Autosave Scumming/Exploit (Unforgiving mode?)

Sunless Sea
21

[quote=Frenzgyn]Atom, i’m sorry if i seemed rude, it was not in my intentions, i’ve read all the post and i understand that of course it’s not working as intended.

The point that i hardly disagree is another.

And that’s true, abusing every exploit removes the challenge, but, as i have said you could choose to use it or not, you are not forced in anyway to abuse that mechanic and that’s the reason WHY it’s not yet addressed and i think it’s not a priority, because it’s not directly gamebreaking or immersion breaking.

The difference between me and you is in this sentence:

For me, it doesn’t matter, if i want exploit something it’s easy to edit two or three file in 1 minute and i have that particular things, but in my REAL gameplay i don’t do it, because i like challegne etc, i’ve messed with gamefile just because i like to understand game mechanic and how the game keep track of variables and so one.
If i want the game to make difficult for me to exploit that, i would praise for encrypted gamefiles instead of plain text one.
Of course this is just an example, it’s a different matter, 'cause we are talking of game MODE , not things outside of the game, but i would just like to explain better what i think.
I just don’t need &quotcops&quot controlling if i’m playing legit or not, for me it make no difference, that’s it.

Of course it’s a matter of personal choice, i was just surprised that you guys takes this matter so seriously, nor that it’s good or bad.[/quote]

It may not be a such a big deal to you at least but when I look at what the developers included in SS so far such as RNG, Random events at different islands and areas, a combat system with enemies that use different and unpredictable attacks all points towards SS being a roguelike game. When I bought Sunless Sea on steam, that’s what I wanted from it. A game like FTL that I enjoy way more than I should. If I had the option to avoid consequences in the exercise in frustration that is FTL then I would do it. The fact is however, that I don’t know how to edit game files and that particular game doesn’t make it nearly as easy to exploit its system as SS does. It matters to me because that feeling that every decision has a possible consequence is a very satisfying feeling I enjoyed very much from FTL despite the RNG nonsense that bothers me a bit in that game.

SS isn’t nearly as difficult as FTL which is plain to see, obviously. When I saw that there was a Unforgiving mode for the first time I was excited about the idea that I can never go back on a decision. I was disappointed when I saw that it wasn’t like Fallen London in that all your decisions are saved and which is strange to me seeing as how SS allows this sort of exploit. I don’t know any roguelike games that allow cheating by simply exiting to the main menu.

If anyone wants to play the game without risk, they should play on merciful mode, if not however, Unforgiving mode is for those like me that enjoy games that go out of their way to punish you(I.E. Roguelike). With these two modes alone, the reload exploit is unneeded for Merciful and plain bad for Unforgiving. Knowing that the game can be cheated so easily makes it so that I’m not having that same feel I have from other games like FTL. I know that if I accidentally encounter Mount Nomad for whatever reason and can’t run away I will die and lose everything unless I exploit the game.

I still love the game, but it doesn’t feel roguelike at all. I choose to not to use the exploit it unless I absolutely have to or if the RNG screws me on something with say a 96% chance on succeeding. Its hard not to use it when something that extreme happens. I guess my main complaint about the exploit is the fact that Unforgiving mode exists to make the game more difficult, yet fails to do so by making it incredibly easy to avoid consequences. It is my personal choice to exploit the game in those circumstances, you’re absolutely right about that. However, answer me a couple questions please. If it’s my personal choice to abuse autosaving in Unforgiving mode, why have a Unforgiving mode in the first place? Why have a mode that’s supposed make the game roguelike, but fails to offer that roguelike feel by having the option to cheat the game even in very rare circumstances? Its because of that I’m not feeling from that mode what I did in games like FTL.

The simplest way to fix this problem I think even more then the autosave system I talked about, would be to make it impossible to go to the main menu without saving. That is a fix that is undeniably simple and wouldn’t waste the developers time or resources. It isn’t a big deal to most people I see, but to me I want a roguelike experience from Sunless Sea and right now it just isn’t there for me.[li]
edited by Atom Stratomsk on 8/10/2014

22

[quote=cjo]I don’t care for the current implementation of unforgiving mode, but saving after every single decision seems like overkill. At that point, the save icon alone would get obnoxious! I think the rogue-like delete-save-on-load is the way to go. Of course players can use their own self-discipline to avoid rerolling, but the same can be said of every other major exploit, and games still try to fix or avoid them. IMO using rerolling to avoid death or alter other random outcomes while playing in Invictus mode is a major exploit which should be closed. Merciful mode is available for people who want to reroll.

On a related but slightly different topic, I think it would be pretty neat to have a mode which is halfway between merciful and unforgiving: one in which you can only save while in London. Of course, just like eschewing rerolling, any player can do this as a personal decision. But I think it would be nice to have the game itself support it.[/quote]
The problem with delete-save-on-load is that you’re absolutely screwed if your computer turns off unexpectedly, for instance because of a power outage, or Windows Update springing a reboot on you for an update you didn’t know it was installing, or if you’re like me and keep your power bar under the desk and you accidentally step on it. (This has happened to me more than once. I just don’t have anywhere else to put the power bar.) Or, indeed, if the game crashes or locks up. These are exactly the type of situations that the ability to save your game is supposed to protect you from.

