Oryx's Paracosm: An Endgame Dungeon by Puffagod

[Mynamerr]

I shall preface this response with my view that very few people actually play Realm for its lore.

You’re making 5 dungeons strung together on the same narrative thread, with half a dozen extremely talkative bosses (and 3 that don’t really say anything).

It’s a bit late to try and downplay the lore-heaviness of it all.

This is a cringe-fest waiting to happen, I haven’t the skill to render this in any meaningful way.

Sounds weird coming from the guy who puts more speaking lines into his ideas than there are in the entire base game (and probably more than there are in most of the dungeons in the Ideas sub-forum combined).

Good, speculation drives potency.

Only when the speculation can be built upon foundations laid by the game’s narrative, not when you have a character that’s a huge glaring self-contradiction.

I wouldn’t personally call challenging a god ‘the smartest of ideas’ either

What’s the consequence for killing gods and goddesses in most video games? You become the ultimate badass and everyone inside the fictional universe respects or fears you.

What’s the consequence for destroying an important concept like Space or Time? Well, nobody knows because that never happens in video games, so the only perspective we could have on that would be a more “realistic” one, namely that it would fuck up our reality beyond repair.

Is there a reason to be fighting rabbits? Is there a reason to be fighting Dr. Terrible?

Yes, because, again, they fit the basic template we have in our minds for what a video game opponent should be.

If you tell me to go fight Death, it’ll probably start some weird half-philosophical discussion (and mostly lead me to question how much sense it makes to make us fight Death in a game that’s entirely based on the idea of death being something you can never truly defeat, only learn to cope with).

If you tell me to fight Bellico, God of Death, I’ll just think it’s another RPG villain and won’t think twice about it.

Because I don’t exactly want armour break flying around in such a projectile-dense environment

But… why? If you look at situations like the Tomb boss fight or Oryx Castle, you have environments with a lot of projectiles being thrown at you constantly and small Armor Breaks hidden inside of them, and nobody has ever criticized those for being unfair because they’re still perfectly noticeable and can be dodged with some practice.

I actually think the Paracosm has some rather unique mechanics per boss.

4 of them (5 if you also count the Bridge of Woe) rely on turning terrain tiles harmful to limit the player’s movement, which isn’t even original to this dungeon since it’s an idea that’s already being used in the Woodland Labyrinth boss fight, Deadwater Docks (both the dungeon and the boss), Shaitan and Pyrr’s boss fight in LoD.

Laidly Wyrm being in two parts with a different sprite and different attacks is just a more complex version of the Rock Dragon/Eye of the Dragon event fight or the Woodland Labyrinth boss fight.

The Erl-King is a mix of the Woodland Labyrinth boss fight, the Forbidden Jungle boss fight and the first Haunted Cemetery boss fight.

So no, I would argue these bosses, for the most part, aren’t unique in this game. However, that doesn’t necessarily make them bad or poorly designed: for example Khazul’s shockwaves make Trickster/Plane Rogue/Mystic with the new UT Orb from the Erl-King very interesting to play against him, and could be used as counterbalance against Stun (since it’s a change of tiles, not a projectile attack, you could have a phase where Khazul could be Stunned to remove his projectiles and give more leeway to the group while still throwing shockwaves to keep you on your toes).

There only two boss mechanics I’m really not a fan of: the Bridge of Woe and the relics, for reasons explained above, and the infectious rage in the final boss fight, which I feel is a downgrade when compared to the Tomb.

At least in the Tomb you can control how close to rage each boss is and in what order you want them killed. Forcing players to keep all bosses at the exact same level of aggressiveness and to kill them more or less at the same time removes a whole layer of depth from the fight.

Manor bats are a decent introduction.

If we were talking about swarms of small enemies, maybe. But putting it on a huge boss, when every other huge boss in the game can (in theory) be walked through without any consequences? Players aren’t going to understand it.

I am loath to change the design of something because of unintended technological shortcomings or defects in the community.

I’m not saying you have to do it (actually, in a sense it’s more interesting to keep it as is just to keep discussing it in the thread), but I am saying it will have to be done if this ever gets an actual release.

Amen.

