Zorbus

[getter77]

I like the Ascension mechanic's direction---probably the first project that comes to mind in ages that is trying to leverage such in an interesting way since Triangle Wizard and whatever madness Wouter has cooking on the sequel now.   

[Joonas]

Release 17

• Pressing F now targets/cycles creatures that are not yet at hostility level high enough to attack the player but not friendly either.
• Option not to render the screen on every step when continuously walking / autopiloting / autoexploring. The default option is not to render. The game feels a lot snappier this way.
• Pathfind / autoexplore shows dots marking the path that the player took. Green dots if the target was reached and red dots if the autopilot was interrupted (hostile creature seen, trap / secret door detected).
• Option to exit lists (inventory etc.) with movement key up when the selector is at top position (not shown). Might be more convenient to browse containers, especially if there's nothing you want to get from the container.
• Settings-menu now has descriptions of the options.
• Obituary is more detailed. Shows the commands used count, creatures you damaged but someone else killed (damaged to 50% or lower of their health), latest log messages etc.
• New ingame art by Tony Forsman showing an adventurer standing before the portal to Zorbus.

[Troubler]

You mean this should be something like "tries to bash you with the hammer but misses"?

Yeah, something like that.

I came back after a break and played a character with a randomized ability start. I managed to get them pretty inflated.
It was considerably easier than the usual game, though the final-final boss and the secret final boss still held up to a degree.
With this character I was able to beat everyone in the end all on my own. I used a few clones on the secret bosses but they didn't matter much.
I had forgotten to try out poison weapons. I guess it just slipped my mind. Webs are a lot less annoying now that you can struggle out of them.

The new victory idea is interesting. I'll try leaving some guys down there next time.
The final-final boss and the secret final boss were harder in this version, though this character was a bit cheesy and managed them both.
I could still tell that they would be more difficult with a weaker character, particularly the secret final boss.
I was also lucky on top of everything else, finding two rings of resistances and a cloak of protection.

I didn't notice much this time around to take notes on, just one thing:
In the victory file the L is capitalized in cloning: "Cloned himself by drinking a Potion of CLoning"

(Release 17)
https://pastebin.com/raw/dBpdeQ8P

[Troubler]

Now here is something interesting.

I was playing again recently when I was stricken with a certain thought. Could the game be completed without killing anything at all?
Obviously it was not designed for it, but I could see it being theoretically possible. There are no necessary boss fights throughout the game.
The biggest problem is that enemies are fast and so you will quickly be overwhelmed and killed in no time at all with a low level character.
But there is one race which has an advantage here: Centaurs. These guys are incredibly fast and can keep pace with even endgame foes.
Further, the current stealth mechanics can be synergized with a fast character to make a lot of progress through the dungeon mostly unseen.
Centaurs start with a substantial stealth penalty at the start of the game, but a decent mind can bring the penalty back to zero.
With some phenomenal rolls during character creation and the lone wolf feat, this plan is made even more viable.

The only consistent issue is the gate at the end of the dungeon. You need knock to get in, and there is no viable build with a knock spell.
However, there is the possibility of finding a wand of knock in the store. So if you get lucky there, you can pull through the rest of the dungeon.
The second problem are the guardians to the teleporter after you enter the gates. I couldn't find a good solution to these, and was killed by them once.
A wand of summoning might give you a distraction, and a potion of holiness might save you from a blast, but really all you can do is cross your fingers and run for it.
I drank what few buffing potions I had and managed to slip past them and get into the teleporter, luckily avoiding the traps nearby.
And so after several attempts I pulled it off, the lowest level victory possible in Zorbus.

(Notes)
1.If you drink an elixir at level 1, and then die, it wont make a note of it in the abilities section of the obituary.
   It will make it out like you started with that extra point. Though it will still appear in the device uses.
2.The devices used section in the victory screen does not take into account how many times you used a wand of knock (probably because it's through a menu).

(Release 17)
https://pastebin.com/raw/3uJmMTvV

[Joonas]

That's just amazing.

Level 1 character, 15 health points and in 32 minutes to demigod ending. Bravo!

