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Finally... => Creative Projects => Topic started by: mendonca on March 28, 2012, 03:26:28 am

Title: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on March 28, 2012, 03:26:28 am

Hello, venerable Bay12ers, purveyors of justice and all that is right.

I've been working ever so slowly on my Python skills over the past year or so, and after overcoming several conceptual hurdles a couple of months ago, I actually managed to pull together something.

This has manifested in the form of a relatively simple, but hopefully reasonably interesting 'roguelike' I am choosing to call '100 Heroes'. It's coded in Python, with the Libtcod wrapper, and you will need Python installed if you want to run it.

SOURCE (http://goo.gl/pjVgOl) - Python version latest code

EXECUTABLE (http://goo.gl/YHrEh6) - executable, built thanks to Lord Dullard (Cult (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=46922.msg938255#msg938255) Developer and all round good egg)

The premise is that you play the role of a retailer in a small town beset by troubles, in the form of a dastardly set of dungeons springing up in the locale. You can immediately see a nice gap in the market to trade in the tools of war, and through shrewd buying / selling of goods, you have an opportunity to make a tidy profit. Amongst all this are 100 persistent heroes, from 12 factions, who mill about the world, going about their business.

(CURRENT(ish) VERSION SCREENSHOTS)

(http://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/hi_boss.png)
(http://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/auction_house.png)
(http://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/hero_information.png)

The heroes themselves are very abstract, but they do have simple needs which drive their purchases. I've got some loose plans around making their behaviour more complex, and there is a fairly straightforward route to giving them all individual opinions about the various factions of the game. As with any new feature, it's a matter of coding it, which won't happen any time soon, but maybe (hopefully) I will get another spurt done in the next few months.

Some Features:
*Realistic shopkeeping simulator, including a month by month ledger recording all your transactions.
*100 heroes persistent throughout the world at any given time. When the corpse of a hero finally rots in a dungeon, a peasant or noble will rise to fill their shoes.
*Read each Hero's internal monologue as s/he travels through the world and adventures in the dungeon.
*Hero skills. Each Hero type will gain skills associated with their faction which changes how they interact with the world (a couple of skills implemented at this moment ...)
*Merchants. A particular type of hero who will come to town, looking for goods or with a healthy cargo of new supplies.
*Too many surnames beginning with the letter ‘H’. Hockadays, Hodkinsons and Horgans of the world finally get a game with which to vicariously live out their desires to work in retail in a high fantasy setting.
*Player knowledge system: Start off an ignoramus, slowly and methodically pick apart the details of the world to become something akin to the Hugh Scully of generic-fantasy-land.

Some goals:
*Slow, fun gameplay to try and create the means with which the stories of these heroes can be told, set against the backdrop of the player making money by the accrual of knowledge, good pricing and stock control.
*The world should change, dynamically, in accordance with the amount of evil left in the world. Heroes plundering dungeons and killing monsters are also killing dreams. Without Orcs, the visiting marching band of Pixies start to come to town more infrequently. And possibly rampaging Balrogs if the heroes bring the wrong stuff out of the dungeon.

Hope one or two of you would be interested in having a play about, it would be cool to get some feedback or thoughts or anything really. I am inexperienced in coding, and I have got some plans to do more work on it, but don't let that stop you if you want to offer any particularly cutting commments.

Thanks,

mendonca

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Yoink on March 28, 2012, 06:15:10 am

Well, I can't play it without downloading Python and such, but I certainly like the premise!
Right from the start it's an innovative idea. It would be spectacular to view all those tired, fantasy plot elements about heroes slaying monsters, restoring ancient artefacts to the temples that crafted them, being brave and saving damsels and all those from a completely different viewpoint: A merchant.
You don't care if Aeltherius The Red needs the silver longsword of undead slaying+1 so he can end the reign of the dreaded necromancer Har'Ken'Spaxl, you aren't going to give him a 50% discount!
Damned heroes, why can't they keep a real bloody job for a change... :P

Anyway, awesome idea. I'd sink a few hundred hours into it, for sure. Watching!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on March 28, 2012, 07:51:23 am

Ha ha! Thanks for the nice comments.

Quote from: Yoink on March 28, 2012, 06:15:10 am

You don't care if Aeltherius The Red needs the silver longsword of undead slaying+1 so he can end the reign of the dreaded necromancer Har'Ken'Spaxl, you aren't going to give him a 50% discount!

Exactly!

And you would happily sell the sword to Har'Ken'Spaxl if he gave you the right price, even if it did mean three decades of decay.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Korbac on March 28, 2012, 11:51:32 am

Sounds genius! :D

Will try it now. :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on March 28, 2012, 12:02:28 pm

Urge to flood this roguelike with suggestions... Growing!

Must resist!

Though I am not sure how this is a roguelike unless you yourself go adventuring.

Anyhow I love the idea that you essentially save the city/town by running a shop (at least I hope this is what it is). Want to take down the Fairy glade? Well maybe I will increase the selling price of Pixie wings from 100 to 200.

New Snakemen giving people trouble? Antidotes are now for sale cheap!

Thiefs/rogues I can see even being double edge. They can steal/find/lockpick treasures no one else can... but they will love to steal from you as well.

Ohh well. Good luck with the game. I'd love to hit you over the head with hero ideas later.

Though I will admit... Though you may have said very little about the game and how it will work exactly... This is one of the more interesting "roguelikes" I've heard of for a long time.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Korbac on March 28, 2012, 12:08:41 pm

Just played it - it's pretty darn amazing, although it does crash after about 10 minutes of play.

A great game by the looks of it! :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Brotato on March 28, 2012, 01:26:36 pm

Haven't tried it yet; but it sounds like an amazing idea.  Hope you can execute it well.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on March 28, 2012, 02:17:27 pm

Ohh it has a alpha already? whoa! I gotta try it with a computer that can open Rar

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on March 28, 2012, 04:02:27 pm

Quote from: Neonivek on March 28, 2012, 12:02:28 pm

Urge to flood this roguelike with suggestions... Growing!

Must resist!

Though I am not sure how this is a roguelike unless you yourself go adventuring.

Anyhow I love the idea that you essentially save the city/town by running a shop (at least I hope this is what it is). Want to take down the Fairy glade? Well maybe I will increase the selling price of Pixie wings from 100 to 200.

New Snakemen giving people trouble? Antidotes are now for sale cheap!

Thiefs/rogues I can see even being double edge. They can steal/find/lockpick treasures no one else can... but they will love to steal from you as well.

Ohh well. Good luck with the game. I'd love to hit you over the head with hero ideas later.

Hey, suggestions are definitely welcome. Of all the ideas I have had, most of them are about the world and less so about the heroes. If you wanted to offer any thoughts on this, they would be most welcome.

I've been struggling to figure out how I would want the demand based value to work, at the minute they assess items on an individual basis, independent to the world (just based on their internal level) but that sounds pretty close to some of the things I would like to do, eventually.

Probably need to get some kind of marauding monster in, at that point thieves stealing would borrow from the same mechanics, I should think.

Quote from: Neonivek on March 28, 2012, 12:02:28 pm

Though I will admit... Though you may have said very little about the game and how it will work exactly... This is one of the more interesting "roguelikes" I've heard of for a long time.

Well, thanks! And the quotes are certainly justified. This is definitely inspired far more by roguelikes, than by rogue itself.

Quote from: Korbac on March 28, 2012, 12:08:41 pm

Just played it - it's pretty darn amazing, although it does crash after about 10 minutes of play.

A great game by the looks of it! :)

Thanks for playing! Sorry about the crash, I'll have a quick look through the code tomorrow, I might be pointing you to a version that is not as stable as it should be. Been trying to keep on top of version control, and I have been cautious with creating new 'rar' files. I might have since fixed a couple of glaring bugs from the posted version.

Quote from: Brotato on March 28, 2012, 01:26:36 pm

Haven't tried it yet; but it sounds like an amazing idea.  Hope you can execute it well.

Thanks, I'm getting there :) It's definitely a case of 'cutting my cloth accordingly'. Trying to ensure the mechanics of the game aren't beyond my limits as a coder, and still get something semi-interesting. It's been better than I imagined it would be, up to this stage.

Quote from: Neonivek on March 28, 2012, 02:17:27 pm

Ohh it has a alpha already? whoa! I gotta try it with a computer that can open Rar

You'll need Python as well, but if you try it out that would be awesome.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Lord Dullard on March 28, 2012, 04:13:21 pm

This is really interesting - I tried playing for a bit and liked it, although I don't have a lot of time to spend on it at the moment. I may see about compiling this into a distributable for you in a while - I think it should be fairly easy to do a simple rewrite of the py2exe script I'm using for Cult for your game so that people without Python can give it a try.

EDIT:

Okay, here you are, good sir!

***HERE*** (http://fallout-mux.wikidot.com/local--files/start/ahundredheroes.rar) is a compiled version for those without Python.

Mendonca, if you'd like access to the script I used to do this and a quick run-through of how to do the same thing via py2exe (it's really, really easy), I can help you out. Otherwise, good luck with your game!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Ma88hew on March 28, 2012, 05:59:59 pm

Works fine with Linux after adding the libtcod and libSDL .so files.
However, crash:

Quote

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 4610, in <module>
    pass_turn()
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1575, in pass_turn
    heroes.hero_decision()
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 785, in hero_decision
    self.fight(generate_encounter(dlev, dlev + self.in_dungeon, dlev, dlev + self.in_dungeon))
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 992, in fight
    self.find_item()                   
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 950, in find_item
    log_info(str(item_won) + ' ' + str(item) + ' ' + self.faction + ' ' + str(self.base_level) )
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 4088, in log_info
    f = open('/logfile.txt', 'a')
IOError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/logfile.txt'

Remove the '/' on line 4088, this causes it to attempt to write to the root directory on linux (the equivalent to C:\ on windows). Thus, a permissions error.

Otherwise, neat game! Good luck with it!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on March 28, 2012, 07:41:41 pm

I'll get to more specifics later but my idea is mostly for classes of heros, their abilities, tendencies, and interpersonal ability as well as possible use for "Non-Hero" friendly units I call Entourage.

Here are three examples

Necromancer
-Type: Magic Hero
-Social Circle: Dark Hero (social circle determine what heros they like to hang around with. Dark Heros dislike being around White Knights)
-Sociability: Solitary (Sociability determines how often they like to team up with other heros. Solitary Heros will almost always go solo but also tend to be more powerful then an ordinary hero)
-Bravery: Average (Bravery determines how difficult of a dungeon they will attempt compared ot their power)
-Quirks: Spartan, Unease, Crypt Lovers (Certain heros have certain quirks. Spartan heros buy the cheapest luxuries possible. Unease makes them exceptionally difficult to be around. Crypt lovers prefer to delve into crypts)
-Special ability 1: Necromancers get four entourage slots where they can summon Skeletons or Zombie creatures. Essentially a walking party.
-Special ability 2: Commune with the dead: Necromancers can speak with dead heros and thus they cannot be caught off guard by a supperior enemy that slain a hero.

Rogue
-Type: Dungeon Specialist
-Social Circle: Seedy (Seedy characters get along with Dark Heros and are tollerated by good heros at best)
-Sociability: Loner (Loners won't join a party but can be scouted)
-Bravery: Low (Rogues are a careful bunch)
-Quirks: Thief, Backstab (Thieves will steal from other heros, dungeons, and even you. Backstabbers will occasionally murder other heros for their loot.)
-Special Ability 1: Trap Disable: Rogues disable traps more easily then other heros, even ones not normally disabled.
-Special Ability 2: Lock Disable: Rogues disable locks more easily then other heros, even ones not normally disabled.

Bard
-Type: Ace (Good at everything)
-Social Circle: Good Hero (Good for lack of a better word... refers to "Bright" heros or goody goodies.)
-Sociability: Super Social (Super Social Heros will always make a party)
-Quirks: Luxurious, Lazy, Critic, Instrument lover (Luxurious love to waste money on expencive but useless objects. Lazy Heros would rather rest then dungeoneer. Critics love to tell other heros about your shop for better or ill. Instrument lover likes to buy instruments)
-Special ability 1: Inspire: Bards improve a party just by being in them
-Special ability 2: Charismatic: Bards are easily capable of snagging people together for a party.

Dwarf
-Type: Melee Warrior
-Social Circle: Neutral
-Sociability: Average
-Bravery: Foolhearty (Dwarves like to delve into tougher dungeons)
-Quirks: Alcoholic, Busybody, Mine Lover (Alcoholic loves to buy alcohol, Busybodies will dungeon delve as much as possible, Mine lovers will prefer mine dungeons)
-Special ability 1: Miner: Dwarves will bring back hidden gems and metals after dungeon delving if the dungeon has any and will sell it.

