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[Xii]

And my highest score so far, too. That's cool. Nonviolence and all. Figured pacifist win would be difficult, but honestly, war is hell. It's not that the combat game is harder per se, but I get so GOSH DARN BOGGED DOWN in combat! It's SLOW like molasses growing uphill in january! Got other things to do besides play Cogmind 24/7, which I've been doing for probably a month now xD

The Cloak of Protection I got from Exile definitely helped a lot. There were a few key, close slip-bys by the end. Then I found a bunch of good thrusters pretty early, which carried me long way. Visited Zion, somewhat underwhelming, but I did happen upon a nice makeshift transmission jammer and some hacking gear. After DM, things turned to eleventh gear very rapidly. I was able to fabricate experimental terrain scanning + processor. With FarCom, it's like map hacks xD

Grabbed warlord's stash for some sweet power and flight. Popped in at ZH's, but he wasn't home. Snagged his stuff. Research was eventful, but found the access exit right from the start, so didn't stick around to watch.

Then as I mapped out access, I had to consider this: do I go for the exit, or enter command? I've never been there before, mind you. Here's the thing though; having been looking at scores, especially bonuses, there might be something worthy in there. And lore, of course. Love me some lore. No chickening out now, cogmind!

Almost got a heart attack when I slashed open one of those pods full of dormant ARCs. Warlord's reinforcements, promptly following my letting them in, offered a brief distraction as I penetrated the main gate, tunneling past through a side wall. Having experimental terrain scanning provided a fantastically clear picture of the complex layout. Flew straight through MAIN.C and dug under the 100-strength blast doors with my trusty long sword and the cooled thrusters overload boost to damage. The reinforced barrier had toughness 70. The long sword swung for like 80. Found this odd wave machine thingy, didn't know what it was for, so smashed it in hopes of bonus points xD

For some reason, MAIN.C was convinced I was there to kill him, which was disappointing. I wanted to talk.


Cogmind is a very good game. I've played Dungeon Crawl plenty, and Cogmind fixes a lot of the frustrations I had with the former. As a fellow game developer, I salute you!

My only real gripe was this moment in S7 in another run, where the LRC armor and other item were blocked by an INDESTRUCTIBLE door. I swung at it SO many times while my Sigix buddy held off the assault, dealing well in range of the necessary damage, and it just wouldn't budge. Is it, indestructible? I realize that the nature of randomness dictates that I could've simply been excessively unlucky. But I need to know

[Kyzrati]

Hehe, it's true that combat, while fun, does take a fair bit more learning and experience.

Still, any win is quite an accomplishment, nice job! Cloak of Protection is definitely a good piece of equipment for a pacifist run

I took a look at your score sheet and that's quite an epic journey for a pacifist! So many locations visited... Amazing that you even headed through Command, too.

Cogmind is a very good game. I've played Dungeon Crawl plenty, and Cogmind fixes a lot of the frustrations I had with the former. As a fellow game developer, I salute you!

Thanks! Just put over 10k hours into your projects and you'll be on the right track, haha xD

My only real gripe was this moment in S7 in another run, where the LRC armor and other item were blocked by an INDESTRUCTIBLE door. I swung at it SO many times while my Sigix buddy held off the assault, dealing well in range of the necessary damage, and it just wouldn't budge. Is it, indestructible? I realize that the nature of randomness dictates that I could've simply been excessively unlucky. But I need to know

There is almost nothing indestructible in Cogmind. There are only two places indestructibility comes into play, the Deep Caves and the new Exiles Vault, and no matter what you're trying to attack/destroy, you can always open its info and see whether it's destructible or how much armor it has compared to what you're capable of (don't forget to check resistances as well!). Terrain that is indestructible (in the two places I mentioned) indicates this instead of having an armor value.

In the end, with the right tools you can break through pretty much anything.

[muxecoid]

I remember some streamer shooting EM weapons at the door control terminal. Does it still work?

Also exiles having technology to build indestructible wall is impressive. There should be a lore entry about it in one of the terminals.

[Kyzrati]

I remember some streamer shooting EM weapons at the door control terminal. Does it still work?

Maybe

Also exiles having technology to build indestructible wall is impressive. There should be a lore entry about it in one of the terminals.

It can seem rather special, but this characteristic isn't merged with the lore anywhere (technically it was added as a pure gameplay element). It could be far in the future, but it's hard to say where and how this characteristic might be applied to future expansions, so as a minor thing it's not really worth adding now.

