Infra Arcana - An H.P. Lovecraft/Horror based Roguelike

[buffalo bill]

Yeah, I must have been missing the xp indicator for some reason—sorry for the false report.
Also, just finally freaking beat the game! I now harness the shadows that stride from world to world to sow death and madness.
Ended with a level 11 Rogue, on dungeon level 32, only 10% insanity. 56305 points. Had two Rods of Cloud Minds, which were essential (as was electrically inclined), and a +4 dagger (but made better by maxing melee tree). Used ranged weapons maybe ten times total.
Great game, would submit myself to Nyarlathotep's service again.

 

[eXalted]

When carrying a Potion, the player eventually gets a "feeling" for if the Potion is benign or malign

This is a curious addition. I kind of like it.

 

[Bocian]

Nearly made it. Sadly, whatever that was (was invisible) paralyzed me and I couldn't get free. So far I'm yet to reach the ending.
Probably best roguelike I've played.

 

[Liosliath]

Absolutely fantastic game, thanks for your creation! Atmospheric as Hell, literally.

Are there some new classes planned? Bishop? Daemon? Some alien creature maybe?

 

[non]

Absolutely fantastic game, thanks for your creation! Atmospheric as Hell, literally.

Are there some new classes planned? Bishop? Daemon? Some alien creature maybe?

Thanks!

I'll refer to a comment I wrote on reddit, answering this same question:

Absolutely. I have some ideas for classes which would be cool from a thematic perspective, but they need to actually have a significant impact on how you play the game, so it's not just a gimmick.

The original three (War Vet, Rogue, Occultist) are very archetypal and represent the fight/stealth/magic domains found in every RPG. It's good that they have their different styles, but I think this game should also have more thematic (for the time period and setting) and weirder classes, so this is why I added the Ghoul.

Some vague suggestions:

• Dreamer - maybe the whole game takes place in the dreamlands, or you just have (easier?) access to them
  
  
• Psychic - abilities related to seeing, information, and manipulating the surroundings, gotta be careful so it's not just a wizard though
  
  
• Doctor - not sure what it would be like, except starting with Healer and more medical resources obviously
  
  
• Alchemist - collect body parts, minerals, etc to make potions, artifacts, ... ?
  
  
• Scientist - better at using Strange Devices and Rods, not sure what else yet...

Edit: Also, I'm pretty sure I'm going to split the Occultist class into multiple classes, based on the current Occultist traits such as "clairvoyance", "alteration", etc - and make sure that each of those are a viable play style with their own strengths, and their own starting spells. I think the current way of focusing on different spell types by picking traits is a bit dull.

 

[Liosliath]

I have some ideas for classes which would be cool from a thematic perspective, but they need to actually have a significant impact on how you play the game

That's why the hypothetical classes I named in my previous post came into my mind. It's just a momentary "light-bulb" idea based on lore-heavy world of your game.

Bishop (Archbishop) - it seems interesting to me to have a religious, zealotic, fanatical, inquisitor-type character (twist of Mage archetype, of course), with holy blesses, holy water, prayers and so on.
Daemon and/or Alien-type - well, they could have some unusual/unnatural skills. Such a mighty (and horrifying!) artifact as the Shining Trapezohedron attracts not only human creatures, and not only from our own part of the Universe, isn't it?

Dreamer sounds very cool (we all remember the unforgettable view of the Unknown Kadath).

And the Scientist archetype class seems really cool. It could merge ideas of Healer, Doctor, Archaeologist in one.

 

[non]

Bishop (Archbishop) - it seems interesting to me to have a religious, zealotic, fanatical, inquisitor-type character (twist of Mage archetype, of course), with holy blesses, holy water, prayers and so on.

Such a class would be a huge departure from the Lovecraft lore, where stuff like this definitely don't work at all. The gods that do exist would hardly listen to or care about your prayers.

Daemon and/or Alien-type - well, they could have some unusual/unnatural skills. Such a mighty (and horrifying!) artifact as the Shining Trapezohedron attracts not only human creatures, and not only from our own part of the Universe, isn't it?

I agree 100%, it sounds like a really cool and interesting concept that this thing attracts aliens as well. It sure opens the window for some very different classes.

The trait system is a bit of a problem though - it's very human centered. It would be weird for an alien to have traits like "marksman", "melee fighter", or "strong-backed". Then there's some traits which could work, but sound subtly humanoid, for example "survivalist" and "cool-headed".

 

[Liosliath]

Such a class would be a huge departure from the Lovecraft lore, where stuff like this definitely don't work at all. The gods that do exist would hardly listen to or care about your prayers.

The trait system is a bit of a problem though - it's very human centered. It would be weird for an alien to have traits like "marksman", "melee fighter", or "strong-backed". Then there's some traits which could work, but sound subtly humanoid, for example "survivalist" and "cool-headed".