Other stuff I thought of are Quirks like: Hoarder and Greedy (Hoarders prefer to stockpile items instead of selling them. Greedy characters prefer to hoard gold over buying items... I think Rogues were supposed to be Hoarders and Theives were supposed to be greedy)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on March 29, 2012, 01:25:00 am

Quote from: Lord Dullard on March 28, 2012, 04:13:21 pm

This is really interesting - I tried playing for a bit and liked it, although I don't have a lot of time to spend on it at the moment. I may see about compiling this into a distributable for you in a while - I think it should be fairly easy to do a simple rewrite of the py2exe script I'm using for Cult for your game so that people without Python can give it a try.

EDIT:

Okay, here you are, good sir!

***HERE*** (http://fallout-mux.wikidot.com/local--files/start/ahundredheroes.rar) is a compiled version for those without Python.

Mendonca, if you'd like access to the script I used to do this and a quick run-through of how to do the same thing via py2exe (it's really, really easy), I can help you out. Otherwise, good luck with your game!

Wow, thanks! I'll admit I did spend a couple of hours trying to wrap my head round py2exe, and failed. A quick run through would be awesome, if you didn't mind! (but don't let it get in the way of Cult coding ;))

Thanks for the report, Ma88hew. I should have disabled the logging really, but I suppose I'm glad I didn't otherwise I'd have never have picked up that potential bug!

And Neonivek, these thoughts are really interesting, fit well within what I think I can do, but actually develop where I had got to quite nicely in lots of ways. Thank you!

Interestingly, I had never considered identifying heroes by their race ...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Korbac on March 29, 2012, 05:55:11 am

Woohoo! Good news all around!  :D

Just tell me when the bugfixed version is out, Mendonca, and I'll be on it in a flash!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: getter77 on March 29, 2012, 06:58:50 am

Most interesting, going to have to keep tabs on this one indeed.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on March 29, 2012, 07:32:43 am

Quote

Interestingly, I had never considered identifying heroes by their race ...

There was this old hack and slash game somewhat based off of dungeons and dragons and the classes were things like Wizard, Barbarian, Warrior, and Archer... but there were also two other classes... Dwarf and Elf.

Which always felt somewhat odd to me. It wasn't even something like "Dwarven Warrior" and "Elven Mystic Guard" it was just Dwarf and Elf. I wonder if somewhere in the world there is "Human".

It is essentially what I call a "Race Class" or rather a Race that is also a Class.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on March 29, 2012, 08:43:11 am

I've just posted up a quick 0.04, which reflects the most current version at the minute, and it is available in Python only.

There are a few extra features and tweaks, and you can now go in to negative cash (because of a monthly tax) but there is no 'lose' condition just yet.

I couldn't recreate a 'time-based' bug, but I have disabled message logging by default in case there were permission things going on (i.e. trying to create a file somewhere where maybe it wasn't allowed).

v0.04 release notes
Code clean-up to faction house / dungeon location functions
Weekly Stock Take for non-player shops. Values reset every sunday night, by appraiser
End of the month tax introduced
Months now respect correct number of days
Merchant behaviour / activity tweaked downwards
Heroes rot after 15 days deceased, to be replaced by a new hero
Some message tweaks
Logging messages default to 'off'

See the OP for download link ... (including the .exe for 0.03)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Lord Dullard on March 29, 2012, 09:09:59 am

Here you go (http://fallout-mux.wikidot.com/local--files/start/setup.py) - that's the setup script I hacked together for you. It is directly cannibalized from the one I use for Cult, BUT I did not remove all of the stuff that applies to Cult because it'll serve as a handy example if you ever need to reconfigure it, and for the time being it doesn't do anything annoying to leave that stuff in.

If you want to configure it, just change the little string blurbs to whatever you'd like (I set them up for you but not very well). You can also fiddle around with the extra_files settings if you ever include subfolders in your game and you want the dist folder to carry across stuff like art, sound effects, blah blah automatically.

Obviously you need pygame and py2exe to get it working. Once you toss it into the same folder as your game, just bring up your Windows command prompt from your Applications menu, navigate to your program's subfolder (i.e. cd C:\ahundredheroes) and do python setup.py py2exe. It'll run on its own and create a \dist folder.

NOTE: You will need to manually move libtcod-mingw.dll, arial10x10.png, and standard_names.txt over to the dist folder yourself (or change the setup.py script respectively), because I was stupid and forgot to include them.

NOTE 2: You can also set it up to attach a .ico file to your compiled exe - pretty self-explanatory on how to do that, but it bears mentioning in case you're interested.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on March 29, 2012, 10:43:02 am

Thank you!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Enzo on March 29, 2012, 02:45:22 pm

Crashed twice in a row, a couple days into each game.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 4610, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1575, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 793, in hero_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 950, in find_item
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 4088, in log_info
IOError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/logfile.txt'

Also, can one adjust the prices of items? I seem to be buying things and then reselling them at cost. When you gain experience/rep, can the player tell what's worth more than it's listed price? I like the premise but I'm kind of confused as to how you go about making a profit.

Also, the help screen should auto-pause the game.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on March 29, 2012, 03:56:53 pm

Quote from: kinseti on March 29, 2012, 02:45:22 pm

Crashed twice in a row, a couple days into each game.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 4610, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1575, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 793, in hero_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 950, in find_item
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 4088, in log_info
IOError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/logfile.txt'

Sorry about that, I left the info logging on in 0.03, but I should have turned it off - or at least made it try and create the file locally rather than in the root. If you are playing the Python version (although probably not, because I should have fixed that for 0.04 ...) you can alter log_info() function to:

def log_info(info):
    f = open('logfile.txt', 'a')

Otherwise, I'll get an exe up soon where this shouldn't happen.

Quote from: kinseti on March 29, 2012, 02:45:22 pm

Also, can one adjust the prices of items? I seem to be buying things and then reselling them at cost. When you gain experience/rep, can the player tell what's worth more than it's listed price? I like the premise but I'm kind of confused as to how you go about making a profit.

The game should automatically put a 20% markup on everything you buy, which normally should put it still within the general acceptable values for most heroes, who are normally willing to pay up to 20% over the perceived value of an item fairly easily, so you should 'generally' automatically do okay just by buying things and not managing prices. You can also go in to the items one-by-one by clicking on your shop, then the item number, then pressing 'v', which is essential if you think you have snagged a bargain.

Low level people know less stuff about stuff, so you should be buying off idiots where you can. Items are also associated with factions, so you can guess that the Fighters guild will know a bit more, generally, about weapons than say the Mages (although there are crossovers for all item types, easier to guess when you know a little bit about each item).

Bigger profits can be made by identifying items and realising when either the town shops (or heroes) are underselling their goods or from getting a lucky bargain at the auction house. When you increase a level, you get to specialise further in one of the four main item types. This enables you to identify when items of that type are higher quality and eventually enchantments.

This might then enable you to get bargains from other people who don't see that quality, but unfortunately only other people who are aligned to the item (by faction and/or level) will also recognise that quality difference, and be willing to pay extra.

In theory, you could go and buy a good quality scroll from the Barbarians (who are low level, and unlikely to recognise most scrolls) at under the base price for that type of scroll. You might be able to then shift that on to say a Summoner at base price, plus the quality modifier, plus 20%. You just have to wait for someone to come along and recognise that quality, because some people might just think you are trying to rip them off.

I think the basic principles work okay, but the game is far from being as fun as it possibly can be, at the minute. There is definitely a bit of balancing due for the player knowledge, as well.

Quote

Also, the help screen should auto-pause the game.

Oh yeah, of course. I don't know why I never picked that up ...

Thanks for the feedback, I appreciate it.


E: 004 Executable now in OP, thanks LD, worked a treat! (just had to comment out the bit about 'numpy' which I don't have)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on March 29, 2012, 09:53:29 pm

I am glad you liked my suggestions I was afraid I was overcomplicating it. I'll create more heros for you to critique eventually.

Concept Idea

One of the general ideas I came up with is that dungeons have "In the open" loot which any hero can take and then it also has "Hidden" loot that certain heros would need to get as well as some heros will pick up some loot more often.

For example a Barbarian raiding a library will probably pick up whatever books he finds and leave and you will likely just get a pile of novels or textbooks. A magic hero will likely know exactly which books are magical and while they certainly will keep some of those books to themselves they may also give it to you. Or less criptic a big dumb hero cannot solve riddles and thus cannot open the chest that requires you to solve one.

As well some treasure is just not obtainable without certain skills. A Warrior cannot mine and thus he cannot mine gold. A Hunter may be able to take pelts from skinnable enemies. Rogues and Thieves can open chests with perfect locks.

Finally some heros create treasure (Crafting heros) out of materials. Though most "Crafting heros" are wimps and don't want to explore dungeons often (I should upgrade Rogues' bravery. Wimpy characters should be part of the 'Non-hero' types)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on April 02, 2012, 02:50:27 am

Quote from: Neonivek on March 29, 2012, 09:53:29 pm

"In the open" loot ... "Hidden" loot

As well some treasure is just not obtainable without certain skills.

(Crafting heros)

I like all these ideas, they are going in my notes with the rest.

Not sure entirely how I will deal with them, but that can wait for later.

I've just implemented a main menu and a savegame function which appears to be working as expected (plus some graphical tweaks - glowing things on the map). I should get a new version up later today.

(http://www.zen102301.zen.co.uk/100heroes/100heroestitle.png)

(http://www.zen102301.zen.co.uk/100heroes/100heroes.png)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on April 02, 2012, 03:17:06 pm

Whilst I would hardly consider it a watershed moment in the history of the computer game, this particular little thing has just crossed an important point in it's own lifecycle.

The concept of the savegame, and the main menu.

OP has been updated.

(cue muted applause)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Willfor on April 02, 2012, 05:16:04 pm

Congrats!

I've never gotten a game to the point where I made a save/load for it. I agree that it's a pretty good mark to have gotten to and passed.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: nenjin on April 02, 2012, 06:55:49 pm

Quote from: mendonca on April 02, 2012, 03:17:06 pm

Whilst I would hardly consider it a watershed moment in the history of the computer game, this particular little thing has just crossed an important point in it's own lifecycle.

The concept of the savegame, and the main menu.

OP has been updated.

(cue muted applause)

Hurray for save games sooner rather than later! Believe me, I appreciate that kind of milestone.

Also, sweet concept. You really broke out of the norm with it.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Lord Dullard on April 03, 2012, 12:15:19 am

Quote from: mendonca on March 29, 2012, 03:56:53 pm

E: 004 Executable now in OP, thanks LD, worked a treat! (just had to comment out the bit about 'numpy' which I don't have)

Awesome, glad you got it working. I'll definitely be keeping track of this project, very excited to see where it goes.  :D

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on September 26, 2012, 02:36:39 am

(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/100heroesv006.png)

6 Month Anniversary bump.

Actually found some vigour to work on this again, making semi-decent progress, tidying up the code and bringing things in to line for my near term goals.

Still got a lot of things I want to do before another release - making the dungeons, relationships and world more dynamic (which will need a lot of balancing) - but I'm having a lot of fun with it again.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on September 26, 2012, 02:42:07 am

Whoa this is back! woo!

I will admit that I might have went insane with this a bit >_>;

So sorry mendonca

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on September 26, 2012, 03:49:54 am

Quote from: Neonivek on September 26, 2012, 02:42:07 am

Whoa this is back! woo!

I will admit that I might have went insane with this a bit >_>;

So sorry mendonca

Ha ha! No problems, I still have a lot of notes written down from your suggestions, hopefully to implement in some fashion in to the hero behaviour :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Rexfelum on September 30, 2012, 04:35:50 pm

No one has mentioned Recettear (http://www.carpefulgur.com/recettear/about.htm)?  It did the "merchant" thing as well.

Key differences are that this game looks to be more gritty, and apparently will quantify RPG plots for their effects on economics.  Or am I misunderstanding?  When you say "killing dreams" and "bringing the wrong stuff out of the dungeon," are you going to have randomized RPG plots that can happen behind the curtain?  Or will it be based off of, e.g., random possibilities attached to each adventurer's personality?

And I'm way late, but . . .

Quote from: Neonivek on March 29, 2012, 07:32:43 am

There was this old hack and slash game somewhat based off of dungeons and dragons and the classes were things like Wizard, Barbarian, Warrior, and Archer... but there were also two other classes... Dwarf and Elf.

Which always felt somewhat odd to me. It wasn't even something like "Dwarven Warrior" and "Elven Mystic Guard" it was just Dwarf and Elf. I wonder if somewhere in the world there is "Human".

It is essentially what I call a "Race Class" or rather a Race that is also a Class.

In other words, it wasn't "based off of" but rather "copied from."  Just add a Halfling, and there you go: you used to choose a race OR a class.  "Cleric" was, by definition, human; "Elf" was, by definition, a "Fighter-Mage."