[Xii]

How is the Pacifist bonus score calculated? In my first pacifist run, I got 12098 points for pacifist. In another, 11583. In my latest one however (attached), only 200 ?? How does that make any sense?? 

Wait... "Combat Hostiles Destroyed  3 ... AOE 1" Is that why? What is this? I fired not a single shot the entire game! Does Trojan(Detonate) count as kills?

[Kyzrati]

The bonus starts very small and grows more and more for each new depth you reach--doesn't matter how many enemies you kill, as soon as you kill one your streak is stopped right there and no more points are awarded.

Any "indirect" kills that do not raise alert (like traps) won't count against you, but anything that raises alert still does. From your score sheet it looks like you destroyed 2 Workers, a Recycler, 3 Watchers, a Swarmer, a Saboteur, and a Grunt... also from the stats it seems you fired your Mni. Grenade Launcher once

You can probably see more details if you look through your log (if you haven't already, in the options you can set it to output your message log at the end of a run).

[Xii]

Oh, yeah... I fired a grenade launcher, once, in Materials to get through a wall. Since the Pacifist bonus score is only 200, that HAS to have been the fault, no? Damn. Probably killed a worker on the other side and I didn't notice.

It'd be nice if there was an advanced option for notifying when the pacifist streak ends.

Ohhhh.... I also overloaded a fabricator in the Armory. Overloading raises alert, so... counts against pacifist as you say.

I will definitely enable that log option, thanks for the info.

Crud. Lost 12k points to thoughtlessness. 

[Kyzrati]

Oh, yeah... I fired a grenade launcher, once, in Materials to get through a wall. Since the Pacifist bonus score is only 200, that HAS to have been the fault, no? Damn. Probably killed a worker on the other side and I didn't notice.

Yep, that was it!

It'd be nice if there was an advanced option for notifying when the pacifist streak ends.

This is on the list of things to do in the future--achievement progress, but we'll see if patrons want to prioritize it or not. I can only add so many of the extra features! (This set in particular is incredibly time-consuming.)

Ohhhh.... I also overloaded a fabricator in the Armory. Overloading raises alert, so... counts against pacifist as you say.

The action of overloading itself doesn't count against pacifism, since that's not a kill in itself, but any of the bots it corrupts will further raise the alert on you.

I wasn't sure whether I wanted this to happen or not, since it counts as a pretty indirect form of attack akin to traps. I'm pretty sure at the time I was afraid it would be too effective and powerful to not count, but considering it's a force hack and Fabricators are limited, I think for Beta 9 I'll change that so that the kills no longer raise alert (or therefore count against pacifism).

Crud. Lost 12k points to thoughtlessness. 

Hehe, just firing a grenade as a pacifist is pretty dangerous! You might not know what's around the corner or behind a wall...

[Xii]

I wasn't sure whether I wanted this to happen or not, since it counts as a pretty indirect form of attack akin to traps. I'm pretty sure at the time I was afraid it would be too effective and powerful to not count, but considering it's a force hack and Fabricators are limited, I think for Beta 9 I'll change that so that the kills no longer raise alert (or therefore count against pacifism).

Today playing beta 9 I learned that trojan detonate not only raises alert, but any bots destroyed in the machine explosions count as kills against pacifism. Another run ruined...

Did you change the fabricator disruption for beta 9?
Do RIF hacks that make bots explode count as kills against pacifism?
Does hacking a worker to disassemble an explosive machine which blows up bots count as kills against pacifism?

I can't play a game not knowing its rules, damnit. And I won't waste all these hours discovering them by trial and error. List what kills pacifist, please.

[Kyzrati]

I wanted to make the detonation non-traceable, but in the end couldn't because it would be far too effective in that case. That said, it's kinda interesting that it doesn't seem to really get used much anyway--you're the only one I can recall actually installing it seriously other than myself and others who might just be fooling around, but normally don't even consider it's existence

Did you change the fabricator disruption for beta 9?

That was changed about half a year ago in Beta 8.1 shortly after you asked (everything that's changed is recorded in the changelogs)

Do RIF hacks that make bots explode count as kills against pacifism?

No RIF hacks count towards alert or kills, no.

Does hacking a worker to disassemble an explosive machine which blows up bots count as kills against pacifism?

Nope.

Very little aside from directly killing bots counts against pacifism, but that was just a secondary achievement goal added after years of development, so I can't recall every indirect thing that might trigger it (since it's not anything directly related to the achievement itself, but anything that counts towards your kill count, which must be zero).

