Subject: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 21 2011 @ 06:18 AM
By: jiriku
Content:
This is my second day with the game, so I'm commenting mostly based on the first impression it leaves.
It would be nice to have more options to perform tasks in bulk. For example, I spend a lot of time dropping crap meat from my inventory or transferring grenades from my backpack to my bandolier. Once, after a fight with 7 midgets, I cleaned all their carcasses and collected 70 pieces of crap meat -- dropping the meat 1 piece at a time took so many clicks that the game actually asked me if I was stuck and needed help with something.
The quest from Stern, the museum curator gives me a Lodge bag, apparently weightless. It would be nice if I could store his quest items in that bag, because they take up quite a bit of the weight allowance in my beginning backpack. It took me nearly two weeks of game time to find all the cities and return with the objects, and with only about 6-8 kilos of space free, I could hardly carry anything.
The Nightmare Court should include some sort of warning for characters who enter with a mercenary or companion, or should leave the companion outside. I entered the NC with Caroline the Speed Medic, not knowing what to expect, and when the nightmare killed us both, I woke up outside the Court but Caroline was gone - I had to spend another 1k req and 3 cigs to rehire her. That's a large investment for a newbie character in the level 4-6 range to lose with little or no warning.
Replies:
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 21 2011 @ 09:12 AM
By: Omega
Content:
Well, first things first: Welcome to Improbable Island! Check the wiki for a treasure trove of information, if you have not done so earlier. Also, you may want to participate in Banter, if you don't want to roleplay. Veteran players that might want to help can't help without knowing who needs help or not.
Secondly, it would be nice to have more options to perform tasks in bulk, but it is not necessary for the case you mentioned, as all types of meat disappear in the Newday that comes next if you do not use them in the earlier one. You may also want to check the meat list here for tips on what monsters give you what kind of meat. Personally, I advise you to only eat tasty meat. Especially if you can sell the half decent meat in NewHome.
In addition, most time consuming actions already have options to perform in bulk, unless it makes sense to not give them that. Some people might not appreciate miss-clicking and discarding all their One Shot Teleporters, for example.
Also, the Nightmare Court already had a warning, but is a bit too vague. However, you could ask about it in Location Four or Global Banter, and the people there would have told you what to expect (There's a hall of fame ranking for the Nightmare Court, by the way.)
I don't like hiring mercenaries, because you can do without them, and they're a waste of precious cigarettes.
Finally, I'm sure your comments are appreciated! We don't get many players who post in the forums this early!
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 21 2011 @ 05:45 PM
By: jiriku
Content:
I have noticed that meat rots away on each new day. However, if one cleans carcasses and accumulates, say, 7 kilos of crap meat while having only, say, 2 kilos of empty space in a pack (happened to me in just 1 encounter), you're now overburdened. Leaving the meat in there burns through your stamina at an accelerated rate. When your options to deal with the situation boil down to "click this button 70+ times in a row" or "burn one of your saved-up new days" or "log out for a few hours", then perhaps there's room for improvement in the UI, hmmm?
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 21 2011 @ 05:49 PM
By: Omega
Content:
There might be room for improvement, but every feature that goes unused is dead weight, is it not?
at any rate, I am sure I don't have the say on what stays and what changes.
You might want to avoid the situation by saving up cigarettes to get the largest backpack, weighting up to 80 kilograms. You can also simply not clean carcasses that contain meat you're not going to use.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 21 2011 @ 09:12 PM
By: Tyr
Content:
Quote by: Omega
You might want to avoid the situation by saving up cigarettes to get the largest backpack, weighting up to 80 kilograms. You can also simply not clean carcasses that contain meat you're not going to use.
Yes, but that requires a new player to hoard all his/her cigs for the biggest backpack, ignoring other things they might want to buy or try (which, granted, is the best strategy. That backpack is useful), but it discourages checking out other game mechanics/abilities.
And only cleaning kills that give good meat is only possible if you're playing with the meat list open in another tab. Which is kind of a drag when you're a new player, and just trying to play the game. Is it good to have all that information available? Yes! Should it be necessary to play the game? No.
jiriku, I don't know if you've found your way to Squat Hole yet, but the midgets there will buy your crap meat from you. That would be another way to get rid of it. For now, I might recommend that you stop cleaning carcasses. I know - it's a great source of free stam, but the stam boost isn't nearly as good as the food you can buy. Pick up a rat pack or two from the Council in NH, or sell your free supplies and buy food.
If people are worried that they might accidentally discard all the items, perhaps a better fix could be having a "do you want to take it?" option after the "you clean the carcass and end up with X crap meat" message. Or, a "Blech, I didn't want to take that!" option to drop it all right then.
And I agree that it would be nice if either the Stern Quest items weighed less, or if you could turn them in one (or a few at a time). For a quest that's supposed to be an early introduction to the island, having the items weigh you down doesn't do much to encourage exploration.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 21 2011 @ 11:07 PM
By: Matthew
Content:
Quote by: OmegaYou might want to avoid the situation by saving up cigarettes to get the largest backpack, weighting up to 80 kilograms. You can also simply not clean carcasses that contain meat you're not going to use.
