Hi, Cropdeckers!
Before jumping into the content production for a full game, I really wanted to tackle a few UX tasks first that people had asked for since the Cropdeck’s first playtest version.
Here are tl;dr patch notes:
Cards in the Forge are now sorted.
When adding a new card to your deck, you can see how many of its copies (including different rarities) you already have.
Also, the card randomizer should make better offers, not give you too many copies.
Added an option to preview the card details (including upgrade tree!) from different screens.
Some instances of the RNG (card and scarecrow-related ones) should feel fairer.
⚠️ Due to this change, if you saved your run with the previous version of the game, it won't be available, unfortunately - sorry for that! You have to start a new game. It's just a saved run - your unlocked cards are OK!
During a run, you can enter a pause menu instead of going straight to the settings. Pause menu includes a link to the collection, so you can check it at any time.
Fixed a bug with pet tiers not being saved properly when you unlocked a new one and quit the game right after.
Fixed a bug with gamepad detection (occurring possibly mainly on macOS).
Easier card merging
Oftentimes, when you add a new card to your deck, you want to know how many of its copies you already own, so you can collect those that can later be easily and cheaply merged in the Forge. Up until now, the only way to know that was to manually check your deck and count the cards. Could be better!
From now on, cards that you can add to your deck will show a small, neat indicator about the copies you already own. This should help make better decisions when picking the right cards.
Card randomizer (used for the Market, card drops, card openings, etc.) often bumped up the chance to offer upgradable copies of the cards you already had. Now it should work a little smarter and should not alter the chance if you already have enough copies to merge them to the best rarity. This will give more chances for other cards that could make your deck stronger.
Item details
You can now preview card and scarecrow details by clicking them (or right-clicking; for gamepad, the right-click is simulated with right stick press). You can read card descriptions or unlock requirements, preview its upgrade tree, learn more about related items, and see item-specific stats. I want to expand the system in the future to include other item types (like card packs or hazards) and more interesting information (like more cool stats).
RNG taming - some thoughts
As much as I think that RNG is part of the roguelike and deckbuilder genres, I don’t want it to be unfair. I don’t have much to say about it so far, but I am making some internal changes for it. I want 50% to feel like 50%, but also limit the number of places where RNG is used, especially if it has something to do with player actions. For example, I consider replacing (in some cases!) percentage event chance with the event happening every N times, for example, Plow Man scarecrow could give you a wooden hoe every third planted crop, instead of having a 33% chance to do that. Another thing I consider is to show more info to the player, rather than keeping it hidden and essentially making it random. Now you know the level hazards only when you already start the level - I would love to show them on the map screen, so you could make calculated decisions. Don’t quote me on this topic, please, as my plans about this might change greatly!
Final words
The demo has been tried by over 3000 players now, and I get quite a lot of nice comments about it! Thank you! It should reach 10k wishlists soon, btw. That’s a huge number for me! This puts some extra pressure. I want to deliver a fun game in the end. Also, the time is ticking, and I really would love NOT to delay the release. If you want to stay connected and see more updates about the game, consider joining the Discord or following me on X.
Thanks for reading!
– Piotrek