My observations regarding the Switch version of DD:A

Advance warning, before any comments, I AM LATE TO THE PARTY. I backed the Switch version, and therefore did not get to try it out until that version finally came out. Some points may be relevant in other versions, too, though I'm unsure how buggy the other versions of the game are in comparison. Anyway, before I made any suggestions or comments, I wanted to really get a chance to enjoy and try out the bulk of the game, and get to, or at least close to, the endgame content. I've gotten every character to at least level 97-98, have beaten all the Campaign maps on Massacre mode, and have dabbled in rifts and other endgame activities. Now, I have some things I'd like to point out, and possibly a few things I'd like to suggest. The first part of the post will be bugs, glitches, and other issues that I've observed, then I'll be posting about a few balancing issues I'd like to change or just simple suggestions I'd like to make.

 

First, the bugs:

1. This is the big one, and it has MANY different variations. This wasn't much of an issue at lower levels, but now that I've managed to make it to Massacre mode, my gear stats simply don't work properly. When testing out my Rogue, I put an extremely good Giraffe pet on him (1700+ in all stats) and he did more damage without a pet equipped than when using the giraffe. I then tested it with a Propeller Cat and had a similar issue where my hero damage simply wasn't scaling. I made sure the proper difficulty and conditions were set each time. I've noticed similar issues with almost every character. On more than one occasion I've equipped gear that was a very obvious upgrade in every facet, from stats to abilities, and simply dealt less damage as a result. HP seems to scale properly, but outgoing damage does not. This makes it VERY hard to settle on a build for my endgame, because the problem does NOT go away when I exit the game and reload. In addition, the -1 HP glitch does still happen every now and then on the Switch. The number of ways this issue comes into the picture is pretty big. It doesn't have an effect on Tower stats, at least not that I've seen, but it makes it very hard to gear up a DPS character.

 

2. Points paid into stats don't properly display. I can't tell how many points I've put into each individual stat because none of them display properly. The same goes for pet upgrades. They'll be displayed as zeros every time I go into the stats menu, though from what I can tell the game does treat them as if I've properly allocated them. Weapons and gear seem to be fine, though, at least when it comes to stats being displayed.

 

3. On Massacre, some maps simply have the enemies stop spawning at the end of a wave with only 3-4 monsters left on the gauge, and you've got to wait for several minutes for the wave to simply end, while nothing happens. This problem is especially bad on The Ramparts. 

 

4. Occasionally enemies get stuck behind the spawn and take *ages* to despawn when you're not using a character that can hit them in there, such as The Huntress. The Outpost is especially bad for this, as they get stuck in the bottom right spawn point all the time, and I've taken to using the Huntress just so I can fire off a Piercing Shot for when they inevitably get caught there.

 

5. Goblin Copters in some maps (The Mill is the worst in my experience) will sometimes drop their ogres, when destroyed, in places where they cannot readily be targetted. In The Mill, it was literally dropping them on a rooftop outside the boundaries of the map, and I was forced to reposition some defenses in awkward positions just to hit them. This isn't a frequent issue, but I do feel like it could be a problem in high Survival/Mix Mode waves when the ogres have a buttload of health even after fall damage.

 

6. Trophies/Awards don't stick. Each time I leave the tavern and come back, my trophies have all reset. My tables should be almost completely full by this point, and it's a bit frustrating. I'm a completionist that can't actually complete things and it's driving me mental.

 

Feel free to add more bugs/issues if anything comes to mind, or if there's something obvious I forgot.

 

Now, here's a few suggestions and things that I see as balance issues, now that I've had some hands-on time with the game. Feel free to agree or disagree, or add some suggestions of your own. I'd love some discussion.

 

Squire: I only really use harpoon towers and bouncer blockades. Bowling Ball turrets just don't feel that good, spike blockades are overshadowed by more useful barriers, and Slice and Dice blockades scale so poorly in Massacre that Spike Blockades do more damage. My bouncers hit for about 90k per shot, but my slice and dicers only do about 3k per hit on placement and just don't warrant the DU. I'd suggest a significant buff to Slice and Dice + bowling ball turret damage, they simply don't scale in Massacre.

 

Apprentice: He's actually in a pretty good place, with the exception of Magic Missile towers. Capping their defense rate at .5 seconds makes them completely and utterly useless. The thing that kept them pulling their weight was the absurdly high potential fire rate. As-is, there's pretty much nothing a magic missile turret can do that an explosive trap can't do better, especially in Massacre when their range is so huge. I also feel like Mana Bomb's charge time is too high (forgive me if they changed the name, I refer to his big AOE charge ability that takes a full 5-6 seconds to use) to be practical.

