Dungeon Master Forum

This post was originally asking for people to playtest the beta version of Angel's Egg following its conversion from CSBWin to RTC. It's now the spot where the latest full release can be downloaded.

27th May 2006: Here's the 0.38 edition (lots of new stuff)....
http://www.sholing.force9.co.uk/angel_RTC_1_2.zip (800KB)

22nd October 2006: rebuild for 0.43 (no significant changes)...
http://www.sholing.force9.co.uk/angel_RTC_1_3.zip (1.1MB)

30th March 2008: rebuild for 0.48 (fixed problems Kain found, not much else)..
http://www.sholing.force9.co.uk/angel_RTC_1_4.zip (1.1MB)

Backup also including source files:

http://cid-5af78f9a064bada7.skydrive.li ... Egg-48.zip

it should be unzipped to the RTC Modules directory.

I've tried to create something a bit different with Angel's Egg. There are no restrictions on spells, and there is no linearity. On any level you might encounter hard monsters and may have to back off and come back later. To win the game you have to get the Angel's Egg and use it to turn off the Demon Portal, how you do it is up to you. You can use the Oily Way to skirt around levels or even jump down the Pit of Damnation, or you can play through the levels to advance your characters. There are lots of pits and teleporters so the route to victory is varied and in many cases deadly.....

Tony King of Spin, could this be the greatest character ever???

I havent got very far but ill keep you informed when i get further (i.e. stuck )

Thanks for giving it a try DMDM. Looking forward to receiving your comments. Testing it myself I had a bit of trouble guaging the difficulty. The CSBWin version was a bit too easy but under RTC the monsters are faster and seem to do higher damage, but I didn't make the characters stronger to compensate. I've only run through it once with 4 resurrected characters (Arnie, Bruce, Tony and Gandhi) and they had a tough time but made it. It might be too hard with reincarnated characters or a smaller party, and there are many different routes through so it is hard to predict what level the characters will be at any given time. On the other hand, my DM play is a bit flawed in that I'm not too hot on avoidance tactics (my characters snuffed it lots of times at the start of Conflux) so I'm not sure I should make it easier.

Update 23/4: had time for a quick tweak today and decided to increase the character's hit points. Link is now version 1.0.1.

ROFL, I didn't last very long, but that was probably for all the laugning. Only thing I could say at such an early stage is, lots of torchs. The light model in RTC is vastly different to DM/CSB(win) as I'm sure you are aware. Very funny so far though. More later if and when I get time.

There are plenty of torches on the first two levels in case your chosen characters are not too great at light spells. Yes it does seem a bit odd that just two torches on the HOC level results in dazzling light (this is discussed in detail in the RTC forum).

From the playtesting I've done so far it does seem that if you don't go for a priest and a wizard in your initial party you're doomed.

I've finished the other stuff I had to do and am back on testing Angel's Egg. I'm currently doing a rerun using a full party but taking different routes through. This has unearthed a few things so version 1.0.4 is now the latest.

Version 1.1 will be the full release when the testing period is completed. I will test it myself thoroughly with various permutations before this but as I said in the orginal posting if anyone is willing to give it an extended try and report their findings back to me (via PM or my email at the end of the angel_readme file) this would be most appreciated.

If anyone has started trying this out, but haven't got very far, you should download the newest version 1.0.4. and start again. I don't think I will need to upload any more beta versions before the full release, as in my second run through I visited most of the locations bypassed in the first run, so there should be very few remaining bugs (famous last words).

For my second run I took another full party of four resurrected characters (Rambo, Ali, Bill and Theresa). For the next two runs I think I should try a single character (one of the all-rounders like George or Indiana) and of course an attempt with reincarnated characters. The latter could be a bit tough because of the non-linearity of the dungeon. There's only really the "Supplies Surprise" room for easy training, and in my previous runs I've relied on being able to cast powerful spells and dish out big weapon damage right from the start.

Only part way through my reincarnated characters test, and so far I've been finding it too easy rather than too hard, especially as I reduced monster health and shooter damage after too many deaths first time round. The extra character hit points more than compensate for the (initial) spellcasting difficulties, though there are two big buts...

1 - I used my knowledge of the dungeon to make sure I did the easier bits and the one and only training area early on, gaining several levels in the process. I probably need to see how the reincarnees fare if they end up in nasty areas before they've levelled up.

2 - I reincarnated all the characters and observered their stats. Under the 0.37 rules, some characters got their stats heavily reduced and others got off scot free. I didn't think the reduced characters would last very long so picked four who kept their full HSM stats.

The revised reincarnation rules in 0.38 should work much better as all characters will get the same amount of reduction, so party strength will be much more predictable. I will of course need to delay the release of the full version until after I've retested under 0.38.

I don't know if anyone else has tried the dungeon for more than a few minutes yet. I have a gut feeling people might find it too easy (fights and puzzles both) but I could be so wrong!