[RMGnoob]

see: Pfiffelonomicon

Now now, that’s not very nice for Piffel. Would you like it if somebody else called you an eldritch abomination?

[Puffagod]

Would you like it if somebody else called you an eldritch abomination?

I dunno, maybe it’d give me some much-needed ‘nerd street cred’

[RMGnoob]

I dunno, maybe it’d give me some much-needed ‘nerd street cred’

I don’t think the terms “much-needed” and “nerd street cred” belong in the same sentence.

Though if you really wanted some, why not make your own game, or work on already existing ones? Considering the amount of dedication you’re willing to put into it even when it’s just a hobby, why not make it a full-time job?

[Puffagod]

I don’t think the terms “much-needed” and “nerd street cred” belong in the same sentence.

why not make it a full-time job?

I shall take this as a compliment, though other passions presently occupy the brunt of my efforts.
For the record, I have personally designed two unique (and locally successful!) tabletop games and a full illustrated mythos to house them. I would say I do not require any additional ‘nerd street-cred.’

It would not be a stretch to re-imagine the better of these in a text-based or ASCII format for a PC platform; but as with everything we shall see what the future holds.

[OYEAGAMING]

@Puffagod Please, teach me your ways of incredible formatting, which my dungeon idea does not have!

[Puffagod]

Feel free to emulate the layout I’ve used, it’s pretty simple without following that ghastly ‘dungeon idea template’ that’s been floating around causing havoc :3

[Mangekyou]

Amazing dungeon. LOVED it <3
And your grammar, articulation and vocabulary is awe inspiring
I feel that the pulsating tiles on the bridge of woe is a novel idea, mainly because for the first time I don’t think people can solo the whole thing
I love the idea of lore integration too, it gives a much more theatrical effect to the dungeon.
This was the first dungeon I’ve seen on realmeye, and I was hooked the whole time.
Nice job m8

[OYEAGAMING]

Yup, my attempt is as pitiful as it gets compared to this guy.

[Mangekyou]

Don’t worry about it man. You can get good soon enough.

[WillLoor]

Deeply considered addition of secret boss summoned by putting @Puffagod into the chat 30,000 times in a row.

Have it drop the most useless god damn items in the game but make them look cool as hell

[JudgeBOZ]

hey so i had an idea that I wanted to make into a boss fight but I’m not good at that type of stuff so I’m gonna tell you this and if you like it you can use it: One of the bosses should have a shot that inflicts Speedy for 1-2 seconds, so you would need to prioritize dodging it so you don’t get flung into a new wave of bullets on accident. I don’t know if you like the idea of using a Buff as a Debuff but I think it would add a twist to any boss fight

[Puffagod]

Ehh… I’m not sure how closely you read the document, but the Paracosm already has a boss that does this (see page 56).

Here it is especially deadly because the second you exit the relic radius, you are basically food for the vultures.

And by the way, it isn’t an especially novel idea - I recall the original LoD fifth dragon idea was one of the earliest ideas to utilise this.

so yeh ;3

[JudgeBOZ]

Whoops, guess I’m not as innovative as I thought disregard my comment then

[MeteorMons]

can u write something like that one day

[Mustaqo]

Wow, no complaints. Sprites are pretty good, drops are balanced, and it’s a difficult and challenging dungeon. It’s a shame Deca probably won’t add this, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed!

[SorataK]

Orb is like a better t0 prism, can be use for rushing

[Puffagod]

I felt like Mystic needed new rushing options - as a proud owner of both Conflict and the ST orb, I still actually prefer planefetter for rushing dungeons. Conflict has an irritating cooldown, whilst the ST orb has an irritating MP cost (for someone with a crummy pet such as myself).

The orb is basically my answer to the Strike Amulet; granting an unsual class extreme prowess in a seemingly unusual niche. Its rarity ensures that mystic won’t replace trickster in any way - if anything, this orb gives the Mystic a more dangerous, active playstyle, which I personally feel would be quite fun.

[Steviedawg]

Are you a writer per chance? You are an excellent word smith!

[Laserquest]

a great dungeon, like the beyond.

side note: i got the 69 like for on the OP