 

Huntress: No complaints about her, aside from the fact that Darkness traps don't feel particularly useful. Not sure how to rebalance that. Edit: almost forgot, the blaze trap is basically useless. Both the damage and attack rate were nerfed into oblivion with the last update. What's the point in doing 10k fire damage every 1.3 seconds in a relatively small radius when my explosive traps do 100k+ in an incredibly huge radius every 2? They need a massive buff to attack rate, I'm talking like 4x what they have now, as right now theyre a waste of DU.

 

Monk: Love him, I don't have any real complaints about him.

 

EV:A: Same here, she's in a pretty good place, though I do feel like Proton and Shock beams should be chainable, like how beams were in DD2. As is, they're not bad... they're just not great either.

 

Rogue: I enjoy him, but I think he'd be more useful if I could get his equipment to function properly. I also feel like his devices should hit just a little bit harder.

 

Warden: Where to begin? She's instant META. Wisp Dens are insanely good, though I feel like they'd be significantly more balanced if their range didn't go up so much with every level. They start at roughly 15 meters in my build, and increase by 3 per upgrade, up to a max of 30, which is absolutely ridiculous. I can put them in the middle of a mid to large map (except maybe Glitterhelm, lol) and have them cover the entire map. Reducing their range on upgrade would be perfect, and people would have to use strategy again instead of "fill the map with wisps and win". For her other towers, the blockade is actually decent, I like it; it should scale a bit better with range, but that's about it. Beaming Blooms are actually amazing, and I don't know why other people don't use them, I've found them to be amazing in my builds, though to be fair I try to minimize wisp use when I'm not arbitrarily farming. Shroomies *could* be good, but they NEED to scale better with Fortify. Using 350-upgrade-average gear at Massacre, I'm still struggling to get them to drop with more than 30 defense health. In a longer wave, even after upgrades, that makes them just about impossible to keep alive in survival mode. and finally, the Sludge Launcher. It does a lot, but it doesn't do it well enough to warrant the price. I feel like it either needs more effective ensnare, longer range (it's middling and doesn't upgrade well), a DU cost reduction to 6, increased rate of fire, or increased projectile speed. Any one of those things (not all of them) would be enough to make it useful.

 

 

 

Finally, a couple personal suggestions:

I'd really like to see a couple of the good parts of DD2 make it into DDA. Particularly, some of the towers. I'd like it if each of the original 4 characters could take their 1 most unique tower from DD2 and have an optional choice to replace one of their existing defenses with it. I'm thinking Earthshatters for the Apprentice, Heavy Cannonballs for the Squire (players of the beta version of DD2 might remember those, they fired a long range piercing cannonball that rolled in a straight line), Poison Dart Towers for the Huntress, and Sky Guard Towers for the Monk. This could be given in the form of an accessory reward from future content, and could be equipped at will.

 

Next, give on screen, non intrusive prompts when a player first enters Nightmare/Massacre mode that explains the new enemies and what they do. The "build suggestions" option in the pause menu can't even be used on the Switch, so instead of having friendly advice on how to do Nightmare mode, it was basically "SURPRISE, IT'S RAINING SPIDERS!!!". I had my experience playing DD1 to back me up, thankfully, but that didn't help me at all when I saw my first Siren, since she's completely new, to the best of my knowledge, and knowing that I didn't actually have to kill them would have made my first few Massacre maps much more enjoyable. I'm trying to view this from the perspective of a new player, since entry to those higher difficulties can seem a bit overwhelming at first. Same goes for rifts. I didn't even notice the little "rifted" option until a few days after starting, and a descriptor of the unique enemies there would help, especially the annoying rifted Dark Elves that can only be damaged by heroes.

 

Next, explain where to get pets IN GAME. Remember that Nintendo hasn't implemented a messaging system, and only a small fraction of players use discord or these forums, so it might be nice if players could have access to some sort of notebook that gives hints on where to obtain each entry, and gives a small explanation of each pet after obtaining it. The same could be used for unique gear drops, such as the Wolfsbane Crossbow that only drops from the Lycan King (at least that I'm aware). Because I've found myself looking at other folks' gear and wondering "ooh, I wonder where they got that one?" and having literally no way to find out.

 

Finally, please give us Switch players a way to access the Rifted Robes for EV:A. I backed the game and was saddened to learn that I missed a timed exclusive.

 

That's all for now. Please feel free to discuss, add something of your own, or tell me why I'm stupid and my suggestions are bad!

 

Edited August 28, 2021 by Thorgonator
Added more content, corrected typos.

