re Boss Monsters being worth more. I like the idea but both my magician character and my plated greatsword wielding knight went up 3 levels after killing Grimloc Blackfist -- whom I would have preferred to talk with, but I guess that is not possible. If there is a way for a 'whack-em and whack-em and whack-em' character to kill GB when a 5th level character, then my knight could not find it. But being faster than he was I could run around him and stuff him full of an unbelievable number of arrows. But should there be this much disparaty between a boss monster and the others on the same level? My gut says that GB is worth too many points for this level of dungeon. Also the way that going up works is odd. You kill GB, go up one level, have a level bar that is completely full but do not actually go up until you kill a second creature, with the same result, until you kill the third. This probably just fell out of the way it was implemented, but it might be better to have the bell ring 3 times when GB dies.

Edit: I  restarted my knight when it looked like holy strike was a waste of skill.  This time I killed every monster on the level except for GB.  When I killed him I did not seem to get as much in the way of experience as the last times.  I went up a character level when I killed him, and when I went downtairs and killed another creature, I went up a second time, but the third time did not happen.  I did not reach level 8, only 7 and a half.  Possibly I missed some other monsters on the earlier duungeon levels?  But I think the difference may mean that GB is worth differing amounts.  Worth checking, at any rate.

Grok Skullsmasher on level 9 seems to be worth hardly any points, despite having a name, and being harder to kill than the average orc.  I think he may have been easier than GB, but its hard to tell.  He was definitely easier for Skioldpaddan the Knight to kill, but then I have a better sword, a much nicer set of plate mail, and better skills and stats by now, too.

I think the spell 'Holy Strike' is bugged.  My level 8 knight just took it as a skill.  Right now, including the stats he gets from his clothing, he has mag 14 but Mana Points 81 -- he just bought all the mana clothes from the store to test the theory that he doesn't have enough mana to cast the spell.  This ought to be good enough.

When you cast the spell you get no sound effect, no graphic, and no loss of mana.  And when you next whack a monster, I cannot see that you did a particularly devestating blow -- though at this low a level it might be hard to tell.  Its my third button spell -- so shows up on the bottom left corner.  If you tap this spot again and again and again while standing not facing Zebu but facing the square directly to his left or to his right you make the store button 'shop' and 'leave' show up.  tapping on shop then doesn't make the shop open.  I think this is a second, unrelated bug.

There is a graphical rendering bug, whereby a monster is supposed to be _just behind a door_, is rendered so you see him, so he looks as if he is just in front of the door.  You cannot hit him.  He cannot hit you.   He cannot walk any more steps forward. When you open the door, which looks like it is opening behind him, combat proceeds.  This happens with monsters that walk towards you -- so as you step towards a door, it looks like the monster steps _through_ the door.  It's a really cool effect, and I propose we keep it, but so far I have only seen zombie-like creatures and (I think) spiders walk through the door, while this is something that I think ghosts should be able to do, not what I am seeing.  But the effect is quite cool.

If you take a step back away from the door, the monster walks back through it, and it's just a door again.  take one step forward, and the moster reappears through the wall.  This doesn't happen with every monster or even every walking dead sort when they walk to doors -- it just happens sometimes.  I think I have seen it 5 times so far, and it may be every time with a zombie-type animation.  I will add other monster names as I find them.

An undead mage just wallked through a door.  And, in another life, a fungal spore.

Boss monsters again:

My magician didn't have much trouble with the gatekeeper and the heretic, but my knight had a bad time of it, and died 6 or 7 times.  I don't think there is a way to stand next to them and thump without getting firebolted, feared, or lifedrained to death.  The approach of walk in, whack twice and run away worked, but it wasn't pleasant. Of course I haven't purchaed much in the way of magic resistence gear yet.

str 25, end 28, agi 48, mag 10.

So I'd suggest either toning down the attacks a bit,  their hitpoints, or giving more experience.  They seem to be worth less than sporelings and the razortooth, while being a lot harder to kill.

This is what I have got done today:

1. Player can no longer close doors on top of creatures.
2. Experience gains cannot be more than one experience level.
3. All targets are lost when player enters a portal.
4. Reduced damage of Hydras.
5. Reduced stun of Centaurs.
6. Reduced damage of Cyclops.
7. Creatures will no longer spawn on top of or move to portal spaces.
8. Checked Holy Strike.  Reduced mana requirement to half.  Now does double damage to undead.
9. Added cooldown to Charge and Blast abilities.
10. Added better starting equipment to new characters including a bow, staff, 2 healing potions, 1 mana potion, and a key.

I keep track of the start and end experience for each level so I can display the level up bar.  So, experience is limited to (end - start) of the current level.  If it takes 8000 total experience to go from level 4 to 5, then 8000 experience is the max that a player can receive from one creature.

I have a couple more things to add in.  I'll send out another link via email tonight.

I decided to try it with 2 swords, something I did not think was possible before.  And my conclusion is that I would very much like to change the screen layout in this case.  The best control for me is to tap with my index finger and the one beside it, rapidly.  Tapping wiht 2 hands makes me feel that I am in danger of dropping my phone.  I suppose most people have larger hands than I do and don't find the two large buttons too far apart, but I do for this activity.

While I am mentioning layout, the magic user layout needs work.  In particular you need to be able to replace your spells on the screen to suit your layout.  The best layout I have found has your favourite offensive spell and the charge spell together in easy reach of your fighting fingers (right hand for me).  It's silly if you have to make your spell selection based on where you want the spells to locate on the screen, and means that lefties have to take 2 others first, to get their killer spells on the correct side for them.

Yeah, I think I just put the left and right buttons on either side to make things symmetric.  Though, for usability, the two buttons should probably be next to each other.  They are likely the buttons that are pressed the most often.  I may do this for a future update since it isn't too difficult.

Games like this probably need several control schemes that the player can choose from.  I guess this is why many RPGs often let people script the interface to make it more usable for different classes and builds.

The Hairy Spiders just spawn Spiderlings.

Cycling magic is actually in the game, but it isn't available until you have 5 spells.  Perhaps I should enable the cycle button on the right when there are 3 spells, so it can rotate them around.

frustrating way to die. I am poisoned by a swamp hydra and trying to symultaneously cast a healing spell and back up the stairs to the last level. I get up the stairs, but fall over dead. But when I tap to restart the last save, well, seems I was already dead before I went up the stairs. I am incarnated dead -- it is not that the hydra has another whack at me. I am not sure if I am incarnated poisoned -- I thought that was not supposed to happen -- but if I was, that could do it. As it is, I think that I died of poison just before I went upstairs. Should I keep this savefile around and send it to you? Deleting MyFiles/deadlydungeons/charname_level_16.sav (where I died) after I backed it up did not give me a restart on level 15 as I had hoped.  Any chance of saving this character?