First impressions thread

Early on, those acid spells are almost nonexistant. You're right though, it's great once you start seeing more gear with discard/acid spells. (Level 12+). But the first 10 levels are basically a "keep repeating until you luck out on rolls". Which, in tabletop is great, but in a video game? I dunno if the same applicable mechanics make sense.

And yeah, I would recommend the same strategy to anyone else dealing with trogs. (I remember having a heck of a time with them but I managed.) But I stand by my suggestion that armor shouldn't block magic. Otherwise, what's the point of shimmering aura cards and the countless others that play off that?

But overall you are absolutely correct. But my opinion stands.

 

Game gets way harder at around lvl 7 (trogs).

I spend more gold reviving than buying stuff from shops.

Currently stuck at Tomb of Tvericus last battle. Where you get 3x lvl 10 skellys, like 6 zombies and a huge guy that carries 14 damage slash cards.

Feel like unless I get the hand of the century where I have boil armor for BOTH small and big skellys, manage to wipe them out with my multi chops before the shuffling zombies joins the fun.

Other than that. Having fun and stress at the same time.

 

Yes, it's known that the game gets harder at that point. It used to be that the game was THAT HARD from level 2 and up. The devs have since implemented changes to give you more of a tutorial: you get to understand "Armor" thanks to early Troglodyte levels, "Blocks" thanks to early Goblin and Human levels, and so on. Also, you are handed several very important toys: Golem Cleaver and Trogsbane (from the campaign) and Akon's Amulet (from the free multiplayer starter pack). If you need to get a power token first (i.e., reach level 7), then it's attained reasonably quickly by playing the level 6 adventures.

And so, at minimum, your Warrior has two out of three items for your build, and your Wizard has an AMAZING anti-Armor item. You said discard and Acid aren't too common: that's not true. Wavering Faith is a default on Priests, and requires only that you be careful with your hand. Glowing Bangle is a level 4 Common Arcane Item. Armorbane Pendant is a level 6 Common. Thus, each costs 5 gold in a store if available.

Yes, sure, you can always retort "well I have to draw those cards before I can use them," but of course the enemy also has to draw the cards you hate in order to use them on you. For a game dependent on random card draws like this, your task is to use whatever you have on hand to succeed in the dynamically-changing battle (e.g., you just drew Boiling Armor? Great! Now be sure the enemy DOES have Armor first, else you'll waste it).

We know that facing enemies who CAN completely wallop you can be frustrating, but you have to understand:

. . . that this is exactly how every videogame works. The enemies MUST BE STRONGER THAN YOU, because you have an advantage on the AI: you are capable of strategy. In this game, you're even capable of adaptive strategy: you can learn new stunts (like that whole "compelling enemies to back up" thing) and buy new in-game items. And, of course, come and ask on the forums for help.

Edit: Memory Loss is another relevant card. Though less ideal, anything that moves the enemy units can also be helpful (Telekinesis, Force Bolt), either to expose their back . . . or simply to stall and let you draw new cards. Again, some of these are quite common, and it's your challenge to use whatever you have on hand for your strategy on that particular round.

 

Wavering Faith! It comes as the default card in the divine item slot.

 

Thanks, you helped me realize I hadn't card-ified "Wavering Faith" in my previous post. Oops . . .

 

Although concentrating your fire is usually a good idea, there's often something to be said for zapping big slow guys with magic to soften them up before engaging, while meanwhile your melee characters work on the mini-threats. (And the big guys often can't get to you until most of the little ones are dead.)

 

This is a pretty fun game, I'll be sure to stick around when group pve is in.

 

Hi everyone. First post on this site.
A friend pointed me here and boy is this some serious awesome sauce.
The game itself is fantastic. Nice graphics, good texts and well balanced encounters.
I never played such a game with this quality. At the moment I have my team at lvl 8 without buying anything.
The quest for the Compass part 2 is the first one that I repeatedly can not pass. Was going good till then. I am accustomed to this kind of games.
The solders have way to many blocks, armor, extra cards from Alarm and I repeatedly keep getting cards that do not work out well despite trying to make the most of my equipment. No griping cause I love the challenge. Total URB !

Some people do have a point however that the more slots you get the more cards there are that you may not really want to have.
My first suggestion (will place it in the proper thread once I find it) would be to be able to disable equipment/ card slots.
Awkward is also that the multi-player cards get shared once you have acquired a deck there.
Sharing the items seams wrong and is not needed. Not by me at least.
Also in between battles inside a quest one can switch out items the hard way by dragging one from the inventory to the character but not the easy way when not inside a quest.
What is the deal behind that?

So then. Of to more fiend slaying and treasure liberations.

 

I'm at level 10 so I reckon that's as late as I can wait for first impressions. The true first impression I got was "this is brilliant" so much so I bought the basic pack right from the off. I'm going to have to put this out there because the things I love about it are subtle and hard to describe and the things I don't like are big and noticeable.

I'm loving the challenge of it, there's only been a couple of encounters that I've had to play twice and never anything I've had to play three times. I feel like I have the tools to deal with whatever challenges come my way, so long as I see them coming first. That's not to say it isn't occasionally frustrating, I do very much hate Trogs and Treemen and am still desperately looking for a good fire weapon but I have ways off working around it. I might have bounced right off it if I played in the Beta without some of those fixed cards (if I didn't have Akon's Amulet I'd probably end up crying.)

