KickStarter Knights of the Chalice 2 Thread - Augury of Chaos

[Rpguy]

I feel it is quite random in KOTC2. for example in the pool fight the shark shaman might cast a summon spell or magic stone or quicksand on you. Same with the fire salamander, sometimes he shoots a fireball at you, sometimes he gets close and melee...

 

[jungl]

One of the problems in kotc 1 was the fact the enemies acted too artificially: no matter the type, be it a simpleton gnoll or a cunning, century-old lich, they all seemed to act like optimized machines, never panicking or making a wrong move. That added to the puzzle-like feel of the encounters: they unfolded in one general way and had their own hard counters. Sure, a wizard that always uses a fireball against your blob of a party during the first round is "optimal" as in "it decimates the player in the most effective way", but it also creates this immersion-breaking feel like you're solving a predetermined puzzle, not surviving an emergent scenario (case in point, feeling like a slave to the initial initiative roll).

Adjusting the various numeric values of the encounters is a tried and true way to tune them, but having multiple options that affect how "optimal" the enemy AI acts would be so much better. Scaling it with enemy intelligence would be perfect, but I doubt it's achievable in any reasonable amount of time. An animated portcullis that is stuck in the loop of the "ready for approach" command shouldn't happen unless you're playing on some weird challenge difficulty setting.

implemented something like this sounds cool but would just lead to easy bad encounters

 

[bataille]

Are you suggesting to randomize the AI?

One of the problems in kotc 1 was the fact the enemies acted too artificially: no matter the type, be it a simpleton gnoll or a cunning, century-old lich, they all seemed to act like optimized machines, never panicking or making a wrong move. That added to the puzzle-like feel of the encounters: they unfolded in one general way and had their own hard counters. Sure, a wizard that always uses a fireball against your blob of a party during the first round is "optimal" as in "it decimates the player in the most effective way", but it also creates this immersion-breaking feel like you're solving a predetermined puzzle, not surviving an emergent scenario (case in point, feeling like a slave to the initial initiative roll).

Adjusting the various numeric values of the encounters is a tried and true way to tune them, but having multiple options that affect how "optimal" the enemy AI acts would be so much better. Scaling it with enemy intelligence would be perfect, but I doubt it's achievable in any reasonable amount of time. An animated portcullis that is stuck in the loop of the "ready for approach" command shouldn't happen unless you're playing on some weird challenge difficulty setting.

I'm not an expert, but my guess would be that the AI could calculate a number of possible actions, assemble them in a hierarchical order, and pick one depending on the difficulty setting. I think making the AI prioritize certain spells over the others is a pretty solid way to tune difficulty. The same goes for the AI picking its targets, flanking, tripping, etc. Pierre seems to know the systems thoroughly enough to make all the necessary informed decisions regarding the spells and abilities.

But who knows, it's just a guess. Maybe there are easier and more efficient ways to go about the whole thing.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

This is definitely a Grimoire scenario where it's better to wait for months of patches before attempting to play it at all, due to the sheer complexity involved.

 

[Noddy]

I can't get past the gate, last time it was going great till I accidentally smashed the second gate down and then someone started casting dispel and it made the entire game hang. I'm starting to get really sleepy too so I'm probably going to hang it up for now, looks like you'll be the first to taste sweet victory.

Will i fuck. The other side is even worse. And i get the feeling this isn't even the last fight.



Not pictured: all the shit that spaws in. Every round.

I'm fucking drained and have no real plan.
Gonna sleep aswell and hope an idea comes to me, but honestly fuck knows.
Game just gets harder and harder.
Think Jasade might be frist tbh

 

[The Red Knight]

BTW this is what can be done to the enemy behaviour in the editor:

A different monster:

Vanilla tactics scripts seem to be only about giving some specific spells/skills to a few monsters, but it opens in a normal script editor so it might be possible to randomize the behaviour further through that?

I imagine a hacky difficulty mode would be possible where the module asks you at the start to pick difficulty, there would be duplicate versions of some monsters with different (easier/harder) scripting, and for the afffected battles the module would hide/show the easier/harder versions of the monsters.

 

[Tweed]

Will i fuck. The other side is even worse. And i get the feeling this isn't even the last fight.



Not pictured: all the shit that spaws in. Every round.

I'm fucking drained and have no real plan.
Gonna sleep aswell and hope an idea comes to me, but honestly fuck knows.
Game just gets harder and harder.
Think Jasade might be frist tbh

*Screams in kobold*

I'll try and clear the gate tomorrow, its getting easier to handle. I've got one rest left, but after that I don't see how I'm going be able to push through that mess without a fist full of prismatic voids and tornado blasts.

 

[Mortmal]

This is definitely a Grimoire scenario where it's better to wait for months of patches before attempting to play it at all, due to the sheer complexity involved.

This is a hell lot more complex than grimoire.

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

I've been rolling my sorcerer for 90 minutes. I'm pretty sure I got mesmerized pressing enter to roll quickly and missed out on a 20 CHA, 20 DEX, 12 CON roll.