I don't play switch, but good post :)

Most of this is relevant for PC too. Good suggestions!

Edit: Regarding Warden, I came back to playing after Lycan's Keep came out. Before the update I was stuck. I couldn't beat the Library on Mass. Leveled up Warden and I could literally AFK. So yeah, a range nerf would be nice. I have no use for my Apprentice now.

Edited August 28, 2021 by Fictorious

2 hours ago, Fictorious said:

Most of this is relevant for PC too. Good suggestions!

Edit: Regarding Warden, I came back to playing after Lycan's Keep came out. Before the update I was stuck. I couldn't beat the Library on Mass. Leveled up Warden and I could literally AFK. So yeah, a range nerf would be nice. I have no use for my Apprentice now.

Same. Beaming blooms render fireball towers situational, the only tower from the Apprentice I still use regularly is the Deadly Striker, and even then, only in huge maps like The Summit. I've tried to learn to avoid using Wisps whenever possible for that reason. They cost 4 DU but defend like an 8 DU tower.

10 minutes ago, Thorgonator said:

Same. Beaming blooms render fireball towers situational, the only tower from the Apprentice I still use regularly is the Deadly Striker, and even then, only in huge maps like The Summit. I've tried to learn to avoid using Wisps whenever possible for that reason. They cost 4 DU but defend like an 8 DU tower.

I found it really strange, actually. Wisps render the toughest enemies not a threat, making Goblins the danger. Anything above Goblins die first, so I'm caught off guard by the horde of goblins taking down my barriers because they're the lowest priority and therefore ignored.  Of course I added in electric aura or explosive traps after the fact, but still.

13 hours ago, Fictorious said:

I found it really strange, actually. Wisps render the toughest enemies not a threat, making Goblins the danger. Anything above Goblins die first, so I'm caught off guard by the horde of goblins taking down my barriers because they're the lowest priority and therefore ignored.  Of course I added in electric aura or explosive traps after the fact, but still.

Yeah, the hordes of low tier monsters can be especially dangerous in mixed mode, when you get the little skeletons that keep reviving when low tier monsters are killed.

On 8/28/2021 at 4:31 AM, Thorgonator said:

2. Points paid into stats don't properly display. I can't tell how many points I've put into each individual stat because none of them display properly. The same goes for pet upgrades. They'll be displayed as zeros every time I go into the stats menu, though from what I can tell the game does treat them as if I've properly allocated them. Weapons and gear seem to be fine, though, at least when it comes to stats being displayed.

This is a problem on all platforms.  The only workaround I know of is to exit the menu, swap to the hero you want to change stats on, then re-open the menu.

 

On 8/28/2021 at 4:31 AM, Thorgonator said:

give on screen, non intrusive prompts when a player first enters Nightmare/Massacre mode that explains the new enemies and what they do

This was something I appreciated in DD2.  Each map that added a new enemy would show a short clip of it on your first run.  Would love to see a similar thing in DDA.

Honestly, I know it's supposed to be DD1, but DD2 is genuinely so clean and has so many good features that I'd kill to have in DDA. Just a small aesthetic one- the diversity of weapons. All of them in DD2 are sick and fun to find and collect to see what they do. Unfortunately apart from like 1 or 2 in DDA (ie that neat blaster from Mech boss) they're not... Interesting. The set bonus of having an extra homing shot every 3 attacks is a good start, though.

Well every game will always have bugs , I have found nothing game breaking on the Switch. I am currently starting to farm massacre keep rifted. The stats issue is weird but if  you see the little arrows thats where your points are and clicking L shows the amount. There is a lot of stuff to pack into a controller for the UI takes some getting use to but pretty use to it now. 

overall addicted to it and hope the patch updates start to come faster through Nintendo. 

On 8/30/2021 at 8:12 AM, Batophobia said:

This is a problem on all platforms.  The only workaround I know of is to exit the menu, swap to the hero you want to change stats on, then re-open the menu.

 

This was something I appreciated in DD2.  Each map that added a new enemy would show a short clip of it on your first run.  Would love to see a similar thing in DDA.

That little cutscene bit is exactly what I was thinking about, actually. And the little dialogue bubbles from the heroes during the build phase would be nice, too. It could offer hints on how to build against them. It would really make a difference, since for some reason you still cant message other players on the Switch (Nintendo needs to work on that...).

18 hours ago, Thorgonator said:

the little dialogue bubbles from the heroes during the build phase

I found myself always missing these.  I'd randomly notice them while building and realize I've missed most of the dialogue.  Maybe if there was a small audio cue when it popped up.  I'd also be fine with voices for the heroes.  I'll volunteer to voice the Monk XD