Dungeon Defenders

Yeah I have a good friend stuck in TOR-land that won't play this or LoL or anything online with me anymore. Hopefully he'll snap out of it someday.

For those of you trying this out on the free weekend:

I'm still playing, feel free to add me (NikkiLott is steamid)

Some tips from a while back:

Which achievement Cymborgi?

Parallax Abstraction wrote:

The game regularly disconnected Stylez or myself for no apparent reason. I also picked the...can't remember it but the warrior class and Stylez picked the ranger and I got almost all the kills cause it appeared my melee and trap attacks were grossly more powerful than his. Also, it's clearly designed for 4 players and isn't balanced for less than that. Stylez and I couldn't get past the 3rd stage (even though we dominated until the last wave) because after the last wave starts, it's impossible to monitor all the sides at once without being overleveled. That was just my initial impressions. I really like the game, these issues were just frustrating. I really want to play more with an experienced group.

The game doesn't do a good job of telling you all the details you might like to know. For example:

1. In multiplayer if you kill a monster worth 2 exp, everyone gets 2 exp even if they did nothing to kill it.
2. All items autosell if you start the next wave, next level or return to tavern. So you don't need to pick everything up.
3. The number of monsters and the hp of monsters scales to the number of players.
4. If you press shift you can see the minimap and see where monsters are. Things flashing red are weakened.
5. Low level traps are indeed weaker than low level towers. As you upgrade them this is still mostly true but traps have some uses that make them indispensible.
6. For my first play through I had many moments like you've experienced where I thought I needed to level to succeed. But trying a different layout, I was able to succeed with no more levels.

The strongest combinations of defenses I've found are mixed. Right now I've been using a Squire/Monk mix.

The squire has good defenses, but the tends to have poor AOE. The monk has great AOE, but can't wall off anything, and relatively low DPS defenses.

Also, it seems like it makes more sense to specialize in towers or hero abilities, rather than trying to be all around. The caveat being unless you have a lot of people, you can't get the coverage you need with going heavy on the hero abilities and have an effective set of defenses.

I've been playing an awful lot of this lately. Just got my apprentice to 74 and grinded out a few mythicals so I feel like I'm pretty close to cooking with gas. If anyone is interested, feel free to add me (steam name hereyoulie). I have no problem doing glitter runs for XP or whatever else to help out.

I honestly thought I'd play more of this than I did. Need to come back to it at some point.

Well finally got this game and I am definitely diggin' it. Solo play is pretty painful though so I definitely need some pals. Can I get an invite into the club?

http://steamcommunity.com/id/docjoe

Thanks!

As a gamer with a small baby and irregular gaming times, can somebody advise if playing this game solo is feasible? I don't mind a challenge but I haven't picked it up because everything I read suggests that playing solo is just too punishing.

Copingsaw wrote:

As a gamer with a small baby and irregular gaming times, can somebody advise if playing this game solo is feasible? I don't mind a challenge but I haven't picked it up because everything I read suggests that playing solo is just too punishing.

It is feasible, but not all that enjoyable. That said, co-op is basically drop in/drop out so you don't really have to schedule times or play for long periods of time. I avoided co-op for a long time and it wasn't really necessary.

Copingsaw wrote:

As a gamer with a small baby and irregular gaming times, can somebody advise if playing this game solo is feasible? I don't mind a challenge but I haven't picked it up because everything I read suggests that playing solo is just too punishing.

Coping if you get it send me a Steam invite.

I don't find co-op intimidating at all. *Most* people aren't complete idiots so it's usually pretty smooth. People only start getting snarky when you get to the high level stuff (aka endgame in MMO's) but there's TONS to do besides deal with them. I'm always up for playing alts, so feel free to find me on there!

Docjoe wrote:
Copingsaw wrote:

As a gamer with a small baby and irregular gaming times, can somebody advise if playing this game solo is feasible? I don't mind a challenge but I haven't picked it up because everything I read suggests that playing solo is just too punishing.

Coping if you get it send me a Steam invite.

I already invited you after your first post asking.

Thanks guys. Couple questions about co-op: is there a minimum level you should be at before jumping in and is there an etiquette around looting gear and crystals?

Thanks for the replies ... I'm getting the impression that there is some sort of auto co-op find feature? I was assuming you had to find a friend online to play but maybe not.

Docjoe wrote:

Thanks guys. Couple questions about co-op: is there a minimum level you should be at before jumping in and is there an etiquette around looting gear and crystals?