 

[Zeriel]

One of the problems in kotc 1 was the fact the enemies acted too artificially: no matter the type, be it a simpleton gnoll or a cunning, century-old lich, they all seemed to act like optimized machines, never panicking or making a wrong move. That added to the puzzle-like feel of the encounters: they unfolded in one general way and had their own hard counters. Sure, a wizard that always uses a fireball against your blob of a party during the first round is "optimal" as in "it decimates the player in the most effective way", but it also creates this immersion-breaking feel like you're solving a predetermined puzzle, not surviving an emergent scenario (case in point, feeling like a slave to the initial initiative roll).

Adjusting the various numeric values of the encounters is a tried and true way to tune them, but having multiple options that affect how "optimal" the enemy AI acts would be so much better. Scaling it with enemy intelligence would be perfect, but I doubt it's achievable in any reasonable amount of time. An animated portcullis that is stuck in the loop of the "ready for approach" command shouldn't happen unless you're playing on some weird challenge difficulty setting.

implemented something like this sounds cool but would just lead to easy bad encounters

Original XCOM (DOS) had a genius solution. The AI picks the "right" move 80% or so of the time, but the other 20% picks random moves that make no sense. This sounds dumb in theory, but it creates the illusion of a real, thinking creature with agency, and led to the famous closet aliens and other unique aspects of OG XCOM that were never replicated in any other game. Sometimes unpredictability is better, even if it isn't smart. Being able to predict what the AI will do is "easy" in its own way.

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

XCom was like crack. I've seen a few other interviews with golden age PC game devs espousing the virtues of fun random stuff that leads to rare and fun experiences. They don't have to be AI driven it just feels that way.

 

[Doctor Sbaitso]

Jasede your suggestions are good. I used your suggestions to build a party which is largely as suggested. Friar Tuck and his band of barbarians.

2 @ Female painted mantis barbs, one on track for quad weilded swords and the other with flails.

The third female barb is 1/2 giant with hammer and pick and a focus on tripping. By the way, hammers hit pretty fucking hard. At level 1 my trip barb consistently hits for 23 HP insta-gibs on cultists.

Tuck is the male human bishop and I have the suggested scoecerer and psi.

So far, so good.

 

[Jasede]

I am going to kill someone.

Beat the Chapter 3 intro fight for the fifth time, in the new patch.
Saved after.

Load game, new NPC has disappeared, along with the book.

Things that have happened to me at the beginning of chapter 3:

1) beat fight, save, accept new NPC, open her char sheet, crash, save gone
2) beat fight, save, accept new NPC, load, NPC gone, along with book
3) beat fight, save, reload, fight triggers again

 

[Rpguy]

Jasede your suggestions are good. I used your suggestions to build a party which is largely as suggested. Friar Tuck and his band of barbarians.

2 @ Female painted mantis barbs, one on track for quad weilded swords and the other with flails.

The third female barb is 1/2 giant with hammer and pick and a focus on tripping. By the way, hammers hit pretty fucking hard. At level 1 my trip barb consistently hits for 23 HP insta-gibs on cultists.

Tuck is the male human bishop and I have the suggested scoecerer and psi.

So far, so good.

Barbarians can't take the oversized two weapon fighting, you will have to use at least 3 light weapons

 

[Citizen]

Maps look great btw, but jeez both ultima7-style sprites and tokens clash with the maps art style so hard... It would be perfect with the Age of Fear style top-down sprites

 

[Rpguy]

Once you play the game you won't want sprites anymore.

 

[Jasede]

I am so tired of doing the same battle I have won five times before again because all my saves corrupted or bugged out, only to get bad initiative rolls and die before making a move.

 

[Jasede]

Six times. Having the Warlock bitch join 100% corrupts my game. Nothing that can be done other than kill her.

 

[Dickie]

I've been rolling my sorcerer for 90 minutes. I'm pretty sure I got mesmerized pressing enter to roll quickly and missed out on a 20 CHA, 20 DEX, 12 CON roll.

You don't want Int for wizard spell saves?

 

[IgnoredFence]

Made an account just to post my sweet victory here, thanks for all the tips I lurked from this bread guys!
https://imgur.com/a/GQzEzQy

 

[Rpguy]

He did it with Wizard Cleric Psion Ranger Gladiator and Samurai. No crazy Jasede builds

 

[Jasede]

IgnoredFence

Well done.

Rpguy
I was mostly theory crafting. Let's compare our parties:

Jasede / Fence
Gladiator Gladiator
Wizard Wizard
Psion Psion
Samurai Samurai
Gladiator Ranger
Bishop Cleric

...oh whoopee, my Cleric is a Bishop and my Ranger is a Gladiator...

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

it's ok you give helpful tips and are therefor a valuable part of the community whereas this new guy selfishly keeps all his secrets

 

[IgnoredFence]

Sorry sorry don't like using forums much, was talking some with Rpguy on the discord if anyone reads that shit.

 

[Rpguy]

Jasede
I stand corrected. In fact, I think your party would be worse because I think cleric is better than bishop for the end game, those level 8/9 mainly accelerated spells sounds invaluable.