Alright, guys. Despite a several hundred mile move and first-time home ownership, alongside a host of other major life changes, I managed to put together what I think is a very cool 3 month update for Caverns of Xaskazien II. Before I get into all the new stuff, though, I want to throw a shout out to some players from the Caverns of Xaskazien Discord channel, who not only provided a lot of useful bug reports, but also some incredible ideas for ways to improve the game. Yard, Monkooky, Gokudera ElPsyCongroo and yaynitz, thank you for the feedback, much of which has been incorporated here! (And if I missed anyone, I apologize! There were a lot of messages to scroll back through!)
You can download the game (or just the latest patch, if you need it) here:
https://virtua-sinner.itch.io/caverns-of-xaskazien-iiHere’s what’s new (Once again divided into a couple posts cuz it's too long):
Major Improvements:- New game concept: Scrolls can now sometimes be reusable - the higher your Runic Lore skill, the greater the chance that a Scroll survives usage. This was done to make Scrolls more useful and Runic Lore more worthwhile to spend Skill Points on.
- New game concept: Prayers can now sometimes be reusable - the higher your Piety skill, the greater the chance that a Prayer survives usage. This was done to make Prayers more useful and Piety more worthwhile to spend Skill Points on.
- Re-instated Class: Spearman.
- New Perks: Spear Fishing, Hold at Bay, Javelineer, Pin Enemy, Spear Maintenance, Probe the Ground, Receive Charge.
- New Map Tiles: Manacled Prisoner, Silver Web, Corpse Filled Pit, Corpse Filled Pit Trap, Pit with Animal Carcass, Pit Trap with Animal Carcass, Frigid Water Filled Pit, Frigid Water Filled Pit Trap, Icy Bottomed Pit, Icy Bottomed Pit Trap, Dwarven Temple.
- New Spells: Cremation (Cantrip), Solidify Spirit, Feeblemind, Pyrotechnics (Monsters can cast, too).
- New Event: Refreshing Rain.
- New Monster Variant: Mad-Dancing Satyr.
- Redid High Score screen to better fit imagery and themes of the current game.
- Redid graphic for Brute to make it fit better with the current aesthetic.
Minor Improvements:- Changed effect of Brevalia Day to instead grant you Regeneration for 10 turns. This was done both because its effect felt underwhelming for a holiday, and because I wanted to use its old effect for the new Refreshing Rain event.
- Rarely, large open bodies of Water, Lava or Acid may now have Stalagmites rising from within them. This will never block passage, but should add some interesting aesthetics and occasional tactical choices.
- Cause Disease spell will now automatically cause a random Disease rather than having only an 85% chance, to make the spell more worthwhile. This applies to the monster cast version, as well.
- On the Map screen, Known Pit Traps of all types will now be visually distinct from Open Pits of all types.
- In the standard view, Stone Golem Assembly Tables and Steel Ant Assembly Tables will now be visually distinct from Homunculus Assembly Tables.
- Unpowered Golem Assembly Tables of any type will now have a separate graphic from their powered variant, in addition to having the lighting effect change they always had.
- Non-flying NPCs and monsters of at least Standard Intelligence are now 83.33% less likely to wander onto Mine Tracks, to help keep them safer from errant Mine Carts.
- Potion of Fire Breath has been changed in the way it works. It used to give a 75% chance to cause 75 to 150 Heat damage to the monster in your square but a 25% chance of killing you outright. It now causes Heat damage equal to between 25% and 50% of your Max Health, with a 90% chance of causing that damage to the monster in your square and a 10% chance of causing it to you instead. This should make the potion a lot more survivable if you drink it unwittingly, and still keep it a useful tool against enemies.
- Updated manual to make it clear that monsters, regardless of intelligence, cannot see Friendly Traps and will not take specific efforts to avoid them.
- Included a new Loading Screen tip to the same effect, as well as several other new Loading Screen tips.
- Also updated manual to include the info on the new rules surrounding Scrolls and Prayers.
- Soldiers no longer start with a Tomato and Bandage but instead with a Wooden Buckler, to better compliment their starting skill of Blocking.
- Using Holy Water against an Undead or Diabolic monster is now considered a Good act.
- Using Unholy Water against a Person or Animal is now considered an Evil act.
- Updated queries of Desperation spell, Desperation Spellbook, Staff of Desperation and Desperation Scroll to make clear that the spell will have no effect on Xaskazien.
- Expanded the Damning Prophecy event text slightly to make clearer the psychological damage the prophecy wreaks.
- Successfully charming a monster with the Recruit Goblinoid perk, Animal Friends perk, Demonic Control perk, Gather Minions perk, Friend of Nature perk or with a Diadem of Rulership will now scroll the word “Charm” above your character.
- Unsuccessfully charming a monster with the Recruit Goblinoid perk, Animal Friends perk, Demonic Control perk, Gather Minions perk, Friend of Nature perk or with a Diadem of Rulership will now scroll the words “Charm” and “Fail” above your character, and with Text Prompts set to Basic, will also inform you textually in the Bottom Bar.
- Sleeping monsters can no longer break free from shackles.
- Changed query of Magic Sensitive/Magic Seeking/Magic Finding jewellery from “+X% chance found armaments are Magic” to “+X% chance found Weapons and Armour are Magic” to keep the effect clearer.
- Expanded description of Mirrors to elaborate on what Doppelgangers are, so you can make an informed decision if you don’t know.
- Open Bottomless Pits will now play the Lair sound effect, keyed to distance, to help players realize they’re upcoming and not blindly stumble into them.
- All Undead are no longer just “Immune to Smoke Inhalation” but “Immune to Inhalant Gases” meaning they won’t be harmed by such squares, and should freely enter such squares without hesitation.
