Desolate Desert

[Vryl]

I was away on vacation this past week, and one of the stops was a zoo. They had a desert dome there, and that got me thinking - why couldn't we have an underground desert? Scorpions would be a good way to work in a little extra poison... especially if they had an associated item on the grounds that their venom could be collected after they died. It would also tie in well with the planned Egyptian-type floor that would allow werejackals!

[Jake]

Yes, and you've nailed the name . I think we touched on the Egyptian-style tomb being a possible Dwelling/Catacomb route, to fall opposite the undead in the Study/Catacomb path. The Desert clearly ties in with that, but before we go further, I'd like to figure out exactly how. I felt like Dwelling + Catacomb = Egyptian mummies might be a bit of a stretch without something else to get us there, and ThirdAnguis suggested scorpions. I think scorpions are a great option, and they definitely go with the desert, and I could see a desert floor leading to other cool things (efreet, dervishes, sand worms, maybe some nomadic assassin-types), but now I'm wondering how we get the floor path to desert in a natural way.

Some possibilities (and feel free to share others):
-Dwelling + Catacomb = Egyptian tomb without Desert, instead becoming one of the possible paths to Desert (and we can have other routes later).
-Similar to the above, we could add a couple of other floors that have a vaguely Arabic feel, like a Bazaar or assassins guild with the right styling, and any one of these could lead to the Desert.
-We add an alternative version of the Lupine Lair that converts it to a sandy cave, hosting jackals (maybe also a Camp alternative that hosts desert raiders?). This excludes "foresty" floors that extend from the Lair, but adds "deserty" floors, like the Desolate Desert.
-The Desert is simply an option that comes after the Lair/Camp. I guess both floors could be imagined to be in a desert--they are just caves after all. My complaint with this option is that I don't want to add too many floors that are not combinations of previous floors (already, there are a couple of floors that I later plan to give a second prerequisite).

If we go a route where a jackal minion is offered, then that floor will obviously become the source of werejackals instead of the tomb.

Any other desert-oriented ideas?

[Vryl]

One other possibility would be Lair plus Portal, which you can look at a couple of different ways: either the naturally hellish heat from the portal helps provide the desert, or the portal leads to other places. The latter could be useful for other odd floors, for instance if you want to bring in a hydra from Greek mythology or ice giants from the Norse. The obvious down side is that Lair + Portal = Kindled Kennels already.

I think that the bazaar/assassin guild sounds good. Perhaps a Byzantine Bazaar (various definitions, but the one I'm thinking of would be "characterized by elaborate scheming and intrigue, especially for the gaining of political power or favor") that requires the Shady Shop/Furtive Fence would work, then require the Lupine Lair to work in beast... though if you did that then people would need Lair and Grotto for the Desert plus Dwelling and Catacomb to go from that to mummies, and that could be a little too restrictive. Your call, of course - maybe you want a handful of extremely powerful but hard to reach floors.

On a side note, if you haven't come up with a good name for your Egyptian mummy floor, how about Tumbled Tomb?

[Jake]

The more I think about it, the more I think I should go with another array of "first tier" floors, but ones that don't become available until a minimum floor count or perhaps until you collect specific artifacts. These floors would become the core desert, jungle, swamp, ice, volcano, etc. floor hubs that combine with the 10 core paths to achieve greater variety.

They wouldn't have any other floor dependencies, other than possibly that minimum floor count, so maybe you have to build five floors before you can build one of these hubs. Maybe, instead, each requires a unique artifact be held in order to build them, and only one such artifact is ever in-play at a time, so you have to choose between these floors, but you'll be able to place the artifact of your choice into a legacy slot, if you prefer one of these hubs over the other. I would make these relatively common artifacts, though, so that players are always likely to find one per game.

I feel like I've been stretching to reach these kind of floors, and maybe I could get to a lot of them with the Portal (especially the volcano), but that would preclude combining the Workshop with these floors, and it also kind of discourages us from combining demons with some of these, because their floor is already part of the build path to something that isn't demonic. I think something like the artifact method would help keep these floors from adding to the initial swarm of floor options, and turn them into another strategic decision that players can make based on their preferences.

Despite what I kept saying up there, I don't think I actually want to use "Tomb," because that word is in the name of the game/place you're building . I think maybe the noun will be "chamber" or "sepulcher."

