just gonna put this here, ty unibro
haven’t played yet but that cyclops miniboss still op af
PT: Crystal Cavern
Mrunibro
#23
textwall time.
Here’s how I’ve been experiencing the crystal cave, so far.
Dungeon
I’ve generally found clearing this one difficult. That’s no bad thing, though - I didn’t mind doing it and it was a notch above the dangers fungal had. Enemy variety has taken a huge hit, though. I suspect the short time you’ve had to make this dungeon shows here.
There are some enemies i’ve got problems with, though.
this guy ^ in particular. With the way he splits his projectiles (PosOffset shoot), he can make 4x80 = 320 damage explosions through walls.
This by itself is no problem, but the problem is that it’s not telegraphed at all. You can’t just yeet 320 instant armor piercing damage through thick walls without any indicator it’s going to happen. The best a player can do is assess a red projectile was shot, and within 0.6 seconds interpolate it through a wall to his precise position. But if this guy is pressed against the other side of said wall, perspective of the walls makes it so that you will not see the red projectile shot in your direction to beegin with.
With the way projectiles “splitting” have to be implemented in realm, there’s no better way to go about it either. For this reason, I’d strongly suggest trying an entirely different approach to this enemies’ behavior. If he were to lob grenades that explode in projectiles instead, it’d be fine: You can see the grenade flying to you, even through walls.
These ^ slimes are on the other side of the meanie spectrum. Relative to other enemies in the dungeon, these guys are total chumps. I have not felt threatened by them at all, especially comparing to how aggressive the bats are. These are all very slow, obvious enemies with predictable patterns. Even the “severe” debuffs like paralyze and armor break failed to pose a threat to me so far.
I wouldn’t mind if these were buffed up to bee a lot more menacing across the board.
Boss(es)
I can’t quite speak about all the guardians yet; I don’t think i’ve seen them all yet.
For this reason, i’ll go over all the guards that i’ve seen multiple times so far.
this guy ^ is probably my favorite so far. His patterns are interesting enough and he is engaging due to having to pay attention to his position. The intersection of his attacks with whatever the center crystal throws at you always seem manageable.
However, I do wonder if this guy poses real kill potential - Would this pose a threat to a larger group with priests and paladins? I’m not sure if his potential for damage per second - unless you’re on top of it - will pose much of a threat.
This guy ^ … i think i’ve seen 2 with the same sprite?
One of them confuses, sicks and armor breaks. I really don’t like that one but i’ve seen him once so far, so I don’t have much to say.
The other one, which comes at you with earthquake- like attacks that explode in crystals, are great. I find him engaging yet manageable much like the previous guardian.
Similar to that one, though, I wonder how it fares against larger groups.
an option for either of these to make their damage matter might be including Armor Broken somehow. Puts a stop to tanking anything dealing less than 120 damage, which will often happen with heals and marble seals.
This guy^ is a total chump.
He has an interesting attack pattern, but he’s very similar to a piñata when it comes to damaging him since he doesn’t really move at all, most of the time. Additionally, his damage is low enough where any melee really doesn’t have to care about whatever he shoots.
If I were to stand entirely still I would take 5 or 6 projectiles, dealing 12 damage to me, each.
Much like the previous 2 guardians, I don’t think any decent group with heals will care about his attack patterns (with the current dmg values), Unless armor broken is a constant threat.
This guy ^ is probably my least favorite by a long shot.
His damage, (especially relative to other guardians) is extremely high. Additionally, he’s got the fastest projectile of all by miles. It doesn’t help he’s shooting a ridiculously wide shotgun while rapidly orbiting, either.
When it comes to opportunities to get close to this boss and actually damage it, you require the stars to align. Unlike other guardians, this one does not expose itself to getting hit on any phase the center crystal does. This is most likely because it is the only one who sticks to the center rather than move around in the outer arena. Due to it not meshing well with the crystal’s attack patterns, attack opportunities are greatly reduced.
Additionally, on the AoE phase from the crystal, to keep the balance in check, this boss will quit orbiting and move to the center, shooting when you get to close.
This keeps the AoE phase managable, but also means you’re not going to be able to approach & damage the boss, either.
Another problem I experience with this one is how he goes into his scorpion phase arbitrarily; You could finally have its movement, your health and the crystal attack phase align to permit approaching it, and it will decide to dive into scorpion phase.
Here’s some examples of my day beeing ruined by said situation:
These were about 15 seconds apart.
A similar situation also occurs when the AoE phase starts and it moves to the center: It briefly goes invincible, and is only vulnerable again once it is in the center not moving, becoming harder to approach for anything that’s not got long range.
I would recommend to make this phase happen a fixed amount of time, i.e. at certain HP thresholds. You could buff the danger of the scorpion phase accordingly to make it a special occurence.
Additionally, I would not mind seeing both his movement and shot damage+behavior reworked, currently anything without range can sit and wait most of the time with this boss.
The crystal itself, once it goes vulnerable, is fine. Its patterns are engaging and original, without being overwhelming.
One final thing i’d like to give as something fun to try out, is for the fractal shot pattern it does:
Have you considered playing the davy jones prism bomb sound effect when a bullet explodes?
