Caves of Qud: He ain't heavy, he's my glover

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Caves of Qud: He ain't heavy, he's my glover

Zeerust: May 1, 2008; They must have guessed, once or twice - guessed and refused to believe - that everything, always, collectively, had been moving toward that purified shape latent in the sky, that shape of no surprise, no second chance, no return.

The only pets I've used extensively are Gloaming and Iopinax the Younger, but I've tried the others at least once. Gloaming is good as a way of learning secrets without trading rep or buying Trash Divining but doesn't contribute to combat. Iopinax is a great early-game meatshield for your character because he's basically indestructible and fights fairly well. Man Opener is good for non-Axe users since she can Cleave enemies, and Dismember if you're lucky.

The only pet I would actively avoid is either / or. Whenever you create a new entry in your character's history, one of them will undergo a random process which can lead to you getting items, an enemy or pool of random liquid spawning, or even a spacetime vortex appearing. It's a cool concept, but extremely random and rarely helpful; I've had quest chains break because one of them turned into a vortex that consumed the questgiver.

# ? Sep 27, 2020 17:29

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# ? Apr 25, 2024 15:48

packetmantis: Feb 26, 2013

A Strange Aeon posted:

Hmm, what's that guy's story? I never associated him with the time period of Saad, but I guess the technology could be very old.

There's mention of a sultan with the same name, and his description says something about his intense charisma and what he could have been if he wasn't a watervine farmer.

# ? Sep 27, 2020 18:04

Cantorsdust: Aug 10, 2008; Infinitely many points, but zero length.

packetmantis posted:

There's mention of a sultan with the same name, and his description says something about his intense charisma and what he could have been if he wasn't a watervine farmer.

But aren't all the sultans except Reseph randomly generated? There's no guarantee that there is a sultan named Mehmet in your game.

I had always just considered it a particularly well-made description of a minor character; I didn't think it had deeper lore implications than that.

# ? Sep 27, 2020 18:39

Inexplicable Humblebrag: Sep 20, 2003

finally did the tomb of the eaters content; fuckin' ace.

crypt ferrets can go gently caress themselves though. couldn't penetrate my AV so each time fighting one was like 20 turns of whiffing with a halberd before finally squishing them

# ? Sep 27, 2020 18:55

A Strange Aeon: Mar 26, 2010; You are now a slimy little toad; The Great Twist

Zeerust posted:

The only pets I've used extensively are Gloaming and Iopinax the Younger, but I've tried the others at least once. Gloaming is good as a way of learning secrets without trading rep or buying Trash Divining but doesn't contribute to combat. Iopinax is a great early-game meatshield for your character because he's basically indestructible and fights fairly well. Man Opener is good for non-Axe users since she can Cleave enemies, and Dismember if you're lucky.

The only pet I would actively avoid is either / or. Whenever you create a new entry in your character's history, one of them will undergo a random process which can lead to you getting items, an enemy or pool of random liquid spawning, or even a spacetime vortex appearing. It's a cool concept, but extremely random and rarely helpful; I've had quest chains break because one of them turned into a vortex that consumed the questgiver.

I really like that they aren't just like a monster you charmed but are actually unique and cool!

# ? Sep 27, 2020 21:24

Unormal: Nov 16, 2004; Mod sass? This evening?! But the cakes aren't ready! THE CAKES!; Fun Shoe

Jason and Caelyn do quite a lot of really nice and fun writing work for each of the pets, they each have a story and most have hilarious dialog.

# ? Sep 27, 2020 21:39

Zeerust: May 1, 2008; They must have guessed, once or twice - guessed and refused to believe - that everything, always, collectively, had been moving toward that purified shape latent in the sky, that shape of no surprise, no second chance, no return.

The real problem I have with either / or is that they can appear as random spawns within the world, e.g. as Mechanimist converts. Once you've met them they follow you forever, since they can't die and a new one spawns every screen if you lose them to chirality.

e: E-ROS is by far the funniest pet. "I LOVE YOU, EVEN IF "FLESH""

# ? Sep 27, 2020 21:39

Johnny Joestar: Oct 21, 2010; Don't shoot him?

...
...

i definitely want to be a patron sometime because the pets are absolutely a big incentive and seem to be a fun as hell reward for people compared to what most other games might do.

this is an old-rear end pull from the memory bank but it reminds me of kingdom of loathing and the familiars you could get that all did a bunch of really weird and neat things.

# ? Sep 27, 2020 22:40

Dachshundofdoom: Feb 14, 2013; Pillbug

Cantorsdust posted:

But aren't all the sultans except Reseph randomly generated? There's no guarantee that there is a sultan named Mehmet in your game.

