Seventh Sense Awards (FAQs, Ideas, Bugs, & Help)

[kamikaze1900666]

Sept 10, 2010 7:58:25 GMT uvirith said:

Hi, me again

I really need another hint on this "leap of faith"-thing. I so have no clue how this works.
Thanks in advance,
Uvi

You should've unlocked another hint if you got an award for Book 1. So cycle through them again to see what all you got.

Just starting and not unlocking more hints, you'd get these three hints:
1) Tempt fate where only your skills and a little luck will save you from the reaper.
2) Have you tried a leap of faith?
3) Grumpy old men are such a pain.

You should have a fourth hint now that you've got an award, so add that to what you got. Also, keep in mind, this is an Expert difficulty award, so it requires a bit more knowledge about the book. Explore a lot trying different paths and see if the hints start making sense.

Sept 10, 2010 22:00:09 GMT Ofecks said:

I disagree. In fact, I think all the rulesets should be locked until you complete it with the previous. BTB -> Hardcore -> Prodigy -> Custom. This would give the software a feeling of progression, just like the books.

The hint system is already kinda set up like that. I made it a point to beat the Kai series on both BTB and HC so I could have access to all the hints.

I think the software is fine in that aspect- a couple features in custom might be cool as unlockables, but most are fine as default. I think between the Awards, unlocking hints and the Hall of Fame requirements, there's enough of a feeling for progression for now- with 14 books to go, still enough time to shoot out ideas though.

[Dave]

The only real problem I see in having an unlocking progression of Gameplay rules, is that the whole point of having the gameplay options in the first place was to "customize" how you wanted to interpret the game rules. My own personal interpretation of what the rules in the books say is what is known as "By the Book". If someone wants to play with different rules, it is "Custom"

It was then suggested that it would be cool to have a "Hardcore" mode, using Hardcore rules from the forum, and so I implemented those Gameplay rules possibilities.

Then we got this groovy Prodigy mode idea, where LW is always really powerful.

BTB, HC, and Prodigy are all simply based on certain combinations of settings that should always be available to the player. Because, frankly, I'm sure that plenty of people disgree with my interpretation of "By the book". Therefore, they need to be able to select those gameplay rules that they think are the real thing. And if they have that possibility, they'll always be able to select the combinations of rules that might end up being "Hardcore" or "Prodigy" or "By the Book".

So, in the end, you can see that I don't support the idea... At least for the time being.

[Honza]

May I suggest the "Where is my stuff?" award for book 5?

Just fail to find your confiscated equipment...

Hint 1: Do not waste your time in the Grand Palace.
Hint 2: Secret passages may be dangerous.
Hint 3: The real Kai lord should not cling to material things.

EDIT
checking is easy, just trigger when in section 158...

[kamikaze1900666]

Come to think of it, that MIGHT work as a Kai series award *you can totally bypass finding your items at all, which requires a little know-how. though if you just started at this book, you wouldn't be losing much* a little rewording of the hints is all it would take. I'll chew on it for a while...

Along similar lines, I did think of one for 1-20 that should prove a good challenge for die-hards: complete the entire campaign starting every book with nothing on your person. This would force you to MacGuyver it the whole way

[Dave]

If LW were to lose the Sommerswerd as part of the fiasco in book 5, that could make for a great "shame" award. It would also mean LW would have to go through at least books 2-5.

[kamikaze1900666]

Similarly in Book 7 too... Thanks for the input, Honza and Dave, I'll get on drawing them up when I have the time

[Dave]

Got an email from a user. He has this to say:

I am hugely enjoying playing through the Awards system and find they add a lot of depth and replayability to the experience. However, I had a few queries, that are rhetorical and don't require answers. (I know there's a forum thread for this, but for various reasons it's not convenient to create an account there.)

(a) Is there a reason most of the awards require Prodigy mode? The requirements of many can be fulfilled in a by-the-book run and while Prodigy makes things easier it would be nice to be recognised for any that might be achieved while "playing as intended". In the event there is a reason, it would be helpful to have that set out on an in-application "Help" page. (Actually, a "Help" page for the awards would go a long way in a lot of ways.)

(b) You might want to give some thought to the intended challenge. Generally gameplay is more enjoyable when its components are initially broken into discrete challenges (jump the gap, then stab the ghost... THEN jump the gap WHILE stabbing the ghost.) The reason is that players can learn the separate skills involved and gauge their competencies at the separate tasks before combining them.

The awards system currently combines two challenges: (a) identify the actions necessary to achieve the award, and then (b) execute the actions successfully. Everything works fine when the player is successful, but when the player isn't successful they haven't received useful feedback about WHY they weren't successful, and which intended challenge they failed at.

