Dungeon Difficulty

[Soaponarope]

For those of you who don't read the RTC editing forum, I'm making a large and difficult dungeon and was curious on just how difficult people prefer their dungeons. I haven't played any customs yet myself, as I want to get this done, though I have read post about dungeons such as Conflux being much harder than CSB.

My dungeon is turning out to be very difficult in all aspects; combat,puzzles,traps. I'm testing it extensively to make sure it's not possible to get stuck and I can do everything without too much trouble, but then I'm the creator and know the best way.

Before I release the dungeon here, it's going to be played by a casual gamer who has beaten the original DM, but found CBS very confusing and didn't play that. My dungeon doesn't have the random teleporters that made CBS so confusing, though it's non linear and jumps around a lot still. If it is too hard for him I think I will make a toned down version and release both, as I want everyone to enjoy.

I guessing most of you like a good challenge though?

[Ameena]

You could always ask someone on here to playtest it too, since you know we all know the ins and outs of DM, CSB, DM2, etc, and various people have played stuff like Conflux and stuff too. If there is someone who has time, you could get that person to try it out and see what they think. I'm not sure if there's a "recommended number" of playtesters, since different people will have different styles of play, so one person might do something that no-one else would even think of. That's how all the random bugs come out, I think .

[Trantor]

Really depends on the dungeon and the kind of difficulty. I think CSB is a pretty good guideline in general. It has a good mixture of some tough fights, lots to explore, and some obscure puzzles, but most of the time, you can manage both the fights and the puzzles. If you know your way around the dungeon and still have trouble staying alive (Conflux), it gets too frustrating for me. Something like the first 3 or 4 levels of DM would probably bore me now as it is just too easy.
Interestingly, the more I like a dungeon, the more difficult it may be for me. When I am more into a dungeon, I tend to try out more stuff when I get stuck and persevere longer. If I'm bored by the dungeon, I'll quickly give up when I get stuck.

Gauging difficulty is pretty tough for a designer, as you almost have no way of telling how hard or easy a puzzle or trap you designed yourself is for somebody who thinks differently from you. This whole post is probably pretty useless to you, but I really have trouble nailing this down...

[Soaponarope]

Very true, I can test over and over and will probably never get every possible bug out until others play it, especially since I'm altering a lot. I know I cannot expect that and am prepared to revise it afterwards of course, I just want it to be quite polished on release.

I have thought about situations of people doing...well...dumb things and made it so it's still possible to continue.

For instance, there is a item retrieval system, just in case someone decides to throw an important key into a pit of lava, even though this makes no sense.

[beowuuf]

I have limited time, but on the other hand I'm recovering from a cold so have no plan to do more than type some stuff on my computer tomorrow. If you have a version ready to test, I could be easily persuaded to check it out and give you initial feedback

I think difficulty without reward is frustrating, as is punishing a reasonable course of action unduely without warning (exploration especially).

I think if an area or fight is difficult, make sure the fight itself is interesting. Large health and damage against a low stated party is not so much a challenge as tedious and frustrating, whereas the same creature with fewer health would be a fun challenge.

Go by feel I guess!

[money]

Agreed - I'm also available, although in limited capacity with work lately - but more than happy to trial/test out a dungeon. My background is in software testing so might be able to look at it subjectively enough to find some of the stranger more obscure issues.. If time permits! Hard though when playing something you love, as you have to tackle it in different ways (play or test stupid theories!)

[Gambit37]

FTL made it so that the player couldn't get into unwinnable situations. That's why you can't throw keys through a portcullis.

Just something to think about...

[Soaponarope]

Gauging difficulty is pretty tough for a designer, as you almost have no way of telling how hard or easy a puzzle or trap you designed yourself is for somebody who thinks differently from you.

That sums it up pretty well.

I will make sure to check the boards often and help anyone who is stuck of course.

Beowuuf and Money, I'm not ready to have people test yet. I have been taking a little break from it lately, the dungeon still has a ways to go, I'm just asking to get an idea of what people like difficulty wise, while I still can alter things.

It's certainly not intended to punish! I hope to make it all very rewarding and it's something I throughly enjoy playing of course. A good dungeon master still wants the players to win after all.

[money]

A good dungeon master still wants the players to win after all.

Let's not forget that in the RPG eh Wuufy

[beowuuf]

A good dungeon master still wants the players to win after all.

Really? Oh.

Well, as Mick Jagger once said, ''you can't always get what you want.' Especially if you use acid pits and mummies.


Edit: Oops, forgot to press 'submit' to this and post it, and now I see someone very cynical has beaten me too it!

[money]

cynical... moi??? Heavens forbid such a thing!

[PaulH]

I think you can throw coins and corbum through doors though.

[Soaponarope]

Well not much I can do about that since I'm not going to make a way to retrieve items from every door. If there is a way to get stuck from base mechanics and something that applies to the original game, that doesn't count.

