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If I go into a room and stand next to the door, every enemy will go up into the entrance, and shoot at me from point blank.  But no matter how fast they are or how high their health is, they never make room for their compatriots.  I could understand if you are on tank treads, or low on health you might want to do what damage you can, but robots in cogmind never do that.

It just kinda feels weird that the AI is exploitable that way.  It seems like it wouldn't be hard to just step out of the way once in awhile.  I realize that would make the game a whole lot harder.  But I think it would also cause more interesting situations to occur.

Not a big fan of those changes.  It feels really arbitrary.

We've found that shooting is too powerful.  We've some alternative solutions:
* Make some more robots unshootable.
* Make high end robots that are still shootable more difficult to shoot at.
* Put a hard cap on shootability, guns that exceed this limit will not shoot.

I personally have never been able to snowball.  It is all I can do to get more than three piece of hackware in place.  I feel like it is only people who are good at owning the game that make this work as it currently stands.

That said I'm only really in favor of either diminishing benefits or a per floor hacking clock.

The only counter I can come up with is everything moving diagonally is essentially 40% faster.  That means that if you are a fast flyer, you can escape combat range 40% faster if you flee diagonally.  If there is a melee robot coming at you horizontally, you will have 40% more time to take pot shots at it.  If you flee diagonally from flyers, they will be able to shoot at you more often as they catch up.

Luckily the game is mostly a ranged game, so I don't think those are enough reasons to change it.

I never really thought about this.  Why intentional?  I could understand in other roguelikes where most characters move the same speed, but cogmind is already so variable in speed already it seems like it wouldn't be a big deal to make it consistent.

Very little software on linux uses meta aka the windows key except for emacs, which uses it a ton.  Obviously if you are playing cogmind you aren't in emacs.

Some window managers use alt (like unity) because it is closer and it would conflict with emacs users if they used meta.  I have not tried cogmind in linux, but I'm willing to bet I would have a ton of conflicts if I did because my wm is set to use alt for everything.  Meanwhile my windows key is bound to nothing at all.

That said, I don't think it is more important than the game itself.  Like, at all.  If you bother at all, put that on the bottom of your list.

You might be able to allow meta to be equivalent to alt as far as cogmind is concerned.  So if alt + i works, then meta + i would do the same thing.  That way it probably wouldn't affect windows, but it would allow linux to have an alternate option.

That's really great.  I would not have guessed that the plating is in as much danger of falling off as the leg.  That will help me prioritize a lot better than I do now.

I guess that answers my question (re confusion).  I play in keyboard mode 100% of the time so I've barely looked at the context descriptions.

It might be possible to skip the extra heat stat and simply say that thermal imparts more heat per shot than other types of weapons.  I can't tell if that would be more confusing than simply having a heat xfer stat, but it would be easier to implement and balance.

Well if you think about it, imparting more heat to target results in two things. 

If you were imparting twice or four times the heat you are now, after that first volley, the enemy is going to both fire and dodge less accurately for future rounds.  And if you impart enough heat and are capable of dealing with your own heat, even if you haven't managed to hit their core, they will quickly have to deal with part disablement.

Also if it were extreme enough, it would downgrade non energy weapons builds by requiring some sort of heat management in order to deal with situations in which a lot of energy based enemies are firing at you.  Currently you only really have to worry about swapping in parts to deal with damage.  Heat management is unimportant in every situation besides your own weapon loadout.

So energy weapons would have defensive implications.  Also it would probably require only small changes to code to try out.  If it turns out it is a waste of time, then so be it.

Maybe the solution to energy weapons is to massively increase the amount of heat imparted on the target?  I know I have had three robots pinging me with lasers and even flamethrowers, with no heat sinks before and barely even noticed the heat impact.  Similarly now that large robots are fixed, I've never overheated a robot, no matter how much firepower I level at it.  You would think that heat dissipation would be important even if you have low heat weapons just because you are having lasers fired at you all day.

I'm kind of sad to see that combat builds sort of go the way of the dodo in the late game, which is probably why I don't do so well.  Those five gun slots aren't going to help me win the game, so why do I even have them?