P.S. I haven't found any bugs in 1.0.4 so far

Upadate - found a couple of minor problems with 1.0.4 and increased monster health a bit after my latest run was too easy. 1.0.5 is now the latest. Another glitch found, fixed in 1.06. Various small tweaks following my latest run in 1.07 and got all characters to be reincarnated via "DM Rules" by reducing mana of those who didn't.

After lots of testing and tweaking, the first full release (1.1) of Angel's Egg is now complete (download link in first posting). I didn't get any feedback from the betas but I'm hoping to receive some comments to help me with version 1.2 which will run using RTC 0.38.

Share and Enjoy

Sorry for lack of feedback, I still haven't had time to sit down with this one.

Probably just as well. Although other people's testing is a lot more informative to the designer than his own, he should really have given the dungeon a damned good thrashing before unleashing it. I have made literally thousands of changes since the first beta I uploaded, which suggests that version was insufficiently thrashed.

I did download the beta and get as far as choosing a party (cool champions btw) before getting distracted by SS 2.1.
I'll have a look at the new version.

I've been playing Surgical Strike too and I think it's the best RTC dungeon so far. I don't think Angel's Egg is Premier League material like SS (and the top CSBWin dungeons such as Conflux and Towers of Chaos), though I do think it's enjoyable to play.

Version 1.2 for RTC 0.38 is now available for download (see first posting). It's not greatly different from 1.1 - a few new custom items, a scroll with a secret URL to get dungeon maps, and some general tweaks.

Hey great! I look forward to playing it...

You know I've just had to dig out my Nightwish album after having "I wish I had an Angel" permanently stuck in my head.

And you know what else? I didn't know it was a Nightwish song, but I guessed it was! Then I checked on the Credits ReadMe and went to see if it was on the album that I had, and it was! So I was very happy...

:D:D

The excerpt is only played twice, once at the the start and again upon victory, though fellow Finns Lordi's Eurovision winner "Hard Rock Hallelujah" might be a more apt, albeit cheesy, closer

Bwahaha..

Angel's Egg has been rebuilt for RTC 0.43 (see first post for download link). Not significantly different from the previous version but those who missed it first time round might like to give at a blast

Sure, I'll give it a whirl!

*Update...* Nice "track listing"!

It's an overall good idea, though the annoyance factor is pretty high, especially with the limitless-giggler invasion where you can get boxed in and hacking your way through is very tiresome.

There is also at least one place where you can get stuck if you fall in from the wrong place. It's the room at the end of the fireball corridor.

Hi Kain, glad to see you've given the old girl a ride, and sorry to hear she's not been behaving...

Traps and Monsters has a notorious giggler invasion, but Angel's Egg is not supposed to! Can you tell me where it happened and which version of RTC you are running under. There are giggler generators in "Pixie Purgatory" on level 6 but the little buggers get killed by the lightning bolt shooters PDQ - maybe that's gone wrong?

On level 1, there's a room with four teleporters and one of them leads to a Vexirk's lair which used to be open to the fireball corridoor but I added a toggleable solid wall in the last but one release - oops.

At least I now have an excuse to dust it off and do a new version

Sure thing. Using latest version of RTC.
The infinite giggler invasion happens in the Free Nelson Mandela area on the same level as Pixie Purgatory, it's triggered by a pad under a fountain in the room with imprisoned knights.

Duuuh yes - the giggler generating pad is an "ALL" which means gigglers can make new friends there. The generator is there to allow you to have several attempts at getting through the monster-operated door. I didn't get a giglalanche when I tested it but that was just luck.

If you have any other comments about Angel's Egg I'll be happy to take them on board when I make the new version. I'd also be interested to know if anyone apart from me has completed the game, and if so how they did it (there are many possibilities).

The biggest appeal of it is the "danger factor." You can walk into a room and bang... party wipe-out.
Certainly keeps you on your toes.

I also like the choice of characters. My party was Arnie, Clint, Indie and Tony. Though Arnie needs a special sword, Indie needs a whip and Clint needs a Magnum.

That's a tasty idea - each character starts with an object from the 20th century

The Encyclopaedia thread still lists V1.4 to be RTC V0.47, which is not correct (V0.47 will not work), I'll update that information.

Was it initially created with RTC V0.36 or even earlier? Am I correct in assuming that V1.4 was not further updated to RTC V0.49?

Aside from that - since I'm currently updating not only version information, but also are gathering dungeon files for backup purposes, would you maybe be willing to provide the source files? Of course you still decide alone whether they shall be released publicly or not.

0.36 was used for the intial RTC build, and the latest version (1.4) was indeed created with 0.48, and there have been no subsequent releases (I probably would have done one if my dunge had been more popular).

Don't mind handing over the source files for posterity - how do you want them delivered?

Hey, good to hear that! Well, easiest would be emailing them (my name here at gmail dot com).

Des, Champion of Open Source has submitted the source files and media and allowed me to upload and release them puclicly.

I updated the backup link and moved it to the initial post so Des can edit it too.