I recently encountered this problem in Fire on the Water - an achievement that talks about "don't let anyone steal your gold" and "kill a few of these dangerous creatures" I took to mean that I should kill a high number of Helghast. On a Prodigy playthrough attempting this reward I killed a total of four Helghast (three in direct combat and one through normal text) which I understood to be the highest number you could kill in that book. The award didn't pop. Did I not kill enough Helghast? Did I kill the wrong Helghast? Did I kill them the wrong way? Did I count my kills wrong? Was I mistaken about what the goal was? Was it just a bug? And to try again, of course, I've got to fight odds that are completely beyond my control (especially on that first Helghast) and hope I'm not just wasting my time.

To fix the issue, could I propose the following fixes, any one of which would probably address the issue, listed in order of (estimated) ease to implement, from easiest to hardest:

(1) Make the final clue for each award spell out in full explicit detail EXACTLY what is needed to achieve the award. (Thereby splitting the challenges - identify the challenge, then execute the challenge.)

(2) At the conclusion of each book display a dialogue window showing progress towards goals for each relevant book. Ie, "You completed 1 of 3 conditions for the Epic Fail award. You engaged in 4 combats; you require 0 for the Minimum Combat award and 5 for the Maximum Combat award."

(3) Pop a dialogue window, note, or other feedback when a player executes an action that may count towards an award. Ie, they kill a Helghast, a little message appears in the bottom right corner of the screen saying, "You've just made progress towards the Helghast Killer award!" or whatever. (This might be a distracting experience - a more complex, but better, implementation would be to allow them to track one award at a time that they're attempting, and just display the messages for the award they're tracking.)

Anyway, that's my feedback on the Awards system. I know it's not coming through the most efficient channel and that it's based only on my own personal experience and thoughts.

My thoughts:
1) As I think about this, it seems like any award that could be earned in Prodigy mode, ought to be awarded in the BTB or HC mode as well, since frankly, that's an even more difficult accomplishment. It would be an easy change code-wise to accomodate this.

2) Yes, a "Help" page would be a good idea. As it stands now, there is a "Notice" page that you get to look at when you first have to accept the License agreement, and through some strange design decision on my part, once you've accepted the license, there is no way to get back to see the "notice" page! Definitely need one, and I'm happy to accept suggestions for what should be on it! (Let's do that in a different thread though - this isn't the right place)

3) He figured out that he did not kill enough Helghasts to earn the award, so we can ignore that specific point, though it is good to consider the general point being made. In defense of how things currently stand, *most* awards do actually tell you explicitly what you must do on that last tip (level 6). This requires that you have the tenacity to play through on Hardcore and survive the whole series to unlock that tip level. Of course, for Magnakai awards, you won't be able to do that until I've got book 12 programmed in - sorry! Those few awards that don't tell you explicitly are usually under the "Expert" category, and I'm not actually too keen on making them explicit. Meta-gaming and fore-knowledge obtained through multiple playthroughs is the key to these awards - lots of experimentation, and restarting. I've spent as much as a couple of hours trying to earn 1 award, and it's awfully rewarding when you finally get it! It seems like it would cheapen those awards to provide exact directions of what to do.

4) A notification-type system for progress towards awards, or what was lacking in the awards not earned... That seems awfully complex to me, and I'm not sure how I'd even implement something like that. I'm willing to give it more thought, if it is a feature that many people would like, but for me, I'd rather my efforts be spent finishing up the Magnakai series. I've got some big things in the pipeline that should come together for the release of book 12. Once that major milestone is reached, I'd probably be more willing to entertain the idea.

Okay, those are my thoughts. Feel free to express your own, either in agreement or not!

[Dave]

I actually went ahead and tentatively made the change to allow earning of awards that currently say "Prodigy only" to be earnable with Prodigy/Hardcore/By-the-book.

Awards that say BTB-only, or HC-only, or BTB/HC-only are unchanged.

I will wait to release the update until I hear some feedback concerning the idea, though.

[kamikaze1900666]

Earning most awards in Prodigy, BtB or HC was how I originally envisioned it- I jut thought the Prodigy-only thing was a programming limitation or there was something else guiding that decision, so I didn't bring it up. Glad to hear it's finally so.

I'm thinking of adding a line to the hints on the Helghast slayer award pertaining to one specific encounter, since this is the second complaint about it. It'll be on the level 5 or 6 hint just to help clarify with a little flavor.

I'm entertaining the idea of writing up a full-fledged awards walkthrough, just how to do it while maintaining the ability to keep die-hards who want to test their LW knowledge to do so while still informing the more casual fans is what's making me drag my feet on it.

Considering the notification, I do have an idea that would work with most awards. An X/Y type notifier when clicking on the award might help, either left as a ratio or marked as a percentage. I'm actually thinking the percentage could encompass almost all awards as follows:

A high-combat award, or one that requires a certain number of passages read sounds easy enough- X = combats done/passages read, Y = number needed. So, clicking on the award mid-book and having 3/10 would read "30% completed of 100% minimum needed." This should work with even those that have penalties if the wrong passage is reached.

