[ITA]mich
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 07-18-2004
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Hi all,
it may be silly to talk about the original dungeon, but here are my thoughts:

I completed with a lot of efforts level eight, which I find beautiful, I love living tars, you really have to learn strategy to win and sometimes...



I started playing level nine late today and I almost finished it... I left only the 4N 2-3E rooms (but I only tried the latter once).
I do really think that L9 is far more easy than L8, I completed the most part of the rooms in L9 at the first attempt...

I don't know if it's only me but I'd suggest to switch L9 with L8 in future releases.

Are there some other people that agree with me???

Please, don't be hard on me if I suggested a silly thing.
Bye.
--
[ITA]Mich.

Mikko
Level: Master Delver
Rank Points: 276
Registered: 02-04-2003
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The levels are planned so that all the monsters except the brain are introduced in levels 1-8. I think that is good, but some rooms might be too tricky to play this early.

eytanz
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 2708
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Actually, goblins are also introduced later.

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gamer_extreme_101
Level: Smitemaster

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Spiders on level 10...

...then again, there is a long story as to why spiders are in in the first place...

[Edited by gamer_extreme_101 on 08-14-2004 at 09:29 PM GMT]

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[ITA]mich
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 07-18-2004
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Mikko wrote:
some rooms might be too tricky to play this early.

Precisely what I was saying; Level 8 introduces a new kind of strategy, you need to be careful HOW and WHERE to move IF not at all.
In level 9 instead it pretty much doesn't matter where you move, it's enough that you move in a certain way to... achieve the room goal (don't want to spoiler ).
I think that new strategies should be taught gradually, FIRST how to move, THEN where to move; switching lvl8 with lvl9 would be perfect in my humble opinion.

Bye.
--
[ITA]Mich.

agaricus5
Level: Smitemaster
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[ITA]mich wrote:
Precisely what I was saying; Level 8 introduces a new kind of strategy, you need to be careful HOW and WHERE to move IF not at all.
In level 9 instead it pretty much doesn't matter where you move, it's enough that you move in a certain way to... achieve the room goal (don't want to spoiler ).
I think that new strategies should be taught gradually, FIRST how to move, THEN where to move; switching lvl8 with lvl9 would be perfect in my humble opinion.

The problem is that your definition of "how to move" and "where to move" is too specific for your generalisation. Level 8 teaches you to look for zones where tar will grow and so shape your movement patterns to avoid making babies, obstruct tar, and be trady for the next growth cycle. Level 9 teaches you that it is important to remember that your movements are generic for all the monsters in the room, and that you need to consider exactly whether a move you make will affect more monsters than you intended at first.

Later levels teach you other types of movement, such as on L14 with goblins. There you are taught to learn the movement patterns of another monster and shape your own movement to it so it doesn't get behind you.

The definition of "where to move" and "how to move" changes for different situations and combinations of monsters. If you have a look at some user made holds as well, you will find many different usages of movement as important parts of room solutions. The Tar Caves by DiMono seems to spring out of my memory as a good example, perhaps because you said "tar", as it requires several different techniques of destroying tar to complete.

In my opinion, learning new techniques is not as clear cut as you may think. To understand a monster, you need to know it well enough to be able to predict what it will do next, and the only way to do this is to look at as many different techniques of defeating them as you can, so you can make generalised rules that cover all circumstances. So, movements do not need to be learned in any particular order (except perhaps for the first few levels) to learn how to smite effectively - every room is an individual lesson, and the understanding is in putting all the lessons together to solve a room you have not seen before.

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The_Red_Hawk
Level: Smitemaster
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I think that levels 8, 14, and 20 especially are the ones where you have to rethink your thinking altogether.

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DiMono
Level: Smitemaster

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I think the biggest problem, actually, is that tar is naturally an element that takes over the room when the Tar Mother is present. It's a very powerful presence, and your gameplay is always, always influenced by its presence. The natural consequence of this is that rooms involving Tar Mothers are harder than other rooms, unless they're constructed very, very carefully.

At the time KDD was originally designed, everyone was sort of new to the whole process, so the level ended up being harder than those around it. The designers have said publicly, though, that no further tweaking will be done to KDD, so while it's useful to discuss these things, unless they've just been leading us on the developers are going to leave the hold alone until the end of time... or version 3.0

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Stuwy
Level: Master Delver

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possible ending spoiler? (ye ben' warned!)

[ITA]mich
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 07-18-2004
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agaricus5 wrote:
The problem is that your definition of "how to move" and "where to move" is too specific for your generalisation. Level 8 teaches you to look for zones where tar will grow and so shape your movement patterns to avoid making babies, obstruct tar, and be trady for the next growth cycle. Level 9 teaches you that it is important to remember that your movements are generic for all the monsters in the room, and that you need to consider exactly whether a move you make will affect more monsters than you intended at first.
[...]
movements do not need to be learned in any particular order (except perhaps for the first few levels) to learn how to smite effectively - every room is an individual lesson, and the understanding is in putting all the lessons together to solve a room you have not seen before.

Ok, of course you're right and I admit I've been too generic in my posts... I think that in level 8 you need to learn too much this early, while in level 9 you just need to understand how to use wisely the doors (because how to drive a roach the way you want you already learned it, you'll be dead otherwise ).

