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Eye Lasers shouldn't have a cooldown time, but it should cost 20 mana.

 

20? That's a bit over the top. Maybe 12. But I like the idea of a spell attached to a Rogue tree. That's quality.

 

Forgot to say:

*negative resistances
Really enjoying them so far ! I like burning zombies.

 

Gonna have to say I hate Transdimensional Dodge. Maybe I don't understand this skill at all, but it's in a tree that offers melee protection and at least a little melee utility (akimbo is nice to counter attack). But if you're a melee character with TD, good luck trying to strategize at all.

Walked into a monster zoo? Run away before you get hit and TD into the center.

Just corralled a bunch of monsters into a corridor? Oh well, you just got whacked and teleported behind them.

Finally cornered a 'chicken' enemy? Well, he whacked you and you teleported 5 spaces away.

I guess this skill can be kinda. . .sorta. . .randomly useful for a pure range/mage that never wants to be in melee anyway, but it basically makes the artful dodge tree terrible for melee characters.

 

They just converted it into an activated buff that only had the teleport-when-hit effect while it's on. That should help, since it's only there when you want it.

 

Not sure if this is intentional BUT I think that Magic Resistance is affecting certain buffs. Specifically Thaumaturgic Tap and Extra Planar Concentration. I've resisted their use multiple times and my resistance is currently around 30.

 

Knit Flesh, too. I think all heal-over-time and similar beneficial effects suffer from that bug, and apparently have since 1.07. Probably due to an oversight when damage-over-time effects were made resistable.

 

Tip: If you plan on playing a melee character, take Archaeology and just turn all Artifact gear into XP. Corruption now hits armor, not just weapons. Haven't checked if it hits rings/amulets or not, but if it does, melee is pretty much boned.

Gotta ask....WHY? Magic is already MILES beyond melee, so why make it HARDER on the characters who have to take it on hard-style? And yes, I know magic resist. But going from "every hit corrupts" to "three out of four hits corrupts" isn't exactly a stellar upgrade. And yes, I know "adapt to the monsters" - problem is, with three floors of corrupting enemies including the last one, that's a lot of being forced to play as a different class. If you really wanna be fair, then there needs to be an equivalent finger to magetypes - y'know, 3 floors where using magic actively wrecks gear and stats permanently so they have to melee the whole way. And this IS hurting the game - I have one friend who, upon hearing about this, stated "well, that turned me off buying it" - and I HAD almost had him convinced to give it a whirl.

 

About the melee vs mage thing, I kinda believe it's a bit getting worse lately, I just realized I won without ANY effort with a terribad build as a mage, while any try on some serious builds and with huge luck as a melee you come to a point where anything WILL destroy you in a couple hits.I usually don't like mage types in this type of games but I had to change and adapt because most of the magic combos are a lot easier to work than melee.For example I found ley walker + promethean + mathemagic a walk in the park from floor 4 onwards while melee was the other side around.If you don't ocnsider the wyrmling pet of course which made 1-4 a joke too.

You know the topic i brought before of casters stacking...well...obvious fireballx3 easy win, melee character can barely try and get in range.It feels a lot skewed for ranged generally...Might be me being bad though =P

I still like the game but would be awesome to try and balance the sides a bit more.I didn't talk about corruption because....what is corruption for a mage character?Also don't bring out traps, mages can die to traps only if they aren't caring since most teleports/general awareness/good +trapenchants will fix that easily while melee has to face corruption in full so yeah, no point saying much since it has been said =P

 

This seems a trend in roguelikes, melee is for early game, I've never beaten ADOM without a crossbow or Acid Ball (probably both). You can mix and match so a character is not mandatorily melee exclusive, even without the proper skills (unless it's a self imposed challenge). I think the 'all-melee' paradigm stem from conventions alien to this genre.

 

Part of the problem with melee is that they don't have enough movement options. You open a monster zoo and you have a row of monsters that are 3 wide facing you. What is the first thing you are going to do? Knockback or Run like Hell and fight as the monsters string out.

And once you are surrounded, as a fighter, it is 8 attacks moves to your 1.... which can only hit a single target. How long is that going to last?
Compare a caster.
Gets FAR away. And then lobs AOE's that are hitting 12-24 targets simultaneously while only being exposed from a single angle.
Even knock back abilities like the Ragnar's Meteor can only be used every now and then.

Warriors need more movement and combat options for late game. Moving diagonal. moving multiple squares per turn.
Most roguelikes didn't have the monster zoo's or even 5-10 monsters stacked at a doorway as soon as you open it (plus many doorways are 1 wide).

 

I think reducing the cooldowns on AoE melee attacks and/or increasing their effective area (I prefer and, myself) would solve that. If you could Ragnar's Meteor every other or every third round, it'd help a lot. As it stands, its pretty much a nuke in the first round so you can hop back to a more fortified position.

It is possible to set up a knockback-focused character, but it takes some nonstandard skill choices.