No offense but this is kind of a holier-than-thou piece of advice. You're basically telling him "well maybe you just need to get better at this game hmm? 
"
Sure, the backend and nifty features like places are important. Polishing up and streamlining the UI/aesthetics, though, are the things new players are going to notice the most, and thus help with player retention in the end, even more than Places (not to knock it, I love Places, but you can't even build one until you've been playing for a good while). And some of it can be pretty damn unintuitive/inconvenient, like said gripe about not having a Discard All or Transfer All button. More established players just don't notice it as much because it's been The Way Things Are and we tend to know the UI inside-out and backwards.
So, yeah, I really disagree with the assessment that cosmetic/convenience tweaks aren't as important as others. I know I'd love a couple buttons like that, myself.
edit: as for an actual useful idea, maybe the Discard link could be replaced with a Discard (1, 5, All). Neat and compact, and fairly self-evident in what it does.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 12:12 AM
By: Devorah
Content:
Quote by: Matthew
edit: as for an actual useful idea, maybe the Discard link could be replaced with a Discard (1, 5, All). Neat and compact, and fairly self-evident in what it does.[/p]
This would be much appreciated! Similarly, a function like this in eboys for buying and selling would be great, though I realize this is more complicated because of the fluctuating prices. If it would be possible though, that'd be awesome.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 12:16 AM
By: Matthew
Content:
Quote by: DevorahQuote by: Matthew
edit: as for an actual useful idea, maybe the Discard link could be replaced with a Discard (1, 5, All). Neat and compact, and fairly self-evident in what it does.
This would be much appreciated! Similarly, a function like this in eboys for buying and selling would be great, though I realize this is more complicated because of the fluctuating prices. If it would be possible though, that'd be
awesome.
I actually can't imagine it being hard at all. Look at the way Places are built, with the "until the job's done" option; it doesn't add, say, 50 wood, it adds 1 wood fifty times and then tells you about it. I'm sure the same can work for eboys purchases.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 12:21 AM
By: Devorah
Content:
Quote by: MatthewQuote by: DevorahQuote by: Matthew
edit: as for an actual useful idea, maybe the Discard link could be replaced with a Discard (1, 5, All). Neat and compact, and fairly self-evident in what it does.
This would be much appreciated! Similarly, a function like this in eboys for buying and selling would be great, though I realize this is more complicated because of the fluctuating prices. If it would be possible though, that'd be
awesome.
I actually can't imagine it being hard at all. Look at the way Places are built, with the "until the job's done" option; it doesn't add, say, 50 wood, it adds 1 wood fifty times and
then tells you about it. I'm sure the same can work for eboys purchases.
True. Either way, I would like to reiterate my previous point. If possible, that would be awesome. Particularly for Bastard ranks where I'm constantly buying a ton of medkits and using them (because it's cheaper than healing at the hospital tent. Why do I have so so many HP?). Very time consuming, particularly when my connection slows down. Anything to speed up that whole process would be fantastic.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 12:31 AM
By: thryn
Content:
Quote by: Matthew
edit: as for an actual useful idea, maybe the Discard link could be replaced with a Discard (1, 5, All). Neat and compact, and fairly self-evident in what it does.
I would have loooooved this when I was newbing around and getting weighed down by meat with my tiny backpack. I still might well use it even now I've got the biggest one.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 12:43 AM
By: Hairy+Mary
Content:
Quote by: TyrAnd I agree that it would be nice if either the Stern Quest items weighed less, or if you could turn them in one (or a few at a time). For a quest that's supposed to be an early introduction to the island, having the items weigh you down doesn't do much to encourage exploration.
What really doesn't help there is that by far the heaviest item is the one from New Home, which is likely the first one to be found, and so has to be carried around the whole Island. Maybe just the weight of that could do with being reduced.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 01:37 AM
By: Awesome+Fred
Content:
jiriku's impression is highly valuable perspective as he is a newcomer. Welcome, by the way.
I especially like the mention about the mercenaries. You get nearly no information really about how mercenaries work, but if I remember my first experience with them (so so so so very long ago), it gave me the impression that we would fight in parties often in this game and that mercs were NPC trials of them, essentially. As I did higher ranks and gained more base stats, it quickly became apparent that mercs were an unsupported and frankly useless feature of the game that was more of a hindrance than a help (due to cost and ease of loss of that investment).
Mercs are a complete red herring towards the real way this game works and either they need to be completely redesigned to be accessible only by experienced players (like how cost-prohibitive Places are), or they need to be integrated as a much more common feature of the game. In fact, before reading this post, I had forgotten that mercs existed in this game.
But this isn't a forum thread about redesigning mercs: I'm sure you forum regulars are bracing yourself against the impending forum thread I'm going to make about how to fix mercs. I'll honestly use this self-awareness to let it slide and let someone else make the thread if the state of mercs bothers them too--I'm not going to make a thread about it, only participate if someone else does.
