Hi Krak3rs,
Thank you very much for playing Grim Grimoire and for your feedback! :-)
I'm glad you like the game idea and you are interested in see future development :-)
About your points:
Starting characters are pretty random. My first run was a total disaster. I've got orc, rat and goblin. You know how it ended... :D
Yes, it's true, but it's part of the jam theme "Though Choice", so you must choose knowing that bad things will happen. Of course for the first time it's already difficult because you need to get into the game idea and there are no so much detailed instructions inside the game yet, then you got also a bad combination, so I totally understand your feeling. I am not sure about changing this part yet, because still the game need to have lots of additions, once those are in place, it will be easier to decide if touching this part of not. For example, there will be other cards that are not just creatures and some of them will benefit only some particular other cards, so having a Goblin + the card Ambush or Hit & Run, might make the Goblin a nice card to keep. Also, for the first battle the enemy would have probably easier cards, if taking for example what's available now, Ogre and Trolls will not be part of its Grimoire, however I could still add those strong cards, but give them a very low percentage to come out, just to add that little randomness that makes every play a different experience and let you want to have one more go.
At least I hope you enjoyed the Orc and Goblin voices in your first game :-P
Picking characters should not be obligatory. I've started with strong starting set but eventually ended up with nerfed version as I had to choose some weaker characters.
This point has more or less the same reply of the previous one, it's mainly part of the theme and I would probably keep it as it is as part of a different game. You can mitigate the loss with a trick, leave out the best cards on the Available section and pick them as last choices. So if you have 2 cards that are good on your hand and they are "stolen", take them back at the very end with the last 2 choices, you will probably get both and if not, you will get the last one for sure ;-)
Missing attacks is so annoying! I feel it's 50% or more. Very frustrating. Especially when I've managed to play two big guys and they couldn't take orc and rat (because of misses).
That's a die roll for both attacker and defender. You can calculate the odds before choosing the attack icon. Select a Creature and hold the mouse button/finger to see their stats. You will see the range including the dice roll. So for example, if you have a Troll, the Melee Attack is 6~11 while the Target Orc has Defence 3~8. So even if you roll a 1 you get 6 at minimum, letting the roll with the only options to get 4+ to save himself. In this case yes, it's 50%, but only after you roll a 1 that is already only a 16.7% of chance that it happens to you.
I have just created a detailed instruction section in the game page, you can check it out to see how many things in the game works. Aside for that, there will be more cards in the future that will boost you creatures like magic and equipment, that will give you more chance to change the odds in your favour :-)
Late battle stages seem to be pretty boring. I have to finish my oponent (with annoying hit chance) or wait until he finishes me (with same annoying hit chance) :D
I totally agree with you, I went through this so many times during the test I was making in development phase. Unfortunately I cut a lot already due to the lack of time, so I postponed the option sections that will have an automatic victory or defeat in those cases.
I've tried to use the "escape" button but it didn't work. Maybe I understand it wrong?
No, you did understand well, I just left the button there to show that there will be that option. Since I had to cut out the exploration part, there was nowhere where to escape, so I left the thing behind. I should have add at least a text saying that it's a future feature, but again, time restrictions.
Would be nice to skip/speed up some battle phases/animations. They become repetitive very quickly and break the fun.
Yes, you are right and actually in the game I was already implementing that. There is a variable for the maximum waiting time for the "dialogue", now it's set to 3 seconds. You can notice that when the Skeleton and Goblin sometimes still talk and the action start anyway. I will also have options to skip the waiting time for the dice roll and disable the talk of your creatures. Again, time restriction meant cut out all the non-urgent features. Like for example, I cut out the save system since without exploration and proper progress, there was no point in wasting time setting it up.
I think characters should not be able to pass other characters. With weak avatars there's no brainer strategy. Just rush forward and hit / shoot. Luckily the AI is not that smart :)
Well, that's part of the game idea, no? While kill a 100 cards deck when you can just kill the boss? Isn't real life like that too? ;-)
With improved AI, tougher enemies in terms of "Players" (and not only Cards), and spell Cards, that will become a less available option, but if at the beginning of the game you got an Orc, Giant Rat and a Goblin, and your opponent's avatar is a Goblin/Rat/Orc. Would you prefer to feel like your first battle is a disaster or would you still like to give it a go and win anyway that battle? You can then choose a card from your enemy, so maybe you are happy to swap a Goblin and a Giant Rat for a Troll. Isn't it? ;-)
Thank you again for playing the game and taking time to write very good points.
I hope to come back on the project soon, so you can start to experience the whole game idea I have in mind.
Also I was considering to create some sort of polls to decide with players how to create the next Creatures, like how much initiative should have a lizardman? Should it have Range attack or not? And so on. I think that will make everyone happy to be involved in the game development in a more direct way in addition to the always useful feedback.
Again, as reminder, if you now check the game page, you will find the game instructions that should be complete for the current game state.
Thank you!
Simone