Since every hack and trojan I know of has at most one argument, would it be possible to accept both alert(purge) and purge(alert)?  I hope it might be a really small code change, depending on how you implemented it.

I realize there is already a little leeway, but I'm really bad about this and often times I'll do something like squad(enumerate), fail, then try squads(enumerate), which also fails, but penalizes me (I'm not sure if one of those is correct or not).  And so I have to search through my history, make a guess or else refer to a cheat sheet for lesser used operations.  And it doesn't help that sometimes the verb is the function and sometimes the verb is the argument (I think).

I've also seen very new players struggle with this for early commands like alert(purge).

The details are fuzzy, but one time I was getting wailed on by three programmers while I was weaponless and standing on maybe a leg, maybe nothing at all.  As I was crawling into the corner to pick up a stray weapon / die, one of the programmers missed and hit another programmer, which caused it to be reprogrammed to my side.  Then that programmer hit another programmer and there were two programmers on my side, vs one hostile.  Then the hostile one reprogrammed a friendly back to hostile.

So they keep trading a programmer back and forth while I'm crawling horribly slowly toward a cannon in the corner, and then with me blasting and one programmer on my side, I was able to survive with one damaged ally.  Unfortunately out in the hallway he glitched and would no longer move, so I had to harvest him for whatever he had.  I should've sent that save in.

Being detected/traced during hacking does not affect the alert level. Being traced causes a dispatch, and killing it will raise the alert level.

I came to the conclusion it did after having a lot of games end where I played fast and loose with hacking.  I would hack until I was almost but not quite traced many times in a row, and then die within a floor due to unexpectedly heavy turnout.  If I'm wrong about this, that's great!  That will be a big help to me.

Destroying machinery doesn't have a huge incidence on the alert level (15 influence per machine), with the exceptions of some machines like garrisons.

I've found destroying reactors in an attempt to kill robots causes the alert level to go crazy, but that could very well be because I'm taking out workers as well.  I guess I extrapolated that to other structures.

I think it's best to hunt haulers whenever you can, and it's OK to kill any neutrals that get in your way (such as recyclers). Just be careful when you're near a garrison.

Yeah maybe I was a little restrictive on haulers.  But I still don't bother with them when I have a reasonable loadout.  There could be a patrol on the other side of the wall that will immediately be alerted.

While decker's tips are effective, the mass storage unit inventory micromanagement technique is not fun.  That said... always have at least one container.  If you lose it, shoot workers until you get another container.  Without it you will eventually be overwhelmed when you lose some key part of your build (usually weapons).

It's totally luck based, or at least it appears to be.

I felt that way at first, but after playing awhile there are a few things I was doing that I didn't realize I was doing that got me in trouble early.

Hacking machines past detection.  Once you are 'detected', move on.  Even if you have a system shield and can easily get in five more attempts, don't, because each one will have a chance of raising the alert level.

Don't attack neutral robots ever, unless you have to.  Especially engineers.  If there is an engineer behind a robot you want to shoot or in the vicinity of a robot that you might accidentally hit due to a missed shot, reposition.  I only attack haulers when I am in dire need of something, like a container or I have intel on what they are carrying.  The same goes for machines, although destroying machines is a lot of fun, it drastically raises the alert level.

Get a move on.  I could be wrong on this, but don't explore every nook and cranny of every room if you already have a sufficient loadout.  The more time you spend on the level, the more robots will be walking around.  Also, exits tend to be on the outskirts, so move away from large open areas.

Never run away from a patrol, unless you are really fast and they aren't.  This is a stark contrast from dcss which is basically a sprinting simulation.  Enemies will chase you and alert every other patrol in the areas you run through which alert more patrols.  Soon you are trapped, weakened, in a dead end.  You also risk running into traps which make everything worse.  Exception:  If a stream of robots is pouring from one direction, they might be coming from a garrison.  In that case just run away for a little while.  Even if you can kill stuff you are just escalating things and damaging your equipment for no gain.