[Zed5Duke]

I like challenge, beside elements like huge labirynth because there is no good automap, compare to Black Crypt. Also i dont like too many small switches and pad, which change something at large distance. These both together are nightmare, because you must walk many times trough large labirynth to find them and walk again to see what they do. Tough monsters are also ok if they are boss in few places, and avoid monster generator like in Wizardry 8, when they appear in every 5 minutes, where battle require 15 minutes, so you spend more time on fight than explore.

[zoom]

That's why you can't throw keys through a portcullis.

my shortest game of dm was thus: level 1 pick up gold key throw through portcullis.
second shortest game: throw iron key trough portcullis to kill screamer level 1
(you can definitely throw keys through )

apart from dead ends
sometimes real show stoppers(teleporters/puzzles with tiny switches/monster lure not obvious) are not unforgivingly bad.
You can accept that if you eventually find a solution to it. It is not nice but as said ok if you can get around it soon enough.
I would tend to say that CSB is too difficult for the standard player. You have no real starting point for instance. I bet a lot of people get starvation problems or simply get killed soon.(ok if you like to reincarnate your characters, you are probably the fault here CSB is for advanced players I would say. It did not have the same following than dm after all, no?)
The original DM Java dungeon was really impossibly difficult.(food drain bug I guess) But that is another topic.

anyway you need to get directions (map in game or knowledge by playing/obvious routes or map paper and pen)
I have only really once seen a too hard to figure out puzzle that had been crucial to beat the game.
Well, sometimes you feel delivered to the whim of the dungeon. Makes you really feel not good. Probably conflux tends to make you feel weak?
Trantor is right: DM is linear in the first few levels, they are rather boring. Make the test and backtrack to the starting point if you where on level 13 already.. not much happens there.(was fun on one occasion there had been a stone heap monster that I blasted away with a mon ful ir- it instantly incinerated. What fun to beat it in 0.3 s.)
If you do not need to get there(the beginning) again, this is actually ok.
ok,I wish you good dungeon building!!

[Gambit37]

You *could* throw keys through a portcullis in early versions, but they corrected this in later versions when they realised some players were locking themselves out of progress through a silly action...

[Jan]

OK, I wanted to write something like "nobody (even me) would be THAT stupid to throw a key through a portcullis without saving a game before", but then I read zoom's post... ermm... I think I won't talk about it anymore.

Soap, if you're going to make a dungeon more difficult than CSB, then God bless our souls! Since I am definitely the most stupid and the worst DM player on these forums, I can test your dungeon from the "silly-proof" perspective, but if it's going to be more difficult than CSB, then it would take me more than one year!

And as Zoom, I wish you good dungeon building, and I'm looking forward to playing your dungeon!

[Des]

@SOAP Conflux III is a very hard dungeon, but it's so good you want to persevere. I think you should give it a blast and see how it compares to yours for difficulty.

[Sophia]

Early versions of RTC let you throw a key through a portcullis, but that got fixed. Maybe that's what you're thinking of?

[Parallax]

As far as I'm concerned, difficulty is not a problem as long as there is always something accessible to do. The problems arise when there is no way to progress into the dungeon unless the player overcomes that one particular challenge. It can be a tough riddle, a particularly nasty fight, or that tiny little switch that's tucked away somewhere and you just can't find it. At that point yes, playing stops being fun and become a chore. I think one way around that is to offer multiple solutions. You can get from A to B by killing the monster that holds the key. Or you can find the secret passage through C that has easier fights. Plus there is a riddle in D that will get you teleported to B if you solve it, but then you'll have to figure out a back way to return to A. That is a bit the way Conflux is constructed, which makes it somewhat tricky when you're trying to figure out exactly which direction is 'forward' in the story, but at least it gives the game a feeling of depth and sophistication that a linear dungeon just cannot compete with. Not to mention it's fun to discover a new solution to an old problem, especially when it's accidental, or from comparing notes with others.

[Ameena]

Yeah, I'd agree with you there - I find things become a lot less fun when you're stuck in front of, say, a locked door, knowing you've explored all other miles of corridors etc that you can find, but also knowing that somewhere back there is the one tinykey you need, or something. Then you have to be arsed to go and look for it. Or, as mentioned, maybe some really uber tough fight that you just can't manage to get through. That kind of thing. Providing multiple paths/solutions to get yourself forward enables different people to win through even though they have different playing styles .

[Trantor]

You raise a very good point Parallax. Such dungeons are indeed great, but very hard to do for the designer. As much as I like such a concept, I won't hold it against a designer if you get stuck in a certain spot - at least not if you have at least some non-linearity.

[Zed5Duke]

Probably most interesting parts of DM is "survival" part: food/water, antidote for poison, cure for broken bones. Then "explore" part: light source, rope, lockpicks, compass. And finally "equipment" part: all clothes and weapons.

Now to make game more difficulty i feel its not to build puzzle with no clue or monster with many HP, but extend these three game parts. For example start hungry, and every food is poison. Remove light spell and need use torches. Give tattered clothes and rusty weapons and begining.