--Rexfelum

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on September 30, 2012, 05:58:55 pm

It was always just weird to me Rexfelum. Humans have such diverse roles but if you are a halfling, elf, or dwarf... NOPE you have exactly ONE job and that was also your race.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Rexfelum on September 30, 2012, 06:12:55 pm

Quote from: Neonivek on September 30, 2012, 05:58:55 pm

It was always just weird to me Rexfelum. Humans have such diverse roles but if you are a halfling, elf, or dwarf... NOPE you have exactly ONE job and that was also your race.

Yyyyyyyup!  Welcome to the club.  Playing off of what you said, it implies a sort of "all elves are alike" thing, which (Dwarf Fortress jokes notwithstanding) is kinda odd when you expect "elven healers" and such to also exist in the world.

Notice how modern D&D doesn't work like this?

But then, I heard tell of one other gaming project (I forget which) that brought back said rule as a deliberate nod to gaming roots.

--Rexfelum

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 01, 2012, 02:39:08 am

Quote from: Rexfelum on September 30, 2012, 04:35:50 pm

No one has mentioned Recettear (http://www.carpefulgur.com/recettear/about.htm)?  It did the "merchant" thing as well.

Yeah, Recettear is an obvious point of reference. I don't think I had played the game when I dreamt up the basic mechanics so far, but it probably is in there somehow, subconsciously. I don't intend to add the dungeons in to any real detail, always keeping them as abstracted little adventures based mainly on random events that lead the heroes either deeper in to the dungeons - to more peril - or back out again.

I would like to add in a means of directly communicating with the heroes though, making them go in to dungeons and fetch you stuff on 'contracts', perhaps based on whether you have a good relationship with the hero in question.

Just having a think about how the hero characters get a chance to interact with the dungeon in better ways based on their skills, got some ideas which I'll try and implement soon based on some 'special rooms' which all heroes will potentially get access to, but only certain heroes get to do anything with (e.g. because they have a given perk).

Secret treasure, summoning altars etc.

Quote from: Rexfelum on September 30, 2012, 04:35:50 pm

Key differences are that this game looks to be more gritty, and apparently will quantify RPG plots for their effects on economics.  Or am I misunderstanding?  When you say "killing dreams" and "bringing the wrong stuff out of the dungeon," are you going to have randomized RPG plots that can happen behind the curtain?  Or will it be based off of, e.g., random possibilities attached to each adventurer's personality?
--Rexfelum

The main thrust of the 'killing dreams' comment is to try and get the world behaviour to change based on the behaviour and performance of the heroes. At the start of the game, it should be pretty normal out there, with some buried dungeons out in the woods that slowly grow in power.

As they grow in power, better and more extraordinary items get pulled from the depths. These either have a latent positive / negative effect on the weighted balance of good/evil order/chaos, and depending on that world score, depends on what goes on in the world. There is also a challenge in trying to make a clear link between the player and the performance of the heroes. It's a bit disconnected at the minute.

I have a basic good/order metric in - based on the total summed inventory of the worlds items, but it's clear that this is not going to be sufficient on its own to get any variance over time (it will just sit at effectively 50% due to the statistical weighting of the alignment of all averaged items).

So I need to get the power of the dungeons balanced right so they grow (at the minute they are getting 'cleansed' pretty efficiently, within two months or so, without killing enough heroes), and I need to try and get the increase in world evil power to increase the profitability of the stores, probably by linking the tax rate to 'order/chaos' (more chaos less tax) and also more monsters / higher dungeon levels = better loot from the dungeons.

Also visual cues like pixies / gremlins flitting about the screen in the forest.

Probably would have more desperate heroes as well, so you could mark up your goods to a greater level.

But this would come with a downside of having evil creatures springing from the dungeons, travelling across the town map, and causing havoc in town.

Ideally it would be a balance where ->

too much order = no more dungeons = no more heroes = no footfall (plus high taxes, quicker 'fail' condition from this angle)
too much chaos = too many monsters = collateral damage (but higher profits, more 'churn', lower taxes).

The order path would be stable and low risk, the chaos path would be unstable and high risk.
Good and evil would just really be flavour modifications, I think (unicorns generating in the dungeons rather than ogres, say)

I would like to try and achieve a system whereby you can't normally play the game for any longer than 6 months before a failure condition grabs you down. It would then poll your high score in terms of profit made (but hopefully it can go on for longer than this without any real issues).

In terms of the RPG plots, it is very much tending towards a whole host of random rolls tied in to the personalities. I think I could make this a lot more immersive by opening up the hero activity to be seen by the player (with a few hundred lines of flavour text associated with actions, hopefully this can be made to appear reasonable) and that will certainly be the first path I will be taking. It also fits in pretty well with where the codebase is at the minute, so all I would really need to do is whip up an individual hero interface sheet with a list of recent thoughts / activities and write a bunch of different possible sentences to describe the various things that can go on.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Rexfelum on October 01, 2012, 01:41:39 pm

Recettear likewise had a basic good/evil metric in "store atmosphere," and it was a bit vague in terms of usefulness.  The idea was to have practical effects on items sold: holy items get sold when you attract the holy customers in preference to the sinister ones.  But again, how was this useful?

So you're defining it (from the player's perspective) as risk and reward.  Gameplay would then be about pushing for more or less chaos/risk to keep at the "sweet spot."  This sounds awesome: push the chaos button until it breaks (i.e., nasty monsters are unleashed), then profit off of the "order people" who come to fight it.

That alone could be a game, but it would be richer if the player had more possible goals.  Two thoughts:

1).  Maybe a goal like "cornering the market" could earn the player profit outside of the order/chaos game.
2).  The good/evil mechanic needs something better to do or you'll spend lots of time programming for little reward.

So . . . how about combining the two?  Perhaps make it profitable to push the market "good" or "evil," like providing easier monopolies or simply having the items be more valuable.  In Recettear, "neutral" seemed to be more profitable than either extreme; doing the opposite would set you apart.

--Rexfelum

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 04, 2012, 05:14:35 am

Thanks for the feedback, Rexfelum, it's good stuff to think about.

I have been working through getting the evil and chaos in, designing some systems around that, but still not really got too far with the implementation.

It's happening, slowly, but as I plod through and fix bugs etc. I am getting slightly worried as the Dead start to walk the earth, oblivious to their ailments, that if I'm not careful I'll break more than I fix.

I'm therefore doing a bit of a release 'as-is' for record / backup purposes mainly (which seems round about somewhere semi-stable, although I'm not 100% I've fixed the last bug that I was tackling).

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/ahundredheroes006py.rar

I'll feel a little bit more comfortable about the future sweeping changes I'm eventually going to make, and I may as well post the link here should anyone wish to play about. Hopefully I'll do a corresponding .exe build later on today.

Release Notes:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

v0.06
*New font
*Random map generation commenced. Semi-random town layout created on new game.
 Town area centralised
  Streets Set up
  Auction House Positioned at Crossroads
  Foundations built, stores placed for each faction, Levels etc. of stores not currently randomised.
  Dungeons placed randomly, with additional extra future dungeon zones retained
*Female forename database added, female heroes birthed in to the world (50/50)
*Dungeon name databases added for randomisation
*Mouse over shows heroes in main screen
*Added 'Shop Open' and 'Taking Offers' global options (allows player to control how heroes interact with his/her shop)
*Merchants entering town 'with a cargo' often bring the item type that the town shops have the least of - to try and keep heroes in certain types of equipment after a few months.
*Dungeon population subject to 'churn' to try and maintain an ideal population of monsters over the long term.
*Monster population increases locally on hero death and increased level.
*Dungeon gold increases on increased level.
*Added Individual hero information screen 'H'
*Reworked activitylog. Heroes make notes as they do things.
*World evil/chaos measure shown on screen.
*Chaos counter introduced which spawns new dungeons based on a set rate
*Evil counter introduced, currently unused.
*More text added for more actions.
*Help screen updated

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 05, 2012, 02:06:53 pm

Gentle bump to signal the release of an .exe for new version v0.06a (see OP).

Minor tweak to the savegame function which wasn't storing the inactive_sites properly ... (in fact it wasn't storing them at all ...)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 08, 2012, 04:46:31 am

(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/contracts.png)

Working on getting the Player much more involved in the actions of the Heroes ...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Korbac on October 08, 2012, 11:27:24 am

Will grab the next release! :D

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 15, 2012, 03:16:49 am

Quote from: Korbac on October 08, 2012, 11:27:24 am

Will grab the next release! :D

:) Thanks for showing interest!

I'm getting fairly close to where I want to be for a working release.

Some of the things that are in and working currently (subject to a bit of tweaking, and getting the rest of the factions to play along ...)

- The Tax Man will now ruin your day if you can't pay him (End Game condition ...)
- Wandering monsters spawn from the dungeons after a build-up of evil in the world. They slowly path to the shops and destroy them if they don't get killed first. If a monster kills your shop - you die (End Game condition no. 2)
- Contracts. Take out a contract for heroes to either delve in to dungeons on your behalf. If they come out successfully, they give you any items they find whilst they were under your employ. Can be very rewarding, but it's also very amusing when the hero dies mid-delve. Other factions don't do this yet, but they probably should, especially the more 'adventurous' factions.
Also you can take out a Contract on a wandering monster. It's the only reliable way to get people to fight these things off, and I think I do need to get other factions to act defensively in the case of a wandering monster (at the minute they watch passively as the whole town gets destroyed).

Before I release I am working on adding the following:

- A placeholder high score table. Will tot up things like total turnover, and I'll get this saving to a general file for posterity. Needs a bit of thought how this will work long term, there are lots of options for recording all sorts of information but might need some extensions and refactoring of the code to make it all workable.

Also thinking about adding:

- A mayoral body. Somebody to both defend, and rebuild the town. I can send all the taxes from all the factions to this body and hopefully in time this will form another kind of measure of town strength which potentially gets depleted with time. Also could provide a useful 'Law' counter against the dungeon 'Chaos' counter.

But I might just release prior to this, get something playable out there for comment.

(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/you_are_destroyed.png)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 16, 2012, 05:54:32 am

Okay, lets give this a go.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/ahundredheroes010py.rar

Link for those with Python above.

I'll build an .exe (hopefully) later tonight.

Release Notes:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

v0.10
*End game when the Tax Man gets ya
*Basic monster generation in
*Monsters spawn from dungeons and roam towards town
*Contract Interface System set up
*Contracts implemented for dungeon delving. Hero's collect loot for the player (or shops)
*Contracts for hunting monsters
*Introduction Screen for new game
*Game generally continues on destruction of shops
*High Score Table
*Player gets to put in their own name
*Tweaks to balance all round

e: And a highscore to beat:

(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/hiscore.png)

I went too hard on Contracts, hoping that I could get some free items for little work.

All three of them didn't come off, with two dying mid-adventure (Markus Hume had the nerve to subsequently get resurrected, and high-tail it out of town without so much as a word - unfortunately such is the contract law in this part of the world ...) and the third came home empty handed.

JUST made the January tax payment thanks to good timing from a visiting merchant, but unfortunately soon after Grax the Malevolent had free reign to cause havoc in an unprotected town, and my shop was fourth on his hit-list.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on October 16, 2012, 07:41:33 am

Does the losing screen change depending on the loss condition?

Or does the Tax man suddenly turn into a demon and bite you in the face for some reason?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 16, 2012, 07:46:42 am

There are two possible end conditions at present, and two possible end screens  :)

SPOILER ALERT  ;)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

(https://dl.dropbox.com/u/66536185/taxman.png)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: Neonivek on October 16, 2012, 07:48:22 am

AHH! That is Hideous! What horrible demon dons thy crooked face!?!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - Learning Python w/ Libtcod
Post by: mendonca on October 16, 2012, 12:31:32 pm

Quote from: Neonivek on October 16, 2012, 07:48:22 am

AHH! That is Hideous! What horrible demon dons thy crooked face!?!

He he he  :D

Bump for .exe (updated the OP with details)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: getter77 on October 16, 2012, 04:05:10 pm

Error 404 Not Found on the latest .exe

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 16, 2012, 04:36:33 pm

Quote from: getter77 on October 16, 2012, 04:05:10 pm

Error 404 Not Found on the latest .exe

Apologies, lazy link editing left an errant 'a' in there ... Oops ...

Should be fixed now.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on October 16, 2012, 05:00:41 pm

The only other "Game over" I can think of that isn't just a different version of "You die" or "You run out of money"...

Is that the heros outright succeed and with world peace achieved they don't need you :P

Thus you are forced to close shop.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: The Rookie on October 16, 2012, 09:02:14 pm

Looking good! been watching this for awhile. I'm also using python and libtcod as well for my roguelike. nice to see someone else is as well! Keep up the good work!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on October 20, 2012, 01:33:57 am

fun game. Wish i knew what the leveling up does though heh. Small issue with crashing somewhat randomly:

Code: [Select]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8190, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 3688, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1510, in hero_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1064, in sell_items
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 5907, in hero_sale
NameError: global name 'self' is not defined
Caused when trying to buy an item from a hero, saving before accepting any offers is the only way I can prevent losing any progression.
and

Code: [Select]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8193, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 7458, in handle_keys
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6026, in auction_house_welcome
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6446, in auction_house_interface
TypeError: 'int' object is not subscriptable
I think this one was caused by opening up the auction house. It has only happened once though, so not sure how common the problem is.