Well, the mad Archbishop's frenetic prayers can attract attention of some unexpected Entities, attracted by splashes of his psychic energy, feeding on it, and granting him some unexpected (and unpredictable) powers in return (maybe by the very fact of their attention).
I need to re-read Master's works, after I finish with C.J.Cherryh "Fortress" pentalogy. I don't remember but whether is there not a single religious, priestly character in Lovecraft's writings... dying, of course, at the end, with awful death by the... ehm... hands?... tentacles? of some unimaginable ancient deity?

As for traits for an hypothetical Alien class - well, does this indeed sound strange for him/her/it to have "melee fighter" proficiency, or "strong-backed"? (the latter suits more to a kind of humanoid creature though, yes - so maybe daemon then?

 

[non]

A religious class could perhaps work as a character who's risen in the ranks of a christian church (e.g. archbishop), but who is secretly a worshiper of some dark god - performing secret rituals and sacrifices. I have actually been considering ignoring the "gods don't care about humans" rule from Lovecraft lore, in favor of opening up interesting gameplay (such as interaction with the altars).

For an alien class, most of the human traits would have to be blocked for it, and it would need to have a bunch of new unique traits for this class. Another possibility is to just call the traits something different for this class, so "expert marksman" could be shown as "augmented precision" or something.

 

[Balor]

Thanks for the game, I had a blast playing it.
Personally, I think 'alien' is kinda meh concept, sounds... tacky somehow.
Scientist, though... the 'mad' kind, obviously - seems like great addition.

 

[Balor]

In fact, adding a few 'high risk, high reward' mechanics to benefit from high stress and madness seems like a good idea for such a character.
You get more brilliant and creative up to the point you go completely insane

 

[non]

In fact, adding a few 'high risk, high reward' mechanics to benefit from high stress and madness seems like a good idea for such a character.
You get more brilliant and creative up to the point you go completely insane

Like, they start with a sci-fi weapon which gets a bonus damage (or side effects like slowing the target) based on their insanity %?

 

[Liosliath]

A religious class could perhaps work as a character who's risen in the ranks of a christian church (e.g. archbishop), but who is secretly a worshiper of some dark god - performing secret rituals and sacrifices. I have actually been considering ignoring the "gods don't care about humans" rule from Lovecraft lore, in favor of opening up interesting gameplay (such as interaction with the altars).

For an alien class, most of the human traits would have to be blocked for it, and it would need to have a bunch of new unique traits for this class. Another possibility is to just call the traits something different for this class, so "expert marksman" could be shown as "augmented precision" or something.

Well, worshiping some dark gods suits more to Occultist, IMO. Priest/religious zealot can sincerely believe he gets some "feedback" from his god, Holy Ghost or whatever, but in fact being the target and victim of some unearthly malicious entities. The key feature of Occultist is his Knowledge, that of Priest is Belief, some spiritual inner strength that fuels his prayers and rituals (that can be wrong-targeted or vain by themselves though). So we get Belief struggling against Disappointment, Frustration and finally Madness.

And yes, just a renaming for Alien traits could be the easiest decision. Though IMO Alien could have some special mechanics and features (as Ghoul now has).

 

[Balor]

In fact, adding a few 'high risk, high reward' mechanics to benefit from high stress and madness seems like a good idea for such a character.
You get more brilliant and creative up to the point you go completely insane

Like, they start with a sci-fi weapon which gets a bonus damage (or side effects like slowing the target) based on their insanity %?

Seems like a good idea, yea. Or, better, start with a 'gizmo' of some sort (not nessesary a weapon - not unlike Rogue's rod of cloud minds) and, as you insanity raises, have a chance to get struck by inspiration and upgrade it into a better and better version (up to and including a 'sci-fi weapon', perhaps).

 

[buffalo bill]

(Repost from roguelikes thread)

Finally got to last level with ghoul (already beat it with rogue), teleported near final great evil one after killing machine gunner, then spammed molotovs/dynamite/smoke grenades I'd saved up. Unfortunately they only (mostly) killed his two other goons, so I went in for hand-to-hand while tossing blindness potions. Right after this I did kill him, but somehow some snakes spawned around me (I assume the last spell he cast, pestilence or something). So after CLEARING the level I got killed by a snake. Go figure, will try again now that I think I have ghoul strategy down: first focused on the melee tree, then dexterity and lithe, then the ghoul skills, then stealthy, then cool headed, then mobile (might've missed something there). Always fought in corridors, which means never explored a level while frenzied.
Overall ghoul is way harder than rogue, though if I found a rod of cloud minds at any point I think I'd be golden.
Should fix: it seems that ghoul wound healing depends on how many hit points you have, which means as ghouls level up it actually gets harder for them to heal wounds. This is OK if you find enough potions of vitality, but seems like a broken mechanic.