You can make a new character and jump right in to playing with other folks. You'll get better experience that way because it scales the number of monsters that spawn to the number of players in the game. As far as looting, if the item is an upgrade (it will have green arrows around it and be green when you hover over it) grab it up. If it's not an upgrade, leave it there and at the end of each round the game sells all the stuff on the ground and splits the mana between the players. Mana is used to upgrade items and is equivalent to money as far as buying stuff from other players.

Copingsaw wrote:

Thanks for the replies ... I'm getting the impression that there is some sort of auto co-op find feature? I was assuming you had to find a friend online to play but maybe not.

When you login to the online game, it has a "quick match" button that just puts you in a game with players similar to your level. There's also the "custom game" section where you can find something specific if you want. If you host a game, there's a good chance it will fill up too.

The 'Quick Match' is going to dump you into any open game. So, when you join, look at the map, at the levels of the other players, at the difficulty. If you are a level 70 in a level 20 game, or a level 5 in a level 50 game, you might want to leave.

Back when I played, generally I would bring up the list of games, find an open match that fit what I wanted, and then join that directly. I found it a much better experience. Don't hesitate to host a game, there is no reason not to.

LtWarhound wrote:

The 'Quick Match' is going to dump you into any open game. So, when you join, look at the map, at the levels of the other players, at the difficulty. If you are a level 70 in a level 20 game, or a level 5 in a level 50 game, you might want to leave.

Back when I played, generally I would bring up the list of games, find an open match that fit what I wanted, and then join that directly. I found it a much better experience. Don't hesitate to host a game, there is no reason not to.

There is actually a level limit a host can set now, which should help avoid this problem sometimes. Other times a lazy host will not understand the new function (or not notice it)

I'd say it's decent for a single player. I got a squire to 70 and then use his towers to help the lesser alts. Also you can pause anytime, so if something comes up then you can attend to it quickly.

Queueball wrote:

I'd say it's decent for a single player. I got a squire to 70 and then use his towers to help the lesser alts. Also you can pause anytime, so if something comes up then you can attend to it quickly.

Squires are excellent first characters. Once you get to level 74 and get a few of the mythic level items, you can just set up defenses on Glitterhelm Caverns and switch to your alts for excellent XP.

Squires are awesome, dps and tower builds are both in high demand all the time.

Solo is possible for this game, but it really shines as a co-op experience for friends in vent. My best co-op moments of the year (2011) were in this game.

Squee9 wrote:

Squires are awesome, dps and tower builds are both in high demand all the time.

Solo is possible for this game, but it really shines as a co-op experience for friends in vent. My best co-op moments of the year (2011) were in this game.

I concur, that the game is much less interesting without other people.

Series EV coming out today! She's awesome!

Finally managed to take down the Spider Queen last night with a team of similarly geared players (all less than 1k in any stat). Was tough, but with good plans we were able to beat her with far less stats than most others. Was great fun!

I really admire the quality, frequency and price on the content these guys put out. It's clear they really care about their game and their fans. I should put some more time into it.

So... Penny Arcade in DD

Free at PAX. Or for money on Steam, Friday.

A buddy of mine and I are really enjoying this game and looking for more people to play with. We're doing fine with two players, but it looks like the more intense levels should really be played with more. I think my highest toon is only about 35 right now, so we're lowbies, still.

So if anyone wants to join us that'd be great. Friend me up on Steam and we'll toss you an invite if you're online. Maybe even schedule a night some time to play.

You can now start on any survival wave you've reached with extra mana to help you get started from where you left off! As close to a save point as we're gonna get, and I'm lovin' it!

MitchellW wrote:

You can now start on any survival wave you've reached with extra mana to help you get started from where you left off! As close to a save point as we're gonna get, and I'm lovin' it!

Wow. That's the only hope I'd probably ever have of the wave 25 pet reward thing.

Stele wrote:
MitchellW wrote:

You can now start on any survival wave you've reached with extra mana to help you get started from where you left off! As close to a save point as we're gonna get, and I'm lovin' it!

Wow. That's the only hope I'd probably ever have of the wave 25 pet reward thing.

Really. That was just too much of a drag getting through those higher waves...

Yeah it's pretty awesome. Sooo happy!

LobsterMobster wrote:

I really admire the quality, frequency and price on the content these guys put out. It's clear they really care about their game and their fans. I should put some more time into it.

*stares at the post... thinks about the major and hordes of minor problems he had back when he still played the game... the constant bugs, glitches, the patch/hotpatch/hotpatch to the hotpatch/repeat a few more times cycles, the changes made over the protests of the player community that were later backed out bit by bit...*

Okay, I'm going to assume there are invisible /heavyhanded-sarcasm tags around that.

The restarting on later survival waves changes is a good thing, almost enough to pull me back into the game.