Scouting is key.  A basic visual processing unit can save you a lot of hassle.  Don't always restrict yourself to  hallways.  Any non EM cannon and apparently most melee weapons can bite through walls, so always be looking for a shortcut between rooms where you are much less likely to meet resistance.

If you are getting shot to hell before -7, and you are pretty sure you won't make it, don't sit there futilely letting important equipment get shot off, just drop one by one, things you don't need and keep ones you do in your inventory.  Try and keep a power source, a weapon, a propulsion, and a storage unit.  Leave cpus in, they weigh nothing.  Leave in something that weighs 3 or less, like a heat sink.  Won't impede you and takes hits and could be useful later.

You already know that, but the reason I mention this is if you are at a high core integrity, it is almost impossible to lose in the first few levels unless you have a huge swarm of fast bots on your tail or a demolisher squad on top of you, because you can get away from almost anything, the stairs are always somewhere nearby, you can recover quickly on the next level if you have access to some basics.  Failing all that you will usually find weapons and a choke spot somewhere, so just equip a couple of them and pick off robots that can keep up with you, then run again.

I really need to catch one of those streams.  I've only caught one that was aborted early and it didn't seem like you play all that much differently than I do up to the mid game, although I did learn a couple minor things.

Unfortunately twitch deletes footage really soon after it happens, and hardly anyone that knows what they are doing uploads to youtube.

I don't know what's the best strategy in Access with those beefed-up terminators and garrisons everywhere. Hackware typically doesn't survive long, armor or no armor, and corruption soon makes hacking impossible. Perhaps hoarding sensors before Access and being extra careful with the sensor swaps would be helpful. Or perhaps moving really fast and not fighting anything except pests and programmers, possibly going naked once all the propulsion units get shot off.

Is it actually possible to fight your way past -3 or so?  By that I  mean has anyone actually won a game where it was largely a combat build past that point?

The only times I've gotten past were when I fought, lost everything and then managed to randomly find a bunch of jets laying around, then proceeded to run by everything I could.  I've even had times where I knew where the stairs were and I just couldn't get to them through the mountain of enemies in every corridor.  The only thing that seems to work is to just ram my way past them, because if I pull back to try and find another way, if even one robot sees me, I will soon draw a mob and be trapped.

Though some solutions would effectively make the "drone swarm" approach no longer possible.

I'm not fond of the "drone swarm".  If you can do a drone swarm, then drones must be weak enough such that it isn't too powerful.  I'd rather have a strong, flexible bay that I utilize continuously, whose integrity I care about rather than a bunch of weak drone bays that I once in awhile stumble upon, use up and never think about again.

One suggestion, by zxc, is to turn them into consumables.

Aka the "scroll of summon butterflies".  It took me awhile to realize I absolutely do not miss the one off consumables that are in every other roguelike.  Get out of danger free cards.  Are alien artifacts the only other consumables?  I say keep them that way.  Especially due to the fact that they can be fabricated.

I wonder if the repair ...

Repair is great, But I would love even more to rebuild drones so long as there is a reasonable matter, energy and time cost associated with it.  But don't let them support more than their max.  I haven't used them, but if you are worried about mass combat drones trivializing the game, make them take a long time to build or make their weapons give low salvage.

Another suggestion by Amphouse (and my first inclination) was to require that the bay stay attached, and otherwise removing it powers down your drones.

I agree with this.  Either they deactivate or at least you stop receiving telemetry from them until you reactivate the part, preferably the part the drones were fired from.  At the very least you should be forced to have one drone bay attached and activated to control any amount of drones at all.

Huh, I guess I didn't realize those bots had storage units.  I'm sure they drop them all the time and I just don't notice when I'm not looking for one.  This tidbit will greatly increase my survival rate.

I hate to bump an old topic, but I had a run where I was doing great, and then I fell into a chute while running treads and I had to abandon most of my stuff.  And then I totally escaped and recovered and had a great setup, but I didn't have my large storage unit anymore and bam I was dead in half a floor because I ran out of guns.