[Joonas]

Youtuber pieceoftheuniverse playing Zorbus release 13:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHhFKKyvmqo

Sadly he doesn't grasp how to switch weapons or how to use ranged weapons.

[Joonas]

Release 18   (02-Aug-2019)

This release is noticeably bigger than before (almost 170 megabytes) and the reason is...

• Sound effects! Roguelikes don't usually shine in this area but try this one out. The sounds really make the dungeon feel like a living thing. Most creatures have custom sounds and the speech bubbles work well with the sound effects. There are also some short ambient pieces playing when you for example discover a hidden treasure chamber or a tomb etc. Splatting those kobols and goblins is just so more satisfying with a proper sound effect.
  Hopefully the sounds work on all configurations. I could only test with Windows 10 on a real hardware. I tried with Windows 7 and Ubuntu with Wine in VirtualBox and sadly the sounds lagged there. Sound effects won't work on Windows XP.
  Sound effects are on by default and can be disabled from the settings.
• Online leaderboard. When you ascend, your character information is sent to a server and added to a leaderboard. Again, I'm hopeful that this works. At least it worked on all configurations (WinXP, Win7, Ubuntu Wine) when tested in VirtualBox. This option is on by default and can be disabled from the settings.
• The leaderboard can be accessed from the main menu, from the homepage or going directly to http://wins.zorbus.net.
• You can start the game with a randomly generated character. This option is added to the birth screen where you decide whether to make a new character or use a pregenerated one. You can press R when the menu selector is on the random character to roll a new one until satisfied and then press ENTER to start the game.
• When looting things you usually pick up stuff by pressing ENTER. You can now directly equip stuff from the loot screen by pressing CONTROL + ENTER on an item. Same rules apply as for normal equpping meaning that you can't equip armor if there are hostile creatures seen.
• Changed the key for switching inventory list type from F12 to CONTROL + TAB. Many probably haven't used this but with it you can switch between equipment/backpack-view and backpack/ground-view without exiting the inventory. F12 is now used to toggle item compare mode.
• You can now exchange items with your companions and edit their equipment. This is launched through the talking dialog by pressing CONTROL + direction towards the companion. If hostile creatures are seen then the options are not shown. The above mentioned inventory switch command is useful here as you can for example first give some items to a companion,  then switch the view and equip them without first exiting the inventory screen.
• Magical enchantments in armor and weapons no longer increase critical defense modifier / critical attack modifier.
• Settings menu updated with stuff related to sound effects and leaderboard. You can also set a default name for your character or change the text font / size. (Previously you had to manually edit Settings.txt to adjust these).
• Obituaries have some new statistics like the current pantheon before you entered the endgame and again after you have ascended. Now shows your starting abilities / skills as level 0. Wand of Knock usages are now listed.

[Joonas]

Release 19   (04-Aug-2019)

• Fixed a bug in calculating skill maximum values during level-ups: ability-modifier was not added. (skill maximum = level + ability-modifier)
• Sound effects are now compressed making the download and memory usage smaller.
• Manual updated.
• In-game help Zorbupedia can be opened from the game menu. It explains some of the statistics (health, stamina, ability scores etc.).

With the sound effects compressed, the download size is now under 30 megabytes.

[Troubler]

Got another victory in the new version. The leaderboard doesn't seem to work yet because it doesn't have it up, but the options said it would send it.
Anyway, it was a pretty standard run except for some weirdness at the very end.
The sound effects are great. They add a lot to the ambiance.
I'm also enjoying the ability to change the text as well.
Here are my notes.

(Notes)
1.If you have the everlasting arrow in your quiver, maybe it could prevent you from auto-picking
plain arrows that are of it's enchantment or lower? After that point they are obsolete.
2.Just a question. Is there ever a point in raising an ability score to an odd number?
3.This is the important bit. You can completely cheese all of the final bosses by turning out all the lights, and then
using ranged weapons to snipe them from the dark. They wont react at all and will just wait to be killed.

(Bugs)
1.While I was killing all of the final bosses using the above method, I found another strange bug.
I was putting everything into defeating the final-final boss from the dark, but then for some reason it became friendly.
And I couldn't finish it off due to the sheer tedium of going through the friendly confirmation. So I guess it wins this time.
2.The encumbrance notification on the left side of the screen sometimes does not update until you switch your weapon.

