Tales of Maj'Eyal

[Unkillable Cat]

I just remembered that I bought this (and all the current DLCs) a couple of sales ago, and I figured I'd give it a go. About six hours later my Lvl 11 Human Bulwark choked on sand in the Sandworm Caves (neat gimmick in that dungeon BTW) and I'm just uninstalling.

My first death was at the hands of a Lvl 26 Skeleton Warrior, while I was Lvl 7. I went elsewhere to level up once, then came back and killed him. The second time I stumble into the Old Forest and get my ass handed to me by a Lvl 10 Bee Swarm.

Third death was me not noticing that I was drowning while walking through water tiles (see UI issues below) before my final death as previously mentioned.

For a roguelike it seems alright, but for me it fails on a couple of fundamental levels. First there's the UI. Considering the main dev was quoted somewhere as being all about how the UI should adapt to the player, I was very disappointed with it. Everything is very tiny, so I tinkered with the option to enlarge the font... which screws up everything related to text as the UI doesn't scale along properly. More than that, the UI seemed disappointingly uninterested in relaying some information. I saw equipment slots, but due to enlarged text I couldn't make them out properly, or what should go into them. Comparing items quickly became a chore as the pop-up windows don't seem to scale at all and the stat changes can sometimes be confusing.

I'm aware that there are tons of user-made UIs available for the game and I didn't bother checking them out, but for me the default UI should set the tone of the game, and not play second fiddle. If the fans are churning out better UIs than the dev team, there is something Wrong here. First impressions are important, and ToME is screwing up on that front.

Another thing about the game that put me off was the unlockables mechanism. The Transmogrification Chest is amazing, but I shouldn't have to play a short time in the game to 'unlock' it for all future playthroughs, it should just be available from the start. Ditto with races, classes and whatever alternate play modes and campaigns lurk within the game.

I'm not saying this is a bad game by any means - it just doesn't appeal to me. It's doing a lot of things right (and a few things wrong) but at the end of the day I can see what a huge time sink this is - and I don't have that time right now.

 

[Lacrymas]

The default UI is cancer, I use the classic one and it's much better and informative. Other than that, yeah, user-made UIs can help with that. A lvl 26 skeleton warrior when you are 7 can only pop up from a vault you opened (the game asks you "are you absolutely sure you want to open this door?"). Melee in general is not a good start in this game and I'd play a bit with the alchemist or some other ranged class first before tackling melee classes. The unlocks are actually a very clever way to make you not think you are wasting your time by dying and getting nothing. The difficulty remains constant, but you still get very significant rewards even when you die and lose your progress, unlike other rogue-likes with unlockables where you usually get a stronger char for subsequent playthroughs. I don't know how you died to the bee swam, so can't comment. It shouldn't take you 6 hours to get to the sandworm caverns, you can get to it like 20 minutes in if you do it right after you get the quest for it. Alternatively, you can get to it in like an hour or so (or even less) if you do it last. The game's length has been criticized, however, but that's another issue.

I'd say ToME presents itself quite well once you get rid of the disgusting default UI, so YMMV I guess.

 

[Darth Canoli]

I'm not saying this is a bad game by any means - it just doesn't appeal to me. It's doing a lot of things right (and a few things wrong) but at the end of the day I can see what a huge time sink this is - and I don't have that time right now.

That's also why i don't play it either, i started with an assassin (level 18 or something), dropped for a berserker which unlocked the castle then dropped him for an alchemist i brought around level 30+ but i don't want to spend the time to unlock all the features i want to play with, i could "cheat" my way to unlock some skill trees with cheat engine though (those you unlock by doing certain amount of elemental damage, quite easy) and the game can be customized a lot but you'll spend hours of searching through hundreds of mods, install them, learn all the shortcuts ...

Long story short, it's amazing but too much time consuming.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

A lvl 26 skeleton warrior when you are 7 can only pop up from a vault you opened (the game asks you "are you absolutely sure you want to open this door?").

Yes, that's exactly the case. There were some other high-level monsters in there (a Skeleton Mage and a Xorn) but they died pretty quickly compared to the Warrior. I pointed out the details of this death to highlight the fact that I next died to a bunch of fucking bees.

 

[Lacrymas]

I died to a bunch of fucking bees.

Wait until you die to a jellyfish, immobile brain matter or a gelatinous cube.

 

[Martyr]

are there any sources of light? I've used a "rune of sunlight" or whatever it's called, and it changed nothing. can't find any torches or whatever.

but areas like this make it painful to play this game. can't see shit and the map is also barely readable.

 

[Lacrymas]

Lanterns. You can buy a pretty good one early in the first town which gives +hp if it spawns. But you need 1 either way. Don't you start with one in general though? If you have a lantern and it's still dark, that's a bug.

 

[felipepepe]

are there any sources of light? I've used a "rune of sunlight" or whatever it's called, and it changed nothing. can't find any torches or whatever.

but areas like this make it painful to play this game. can't see shit and the map is also barely readable.

There are no torches, one of the equipment slots is for lanterns. Usually you start with one and there are several types of magical itens that can replace them but still cast light:

 

[Martyr]

thanks guys. if you start with a lantern I've either not taken notice of it, or I've sold it. but good to know that this all-consuming darkness doesn't have to be endured, if you want to play this game. I was starting to think that not seeing anything was going to be a main feature of the campaign, because I've just been to dungeon prior to this one, and that was also pretty damn dark.

