Incline Troubleshooter: Abandoned Children - isometric tactical Korean SRPG

[Nutmeg]

Also in case devs are reading here (hey you never know), here's some things you can do that will push the players in the right direction, who will then push you in the right direction, to tighten the game:

1. Come up with a ranking formula that makes sense (why do I get perfects, even though I take losses?). Action time taken (less is better) and player characters out of action (again less is better) would be a decent start. I personally like the power and technique formulas used in Days of Ruin. Copy those.

2. Allow players to see and input the random seed used for enemy spawns when playing missions.

3. Allow players to temporarily down-level their characters (i.e. select their char level freely up to their achieved max level).

4. Add level requirements for masteries.

5. Now you can add leader boards for mission × seed × max character level e.g. I could see leader boards for 31V (seed 7832) @ level 35, and I can see e.g. that top score is 6774 or whatever completed in 1220 AT.

For simplicity, you could just turn the recommended level into a level cap e.g. you couldn't play 31V above level 31, that way you don't need to have a separate leader board for character level. You could also tailor the player experience better that way.

The data you'd get from this would be invaluable in terms of making really awesome maps for players.

But who am I kidding? Sound, competitive single player game design in 2022? Devs will probably just add some kind of doll crafting or whatever with 10 maps for hunting dolls for doll masteries and crafting ingredients or whatever instead

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

4. Add level requirements for masteries.

boo!

 

[Nutmeg]

4. Add level requirements for masteries.

boo!

You'd have to otherwise someone who's at level 50 (and thus has access to high level content) or someone who spent hours "farming" some early story event with high level characters (e.g. the Don vs Marco fight, or Sion's day off mission with the Marco vs Carter fight etc.) would have high level masteries like Veteran and Iron Wall while other players wouldn't, and this would take away an element of uniqueness and standardization of non grindy play for low level leader boards.

Another side effect of adding level requirements is it would remove the above mentioned degenerate farming.

 

[Abu Antar]

Reading that, I hope the developers don't read this thread.

 

[Nutmeg]

Aside from the level requirements for masteries it wouldn't affect casual play for mobile or gacha style skinner box enjoyers, so I don't see the big deal. Even that could simply be made into a difficulty modifier, like the excellent "limits to growth".

 

[GhostCow]

The only changes I really would have made to the game would be to drop crafting entirely and most of the farming too. I don't mind having to replay story missions with different options for masteries too much, but I don't want to farm mats or craft. That's what kept me from going on to the dlc after I finished the main game.

Also I can't believe that you'd say the art and music are anything other than fantastic. Absolutely mind blowing to me.

 

[Grunker]

The only changes I really would have made to the game would be to drop crafting entirely and most of the farming too.

honestly could almost drop equipment completely and nothing of value would be lost

 

[Abu Antar]

Not drop it completely (for me), but toning down the random loot element wouldn't be bad.

 

[Jermu]

My biggest gripe after doing pretty much everything 100% (achievements + mastery sets and so on) is locking masteries behind pet taming + leveling em. It's very time consuming and boring (there is an option to unlock all masteries if u are doing offline playthrough).

I don't mind loot system too much you can finish the game with only crafted items easily (2-5 piece set combos are quite good especially golden set) and farming uniques is not too time consuming if u are using joint drills think my average ben team kill took like 2-3 minutes but that was pretty optimized (unless you are autistic and want specific item with specific bonus and 4-5 stars). Upgrading items to +9 on the other hand takes ridiculous amount of materials.

 

[Lhynn]

Crafting is entirely unnecessary and works as a money sink. Your finances will be better if you dont crat, and your team will be stronger. Crafting is time consuming and you can just use that time to do another mission that will, in the end, give you a better reward for your time.

The more interesting part of looting is going after hidden unique gear. Every unique character probably has something that will offer a lot to one of the people in your team.

 

[GhostCow]

Crafting is entirely unnecessary

Until the DLC. I couldn't buy new weapons for my DLC characters and I didn't get any in the few missions I did. It seemed like crafting was the only option to upgrade their weapons unless I'm missing something.

 

[Jermu]

yeah Kylie / Ray / Misty weapons have to be crafted (Misty comes with decent weapon though for rogue) and Alisa only has 1 weapon drop (quite sure there is not more) which is very late game

 

[Axioms]

This is the game with really good stacking dots and debuffs and stuff yeah? If only the theme/plot weren't so lame.