Only other bug that I have seen is that sometimes an item will be listed for $0 in either a hero-sale or at a shop.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 20, 2012, 02:56:40 am

Quote from: GalenEvil on October 20, 2012, 01:33:57 am

fun game. Wish i knew what the leveling up does though heh.

Thanks for playing!  :D

I kind of suspected the levelling up mechanic isn't really working at the minute - or that is, it's not very useful or transparent what it actually does.

Essentially, it enables you to view whether an item of a specific type is 'good' quality, or has an 'enchantment'. This can enable you to sell it on for more money (only problem is, only certain people will ALSO know about the quality of the item - so most people will only pay normal price for it anyway, unless they are faction-aligned and of a high enough level.)

Needs a bit of a re-work, to be honest.

The best thing it does for you now is give you an extra life when the monsters are trying to rip your shop down.

Quote from: GalenEvil on October 20, 2012, 01:33:57 am

Small issue with crashing somewhat randomly:

Code: [Select]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8190, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 3688, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1510, in hero_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1064, in sell_items
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 5907, in hero_sale
NameError: global name 'self' is not defined
Caused when trying to buy an item from a hero, saving before accepting any offers is the only way I can prevent losing any progression.
and

Code: [Select]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8193, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 7458, in handle_keys
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6026, in auction_house_welcome
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6446, in auction_house_interface
TypeError: 'int' object is not subscriptable
I think this one was caused by opening up the auction house. It has only happened once though, so not sure how common the problem is.

Only other bug that I have seen is that sometimes an item will be listed for $0 in either a hero-sale or at a shop.

Thanks for the reports! I'll have a look and see if I can figure out what is going on.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: coolio678 on October 20, 2012, 09:35:07 pm

looks cool! I just downloaded it, but I won't have enough time to play a round right now :P. Maybe tomorrow, if I can.

edit: it crashed, unfortunately. I forgot/ don't know how to get a report, but it happened when I accepted a heroes offer for a tunic, if that helps.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 21, 2012, 09:04:02 am

Quote from: coolio678 on October 20, 2012, 09:35:07 pm

looks cool! I just downloaded it, but I won't have enough time to play a round right now :P. Maybe tomorrow, if I can.

edit: it crashed, unfortunately. I forgot/ don't know how to get a report, but it happened when I accepted a heroes offer for a tunic, if that helps.

Ok cool, thanks for the report.

I've been doing most of my own testing without 'accepting offers', as it seemed fairly stable before and allows for an uninterrupted playthrough when I want to make it whizz through.

I suspect I have introduced a bug after adding in the 'PlayerName' variable in lieu of a fixed name but I'll see if I can hunt it down and confirm.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on October 22, 2012, 01:37:03 am

Heros sure have no self-preservation sense.

"Dang, I am wounded... I am several floors too deep... but must keep going!"

Not that, that is inaccurate for many heros. Take away plot armor or secret mentor protecting them from the shadows and a lot of heros would pretty much be dead now.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on October 22, 2012, 03:20:25 am

Yarr... Lost a lvl 4 hero that I was cultivating by constantly sending them and only them on dungeon dives for lootz and they went down to lvl 15 of a dungeon, got badly wounded by some trolls, and then went further down to lvl 19 of this dungeon before being all "screw this I'm leaving" then got ganked on the way back up -____- that ticked me off since I had paid out 200 to the hero before they would accept the mission.

Is the only option to pay the hero before the mission? Or does a post-mission payout option come about if you get to a high enough level?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 22, 2012, 04:13:29 am

Quote from: GalenEvil on October 22, 2012, 03:20:25 am

Yarr... Lost a lvl 4 hero that I was cultivating by constantly sending them and only them on dungeon dives for lootz and they went down to lvl 15 of a dungeon, got badly wounded by some trolls, and then went further down to lvl 19 of this dungeon before being all "screw this I'm leaving" then got ganked on the way back up -____- that ticked me off since I had paid out 200 to the hero before they would accept the mission.

Is the only option to pay the hero before the mission? Or does a post-mission payout option come about if you get to a high enough level?

This isn't implemented yet, unfortunately. The starter position was to try and have a certain element of risk in offering contracts in the first place, and I have only really balanced it on level 1 dungeons and level 1 heroes (lots of starting and restarting - not so much extended playing). I don't think I've seen a level 4 hero in the more recent iterations of this game ...  :)

A post mission payout option sounds reasonable, though, especially when you have worked a lot on your relationship with that particular hero.

Just as a thought, would you prefer to see this tied in to your own level, have it as an option for everyone, or perhaps even tied in to your relationship with the Hero? It certainly seems likely that if you have already engaged the same hero in a number of contracts, they would be far more willing to take you on your word.

At present although you can't really see it, you are building a relationship with all the heroes with certain actions. I just need to work on how that gets implemented.

I could see post-payment being more expensive (perhaps the same level as now? - Are you finding you are sufficiently rewarded with the item haul in general, or do you often feel short-changed?)

It probably needs more nuanced mechanics, and a more transparent 'negotiation' method to boot (how does the player know, for instance, what a reasonable cost for a contract is - especially for sending people to higher level dungeons/monsters?)

Thanks for the feedback - I'll give it some thought ... there is certainly a lot I can afford to do with the contracts to make them more fun.

And I snagged the 'Hero_Sale' bug - One in four times (hence the random nature of it) it was trying to write a random note in the hero journal (a little comment on the purchase e.g. 'My daughter has always wanted one of those.') but referencing the wrong thing to write it to ...

Quote from: Neonivek

Heros sure have no self-preservation sense.

I think I'll tweak the logic for the heroes a little to make them exit the dungeon quicker, also probably make them descend slower. It's just a probability tweak for now, but it will suffice until I do a more extensive rewrite of the dungeon-hero interaction code. Just noticed a 'bruised' hero has a 25% chance to 'descend' ... this probably explains why they are going so deep when they probably shouldn't ...

I'm looking forward to tackling this rewrite, as it opens up all the hero perks and quirks and I also want to use this chance to get the heroes to start using their scrolls and stuff, and more hero-hero interaction. I don't think I have the design quite ready in my head yet, though.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on October 22, 2012, 04:37:11 am

As far as ROI it's a hit and miss venture as it should be with paying up front. Right now my collected stats are showing a 15-20% chance of hero death and thus 0% ROI, about 50% of the remaining is between 75 and 100% ROI (meaning I am pretty much getting what I paid for), and the remainder is between 101 and 200% ROI. It's pretty useful as is for being Pay Up Front.

For Post-mission payouts to work well I think it would need to be: a) relationship as well as hero level based, and b) negotiable if the returned lootz aren't up to standards.
A1) Relationship due to the hero needing to trust that you will have the money you say you will have when they return
A2) Level based so that the hero will be sufficiently leveled to afford to go deep diving to get enough items to be worth a high price.
B1) Negotiable in case they either find way more loot or way less / no loot than asked for.

Items could also have further inherent value to them as loot even if the hero has no clue what they are:
- Things the hero knows he/she will never use are undervalued
- Things the hero uses already and has few of are overvalued
- Things the hero uses but has a lot of are neutrally valued
- Spellbooks could have a higher inherent value to the hero just because they are generally high priced merchandise (had a $95 book given to me with a lot of other stuff on a $50 contract ^_^)

Oh yeah, the negotiation of contracts should definitely be tied in with the player's level. Getting better at retail generally means being a better salesman / negotiator as you go along so it makes sense for it to work in that manner.

I think the best hero I saw was a level 5 hero, but I think he just got really lucky since we kept the dungeons really low leveled and he was just wearing a tunic and a kitchen knife -_- He would have been so much better if he had just stopped by my shop every now and then!

Also, as a shameless plug: I do AI work and would be interested in helping out if you need any help. I work in C# mostly right now, but I can give help and pseudocode if you require.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 23, 2012, 05:10:25 am

Thanks again for the feedback.

It's interesting to see that the contracts seem to be balanced around-about okay, and they are some very nice thoughts to file away for when I approach the contracts in a bit more detail.

Help, particularly in the field of AI, sounds awesome. Something that I have not even tried to approach properly yet, apart from giving the little people a load of things to think about (and then having them not consider much of it). Thanks!

Interestingly, in the 'dev' version, making the heroes behave much more sanely leads to an almost inevitable death of all the dungeons (they are no longer getting the regular influx of monsters associated with hero death). I now need to rebalance things to make sure that doesn't happen.

Ignoring all that difficult thinky stuff, I made the messages come out in pretty colours and gave the Player the ability to 'Tout' for business. You can 'Call Over' any hero (from the individual Hero screen) that is engaging in retail-based activities (the thinking being that you go in to another shop and ask them over to yours, at a penalty to individual reputation with that Hero).

They also pay a small bed-rent if they stay in your shop overnight, and they earn a 'wage' when they are outta town (ostensibly so they have some cash to spend when they return - a most noticeable issue when a hero has been 'raised' - and subsequently has lost all their equipment.)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on October 23, 2012, 06:42:36 am

Quote

Interestingly, in the 'dev' version, making the heroes behave much more sanely leads to an almost inevitable death of all the dungeons (they are no longer getting the regular influx of monsters associated with hero death). I now need to rebalance things to make sure that doesn't happen.

I think that is perfectly fine early in the game as a sort of grace period before dungeons become truely vicious.

One thing I have thought about but doesn't work, simply because heros don't stockpile and this game is about owning a shop, is the possibility of buying up houses. So when a hero who lives in them dies you simply take all their things. Or I guess earn rent.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 23, 2012, 08:21:54 am

Quote from: Neonivek

I think that is perfectly fine early in the game as a sort of grace period before dungeons become truely vicious.

I tend to agree, but with the current dungeon development mechanic, they will never get the chance to become 'strong'. I suppose this could warrant a more developed 'Enemy Strategic Path' to ensure that this doesn't remain true.

Quote from: Neonivek on October 23, 2012, 06:42:36 am

... is the possibility of buying up houses. So when a hero who lives in them dies you simply take all their things. Or I guess earn rent.

I had never thought about that. I'm not averse to it (in fact I quite like the idea) - But I'm thinking it should be something slightly more involved than a simple 'buy once - claim rent forever - big payday on death' thing to be a worthwhile game mechanic to explore.

It would need some reasonable downsides I think, aside from just asking for an up-front payment, to make it more interesting 'in-play'. Hmm. Certainly warrants more thought, and would give me something to do with all that real-estate kicking about in town (they are supposed to be for 'rat-cellars', but I've never quite got round to implementing them ...)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on October 23, 2012, 10:59:31 am

The Monster Hunter contracts might need a little work also. In my last few plays through the game I had a few monsters on screen at once and I was throwing up contracts as soon as they spawned for about $50 each. There were 5 heroes in town shown as healthy that weren't really doing anything but about half of the shops got destroyed (as well as the Auction House) before any of my contracts got taken up. I think that monster hunt contracts might need to take some priority so that the game can last a bit longer or have the heroes more likely to want to kill the monsters sans contract more often. Have only had a single monster get killed outside of a contract before.

What conditions are there currently for a dungeon leveling up? Is it related to hero death count, or the number of monsters? Or something entirely different?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: bluejello on October 23, 2012, 11:18:00 am

Yea, lost a game to a monster attacking, destroying three buildings before me.  For some reason the heroes did no think to kill it.  I also have trouble starting, should I just buy as much as I can or put up contracts?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on October 23, 2012, 11:34:26 am

Quote from: bluejello on October 23, 2012, 11:18:00 am

Yea, lost a game to a monster attacking, destroying three buildings before me.  For some reason the heroes did no think to kill it.  I also have trouble starting, should I just buy as much as I can or put up contracts?

I guess that is just what happes when you have a town full of antiheros.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on October 23, 2012, 11:59:39 am

@bluejello: What I have been doing lately is buying up really cheap stuff and making sure to put in a $1 bid on anything that comes through the auction house. The low bid is because usually I don't have a lot of excess cash lying around aside from what I need to fulfill my open contracts, and if an item isn't bid on by the end of the day it is immediately fed to a dragon and thus destroyed. So I go around to all of the shops and buy up anything less than $10 and then start examining it over the next few days to get their properties revealed to me. Sometimes I get lucky and end up buying something worth $15 - $20 which means I got a really really good deal. Most of the time it is actually worth what I payed for it, and rarely it is something crappy like a kitchen knife or an itchy shirt. Something to watch out for if you go the $1 bid route is to immediately reprice the item if you win since it is put into your shop's inventory for sale at $1. Usually I can get a good profit from doing this, around 10-15 is common with the maximum (that I have gotten) profit of about $80 from a spell book that I jacked the price up on.

