Request: Enemies play by the rules

#1

My wife and I both really like DQ. We think the UI is great. All the tech info provided (if you want it) in battle is fantastic. The constant double route to gear advancement–grind and buy it, or try harder levels to get the goodies–works out well. The story is solid and different, under a highly amusing exterior with cleverly written dialog. The character classes are well chosen, and introduced in a way that feels unforced. Customizations are good, and the battlefields provide a variety of interesting challenges. The fact that you can change experience and penalties only makes it that much more solid and user-friendly. We’re not people who enjoy tower defense games, but this really pleases us.

So we’ve only got really one criticism, and has to do with a specific battle (as far as we’ve gone, yet) in the story. Note, this is a spoiler, so if you haven’t played through, don’t read on…

It’s the enemy who appears that is literally unkillable. 1000-level armor, doesn’t take any damage, until one of my knights suddenly broke it; and when he started taking damage heavily, he vanished…only to teleport and reappear with 1000-level armor intact and full points restored. And then just as he’s about to reach your leader another enemy appears, who kills him with a 1 million damage shot lightning bolt.

We’re big fans of enemies in games abiding by the game rules. Find a boss who is 10th level? They should have the advantages of a 10th level character, along with any special item advantages. It all may be skewed one way to give things more personality–he/she may be strong but slow, a great ranged fighter but terrible at melee, etc–but they should fit solidly within expectations for the gameworld’s environment. When an enemy shows up who takes no damage from any attacks, you just know that it’s a setup for someone else to magically appear who will take them down with a single shot. I guessed as much, said it to my wife, and it happened. And that’s where we both have a bit of difficulty accepting: the invincible enemy shouldn’t be invincible, and the character capable of tossing off a 1 million damage bolt of lightning is over the top. Not to mention that you’d killed him once before, when he offered a reasonable challenge with all the spells you had (if you ignore the teleportation.)

So we’re only requesting that in the next game in the series (which we will be buying), the enemies stick to the same rules your characters do. Make them stronger because of extra levels, give them useful items, but don’t make them godlike, please. Even if it’s just the power of a god manifesting through them, or an item of super-kill, in our opinions, it feels cheesy. Thanks.

#2

That is kind of how worlds work, though. There are enemies you can’t kill: you have to have someone else do it, or run.

#3

Perhaps I’m not being clear. :slight_smile: As I see it, this is a game. I put in a fair deal of effort to win a given scenario, because I know that, in the end, it’s my sense of strategy that will determine the outcome–whether I win, or lose. I’ll enjoy it because of that. If at the last moment some character magically appears who takes away that, I feel a bit cheated. Not of my ability to win, but of my ability to make the decisions that determine what happens.

And to have it happen with a spell that is a 1000 times stronger than anything else in the game, against somebody who has wildly overpowered armor, is just icing on the cake. If it’s meant as parody, it doesn’t work.

#4

— Begin quote from "Rameau"

Not of my ability to win, but of my ability to make the decisions that determine what happens.

— End quote

Not everything in a game with a heavy story element is suppoed to be under your control.

— Begin quote from ____

And to have it happen with a spell that is a 1000 times stronger than anything else in the game, against somebody who has wildly overpowered armor, is just icing on the cake. If it’s meant as parody, it doesn’t work.

— End quote

It’s probably just a bit of developer laziness - a cheap way to say "whatever YOU do, whatever magic or physical actions you take, you cannot harm that guy, but there are stronger types of magic.

Imagine a Tiger tank approaching a defensive emplacement of infantry with support of 45cm AT guns. No matter what decisions they make, they cannot harm it - until suddenly an M26 appears and says Bang. Was it unfair for the infantry commander to be helpless at that stage?

Yea, it’s a very bad parallel, I know - but what are you asking for? That the story for the next game is shaped so that at no stage will the party have an encounter with somebody unbeatable for them, but defeated by somebody else?

#5

— Begin quote from "coyot"

— Begin quote from "Rameau"

And to have it happen with a spell that is a 1000 times stronger than anything else in the game, against somebody who has wildly overpowered armor, is just icing on the cake. If it’s meant as parody, it doesn’t work.

— End quote

It’s probably just a bit of developer laziness - a cheap way to say "whatever YOU do, whatever magic or physical actions you take, you cannot harm that guy, but there are stronger types of magic.

— End quote

Yes, I know. It’s just that my wife and I both found it unbelievable in a game that otherwise is always careful to create opponents and battlefields that however tough, are carefully structured so you can win if you show a good sense of tactics–instead of with 1000+ armor, or a spell that does 1,000,000 points of damage.

— Begin quote from ____

Yea, it’s a very bad parallel, I know - but what are you asking for? That the story for the next game is shaped so that at no stage will the party have an encounter with somebody unbeatable for them, but defeated by somebody else?

— End quote

Did you read me initial comments? Because I wrote this above to show exactly what I was asking for:

— Begin quote from ____

So we’re only requesting that in the next game in the series (which we will be buying), the enemies stick to the same rules your characters do. Make them stronger because of extra levels, give them useful items, but don’t make them godlike, please. Even if it’s just the power of a god manifesting through them, or an item of super-kill, in our opinions, it feels cheesy. Thanks.

— End quote

I’m not suggesting you agree with me. Everybody has different views on pretty much everything in life, and that’s as it should be, otherwise the world would be a very dull place. But this is a sub-forum for requests and suggestions, and that’s the primary one we have.

#6

I don’t have a problem with your suggestion :slight_smile: . I was just making sure that I understand it correctly, because I find your request practically incompatible with the game story. In other words, the enemy in that particular level is supposed to BE unbeatable by your party, no matter how good your sense of tactics is. So, there are two options - a) change the story b) change the implementation of “unbeatable enemy” so that it doesn’t show as a ridiculous 1.000.000 damage spell.

I don’t mind story-fitting unbeatable enemies. It doesn’t spoil my enjoyment of the game - when I saw that for the first time, I didn’t say “unbelievable, how could they do this” :slight_smile: . (That is, it was actually second time, because the first time I ran it at 4x speed and due to implementation bug long since fixed, the spell wasn’t cast in time and Azra got killed by the bad guy, and I wasn’t happy about that…)

But it’s OK to have different tastes :slight_smile:

#7

You know, the funny thing is one of my characters actually managed to break that enemy’s armor the first time through, and he began taking damage. After losing about 200 points, he vanished, and reappeared elsewhere, with all damage fixed, and armor intact. I’d have loved to meet his triage team and blacksmith. :wink:

#8

I know why that Red Cultist does that. It is immune to normal DAMAGE (see his strengths) and he has ARMOR REGROWTH and HP REGROWTH, making it impossible to kill. But that guy that helped you had a stronger type of magic, which was able to nullify the DAMAGE weakness. :slight_smile: