Some suggestions for Boneyard

edited November 2017 in Solomon's Games
1) I think it would make sense if, in the character selection screen, you could toggle on and off the bosses for the round you are ABOUT to play, rather than being in the character selection screen counting as the start of a round. That would allow me to plan my perks and figure out which character I want to use, and THEN decide if I want to fight bosses or not. I feel like this would just make things a little easier, if it's even possible.

2) I think Bribe Destiny should be a togglable fate, similar to the bosses, for several reasons:
A) The initial unlock price is enormous, and took me a little while to actually unlock.
B) The purchase price per round is absurdly high for a perk that I might not even end up using, as I only use Bribe Destiny when, say, my mana management is down the drain, but Channel Mana and Battle Mage etc. are never showing up when I level up. Some rounds I may be just fine, and may bring along Bribe Destiny for no reason at all and waste either 750 or 1,500 gold.
C) Initially, in the old version of Solomon's Boneyard, I spent actual money to unlock Bribe Destiny, and now I feel kind of cheated. I still love the crap out of this game, but I feel like since I payed money to access this perk freely, I should have unlimited access to it here. I know it's probably one of the most OP perks, too, but I had gotten used to just having it around and not having to pay for it each round. I hope I don't sound too arrogant.

3) I think the extra perk slots should be permanent unlocks, as well. It's difficult enough to have to buy the perks that I need to advance far enough in the game to actually afford said perks every round as it is, but to spend a fair amount of gold every round to access what I would call a "fun" amount of perks gets kind of annoying. Especially since there's so much new stuff I want to try, but it's so expensive that I hardly have the resources to use them without going on an ad-watching binge spree every other round.

4) I know that this is something that you probably don't want to hear anymore of, but I would really, honestly, LOVE an option to disable the need to purchase the perks each round. The old Solomon's Boneyard was such a chill, relaxing game for me, because I didn't feel like I had to worry about messing up. If I had a short round and died within like 10 minutes, I could just say "Aw crap, that was dumb. Well, back in it I go." But with each round, I have to spend so much gold for the perks that I usually equipped in the old version in order to actually make any notable progress, that each round feels like such a massive financial investment for me, and it adds a whole new level of stress to the game that I don't particularly like. I feel like I'm managing a bank account while trying to earn enough funds each round to sustain my income so that I can afford the perks that I love to use. I would pay real money to have the ability to, at the very least, toggle this system off.

5) A sort of follow-up idea to my above comment: Another idea for a gold dump, since not having to pay for perks each round would, in turn, create quite the surplus of gold in people's pockets, would be exchanging gold for rings. Is that a viable idea? The prices would be up to you, but since people would have so much gold, they could possibly exchange 7,500 gold for a Magic Ring, 35,000 gold for a Rare Ring, and 75,000 gold for an Epic Ring. Those prices may be a little bit steep, but in all honesty, I really just want the relaxed enjoyment that I used to feel when playing Boneyard. I truly appreciate the effort you put into reworking the system, because for so many other games, it would work so well, but for this game, I feel like such a system is just out of place. It makes the preparation and playing of each round a little too stressful for me. I know that there's always the option to binge watch ads for gold, but I really don't like having to do that. I would definitely binge watch ads to for gold if I were to use that gold to buy some extra rings, but I really dislike having to binge watch ads just to afford my roundly perks.

6) The scavenger. I'm totally fine with paying gold to access the rings that I'm saving. 100%. However, I feel like the system for the scavenger is a little unstable. I'm seeing other people saying things about it, and I see that it's on your to-do list, so I won't say too much about it. 

I know I'm asking a lot, but I thought I'd just put my opinion out there. I still love the game and will keep on playing it because good lord it's just too much fun, but I dearly hope you consider my ideas/suggestions.

Comments

  • edited November 2017
    I definitely agree on C, I feel like that's a QoL upgrade and should be a permanent thing.

    I think bribe destiny should honestly be taken out of the game, but ONLY IF the game is balanced so you're not super screwed if certain skills don't show up.

    I don't like having to buy perks every round either, I liked the old style a lot more, but it's a design choice. Not our call to make.
  • When Keep got updated, anyone who had ever purchased IAPs in the past was compensated with a free ad removal. Did the same thing not happen here?

    Also, Bribe Destiny being far too expensive is kind of the point. It's an overpowered cheat that John regrets having ever added in the first place. So now you get punished for using it.
  • I’m not sure if anyone else got a free ad removal, but I still, gladly, paid 3.99 to kill the ads.
  • definitely agree 
    you have write down anything what i wanna say
  • While I wholeheartedly agree with 4 and 5, I don't think that's going to happen. It feels like an insidious way to make players spend more money by making it really hard for them to progress in a meaningful way. Having fun and just trying out new combinations is discouraged by the threat of losing a pretty massive amount of money that you'll have to grind pack, 1 coin at a time.

    It does extend the game's lifespan, it just does this by making it nearly impossible to reach endgame. Your magical ring idea would've been a much better way to go about it without making players like me feel like the game is trying to get as much cash out of you as possible.

    If you've bought any in-app purchase before this update you can write an email to the raptisoft support and they'll hook you up with an ad-kill code, I'd highly recommend doing that.
  • Yes, if you bought Bribe Destiny in the old version, the ads were turned off by default (that was the only non-consumable purchase in Boneyard).

    I'm looking into all the complaints and might be adding "Legacy Mode" into Boneyard in the next update.  But everyone should be aware that the initial perk price in Boneyard was a LOT higher-- some will be shocked at how much the original perks used to cost!  But I'm not immune to being complained at, so I'm looking into it.

    As for other changes-- SK and SB were only updated because Apple was about to kill everything off.  For true game-changing stuff, I intend to put it into SKHD.


  • When I first played the new update, I still got ads every level up, so I quickly and happily bought the kill the ads IAP, so I didn't know that there was a little bit of compensation for buying the Bribe Destiny beforehand. My mistake.

    A legacy mode sounds amazing, actually. I really feel like it's not my place to ask anything like this at this point, but would it still have the new stuff that was added in the revival update?

    And I'm sorry again about this whole post, I know it must be a pain. I suppose there just wasn't too many ways to phrase what I wanted to say without sounding like a spoiled, ungrateful customer. I hate being a thorn in peoples' sides, especially when they have our best interest at heart, and I do hate to complain. I greatly appreciate all of your effort and will keep playing and supporting your games no matter what ^u^
  • edited November 2017
    >A legacy mode sounds amazing, actually. I really feel like it's not my
    place to ask anything like this at this point, but would it still have
    the new stuff that was added in the revival update?

    Yep!  But actually, the "anti" side is so powerful that I might just go ahead and make the whole game like it was before.  There's definitely a "pro spending" side, but I will give them great satisfaction in SKHD, and put Boneyard back to its old mechanic.

    >And I'm sorry again about this whole post (etc)

    No, I read all feedback.  Sometimes things are impossible.  Sometimes other things would break secret game mechanics that only I actually know about.  But anything that's a good idea goes in.  Or will, in SKHD.
  • Wait, so you're considering reverting the game's economy to how it was before? That seems a bit extreme if you ask me. While I'd like to check out how it used be out of curiosity, I'm pretty sure I'll prefer the new way perks are handled. So I'd much rather have the option.
  • Well the old method was just that perks didn't cost money to re-use.  So once you unlocked them, they were unlocked forever.  This causes people to complain that there's nothing to do with gold at some point, but since the scavenger costs gold now, at least that's something.

    The chorus against the change is gigantic, though,  So I am probably going to revert it and see if I can't figure out an alternate gold-sink to add in.
  • Although I was a bit annoyed about the new perk system at first, I honestly kind of prefer it now, so if it wouldn't be too much trouble, i feel like it would be a good idea to have a setting in the options for "alternate perk pricing."
  • I don't mind the new perk system. Honestly, I find that if I take 100% gold and item drop I can easily make my gold back plus some extra - even during a short game.

    I like the idea of having a gold dump option. Buying rings is a cool idea but I think buying epic rings might be too much. Since they drop so rarely in game, being able to buy them would take some of the ridiculous excitement of actually getting an epic out of the game.

    Adding onto the idea of a gold dump, I think there are ways to offer players to use their gold however, I know that Raptisoft isn't planning on doing too much new content for this game since anything new will be added in SKHD. I would love to see wizard customisation. Spend gold to buy outfits, hats, hoods, staff models, etc. That could be an effective way to spend gold. Perhaps not indefinitely since there isn't an infinite amount of cosmetics that can be designed.

    Another option would be to add in 'cheats' that you pay for with large sums of gold that work for exactly one game. These 'cheats' since they would have a massive potential to break the game, would null your high score and would only be for fun. But maybe you pay 30k gold for infinite mana, or start the game at level 25, or start the game with an automatic 95% damage and magic resist. Another one could be you get every perk available from the peek list.

    Something like that I feel could add some spice to the late game after people have unlocked everything by changing things up (only occasionally since these cheats would be so expensive) and would give veteran users who, by this point thoroughly understand the game and its mechanics, to have some fun and mess around.

    What do you all think of this idea?
  • Well, the guy who sorts my e-mails for me is enduring endless abuse over the new perks system, so just to spare him it's time to retire the experiment.  Plus, I can only endure so many accusations that I am doing a cash grab (while at the same time being accused of not wanting people's money by not fixing the Android store crash, go figure :P).

    I'd be loathe to add "cheats" in to the game, so I'm not sure what I'm going to do at this point.  I will try to figure out a good gold-sink besides bribe destiny that remains viable for the life of the game, but honestly, I need to put this to bed so I can finish RwK and rest a bit before going on a long SKHD bender.