@Neonivek: yeah that annoys me, damn antiheroes! They need the shops to sell their lootz to, and to buy more crap! >:( They should all want to gang up on the monsters. If not for fame then for the lootz :D

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 23, 2012, 12:43:47 pm

The hero intelligence question warrants a more detailed response, but in a nutshell - they are REALLY DUMB, and needs work. It's especially highlighted with the monsters, because I haven't put in too many mechanics around them yet.

What the current logic comes down to is basically a dice roll based on only limited inputs, with actions taken once the hero feels comfortable with his outfit. They also only ever attack monsters under the terms of a contract, at the minute.

In the future there should be a few more routes for heroes to attack monsters:

1) 'Goody two shoes' people from the Church, and adventurous Swashbucklers should go for it, for kicks or out of righteousness..
2) The mayor should start crapping his pants and take out a contract on the monsters, opening up a route for the more selfish characters.
3) I would like more conditions, which aren't anywhere near implemented, such as Summoners with a 'Capture Soul' scroll or something, attempt to go and ... capture their soul ...

Presently, they only attack monsters accidentally if they appear in the shop with them and interrupt their browsing.

Quote from: GalenEvil

What conditions are there currently for a dungeon leveling up? Is it related to hero death count, or the number of monsters? Or something entirely different?

Just hero kills at the minute. They need something like 4 level 1 heroes to advance a level (or 1 level 4 hero). This goes up to 8 equivalent to get from level 2 to level 3.

Quote from: bluejello

I also have trouble starting, should I just buy as much as I can or put up contracts?

Contracts are pretty risky, but can pay off well if you are lucky.

It might be worth bearing in mind that you can normally get away with selling things at 120% of their base value. As long as stock keeps moving, you should be able to generally make at least 20% on it (not always true, depending on whether you get the item for a decent price in the first place).

Also keep an eye on heroes 'shopping' and see what they are shopping for. Are they missing one of weapon/clothing/armor? If they are chances are you just need one of those in stock and if its fairly priced the hero will snap it up. You can get a quick turnaround on stuff by nipping over to the Barbarians or the Fighters to buy something in (lower level shops are more likely to price things a bit low, generally speaking). and hopefully quickly flip it for a profit.

Also if you try and keep plenty of stock in, it maximises the chances of a visiting merchant cleaning you out and giving you a good payday.

And yeah, try and examine those things you win from the auction house. It's possible to get, say, a 'summon lost soul' scroll which can shift to the right hands for up to 120 bucks ...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: bluejello on October 23, 2012, 01:07:03 pm

I have noticed that even if people are interested in a item it goes to the dragons on occasion. just them not having enough money on hand, right?

Bug report in the windows version, has happened a couple times.  Buying a offer from a hero (this time a leather armor).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8190, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 3688, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1510, in hero_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1064, in sell_items
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 5907, in hero_sale
NameError: global name 'self' is not defined

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 23, 2012, 01:32:53 pm

Quote from: bluejello on October 23, 2012, 01:07:03 pm

I have noticed that even if people are interested in a item it goes to the dragons on occasion. just them not having enough money on hand, right?

Bug report in the windows version, has happened a couple times.  Buying a offer from a hero (this time a leather armor).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8190, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 3688, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1510, in hero_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1064, in sell_items
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 5907, in hero_sale
NameError: global name 'self' is not defined

Sorry about that bug, it's a typo on my part.  :-[

I'll put up a hotfixed version soon, it's a really silly mistake.

The first one is deliberate, but if you are reporting it as a bug it could maybe be more clear ... Interest at the moment doesn't guarantee a bid (the thinking was that you would just get the rumours of who has been in, looking at the item - not necessarily the total number of bids received - which the Auction House would likely want to keep confidential to maximise their own profits).

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on October 23, 2012, 02:26:41 pm

Just thought of something! Maybe a way to maximize the view sorta like how DF does it? The running message list at the right side of the screen that tells you when heroes buy from you gets cut off a lot of the time. Or maybe just have a way to increase the resolution so that high resolution monitors don't have really small play areas :P

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: bluejello on October 23, 2012, 02:29:30 pm

oh, trying to access the auction house via hotkey crashes the game if the auction house does not exist, makes sense.  And now I lost that level 3 save, ah well, can be expected in early development of a game.

One suggestion: a way to speed up time more than 5 does, and I must be doing something wrong because I have trouble attracting people to my shop, even if it has the lowest prices in town. 


FAKE EDIT: Yea, a increasable resolution would be nice to have, I agree.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 23, 2012, 02:39:51 pm

Quote from: GalenEvil on October 23, 2012, 02:26:41 pm

Just thought of something! Maybe a way to maximize the view sorta like how DF does it? The running message list at the right side of the screen that tells you when heroes buy from you gets cut off a lot of the time. Or maybe just have a way to increase the resolution so that high resolution monitors don't have really small play areas :P

My way of tackling the message issue was going to be - click on either message box to ENLARGE. Right click to shrink.

I could quite easily do a resolution change, in a similar way to Brogue, by having say pgup and pgdn increase / decrease the font that the system is using. This is a good idea, might even mock this up quickly with some scaled versions of the hunderthelden font to see how it looks.

Quote from: bluejello on October 23, 2012, 02:29:30 pm

oh, trying to access the auction house via hotkey crashes the game if the auction house does not exist, makes sense.  And now I lost that level 3 save, ah well, can be expected in early development of a game.

Sorry man :( it kills me that there are people ACTUALLY playing this, and it's not working quite properly :)

(I have already fixed this in the dev version, I think)

Quote

One suggestion: a way to speed up time more than 5 does, and I must be doing something wrong because I have trouble attracting people to my shop, even if it has the lowest prices in town. 

You aint doing anything wrong, it's just that people aren't 'attracted' to your shop by anything more than chance at the minute. More 'dumb hero' stuff.

I had thought about a variable fast-forward function, it shouldn't be too much to ask I don't think. I'll jot it down to make sure I don't forget.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.10 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on October 23, 2012, 05:17:47 pm

There could also be guards Mendonca who only attack town monsters. Plus possible walls.

That would be a great way town money could matter, but at the same time. Guards are clearly inferior to other heros.

---

Also possible idea for giving dungeons more time. Give heros longer recovery periods. Comming back wounded could put them out for a long time. That also allows you to have more heros in town.

Either that or make it so dungeons are less uniform. So that no starting hero can reasonably beat even a starting dungeon (but yeah that isn't exactly a fix >_<) because the final floors ramp up the difficulty. Either that or floors need to be "defeated" and heros who arn't powerful enough can lose time trying to finish a very difficult floor.

Final possible idea is also allowing dungeons to be "seeds" so to speak... or rather dungeons can just sit there closed and open more powerful then normal.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 25, 2012, 05:49:04 pm

Found a bit of time to post up a small release which should squash the couple of silly gamebreakers in there.

Also adds a few small new things, just to keep any thoughts of complete stability in question.

Release Notes

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

v0.11
*Hero 'AI' tweaks (returning heroes should be a little more dynamic, tweaked ascend / descend probabilities)
*Bugfix - occasional crash when hero wanted to make a note of the item they just bought from the player
*Possible bugfix if Auction House has been destroyed (shouldn't be able to try and enter via 'a' key)
*Colour coded messages
*Can now 'Call over' heroes. Tout for business for those engaging in retail-based activities. Cost to personal reputation with Hero.
*Can cycle through text sizes with PAGEUP to 'change resolution'
*Variable game speed (four speeds from slow to daft)
*Re-balanced game on new hero behaviours

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: bluejello on October 25, 2012, 10:20:34 pm

For contracts, there should be a way to cancel it after posting it. would be a nice feature to have if you can no longer pay the contract or do not want to have it pop up when you are going to not accept it anyways. 

Score of 266, died to the tax man, evil being that he is.  Highest score I have got yet, survived until April 1... 

There was a period of time where there was only one dungeon, but that did not last long.  Had a couple contracts not pay out, most ended up even and a couple came out ahead so decent risk vs reward for contract that time.

No crashes, but I think I saw my money go up a couple times for no apparent reason, couldn't find out what caused it though.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 26, 2012, 12:25:35 am

Quote from: bluejello on October 25, 2012, 10:20:34 pm

...

Cool :) nice score!

I agree on the contract thing, one thing that I haven't got round to putting in yet. It'll likely go in when I do more on contracts again, hopefully soonish.

Oh yeah, and Heroes now have to pay a small rent if they stay overnight at your shop ...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on October 26, 2012, 01:32:38 am

I will say that the start of the game is both too slow and too fast at the same time.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lemmily on October 28, 2012, 03:57:36 pm

This is so strange - this idea is practically(not quite) what I've been wanting to make for a while now. Though my programming skills are WAY too low to really get any kind of result. Though seeing your game though has inspired me to try making some little prototypes. I've now got some "heroes" wandering around a map! So thanks for the inspiration - it is my first try at making some kind of "AI" (I really feel like AI is a little extreme a name for it right now though, haha)

I definitely want to see what you do next with this.

I found some of the interfaces a little confusing, and when heroes make offers to you I was trying to slow the time down etc, but refused the offer - it might be wise to change it from any button refusing it. Also I couldn't tell which shop was mine - am I being blind? I kinda liek the idea of knowing which one is your :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 29, 2012, 04:20:31 am

Quote from: lemmily on October 28, 2012, 03:57:36 pm

I found some of the interfaces a little confusing, and when heroes make offers to you I was trying to slow the time down etc, but refused the offer - it might be wise to change it from any button refusing it. Also I couldn't tell which shop was mine - am I being blind? I kinda liek the idea of knowing which one is your :)

That's a good point regarding the offers. I'll make a note to change this. Any specific issues with specific interfaces, or just general all round confusion? Any thoughts as to what in particular you are struggling with?

Your shop is the 'bright yellow' one, as compared to the other blue shops. I tried to make it stand out from the others, with the additional option of entering your shop by pressing 'i'.

Thanks for the feedback, and likewise, I'd be interested to see progress if/when you get anywhere with your project and are willing to share :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lemmily on October 29, 2012, 08:10:55 am

I can't put my finger on what it was really, it may have just been getting used to it. As soon as I'm aware why I'll tell you :) for now, just keep making cool things! :D

I played it again today and also noticed that 5 is speed up and 6 is slow down, I naturally go for the right hand side to speed up and left to slow down, not entirely sure if that's just me though :D

and yes, I see the yellow shop :) .

Oh my project probably won't ever reach public eyes :P I'm making it in AS3, and I've only been half heartedly learning it(AS3 and programming in general) for 7ish months! But if it ever gets anywhere I'll give it a share :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on October 29, 2012, 12:23:56 pm

Quote from: lemmily on October 29, 2012, 08:10:55 am

I can't put my finger on what it was really, it may have just been getting used to it. As soon as I'm aware why I'll tell you :) for now, just keep making cool things! :D

Thanks! I do try and make it at least semi-sensible, if you feel like letting me know what gets you down at any point, I'm all ears :)

Quote from: lemmily

I played it again today and also noticed that 5 is speed up and 6 is slow down, I naturally go for the right hand side to speed up and left to slow down, not entirely sure if that's just me though :D

Yeah, yeah ... you know '5' for ... fast and ... '6' for slow ???

Okay, I admit. It was completely arbitrary (probably based on the order I added them to the key handling function, rather than any appliance of common sense), and in truth I have often thought about why they were the wrong way round, without doing anything about it.

Quote from: lemmily

Oh my project probably won't ever reach public eyes :P I'm making it in AS3, and I've only been half heartedly learning it(AS3 and programming in general) for 7ish months! But if it ever gets anywhere I'll give it a share :)

Ok, cool. Good luck with it, nevertheless!

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on January 03, 2013, 06:17:04 am

Thanks everyone that voted for 100 Heroes in the ROTY poll!

It's fair to say that I was thrilled that I got another vote (other than mine), let alone another 10, and I can't help but think some people might have voted for this game by accident  :)

I've set up a blog with the intention of jotting down thoughts for the development of the game over the next year, as well as posting about any further progress that gets made (although I imagine a new addition to the family in a couple of months might get in the way somewhat).

But for now, I'm trying to use it to spread a bit of love for some of the Roguelikes which performed about as well as 100 Heroes. I'm going to be posting about PRIME, Steam Marines, Rogue's Tale, LambdaRogue and Cargo Commander as I have a play about with them over the next few weeks or so.

Honourable mention also to Castle Dungeon, which I can't play as it is Kindle only.

Check it out here:

http://hundredheroes.blogspot.co.uk/

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Minstrel on January 07, 2013, 09:19:42 am

I read your blog posts over the holidays - great writing. It's good to see more interesting people writing about roguelikes.

