Ok so having some roots in the shaman community I'll give my opinion here and hope to clarify some things. I don't really know where to start so this might turn into a little rant.

[rantAboutImplementation]
Firstoff, awesome that the devs decided to take the step and incorporate this. However it went pretty much the same way like hard mode was implemented, top down from admins to players instead of an exchange between the two. As a player it seems like the devs noticed the concept of 'no-b' or 'v-only' and think it's a nice idea so they want to give something back to the players and put a feature to support it. However I have the feeling that they don't fully understand the concepts since they didn't play according to them which totally makes sense (no offence).
The totem totally defied the purpose of 'no-b', making a hard mode equally easy as non-hard mode again. However this was in the game for so long, I don't expect to see any change here.
Nonetheless divine mode is really young so I give my most honorable plea to the admins to look into changes because the way it is now is not any different to the hard mode implementation at all. According to the announcement it's supposed to be "the new very hard much difficult mode" and for players who want to save mice with "brio and cleverness".
[/rant]

Let's start with the things that went well in my opinion:
- Far summoning range (You don't need to balance on your wobbly build while construction, smart move)
- No totem
- No cloud

Now the things to be critisized:
- Arrow anchors allow the shaman to make their build just as stable as with yellow anchors. The purpose of v-only is that every object is able to rotate freely.
- The demolition worker and architect skills don't work on objects that are connected with a blue anchor. I think they would be very handy in divine mode in case you make a mistake. Right now you just cannot use them.
- Several skills don't just make the mode 'not hard enough' but just as easy as normal mode, here is a list of them with a short explanation/scenario:
* Springs and speed boosts. Makes maps not "very hard much difficult" but solvable with one or two springs.
* Apple, chief's food and personal teleporter. The shaman puts an apple at the hole, teleports to cheese and gives every mouse at the hole a cheese without having to build one object. Not "very hard much difficult" but very easy.
* I'm on the edge with easy victory but would prefer if shams would not be able to use it, otherwise you might tend to create a one-way building which should not be the intention of a good shaman.
* Teleporter is pretty similar to easy victory I think, luring shamans into building one-way solutions.

The following part was meant for the suggestions sub-forum but I will post it here as well since I think it's also a body for discussion.

So my suggestions are the following:
- Fix arrow anchors. [Important]
- Disable the skills I listed. [Important]
- Fix demolition worker and architect skills for blue anchors.

The ones with [Important] are the ones to save divine mode from the same destiny that hard mode followed which is implementing a nice feature with too much inconsistency to make it reasonable at all and be a disappointment to the shaman community again.

We should end up with a divine mode that indeed has the intention of being a challenge to the shaman instead of being popular for red coloured saves on your profile.


More suggestions which I suppose to be wishes for my utopia and which therefore will never even be considered I guess:
- Give divine mode shamans a different map rotation with maps that require building, instead of conjuration or bomb maps.
- Remove divine mode titles so people don't play in the mode for "I want the titles".

Another MAJOR gameplay change wish of me would be the following: Let every shaman start with all skills and objects (including totem and spirit and cloud etc) and let the shaman choose what to play. If they only use blue anchors in their build, they will get divine mode saves. If they use their totem they will get hard mode saves and the b anchor and spirit will be disabled. If they use a b anchor at any point the totem will be disabled and they get normal saves. (In contrary to what I said before, this would be my utopia.) I think this would provide the best solution for everybody.

I suppose that I forgot to mention several things, maybe I'll post them later. I also guess that this is enough material for a discussion

Wow Just Great Epifistu

Divine Mode should be counted for Hard Mode saves!

Wow thanks for you quick reply!

I remember there was an update in which arrow anchors were removed actually, of course I don't know whether it would be possible to make this an optional feature for divine mode. In my opinion 5 arrow anchors are still too many but well it's better than unlimited arrow anchors ;)

Another point about why people play in the mode is also the leaderboard. For sure there will be a higher rate of people playing it if it counts into stats on the leaderboard, but of course that's not your responsibility.
My point with the titles was rather in combination with the map rotation. I don't think most of the maps in the rotation right now actually require the shaman to build something so people will choose it, hoping that they will not have to build anything but instead get saves for mice finishing the map themselves. If divine mode also requires a shaman to build (which should be the shaman's reason for being in a map anyway) people will be less likely to choose it in order to boost stats or get a title. (And I've already read some players writing that they only want the title.)

However, I'm looking forward to changes!

Great Epi!

five arrow anchors are to divine mode as five red nails are to hard mode

i dont think the use of them will ever be other than to exploit 2 v -> 1 c

Sydoline a dit :

Thanks for your long review Epi', it definitely helps us to see this new mode with a player perspective.

Topic-34776 since 2012

Shamousey a dit :

I've made use of rotating green anchors a few times, they seem pretty useful if you can time things just right.

Sometimes, but most of the times it starts to lag and spray over the whole map

Shamousey a dit :

I've made use of rotating green anchors a few times, they seem pretty useful if you can time things just right.

you can use motors on regular spawn joints without arrows

but if you limited arrow anchors to just motors that'd probably remove the stabilizing factor since theres nothing stable about them

How come the stability has been really shaken over the years? The builds aren't as stable as it was in let's say 2011-2012 (Atleast that's what I see)

Fxie a dit :

you can use motors on regular spawn joints without arrows

but if you limited arrow anchors to just motors that'd probably remove the stabilizing factor since theres nothing stable about them

I could name quite a lot of stable builds using arrow+motor:

-ctg elevator
-accordion elevator. I think it was made by epi but dont remember well.
and many others

Actually you have more controll over arrow+motor that you have using motor joints.

