Incline Voidspire sequel: Alvora Tactics

[Trash Player]

The graphics are very charming to me but I suppose that is an acquired taste from formative years with gbc/gba.

 

[Kalasanty11]

Can you create molotov coctails? I found craptone of bottles and even few oiled rags, but no actual fuel.

 

[HoboForEternity]

Finished this finally. Thanks to trails of cold steel, i put other games on hiatus while binging cold steel.

I came back to this yesterday and finally done.

Great game. Altho i think the final boss is weaker than voidspire's final boss. In voidspire i play the medium difficulty and got beaten trhice.

In alvora i played the expert diff and didnt die even once, even the party are all alive by the end of the battle.

Maybe it is just simply i am used to the combat/tactics in alvora, plus the new classes are pretty OP imo.

Anyway awesome game. Will again d1p the next tactics game

 

[Eldiran]

Thanks Hobo!

New patch v1.0.5 is out, notes here. Bugfixes, visual improvements, and better controller support.

Some highlights:

• Improved navigation around corners and 1-tile-wide tunnels
  
• Added minor animation and sound to opening most menus and windows
  
• Support abilities that add attack effects (ex: Thousand Fists) now show their icon in the action evaluation window
  
• Improved Unmaker's 'Drain' visual effects
  
• Controller bindings now show instead of keyboard hotkeys when using a controller

 

[Eldiran]

Patch v1.0.6 out; here are the patch notes. It's a longer one.

Highlights:

• Characters now only lose Max HP the first time they are KO'd in battle, instead of every time
• Sage's 'Revive' now heals more HP baseline, and scales less severely with stats and ranks
• Warrior's 'Counter' now deals 90% damage.
  
• Improved animation of Brawler's 'Hurricane Kick'
  
• Improved animation of Warrior's 'Shove' and Guardian's 'Hold the Line'
• Added number display to character editor to make customization easier

Here's the new Hurricane Kick and Shove in motion:

 

[Jack Dandy]

Uh, hey Eldiran - little help here?

 

[Eldiran]

Does that happen on startup?

 

[Jack Dandy]

Yep

 

[Eldiran]

Can you in Steam right click on Alvora Tactics > Properties > Local Files > Verify Integrity of Game Files? That might make it run again.

If that doesn't fix it, email me at radcodex gmail, or send me a PM, so we don't flood the thread with tech support. : )

 

[Eldiran]

Big new patch! Big enough I had to divide it into multiple sections.

Here are the patch notes.

Some highlights:

• Added indicators of what path you'll take during movement
• Added journal entries for status effects
• Damage numbers are bigger and flashier when dealing high damage
• Newly encountered Aphest, Crub, Wilderi, and Vinemen now have unique arm sprites that show under their class gear
• Fixed Blade's 'Double-Edge' self-damage using an incorrect formula that inflicted too much self-damage
• Fixed most buffs and cooldowns getting removed at the start of combat

Here's an example of the new flashy numbers, and the new Aphest arms:

 

[Ent]

I think I found a bug with the Sharpshooters focus skill - if you focus and use a skill like headshot and it initiates combat you keep the focused status for you first turn. FREE DOUBLE HEADSHOTS BABY.

 

[Eldiran]

New patch - notes here. The main change is that I finally fixed a longstanding, if rare, quickslot UI bug.

I think the double Headshots thing is fixed too.

Also, Alvora and Voidspire are both on sale - $7.50 each until Jan 4th.

 

[Kaivokz]

Finished the hardest non-RUIN difficulty today with about 15 hours clocked. Not sure if I’ll delve back into RUIN mode. I feel like I’ve already seen enough of each section of Alvora, though there were once packs of pretty tough robots (?) with guns in the palace I had to flee from (on my first run) that I never encountered again, and I didn’t find the vault, so I’m sure I missed stuff.

I went through with my first six characters and unlocked classes the traditional way (I think it’s more fun than masks/training, though that’s a cool idea). Overall I enjoyed the first game more. Largely because of symptoms of the shortness Alvora compared to Voidspire. For example,

gearing up wasn’t as meaningful/didn’t happen—I finished the game with primarily steel equipment, other than one mythril greatsword and a unique greatsword from the final adventurer party. (Which was the only unique I found.) Though the aqua weapons from one of the earlier floors are neat in conjunction with lightning spells.

the premises of the stories are good in both games, but Voidspire is more developed/feels like a complete story.

the adventure elements of Voidspire gave the game a good sense of progression, unlocking different ways to go as you figure out what’s going on.

Ultimately I think the pacing of Voidspire was better, which made everything feel smoother (gear, character progression, exploration, encounter progression, story, the ending).

However, Alvora’s mechanics and systems are still good. It was enjoyable to play with 6 characters, and the new classes were fun. The tactical gameplay is still good. I don’t regret purchasing this for full price when it released, and I’ll be keeping my eyes open for anything further releases.

 

[Eldiran]

Glad you enjoyed it!

I agree with your criticisms. Alvora's procedural stuff (the reason why the game was short) was a good experiment, and allowed me to make some very useful tools for next game programming-wise. But I look forward to returning to 99% handcrafted content next game.

 

[boot]

I beat the game yesterday on Expert. Good game. Took 18 Hours first time through, playing cautiously and with a lot of idling on menu screens. I enjoyed most of it. The beginning was very good, would have been better if you wrote a manual or something. Ending was very abrupt, the party was just hitting their stride.

Now I've started a second party on Ruin mode. Fighting monsters early on was nearly impossible, so I created a Rogue and had him sneak to the Golden Palace ruins, where I farmed a ton of gold and was then able to purchase all training and top tier equipment. I'm only about 5 hours in all together, I think. Hardest part was creating a character capable of destroying those statutes, since bombs hardly ever drop.

Was I supposed to do this? Is that why you called the mode Ruin mode? Because you're expected to farm the ruins?

___________

Doesn't matter, this is not why I'm posting.

My party the first time through was sort of cobbled together and inefficient. I take great pleasure in creating super optimal elite badass squads in these games, so my second time around has been much more fun. But there has been a problem.

Life Mirror does not stack with any counterattack abilities. I planned one of my characters around this skill combo. Is this a bug?

I am greatly distressed.

 

[Eldiran]

Sorry about that- it's not a bug. All Counters that share a trigger are mutually exclusive (can't equip Counter Throw and Counter Shot, for example) for balance reasons - and because it would be really buggy otherwise. (Life Mirror is already a bit buggy on its own...)

I'll be sure to add that to counter ability tooltips in the next game.

Glad you've enjoyed the game though, and I'm impressed that you managed to sneak to the ruins to grind loot. I actually hadn't considered that method, but I like that it's effective.