As for the game: I will check it out again tonight when I come back from work. My new responsibilities along with my MA thesis leave me little time to rogue'n'roll.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on January 07, 2013, 11:26:26 am

Congrats on the new addition to the family incoming mendonca! I am working on a new pathfinding algorithm to work with fully procedural content that is coming along promisingly. I also got a new laptop so will hopefully be able to actually do what I offered soon :P I will need to redownload the source since I think that got wiped in the old laptop's HDD crash, which means that all of my notes vanished with it :(

Good luck all around, with the familyMembers++, your bloggity, and with the game :) Hopefully it doesn't take a year to bring it to v1.0 :D

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on January 08, 2013, 02:30:35 am

I am always happy when the Roguelike genre is expanded to incapsulate new things. Rather then the same things with stuff tacked on.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on January 08, 2013, 04:05:26 am

Quote from: Minstrel on January 07, 2013, 09:19:42 am

I read your blog posts over the holidays - great writing. It's good to see more interesting people writing about roguelikes.

As for the game: I will check it out again tonight when I come back from work. My new responsibilities along with my MA thesis leave me little time to rogue'n'roll.

Thank you!

If you mean Rogue's Tale, I would recommend giving it a shot. It's brutal, though, and once you accept the fact that only a fraction of characters will leave the first level (that fraction seems to be higher for me if I start off with high agility) then it is enjoyable.

There is a high level of polish though and its easy to play - so there isn't the normal friction associated with actually playing the game. It eases the pain somewhat.

Quote from: GalenEvil on January 07, 2013, 11:26:26 am

Congrats on the new addition to the family incoming mendonca! I am working on a new pathfinding algorithm to work with fully procedural content that is coming along promisingly. I also got a new laptop so will hopefully be able to actually do what I offered soon :P I will need to redownload the source since I think that got wiped in the old laptop's HDD crash, which means that all of my notes vanished with it :(

Good luck all around, with the familyMembers++, your bloggity, and with the game :) Hopefully it doesn't take a year to bring it to v1.0 :D

That sounds rather interesting! As in, pathing through arbitrary 3d spaces? Any links to show off progress, or is it all behind closed doors?

And thanks for the good wishes! I would really like to get some more progress on the game done so I can show it off to the little 'un, but I suppose I probably have at least four years before it will mean anything to them :)

Quote from: Neonivek on January 08, 2013, 02:30:35 am

I am always happy when the Roguelike genre is expanded to incapsulate new things. Rather then the same things with stuff tacked on.

Hear hear. There's nothing more depressing to me than somebody taking the time out of their day to declare something which is clearly related to the Rogue family of games (for whatever reasons) isn't actually a Roguelike. See ToME coverage on RPS (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/01/07/tome-is-where-the-heart-is-happy-new-roguelike/) yesterday for a wonderful example - there were several comments declaring that is wasn't, in fact, a Roguelike.

I suspect we are at a time now when a significant portion of the people who play / develop / follow Roguelikes have never actually played Rogue (I know I haven't) and therefore - to me - as time moves on drawing a line based on the obvious origin of the term 'Rogue-like' becomes increasingly meaningless. It's probably an inclusive vs. exclusive viewpoint.

I could probably go on for a while about this, but I won't.

The point is I wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment.

On a slightly related note, a post has gone up on my blog today regarding Cargo Commander (http://hundredheroes.blogspot.co.uk/), which is pretty fair game for NOT being a Roguelike. But 10 people thought it was one of the best Roguelikes of 2012, so that's good enough for me. It's a very fun game, funny, and well designed - but too fast-paced for my addled brain.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on January 08, 2013, 07:42:21 pm

Quote from: mendonca on January 08, 2013, 04:05:26 am

That sounds rather interesting! As in, pathing through arbitrary 3d spaces? Any links to show off progress, or is it all behind closed doors?

It can support arbitrary 3D spaces, but currently I am restricting it to just 2D since I need to work out a few kinks still. It's not really behind closed doors, but it currently uses waaaay too much CPU time since it is doing some path smoothing and that part is rather inefficient hehe.
If you have a windows computer you'll be able to see the current demo here (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/108102506/Random%20Cool%20Stuff/NPCLife/NodeGraphTest_Spirograph2/NodeGraphTest_Spirograph2.html). It's not much to look at since I haven't worked on speeding up node generation enough to make it work with larger areas. There are I think 500 entities pathing around the grid avoiding the obstructions in their way. They do not currently avoid each other though, which will be needed for a later stage in the AI development. The threading system also isn't optimized which tends to increase CPU usage a bit as well. Runs my Dual core desktop up to 90% load and my Quad core laptop to 70% load.

I will post up a new version in the next few days once I get the current kinks worked out. Hopefully it will be able to support an area some 5-10x larger than the current with a lower CPU time usage :D

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Minstrel on January 21, 2013, 07:13:59 am

Replayed this again. Man, I wish there was a way to predict what the heroes will need so I can grab some bestsellers from the auction house or buy out my opponents stock and sell it for more.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on January 21, 2013, 11:12:56 am

Quote from: Minstrel on January 21, 2013, 07:13:59 am

Replayed this again. Man, I wish there was a way to predict what the heroes will need so I can grab some bestsellers from the auction house or buy out my opponents stock and sell it for more.

Cool stuff! Glad to hear you're playing it again :)

You can predict, in a fashion, what any particular Hero might want by inspecting their inventory. They basically try and sate a desire for 1 no. weapon, 1 no. armor and 1 no. clothing. If they are short one of those, you can be pretty sure that is what they are shopping for.

There is a chance (if the Hero belongs to a scroll using faction) that they will be looking for a scroll, so if they are 'shopping' and they appear to be adequately equipped - they are probably after a scroll.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Minstrel on January 22, 2013, 05:59:16 pm

Hmm, will try that tomorrow morning when I will have a bit of time for viedogames.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Mephansteras on January 24, 2013, 09:36:44 pm

Sounds neat. I'll have try it out.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on March 18, 2013, 08:41:57 pm

I'm really liking this game, but I keep getting a bug when I try to go to the Auction house. (I've seen this in 4 of 5 games, usually sometime in Feb.)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8331, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 7587, in handle_keys
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6129, in auction_house_welcome
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6549, in auction_house_interface
TypeError: 'int' object is not subscriptable

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on March 19, 2013, 07:34:33 am

Quote from: lecavian on March 18, 2013, 08:41:57 pm

I'm really liking this game, but I keep getting a bug when I try to go to the Auction house. (I've seen this in 4 of 5 games, usually sometime in Feb.)

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 8331, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 7587, in handle_keys
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6129, in auction_house_welcome
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 6549, in auction_house_interface
TypeError: 'int' object is not subscriptable

I think a monster may have sacked the auction house, as you seem to be trying to enter using the keyboard, and it's possible it isn't there anymore. I'm pretty sure I've fixed this little annoyance up in my version, I'll make an effort in the next few days to try and get it up - although there may be not be many changes - my 2 week old daughter isn't too keen on me wasting my spare time coding, and I doubt she will be for a while, so I'll do it anyway.

Thanks for the feedback, it's nice to hear people playing this! :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: GalenEvil on March 19, 2013, 09:03:46 am

:O Congrats on the new addition to the family! ^_^

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on March 19, 2013, 06:47:24 pm

I'm glad you're still developing it... and I totally understand as far as your daughter is concerned.

I was most interested in this game because I had been working with a concept (circa 2002) that was sort of similiar, but I couldn't figure out a way to make it compelling.  In my concept, you played a God -- but the shop keeper is probably alot more interesting.  Unfortunately, my game was written to run within a mud-engine (MUDOS or LIMA) and think that's mostly out-of-style now.  Anyway, recently picked up libtcod and saw your game referenced in some forums.

Really great job -- even if I'm pretty awful at the game so far..

I think the bug is happening when the auction house runs out of items and I still try to enter it anyway...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on March 20, 2013, 01:56:04 pm

Well think about it Lecavian a shopkeeper is almost ingenius.

Think about any RPG (Either videogame or Pen and Paper) and what was always at the center of every single campaign?

The Shops!

You could essentially control entire adventures just by how you run your shops if you tried.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on March 20, 2013, 07:25:27 pm

Yeah, so true.  Really wish I had thought of it.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on March 21, 2013, 02:14:07 pm

I've seen a few RPG shop games and one where you affect the flow of battle with your shop (but to be truthful that game feels more like you are equipping them rather then you are selling them things, heck you even take THEIR loot) yet none of them take the sort of possition this game does.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: alamoes on March 23, 2013, 10:05:53 am

I love this game.  I claim the high score.  I lost to incompetence.  My inventory was full of items that would bring me a nice profit.  I had just barely enough gold for the item in question.  I bought it.  Then I looked at the date.  It was the 30th, and the taxman took away all my stuff as punishment for incompetency at the end of the month.  Could we have a bank?  A guy who gives out loans, so you don't automatically lose when your goods are worth more than taxes. 

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

(http://i1321.photobucket.com/albums/u555/alomoes/HighScore_zps086c1573.png)

I claim the High Score for this game.  You should never use the contracts.  Just buy stuff from the merchants and guilds.  And never forget to identify items. 

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on March 23, 2013, 01:18:15 pm

Furthest I got was late August, but I managed to crash before I could get a high score.  I think I had levelled up 4 or 5 times.  Heroes were absolutely destroying dungeons (within a day or two of the dungeon being opened), which seemed sort of strange.  It had been about a month since the last time I had seen an item I hadn't identified.

Sooo... yeah, I really love it... and the "just one more day" or just "one more month" appeal is really strong.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: alamoes on March 23, 2013, 07:47:53 pm

Dang it, you got to August, I need to beat that. 

Edit: I played another game and the monsters got me in July.  Of note is a bug.  I found a weapon and a scroll worth zero gold.  I made 40 gold with the scroll. 

It was interesting, as my heroes seemed to be made out of glass this run.  They died extremely often.  The first monster to spawn rampaged through the town, destroying about half in mid march. 

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: forsaken1111 on March 23, 2013, 09:51:20 pm

ptw. this looks interesting

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on March 24, 2013, 09:08:23 am

alamoes, congratulations on the high score, that truly is phenomenal! :)

And also, lecavian, I'm really happy and a little surprised this game made it to August! I love it :D

From a development point of view, I am all for 'banks' as a core feature. Sounds pretty reasonable. I'll get to thinking about the cost of borrowed money and the circumstances upon which the town money lender will lend you money, but that sounds like a good idea.

It's also evident that I will need a good few hours to re-acquaint myself with the code (I haven't looked at it in 4 months or so) and needless to say any further development isn't going to happen particularly quickly, at the moment (busy work and homelife) but I love to see people actually playing this, and it gives me massive amounts of motivation to actually work on it! (If only I could lose my job!  ;))

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on March 27, 2013, 05:38:51 pm

Good news... it is possible to make it to the 2nd year. ;-)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Mictlantecuhtli on March 31, 2013, 09:54:12 pm

PTW since I just tried this and it scratches quite an itch.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 03, 2013, 03:50:57 am

Thanks for showing interest, guys :)

I'm getting back in to the swing of things again here, funny how it seems to go in 6 month cycles. Setting aside half an hour to an hour a day to plug away at new code.

Currently in the process of breaking the hero 'AI' to put it back together again. Starting to implement sales metrics, a town overseer (The Mayoress), rewriting contracts (including generic non-seen contracts implemented via the mayoress and her noticeboard) as well as personality-based decision making and augmentations to shops (might manifest as simple 'signs' in the first instance). It will need a whole new dungeon-crawling set of logic as well, and I am tending towards keeping heroes in town far more than currently. Drivers to go underground should come from the needs of the town - or for glory-seeking heroes (Barbarians) but by and large a Mage would be stupid to go down on their own just for kicks (unless the drive for knowledge can't be met by the shops in town).

Also trying to design a system so that heroes group together and go down in Parties, but not outside of concept for that one yet.

Remains to be seen how it will all work, but hopefully you will start to see real patterns emerging in the behaviour of certain types of heroes in the town, directly affected by the behaviour of your shop (e.g. social heroes will be more inclined to visit busy shops, antisocial heroes will be more inclined to visit quiet shops etc.) and things like contracts will be more useful (if not necessary) to get any signficant dungeon / hero behaviour.

(Unchecked dungeons will be dangerous as they generate monsters, but on the other hand the Mayoress should also exist to try and deal with those, with the available resources of the town).

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 03, 2013, 04:15:45 am

Does that mean dungeons will be bigger and tougher to beat in general?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 03, 2013, 04:22:31 am

Quote from: Neonivek on April 03, 2013, 04:15:45 am

Does that mean dungeons will be bigger and tougher to beat in general?

Yeah, I think they will have to be. First things will probably be allowing the dungeon a bit more recovery time between visits (due to reduced delving), and adding in a few higher level monsters in to the pot. Long term, I'll try and rebuild dungeons wholesale so it's a bit of an open question. Definitely in principle, though, yes.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lemmily on April 03, 2013, 04:51:17 pm

Quote from: mendonca on April 03, 2013, 03:50:57 am

Setting aside half an hour to an hour a day to plug away at new code.