To my knowledge, most of the community pacifist runs so far are done simply as speed runs, since you don't technically have to engage or destroy any bot and can go straight to the end fairly quickly. Or for a slightly slower but less risky playstyle: slap on some flight prop, fab some hackware to make better use of Terminals, and otherwise make a beeline for the surface.

Spending a lot of time in the complex trying to engage threats is a pretty risky way to get pacifism. RIF would be great in theory, but also requires that you enter Garrisons, which are tightly confined spaces filled with lots of hostiles xD

[Xii]

I wanted to make the detonation non-traceable, but in the end couldn't because it would be far too effective in that case. That said, it's kinda interesting that it doesn't seem to really get used much anyway--you're the only one I can recall actually installing it seriously other than myself and others who might just be fooling around, but normally don't even consider it's existence

I figured I'd rack up property destruction score with it
Next strat, hit that -8 early garrison and get some NC couplers to blow shit up!

Pacifist score maximizing is certainly an interesting experience.
Thanks for taking the time to reply, appreciate it!

[Xii]

Does hacking a worker to disassemble an explosive machine which blows up bots count as kills against pacifism?

Nope.

Ok, so, started a pacifist run, got RIF. Hacked 3 workers to disassemble explosive machines, then dumped stats. It reads 3 robots destroyed, and pacifist bonus 1787.

Then I ascended to the next factory floor, RIF hacked 2 more workers to disassemble explosive machines, then dumped stats again. Now it reads 5 robots destroyed, and pacifist bonus is still 1787. Shouldn't it increase going up a floor?

The 5 workers RIF hacked to disassemble machines, then dying in the explosion definitely seem to be counted as kills, and against pacifism, contrary to what you have claimed.

Even worse, value destroyed is abysmally tiny score. Like 1 point per machine exploded. Another two hours wasted.......

I wish there was an advanced option that printed "First kill" when it happens. Then I'd at least know immediately when the run is over instead of pointlessly wasting time continuing it. After all, I could in theory dump stats every turn to check. Which would be tedious, of course, so I won't.

[Kyzrati]

Ah, sorry about the RIF worker dismantling, thanks for reporting that, it's a new bug

Datajacks used to be considered a hostile attack before RIF was added in Beta 7, and it's not considered one anymore, but apparently when making those changes I forgot to address it in a separate system that searches for an indirect attacker on record when a specific bot dies from a cause that has no apparent attacker. This is why you're only seeing death counts specifically from the Workers you jacked, rather than other bots that may have been also caught in the explosion, or even points from destroying machines. (On that note, score is generally derived from things that raised alert, so it's actually not very easy to accumulate points via pacifism aside from the bonus and other non-combat-related bonus points like plot stuff.)

I'll fix this for the Beta 9.1 release next week--that shouldn't count against you if using deconstruct_machine. And Datajacks in general shouldn't count as an "attack" for scoring purposes, as you've shown they are (I just tested these things to confirm all this).

I figured I'd rack up property destruction score with it

Indeed that's why I couldn't let it be not attributed to you, because in that case it's really way too powerful . Massive arrays of explosive machines, automatically destroying whole squads that pass by, just super effective if used right! I don't think it actually gets used much, but that's also because the potential costs are as high as they are. Also it can have pretty unpredictable results, so it's more of a fun thing than a solid strategy, I think.

I wish there was an advanced option that printed "First kill" when it happens. Then I'd at least know immediately when the run is over instead of pointlessly wasting time continuing it. After all, I could in theory dump stats every turn to check. Which would be tedious, of course, so I won't.

Yeah something akin to this is a feature for possible development, showing and reporting your progress towards achievements (even those already earned), although it would be a huge amount of work so I included it among the features patrons can vote on as one for a major release, but it didn't win yet--too many people voted for other stuff

[Xii]

Ah, sorry about the RIF worker dismantling, thanks for reporting that, it's a new bug

Oh! Not a waste at all then

[Kyzrati]

Indeed very helpful, I fixed it earlier today and you'll be able to do this all you want in a few days when the update hits! You're in the changelog now

[Xii]

You're making something awesome, and listen politely to your community. I think I'll become a patreon. Also, thinking about making Cogmind videos on YouTube, because it's something I'd wanna watch that doesn't really exist yet!

[Kyzrati]

Aw thanks!

And there are a number of people who do (or at least have done) Cogmind videos, though yeah compared to other games it's not as popular for that. Only maybe a couple times in the past has anyone done a regular and consistent long series, and not recently, so of course there are a ton more features now