Vryl wrote:...do your minions heal and/or recover defense when they aren't fighting?
Minions recover all defense between encounters (so if heroes keep joining the fight, your defenses will not have a chance to replenish--it only restores when the floor is clear), but not health. Heroes, however, only recover defenses when they reach an elevator.
Vryl wrote:If not, injured minions could spend some down time between waves to meditate in one or another shrine to recuperate. It might add a little more complexity than you'd care for, with people having to balance providing enough different shrines or other resting places against having rooms with units they want, but it would be nice to have a way to heal instead of replace expensive cannon fodder and especially champions without having to hope that you find a potion each time you need one. Of course, if need be you could script it so that every minion can rest in the room it was hired from.
The idea of having floors that bestow effects upon your minions is worth considering, but some effects are more troublesome than others. If a floor heals your minions, when does it do the healing? Do all minions who aren't in active combat always receive full health while they are on the floor? I'd almost prefer a sort of anti-trap-style thing ("blessing"? that term is uncharacteristic, but something like that) where passing allies activate an effect that you previously prepared, just because it's more consistent with existing mechanics. Offering healing by floor could also be a little frustrating, because health is a bonus that lasts beyond that floor, so players would feel encouraged to direct their minions through that floor repeatedly, but they don't have that direct control.
On the other hand, latent effects--like a bonus to fire damage while on the fire temple floor--would just be a simple tweak for battles on that floor. There's no bonus to pushing minions through that floor to carry an advantage to other floors like with the healing.
We'll see other means of healing units, beyond single-use health potions, though. There'll be some triggered items (say an artifact that partially heals any unit that avenges an ally--killing a character that just killed an ally) and of course minion abilities (like a cleric's heal ability).
On the topic of the Belfry itself, I mentioned in the stream last week that I think I'll make an entire themed set out of the cathedral-esque floors, where this would be one part of a four-piece collection of rooms, including the main cathedral floor, an undercroft, a cloister, and this belfry; I think at least two of those floors will offer alternatives based on the Sinful Study/Dark Dwelling build paths. I don't know that I'll give the same "room set" treatment to other temples, but I do expect elemental temples to be a good stepping stone toward other element-based minions.
by Vryl » Wed Aug 27, 2014 12:08 pm 