Andor's Trail

Hi,

while playing Andor's Trail (AT) I noticed some very annoying features. I already played many other RPG games, like Golden Sun, Tales of... or Fire Emblem so I can say, that AT really has potential, but at the moment is is very annoying and frustrating to play.


Let' start with the good parts:
- No ads.
- No ingame purchases.
- Works without internet.
- Really nice story and great quests! This is the fun part of the game!

The minor problems:
- No music, no sound. OK, I play my own music, while I play.
- Incomplete game. Also OK.

And now the annoying things:
- Fights are mostly random. If you lose, just reload a save game and try again. Perhaps you win the fight this time.
- No skills are required to fight an enemy. Just tap like an idiot on your touchscreen and win or lose the fight.
- Enemies are re-spawning to often. I kill an enemy, I see a sea of blood and in the next moment the same enemy spawns again and attacks me. Happens very often, but not always.
- Effects by the enemy can be stacked (like Corrosive Slime), but healing items like meat can't be stacked. Either both should be stacked or none should be stacked to be more fair.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm The minor problems:
- No music,

That's a major plus factor for me, (although it can usually be turned off).

Thanks for sharing, a fresh perspective is good to hear once in a while.

Reloading: This can be considered cheating, but you don't have to do it if you think it is wrong. You have the option. Some argue to allow it, the trade-off being that is very annoying to do every time you eat raw meat or die fighting.
Fights: We have discussed implementing fighting stances for more strategic combat. Look it up.
Respawn: I believe almost all players are fine with the current respawn time. Sudden respawns keeps you on edge. Knowing exactly when an enemy will respawn will be boring b/c you can avoid it too easily.
Effects: Look at real life, nature can kill you much faster than you can heal yourself...

Hello BelaMagla, and welcome to the forums.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm - No music, no sound. OK, I play my own music, while I play.

That has been considered, but there are a couple of problems. One is that it potentially increases the size of the game a lot, and we have a strong desire to keep the game playable on very old devices (because for many people in the World, that's all they've got). The second is that we don't own the rights to any music.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm - Incomplete game. Also OK.

We are working on it . Everyone just volunteers time for it though, and we all have real lives, so it's a slow process.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm - Fights are mostly random. If you lose, just reload a save game and try again. Perhaps you win the fight this time.
- No skills are required to fight an enemy. Just tap like an idiot on your touchscreen and win or lose the fight.

I'll address both of these at once, since they seem (to me) to be saying the same thing. If you choose to walk up to a monster and just bash it until one of you is dead, what you say is true. You don't have to fight that way though. You can choose to flee (and then presumably heal, and give it another go), or use an item such as a potion. What skills did you have in mind?

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm- Enemies are re-spawning to often. I kill an enemy, I see a sea of blood and in the next moment the same enemy spawns again and attacks me. Happens very often, but not always.

It may seem like it's happening often, but it's not. A monster has a 1% chance of spawning every 0.5 seconds. That means there's about a 50% chance of it respawning in 35 seconds. If you leave an area for 3 minutes, or rest in a bed, all monsters respawn.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm- Effects by the enemy can be stacked (like Corrosive Slime), but healing items like meat can't be stacked. Either both should be stacked or none should be stacked to be more fair.

Life is not fair
It's true that no positive effects stack (yet). However, the only bad effects from monsters that stack are Bleeding wounds, Irdegh poison, Corrosive slime, and Minor sting. Of those Corrosive slime is very nasty, because you lose AP as well as HP. Fortunately, it's only in one cave

Yes, save on success and reload on fail is unfair, but the game is also unfair. AT is the first game, where killed enemies respawn instantly. No problem if they repawn after several seconds, but please not instantly.
I can't tell you what is wrong with the game, but it seems that with the current situation the difficulty is a little bit to hard. I can't remember that I had to save and reload so often in any other RPG game.

rijackson741 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 6:50 pm What skills did you have in mind?

I don't know. Other RPG I played uses several characters or magic. But both of them does not fit very well to AT.

rijackson741 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 6:50 pm It may seem like it's happening often, but it's not. A monster has a 1% chance of spawning every 0.5 seconds. That means there's about a 50% chance of it respawning in 35 seconds. If you leave an area for 3 minutes, or rest in a bed, all monsters respawn.

That sounds good. Perhaps there is something wrong the the probability, since enemies and myself have very often a critical hit, even if this should happen only with a change of 10% for example.

rijackson741 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 6:50 pm Life is not fair
It's true that no positive effects stack (yet). However, the only bad effects from monsters that stack are Bleeding wounds, Irdegh poison, Corrosive slime, and Minor sting. Of those Corrosive slime is very nasty, because you lose AP as well as HP. Fortunately, it's only in one cave

That's ok, I already finished the slime cave.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 7:07 pm I can't tell you what is wrong with the game, but it seems that with the current situation the difficulty is a little bit to hard. I can't remember that I had to save and reload so often in any other RPG game.

It is a hard game. Part of the problem is that there are not enough mid level quests to build XP. We are working on that for the next release.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 7:23 pm

rijackson741 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 6:50 pm What skills did you have in mind?

I don't know. Other RPG I played uses several characters or magic. But both of them does not fit very well to AT.

Magic has been ruled out. I agree that several characters would not fit with AT. As Voom says, we have discussed implementing fighting stances.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 7:23 pm

rijackson741 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 6:50 pm It may seem like it's happening often, but it's not. A monster has a 1% chance of spawning every 0.5 seconds. That means there's about a 50% chance of it respawning in 35 seconds. If you leave an area for 3 minutes, or rest in a bed, all monsters respawn.

That sounds good. Perhaps there is something wrong the the probability, since enemies and myself have very often a critical hit, even if this should happen only with a change of 10% for example.

I think it's more a question of perception. You notice the one time it happens, you don't notice the 9 times it doesn't.

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 7:23 pm I can't tell you what is wrong with the game, but it seems that with the current situation the difficulty is a little bit to hard.

One rather obvious question, that I forgot to ask, is what level are you?

Schmmiiirc wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 3:17 pm

BelaMagla wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 1:41 pm The minor problems:
- No music,

That's a major plus factor for me, (although it can usually be turned off).

I agree 1000%

rijackson741 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 16, 2017 10:57 pm One rather obvious question, that I forgot to ask, is what level are you?

Level 35. I currently do the Lost Potion quest. I was able to fight all enemies without big problems (let's ignore the instant respawn of some of my "friends"). Now some blue ghosts in a cave are hard as hell. It seems that there is no way to kill them with my current stats.

You must mean the Hirathil. They are extremely hard. They have a very high damage resistance, and are immune to critical hits. Those caves are the hardest thing in the game. I did them closer to level 45 than 35. At level 35 I'm actually quite impressed you even got to them . My advice is to back out of there, and complete everything else in the game before returning.

What are your current stats?

My guess is that the "instant respawn" woes you mention were getting to where you are now. Most monsters just wander aimlessly around their spawn area, until you get next to them or bump into them. Not all do though. The dung flies, for example, protect their spawn area, and will move to attack you as soon as you step into it. So it probably seems like they are respawning next to you more often that they actually are. There are others, for example the Hirathil that you are now having trouble with, that will protect others, so if you attack one, they all come for you.