Again, thank you jiriku, and if you write up a couple more impressions for the first weeks go by, I know a lot of us will continue to be interested in the perception of a new player. We all are invested into seeing the game develop successfully.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 03:40 AM
By: jiriku
Content:
On the subject of mercenaries, I find Caroline to be EXTREMELY helpful (I've had her from about levels 3-6). When wandering around the map and getting lost (which I managed to do quite frequently since I am mapless), Caroline's HUGE riposte damage and 2-pt. regeneration allowed me to fight several monsters sequentially without getting worn down,. That was good because I was far from any source of healing and my backpack was so full of quest-related crap that I couldn't carry half as many rations and medkits as I would have liked. Moreover, with Caroline, I didn't need medkits at all, so I could pack more rations and thus play for longer between each New Day. When she got killed, I immediately went to IC and hired her again, and the trip was roughly twice as hard without her as it had been when I had her help.
I'd also agree that a 1/5/all option would be useful. Now that I have a little more familiarity with the game, I'm picking up free grenades from the council hall and selling them every day at eBoy's, and the process of selling grenades and buying any rations I want could be made faster with that option.
If I could add another feature request to this thread, it would be nice as a newbie to be able to grab some kind of item that would point back to NewHome while I'm on the island map. Once, I got so lost that it took me three or four days of wandering to get back into familiar territory, and there were times when I was reduced to following shorelines and hoping to stumble across some terrain I recognized. And when the terrain is a series of colored squares, everything looks halfway familiar. A pointer telling me what direction home was in would have saved me some wandering (and, umm, a trip to the Failboat).
An item that extends your sight range to a 6x6 grid on the travel map would be pretty cool too.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 03:59 AM
By: dizzyizzy
Content:
Quote by: jiriku
If I could add another feature request to this thread, it would be nice as a newbie to be able to grab some kind of item that would point back to NewHome while I'm on the island map. Once, I got so lost that it took me three or four days of wandering to get back into familiar territory, and there were times when I was reduced to following shorelines and hoping to stumble across some terrain I recognized. And when the terrain is a series of colored squares, everything looks halfway familiar. A pointer telling me what direction home was in would have saved me some wandering (and, umm, a trip to the Failboat).
An item that extends your sight range to a 6x6 grid on the travel map would be pretty cool too.
There's a map! It's a little costly, but it'll stick with you forever. You can get it in the comms tent.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 04:04 AM
By: Temper
Content:
A tip for getting lost... Just hover the pointer over the map square at NewHome, and memorize the grid coords. Then, if you get lost, hover your mouse over the squares you're around, and use that as a way to get your bearings. I... never use maps anymore, myself.
Since the map goes by X,Y coordinate system, it works fairly well...
Although, to be honest, that might also be because I've been around for forever and a half, and have a lot of the map memorized. Also, you can buy a map of the Island in the Comms tent for... 2000 req?
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 05:01 AM
By: Matthew
Content:
Quote by: Awesome+FredYou get nearly no information really about how mercenaries work
True story: I didn't even know mercenaries existed until I stumbled upon them by accident.
Well after my 200th DK.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 05:37 AM
By: jiriku
Content:
I did notice the map for sale. Could not afford it. 
2000 req is pretty much out of reach for a level 1-3 character - which is the level range in which you're probably first getting out and about and exploring. I was imagining something cheap enough that you could reasonably pick it up at level 2. Or I suppose the map could be made cheaper, but exploring isn't really exploring if you have a map, eh? Some sort of nav-beacon would be a half-step between full-on mappy goodness and exploring with nothing more than courage/stupidity, a spork, and some frilly pink panties.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 06:01 AM
By: Awesome+Fred
Content:
The thing about the map is that it's a 1-time purchase, you'll never buy it again in all your playing. It actually used to be 10000 req instead of 2000. Most newbies don't use mercs...
Do they? O_o Huh.
...most newbies aren't intended to use mercs their very first DK, so save some money, fight slower, and grab your map! Being lost will never be a problem again after that.
Re: Recommendations from a new player
Posted on: September 22 2011 @ 04:32 PM
By: tehdave
Content:
Quote by: Awesome+FredThe thing about the map is that it's a 1-time purchase, you'll never buy it again in all your playing. It actually used to be 10000 req instead of 2000. Most newbies don't use mercs...
Do they? O_o Huh.
...most newbies aren't intended to use mercs their very first DK, so save some money, fight slower, and grab your map! Being lost will never be a problem again after that.
And once you've gotten slightly used to the map, you'll find yourself not needing it, and being able to recognize where you are just by the shape of things around you in the miniature display! (That is, if you're anything like me...I could almost go from NH to each other outpost blind, much less needing the Big Map...)
As far as Mercenaries? The real issue with them is cost and scaling. I haven't used a mercenary since...25 DKs maybe? And that was only to test out GRUNT. Early on they're incredibly helpful, but costly. As you get more powerful, I'm not sure that they actually scale with you. So I'll be sitting at ~600hp, getting hit for 40 or so on a normal hit, and healing for 2 from Caroline? Not worth it...even just two hearts beats that by such a wide margin it dwarfs the Grand Canyon...
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