The Caves beckon and a new explorer heeds their siren's call.
I've been playing a bit of this lately, and thought it might be fun to whip up a new character for folks here to see.
Caves of Qud is a science fantasy roguelike epic steeped in retrofuturism, deep simulation, and swathes of sentient plants. Come inhabit an exotic world and chisel through layers of thousand-year-old civilizations.
Caves of Qud was inspired by the pre-graphical-update Dwarf Fortress, and has, much like it's inspirational source, been in development for something like 15 years. It's a sprawling labour of love and passion, and its simple graphics are the perfect medium to explore this sprawling and chaotic world. I've honestly had a great time diving into this game and (mostly through trial and failure) figuring out the basics.
The game offers several game-modes: Classic (iron-man style perma-death), Roleplay (checkpoint save in towns), Wanderer (exploration focused), Daily, and Tutorial. Daily I haven't tried yet, it seems like it's Classic but uses the date you start the character to generate the world seed? I haven't looked much into it yet.
I tried Classic a few times right off the hop and while the game gives you a few 'highly survivable' starting characters, I found myself dying within an hour each time... so I skipped over to Roleplay and I've thoroughly enjoyed the game with the assurance that I won't wipe my character if I mess up while I'm learning.
For this run, I've created a brand new character instead of using one of the Presets or Random
You have two branching types of humanoids in Caves of Qud: Mutated Humans and True Kin. Mutants get wild mutations as you level up, and can become multi-limbed, multi-headed monstrosities just as likely to sprout wings all of a sudden as they are to grow horns out of their heads. True-Kin on the other hand are more like 'Pure' humans - they don't mutate and instead get body-mods by way of Augments that help them achieve many of the same styles of gameplay as their Mutant counterparts. I've picked up some really neat augments on my primary character, but I don't think I'm quite ready to dive into trying that style yet... so I stick with a Mutant again for this run.
Because I'm not using a template or randomized character, I get to sort through the various perks, and pick what kind of initial mutations I want. I choose Chimera, as it mentions I can get a bunch of arms and I want to try sprouting a bunch of hands and turning my character into a dagger-wielding blender.
I then pick his Class and Attributes. I chose a Pilgrim as it gives me a few skills that are sure to come in handy.
With that, it's time to pick our starting village. I stuck with the standard village of Joppa, as it's the one I'm somewhat familiar with.
And, with a moment to load... we're officially in the game!
In the starting village we can get two simple quests: one is to travel to a nearby location and basically hunt down a monster and bring its corpse back, and another is to travel way to the north through the salt-dunes to toss a strange bauble into a sacrificial pit. I pick those both up, (after checking myself out to see how I look).
Jewel Encrusted clothing simply means I can sell it for more to traders, which is good as fresh water is the currency of the day, and we need to drink. Then I read my quest:
Something has been eating the Watervines (a food and water source in this mutated wasteland world), and that's a problem. They're not sure what it is, and that means we need to step in and hunt it down.
So, next time... we're off to pay Red Rock a visit and see if we can get to the bottom of What's Eating the Watervines.
Until next time friends, Happy Gaming!