So I took a small break because I was having no fun playing with the 1.3 live version. I came back a week later after reinstalling. I figured I'd try something different for me (not Shalore, not Anorithil or Hero/adventurer). Started up a Yeek Mindslayer. I've avoided playing them in the past because my Yeek experiences have been largely negative and rage inducing.
This time I actually did alright, getting through the beginning areas with absolutely no problems. I
Did Trollmire, Scintillating Caves, the Derth Arena, Rhalorin Camp, Kor Pul and Forest. (2 escorts total.) Did the AM quest. I did struggle a little with the corruptor but in the end was victorious without dying. Then I started the Tempest quest.
Had a moment in Derth where 4 elementals managed to converge on my position despite my attempt to get to them one at a time via sneaking around corners and then sneaking back to ambush them. Two turns later I was talking to the Eidolon. I came back and killed the rest and moved on to Nur.
All was fine after that until Nur level 3 (before the fortress). I encountered the dreaded unkillable monster whose name is ultimately forgetable to me (Because it is one of those "arcane" sounding names that has no meaning to me other than someone wanted something arcane sounding.) To kill him one must kill his tentacles as they appear. Usually not much of problem because the tentacles don't usually pose a threat at the levels I typically encounter this abomination. However at level 16 I was not equipped for the task.
I couldn't escape because no pd/tele on AM and no shields other than the largely useless psionic shields (because they don't actually do anything that I can see). I got him to about 25% hp via killing his tentacles and he managed to catch me in a corner with all my heals/regens on cooldowns with 3 tentacles and that was all they wrote. Rinse, repeat because why not?
Needless to say it is just one of many possible threats that can be out of depth (or is it out of depth in Nur where horrors abide for no explicable reason??) And I have dealt successfully with it in the past so I guess I should chalk this one up to a bad build since prior successes were only by characters 7-9 levels higher. But it irks me because it seems random in a bad way.
For example: Door #1 you open it and get eaten by a lion. Door #2 you open it and become fabulously rich & famous. Door #3 you meet the love of your life and all ends well etc, Doors #4-999 see door #1. That kind of random.
I realize this is subjective and not at all based on looking at code and spotting evidence where something is off or some other logical response. And it isn't an accusation of imbalance (I have said it in the past but imbalance is a part of the game.)
It is just a growing frustration and feeling that no matter what happens. no matter how many times I do actually win (because I didn't get the unlucky door open and didn't fumble my way to senseless deaths) I will always lose to crap like this and "what is the fucking point?" if you can pardon that french.
While at times I am fascinated by all the possible outcomes different builds bring I can't help but feel my IQ just doesn't rise to the level of the difficulty of the game even on "Normal".
- Gandolfo's blog
- Login or register to post comments
RNGesus Take The Wheel!
RNGesus is a mean son of a bitch. I kind of look at him, for a brief theological moment of discussion for the sake of metaphors, kind of the anti-Jesus, if you will. The way that Jesus is to God, RNGesus is to Lucifer/Satan/Et cetera.
All that aside, I think you might have just.... rushed things? I mean, I don't know what AM quest is, now that I think about it, I'm guessing Anti-Magic, but spoilers and things aside(not interested in spoiling myself, LOL.) I think it comes down to thinking you're prepared vs. overpreparing. I just died recently with my Doombringer, and he was at Level 11 after Trollmire > Derth Arena > Norgos > Heart (The rest of my order is here: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=316984973) Up until Scintillating Caverns, in which I think I died to a bad build. Bought into too many passives, foolishly.
I guess what I'm getting at is it's best to overprepare, and if you're getting frustrated, take a breather. And I mean, if you're truly not enjoying yourself, maybe it's time for a longer break?
Not trying to push you off, at all, but I mean... It's just kind of how I am.
Sorry if I'm a wee bit rambly, I haven't slept yet.
I guess what I'm saying(Ugh, repeating myself now) is you can't really control the RNG, but through builds and what not, you can kind of prepare yourself for how hard RNG is going to punch you in the nuts. Soften the blow, if you will.
I took the week long break to
I took the week long break to give myself some distance to try something new without all the frustrations of other yasds biting me while I was doing it. Maybe a longer break IS in order but that seems a bit harsh. I mean why not just delete and forget at that point?
RE Passives. Nothing wrong with them if they do their job as intended but you have to know what they do and how they synergize. And as has been mentioned before don't rely on them to save you if what you really need is to get away.
Some Suggestions
Mindslayer is a tricky class to get the hang of. That said, there is a lot you can do to make your games less of a headache.
This advice comes from a player with four wins on normal, but zero since I started going roguelike. Feel free to look at my many failed incarnations of Brainbeard the dwarf if you'd like more insight into my playstyle.
