You've led a simple life as the child of an innkeeper. Gods and politics don't make their way to your village. And yet, when a squad of the duke's soldiers show up at your family inn, you find yourself pulled into an adventure with divine implications.

Features

  • Deep, Unfolding Gameplay. Starting with a single D6 of Strength, go on to unlock a wide range of power and abilities as you overcome greater and greater challenges.
  • Story-Rich World. Explore a novel fantasy world where the magical and the divine blend with the mundane and the political.
  • Challenging Encounters. Take on a variety of challenges that will require different tactical approaches.
  • Build Relationships. Meet a wide range of characters, uncovering their motivations and goals as you make your way through a web of friendship, rivalry and enmity.

Early Access Warnings

Current builds are still in development, and you may run into unexpected or untested behavior. Apologies in advance, but I hope you'll let me know about anything unusual you come across.

Furthermore, I made the WebGL build to make it easier for people play, but my testing has found that it is not compatible with mobile devices. It also has limited saves that rely on your browser cache and those saves will likely be cleared by future updates. If you play the WebGL version and wish to backup your saves, I recommend exporting your save to a string (found in the settings menu) and saving that to a text file on your machine.

Download

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Roll For the Gods (x86) 184 MB
Version 0.4

Development log

Comments

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how do you beat the anemic cat? it's the only encounter i can actually do, but i can't seem to figure out how to beat it

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I read about an approach for posting possible spoilers, so I’m trying it out here. Apologies if it takes a few edits to get right. But:

Tips on the Anemic Cat (click to expand)
  • It's an evasion encounter. So roll a Rogue with High Constitution & Dexterity and equip yourself with an item from the thieves' guild.
  • Like the other animal encounters, the cat scales its damage based on some of your stats. So your Rogue should have as low Strength & Wisdom as possible (literal 1's or maybe a 2 in Str if you have to).
  • Late Edit for posterity: The cat is a Focused evasion encounter. So it takes more damage from Obscuring abilities (i.e. the Smoke Bomb).

Hope this helps.

which item? i have already stumbled on the class and stats, but the only solution i found was getting super lucky

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If you've gotten the class, you also unlocked the shop selling the equipment you need if I remember right.

Which item, I'm pretty sure the Cat has a 'damage' type weakness listed if I remember right.

i am using the one weapon i found that deals this kind of damage and actually works

Ah that’s right, I forgot that you needed a more specific item. Sorry about that.

Item details The Rogue evasion items have damage types and the Cat is a "Focused" encounter, which means it takes more Obscuring damage but less Distraction damage.

The only Obscuring damage item at the moment is the Smoke Bomb.

when is more coming out?

Likely not for a while, unfortunately. I'm quite slow.

I'm really hoping to play more 

I really like the story and the gameplay

Thank you, your words are certainly very motivating.

yeah it did take a bit to understand the mechanics of the game but then it gets easy when you do understand them

Another note: I just managed to get enough wealth to reach solvent (1/10), however if I reroll I notice I'll be at the same tier at the same level, but I also know I did spend 4 wealth during my current life, and was expecting a reroll to bring me to solvent (5/10).
If I knew this before I'd be able to try and gain the last level up coin while spending as little as possible, or rerolling before hitting the goal so my current gear would be "sold" for progress in the next one.

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It's a bit unintuitive, but wealth rewards are scaled down by the level of wealth you reach. Once you reach Solvent wealth, rewards of 3 or less do not increase your wealth anymore.

Rerolls then (are intended to) set you to the max wealth you would have reached if you got all of your rewards up to that checkpoint in a single run. Currently you should cap out at Solvent 1/10 or maybe 2/10.

The situation you describe is a gap/optimization you could try to take advantage of during a single run, where you spend down below a Wealth tier before completing a mission so that you receive an extra "unscaled reward." 

This can give you slightly more buying power for that run, but the benefit of that is pretty limited; basically you can buy an extra tier 1 item or two, at a time when you should already be able to fill most of your active party's inventory with them.

Typing it all out, it definitely feels confusing, and I get how it feels like you "lost wealth" unexpectedly. I'll consider if there's a way to make it clearer; perhaps closing that single run gap is the best option, or maybe there's a better way.

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I see, thank you for your reply! If you want my two cents (heh) on how to keep this but make it slightly clearer I'd like a breakdown when you hover over your reroll solvent level that shows how your progress in levels requires money rewards in a certain tier (e.g. in my case it'd show "1 level progress from 1 3-99 reward(s)"). It'd stay a bit confusing but would reassure me that rewards are tracked and taken into account, and that to progress in this tier I need bigger rewards.