 

[Nutmeg]

lol at RPG players balking at the idea of challenge and competition in a game

Truly players themselves are the reason games are the way they are in 2022.

 

[Nutmeg]

The only changes I really would have made to the game would be to drop crafting entirely and most of the farming too.

honestly could almost drop equipment completely and nothing of value would be lost

Agree with the caveat that I'd keep the bottom and top pocket slots.

 

[Nutmeg]

Crafting is entirely unnecessary

Until the DLC. I couldn't buy new weapons for my DLC characters and I didn't get any in the few missions I did. It seemed like crafting was the only option to upgrade their weapons unless I'm missing something.

yeah Kylie / Ray / Misty weapons have to be crafted (Misty comes with decent weapon though for rogue) and Alisa only has 1 weapon drop (quite sure there is not more) which is very late game

That's interesting. Glad I found out now.

Few options around that for players who hate farming, grinding etc. I can think of.

1. Simply don't use those characters
2. Simply play the game with their starting equipment.

Second option makes me think whether you could do that for the whole game - just never change equipment from what your characters begin with at all. On cruel with challenge mode and high risk high reward on, this would probably make for a very tedious game, as at a certain point almost all enemies would be one shotting you and you'd be doing negligible damage to them, so even if you were able to single them out to make the game possible at all, you'd still be mindlessly bashing them for 3 or 4 character turns for each character to take them out of action.

You have to keep cruel mode on for the AI changes, I'd imagine (unless someone can attest to the hard mode AI actually being better - it could be, greedy AI strategies aren't always optimal after all), but you could safely do away with high risk high reward, which is basically a "So you hate farming? Well here's the option for you, but we gotta tweak the difficulty a bit to compensate" feature and is redundant with the self imposed challenge of never changing from starting equipment. Challenge mode is mostly redundant with limits to growth, certainly for story, but also for other missions if you play with the self imposed rule of clearing all (lower level) non-story missions in level order before advancing the story, so perhaps this is another thing you can tweak to remove what would become painful HP bloat.

Ofc. you'd keep all other modifiers on. Mind body unity is a must unless you want to break the game with Heixing and Fetters of the Past and Paranoid are amazing.

My biggest gripe after doing pretty much everything 100% (achievements + mastery sets and so on) is locking masteries behind pet taming + leveling em. It's very time consuming and boring (there is an option to unlock all masteries if u are doing offline playthrough).

Unlocking all masteries is probably a good option for players who like maximum build variation and do not enjoy grind and farming. Alternatively you can just accept a bit of random extra challenge or lack of challenge on runs through the game "well I didn't get Veteran during S9, that locks me out of the good Martial Artist sets till S43, guess I'll play around it". If you're keeping AT time counts for missions (as I do) it makes more sense to switch that option on.

All this reminds me why I generally hate sand box with kitchen sink thrown in in game design, as is the case with Troubleshooter. You can maybe, if you try hard enough, salvage a good game using all the options and tools given and writing a laundry list of rules the developers didn't, but you'll probably be the only person playing that way, and you might find out 50 plus hours into a run the game is still broken in some way anyway. Then the question arises, why don't I play a game where the game designers actually did their work, I mean beyond the market necessity of making a skinner box for retarded people?

Edit: Jermu were you talking about the "A parallel world" option here? That's like a new game+ kind of thing, and you need to have a save file which already has the masteries unlocked, meaning you'd have to have done the grinding at least once. Or is there a different way? I was just about to start a new no new equipment or equipment upgrading run too to test out my theories.

 

[Jermu]

[Notice] Contents Update and System Maintenance Announcement

Hello everyone, this is the Troubleshooter development team.

Thanks to your support and encouragement, we were able to continue developing troubleshooter this year.

Our development skills are still lacking and we make mistakes frequently. Nevertheless, we sincerely thank you for always supporting these development teams.

We thought we had prepared a lot of things, but after writing down the notice, we realized that there was not much content, and we are sorry to you.

We will do our best to include more in the new year's update!

Have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We beg to inform you that the game contents update and system maintenance.

• During the maintenance, players who use the Online mode can't play the game.
• Please end the game normally before the maintenance begins.
• During the maintenance, players who use the Offline mode can play the game.