The thing that jumps out at me the most is that you have practically no points in shields. Shields are *hugely* useful. They suck up a lot of incoming damage and generate psi for you. I consider at least 3 points each in Kinetic Shield, Thermal Shield and Charged Shield to be mandatory, as they cut damage from the affected types by nearly half. Typically, I have Kinetic Shield up permanently, and switch between Thermal and Charged depending on what I'm fighting. You can only have two up at once, but fortunately, switching shields doesn't take a turn.
Yeek, IMO, is not a great race for mindslayer. "Wait!" you might say, "They have perfect stats for it!" Well, yes and no. The boosts to Willpower and Cunning are certainly welcome, and you can shore up some of their weaknesses with a gem in your TK slot, but you are still a Yeek with pitiful hit points, and even your shields can't totally counter that when you're mixing it up in melee as mindslayers often do. My preferred race is dwarf: good health, decent stats, reasonable XP penalty and and a racial tree that is useful but not vital.
If you're going mindstars/gem, why are you maxing Augmentation? The gem can get you your armor prerequisites and carrying capacity on its own, and all your combat stats come from Willpower/Cunning.
Is there a specific reason you went Antimagic on this character? Mindslayers already have good magic defense in the form of shields, and AM denies you a lot of good options: runes (like, say, Rune of Teleportation), the Wheel of Fate, Premonition from seer escorts, etc. AM also uses up more generics, which Mindslayers are already short on.
Finally, IMO Augmented Striking and Voracity are very weak trees that don't do a lot for you compared to the others. I personally don't like the Projection tree either.
I know that roguelike games have a strong random element, and sometimes you can be put in unwinnable situations through no fault of your own, but I find that the vast majority of my deaths come from either overconfidence, misreading the situation, or simple careless mistakes.
Yeah Dwarf may be better
Yeah Dwarf may be better though I understood from certain players that Yeek was advantaged by having a bit more experience % mods so that would in theory make up for the collective lack of HP. I guess they were wrong.
Typically I start Weirdling at level 14 or so so I figured with level 16 I'd be fine. C'est la Vei.
RE Augmentation, force of habit from playing Adventurer style builds those stat gains are huge. And they were instrumental early on since you don't start getting Mindstars until after you leave the early areas and even then I only started using the ones I had earlier than I expected because I recently did an escort that gave me Psiblades (Old Forest 4 I think). Otherwise I would have stuck with the 2hers. It is true I didn't account for the change from being reliant on Str/Dex to being Reliant on Will/Cun. I guess I have to plan the beginning a bit better since the two don't styles/choices don't mix well.
As for going Antimagic, I assumed the Fungus line would be excellent with my heals. But of course I didn't get that far.
I agree about causes of death typically and a lot of that I don't mind but when it is something like an OOD monster I see red because there is no predicting that. As the fellow below you commented my priorities are usually to make sure I can escape first and then fight. But Mindslayer does not seem to be very good at escaping or fighting for that matter. Being super squishy of course does not help.
My experience with the shields is they suck. I might have it wrong because Psionics in general are abstractly done here and don't make a lot of sense to me as implemented but they are newer from my pov than much of the rest of the game, so I may just need to learn what works/doesn't work. But even though there are all these holes (thanks for showing me them) in the build it was doing well. On par for its level until this point.
edit=
I think I forgot to mention that a lot of this advice I intend to put into practice (build wise) on my next mindslayer. So thank you.
More Suggestions
Not to take away from zsd's advice because its very good advice specifically for Mindslayers (Although my build uses Augmented striking, Voracity, and Projection) but even with a bad build you can still effectively win normal adventure by preparing for those occasional difficult moments. Learn to value your escape options over everything else. Even as an AM character you can pick up a psychoportation torque or movement infusion. I have both on all my classes. Movement infusion is great for preventing stuns as well. I'm not saying you need your torque equiped 100% of the time but have it on you none the less. Also with the exception of Archmage you can start all classes out by taking away points from all magic skills to make ziggy appear which will give you one more town to shop from.
Shop priorities: Psychoportation/pet item (vine) - Infusions/runes (specifically Wild Mental Physical/Heat, Regen/Shield, and a Movement/tele - Then look for HP+ gear. All this prior to T2 dungeons.
You can check shops in the first 2 minutes of gameplay by just leaving your first dungeon. I'll do this even if it means failing a quest example: TW's and Archmages. If your not satisfied with the shops then just restart by creating the same character again till your satisfied. Usually 2-3 times is enough.
By taking 5-10 minutes to prep your character in the beginning you will typically save youself from countless deaths later.
This game is really good at making all of us feel really stupid because for most deaths 90%+ there was a way to not die if you think long and hard about it. If you think about those moments they happen less and less and your death toll won't be as frustrating.
Ive yet to actually see a
Ive yet to actually see a psychoportation torque in a shop. And there are no torque shops in Yeek Ville. So by "first 5-10mins" I assume you mean for those who start in a normal area. (The Thalore village is the only reliable torque shop I know of btw.) I tend to not rely on shops in general as I have almost no deaths before tier 2 that aren't entirely preventable due to poor play or fumble fingers/tiredness and as far as my experiences go shops tend to not carry what you want, only what you don't need. Though of course that varies.