Hello! thank you for making this game I've been having fun with it!
After trying and failing to do the second rogue job I've tried my hand at the tournament arc, and I'm finding shadow warrior to seem to trivialize most fights. It has been fun being powerful but it might be worth giving it a balance pass?

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That's great, thanks for the feedback. It's definitely something I'll be thinking on.

I went back and forth on having abilities "cross over" into other classes' arcs, and considered, for instance, making the arena fights nullify non-physical damage.

I  wasn't too happy with that though, so eventually decided an easy encounter was your reward that finding an "outside set" of abilities that blew open something like the arena. That said, it's obviously a bit anti-climatic when you can just march through each fight, so I'll continue thinking on ways to mix it up.

This is great. really loving it. though I'd love some information on development. also I have no idea how to change party members

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Thanks for the kind words. 

To change party members, you double-click their icon in the party/stats screen.

Edit: In terms of info on development, you mean how it's currently going? It's been a slow couple months, as I've spent some time checking out Godot. I won't be porting the game over, but content development has been slow.

I really like this!

Thanks for checking it out. Glad you liked it.

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I think what really sells it for me is the fact that the weirdness of doing both of the main routes is acknowledged. I'm excited to see where it all goes.

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That's awesome, glad you are enjoying/enjoyed it.

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I found this while browsing things tagged as incremental games, and wound up liking it a great deal. I'd say its progression is a little more like an RPG than what I'd think of as an incremental game, but I wound up pretty hooked despite it scratching a very different niche.

Definitely looking forwards to seeing where you go with this :)

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That's great, I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Your perspective on the genre/tags seems very reasonable to me. Personally, I view it as something of a mashup of interactive fiction and RPG with some incremental mechanics (e.g. unfolding complexity, multiplicative scaling, and "prestiging") mixed in, but I definitely understand the point of view that it feels different from many incrementals.

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Makes sense! I definitely see what you mean about the unfolding feeling of something like the Candy Box games, and the prestiging. The distinction can be pretty arbitrary and vibes based, so it's tough to say what does and doesn't make an incremental. Still, it's rad, regardless of what subgenre it falls into!

This is a pretty fun game! I'd agree with hacxattack's comments below about the rerolling gimmick. As a suggestion, perhaps each stat could have an extra dice added, and then the lowest removed from the total? This would weight the dice towards higher values while still keeping the same ranges.

Thanks for the suggestion. I haven't shared much of my plans, because I think the unfolding discovery is definitely part of the experience. BUT making rerolls more mechanically interesting (and easier, especially as the number of dice go up) is definitely on the agenda.

This is absolutely fantastic! I played the game in one sitting, even though it took me about three hours. The character writing is extremely good, the characters are all likable (except when they’re meant to be hated), the plot and mysteries we’ve seen thus far are deeply engaging, and there’s an incredibly solid sense of progression. This sense of progression permeates through the stats system, the inspired “rerolling” mechanic, the way your character increases in prestige and stature throughout the storyline–you’ll always be left thinking “just one more encounter. I need to see what happens next!” Absolutely brilliant work. My only gripe is that I’ll be very impatient for more!

Thank you for the kind words. I find them very motivating; it's basically exactly what I'm aiming for, so I'm thrilled to hear it worked for you.

Great game, but I don't love the gimmick of rerolling. You might get a perfect roll, only to be forced to discard it almost immediately because you need to change your purchases, class, skills, etc. And then spend an unknown amount of time rerolling over and over until you get close enough to the desired stats. Repeat for nearly every objective. I think it would be much less annoying if the player was given more adjustment points to play with.

I really like the story element. It's reminiscent of a lot of other fantasy stories, like dragonlance or legend of dragoon (not related to dragons afaik, that's a coincidence). But even though it is familiar, it's well-written, and it's nice to have actual characters and dialog etc., which is becoming more rare these days.

You can skip much of the dialog, but it is important to at least scan for important information so you know what you're supposed to be doing, or how you're intended to accomplish a task.

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Thanks for taking the time to write out the feedback. 

I'll definitely be mulling over your thoughts on re-rolling.

this is nice

Thanks, I appreciate the positive comment.

Found a softlock, if you don't read the dialogue often (like me) you don't know that the buck can only be defeated by a bow, and you are given the option to pick your weapon from the crooked horeshoe, I chose the dagger, so I can't kill the buck. I'm currently looking for a way to rectify my mistak

Disregard, just found the way out, just reroll stats, it saves before you buy

Yep, rerolling resets your gold, so if you find you're current items aren't working for an encounter, rerolling gives you a chance to buy different ones.