[Vryl]

Flavor Floors sound fun. Maybe you could set them up to require five first-tier floors to be built, so players will have to decide if unlocking them by building low-tier floors is better than trying to rush for, for example, putting the Looming Lunarium on a fairly high floor to get the werecritter early in the night.

It might be better to start a new thread to ask people to submit ideas for those, but offhand I think that a Frigid Freezer with killer penguins and/or snowmen skilled at ranged combat but unable to leave the floor would be amusing for a basic ice floor. Maybe you could have a Vocal Volcano that works as a trap, coughing up lava, semi-molten rock or maybe clouds of choking ash.

Fair enough on the tomb - I wasn't sure you'd want a tomb within a tomb, but I thought I'd mention it in case it was a worthwhile idea.

[ThirdAnguis]

offhand I think that a Frigid Freezer with killer penguins and/or snowmen skilled at ranged combat but unable to leave the floor would be amusing for a basic ice floor.

I'm a bigger fan of "Dreary Drifts," myself. Also, instead of "Desolate Desert" might I suggest "Desolate Dunes"? It's still an endless expanse of sand, but one of them limits you to just the desert while the other can also be a branch off into oceanic-themed stuff. Similarly, maybe link Fire and Earth by having a mountain room of some variety as their base, then have one branch off into caverns and tunnels while the other delves into a volcano. I like the idea of path splits -- that way even if you find artifact A, you're not just stuck with path A; there's a choice between A and B.

[Jake]

I was planning a Freezer floor as an extension of the Abattoir, as a meat freezer that expands flesh capacity. That may not be suited to snowmen or penguins, unless they are demonic (animated snowmen sound like they may be better justified as "constructs" or "golems" from either the Workshop or Study--they would be a fun addition, though . Regardless, this could still be the result of one of these "flavor floors."

Now I am thinking about not limiting the number of these artifacts in play, and instead relying on the idea that holding them is a trade-off: do you want a greater array of floors or a greater arsenal of items? In order to really balance this trade-off, though, I think we will limit the frequency with which these floors can be built, and this is how I think I'd like to do that in a straightforward, reasonable manner:

I will add depth milestones. I was already planning to have different layers to the surrounding dirt as you go deeper, as a visual cue for how far you've progressed in the game, but what if I mark each transition with glowing "milestones" that unlock (and light up) when your dungeon passes them (that is, when the Sanctum reaches that level). We'll display the number of milestones you've unlocked on the HUD, and some floors, like these "Flavor Floors" or the "Rest Stops" we've discussed elsewhere, will cost a milestone to build. I think this system will keep these floor limitations much clearer than, "Oh, you can only build some of these every five floors or so," and make it easier to track how close you are to unlocking another one. This is something that deserves its own thread, if anyone would like to debate its merits in-depth .

If we allow more than one of these floors, then I'm not sure we need to worry quite so much about leveraging each Flavor Floor to offer multiple paths, but you're right that it makes sense to present floors that offer the greatest potential for variety. I think I prefer "Desolate Desert"; "Desolate Dunes" is definitely more flexible, but we may also end up with a general "water path" that has the seaside aspect covered. The Freezer, however, seems like an example of something that's too specific to be a core flavor floor; we are going to want things that are general and open-ended, and "Dreary Drifts" may fit the bill--but other suggestions are certainly welcome .

Any idea for alternative terms for "Flavor Floor," in case I need to use the term in-game? I'm thinking maybe I come up with a term for the specific artifacts that allow them ("relics," "fragments," "essences," "monuments"?) and basing the term for the floors upon that. I know at one point I was considering different temple-style hub floors for each element, and this concept can replace that with broader floors that are more flexible than just temples (and allow for temples as combinations with other things).

[ThirdAnguis]

Any idea for alternative terms for "Flavor Floor," in case I need to use the term in-game?

Landmark Level? Restricted Realm? Milestone... Mezzanine? I dunno, I'm not feeling very synonymous right now.

[Vryl]

Seems like we're talking about introducing new climates or biomes to the tomb with these floors, so I'd kind of like to work one of those words into the name... can't really think of anything for climate at the moment, but Basic Biomes could work since they are forming the basis for later floors.

If you want a forest biome, Forbidding Forest would be a good name for it. Assuming that you aren't using 'forbidding' elsewhere.