A few suggestons from a new player

[kzer_za]

I'm not that good a roguelike player, but I enjoy playing them. I recently discovered Sil. I love the strong Tolkien theme, the good AI and tactical, and the depth of the skill system (with a couple of small caveats - see below). Here are a handful of ideas.

1. It would be very helpful to be able to view ability costs on the character creation screen. Sometimes I want to try a certain build, but then misremember the cost of an ability and have immediately restart a new character.

2. Is there a way to intentionally draw an unaware monster's attention besides throwing things? There are some situations where you don't want to be stealthy. Dungeon Crawl has a "shout" command - something like that would be useful if it's not already in.

3. The skill system is pretty intimidating and has a steep learning curve. So many very important decisions to make at the very start of the game! In a game like Crawl that's full of races and classes, you have a lot of choices, but you have a list of clearly differentiated options and you know what your character will do early on. Sil kind of leaves you to fumble around with what you hope sounds good - the tutorial says "Melee and Evasion", but that's pretty vague. And even without worrying about builds, there is already plenty of stuff in Sil to learn!

I like the depth of the skills and I don't think the system should be changed. My suggestion to have a handful of premade character templates with stats and skills allocated (which the player can modify after loading of course) to give new players a nudge in the right direction.

[mrrstark]

You don't have to spend the initial 5k points immediately. I basically never do exactly for the reason you listed, and also in case I find some build-changing awesome item in the first 1-2 floors.

It would actually make maybe more sense to just cut the points allocation from the character generation, and do it only in-game, with some help notification that you need to do that.

[taptap]

Originally Posted by kzer_za

1. It would be very helpful to be able to view ability costs on the character creation screen.

2. Is there a way to intentionally draw an unaware monster's attention besides throwing things?

3. The skill system is pretty intimidating and has a steep learning curve.

1. They are uniform, 500, 1000, 1500 etc. xp for the first, second, third ability - 500 less for each if the house has an affinity in that skill.

2. Noise (by trumpet, door bashing, mattock or loud songs) or wrath (common enchantment on shields) or shooting / throwing.

3. Figuring things out is a big part of the fun at start. The game is balanced well enough to allow you specialising in almost every direction you can make up.

[kzer_za]

Originally Posted by taptap

1. They are uniform, 500, 1000, 1500 etc. xp for the first, second, third ability - 500 less for each if the house has an affinity in that skill.

I was referring to the skill point requirements.

3. Figuring things out is a big part of the fun at start. The game is balanced well enough to allow you specialising in almost every direction you can make up.

I can understand this, and it is fun to experiment. But Sil is already hard even by Roguelike standards and has lots of other game systems to learn, and I don't think it could hurt to give players a solid starting point.

[Patashu]

Originally Posted by kzer_za

I was referring to the skill point requirements.

Those are also a linear increase - 100 200 300 etc. I think this is also in the manual.

I can understand this, and it is fun to experiment. But Sil is already hard even by Roguelike standards and has lots of other game systems to learn, and I don't think it could hurt to give players a solid starting point.

I've seen the ideas of having a pre-made character template a lot, but I think it will discourage experimentation and people coming up with their wild own ideas because they have to do so. It's one of those 'initially good, bad in the long term, quick fixes' that you need to be wary about. A pre-made character template also can't convey all the nuances of how to best play this template - watching someone else play it out (like the youtube videos of sil play I see others put up) would be better, but they're also sooo long, and it's not very good UX to say 'Not sure how to start? Watch, oh, 3 hours of someone else playing'. Yeah, it is a problem, but not with an easy solution.

(Another problem with pre-made character templates is that it adds technical debt - now every time an update to Sil changes the balance of the game or adds/removes skills, allll the templates have to be evaluated to see if they're still good, if they need to be tweaked or have their related advice changed, etc. Especially for forge based builds!)

[Infinitum]

This is a generic build that works quite well for me - usually gets me into 700' territory in 1.2.1 (at which point I usually die to overconfidence and everything being horrible (tm)).