Smart game design

👍

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Some bugs i found

After going with Grenn to the Selky Pint i cant continue down that quest as the button is grayed out. 
It might because its not implemented yet (If so, maybe add a note for it?) but just wanted to bring it up as when you go to find the Countess' mansion the Selky Pint button takes you to the page to find Countess' mansion.


despite that, loving this so far

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Glad to hear you enjoyed it and thanks for the feedback. That is the end of the Selky Pint content so far; a note is 100% reasonable thing to expect there.

Interesting to hear about that button leading to the wrong location. I'll have to see if I can reproduce it, though things in the mission select code have been cleaned up a bit, so hopefully it's overcome by events.

Do you plan/or could plan some classes/content centered around ranged pcs? The Gallant fight was a pain in the ass and disappointed i could pr much only use one strat to take them down (The one you mentioned in the comments)

But i guess it is the point of the game (i think) for it to be centered around rerolling and doing diff things

The short answer is yes.

The longer answer is that while I have a lot of ideas for how the game will progress, it has been growing somewhat organically, so it's hard for me to say with certainty where the fights/challenges will go. The goal is certainly that as the party grows and you unlock more options, you'll have more flexibility in tackling challenges. Having ranged PCs is certainly one of those options I'm keeping in mind.

This game is awesome. Unfortunately, I am so stuck on the gallant fight. I've tried every weapon/ ability combo and it isn't working.


Any hints?

Thanks so much.

I'll try to give some spaced out hints with specifics in strike through to give people a chance to avoid/limit spoiling something they want to figure out on their own. 

I'm sure you've tried/noticed these things, but you need to put most of them together to win consistently.

1) You'll have just gotten a new strength die. A 12 strength + 11 constitution (or more) main character (MC) has a lot more leeway than someone with lower stats. If you follow all these steps, you don't need a perfect 12 12 roll, but it can cover for not having all the points addressed + make victory more consistent.

2) Both enemies do edged damage. Loading up your bruiser MC with Scale Armor will let them do more damage for longer.

3) The enemies have different armor types. Equipping your MC with multiple weapon types will help you deal the most damage (this + step 2 requires you to use fighter abilities to gain an extra weapon slot); you won't have space for off-hands + armor + 2 weapons, so grab the biggest two-handers of both damage types.

4) Plan for the enemy knock back. If you have no movement abilities, Lia should have a melee weapon to maximize her damage, as bows do reduced damage from the frontline. But the easiest victory is to use the three earlier clues and have Lia use the duelist specialization with a knife so she can help tank damage.

There are some other tricks that can be used to achieve victories, though the hints above give the most consistent path to victory. Namely, the Kite Shield or Lightning Potion can be used (with the other hints) to get a decent chance of victory, but not as consistently as the above method.

Hope this helps.

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I made it! didn't realize you could equip the great sword and hammer at the same time. 

The story continues. Thank you so much.

Might have to do a second play through making new choices.

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I managed to complete it somewhat unconventionally, with only edged damage (bursting down one character even if the 2v1 after is drawn out), Lia's repositioning ability actually ends up splitting the damage almost perfectly evenly with no need for a shield (11/11 stats), altho only won the fight by a sliver with both characters alive still

Heyy, no rush whatsoever, but is there a newsletter/update notification? I LOVE this game and don't wanna miss out on anything new as it goes live

Awesome, thank you. As to your question, short-term, I'll being doing posts on itch when I do an update. I think I'll also start a Substack (or something like it), just so I'm not fully tied to itch as my only messaging; I'll include links to whatever I setup in the itch updates.

As to news on the next update itself, unfortunately July was a slow month. I've been dealing with some life issues (mostly dental and home-water-damage related), so I haven't been as focused as I would like.

Hello developer person!

I believe I have reached the end of the current content, spoilered in parenthesis (Reached Checkpoint: Met Countess Harrow).

Have to say, this is a style of game I find very intriguing, and have been thinking about creating myself for quite some time, but never found the availability for it.

Overall, unlocking the cleric class definitely made me realize this is exactly the perfect game for this genre I am unable to name.

Mayhaps I can offer help with the development of it? If you wouldn't mind.

Either way, amazing performance, perfect concept, and marvelous execution; Well done!

Thank you for your kind response. And yes, that is the end of the current content.  

Unfortunately, I'm not looking to bring in more people to work on this at the moment. It is a very generous thought/offer/idea, so I don't decline lightly. But I'm just not at the point where I would be able to coordinate it effectively.  

As to the game genre, you might not be surprised to learn that I've actually spent a decent amount of time thinking about it. I currently view the game as somewhere on the line between interactive fiction and idle RPGs. A better description might still come along, but that's the best I've come up with so far.

I like this game's story! It's quite compelling.

That's awesome. I appreciate the feedback.

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When I click on the text string for a export, it makes the whole window go black for a short while. I can still hit ctrl+c and then ctrl+v it but, pretty confusing for that to happen. Not sure if it's just me though. Also it appears that after a short wait it will return.