- Made all Glyphs two-toned to stand out a little better and just to look more attractive.
- Rafts, Row Boats, Dragon Boats, Mine Carts and Gnomish Bores should now be visible on the mini-map, provided you have line of sight to them, with faded graphics representing if they’re broken.
- Cult Temple will now be visually distinct from the normal Temple on the mini-map since the Temple is such an important square.
- Listed Miracles in the Religion Tab will now be grayed out if their Faith cost is greater than your available Faith.
- Listed Spells in any of the Spell Tabs will now be grayed out if either their Spell Point cost or Intelligence requirement are greater than what you have.
- Tripled the chance that players shed disease on entering a new map. This means Disease Resistance skill, in addition to its 25/50/75% chance to not catch a disease in the first place, now provides a 15/30/45% chance to shed each disease on entering a new map. Dwarves now have an innate 30% chance to shed diseases on reaching a new map (instead of 10%) and all enchantments/Magic Items that increase odds of shedding disease have also had their odds increased. This was done to make Disease Resistance a more useful and desirable skill.
- When querying a Weapon, its Strength or Dexterity requirements will be written in red if you don’t currently meet them.
- When querying any kind of Armour, its Strength requirement will be written in red if you don’t currently meet it.
- When querying any known Spell, its Intelligence requirement will be written in red if you don’t currently meet it.
- Cleaned up clumsily worded text accompanying prompt to enter Hot Halls.
- Frost Breath had its Spell Point Cost and Intelligence Requirement lowered from 20 to 15, to keep it in line with value of other spells.
- Sparks had its Spell Point Cost and Intelligence Requirement lowered from 25 to 20, to keep it in line with value of other spells.
- Absorb Life Energy had its Spell Point Cost and Intelligence Requirement lowered from 35 to 30, to keep it in line with value of other spells.
- Demonic Assistants and Demonic Congress spells both now have a 10% chance of immediately dropping your Spell Points to zero instead of having their normal effect, to help curb their overwhelming power as spells.
- Scholars now start with an Absorb Life Energy Scroll instead of a Candelabra, since the Candelabra isn’t super useful on Dung. Level 1, and they need a little extra survivability early on.
- Duellists now additionally start with a Broken Bottle equipped as a second weapon, to allow them to take advantage of their Dual Wielding capability right out of the gate.
- Envy can now only be used once per NPC, to curb its abusiveness.
- Monsters that are Flaming because of a Flame Augmenter, monsters that are Burning or monsters that are Frozen will now always be visible to Infravision, even if they normally don’t give off a heat signature.
- The chance of Knockout Blow perk taking effect has been dropped from 15%/30%/45% to 10%/20%/30% because it was overpowered.
- Sleeping Monsters who are affected in any noticeable way (taking damage from any source, gaining any status effect, being relocated by teleportation) will now immediately awaken.
- Neither the player nor monsters will slide from Grease or while on Ice if they’re sleeping, because as funny as that was, it didn’t make sense for a stationary being to be shooting in random directions and because it frankly complicated matters behind the scenes.
- While asleep, the player and monsters now have no chance to dodge pendulums.
- If the player is asleep and is affected in any noticeable way (taking damage from any source, gaining any negative status effect, being visted by a deity, etc.) they will now immediately awaken.
- Detect Treasure has been changed to a Mid Power spell costing 45 Spell Points, to help curb its overwhelming power.
- Players will not be able to see beyond their current square or hear any sound effects while inside any kind of Wall now (via a Wall Pass effect). This was done both for flavour and because the Wall Pass effect is pretty darned powerful for a very low cost. You also cannot look at your mini-map while inside a wall.
- When generating procedural maps, all Frigid or Frozen squares adjacent to Lava will be converted to normal temperature variants, solely to avoid the cognitive dissonance of something next to lava remaining cold.
- Updated text in query of Mine Carts to take into account the speed of the Mine Cart when describing your chance of entering. (So instead of saying “If you move onto a square containing a Mine Cart...” it might now say, “If you move onto a square containing a Slow Mine Cart...”)
- When a liquor barrel runs dry it will now make the sound of the barrel being removed and placed on the ground.
- Cauldrons now have a unique background noise that can be heard if in earshot.
- Standardized text output of entering Hot Coals to read “Hot Coals!” as the top line.
- Capitalized “Stalagmites” in the death phrase, “Impaled by stalagmites.”
- If you die by materializing inside Cave Columns it will no longer give you the death phrase, “Impaled by Stalagmites” but instead, “Perforated by Cave Columns.” Also it will no longer output in the bottom bar that you’ve been impaled on Stalagmites, but Cave Columns instead.
- All NPCs are now considered Persons, which means spells like Animate Dead, and miracles like Create Ghoul or Create Vampire will work on their corpses.
- Added red letter calculation of your odds of becoming paralyzed to queries of Netted Pits and Known Netted Pit Traps.
- If any Weapon/Armour/Magic Ring/Magic Amulet/Magic Item is beyond a player’s ability to use because of a lack of the appropriate level of skill (or ongoing mastery spell effect) its Type will be listed in red when queried.
- The Vestonian miracle called Prayer has been nerfed to only work on deactivated Good Shrines, instead of ANY Shrine, both for thematic purposes, and because it could get really abusive if you had a lot of Faith and found the right shrine (like a Fivriaskan Shrine, for instance).
- Dracones are now sub-classified as Spirits, since they’re semi-transparent, intangible, undead beings (and they always should have been so classed). (This means they can also now be summoned via the Call Spirit spell).
- Shield of Caleese will no longer play the healing sound if it should heal you but you don’t need healing.