Hooray! :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Mictlantecuhtli on April 03, 2013, 05:18:54 pm

Quote from: lemmily on April 03, 2013, 04:51:17 pm

Quote from: mendonca on April 03, 2013, 03:50:57 am

Setting aside half an hour to an hour a day to plug away at new code.

Hooray! :)

x2

Still watching this intently.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on April 03, 2013, 08:07:36 pm

I'm very excited as well.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Cheesecake on April 04, 2013, 02:40:53 am

PTW. By the way, good job.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on April 05, 2013, 04:05:23 pm

For those who are enthusiastic, check out Mendoca's blog post about the Mayoress... which sounds really interesting.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: professorlamp on April 05, 2013, 08:19:32 pm

Irritating suggestion:

Support the numpad, I just spent a minute mumbling and grumbling to myself before trying the top row of numbers :D

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 09, 2013, 08:52:44 am

Thanks for the overall enthusiasm, guys and gals :)

professorlamp: Yes indeed. Not so much an irritating suggestion, as a sensible suggestion that perhaps highlights my own ignorance? I'll get right on it, sir!

lecavian: Ha! I wasn't sure whether anybody actually checked the blog :D Works as somewhere to put down my thoughts, at the very least, even if it doesn't immediately satisfy my insatiable desire for overwhelming attention ...

Just done a quick check, as I seem to be typing an awful lot of code and not getting anywhere. Hopefully the new brains will be in place shortly*, all at a cost of about a 10 - 15% increase in the total amount of code (allowing for the deprecation of many unwieldy functions) ... I just hope it works as intended!

*in geological terms, at least

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 09, 2013, 08:58:28 pm

Honestly for dungeons I always suspected they would have depth (as in multiple floors) so to stop the recovery problem you could make deeper floors entirely unaffected and not only that but the less a dungeon is explored the quicker it recovers.

That way heros cannot chip a dungeon to death.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 10, 2013, 04:31:01 am

Quote from: Neonivek on April 09, 2013, 08:58:28 pm

Honestly for dungeons I always suspected they would have depth (as in multiple floors) so to stop the recovery problem you could make deeper floors entirely unaffected and not only that but the less a dungeon is explored the quicker it recovers.

That way heros cannot chip a dungeon to death.

I agree entirely.

My problem at the minute is both designing a system I am happy (and comfortable) to implement, and finding the time to do it. Also want to implement a lot more variety in the dungeons, the new hero behaviour should make it a lot easier for me to slot this sort of thing in, as well as clever things like variable hero literacy - which would be reflected by the way the heroes report what they are discovering in the dungeons. It could probably be quite simple to implement a simple 'depth' to the dungeons with more defined populations of monsters, but it will undoubtedly open a can of worms in my brain - which I would like to handle more properly.

Personally, I think the current arbitrary system works reasonably well (or well enough) within the context of the game such that I think I would prioritise a few other things: a full mouse interface, more interesting contracts, more detailed monitoring of world evil/chaos measures and town / shop industry - thinking more towards accessibility and making the progress of the game a few months in a little more interesting.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 11, 2013, 04:08:29 am

I decided to just try running the thing ... and by and large, it works.

I've recorded a short video of some gameplay at present - doesn't look much different from now, but I'm hoping the new system of hero decision making will be far more extensible and robust than the hack-job we had before.

http://youtu.be/tfVS3rmNsxM (http://youtu.be/tfVS3rmNsxM)

I've also added a few words to my blog about the way the heroes work - should be fun trying to think of things that the heroes can get up to.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on April 11, 2013, 11:47:05 pm

Wow, pleasantly suprised at the amount of work that's been done -- and the video is great for demonstrating the state of things..

I think you were just trying to show the features in your video - so I don't expect your play in the video to be the way the game should be played (didn't ID, not bidding on auctions), but I want to ask a design question that has been tickling my mind...

When I was playing, I did everything I could to make sure I identified something every month -- with the # of items in the game, I knew most everything by the beginning of the second year.  I guess there are three ways to manage this: increase # of items, decrease the frequency of ID, or make ID more difficult.  Which do you think you'll pursue or is there another game design element that may work better to resolve the issue of the keeper knowing too much too fast.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 14, 2013, 04:53:44 am

Quote from: lecavian on April 11, 2013, 11:47:05 pm

When I was playing, I did everything I could to make sure I identified something every month -- with the # of items in the game, I knew most everything by the beginning of the second year.  I guess there are three ways to manage this: increase # of items, decrease the frequency of ID, or make ID more difficult.  Which do you think you'll pursue or is there another game design element that may work better to resolve the issue of the keeper knowing too much too fast.

That's a really good question.

I'm pretty sure that increasing the number of items will be part of that - but I have been toying conceptually with resolving this largely by changing the identification mechanics (without really deciding how I want to do it). I'm not convinced the micro-manage click-click-click every day mechanic is thoroughly entertaining, and will be even less so when there are a significantly increased number of items and therefore each successful identification action is less rewarding.

I might have identification dealt with automatically by 'backroom staff', letting them examine anything you have in stock. Possibly boosted if you choose to take the 'library' as one of your 'extra rooms' to build within your shop.

That would supersede the current leveling mechanic - so I don't really know what would replace it - maybe more generalist shopkeeping (or industry) skills.

So ... I don't really know  :). And I'm resisting touching it too much at the minute prior to figuring out a whole other bunch of mechanics.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 14, 2013, 05:05:00 am

Don't forget the Bards swinging by to offer to identify your stuff for a fee.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on April 14, 2013, 11:45:23 am

Cool.  I'm sure I'll ask other questions as they pop into mind.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: forsaken1111 on April 16, 2013, 03:50:22 pm

Quote from: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

Which flash game?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 16, 2013, 03:52:20 pm

Quote from: forsaken1111 on April 16, 2013, 03:50:22 pm

Quote from: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

Which flash game?

The one that plays like a Facebook game... In that you need to collect people to gain an advantage.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lemmily on April 16, 2013, 04:09:57 pm

Quote from: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

I heartily enjoyed reccettear, but i felt it lacked something :/ maybe the "adventuring" just got old.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 17, 2013, 08:17:27 am

Quote from: lemmily on April 16, 2013, 04:09:57 pm

Quote from: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

I heartily enjoyed reccettear, but i felt it lacked something :/ maybe the "adventuring" just got old.

Yeah, love it to bits, but I can't seem to return to it after a couple of (in game) days playing it.

Suppose it quickly becomes apparent that it's a pretty much a massive grind or something. Lovely game though, lots of character.

I would love to know the name of that Kongregate flash game, if anybody had it to hand.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Zangi on April 17, 2013, 08:55:13 am

Quote from: forsaken1111 on April 16, 2013, 03:50:22 pm

Quote from: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

Which flash game?

Ah, I tried looking it up in my play history when I first posted about it.  Just remembered part of the name and looked that up.

Swords and Potions (http://www.kongregate.com/games/EdgebeeStudios/swords-potions?acomplete=sword)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: lemmily on April 17, 2013, 06:04:20 pm

Quote from: mendonca on April 17, 2013, 08:17:27 am

Quote from: lemmily on April 16, 2013, 04:09:57 pm

Quote from: Zangi on April 16, 2013, 10:30:29 am

PTW, this is similar to a Kongregate flash game and Recettear...

I heartily enjoyed reccettear, but i felt it lacked something :/ maybe the "adventuring" just got old.

Yeah, love it to bits, but I can't seem to return to it after a couple of (in game) days playing it.

Suppose it quickly becomes apparent that it's a pretty much a massive grind or something. Lovely game though, lots of character.

I would love to know the name of that Kongregate flash game, if anybody had it to hand.

I got really frustrated because I never worked out how to go to a different dungeon so it was really boring doing it over and over. But I was determined to enjoy the game so I did play quite a while. I think discovering the new items/recipes etc was something that I really enjoyed and kept me playing though.

I just tried that swords and potions game. It's yet another free to play/pay to "win"/collect people games. Unfortunately. :(

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 17, 2013, 06:10:01 pm

How about the fact that not only is dungeon diving pointless after the second dungeon... but that ignoring dungeons altogether is the easiest way to earn money.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 19, 2013, 03:43:26 am

Quote from: alamoes on March 23, 2013, 10:05:53 am

A guy who gives out loans, so you don't automatically lose when your goods are worth more than taxes. 

For now, you can Pawn items to the auction house (for a fraction of their value) at any time.

Was an easy addition, should have thought about it before, and hopefully should be a nice stop-gap prior to proper moneylending.

In other news, for those interested, progress is going pretty well to a new release.

Won't look a great deal different, but the hero behaviours are far more intricate, and I'm quite happy with the way it is working generally.

e.g. I set up a scroll shop in town - filled it full of scrolls - and got quite a lot of business from Necromancers, Summoners and Mages swinging buy [sic. heh nice typo] to see what the fuss is all about.

Contracts seem to be working fairly robustly, get generated independently of the player, and dungeons are a little more interesting (was funny reading a hero's log as he repeatedly expressed frustration at being 'lost' in the dungeon ...). I have added a pretty simple 'fixed' feature to each floor level (generated on discovery by a hero) which needs fattening up a bit, but introduces things like trapdoors, traps, 'puzzles', treasure rooms, evil altars etc.

Some of the features also generate 'Rumours' back in town - nothing done here yet but the intention is to allow the rumours to generate 'Special Missions' for adequately equipped heroes.

Monsters don't work either, and balance is all to-cock, but I'm pretty happy with it so far.

Chug chug chugging along ...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.11 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 22, 2013, 03:06:52 am

I think we'll call this a release:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/66536185/ahundredheroes015exe.zip <- EXE

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/66536185/ahundredheroes015py.zip <- PY SOURCE

Release Notes (Not entirely detailed):

Code: [Select]

v0.15
*Hero AI rewrite, each guild gets different personalities based on Loot, Wealth, Leadership, Balance, Contracts, Glory, Social and Knowledge

*Sales metrics introduced to better inform hero sales decisions, personality based; generally:
-> Balance: Heroes seek out unpopular shops
-> Wealth: Heroes seek out popular shops, lots of sales
-> Loot: Heroes seek out shops, lots of purchases
-> Social: Heroes seek out popular shops, attendance

*Heroes come to town more often if the contract list is well populated (i.e. lots of work available)
*Dungeon crawling logic rewritten based on contracts and personalities
*Phases of operation for heroes should clear up behaviour a little;
*Better transparency for hero decision making in general
*Basis laid for Mayoress, noticeboard, and contracts, implemented in part.
*Some rumours started, but no effects on behaviour yet.
*Contracts moved to a new class, data storage and methods etc.
*Monsters moved to new contract / decision flow system.
*Dungeons expanded slightly, with floor by floor features that can de discovered, with different effects for each feature.
*First pass on game balance for new systems. (might be a bit out - happy to take comments)
*Numpad works where numbers are viable input.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: forsaken1111 on April 22, 2013, 07:34:05 am

Don't put code tags in spoilers. It makes it too tiny to read.

Very cool that you release the source along with each release. I'll take a look when I get home. :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 22, 2013, 10:52:45 am

Quote from: forsaken1111 on April 22, 2013, 07:34:05 am

Don't put code tags in spoilers. It makes it too tiny to read.

Ha! So it does ...

Quote from: forsaken1111 on April 22, 2013, 07:34:05 am

Very cool that you release the source along with each release. I'll take a look when I get home. :)

If you have the time, I'd be interested to know your thoughts :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: forsaken1111 on April 22, 2013, 05:46:22 pm

Grabbing it now!

I'll be playing pretty much blind but will let you know what I think.

Edit: First feedback... fixed resolution. The window is incredibly small on my 1080x1920 monitor. Hard to read the font. :)
Edit2: A minor point. When pressing S to add 5 to your bid, I feel like it should set the price at 5 instead of 6. Maybe have the bid default to zero? It adds an extra keypress if I want to bid in multiples of 5 as I have to then subtract the default 1.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on April 22, 2013, 07:32:47 pm

So cool.... especially noticed all the configurablish files in the directories.  I haven't had a chance to play yet, but I'm salivating.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Brotato on April 22, 2013, 08:48:03 pm

For some reason that link isn't working for me.  Is that website down or something?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 23, 2013, 01:58:11 am

Quote from: Brotato on April 22, 2013, 08:48:03 pm

For some reason that link isn't working for me.  Is that website down or something?

It's just a dropbox link, might have been down.

Alternate download location here:

http://www.zen102301.zen.co.uk/100heroes/ahundredheroes015py.zip <- source
http://www.zen102301.zen.co.uk/100heroes/ahundredheroes015exe.zip <- Exe

Quote from: forsaken1111 on April 22, 2013, 05:46:22 pm

Grabbing it now!

I'll be playing pretty much blind but will let you know what I think.