I'm not super fond of the reliance on storage units for combat builds.  They are easy to pick up on -10 and barely exist on floors above that, so I've noticed a ton of my runs end with the loss of a storage unit.  I have actually gotten to the point to where I start picking up jetpacks because I know I'm going to have to run for my life soon.  I also tend to scan storage units early although I rarely am able to find and successfully fab one when I need it due to being stuck in a combat build.

I'm interested in what you think of the changes you've done, and what you think of some of the suggestions others gave throughout this thread in that light.  Two suggestions that stuck out to me, adding inventory slots every other level or making repair stations not suck for non hackers so that you could repair a few pieces of equipment occasionally.  I think I've lost more equipment than I've repaired, so I no longer bother anymore.

It never even occurred to me to try a melee weapon.  That will make things a lot easier.

Back to the initial topic.  Is there a rule of thumb to tell if a non explosive, non special weapon can blast through doors / walls?  I find it extremely useful late game to find shortcuts through a level but it is a tossup whether one of the weapons I happen to have will serve this purpose.

The exit is not always different between branches and normal exits.  To be certain requires you to successfully run the right command on a terminal, use a scanner, or just say screw it and find out the hard way.

You shouldn't necessarily avoid them.  Often times there are amazing things to be gained by delving into side areas, even the caves.  Also there are amazing deaths to be had there, but if you feel reasonably well equipped you will usually be able to survive, and who knows, maybe even come out ahead (even way ahead).

It might be nice low priority change to, when you enter a new area, pop up the world map, update it with the new room to make it clear how you progressed, and then start doing the normal area entrance animation.  It would be reminiscent to some old school level transitions.

I will say I did not discover that scanners could identify exits at all until a week or so ago (been playing for a couple months).  I read the description early on and then never read it again, and only realized when I read a stair finding guide here on the forum.  That said I do not feel the need to permanently carry a scanner around with me.  Sometimes I pick one up and wait til I get to a stairwell, pop it in to figure out what the exit is, then destroy it, because they are rather common.  Ultimately a slot is too important to waste all game on  identification.

I just played through a game and I tried to use as few propulsion slots as possible and try to dedicate 2-4 slots to armour, and it wasn't that bad.  I made it to -4 before the strategy fell apart.  And when it did, boy did it ever.

I think the problem mostly lies on the higher level armours not being anywhere near up to the task of the amount of combat that happens higher up.  A lot of the medium and heavy armours have much higher coverage and much higher costs, but their integrity is only a little bit better than predecessors.  The values in the wiki right now look really wrong to me, but things in the 150 range should probably have around 250 and things with 200, maybe 400.

I wish I could give more specific suggestions, but armour values are in the executable.

I agree with most of decker's criticisms.

I also dont' use particle chargers, despite my initial enthusiasm.  It just never really works out.

I've never managed to use shields or force fields effectively, although I admit I've only ever really tried using batteries with them.  I might try to get an extra power slot next time I find some.  I will probably regret it, but if I don't that'll be a lot of fun.

While I've have saved my life with melee weapons in desperate situations, there's no way to direct their damage to the core, so most hits appear to do nothing while I'm busy being shot up.

As for armor, I'm not the most advanced player, so maybe this is off base, but plating doesn't seem to be as good as just getting extra movement slots.  Plating has more coverage generally, but it also generates heat, weighs a ton, and often takes multiple slots.  Whereas, like an armored leg or some treads turned off take no energy, produce no heat, have no weight, even if you are flying around, have surprisingly high integrity, are extremely common, and will often save your life if your other means of travel get shot off.  I feel like either movement parts need to have a weight value assigned when they are turned off or armour needs more integrity then it has.

And I'll add one item to the list.  The remote datajack seems to take a stupendous amount of matter to function.  I'm sure this must be from some previous balance change, but every time I seek to use it I run out of matter within a couple fights, having maybe hacked a robot or two.  If I'm specifically going a hacking route I won't even have enough matter to risk switching it out for a real weapon when I've rebooted a robot.