(Cosmetic)
3.Odd wording in the description for "improved ranged criticals" talent
"You get a +4 modifier when determined whether you score a critical hit."

(Release 19)
https://pastebin.com/raw/ML678356

[Joonas]

The upload to leaderboard worked, it just isn't updated in realtime.

The leaderboard can be seen here (can also be launched from the game's main menu):
http://wins.zorbus.net

It's nice to see the leaderboard opened. Not so nice that the game still has exploits in the end game.

Everlasting arrow / disable auto-pick for equal/lower enchantment:
Yes, have to add this. In some cases you might want to hoard ammunition for current / future companions.

No point of raising an ability score just to an odd number unless you have a +1 item for that ability.

[Joonas]

1.While I was killing all of the final bosses using the above method, I found another strange bug.
I was putting everything into defeating the final-final boss from the dark, but then for some reason it became friendly.
And I couldn't finish it off due to the sheer tedium of going through the friendly confirmation. So I guess it wins this time.

Classic variable overflow: Creature's emotion (hate/love) against other creature is stored in a 16 bit signed integer. Negative values are hate and if it goes below -32768 the value wraps to positive and hate becomes love. Fixed.

2.The encumbrance notification on the left side of the screen sometimes does not update until you switch your weapon.

Couldn't reproduce/fix this yet. Let me know if you manage to narrow down the situation when this happens.

(Release 19)
https://pastebin.com/raw/ML678356

By looking at the commands you've used:
- Fire ranged                             1468
- Ranged / reach attack marked target        8
you haven't used the [R] command almost at all but mostly fired with [F].

Release 20

• Fixed some endgame related bugs.
• If you have an everlasting arrow/bullet equipped, ammunition of equal or lower enchantment won't be autopicked.
• Inventory: You can adjust the amount of a selected item by 10 with CONTROL + movement key left/right. You can adjust the amount of a selected item by 50 with ALT + movement key left/right.
• Summoning animation is now repeated 2 times instead of 3, making it a bit faster.

[Joonas]

Release 21

• Leaderboard now has a section for non-winning characters of at least experience level 2. Only the highest level character per player and per game release gets added to this list.  This option is on by default and can be changed from the settings.
• Removed weight from coins and ammunition.
• Small stealth / visibility tweaks.
• Small AI tweaks.
• Max range of ranged attacks set to 10. Max range of talents set to 8.
• Shopkeepers can no longer be lured with items from their shop area.

I hope that last one fixes this:

2.Once a shopkeeper just walked out of his shop, I noticed his items were no longer for sale. Not sure what made him do this. It happened again with a recent character when I was luring a quaist into the bar to be killed.

Some tips to new players:

• Don't try to kill everything! Bears, lions, tigers and other big animals are deadly for low-level characters.
• Instead of the dumb brute try the "intelligent warrior"-type by having a Mind-score of at least 12 or even 14. You get more skill- and talent-points per level. Humans get extra points at 1st level.

http://www.zorbus.net

Leaderboard at http://wins.zorbus.net

Some behind-the-screens screenshots at http://www.zorbus.net/bts/

[Joonas]

Release 22   (25-Aug-2019)

• Player and recruitable creatures get full Health- and Stamina-points at experience level 2. After that the points are randomly rolled.
• Player gets 50% of the XP from creatures killed by companions (recruited / animated / summoned). Was previously 20%.
• New playable races: aasimar, half-troll, saurial, tiefling.
• Some small changes to the old playable races.
• The log shows a line "xxx comes into view" when you see a creature type for the first time. Also shows the creature's name / type over the tile for 5 rounds.
• Fixed a bug where some tamed creatures might get hostile against neutral creatures.

Someone already got the ultimate overgod ending:
http://wins.zorbus.net

[Asin]

Greetings, Joonas. Your recent update has gotten me thinking... Are there plans to add more races to Zorbus? Or do we have all we need for quite some time?

[getter77]

Saurial is definitely a deep and juicy cut on the racial gains---nice.     Keep delving deeply!