So I've tried it on Chrome and Firefox and haven't seen that. What browser are you using?

I'm not bsmith502 but I got the same thing on chrome/win10.

Ah I might be seeing it now. Does it come back if you click again on the screen (deselecting the text)?

I don't have it up anymore but when messing around with it, it looks like it came and went if you kept clicking in the text box, but there seemed like some kind of lag/delay where it wouldn't work right away.

Thanks. So from what I'm seeing, it looks like if you select the (long) save string, it shoots the game window out of the view of the browser. If you scroll all the way down (but don't use the mouse wheel) and then select the text, it will stay on screen.

I have a fix, but I think I'll hold off until I have a better solution for how to do the WebGL updates. As you guys have found, the text is still being selected and is copy-able; it just disappears. For me, the disappearance was until I clicked again and deselected the text.

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I've added the ability to import/export saves as strings, which you'll be able to use backup your saves or transfer between versions of the game.

Unfortunately, in doing so, I've learned that through some combination of my ignorance + itch and/or Unity's WebGL, the new build loses track of saved games from the previous version. I apologize for any lost progress.

If you had completed the Prologue and wish to avoid needing to redo that, it is possible to start a new game that skips the Prologue. In the settings screen, if you enter the Konami code (Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Enter), you should be able to start a new game that skips the prologue. Entering the code does require the game to have focus and the mouse cursor has to be over the Window.

Again, apologies to anyone who lost save progress.

Would you consider adding a mechanism to go back and re-read story text you’ve previously seen? That would be particularly useful for the arena fighter descriptions.

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If you are currently in a dialogue scene, you can mouse-wheel back to see the earlier dialogue.

But I suspect you mean looking at dialogue history once you've already finished the given scene? It's something I'm considering and makes a lot of sense for things like the reasons you give.

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Amazing game! I love the mechanics and the story.

One apparent bug: loading the game doesn’t seem to reset equipment/gold/skills, or possibly something is autosaving. I’d like to reload to try different equipment and skills, without having to go through a reroll.

Also, is the Thieves’ Guild storyline currently unfinished? It seems like it stops after the initial interaction, and the Selky Pint becomes unavailable.

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Great, glad to hear you are enjoying it.

So, currently the game pretty aggressively auto-saves after encounters and dialogue. And the interface only really manages the most recent save; the downloadable version keeps extra saves around for backups, but currently it doesn't handle them in game. Sorry!

It's definitely something I'll look into improving; in theory, you'll be able to manually do it when I add the save exporting string implementation (hopefully tonight), though I know that probably isn't ideal.

And yep, Thieves Guild currently just has a first step implemented.

I have to say, pretty damn good. Looking forward for more.

Thank you so much for taking the time to play it and leave a comment.

I'm pretty sure I've reached the end of the current content. I've enjoyed it so far, currently wishing there was more already hahaha

That's great! Thanks so much for the positive comment.

Like the game so far but losing all of your gold/equipment when resetting without anyway to regain it can basically softlock you. Need to look into that.

Thanks so much for taking the time to play it.

With gold/equipment, the expected behavior is that you get your gold back on a reroll (so that you could buy different equipment if desired). If you aren't getting your gold reset, that would be a bug.

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Yea. I had a Club, Short Sword, Short bow and Knife. I had just beaten the preliminary match in the Arena which I believe awarded 1 gold.. anyways regardless of the specifics of what I should have had. I got the Saint Class then did a reset, and had no equipment or gold. So yea, must be a bug.

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Yeah, I'll look into it; thanks for the additional info.

Edit: So my first few straight-forward attempts haven't reproduced it.

When you go to reroll the character, what does the "Wealth on reroll:" say? I'd expect it to say "Gold 0 (5 / 10)" and that you'd have 5 gold to spend after you reroll.

I'm leaning towards implementing the Save String Export/Import stuff when I get a chance tonight so that you could export a save and I can take a look at it.

Well I'm unsure what happened because I didn't clear cookies but my save is gone so. I'll just play again and if I experience it another time I'll notify you.

I appreciate you putting the time and effort into trying things out and letting me know what happens.

I made another post above about the lost save files: unfortunately, updating the game has meant the old versions saves got lost. There is a potential work around to skip the prologue (explained in the post), so hopefully that helps.

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I had the same thing happen as well.  It had said Gold 0 (4/10) for me, one moment.  Do you want me to send my save as well?


Or I lose the thing due to restarting with skipping the prologue.  :/

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Yeah, if you have a save that takes you to 0 gold after a reroll, that would be useful. I still haven't seen it though I admit I'm focusing on other things at the moment.