I had always just considered it a particularly well-made description of a minor character; I didn't think it had deeper lore implications than that.

The book "Frivolous Lives, Vol. I" discusses a series of Qud's kings, starting with Abram who's mentioned as interacting with Resheph. So to be accurate, Mehmet wasn't the name of a sultan, it was the name of one of the post-sultanate kings.

It's always worth it to read yellow books if you haven't before, Qud's got fun lore and you can learn neat little details, like what the deal with Apple Farmer's Daughters is.

# ? Sep 27, 2020 22:45

Xand_Man: Mar 2, 2004; If what you say is true
Wutang might be dangerous

Dachshundofdoom posted:

like what the deal with Apple Farmer's Daughters is.

That books raises way more questions than it answers

# ? Sep 28, 2020 00:03

hand of luke: Oct 17, 2005; Mmmhmm, yes. I suppose I will attend your ball. Someone must class up the affair, musn't he?

The Mutation Overhaul patch is here! This update includes our biggest mutation rebalance ever, new elements of our RPG-style UI, and hundreds of other changes. Full notes: https://steamcommunity.com/games/333640/announcements/detail/2776989525405377948

# ? Sep 28, 2020 21:47

beer gas canister: Oct 30, 2007; shmups are da best come play some shmups they're cheap and good and you like them; Plaster Town Cop

WOW there some bangers in that changelog. physical mutation specialists seem far more powerful now.

# ? Sep 28, 2020 22:08

Post poste: Mar 29, 2010

hand of luke posted:

mutationRank*10% chance per round to regrow a missing limb. If this chance exceeds 100%, you cannot be decapitated.

Please tell me there's a special flavor text or achievement for decapitation failures via this

# ? Sep 28, 2020 23:22

Mithross: Apr 27, 2011; Intelligent and bright, they explored a world that was new and strange to them. They liked it, they thought - a whole world just for them! They were dimly aware that a God had created them, was watching them; they called out to him, thanking him in a chittering language, before running off.

Ok you win I'll play again. With all these mutation changes I'll be too busy screwing around as a chimera and dying to ever reach the current end of the game and get cliffhangered.

First up: Winged Regenerator Chimera. I'm just going to fly around and see what there is to see.

edit: First thing, accepted the quest from Mehmet, then performed a water ritual. Apparently the Girsh greatly admire him...

Mithross fucked around with this message at 23:44 on Sep 28, 2020

# ? Sep 28, 2020 23:35

Scaramouche: Mar 26, 2001; SPACE FACE! SPACE FACE!

I was all excited to see the mut changes and then realized I'd aready seen them because I'm on beta branch :I

# ? Sep 28, 2020 23:52

Mithross: Apr 27, 2011; Intelligent and bright, they explored a world that was new and strange to them. They liked it, they thought - a whole world just for them! They were dimly aware that a God had created them, was watching them; they called out to him, thanking him in a chittering language, before running off.

Scaramouche posted:

I was all excited to see the mut changes and then realized I'd aready seen them because I'm on beta branch :I

I considered hopping on beta branch to try them out but decided those were the sorts of changes I'd rather play once they were all done and finalized, not bit by bit.

# ? Sep 28, 2020 23:59

Snake Maze

Jul 13, 2016

3.85 Billion years ago

Having seen the explosion on the moon, the Devil comes to Venus

A controversial figure.

# ? Sep 30, 2020 02:27

Inexplicable Humblebrag: Sep 20, 2003

am i dumb or did i miss something in the description of miasmatic ash that indicates it does nearly a hundred hp damage per turn you spend in it?

i'm not hugely fussed because this character had completed the Tomb and i was just looking to eventually suicide them into the bottom of some ruins. it's just surprising

# ? Sep 30, 2020 22:58

Crimson Harvest: Jul 14, 2004; I'm a GENERAL, not some opera floozy!

Honestly I would never expect 'miasma' do to anything but cause nausea so I got my skin melted off.

# ? Sep 30, 2020 23:19

hand of luke: Oct 17, 2005; Mmmhmm, yes. I suppose I will attend your ball. Someone must class up the affair, musn't he?

