Caverns of Chaos

Got Jim Darkmagic at level 8 Nightmare Node, noticed he only has 21 HP, less than other Human Wizards in CoC. Is he the exact same as the Jim from the prebuilt decks?

 

some thoughts / feedback on the AI monster now infesting the Caverns:

Let me start out by saying I love seeing the cake slices on a map. Who doesn't love cake??

Now, those orc assassins are very aptly named. Three of them absolutely slaughtered the hapless vampire priest / human warrior / bald human priest party I had on level 3. Given the vagaries of randomly selected maps and the against-the-swarm nature of the Caverns, it can be downright impossible to keep yourself positioned to avoid the deadly backstabs. When you do manage to get as assassin pinned down so that it can't keep leaping away, they love to show up with a bloody job application in their hand. I expect that parties with terrain attachments, AoE attacks, or some lucky purging burst draws would fare better against the assassins, and there are certainly maps where they can't go leaping about like frogs. Overall, I would rank them as on par with trolls in terms of NOPE.

I have seen the gravestones, but wasn't able to get the AI to cooperate and let me kill one before I got pummeled to death by some trees and oozes. As long as they don't have the "all die this round or they respawn" mechanic on them the caverns, they are a welcome addition.

I saw a negative energy being thing just long enough to realize it was there with trolls and two other pairs of really nasty monsters on level 1, so I immediately aborted instead of grinding out a protracted loss. I expect roulette will be more help than hindrance in CoC, and negative energy being will be tough for some parties and a cakewalk for others.

I haven't seen any of the traps yet, and am hoping to never meet that boulder and it's 50-damage attack in a dark alley.

 

The tombstones won't respawn, and also aren't worth victory points. You don't need to kill them to beat the map but you do need to not be killed by them.

Hehehe

The guillotine traps aren't in CoC. The others... well. Hehehe.

 

I have had a rather unfortunate encounter with Rockfall Traps paired with team moving enemies and a map that forced my party to stick to a cramped area, but I'd hate to think what would happen if I came across the Big Bad Boulder.

And it sounds like Death Elementals appear as well? That's going to be interesting without purges, let alone without priests. I'm hoping they're not worth any victory points but knowing CoC that's not likely.

Now we just need to find the one and only Legendary Wedding Guest, Tony from Sales, in CoC.

 

Despite @Flaxative's enjoyment of making everyone nervous... the boulder can't take damage (in general). Therefore from a design perspective it can only be put on maps that have victory points otherwise Boulder = auto loss. But since all the maps for CoC are randomly generated other than the first and last, which have no victory points, there's no way based on the current CoC design to put the Boulder on VP maps. Therefore, one must conclude that the Boulder is not in CoC. QED.

Now based on my own post I'm inspired to kill the Boulder... off to the quarry to crush rocks to dust in my bare hands.

 

I'm not sure if I'd rule the boulder out just yet, Servants, Gravestones, Slices and Roaches all give no victory stars so you can win the map without killing them, so if the boulder similarly gives out no stars then it could still appear without making the map unwinnable. That does make me curious whether the boulder gives out any victory stars when crushed, and who's going to be the lucky person to find out. It's certainly not going to be me!

Also might I advise bringing Doom? Hm, now I'm tempted to test that myself.

 

It does not. So perhaps you're right.

Spoiler: Melvin shows Gary how it's done

 

Rolling Boulder can only appear on the last map, and has a low chance of doing so. And yeah, not worth victory points. You just gotta avoid it.

 

Is it the "Boss?" Or is it in addition to the the boss?!

 

Just came across the boulder yesterday on the last map. He was in addition to the the boss. And if you get any savage curse on your priest then I suggest that you get rid of his armor by cursing him and him only. 50 or 54 damage at least the armor is gone. And maybe you need to sacrifice one of your character for getting rid of that armor. Other than that I have no idea of how to win against him on the last map.

 

Acid Geisha!!

 

But all we got was 1 volcano and 8 mass frenzy for every turn and a odd savage curse every 3 turns or so. Not joking.

 

Sincerely, don't get why change the again CoC. Before AI, CoC was changed to improve his gameplay. Now, on my game experience, there are other changes in the Cave apart from new monsters. The amount of enemies have been increased (even in the early modules), more maps than before (something good on paper), general difficulty feels increased.

First release of CoC had weak characters overall, that's why some were improved. Some remained weak (Fire Elf Wizzard, Prehistoric Human wizzard). With the new release, weak charts are just too weak. Before you just need to deal with it, carried by the good ones, but now the good ones have problems.

And about the no starts enemies, yes Roaches and servants are doable. They have 5 hp, if they are a problem you can go for them, instead of avoid them. Also their damage isn't that big. But the new ones... With some maps you can't simply avoid them. Especially when ranged enemies hide behind this no starts guys.

It will interesting, to see a graphic about CoC success before and after AI. Don't know, 100 runs test.

 

None of those changes have been made. Monster numbers should be the same on average (there's always been a range, and that range hasn't changed). There definitely aren't any new maps.

 

Maybe I'm just salty, and before AI my rng was just really good. But, i need to say I play CoC a lot.

 

The thing is, running into death elementals is just not fun. They appeared 4 times so far (past lvl 1) and I lost 3 times without the slightest chance. I got them down 1 time, but doom killed my characters before they could kill the other enemies...

I think they are not per se unkillable, but they have way too many negative energy in their deck. In addition, doom is a killer in CoC, because the fights are quite long due to low damage player decks. I never got a purge in my encounters nor enough attachment to overwrite doom.

 

The devs should lower the spawn chance on them.

 

I once played against Death Elementals without a priest and it was fun enough.
Ok, I admit, I could smokebomb the elementals in the beginning, the other ennemies were mostly men-at-arms and sparklers (so 10hp, guess what does 10 damage), plus there were victory squares.
But it was fun

 

WOO-HOO!

Finally did it, thanks to @DupleX who helped and coached me (he was hosting and was the voice of wisdom). First time I made it to the final level and first time to beat it.

The closest situation was on level 9, where I managed to kill both of DupleX's chars and was dashing around with my elf wizard with 4 HP remaining against one Flying Monkey and two Arcane Sprites. Thanks to stupid AI and Healing Dashes / Force Field and DupleX's cheers, I managed to play hide and seek and finish it.

Lvl 10 was against Grendel, Troll King / Mind Flenser / Flying Monkeys x3 / Gnome Inciter with Chartwell, Human Priest (skeleton) & Glasod.

Spoiler: Final CoC loot

Evasion, Crown Of Chaos & Xander's Mail