TOPIC: Reviews and feedback

quip wrote:

Arcanist Kolixela wrote: At the very least have DMs willing to avoid push damage if someone with the solution privately tells them the solution and lets the room play. That's what my Viper room DM did and it worked great.

I think that's a great idea. It allows players who know the answer to relax and encourage players new to the puzzle, and potentially enhance their experience rather than detract from it.

The early push damage can lead to what we've seen for complaints in posts from newer players of "veterans solved the puzzle quickly, and I felt like I wasn't part of the team".

Also, if you're doing a run with friends because you have enjoyed running with them in the past, and it's their first time doing the run, (and you've solved it on a prior run)it's much more fun to let them solve the puzzle rather than have the urgency of "We know the puzzle. We have to solve it NOW to avoid early push damage." Likewise, it avoids the players who have solved the puzzle on a previous run from resenting having players doing the puzzle for the first time.

I would love to see this be the official way to handle it. It allows the best experience for all involved.

Personally I'm not a fan of the push damage change. If the change stays PLEASE find a proper valid reason for the periodic damage that's thematically appropriate to the room. Otherwise it feels misplaced and shitty

Drakku wrote: I worked Zephyr Puzzle Thursday night and Friday, Saturday, and Sunday mornings.

1/I'm sorry to hear that so many veteran players were doing this, I know things like that can really ruin someones experience.

2/I was totally in one of your Friday Morning groups and thank you! You were fantastic, I think you were actually my favorite part of the dungeon because I like when I get a consistent story and having us go through rooms together really added to that for me!

Deaterrae wrote:

Doug Smidebush wrote: I loved the last Viper room, and the amazing animatronic, but we ended up winning the room right at the buzzer. What happened? Did we find the dwarves? What's up the drow -- I only saw her for a second because I was sliding, and then helping another party member with spell choices.

I ended up being a little liberal with the script, but essentially what I said as the Drow in Combat Viper was:

(to the priest - if still alive) "You . . . you caused this when you sold us those dwarves! It brought them [the party] here! Now, I will finish this!"

My action of throwing myself into the pit completes the ritual the priest was incanting when the party entered the room, causing the beloved Vipron to rise up and devour the party. At least, that was always my character's intention.

If the party killed the priest before the correct timing of the Drow's entrance, the script changed slightly, since the Vipron has already risen after the priest threw his/her dying corpse into the pit. The Drow still jumped - maybe a second sacrifice might make Vipron even stronger for the imperative death and destruction.

You might get the impression that the Drow has something going on that she'd rather you not disturb. Apparently, we all must play next year to find out.

Thank you! That helps clear up a lot. I thought the Drow jumped in the pit, but again, I wasn't really sure. With all of the madness of the combat, it's sometimes hard to hear everything.

I did a combat run with a few random experienced players who had been through the puzzles before (as had I). Issue was we had 4 brand new players as well. I thought we had a good plan: let the people who hadn't done the puzzles before figure it out on their own but we can help with some clues if we don't think they are making good progress (especially in treasure rooms).

Unfortunately I felt like some of the other experienced players gave away way too much of the puzzles way too soon. Of course it is all a matter of perspective but I thought it might have negatively impacted the experience of the newbies.

On the whole I thought TD was great this year. I did two normal runs, both combat.

Zephyr:
Although we were combat, there were a lot of (in my opinion difficult) puzzles. Some were for treasure, which was frustrating. We managed to not get a single one in time, although we were on the right track. We were very close in room 1 (the light table with "power cells"), but the so-called clue in the rogue's box threw us severely off track. [Something about each block that connects directly to a cell must have a straight line down the middle, which didn't exist.]

I also am curious to see the solution to the puzzle part of the last room. Our DMs couldn't even get the gauges to turn green.

Although we beat the shielded monster, we nearly failed from the group in front of us being allowed to go over by 4 minutes. 1/3 of our time was gone...hard mode!

Viper:
This was one of the best adventures we've done. Great puzzles, great effects, great animatronics. Bad time to forget a scroll of Chain Lightning.

My only complaint with Viper was the epilogue staff. The lady doing the tokens insisted that the HoP gives you a grand total of 6 pulls (for three stamps). "But 3 times 3 is 9". "No, six".
"Three pulls per one... three + three + three...". "Six", she insisted, "I have a flow chart".
We shrugged and went with it.

Fiddy wrote: - Room 2 (snake guardians) - combat was nice and simple. In one of my runs got to see an assassination on the first slide which was cool, but then there was not much to look at in the room.

Heh, that was me, as Fiddy well knows.

Our genius group decided that the Rogue Assassin (yay RoSP) was the closest thing we had to an evil character, so I got the honor of bowing before the "Obviously Going To Bite Your Face Off" snake statues.

So I got bit. Then I taught that snake a lesson in what happens when you piss off an Assassin.

Nimble wrote: Our genius group decided that the Rogue Assassin (yay RoSP) was the closest thing we had to an evil character, so I got the honor of bowing before the "Obviously Going To Bite Your Face Off" snake statues.

What was the answer to that room, we tried a Rogue as well.

Angela Melzak wrote:

Nimble wrote: Our genius group decided that the Rogue Assassin (yay RoSP) was the closest thing we had to an evil character, so I got the honor of bowing before the "Obviously Going To Bite Your Face Off" snake statues.

What was the answer to that room, we tried a Rogue as well.

The answer was "put the person with the highest HP on their knees." Because someone's getting bitten.

Nimble wrote:

Angela Melzak wrote:

Nimble wrote: Our genius group decided that the Rogue Assassin (yay RoSP) was the closest thing we had to an evil character, so I got the honor of bowing before the "Obviously Going To Bite Your Face Off" snake statues.

What was the answer to that room, we tried a Rogue as well.

The answer was "put the person with the highest HP on their knees." Because someone's getting bitten.

We sacrificed our Dwarf Fighter, then I punched the snake to death.

Angela Melzak wrote:

Nimble wrote: Our genius group decided that the Rogue Assassin (yay RoSP) was the closest thing we had to an evil character, so I got the honor of bowing before the "Obviously Going To Bite Your Face Off" snake statues.

What was the answer to that room, we tried a Rogue as well.

The answer was to kill it. It was a combat room from the word go. You just had to trigger the combat.

I thought we had a pretty good solution to it (and so did the DM, apparently). The druid polymorphed into a viper before bowing. The bewilderment of the guardian won us initiative.

A belt of retrieval, oil of the tinkerer, and a nat 20 from a +2 great club of bashing brought it to a quick end

My last group pretty much refused to bow to the snakes. Instead the druid cast detect poison. Then he cast Neutralize Poison, that was enough for the DM to start combat and no one got bit.