201.45

Village quests no longer have the chance to ask you to find a location "with a parasang" of another location. Instead, they may ask you to find a location "next to" another location, in which case the two locations will be in adjacent maps.
Two-Headed no longer wakes you up from voluntary sleep.
You no longer see troll budding messages when you cannot see the troll.
Nerve Poppy is no longer called Numb on the character sheet.
Creatures without faces no longer get bloody noses.
Relic and extradimensional books now provide skill training on read.
While performing the water ritual, you're no longer offered to learn a skill's introductory power without being offered to learn the skill itself.
We made some changes to clonelings and clones.
- Clonelings now have a cap on how many creatures they can clone. If you're friendly with a cloneling, you can refresh their cloning capability by supplying a dram of cloning draught.
- Clonelings can now clone you.
- If a cloneling is in your party, you can now direct them to clone creatures.
- Clonelings in your party no longer wander around randomly.
- Clones created by clonelings are now worth half the base creature's XP rather than no XP.
- Clonelings now rarely cloning draught on death.
- Freshly grown clones are now uninjured.
We added new support to the prerelease input manager and fixed some bugs.
- Added a wait command.
- Accept now interacts with the selected object in the looker.
- Fixed interact nearby not working.
- Vendor actions in trade now work properly.
- Accept now interacts with the selected object in the looker
- Added Take All and Store Items keybinds for containers
Armor AV/DV averaging across body parts now rounds down.
Leather bracers have been singularized into a 1 AV single-arm slot "leather bracer".
Autoexplore now interacts with interesting objects before taking them. Example: you'll now read engraved items before taking them.
The attack nearest enemy command now counts enemies that are currently engulfing you.
The item picker dialog for spray bottles now shows any context for the listed items, like the body part they're equipped on, for example.
Lit torch tiles now display color variation in their flame part instead of their wood part.
Kindled flames and luminous motes now have tiles.
Reduced the number of novices of the sightless way that appear in various regions.
Panhumors now use their own correct tile instead of using the gelatinous frustrum tile.
Changed the appearance of putrescence to be distinguishable from slime.
Made some improvements to the behavior of pathfinding around potentially damaging gases.
Pathfinding now strenuously avoids aloe pyra and aloe volta.
You can no longer get unlimited data disks by repeatedly installing and uninstalling SkillSoft Tinker implants.
Made plurally gendered players correctly addressed in the second person in a number of contexts.
Made the popup to confirm switching a hotkey to a new ability show the old ability's display name, not its internal command name.
Improved ganglionic teleprojector's messaging when used on a square with no robots in it.
Fixed a bug that prevented Two-Headed's chance to remove negative mental status effects from working.
Fixed a bug where evil twins arrived without a popup message.
Fixed a bug that caused unpowered items with boot sequences to have their operational status treated as "booting" rather than unpowered.
Fixed a bug that disabled the floating text that appears when an item rusts.
Fixed some color formatting errors.
Fixed a formatting issue in the level descriptions of Sleep Gas Generation and Corrosive Gas Generation.
Fixed some typos in Sleep Gas Generation and Spontaneous Combustion.
Fixed a rare exception during world generation.

# ? Oct 3, 2020 03:22

Xand_Man: Mar 2, 2004; If what you say is true
Wutang might be dangerous

hand of luke posted:

201.45

Village quests no longer have the chance to ask you to find a location "with a parasang" of another location. Instead, they may ask you to find a location "next to" another location, in which case the two locations will be in adjacent maps.

# ? Oct 3, 2020 04:07

Revins: Nov 2, 2007; tune the FM in to static and pretend that its the sea

Xand_Man posted:

# ? Oct 3, 2020 04:35

Zeerust: May 1, 2008; They must have guessed, once or twice - guessed and refused to believe - that everything, always, collectively, had been moving toward that purified shape latent in the sky, that shape of no surprise, no second chance, no return.

Can Clonelings still clone creatures that are in nullphase? I remember getting some serious grief in Bethesda Susa from having two or three hostile Gloaming clones following me around, unable to attack but stopping me from performing automated tasks or resting.

# ? Oct 3, 2020 08:15

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

Ah man, had my first run in with a creature with freezing powers. Went around a corner, froze me, couldn't get unfrozen before it bit me to death. Had absolutely nothing on me that would reverse freezing which is a bugger.

Rip lvl22 Gun Tinker man

# ? Oct 3, 2020 15:34

chaos5023: Oct 3, 2020; non curo. si metrum non habet, non est poema

_jink posted:

a really smart middle ground (from a stalker mod i played recently) is earnable lives. removes the lame feeling one-taps, like taking a blind corner into a group of espers 30 hours in, while preserving the essential roguelike "well it looks like i've gotten myself into a very bad situation" scenarios.

big potential design space to make it interesting & thematic as well. do you regenerate in place? instantly? do you get temporary immunity? how are the lives earned? etc. maybe if you die you turn into a wretched little slug, and can attempt to wriggle away. just throwing out ideas here people.

