ZDS'S PROFILE

I went with SgtMettool this time.

I'm sorry kentona. I felt like yours was the most accurate compared to the drawing. ):

That said, the one sooz drew is legitimately amazing as art. (as are many others)

I may go deeper in this in the future.

You had troubles with random scenarios destroying your main character and you found that not so fun. That's an issue I find with a lot of roguelikes myself. But there is nothing stopping you from a more "controlled" random approach. Find the middle ground. Doesn't have to be pure random.

Example: If it's the start of the game and you have weak weapons. I don't think you should find a super strong enemy. Try to consider ways to make it possible to live by strategy and possibly give subtle/not so subtle warnings of harder areas.

There are tons of ways to go about it.

Maybe you should start on a MUCH smaller scope for a demo or something. Try to figure out clever ways for a weaker character to still somehow survive by struggling. Or it could be ways for a stronger character to lose by being too confident.

A small roguelike done right is still quite hard to pull off. You can still have a tight level design be randomized. You just have to be a bit of a mad scientist and make sure it all works out. Find that healthy mix of balance and unbalance. Something I learned is that unbalance is sometimes as important as balance. Just don't let one lean much more than the other.

I hope some of this babble helped a bit!

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Cliches don't matter. The flavor of the story is the important thing here. If you read a Wikipedia summary of most good stories, they would seem cliche. If someone obsesses over making every plot element be "original" they eventually lose sight of what's actually important: a good story to tell. The twists and turns of the emotions of both player and character is very hard and unwise to describe via a plot summary. That's just my two cents on that haha.