The only idea I have to cut down on the opportunity for save-scumming is to autosave whenever you use up Something Awaits You, since most scummable storylets are based on that quality. It wouldn’t be quite as much of a lockdown as autosaving every time you take a step + deleting your save when you die.

I play in Merciful Mode anyway because I prefer being able to take risks with at least some sort of safety net (or straight-up test whether certain dire conditions will kill you and how), but I got the impression that Unforgiving Mode was mostly intended to make death unforgiving. And thus, the increased difficulty would result from having to be more careful with your skin instead of playing fast and loose with Terror reduction and fighting every lifeberg, pirate, and giant crab you spot.
edited by CameoAppearance on 8/10/2014

23

Well, remember it’s an early access game, it’s wip and it probably will be fixed, of course saving every time you exit the game will do the trick (well, you could always alt+f4 the game, but that’s another story).
I was just surprised noticing it’s so a big deal for some people, maybe because i never experienced the &quotcan’t resist temptaion&quot situation, but, again, maybe that’s just personal attitude :)
edited by Frenzgyn on 8/10/2014

24

The only places where I’ve resorted to savescumming – even in a mode where you can save whenever you want – are that storylet with the various riddles (more often the 100-echo option that gets you a Live Specimen, but I have savescummed on the Great Riddle of Irem a couple times when I wanted quick cash; doing that too much seemed like a boring way to take all the challenge out of echo gain though) and getting a Khanate port report so I could obtain it with a Khanate Suspicion increase of 1 instead of having it shoot through the roof. I don’t actually feel bad about the second one because the smallest possible Suspicion reduction will cost a ton of expensive coffee or difficult-to-obtain drowning-pearls, and your Suspicion goes up whether you succeed or fail, so I feel justified in cheating a little bit to keep it from increasing too fast.

You can’t really savescum combat, because loading a save clears the map. If you’re really determined to farm a certain enemy (for instance, lifeberg hunting) you have to zail around until they spawn and repeat the process if they kill you when you find them.

I don’t even experience a temptation, let alone an irresistible temptation, to savescum for the best outcome on every event; it disrupts the flow of the game, and even if I was less devoted to maintaining immersion, it has the practical disadvantage of clearing away all the enemies I could have extracted valuable loot from. The monster thing admittedly might be a plus rather than a minus in Unforgiving Mode, when you’ll have to start over completely if something that can kill you does in fact kill you, but in Merciful Mode it discourages reloading because you had a minor setback or failed a luck check or didn’t get a rare success, because then if you want to get shiny loot from a somewhat challenging enemy you’ll have to zail around the port for ages waiting for them to come back. (This is why I think that they should keep clearing-the-map-on-load thing at least for Merciful Mode; trying to fight a crab, dying of crab, and having the crab not be there when you respawn adds consequences to overconfident attempts at monster hunting.)

25

[quote=CameoAppearance][quote=cjo]I don’t care for the current implementation of unforgiving mode, but saving after every single decision seems like overkill. At that point, the save icon alone would get obnoxious! I think the rogue-like delete-save-on-load is the way to go. Of course players can use their own self-discipline to avoid rerolling, but the same can be said of every other major exploit, and games still try to fix or avoid them. IMO using rerolling to avoid death or alter other random outcomes while playing in Invictus mode is a major exploit which should be closed. Merciful mode is available for people who want to reroll.

On a related but slightly different topic, I think it would be pretty neat to have a mode which is halfway between merciful and unforgiving: one in which you can only save while in London. Of course, just like eschewing rerolling, any player can do this as a personal decision. But I think it would be nice to have the game itself support it.[/quote]
The problem with delete-save-on-load is that you’re absolutely screwed if your computer turns off unexpectedly, for instance because of a power outage, or Windows Update springing a reboot on you for an update you didn’t know it was installing, or if you’re like me and keep your power bar under the desk and you accidentally step on it. (This has happened to me more than once. I just don’t have anywhere else to put the power bar.) Or, indeed, if the game crashes or locks up. These are exactly the type of situations that the ability to save your game is supposed to protect you from.

The only idea I have to cut down on the opportunity for save-scumming is to autosave whenever you use up Something Awaits You, since most scummable storylets are based on that quality. It wouldn’t be quite as much of a lockdown as autosaving every time you take a step + deleting your save when you die.

I play in Merciful Mode anyway because I prefer being able to take risks with at least some sort of safety net (or straight-up test whether certain dire conditions will kill you and how), but I got the impression that Unforgiving Mode was mostly intended to make death unforgiving. And thus, the increased difficulty would result from having to be more careful with your skin instead of playing fast and loose with Terror reduction and fighting every lifeberg, pirate, and giant crab you spot.
edited by CameoAppearance on 8/10/2014[/quote]

Yeah, I’ve abused the storylet options in the past as well(especially the riddle one). It would be a very simple solution to make the game autosave whenever a SAY event is completed and delete your save when you die. Ultimately this exploit makes Unforgiving mode pointless and I hope that its at least a shadow of a priority with the devs seeing as its would take little effort to fix it.
[li]