Start scumming definitely does not appeal or seem worth it (fun wise) to me.
Ive made it East a lot and won more than a handful of times on normal over the course of 4+ years so I am not really having difficulties with specific areas. I know the tier 1s and 2s very well and most of the higher tier dungeons in the game now, and can usually gauge whether I am ready for an area before I enter it. My problems are almost always when dealing with OOD mobs. Sometimes bosses get the better too because I forget something or played suboptimally when fighting them. That is a matter of adjusting to the informal rule of "don't play when tired/bored/distracted" because I have bad habits.
The Yeek starting area being the exception because aside from a lot of false starts, this one was 3rd or 4th yeek that walked (recalled) out safely having completed the quests.
Weirdling boss in particularly is frustrating because he either dies very quickly or takes eons to kill and often those fights are hanging by threads.
The Master can be tricky of course and the Grand Corruptor is scary on some builds where a level or 2 makes a huge difference and sometimes I just skip the spellscar until later because of that.
I am of course new to Mindslayer and I think my approach to the build was wrong despite having a number of TK ready Hero/Adventurers. But it was again the OOD mob that did me in. Even though I knew what to do to kill it and what not to do. (Standing near it, not ducking around corners, etc.)
Thanks for the comments.
Ziggy has a shop as well you
Ziggy has a shop as well you can find a psychoportation torque. They are not as common as the other items but I usually have one in 2-3 characters. All the prep work isn't for T1's its to get ready for those oh shit moments in T2's. After that if your build has good exit routes you should be able to win. Most classes have good mobility anyhow so I don't bother with the psycoportation as much as I'm looking for a physical/Mental wild and a decent regen/shield. But they are usually around 10 gold so I purchase one on all my playthroughs even if I don't think I'll use it. Its better to have and not need than to need and not have. And I agree this method is more for higher difficulty but I was just pointing out some things that might help with your frustration.
Ah yes forgot the Zig shop
Ah yes forgot the Zig shop though I don't recall ever finding anything interesting in those shops aside from the Stars. I don't really have trouble usually finding regens/heals/wilds on the floor.
One More Thing
Forgot to add this but to make the game way easier just enter all the dungeons early then leave. Example: Once your done gazing at the shops just enter all the T1's and exit. Once lv 14-16 enter all the T2's and exit. The zones will all appear at there lowest levels rather than scaling as you level. Do the same thing in the east. Enter all the dungeons prior to coming back west and exit. Only exception that comes to mind is the crypt in the east. IIRC there is no exit when you enter. Also You don't need to complete all the zones to beat the game so pass up some of the more dangerous ones till you have beat the game like the crypt in the east.
I know to most this is common knowledge but I've been playing this game well over a year and had 4 wins before I figured this out. I'd have way more wins had I found out sooner (I mostly play offline). If you check my profile that would mean I literally just figured it out recently. You would think my common sense would of kicked in and figured it out sooner... So trust me when I say even the small IQ people like myself can enjoy this game.
While I know this, I never do
While I know this, I never do it. The Tier 1 & 2 dungeons are not hard, at least on normal. Maybe on Insane+ that technique is important. Typically the trouble areas are ones where your chance of failure is high due to RNGesus like the Western Dark Crypt (Melina). I've declined that quest more than once because of not being up to it with a particular build/level.
Eastern Dark Crypt is usually doable (no harder than) after doing the prides. Careful play of course and planning your exit strategy as per usual should keep you alive. And I guess that is the real problem with OODs because there is no way to plan for them. You can only hope your contingencies are up to the task.
Couple of thoughts
The RNG is a harsh mistress. There are so many damage/resist types that you cannot build a guaranteed safe character, and the corridor-heavy character of many zones makes summoners particularly dangerous. Phase door and teleport runes are popular early on, psychoport torques I find are usually later game (so much so, in my case anyway, that I usually don't need them by the time I find them).
I am not very experienced, but I do have a Yeek Mindslayer winner. In reading through your original post, two things stand out.
First, I push the Derth lightning fest out until I have some decent lightning resist, because the elementals are not always spaced out enough to take them on one at a time. That's just one of those areas that requires a specific set of things to address to minimize danger, otherwise it's a crap shoot.
Second, Lake Nur is one of those areas I'm always scared of - I *always* push that out, though I know it scales, because there are just too many things that can smoke you early. You need to be resilient in a host of different areas, and have a lot of capabilities, and even then it's still dangerous (rare worm-that-walks, shivers). That's one area I don't try to clear.
In the end, no, you cannot plan for all OODs. Sometimes you get hit with a bad crit, or a speedy tough regenerator, or a one-shot. That's just how it goes.