 

[Martyr]

turns out I already had a lantern equipped, even in the screenshot above.
LÖL !!!

swapped the brass lantern with the bright brass lantern of health and I can perfectly see my surroundings in the same dungeon!

 

[felipepepe]

You probably had a bug bro, even playing with no lantern it's supposed to be a lot brighter than your screenshot.

 

[Martyr]

is there a way back to the "Maj'Eyal" map after you've gone to the "Far East"? if yes, then how do you do it? I've left many places unexplored in Maj'Eyal.

 

[Lacrymas]

There is, you have to do a quest chain from one of the houses in the Gates of Morning.

 

[Hrymr]

turns out I already had a lantern equipped, even in the screenshot above.
LÖL !!!

swapped the brass lantern with the bright brass lantern of health and I can perfectly see my surroundings in the same dungeon!

I may be a bit too late, but the second screenshot shows what is the issue.
https://te4.org/wiki/Mummified_Egg-sac_of_Ungolë
Light Radius -2 when carried, so it negates bonus from a normal +2 lantern.

 

[Martyr]

turns out I already had a lantern equipped, even in the screenshot above.
LÖL !!!

swapped the brass lantern with the bright brass lantern of health and I can perfectly see my surroundings in the same dungeon!

I may be a bit too late, but the second screenshot shows what is the issue.
https://te4.org/wiki/Mummified_Egg-sac_of_Ungolë
Light Radius -2 when carried, so it negates bonus from a normal +2 lantern.

that information is never too late, since I'm pretty sure I haven't sold that thing yet - but now I will, so "let there be light" !

 

[Martyr]

in the Slime Tunnels you have to activate 4 orb pedestals; 3 out of 4 times I got a message that the pedestal reacts to an item in my inventory. the 4th pedestal (which is actually the second one) doesn't give me that message and doesn't react to any of the orbs in my inventory: Elemental Orb & Orb of Destruction & Orb of Undeath (all 3 of them are Orbs of Command), Orb of Many Ways, Scrying Orb.
which orb do I have to use on that pedestal and where do I find it? there doesn't seem to be another one in the slime tunnels.

fake edit: wait a sec, did I get these orbs by defeating the orc leaders in their prides? could be, because I've cleared 3 out of 4 prides?!?

 

[Lacrymas]

The game gets significantly more bogged down by bullshit when you get to the Far East, clearing prides is pretty repetitive, he either should've made you clear 2 or a single pride and then do other stuff for the orbs. It even makes more narrative sense, the other prides could've surrendered after seeing you can decimate them without breaking a sweat, or mobilize after the fact and take you 3v1. The game needs an edit pass the most tbh. And now the expansion he's planning will just replace the starting continent and not the Far East, which I think is widely regarded as the worse half.

 

[Martyr]

The game gets significantly more bogged down by bullshit when you get to the Far East, clearing prides is pretty repetitive, he either should've made you clear 2 or a single pride and then do other stuff for the orbs. It even makes more narrative sense, the other prides could've surrendered after seeing you can decimate them without breaking a sweat, or mobilize after the fact and take you 3v1. The game needs an edit pass the most tbh. And now the expansion he's planning will just replace the starting continent and not the Far East, which I think is widely regarded as the worse half.

cleared the 4th pride and got the last orb.

another expansion? good heavens! and he wants to replace Maj'Eyal? O_o Far East is far, FAR worse with all the stun-locking, teleporting, fireball-throwing orc wizards and as you said, repetetive pride-clearing. the area design is also less varied (apart from the desert area, which might be the most beautiful desert in any game ever: so many plants) than in the starting zone.

 

[Lacrymas]

Not replace, more like giving you the choice between Maj'Eyal and the other one. I forgot the details, but you can either choose where you start or it'd depend on whether you start with the new races/classes.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Interesting, never reached the far east, too many things to do in the west.

Did any of you tried the other campaigns ?

 

[Kabas]

Did any of you tried the other campaigns ?

Arena is fun.
Infinite dungeon is pretty much that, the infinite randomly generated dungeon. It was expanded a bit at one point with things like challenge quests.

Embers of rage campaign is it's own self-contained thing, i liked it. It's comparable in length to the main campaign before reaching the far east and in it you're kinda encouraged to use tinkers even as non-tinker class.
I remember the glorious time of playing as a ridiculous bullshit that was the freshly released sawbutcher.

 

[Martyr]

okay guys, serious question: can Elandor be beaten by a pure melee character?
that guy is such a huge pain in the ass, teleporting all over the map, stun-locking my char and shoving her back, constanly blinding her and bombarding most of the map with very powerful spells, while there's a seemingly unlimited amount of monsters. about 90% of the time I can't even come close to him and when I do, his health regen is higher than my damage.

 

[Kabas]

I rarely reach the final part of the main campaign due to my tendency to delete my characters in shame if they die more than twice on the exploration mode(and the other reasons already mentioned here), but i do remember that you can shutdown the monster portals with your pride orbs.

 

[Martyr]

1 hour later and I can answer my own question: yes, Elandor can be beaten by a pure melee character. the "Execution" skill dealt massive amounts of damage, draining Elandor's HP rather quickly, after stunlocking him.
that ending though ...... it's ... something else, to say the least.

are the expansions seperate campaigns and do they have to be played with a new character each time, or can you play them all with the same character, as long as you don't enter High Peak (point of no return)?

 

[anvi]

I keep getting near the end and then getting 1 shotted by some fucker and I rage quit. One time I think I nearly completed the game and it became bugged and broken :/