Post by E5Burrito in Update 1.3.3 - Plans and Fury comments

Update 1.3.3 - Plans and Fury » Comments

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Pacing / Difficulty observation : Just a heads up, I incorporated before becoming a legend this time around. The 5 Rep bonus didn't affect the pacing of either cycle, just knocking out the first few hours to get that initial 100 Rep. I'm pretty sure I'd've done the same from an initial playthrough from scratch.

By the time I was at 1 TP earnable I had triggered the Incorporate tracker at the bottom of the screen, and it was clear I could just push through in less time than it would take to rebuild from scratch with Legendary status.

(If you tweak anything, I wouldn't aim to make Incorporation harder. Unlocking Legend took a while, even cheating via the 5 Rep life cycles - maybe the low end of the high end missions could get a hair easier?)

Jack Chance10 days ago

Genuinely surprised you were able to incorporate before becoming legend. Each incorporation is supposed to be exponentially more expensive. Maybe some wires got crossed, maybe you're just so effective at earning money that low exponents isn't enough.

E5Burrito10 days ago

I did concentrate on maximizing stamina, how many seconds of life stamina buys, and Merchant efficiency. Once you're living around seven hours, there's plenty of time to exploit the counterfeit fencing loop. Lots easier than juggling everything to squeak out wins against the hegemony.

E5Burrito9 days ago

Hooray! Second incorporation down.

Thank you for making deeper Tech upgrades more rewarding , PB-wise.

It's worth noting that I didn't bother becoming a Legend after incorporating, either. I got my Corp Cash this time around (didn't start at 0cr like last time) and was able to knock out the Corp side without any genuine contribution on the Runner/Classic side. I just burned time, essentially, knowing I'd lose everything when I boosted Tech again, doing some light Stamina boosting so my task rewards stuck around longer... although the way Corporation executed tasks aren't affected by Overtime degregation left me doing very long runs deep into old age, unwilling to surrender my iron grip on the company...which feels thematically appropriate.

Probably still needs more intertwining between the core gameplay loop and the corporation one. There's not much of an impetus to run the runner bit once the corps up and functional.

Jack Chance9 days ago(+1)

Excellent feed back, as always.

The decoupling is intentional.. but about halfway through the basic setup for incorporation I realized I can't completely decouple the criminal and corporate sides. It's in a weird place, conceptionally, that I don't feel really works currently. When I started this project job searching and life were my only other concerns, then it became school, job searching and life, and now it's work, school and life all competing. I love my new job, but I feel the decrease in time I get to dedicate to tackling these difficult design questions.

All that to say, I feel the disconnect and it is a real problem but it might take a large amount of time before I'm able to solve it. Solving bugs is easy and AI can aid me when I identify the conceptual issues. Game design is sacred and I actively resist letting AI have influence on it. Bear with me, and know that your input is very valuable.

E5Burrito9 days ago

Thank you for that. I want to reiterate that I've been impressed with the rate of progress and turn around time on issues - it's still occuring at an impressive rate.

The game is advanced and balanced enough at this point that if you were to make an end run, a nearly impossible, "requires essentially full community backing, several megacorps of logistical support, and six hours of character buffing to achieve" difficulty Boss Fight to end the digital illuminati or whatever, I think you could step away proud. (And, hopefully, with a perpetual trickle of ad revenue!)

Idlepunk is my favorite Groundhog-Day-Like, as is, and it just keeps getting better. Thanks for all the effort you've put into it already.

E5Burrito9 days ago

I'm unsure what the cost increase formula for incorporating is, but I think you figured it out before including the increase in earnable PB? This may not be a problem, but it occurs to me there's a non zero chance that a players entire run might be difficulty adjusted for "number of corp completions" rather than "prestige bonus strength" now that the two are not hand in hand aligned. That'd massively, permanently favor players who went deep instead of wide on their tech breakthrough choices.

Just a thought. I can't see the math on this end (at least, not without about a year of playing and recording variations!) so I'm not sure if it's a real concern or not.

itch.io

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