I have a design in my head for a thing where you could find Eater cloning vaults and (maybe with some delicate security compromises) use them. Give the pod a dram of cloning draught and a tissue sample, it grows a nice clone for you and keeps it in suspended animation. Then when you die, boom, you wake up in the vault, with however much gear you left behind for yourself. The basic version would be braintaping-based, so your character would reset to the checkpoint of whenever you most recently visited the vault, with some upgrade path to over-air updates.

The usual workflow for these things is that I spend dozens of hours developing them on speculation, then Jason hates them and I release them as a mod. So that's something to look forward to.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 00:19

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

Making it so regeneration gives you a chance to "die" and then wake up 24 hours later missing a random selection of your gear might be entertaining.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 10:10

So Math: Jan 8, 2013; Ghostly Clothier

Drone_Fragger posted:

Making it so regeneration gives you a chance to "die" and then wake up 24 hours later missing a random selection of your limbs might be entertaining.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 13:02

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

limbs missing less of a chance if you have regeneration though, you still want to be punished for dying and being a fuckup.

Also, my latest character seems to be doing well:

THE ARMLORD:

Multiple arms, triple jointed, double muscled, night vision, enhanced quickness, mental mirror, irritable genome. Take either short blades and go for an insane dodge build relying on short blades "double offhand attack" gimmick, along with rejoinder to turn dodging into DPS, or take axes and max strength and go for a fairly standard berserk multi axe-arm build. In either case, get rifles and abuse that high agl to shoot idiots for a billion damage before you whirlwind them to death.

Irritable genome doesn't really hurt you on this setup because you're going to be wanting to spread your points out anyway over time, and you're not likely to want to buy anything new.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 14:25

Tempora Mutantur: Feb 22, 2005

alright I've been using this for a while after the mutations rework in beta a bit ago; it's a mutant build that lets you get tinker 2 while still being extremely combat viable. basically, aside from esper powers, this build and its variants let you explore Qud, have a ton of skillpoints, makes some very hard quests much easier, and basically be able to play with all the non-esper toys short of Tinker-3 gear (and if you live long enough you'll get enough stats to pick up Tinker 3 anyway).

bbkmmmmkcdbebtb1b2b5cn

The general points for playing or tweaking the build:

Wings are super legit now. You get excellent overland travel (speed boost + reduction to chance to get lost), permanent outdoor flight once the mutation is level 6, and it trivializes two major quests Golgotha and Rainbow Wood as well as making it very easy to level up outdoors early with even just a basic bow and arrow (fly around and shoot though explosives, ranged, and other flyers can still pose threats). On top of that, its bonus to Sprint speed, Jump distance, and Charge distance all work while underground.
DM and TJ are there for sheer stats, though if you go cudgels, you'll stun a lot more with the daze from DM. The daze in general is nice anyway, but mostly icing. This build used to have more str and less agi (starting with 20 in each) since it allowed you to reach 29 str and/or 29 agi by 24 with spending only a single attribute point in either, but I rebuilt it with more agi to focus on my core playstyle of ranged + long blades (the original idea was to be able to use whatever weapons were found but I just love long blade disarm too drat much).
Starting with 18 int means that if you spend 2 attribute points, you can have Tinker-2 by 18; if you wait till 24, you only have to spend 1 point. If you kept this stat spread as-is, you can use the remaining points to reach 29 str for axe/cudgel builds, otherwise I just dump the extra points into toughness.
Beak and Thick Fur are basically flex points. I like Snake Oiler and have the skillpoints to spare, so starting with 16 ego + 1 from beak means you can get Snake Oiler at level 12 the earliest. Mutant night vision is kind of crap compared to floating glowspheres or a higher-level helmet with the laterned mod though it's still a very nice QoL tool early.
Regen is the next most replaceable part of this build; it's there for QoL. You don't need to care about diseases or fungal growths whatsoever once Regen is level 5. Between Regen, Beak, and Thick Fur, you basically have 6 flex points of mutations (2 if you don't want to deal with Irritable Genome but it's really not a big deal imo).
The really high agility means that you're not missing with ranged weapons very often. Even with the carbine/sparbine nerfs, they're still great till you get something better. They still kill crags and palms within a mag or two, for instance.
More of a general thing than specific to this build: I highly recommend starting in the Wayfaring village because you can often get enough rep from the warden + the locals to have it before you leave, and killing even just some glowpads (if you don't cheese it harder than that) means you can avoid getting lost early. At level 3, if you put that point into int (for 19 total) you can get Jungle Wayfaring, immediately go to Kyakyakua, get cooking from the mayor, and 150+ bullets from Yurl (along with a ton of water there).