The telegraphing of it starting with the green arrow is excellent, but the phase itself feels a little lifeless somehow. Perhaps a sound effect to give the sense of a barrage makes it more lively. Just be careful not to too much and pierce ears 
KiddF
#25
New update, now on testing:
- Updated EXP
- Slimes now move faster
- Crystal Worm has less HP
- There’s more crystals per room on average
- Updated sprites for items
- Removed cooldown on Wakizashi, increased damage to 250, slightly improved movement
- Shuriken now also gives Berserk when holding
- Cloak tooltip now mentions the Decoy
- Updated dialogue of Dwarf Miner
Imasquash
#26
Changed scorpion guy is much better, the shotguns damage seems to have been reduced, and now it is very clear that you have to kill one specific scorpion. It might just be that i wasn’t killing any of the fodder scorpions, and thank the lord for the fixed vulnerability time. I completed the dungeon twice with no UT drops, and have d/c’d around 3 times trying to complete it again.
is there a way for us to get our hands on the UT’s?
Seelpit
#27
I did a run on a 6/8 Wizard (leftover from earlier testing), maxed in base stats, with average HP and MP, using a 100/100 Pet.
Overall, the dungeon is indeed challenging, and the boss fight, though a little chaotic, is quite doable and interesting.
There are only a few complaints that I have which have to do with the difficulty being too high and a few instances of it being too low.
The Bats: Out of all of them, the purple one caught my attention the most. It’s still fast, hits relatively hard, and has a weird shot pattern that is not at all easy to dodge. It’s not fun having to kite these guys.
The blue one is alright, but one detail that I dislike about it is its disjointed shots. They start a slight distance away from it, making you susceptible to being hit earlier than you expect. If its 3-shot burst started just a little more “inside” it, I think it’ll bee fine.
(I couldn’t find their actually yellow-coloured version)
I experienced a glitch while fighting two of these; they shot both their narrow and wide shotgun at once.
Definitely think that’s not intended; this only occurred once with two instances that were next to eachother, and didn’t happen any more afterwards.
I’m on the fence about this Guardian. Although I love its attack pattern of summoning crystals in a V formation, which then shoot a bunch of bullets, its vulnerability time is astonishingly long.
I think that it should be lowered by a few seconds, but should then also have its speed reduced slightly to make up for it.
By far my favourite Guardian with its aimed crystal shots attack. Unfortunately, it’s other attack feels a little lackluster - it’s just a +/x shaped boomeranging attack, with nothing else really to it. I think it deserves something a little more interesting.
Everyone’s (least) favourite enemy, the Scorpion.
I think that its shotgun might still be on the fast side for its damage.
If it were a little slower, and a little less wide during the phase where it summons the reticles, it’ll be juuuust balanced enough.
I can definitely see this being a fun addition to the Fungal Cavern, as long as the drops are interesting!
Keion
#29
Exposed in the crystal cavern is a new mechanic, as such I expected it to have some hiccups.
Currently it doesn’t just lower def by 20, it increases damage taken by 20.
They don’t seem that different but it actually causes you to take 20 more damage from all armor piercing shots, instead of just taking 20 more damage on shots that calculate post-armor.
Basically a shot that should always do 80 damage unless you’re cursed will now do 100 damage.
But it shouldn’t, because it ignores armor, so exposed shouldn’t impact it.
Please fix this, as I can see it leading to issues further down the line when exposed is more widely used.
Mizumi
#30
But that’s how exposed works on enemies too. If you armour break them and then expose them they take damage as if they have “-20 defence”. This also works the other way around, if you expose then armour break them because exposed is a continuous effect.
Having negative stats isn’t new/foreign to the game as you can see it with certain class equipment combinations at low level.
Keion
#31
You’re not understanding what I am saying here.
It’s not armor broken, it’s armor piercing, meaning it IGNORES ARMOR in the first place.
So by that logic, exposed shouldn’t impact it.
I am not being armor broken, the shot in question has never considered armor values a thing.
So I shouldn’t take 20 more damage when exposed.
People don’t seem to understand the difference between being entirely armor broken, and being hit by a shot that just ignores armor altogether.
Seelpit
#32
I think that the reason Armor Pierce is also affected by Exposed is because it doesn’t ignore defense entirely, but rather only lowers it to be 0.
So, rather than having it go like this:
80 AP Damage, DEF = 0; 80 - 0 = 80 damage dealt.
80 AP Damage vs Exposed, DEF = 0; 80 - 0 = 80 damage dealt.
It’s:
80 AP Damage vs Exposed, DEF = 0 - 20 = -20; 80 - -20 = 80 + 20 = 100 damage dealt.
The statement that Exposed lowers defense by 20 is therefore still correct; however, it is incorrect that armor piercing shots ignore defense, but they actually just set it to 0.
Xaklor
#33
Ok, well, exposed works like that for armor piercing shots like cwand too. Still not a new thing happening here.
Kristian
#34
This may be a unpopular idea but I think the enemies should have a chance to drop something. I’m not seeing the worth in anything except the boss especially with how long it will take compared to other dungeons.
Mrunibro
#36
Static.drips.pw
Navigate to rotmg/production/current/sheets
Try and locate smth like “CrystalCavern(…).png”