 

I'd think that adding some more oft-used AOE options with melee would help that.

 

Again, why can't you solve the problem using AoE bolts? Wands? Lobbing bombs? Why can't you pickup a magic skill for specific situations?

 

What does Remember Your Charlemagne do? Looks like it is the only new skill that still is not described here or on the wiki.

 

Because mages can do the exact same thing if their mana runs out (which between potions, spellpower stacking, ley walker and blood magic, should never happen). We're not discussing maximising resources to adapt to situations, which is part and parcel of a roguelike. We're talking about balance here. Dredmor is a game where players are encouraged to experiment with different builds in order to find one that suits them. Builds consisting of support skills only will of course be underpowered, but we're talking about two out of the three main character archetypes recognised by the game (warrior and rogue).

Having magic being clearly superior to melee or even crossbows defeats the point, and as the other posters have brought up, the popularity and effectiveness of magic builds compared to melee builds is clear on the wiki. When even the game mechanics for what should be rightfully physical-based attacks (assassination tree) are based off spellpower, something's not right. Gaslamp has shown interest in rebalancing, both nerfing clearly superior must-have skills such as blood and promethean magic and buffing underpowered skills like fleshsmithing. They've done a good job balancing the magic trees, now it's time for magic vs. physical.

This is what we're so upset about. Mages have plenty of ways to deal with their squishy weaknesses (teleportation, knockback on command, damage resistance, damage/stun auras), warriors and rogues have problems closing the distance and save for huge nuke-bolts like bolt of squid and mass destruction, plenty of the bolts are rather lackluster when it comes to late-game mobs. No monster reflects spells, yet rogues always run the risk of a counter double-crit instakill. Picking up a magic skill on a physical-oriented character pretty much leads to a waste of a skill due to low magic power and mana pool. The playing field is uneven with mages being a shoo-in for someone seeking to minmax.

 

Excellently said. And my precise point, lost in the shuffle, is this: Warriors have to spend a large portion of the game - including the final boss - playing as "another archetype". NOBODY beats Dredmor in melee; he hits like a train, counters like Wesley vs. Inigo Montoya, and tops it off with spells and corruption. Mages NEVER have to leave their wheelhouse. They run outta mana? They STILL play the same way, just use different tools...open range, open fire. Corruption's not an issue. Traps aren't an issue - take Tinkering, congrats, you can get level 9 Trap Skill, and you've got 6 skills left to play with.

Warriors are EXPECTED to leave their wheelhouse for at LEAST 1/3 of the game plus the final boss. Either mages need the same finger-flip, or the finger-flip needs to go AWAY. And yes, I would be PERFECTLY happy with three floors of the dungeon becoming null-magic zones with enough dampness that crossbow strings snap.

 

I like melee builds. One build in 1.06 that was brutal up till level 6 (stopped playing him for now... as soon as my characters get far in I tend to stop playing them ) was swords, dual, berserk, perception, deadshot, assassin and burglary.
I used my crossbow or tentacle wand sometimes, but most zoos I could just cleave through, no worries about mana, hardly any worry about hitpoints. I felt so OP compared to my usual magic chars, so I am not seeing the melee being less powerful ingame. It's a pretty big disadvantage that when you're out of mana or skills are on cooldown you can't, as a mage, just whack that one sanguiblobby. Simple things like that become challenging for a mage, so melee for me felt like I could breeze through so easily.

EDIT: about Dredmor I kind of agree, maybe make him a random spawn: one version is hell for non-melee, other is hell for melee.

 

I can get behind rebalancing the overreliance on the magic power stat, not because it affects melee characters (again, I find the definition unfitting of most roguelikes, present one included) but because it affects heavily armored/shielded characters, who usually take huge penalties for said stat; it also makes little sense (although the definition of 'sense' in Dredmor is very questionable, it's a very silly universe, after all). Also, I agree that, if bolts can be countered, magic should be reflectable by mobs (aren't they? I need to test this further).

That said, the idea of making a 'melee' character seems very strange in Dredmor, as there are lots of considerations when creating a character in this game, such as how to deal with traps, Zoos, early, mid and late game, melee range, ranged mobs, etc. Melee is not underpowered and has a plethora of situations were it's useful/superior to magic skills. The complaint I get from this discussion is that it's harder to play an exclusively melee oriented character, which I can't agree with, as such a decision is a handicap in Dredmor.

 

Please provide examples of when melee is superior - give a detailed example of a situation where the answer that results in least damage, fastest kill, and least expended resources is NOT "open range, open fire". I'll give you the ONE I readily agree is there: level 1, before you get your bread&butter spells and get mana regen down to 1/turn. All the rest of the time, open range, open fire is the answer, and if you CAN give me a situation that doesn't require the player being stupid, I'll eat my hat. Please note: "didn't drink booze, at low mana, and opened a zoo door" is stupid.