Devlog 2 - Unlocks and Modifiers!

Unlocks

While looking at feedback among both playtesters and those who play the demo, there are a few common themes that I see. As a roguelite (emphasis on the 't'), players should feel rewarded for playing the game, win or lose. They should have goals or reasons for playing beyond having fun, and I feel that I did not do well enough in that regard.

Previously, players could unlock cards by simply playing the game via experience and leveling up their class. I want to mention now, I did not remove this feature. Players will still unlock cards for their classes!

However, I asked myself, "why stop there?" So, it was decided that I should add ways to unlock items that you can play with in game. Let's take a look at some of them!

This picture showcases the new Unlocks menu. Here, you can see a large list of brand new Explorables that the player may purchase using a new in game currency, Platinum.

The plan is to allow players to unlock explorables, cards, and modifiers (more on those later). There is no restriction on the player, nor are they forced to purchase any of these upgrades! You can simply ignore them if you want, but they are there as a place to add content without overflowing the base game.

This adds a new way to customize the map to your liking. Players may choose which of these explorables will be found on the map. In other words, you can customize the map to synergize with your build.

New Currency - Platinum

Platinum is a new currency that players obtain through playing the game! Its sole purpose is to be used to purchase unlocks as shown above. You can gather Platinum in the following ways:

• Slaying bosses

• Purchasing it in shops

• Every 10 waves (higher difficulty yields more)

• Winning the game (higher difficulty yields more)

New Explorables

With this new Unlocks system, I obviously had to make things for you to unlock! I made 18 new explorables that players can unlock using Platinum!

Note: An explorable is a tower that is placed during the map generation. The player will find these towers as they explore, hence the name.

Here is a list of all of the new explorables you can unlock!

Abandoned House: Spend gold to fix the house! Gain gold every round or sell the house for a big sum.

Alchemy Table: Surround this to gain a random potion each round.

Bank: Surround this to increase damage modifier by 0.01 for every 1000 gold.

Beacon: Surround this to increase max health equal to 2x corruption.

Broken Catapult: Spend gold to fix it. Hurl boulders at enemies!

Broken Clock: Increase or decrease the final wave by 5. (More on that later)

Crate (and Pot): Place a tower to break this, giving you 3 (or 1) Modifier bonuses of choice.

Cursed Shrine: Surround this to increase damage modifier each time you gain a curse.

Cursed Skull: Surround this to increase elite spawn rate by 2%.

Cursed Statue: Surround this to increase mini boss spawns by 1.

Garden: Surround this to increase Luck by 25%.

Giant Latte: Spend gold to drink the latte, upgrading your Castle a ton.

Grindstone: Surrounding this gives a 10% chance to gain crit chance whenever you roll a die during a wave.

Pot of Gold: Surround this to gain 25% gold gain.

Runestone: Surround this to gain +2 max runes.

Shrine: Surround this to give Exhaust to all curses.

Strongbox: Surround this to give +10% to spawn an extra chest.

Modifiers

By now you probably read "damage modifier" or "crit chance." Let's discuss those here!

One large problem that I wanted to tackle was the feeling that each game "feels the same" (which as a developer is a very scary thing to hear). Modifiers are my first attempt at solving this problem.

Modifiers are multipliers that are added in calculations for a variety of features. An example, the damage modifier is added when towers deal damage to an enemy. When you upgrade the damage modifier, all towers will deal more damage.

You may get these Modifier bonuses when slaying a boss or breaking a crate/pot. Each time you would get a bonus, you choose between 3 random Modifiers to upgrade.

The picture below shows the player choosing between 3 modifiers to increase. Crit Damage, Fire Rate, and Gold Gain. Side note, notice how you can refresh these if you don't like the 3 choices!

Modifiers have rarities, as shown in the picture above. They are Common, Uncommon, Rare, and Epic. The higher the rarity, the stronger the bonus will be for said modifier.

I will admit that these modifiers are goofy, sometimes very game breaking, but they have also introduced a large variety of builds to work toward and new strategies to focus on. It has been very fun to watch 2x fire rate builds or a gold gain build with the bank explorable.

Shop Changes

A key feature in Runeforged: Monolith is the Shop, a place to spend your hard-earned gold from slaying monsters to purchase class cards. Players access the Shop after every 5 waves.

Within each Shop, there is a service that players may purchase. These services include:

• Card Removal: You can permanently remove cards from your deck.

• Card Upgrade: You can permanently reduce the cost of cards.

• Multiclassing: You can add another class to your run. All future chests and shops will contain cards of this class.

What's the change? Well, now there are two services per Shop! The first service will be one of the three from the list above. These will cycle over time.

The other service will be randomly selected from the list below:

• Devil's Choice: Choose a card in your collection. Flip a coin, call it. If called correctly, you make a copy of the card. Otherwise, you lose the card.

• Platinum Trade: Spend 500 gold. Gain 5 Platinum.

• Heal: Spend 500 gold. Heal 3.

• Dark Bargain: Take X damage. Gain gold per damage taken.

• RemovedCurse RemovalSpend gold to remove curses. The more curses removed, the more expensive the service will be.

• Modifier Increase: Buff all future modifier bonuses. Gain 1 Corruption (increase game difficulty).

New Enemy

Slimes! Everyone's favorite! But don't let this cute little squishy guy fool you. This gelatinous creature was literally designed to end your run when you enter endless mode!

This is my way to make endless mode feel stressful. The game should end. The longer endless mode lasts, the more slimes will spawn. Then, after 5 waves, you will meet... Mother Slime! A new boss that's only found in endless mode.

Slimes are tough, resistant to most damage, cannot be slowed, and will most likely defeat you in one shot (unless you have enough shield). They only spawn in endless mode.

This is a picture of the Slime Model

Class Updates

While I have nothing to show quite yet, I figured I would give a few design updates for the upcoming classes!

Rogue

The Rogue class is meant to have a high-risk high-reward playstyle. I want the player to experience that mentality as much as possible. Even something as small as drawing a card should have some form of risk. At the same time, I want to ensure that the Rogue class stays true to its fantasy of being a sneaky thief lurking in the shadows and deal large damage without being seen.

With that said, an upcoming new mechanic for the Rogue will be Stealth Checks. Cards with Stealth Check will require a die roll, specifically a d6. Getting a 5 or higher is considered a success. These cards will change what they do depending on the Stealth Check roll.

Overtime, the Rogue will be able to increase the odds of succeeding a Stealth Check through towers, various cards, and their signature ability which will provide them a +6 to their roll (essentially, they can guarantee to pass a Stealth Check).

Beyond Stealth Checks, Rogues will utilize dice for a lot of their damage. This means that Rogues will be a tad weak early, but scale heavily into the late game as they buff their dice rolls overtime.

Necromancer

The Necromancer is THE graveyard deck. For years, I have played various card games, and I can say without a doubt that graveyard decks are my personal favorite (I know I know judge me all you want).

There are a few large graveyard themes that I want to include. They are:

• Milling: Putting cards from your deck directly to your graveyard.

• Reanimation: Bringing cards back from the graveyard.

• Zombies/Undead: You are a necromancer so...this one is probably obvious.

Your graveyard will be a secondary hand. Cards that are in your graveyard will be able to be used, brought back, or bring some form of value to you.

Opposite of the Rogue's high-risk high-reward philosophy, the Necromancer will be focused on pure value from their graveyard shenanigans. Similar to the Warrior, the Necromancer will have access to Unit towers. You will raise zombies to fight your enemies.

That is all for now! Thank you all once again for testing the demo. Until next time!

Runeforged Monolith