  you'll end up drafting more interesting decks as a result. I'm curious what you think though - do you like the new changes? Let me know! (comment works great, or filling out our feedback form https://forms.gle/VNMR2WvXr57KkYTr5) 

Cheers,

-Ezra

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insomniac_lemon256 days ago (1 edit)

I'm new to the game, but I'd prefer if instead of rerolling both cards, you could reveal 2 more cards (leaving the previous 2 there) or you can reroll cards individually twice instead so you can choose between a pragmatic option (gargoyle -> hellfire) and something that changes strategy more.


It would also be nice to add a bit more options for deck management. Like a card bank and/or a way to get multiple cards in one selection. As-is certain options don't make sense when you get them early on. There are probably interesting ways of dealing with that, though I would probably make it something that works in the early game (block discarding/splitting or some buff(s)/alternatives to Maw).

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insomniac_lemon248 days ago (2 edits)

Something annoying I just noticed: if you get a temple and reaper in the same block, the temple will absorb the reaper first but then the reaper (which again, isn't there) destroys the temple anyway.


EDIT: And 145 on round 4 because I placed an angel on my last turn and it did not convert (despite being connected directly to a bloodriver)

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