Thing is though that's with the Club reward, without it I'd either feel compelled to grind up for more items, which would run into timer issues or struggle along with insufficient resources. The game is really generous with what it gives away free but it's not entirely satisfying. Meanwhile paying for it seems a bit much for what it is, I don't really want to be paying $10 a month. Beyond which the existence of timers, the option to pay real money to continue and the sheer expense in either time or money of acquiring specific items makes the game feel compromised. I just wish it was a thing I could buy even if it does wear it's free to play colours less glaringly than most.

I also think it's a bit of a shame that the narrative is so light, I'm assuming it's either a parody or just recreation of the awful writing style of old RPG modules and the meta narrative is a lot more interesting but I find myself wishing it had more of a story.

 

You don't really have to pay, I think, so much as give up worrying about finding specific items. Whatever specific item you want, you probably have something almost as good with maybe a couple of weaker hits on it.

Once you complete the campaign, you can play the levels again with quests such as 'no deaths in the mission' for a guaranteed rare the first time you do each quest. Or you can start an all-dwarf party or whatever. So there is good longevity there, aided by the treasure hunts.

In MP you might be more concerned about getting the perfect items, but there is special loot for that.

 

It's not that you have to pay, so much as there isn't really an optimum experience at an appropriate price. The sweet spot seems to be to buy the initial pack and then do all the quests, all the challenges and a ton of multiplayer in that first month. Even so I don't like being pressured like that, I'd rather just be able to buy the game and play it at my own pace. Instead there's just this constant hand outstretched asking for $20 items that provide direct improvements in a competitive environment, $10 to get items at the normal rate and if you want alternate costumes they cost money too. Just because I'm not going to pay that kind of money or anything like it doesn't mean it's presence in the game isn't an annoyance.

It doesn't break the game, it's just not cool. When I heard about the game my reaction was "That sounds great, but, ugh, free to play." It's not AS bad as I thought, but if I want to recommend it there is the caveat, "Yes it's free to play, yes there's an energy system, yes it sells power."

 

While not a proper review or first impression, I posted this on the Day[9] forums to attract more people to the game.

Day[9] is a celebrity in the SC2 and eSports scene. He has a huge following, and whatever gets mentioned by him is bound to receive the attention of a whole lot of people.

Hopefully some guys on those forums will try out the game and get really hooked up with it, spreading the word further. If Day[9] decides to do a "Days Off" series (where he basically plays random games once a week) about CH, we basically hit bingo!

People following him are especially interested into competitive gaming, and since CH has a fairly solid competitive mode (and lots of untapped potential too), well, that's basically why I decided to post my overview there to begin with.

 

I would have at least proof-read it before posting it if I knew this

But hey! I just thought whatever helps with helping the game reach out to more people.

If I can get the chance to hand out a piece of advice: you guys should really try and find the time to update the Press page with up-to-date material. I had to use the outdated press-kit for my article (was too busy writing/editing for taking screencaps too), which is fine for a fan's article, but I guess media outlets might really be bothered by that.

Also, a new trailer might be a good idea too, even if it only shows random bits of gameplay + some text like the previous one.

Please don't take this as criticism. You guys are doing an awesome job and I can only imagine how tightly packed your working days are already.

 

Thanks Bandreus. To really get the game populated we do need the attention from big name-er like Day[9]. I do recall this video from TotalBiscuit (I'm pretty sure that's Jon btw ). I wish he could revisit the game again since that video was really early alpha and doesnt put the game in its best light (stuttering, crash and stuff).

 

Yes, I agree, though I'm not sure if TB is used to returning to games he already did a "WTF is" about. But yeah, if BM can get him to touch on the game again, that would be a sure way to get tons of traffic to the game. And hopefully at least some of those who try it out will stick around.

That being said, a number of internet celebrities could very well be asked to give the game some coverage (Northernlion and Force come to mind, but I'm likely forgetting about a ton more).

After all, CH received quite some press coverage in the last few months, so I'm pretty sure everyone but my mother would be more than happy to feature it on their channels, especially if they can snatch an interview with one of the devs over Skype to boost views or something.

 

Call me a hater if you want but I think Day[9] is a ******, that guy is a shallow ass.

On-topic, I was watching Ashley Burch play Spelunky yesterday on Twitch. She and her brother Anthony were talking about Card Hunter being one of the games to play right now. Anthony wrote Borderlands 2, while Ashley was the voice actress of Tiny Tina. In addition both are in the popular HAWP/Hey Ash Watcha' Playing series. I think they'd be another good gaming celeb bunch to approach.

 

Eh, I certainly don't see the Day[9] the same way, actually I like him a lot, but that's fine with me (we all have likes and dislikes).

What's really important though is the fact the guy is a very prominent figure in the eSports scene and has a huge following.

And yeah, agreed on Ashley. Basically anybody who has a decent following and/or is a respected and recognized authority in the VGing news scene could do, as long as it gets the game any additional amount of exposure.

 

Just to be crystal clear, don't just wait for the developers to do all the job on their own. Do whatever you can, only if a little thing, to help with spreading the word out.

If there's a guy you follow who hosts a videogames channel on YT/Twitch , definitely reach out. You don't even need to do anything special other than just pointing out how great Card Hunter is, how much you would like him to try the game out, give him a link, et voila. It really is as simple as that. It doesn't even matter much if he's an internet rockstar with millions of daily views or just an average Joe streaming himself as he plays (though the former would obviously be better ).

You'll be surprised how nice and welcoming these guys tend to be with their followers, so chances are anything you point them to they will at the very least look into, as long as you let your passion for the game show.

I mean, if you want to get more involved writing an article/review as I did, definitely do, maybe post something on your own blog/twitter/facebook. Maybe you like making videos? Do a CH montage and upload that to your YT. The possibilities are endless.

We as a community can do a lot to help CH grow by only putting a little bit free time and effort on the table.