Fingolfin, 3353 allocation. 3 strength because a lot of weapons gravitate around 3lb and you want 5+ later on for extra attacks and as much constitution as possible because it has a exponential progression, hence points invested early get more valuable in the lategame (especially with temporary boosts). 3 strength is also plain convenient for bashing doors, resisting disarms and having a buffer for drain attacks.

For xp allocation, focusing on Melee and Evasion is solid advice. I usually just put 7 points in Melee and 6 in Evasion to start, and keep pumping them throghout the game. Seriously, due to the way combat rolls works even a few points can make all the difference in the world here. Get 3-4 points of Stealth (to avoid wormsplosions) somewhat early on as well. Put a few points into Will (3-4) when you start running into wights (W) and a few points into Perception (3-4) if you find a locked chest or hidden door that you cannot open otherwise. By 500' or so you'll want at least 6 perception for Rauko-Bane and 7 Will for Poison Resistance anyhow, so investing a few points early isn't the end of the world if the situation warrants it.

Getting 10 archery and 11 stealth for the dexterity points isn't a bad idea later on, but don't worry about them if you are struggling in Orc-depth (actually some stealth helps preventing you getting zerged, but a few points early on is enough for that).

For abilities, get Keen Senses once you start running into invisible enemies and Dodge/Sprinting once you start running into Wargs (at which point even melee characters will want to run away from a lot of threats). I like working my way up to 6 Will and getting hardiness in anticipation of werewolves at this point as well, at which time I get 7 will and Poison Resistance.

Don't bother with other abilities early on as the effectiveness of most are highly dependant on what gear you find in the dungeon. Save the melee tree in particular until you've found a weapon that you're comfortable winning with. Some people like getting loremaster early, but be aware this'll cost you several thousand xp compared to just playing the ID game.

Gearwise, you'll want a 2-hander to deal with armored enemies and a shield swap for maximising defense vs archers, but the wepon types are pretty balanced overall so just use whatever high quality weapons you roll into. Light weapons tend to require a few abilities to be effective so I'd personally err towards Bastard Swords when starting out at least.

Seriously, get a lot of melee and evasion. Being able to kill chaff consistently makes it so much easier to run away from what you can't kill it's not even funny.

[kzer_za]

Originally Posted by Patashu

Those are also a linear increase - 100 200 300 etc. I think this is also in the manual.

That's not what I mean either - I'm referring to the numberof skill points required to purchase different abilities. 1 point for Power, 3 for Armorsmithing, etc.

[Patashu]

Originally Posted by kzer_za

That's not what I mean either - I'm referring to the numberof skill points required to purchase different abilities. 1 point for Power, 3 for Armorsmithing, etc.

You can buy skill points at any time during the game, not just at character creation, so just don't buy anything, check the abilities in game then do your skill point shopping.

[locus]

I feel like it's rare to want to buy an ability with your starting 5k XP anyway, with the exception of smithing abilities I guess.

[taptap]

Originally Posted by kzer_za

I was referring to the skill point requirements.


I can understand this, and it is fun to experiment. But Sil is already hard even by Roguelike standards and has lots of other game systems to learn, and I don't think it could hurt to give players a solid starting point.

It has been proposed a lot and there should be a comment about this by half or scatha somewhere. For me it would now look like reintroducing classes through the backdoor, although I proposed it myself earlier.

The best inspiration currently is the ladder, where you can look how other people build their characters.

The most simple brawler build would take reasonable strength (2-3), raise mainly melee and evasion and add will later. The game has been won without taking any abilities at all this way, abilities do help, but not going on a shopping tour and trying to take everything makes the game considerably easier in my experience.

On the opposite end of the spectrum are high dexterity / high grace singers, specialising in stealth, perception, song with core abilities song of lorien and listen. This (not the fighters) is basically the canonical build. It is how Beren got the Sil and how the first winner in the game did it.

There is a guaranteed forge at 100 ft. So you can plan with it, to do special tricks - say, like making a crown of command that gives you song of mastery cheap or making that glaive you want for your polearm character. With armoursmith and artistry (quite common) you can expect to gain at least +1 evasion on every armour piece compared to standard equipment, which makes a huge difference in early and middle game.