# ? Oct 4, 2020 21:04

Elbo: Oct 9, 2012

Oh wait wings give sprint speed and charge distance now? That's nuts. Gonna try out that build next time I play.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 21:29

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

ha HA! not this time Qud! I've been carrying around this waterskin of asphalt for like 15 levels and this time it saved my goddamn rear end when some unique with a freeze ray tried to freeze me again.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 22:11

verbal enema: May 23, 2009; onlymarfans.com

Drone_Fragger posted:

ha HA! not this time Qud! I've been carrying around this waterskin of asphalt for like 15 levels and this time it saved my goddamn rear end when some unique with a freeze ray tried to freeze me again.

wait what

# ? Oct 4, 2020 22:11

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

verbal enema posted:

wait what

if you drink Asphalt, it does like 20 dmg to you, BUT it sets you on fire. You can drink while frozen so you can use it to escape being frozen as a last-ditch attempt (the first ditch attempt is not to get frozen in the first place).

# ? Oct 4, 2020 22:25

Inexplicable Humblebrag: Sep 20, 2003

paupers blaze injector

# ? Oct 4, 2020 23:22

Helical Nightmares: Apr 30, 2009

Drone_Fragger posted:

if you drink Asphalt, it does like 20 dmg to you, BUT it sets you on fire.

Goddamn I love Qud stories.

# ? Oct 4, 2020 23:29

BaconCopter: Feb 13, 2008

Drone_Fragger posted:

if you drink Asphalt, it does like 20 dmg to you, BUT it sets you on fire. You can drink while frozen so you can use it to escape being frozen as a last-ditch attempt (the first ditch attempt is not to get frozen in the first place).

You can dilute the asphalt with other liquids to drastically lower the damage you take while still having it's thawing properties!

# ? Oct 5, 2020 07:07

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

BaconCopter posted:

You can dilute the asphalt with other liquids to drastically lower the damage you take while still having it's thawing properties!

Ah uh, interesting, will make some dilute asphalt and carry that around instead.

Also I uh, raided a historical site with the armlord and after dodging, shanking and rejoindering my way though barkbiter hell I have ended up with like 3 biodynamic cells, an eigenrifle and a bunch of armlets. The eigenrifle seems fairly strong. Also can confirm that multiple arms with short blades is kinda nuts, that �doubled offhand attack� chance applies to your multiple arms as well so you�re kinda reliably hitting for 2.25 attacks per turn without any investment in dual wield.

# ? Oct 5, 2020 08:35

beer gas canister: Oct 30, 2007; shmups are da best come play some shmups they're cheap and good and you like them; Plaster Town Cop

BaconCopter posted:

You can dilute the asphalt with other liquids to drastically lower the damage you take while still having it's thawing properties!

# ? Oct 5, 2020 15:40

Angry Diplomat: Nov 7, 2009; Winner of the TSR Memorial Award for Excellence In Grogging

If you want to see some really horrifying damage output, dip into tinkering and slap Flaming and/or Freezing on all of your knives.

The Eigenrifle is really good. It's kinda no-frills - no burst fire, just a point-and-shoot rifle - but its damage and penetration are quite solid and its shots can pierce multiple enemies. It's definitely a lucky find. I seem to recall it eating energy relatively fast but if you have three biodynamic cells you should be fine; it's not like blood is hard to come by :v:

# ? Oct 5, 2020 15:44

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# ? Apr 25, 2024 15:48

Drone_Fragger: May 9, 2007

Angry Diplomat posted:

If you want to see some really horrifying damage output, dip into tinkering and slap Flaming and/or Freezing on all of your knives.

The Eigenrifle is really good. It's kinda no-frills - no burst fire, just a point-and-shoot rifle - but its damage and penetration are quite solid and its shots can pierce multiple enemies. It's definitely a lucky find. I seem to recall it eating energy relatively fast but if you have three biodynamic cells you should be fine; it's not like blood is hard to come by

Ooh, that�s a good shout, I�ve got tinkering 2 so no problem on that. I already made my eigenrifle mastercrafted so it can do the nice crits. I might try electrified knives since that�s the mod I�ve already got learned.

Genuinely I think going triple jointed and double muscle is so strong right now, gives you absolutely insane attribute flexibility although means you�re maybe not as flashy as an Esper. Hitting things for 9 pen with 4 knives really adds up quick.

# ? Oct 5, 2020 16:45

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