I do agree with most of things epi said, but we should not forget that not everyone plays/played in room shaman so they are not used to do hard builds.

Id like to see room shaman become an official game one day (like someone promised us back in 2010 ;) ). Always loved shamaning and its kinda sad see that room die. Adding titles like theres in bootcamp would bring it back to life again. And offcourse you could add true hard modes in that room.

Edit:
Alright i misread your post. sorry

Noexcuses a dit :

I could name quite a lot of stable builds using arrow+motor:

-ctg elevator
-accordion elevator. I think it was made by epi but dont remember well.
and many others

Actually you have more controll over arrow+motor that you have using motor joints.

Not as a stay-in-one-place-stabilizer

this is what we're talking about


using two nails (arrow anchor) to turn v nails into c nails

Noexcuses a dit :

-accordion elevator. I think it was made by epi but dont remember well.

I'm flattered but sadly that's not my invention, however one of my favourites to build. I think this one leads back even further to Affliction or Temple. I guess you are talking about this one:

Noexcuses a dit :

I do agree with most of things epi said, but we should not forget that not everyone plays/played in room shaman so they are not used to do hard builds.

Yes, however for me it defies the purpose of v-only if you can make a workaround because most people won't play it for the challenge which feels like cheating.
I also always find it funny if people complain about an optional feature being too hard. Hard mode was called hard mode for a reason (which wasn't really given) and also then people complained it would be too hard. If somebody thinks it's too hard they are free to choose not to select it, it's not like somebody is forcing them into doing it.
Maybe it sounds selfish but shouldn't the relation bar for the hardest mode be set at the top players and not at the majority of players?

Epifistu a dit :

The totem totally defied the purpose of 'no-b', making a hard mode equally easy as non-hard mode again. However this was in the game for so long, I don't expect to see any change here.

I disagree with this. Totems were a very unique concept, they weren't limited to being just about replacing a B anchor (though almost every totem is, so let's treat a totem like a B anchor for the sake of this argument).

Before hard mode, (good) shamans' builds were predictable and generic: if it's a map where you have to build a bridge from one side to the other, just place a small/long horizontal B plank below you, attach a long C plank and anchor a ghost B plank to keep it 100% stable and this way you'll guarantee it doesn't bounce around. You would repeat this until you got to the cheese.

Hard mode was about making it different and definitely more difficult but not just by REMOVING aspects of the way it worked: there had to be a way to get a stable B plank because at the time when hard mode was introduced, people didn't think outside the box that much (and they had no reason to). Totems were a genius answer to this problem, in my opinion, and it opened a lot more doors than they likely intended (box/cannon/balloon spam, premade structures, etc).

Maybe it's because you're a lot more experienced now but hard mode was a big challenge when it came out so it's definitely not as easy as regular shamaning (ask anyone who recently made the transition from normal to hard mode).

As for your suggestions, I won't comment because I don't intend on using this mode, it seems pretty rushed and not very well thought out, and I think some maps are practically impossible with it, but maybe I'll be proven wrong by someone's creativity.

Sydoline a dit :

Thanks for your long review Epi', it definitely helps us to see this new mode with a player perspective. I will try to answer to some of your points but I don't have all answers yet.


Arrows will be limited to 5. This bug seems impossible to be fixed and arrows are still useful for shamaning. Hopefuly this small change should be enough.


I will report this.


I know Tigrounette is already working on some changes regarding skills for this new mode. I don't have the complete detail yet but some items are going to be more limited (like arrows, spring will be limited to 1) and shamans can now give only 5 cheese.


I don't think this is possible atm but I'll bring it up.

Right now a lot of "newbie" players are playing with this new mode because it's new and exciting. I believe this will change in the next days. Removing titles isn't the solution here in my opinion.

Sydoline there's a problem with that. I'm limited to one spring not only in divine mode, but IN HARD MODE AS WELL. Shouldn't this be changed? Also, the giving cheese as well? Shouldn't that be changed?

Sonicherois a dit :

How come the stability has been really shaken over the years? The builds aren't as stable as it was in let's say 2011-2012 (Atleast that's what I see)

Builds most commonly because unstable when you overlap nails or connect more than two objects with a single nail (which is essentially the same thing). This wasn't as much of a problem when we could just slap a b plank on every single board we spawned.

One of the most prevelant problems is when the anchors will not appear again when you press v and you have to spawn an item to use anchors again. It only happens in v. In other modes it can be fixed by simply changing to the c anchor, but now that we can't do that it's a huge disability. Please fix this as it's been around for a long time.

I just noticed why hotkeys feel so awful in divine: with no spirit nor totem, all hotkeys are shifted down, which completely throws people who adapted to the hotkey format out of synch.

This could easily be solved by replacing totem with 1 single c anchor, as already suggested in the master mode thread and which still stands as a good feature

Johnlantern a dit :

One of the most prevelant problems...

Isnt related to that, we used to do no b and only v builds way before the hard mode come out and they were pretty stable.

I didnt shaman for months and past 2 days been doing some tests, shaman items physics arent the same as they used to be. Probably related to the anticrash update.