Edit: First feedback... fixed resolution. The window is incredibly small on my 1080x1920 monitor. Hard to read the font. :)

You can press PGUP whilst playing to cycle the fonts, as set within the ./data/init/available_fonts.txt (with the font files set in ./fonts/*.png dir)

The default font sizes are 10x10, 12x12, 15x15 and 20x20. You could grab a compliant libtcod-style PNG font file and use your own, if you wanted.

End result is a larger display, the game boots with the 10x10 font size by default. I should really make that an option on the main introduction menu (it isn't at the minute) - and also make it pretty clear that you CAN do that.

Quote from: forsaken1111 on April 22, 2013, 05:46:22 pm

Edit2: A minor point. When pressing S to add 5 to your bid, I feel like it should set the price at 5 instead of 6. Maybe have the bid default to zero? It adds an extra keypress if I want to bid in multiples of 5 as I have to then subtract the default 1.

Yeah, I had considered that. I figured the distinction is pretty arbitrary, and 6 is as good as 5 really, but I'll give it some thought.

E: There is also a manual of sorts (manual.txt in the game directory). Might be worth a quick read to get a feel for the things you can and can't do.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: forsaken1111 on April 23, 2013, 06:33:45 am

Good to know. I'll give it some more time this afternoon, didn't have a lot of time yesterday.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 23, 2013, 06:49:59 am

Quote from: lecavian on April 22, 2013, 07:32:47 pm

So cool.... especially noticed all the configurablish files in the directories.  I haven't had a chance to play yet, but I'm salivating.

Hey sorry, just noticed this post :)

The files are really an effort to externalise a lot of the data, as it was becoming a nightmare to modify that within the body of the code.

You could, if you were so inclined, modify pretty much any file within the data/ directories and everything should work okay - assuming you stick to the general parsing layout for the particular data structures used (it's brought in via YAML).

Adding more writing / items / monsters is probably my next task, after playing it a few dozen more times and trying to nail down any irritating bugs and feeding back in some more figures in to the nebulous 'balance' of the game.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Zangi on April 23, 2013, 10:43:00 pm

Finally put some time into this.

Needs more contracting stuff.
For some reason, heroes don't want to ever take 'my' contracts for the '1st/default' dungeon.  Mind you, I have 4 or 5 of em up and they are all for taking loot for me.
Then, they all seem to offer me contracts for loot in the '3rd' dungeon and take those contracts too.

Also, would be pretty cool to have some sort of memorial... maybe.

I'll have to eventually go through the thread and read your posts to figure what the general design decisions are.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 23, 2013, 11:34:02 pm

...

Note: I edited out the suggestion because I do WAAAAAY too much of that.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 24, 2013, 04:21:21 am

Quote from: Zangi on April 23, 2013, 10:43:00 pm

For some reason, heroes don't want to ever take 'my' contracts for the '1st/default' dungeon.  Mind you, I have 4 or 5 of em up and they are all for taking loot for me.
Then, they all seem to offer me contracts for loot in the '3rd' dungeon and take those contracts too.

I suspect (based on what I have seen as well) that a $10 item hunt is seen as a sour deal by the heroes (assuming you went with the default price). They will only take a contract if they feel 'safe' enough to do it, modified by price. I'll do some more tests on this, but it's possible that $10 rarely is seen as 'safe' enough. Probably just another $5 would be enough to tip the balance.

It's also possible that there are just better deals out there, when a hero feels like they want to actually do an item hunt (they go for the best price contract generally).

I also suspect (haven't checked the code yet) that heroes can 'petition' the player (like they do other shops), and I didn't put in the checks that I thought I did to stop this.

Quote from: Zangi on April 23, 2013, 10:43:00 pm

Also, would be pretty cool to have some sort of memorial... maybe.

Yeah, I like it. Not sure what I could do here, but I like it.

Thanks for the thoughts :)

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Zangi on April 24, 2013, 09:08:37 am

Quote from: mendonca on April 24, 2013, 04:21:21 am

Quote from: Zangi on April 23, 2013, 10:43:00 pm

For some reason, heroes don't want to ever take 'my' contracts for the '1st/default' dungeon.  Mind you, I have 4 or 5 of em up and they are all for taking loot for me.
Then, they all seem to offer me contracts for loot in the '3rd' dungeon and take those contracts too.

I suspect (based on what I have seen as well) that a $10 item hunt is seen as a sour deal by the heroes (assuming you went with the default price). They will only take a contract if they feel 'safe' enough to do it, modified by price. I'll do some more tests on this, but it's possible that $10 rarely is seen as 'safe' enough. Probably just another $5 would be enough to tip the balance.

It's also possible that there are just better deals out there, when a hero feels like they want to actually do an item hunt (they go for the best price contract generally).

I also suspect (haven't checked the code yet) that heroes can 'petition' the player (like they do other shops), and I didn't put in the checks that I thought I did to stop this.

Actually, all of em are the same price, all 3 dungeons available at the start are listed as level 1, I put up offers of 20$ each.  They totally favor the '3rd' dungeon, since contract offers from heroes that I've accepted for that dungeon were less then 20$.  Heroes picked up 18$ contract in '3rd' dungeon, ignoring 20$ contract in '1st' dungeon.  '2nd' dungeon is also dawdling there at 20$.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 24, 2013, 09:17:13 am

Thanks for that, that's good to know.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: lecavian on April 24, 2013, 02:13:44 pm

I know that this might be something minor, but I wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed the comedic elements of the manual.

I've played about 3 months and read through most of the source code.  Also, the game has invaded my sleep a bit lately... 

Oddest thing I saw was what I think you've mentioned already, which is that a hero proposed a contract to me to invade a dungeon. -- Which made me think, it'd be cool if the heroes could put contracts out to acquire x armor, weapon, item, etc. and the player could perhaps compete with the other shops to attempt to fill these special requests.

(Off-topic: Also played some swords and potions... while that game is fun, I have to say the whole token dynamic and the "recruit your friends" thing is really annoying).

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 25, 2013, 02:51:42 am

Quote from: lecavian on April 24, 2013, 02:13:44 pm

I know that this might be something minor, but I wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed the comedic elements of the manual.

Ha ha! I'm glad someone read it :)

Quote from: lecavian on April 24, 2013, 02:13:44 pm

I've played about 3 months and read through most of the source code.

... but really surprised that someone has read that!  :D (I apologise for any offensive comments!)

Quote from: lecavian on April 24, 2013, 02:13:44 pm

Which made me think, it'd be cool if the heroes could put contracts out to acquire x armor, weapon, item, etc. and the player could perhaps compete with the other shops to attempt to fill these special requests.

That sounds like a good idea. I really need to do a bit of work, generally, on how heroes go about equipping themselves. Whilst it is slightly better now than it was, it's telling how much they struggle to actually find what they want after a few weeks in town, when the balance of items available in the shops has shifted significantly.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

If you are interested, press the 'zero' key to enter debug mode ... you'll notice how often heroes spam the 'buy' command, when there are several of them in town at once ... with virtually no one trying to sell ...

I've noticed that the current 'marketing' logic can severely hamper the decision making process for the Heroes, with them by and large gravitating towards the busiest shop - regardless of whether that has an item they need. I quite like this, in principle (commentary on the idiotic consumer?), but as it currently stands it just doesn't quite work.

Something like the suggested mechanic, tied in with a better merchant cargo delivery logic (Should shops be able to put in orders with the Merchants?), and perhaps a more even spread of item types available, should hopefully help things along here.

The other shops definitely need to take a bit more of an active role, as well. Them being entirely passive just gives the player a HUGE advantage in getting the right levels of footfall to be profitable.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Neonivek on April 25, 2013, 06:48:47 am

My issue with "X-Armor" is somewhat the same issue I have with when Reccetear does it...

Why are they doing it?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Zangi on April 25, 2013, 08:02:44 am

Update on contracts, heroes finally took and done some of my 'other' contracts.  Maybe it was just RNG being really ornery... or a dungeon of the week thing.

At other shops: I can probably easily start completely buying out the other shops now, if not soon. I've already bought out all of 1 type of gear and on my way with the 2nd type... but I want to keep some money on hand to buy directly from the source, adventurers/heroes/merchants.

Buying/selling, in a retail sense and coming from Swords and Potions/Recettear... there really is not a lot of margin to mess with the pricing.
From what I can tell, chance to sell is non-existent once you get around... 40-50% markup of value.  (I try to bring markup to roughly 30% if it defaults to something lower.)
When buying offers, there is no haggling and nearly always offer at or near value... though I guess since NPC shops will buy those up anyways, don't matter much to the heroes.

Suggestion: Sponsoring Heroes, shop gears em up, they give 50-100% of dungeon loot to shop and/or wear logos/advertising.  NPC shops should start with a few of these, so that they have core customers of sorts/first pick.  Will actively search out for another one if theirs croak.

@Gear: It is not so apparent the difference between the more expensive gear and the cheap ones...

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 29, 2013, 02:07:42 am

Quote from: Zangi on April 25, 2013, 08:02:44 am

dungeon of the week

I totally need to implement a 'DUNGEON OF THE WEEK' feature ...

Quote from: Zangi

From what I can tell, chance to sell is non-existent once you get around... 40-50% markup of value.  (I try to bring markup to roughly 30% if it defaults to something lower.)
When buying offers, there is no haggling and nearly always offer at or near value... though I guess since NPC shops will buy those up anyways, don't matter much to the heroes.

I'm very conscious on how opaque the current pricing is. In principle items should be able to go for much more than their base value (if they are of better than normal quality / bonus). I haven't spent enough time analysing how the heroes truly respond to this, though. In general the answer seems to be 'not very well' - however the current implementation at least allows the game to be 'played'.

Prices, generally, should be (and are, to a degree) modified by the hero personality, and the individual reputation, after a randomly modified 'appraisal' function. Looking at the prices in the shops (which use the same function) it is not as 'random' or variable as I intended it to be. To compound things slightly, the heroes are pretty dumb when it comes to identifying the 'good stuff' - which makes them unlikely to pay much over base value when something good does come along. Makes it hard for the shopkeeper to justify having high prices for good quality items, as they never (or rarely) shift at the raised price.

I reckon it needs a real good design session, as well as some logging and analysis of what actually goes on in the heroes minds, to figure out a better system.

Will be fun to approach it, but as with all these things it's daunting to start it in the first place (as I know how wide-reaching the changes will have to be).

Quote from: Zangi

Suggestion: Sponsoring Heroes, shop gears em up, they give 50-100% of dungeon loot to shop and/or wear logos/advertising.  NPC shops should start with a few of these, so that they have core customers of sorts/first pick.  Will actively search out for another one if theirs croak.

I can work with suggestions like these. Love the logo / advertisement idea.

Quote from: Zangi

@Gear: It is not so apparent the difference between the more expensive gear and the cheap ones...

Nah, as with the pricing, nothing much is apparent, really. Higher level equipment is however more effective than low level equipment when heroes are down fightin' in the dungeons - but when a hero is in possession of a high quality / enchanted item, this is likely to quickly overpower any level benefits anyway (each level of quality / bonus is equivalent to one level of item - e.g. a fine quality (+2) gladius (lvl 1) is as good as a base quality greatsword (lvl 3).

Heroes roll an x-sided dice against monsters that they meet, monsters get a [power]-sided dice, and x for the hero is level + weapon + armor + clothing.

It's another one of those things that is 'working' (in terms of apparent game balance), but I would like to do a bit differently / better. Ties in closely with how items are generated, perceived, valued, assessed etc. by the various parties. Ideally enchanted / high quality items should be more clearly 'special', less common and much more sought-after. Needs a real good session unpicking the mechanics and putting them back together again.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Rossol on April 16, 2014, 05:12:50 pm

I'm having a blast playing this game!
Any updates by chance?

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: mendonca on April 17, 2014, 04:18:20 am

Quote from: Rossol on April 16, 2014, 05:12:50 pm

I'm having a blast playing this game!
Any updates by chance?

That's awesome!

I'm really happy about that :)

I've kind of internally promised to get something updated for the ARRP in September, but a small child, new job and ongoing house move means dedicating brain space to this is difficult.

I'd love to overcome these psychic hurdles life throws in the way - and get a chance to work on it again, though.

Title: Re: 100 Heroes - A roguelike(like?) in development - v0.15 .exe available
Post by: Voideka on June 29, 2015, 03:21:28 am

I don't know if you're still developing this, but I had a crash on windows:

Code: [Select]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 10118, in <module>
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 5420, in pass_turn
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1456, in hero_make_a_fucking_decision
  File "ahundredheroes.py", line 1798, in action_your_decision
ValueError: list.remove(x): x not in list

Loving this otherwise!

Edit: Well I can't seem to load any saved games. The general messages and hero messages areas show up, but the rest is the green welcome screen background and an error pops up

Code: [Select]

[Window Title]
100 Heroes

[Main Instruction]
100 Heroes has stopped working

[Content]
A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Please close the program.

[Close the program]
Edit 2: So I'm just dumb and never tried running it as admin. Works now.