 

[Trash Player]

(Repost from roguelikes thread)

Finally got to last level with ghoul (already beat it with rogue), teleported near final great evil one after killing machine gunner, then spammed molotovs/dynamite/smoke grenades I'd saved up. Unfortunately they only (mostly) killed his two other goons, so I went in for hand-to-hand while tossing blindness potions. Right after this I did kill him, but somehow some snakes spawned around me (I assume the last spell he cast, pestilence or something). So after CLEARING the level I got killed by a snake. Go figure, will try again now that I think I have ghoul strategy down: first focused on the melee tree, then dexterity and lithe, then the ghoul skills, then stealthy, then cool headed, then mobile (might've missed something there). Always fought in corridors, which means never explored a level while frenzied.
Overall ghoul is way harder than rogue, though if I found a rod of cloud minds at any point I think I'd be golden.
Should fix: it seems that ghoul wound healing depends on how many hit points you have, which means as ghouls level up it actually gets harder for them to heal wounds. This is OK if you find enough potions of vitality, but seems like a broken mechanic.

I would suggest taking Indomitable Fury asap. Self-aware is good for not chickening whenever a random Colour pop up. The claw buffing traits are skippable with decent weapon find.
Won twice doing that, still not sure if that is good. Check this out, I learnt a lot from him:https://www.twitch.tv/mekire/videos/all

 

[buffalo bill]

I would suggest taking Indomitable Fury asap. Self-aware is good for not chickening whenever a random Colour pop up. The claw buffing traits are skippable with decent weapon find.
Won twice doing that, still not sure if that is good. Check this out, I learnt a lot from him:https://www.twitch.tv/mekire/videos/all

Those aren't traits in the newest version (unless I'm missing something very obvious). I've tried doing runs with a pitchfork for the added dodge, but found claws to be better long term with ghoul traits.

Edit: just found indomitable fury—damn, I never took tough as ghoul before.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

A religious class could perhaps work as a character who's risen in the ranks of a christian church (e.g. archbishop), but who is secretly a worshiper of some dark god - performing secret rituals and sacrifices.

Can't a character be a cultist worshipping some other ancient diety? Ancient gods don't answer prayer, but there is plenty of people still worshipping them and getting changed/losing humanity in process.
Instead of mana he will have "favours" resource which will be spend on various miracles/spells. Restoring "favours" will require sacrificing valuable loot / xp / interacting with your enemies in a specific way.
If the character is out of "favours" he can try to sacrifice himself in order to cast a spell recieving damage / curses.

There could also be a mutant/werefish type of character. A type of cultist who gradually mutates into some kind of aquatique creature as he levels up. He can have unique mutation-traits, but loses access to regular equipment. Similar to mutation system in DCSS or smth. I guess it's a variation of ghoul though... But seems to be lore appropriate. That also suits the alien

 

[non]

Should fix: it seems that ghoul wound healing depends on how many hit points you have, which means as ghouls level up it actually gets harder for them to heal wounds. This is OK if you find enough potions of vitality, but seems like a broken mechanic.

This is not true at all. When you feed, there is just straight up 1/6 chance to heal a wound.

 

[non]

Maybe you guys want to enlighten this poor fellow:

https://www.reddit.com/r/InfraArcana/comments/7zp4r3/tips_for_ghouls/

Pretty old post now though.

 

[buffalo bill]

Should fix: it seems that ghoul wound healing depends on how many hit points you have, which means as ghouls level up it actually gets harder for them to heal wounds. This is OK if you find enough potions of vitality, but seems like a broken mechanic.

This is not true at all. When you feed, there is just straight up 1/6 chance to heal a wound.

I was killing and eating hunting horrors and the like with one or two wounds, feeding for many turns without healing. I don't know why (mechanically speaking under the hood) but my high-leveled ghoul character was way less likely to heal than at low levels, even though I spent way longer feeding. I spent a lot of time with ghoul characters recently, and am pretty certain of this.

 

[non]

I was killing and eating hunting horrors and the like with one or two wounds, feeding for many turns without healing. I don't know why (mechanically speaking under the hood) but my high-leveled ghoul character was way less likely to heal than at low levels, even though I spent way longer feeding. I spent a lot of time with ghoul characters recently, and am pretty certain of this.

This gotta be just random outcomes + selective memory, there's no other explanation for it. The code for this is very simple - there's just no way that your hit points or character level could affect wound healing from feeding at all.

 

[buffalo bill]

I was killing and eating hunting horrors and the like with one or two wounds, feeding for many turns without healing. I don't know why (mechanically speaking under the hood) but my high-leveled ghoul character was way less likely to heal than at low levels, even though I spent way longer feeding. I spent a lot of time with ghoul characters recently, and am pretty certain of this.

This gotta be just random outcomes + selective memory, there's no other explanation for it. The code for this is very simple - there's just no way that your hit points or character level could affect wound healing from feeding at all.

Yeah, looks straightforward. Could be it's just cognitive dissonance of some sort on my part, but I'll check more. Is it at all possible there's some factor affecting the ghoul's chance to heal?

 

[non]

Yeah, looks straightforward. Could be it's just cognitive dissonance of some sort on my part, but I'll check more. Is it at all possible there's some factor affecting the ghoul's chance to heal?

The way i see it there is absolutely no factor that could affect it, other than just a random 1/6 roll.

But I mean this happens sometimes with random number generators. Sometimes crap like missing a 99% chance shot four times in a row just happens - and of course one assumes that something is very broken then.

 

[Bocian]

Got him!