Anyway, I learned how to survive in L8, so everyone else will do it

Bye.
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[ITA]Mich.

Mattcrampy
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 2388
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We made some minor tweaks to KDD for the new version of JtRH. I recall one room being impossible if done after another room which was fixed, although I wouldn't mind having a crack at finally fixing that room on level 8.

The plan is that KDD will be available as a free download for anyone who wants to relive it. Meanwhile, JtRH is intended to be far more even in difficulty, so there hopefully won't be huge jumps up in difficulty. JtRH is intended to replace KDD's role as the first dungeon most people play.

(No word on if we can keep the KDD ending intact - I sincerely hope so.)

Matt

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[ITA]mich
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 07-18-2004
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Well, thank you all for your replies; after thinking a lot about it and reading the other's opinions I slightly changed my mind...
let me explain better: I realized that in fact L9 does not teach you anything, you simply use what you already know
So even if you switch L9 with L8 the "learning curve" won't be a curve anymore.
In my humble opinion in L8 the difficulty jumps a lot forward since in most cases you have to repeat the entire room even if you managed to arrive to a checkpoint; and that, in level 8, means a lot of moves, a lot of thinking and trying movement patterns, tar "positioning" and counting.
In level 9 the difficulty jumps again a lot backwards (I think L7 is more difficult than L9) since nothing is definitive until you hit a certain switch so there is still time to try another move and honestly you don't use much time thinking what is needed to kill the roaches. (how to do that is completely another matter but IMHO is far, far easier than struggling with a living tar when there is a mother around).

Ah, since I'm not english would you mind correcting my english, in case of errors, as a personal favour? Thanks in advance

Bye.
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[ITA]Mich.

eytanz
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 2708
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Personally, I found level 9 the hardest level in the first half of the game - it was harder than any other level before level 15, because you have a really small margin of error in most rooms - a single wrong move could make the room unsolvable and you don't always know it at the time.

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Zmann
Level: Master Delver

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Even if it does seem easier, I actually liked this learning curve because there was a little break between the "hard" levels. I probably would have got frusterated and quit playing for a while if I had to do all the hard levels one after another. Sometimes it's good to give the player a little "rest".

[ITA]mich
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 07-18-2004
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eytanz wrote:
you have a really small margin of error in most rooms - a single wrong move could make the room unsolvable and you don't always know it at the time.

It's true but think about the living tar... if you make a wrong move you're likely dead or stuck and you need to redo all the previous moves (which almost always are a large number) in almost the exact way (changing of course the last move or the last group of moves ) maybe just to realize that only changing your moves from the beginning will get you to the solution and then start again thinking, moving and counting.

In Level 9 you just need to know how to use the doors and then decide which group kill first


I only found "difficult" (related to the other rooms) the northern rooms, but I already got the right strategy, I just need to move the right number of roaches where I want, which is not hard since they follow your moves like puppets.

Bye.
--
[ITA]Mich.

DiMono
Level: Smitemaster

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Mattcrampy wrote:
We made some minor tweaks to KDD for the new version of JtRH. I recall one room being impossible if done after another room which was fixed, although I wouldn't mind having a crack at finally fixing that room on level 8.

If you'll recall, at one point I posted up a version of that room with a solution to the problem involving a green door and an orb. Please feel free to use it or something like it if you like. I can dig it up for you if you'd like.

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Astronaut
Level: Goblin
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Zmann wrote:
Sometimes it's good to give the player a little "rest".

I couldn't agree more. Eventhough not all rooms of level 9 were a walk in the park the first time I played them, it was a great relief to work with something as familiar and predictable as roaches after having struggled with the concept of living tar. Level 8 contains quite a few rooms, and 7S3E was a real struggle to me and, I suspect, to some others as well.

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[ITA]mich
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 07-18-2004
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Then it must be me... From Level 9 I started solving the rooms in 3 tries max... now I'm on level 12....
Bye.
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[ITA]mich.

yarnexpress
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 24
Registered: 12-16-2003
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Had to get my two cents in. I found level 9 rather easy after level 8 & I greatly appreciated it. It was a welcome relief.

Except for obvious conudrums, it's difficult to predict what any particular person will find difficult or easy. We process information differently & approach problem solving in different ways. (Case in point: I've been completely befuddled by rooms which others apparently solved with ease. While some rooms which seemed to present problems to many others were easy for me.)

I think the builders of DROD have done an excellent job of presenting puzzle concepts in a logical order.

ESk
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 16
Registered: 06-04-2005
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This is probably a dead thread, but:
For what its worth I found lvl 8 the "hardest" (or at least most frustrating) level in the game. I beat the game 2-3 yrs ago and just beat it again about a week ago (since I deleted all my old files). Its mostly just because there was no spawn counter in Caravel DROD (and a pretty sad one in A. Edition). Don't get me wrong, Tar rooms could be some of the best, but they were too often un-intellectually taxing without a spawn counter.

I think the difficulty will be much less, therefore, with the JtRH engine/build/whatchamacalit.
possibly "spoilage" (general comment on game character)-->

BIG QUESTION: where can we post about changes to KDD?

lvl25/ending Secret-->

[Edited by ESk at Local Time:06-15-2005 at 06:08 AM]

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[Edited by ESk at Local Time:06-15-2005 at 06:11 AM]

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