Aspects of the game are just too confusing

[maxxymus]

Hi there!

First of all, just wanted to say thanks for ONI. I've played it for over 600+ hours and it's an amazing game.

Secondly, I've played a lot of Slay the Spire and just started playing Griftlands. I really like the art aesthetic and the variety, however I find this game extremely confusing.

1. As a color blind person, I was very happy to see the color blind option, but why is all the artwork style almost the same? It makes combat so slow and not fluid because I constantly have to read the tiny text to understand what the card does because, in comparison to StS, there is no strong distinction between the artwork of most of the cards, nor are there many color palette differences.

2. Same goes for combat icons. There is just so much going on. Buffs. Debuffs. Who attacks who and who does what. Most of them look non intuitive to me and I have to mouse over them again and again and again...

3. Is this an RPG, a quest, a card game? Why would I want to go through so much dialog in order to play the game? What is the identity of this game?

4. So many choices have repercussions that are just not transparent. What will happen if I kill this person? or if I let them surrender? Or if I eat this blue thing instead of this green thing? Or if I take this quest will I lose access to the other quests? etc.

5. Why can't I see all the upgrade options of cards? and why are there cards with no preview of their upgrade options? and why are the upgrades random?

My first play through of the game was a lot of fun. My second one was just tiresome. I started playing rook and was instantly turned off, because in essence it just felt the same. The game being so "slow" and non intuitive just makes replaying it a chore. I can't try to setup a build because upgrades are random and so are quests and so are outcomes. I hope you decide on the identity of this game. In the current state, it just makes me want to go back to StS because I feel so much more in control there.

Thanks in advance

[pacovf]

1. I unfortunately can offer no help here, since I am not colourblind. I find the card art for most cards to be distinctive enough, although maybe not as much as StS.

2. I honestly think Griftlands does a good job conveying all the necessary information. There's just more of it than in StS. You just have to get used to the fact that damage previews appear over the target of the attack, rather than the attacker. This is necessary because you have multiple NPCs on both sides for many fights. You can hover over a damage preview to see who is the attacker, or hover over an attacker to see who they are attacking (a red arrow will appear).

3. You can right click during dialogue to skip it. A tl;dr will appear to give you the gist of it. You also have a quest indicator in the top right of the screen to remind you what you have to do. I think the plot, world building, and story making aspects of this game are the main things that distinguishes Griftlands from StS. You need multiple runs to figure out the characters and background. But you can skip all that if it's not your jam.

4. Some choices could have better indicated consequences, that's true. Klei does try to make it clear, though some tooltips are missing (point it out in a report if you see any!). The mushroom one is an exception, you are meant to choose randomly (or not choose at all, you can always leave). Opportunities are a bit confusing at first, although I think they've added extra info to make the choice more clear in one of the latest patches.

5. Most of the cards in your starting deck have random upgrades, for a bit of extra variety in your runs (you can check the compendium if you want to see all the possible upgrades). But every other card has the choice between only two upgrades, that you can see in advance by clicking on them in the deck tab, or right clicking on them in the card choice UI after a battle / negotiation. Maybe the cards with random upgrades should be clearly marked as such.

Hopefully this helps.

[maxxymus]

Thank you for your detailed response!

StS in it's current state, while far from perfect, has a much more streamlined experience for me (even if I have to be constantly looking at relic counters, buffs and debuffs). The cards and icons are just distinct and make more sense. I'd say most of my issues could be solved via simplifying the user experience, even though the art and animation are gorgeous. IMO, a person's eyes should be able to attain the maximum amount of information in a minimal amount of time - and here is where Griftlands could definitely be polished.

Also, I think there is enough variety in Griftlands. The limited scope of your decisions in which quests to take and which dialog options to choose will really hurt replayability for Griftlands, IMO. This in comparison to the strategic importance of selecting the correct path in StS.

I would like to be able to see all possible upgrades not just via the compendium. I started a run and went through the initial deck and was confused.

Thanks for the right click tip - I will make use of it!