For the minimum combat ones or similar (like no equipment challenges), adjusting the ratio (X+1/Y+1 to keep denominator above zero) could follow the same patter. Say it's 3 or less combats, and the person ran into one, then it would read "50% penalized of 100% permitted." It could also go X/Y+1, so the above would read like "25% penalized of 75% penalty permitted." Once a disqualifying condition is reached, it could simply read as "Disqualified for this playthrough."

In my opinion, such information should be unlocked as with a level 6 hint due to how specific it is.

For an Awards Help page, most of the info on the first post in this thread should help for those who don't go forum-diving- expanding, abridging, and rewording as needs be. A Gameplay Help page would be good as well, to show people what rules are selected on which difficulty (P/BtB/HC) and a little more in-depth info on each variant (ie RNT Guiding, Custom Weapons) than what's given in the tooltip. Enough on that for now.

[Ofecks]

Woa, was that Dever himself emailing you? You don't have to answer but it seems like they have experience in gameplay design.

I do agree with he or she, though. I'm not sure I understand why you're being secretive about the conditions needed to earn some of the rewards after unlocking all the hints. For a brand new player to a brand new campaign, that's understandable, but after completing a hardcore run (which is NOT easy and requires good knowledge of the books), I should be rewarded with exactly what I need to do on future playthroughs to earn the medals. Otherwise, it's like, "oh, I'll start a new run, and I might get a new award or two, or I might not. well since I've already beaten it hardcore, I'm just not gonna play again because it might be a waste of time." Players like myself would like to know for sure.

My own experiences with Awards/Achievements is limited to World of Warcraft and Steam, both of which are very explicit in what you need to do to earn them. It is certainly more fun and intuitive to work towards a goal when you have a checklist of things you need to do. Otherwise, you're just guessing and chasing your tail for what could be forever, and getting frustrated doing so.

I also think an "award status report" or something similar would be very nice to have upon completion of the book. Counts, progress percentages, successful actions, failed actions, that sort of thing.

[kamikaze1900666]

Hmmm... I'm working on a potential Help Page for the awards system in general. Would it be possible to add a hidden portion of the page, one that will only be shown when somebody completes a Hardcore run for a given series?

The idea is that for each series completed in HC, you get a section for the awards that are seen as being the most problematic at getting through the hints given. Right now, I see a lot of flak about the Death Defiance feats, so the most complex of those could go into greater detail. I'm against actually divulging section numbers, since I see this as something that takes away from the gameplay experience. However, giving detailed descriptions of necessary events and detours that increase chances of earning the award would be a nice touch. For instance, a High Combat award for book 1 might have extra info like: "It might help if you crossed the bridge, made a left and fought the first enemy before cutting through the forest and visiting a seemingly kind ferryman." Keeping it under a different section would give players an option as to whether they want to figure it out from the hints given, or if they want a little extra help (or a lot).

In any case, I think it would be a good time to get some feedback on what people think are the MOST problematic awards to discern from the HC level hints given. Please let me know on the Help Page Discussion thread so I can write it up better.

[Dave]

Nov 20, 2010 21:42:48 GMT kamikaze1900666 said:

Would it be possible to add a hidden portion of the page, one that will only be shown when somebody completes a Hardcore run for a given series?

Yes. But not in the 1.7 release. Could definitely be in the 1.8, though.

[Ofecks]

Currently doing a low-combat run. Got it for book 1 no problem. In book 2 I fought only the Harbour Thugs, Halvorc (lol sorry dude, I was unarmed), and the Zombie Captain. No award upon entering book 3. Was I supposed to evade the harbour thugs? I actually killed them on the 2nd round. =\

[kamikaze1900666]

Nov 21, 2010 18:45:16 GMT Ofecks said:

Currently doing a low-combat run. Got it for book 1 no problem. In book 2 I fought only the Harbour Thugs, Halvorc (lol sorry dude, I was unarmed), and the Zombie Captain. No award upon entering book 3. Was I supposed to evade the harbour thugs? I actually killed them on the 2nd round. =\

Nope, that wasn't the disqualifying condition- it doesn't matter if you kill them or run from that fight (or at least it shouldn't). Though I should probably put a hint in as to what it actually was.

[Honza]

Could there be more Epic Failure awards in a book?

What about losing the combat against the Sewer Door in book 6

Similar award could be in book 2 (Halvorc), or being stuffed by Chanda in book 6
award

BTW, this sunday I've finally got Lunatic of the Myjaviks award.

I stopped counting after the 20th attempt. Three times I managed to defeat Akraa'Neonor bare-handed in 7 turns (with Alether I must admit), just to pick 0 or 1 in the next section against Vonotar's freezing wand...

This was much tougher then Kalkoth hunting...