Maintenance Schedule

• Daylight saving time is not applied.
• Date: December 23th, 2022
• Friday 12:00 ~ 14:00 CET
• Friday 20:00 ~ 22:00 JST
• Friday 03:00 ~ 05:00 PST
• Friday 11:00 ~ 13:00 UTC

Update Details:

• Added a new scenario mission 'Got a Clue - Angry Barrel Street'.
• Added an additional difficulty setting 'Records of Ancestors'.
  • A beast that has individual mastery will have random individual mastery.
  • Gaining an enemy information to the beast type will be increased by 100%.
• Added a new potion: Catharsis Potion
• Added a new Chain Effect: Electric Leakage

Added new masteries:

• Changed the max level cap up to 57.
• Changed the masteries:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Changed the total slot count
  • Changed the total slot clount of 1st classes from 17 to 18.
  • Changed the total slot clount of 2nd classes from 23 to 25.
  • Classes that of machines are not applicable.
• Changed the activation condition of Chain Effect: Slip Off from 'knock back 3 more tiles' to 'knock back'.
• Changed the Junk shop to sell Training Manual and Blue Prints.
• Changed the function that a beast summoned by enemy denies player's taming when the beast starts their turn and their summoner is in their line of sight is applied only on a beast with the 'Loyal' grade loyalty.
• Changed the extraction scene for Psy-Stone to be skipped by pressing ESC.
• Changed the individual mastery of enemy unit Kevin.
• Changed the appearance of some pistols.
  
  
• Fixed a bug that the Unstable Chemical Concoction status was not displayed in a specific condition.
• Fixed a bug where the level of some quests and the recommended level of missions did not match.
• Fixed a bug that a description for the Public Safety Lv.5 was wrong.

Thank you.

MORE ABOUT THIS GAME

 

[ERYFKRAD]

One update that isn't apologetic, that's all I ask.

 

[Abu Antar]

Our development skills are still lacking and we make mistakes frequently

Can you get self deprecate than that? I don't think so.

 

[Endemic]

One update that isn't apologetic, that's all I ask.

They're really doing their best to uphold the Asian father meme.

 

[mediocrepoet]

One update that isn't apologetic, that's all I ask.

"We are sorry, but we must respectfully decline your request. We beg you to please understand, but if you cannot, it's just that we lack the eloquence to convince you. The communications manager has ritually disemboweled himself in the bathroom to atone for his shame."

 

[InD_ImaginE]

I just want them to release a new game instead. Even with just the same asset and shit. Just a new campaign with existing system.

I would gladly spend money on it.

 

[HoboForEternity]

finished the white tiger violent case. came in level 32-33 came out level 34-35 ish. that was pretty intense with the bosses swarming into my location one after another

 

[Jermu]

[Notice] Fixed Bugs
Hello everyone, this is the Troubleshooter development team.

I would like to inform you about the bugs that have been fixed since last Friday's update.

Fixes below have been already applied to the Steam and extra maintenance won't be carried on.

• Fixed
  • When using additional difficulty Ancestral Records, beasts learned abnormal mastery.
  • Specifial function of the dagger Crimson Crow was not activated in a specific condition.
  • Citizen and loot boxes were generated at the wrong location and couldn't been recused or opened.
  • Stats that have been affected by the mastery Professionalism were not been displayed on the character information tooltip.
  • 'Show all transmog list' function didn't work.
  • Detail part was not been displayed when attacking Mungo using Precision Sniping ability.
  • Property of Mungo Roll was set as Wind.
  • Mimicking Evasion worked before the 'unconditionally dodge' property.
  • Quick Cover-Up didn't activate properly.
  • The duration of Full Sprint getting longer.
  • Item information were not displayed properly when identifying, upgrading and transmogging.
  • Mungo's ability effect was displayed abnormally.
  • Text displaying HP was not affected by the option value.
  
  
• Changed
  • Effect of reducing Action Time from Cover to Cover reduced. (10 → 5)

Beside the fixes described above, the dev team is still working to make another fixes of knows bugs.

Once it has been made, its details will be shared through the maintenance notice or extra notice.

Thank you.

Not even sorry for introducing bugs in a first place, outrageous

 

[mediocrepoet]

Not even sorry for introducing bugs in a first place, outrageous

Yeah, that's the new communications manager. The last guy ritually disemboweled himself.