  • edited November 2017
    Something I have no idea of the difficulty of, but I would really enjoy, would be a (possibly unlockable for gold? Maybe you have to pay a scribe?) way to separate the high scores screen by character. I've always preferred Morth and had the most success with him, but as a result it is very difficult to compare my scores for other characters. For example, I could easily have my best run ever with Lucritius and have it not register among my high scores.

    Another idea for a gold sink, that I haven't really thought through the details of: You could let players create golden wreaths for graves which persist in between games, and which cost gold. After fully gilding the graveyard, something nice could happen/unlock... Although I suppose it might be hard to implement this in a clear way. Maybe a perk that enables gilding, with a warning on it.
  • Is there really anything that speaks against giving players the option between both systems? As long as you either make the old system the default option or ask players to choose the first time they launch the game, that should get rid of the complaints, shouldn't it?

    I really wouldn't want to see Boneyard forcefully reverted to how it used to be. The old approach to perks sounds a lot less interesting.
  • Hi there!

    The only thing more amazing than these games is that the developer actively interacts with the players on this forum... I love it :-) 

    Anyhoo, I agree with everyone saying that the new system is annoying. It encourages much less experimentation (trying different sets of perks), as people don't want to spend money on a set of perks that will potentially cause premature death and make them lose even more money. 

    I don't feel like it's a very good solution to the problem "people didn't know what to do with their gold". It's effectively making people pay for something that was free just so that they can spend their money on something they already could have for free before. It doesn't add anything to the game. I know that finding other ways to spend the money requires way more coding/thinking than this solution, but new features should always go in the direction of giving more possibilities to the players, not fewer!

    Here are some ideas for ways to spend gold:
    • Buying random rings of a given rarity (as suggested by others)
    • Making an offering to the god of wizardry, increasing the chance to have "miracles" at random moments during the next game (a crazy loot on a random monster, a heal when low on health, a wave transformed to a wave of basic skeletons, many ways to be creative here)
    • Add new perks to the game
    • Make the different boneyards actually different and interesting (atm it's only a different appearance and they are very much alike, it would be cool to have different settings, for example: one with narrow galleries, one with rivers that you can't easily cross, maybe different types of monsters on different boneyards), and charge gold for each boneyard, not just once.

    It's really a pity that Dark will never see the light (that was the worst pun of my life). I like its stuff/skill system a lot - I know you are working on KeepHD but I actually like the gameplay of boneyard/dark (waves of enemies in a confined location) much more than "some enemies scattered across rooms". 

    Keep up the good work!
  • Some more gold-spending ideas:
    • Fate to allow seeing how much shield (either from magic shield of from harden) you have left
    • Fate to allow seeing how much life enemies have left (little health bar on top of them)
    I don't know if you have any intention to keep updating boneyard now that keepHD is coming, but hey, ideas cost nothing :p
  • @gloomy, SKHD is intended to have a full scripting engine (not visual like Dark, but one that's actually more powerful for making total conversions).  I would fully expect that someone will put out a nice arena version-- and if I don't write it, I'll be actually able to play it without knowing what's coming next too!
  • Maybe jus put an option to buy a ring and the rarity is random, like a lootbox.
  • oh god no......why say that word?! lootbox ...... thats used to be such a nice exciting word when you'd find a chest in a game.
  • I didnt mean to actually put chest. I just suggest to make a shop to buy ring for a fixed price wherein the rarity of the ring is random, just like a lootbox. That will serve as the gold sink.
  • edited November 2017
    Lootbox... what a very “nice” term for gambling. I don’t think it is a smart move to add lootbox in a game these days cuz people are getting sick of games with lootboxes (thanks EA).There could be complaints about “few werks ago ads and now lootbox? You cashmongering jerk.”
  • Right now Raptisoft is working on implementing some "consumables" to be a gold sink. Keep the loot boxes far far away. He wouldn't go that low
  • The ring "lootbox" kinda already exists in that ring perk... though that won't fetch super-rares.
  • Jeez I didnt say to actually implement lootboxes, besides what would you even put inside it? Wizard skins? I'm just saying how the buying of a random rarity ring functions like a lootbox where the drop rate of magic ring is maybe 65%, rare ring is 30% and epic ring 5%, just an example.
  • I think you've maybe given me an idea, @jdfebiar.
  • About the ring or the wizard skins? Lol
  • Hi everyone, i posted this on one of my discussion and i wanted to know what did you all think about it.

    I have come with an idea about rings. There are many types of rings with diferent stats, sometimes is confusing when you look for a ring and you do not find it. So, my idea is: maybe all the rings of one same stat could be of one same form and then they could have a diferent shadow depending of their stat
    For example, all the bonus experience rings could be of one same shape. Then the 25% exp bonus could have blue shadow, 50% green shadow, 100% red shadow
    I hope i explained it good
  • I saw that... it's not a bad idea, but it's outside the scope of what I want to do with these games (originally I just wanted to port them, not sure when I started expanding, but it was maybe a bad idea).

    In SKHD I will make everything a lot clearer.
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