Dunegon "Perfect Run" not what it should be

When the new Dungeon mechanics were introduced, it was explained by the devs that they wanted to create an experience that makes it feel like you are exploring a real dungeon. I assume this means like in a Fantasy RPG.

Well, in a Fantasy RPG - you usually have a rogue or similar PC who has a chance to detect and then disable traps. Also, once a trap goes off it’s a one time thing. It doesn’t effect every room after the one it is set in. The PCs usually mitigate any damage before they go on.

Also - “Perfect Run” implies doing something well - something requiring a skill. Being lucky at picking doors is not doing something well.

So - I suggest 2 possible ways to make the Dungeon fun again and not a tease or cash grab like it feels now.

1.) Make a mini-game similar to “Treasure Hunt” (maybe by opening by spending the useless treasure maps) to detect a trap before a door is opened OR, at the least, that allows you to “disable” the trap before continuing - maybe ten turns to match X number of “tool” gems or some such to disable the trap. (You could then in time introduce new rogue troops who create “tool” gems in the future.)

2.) Perfect run should apply to using skill at the dungeon. This means you get a perfect run if you complete all three Boss rooms without losing troops or within 10 turns or something that players can try to excel at. Not a luck based mechanism that players have no control over (at least not without suggestion 1).

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It’s confirmed that the Boss Dungeon mode was INTENTIONALLY designed 100% around luck with no further skill, strategies, or any (meaningful) player agency involved.

proof

When the mode launched, there was a bug that caused certain rooms to never appear behind specific doors, meaning that certain combinations of doors had better or worse probabilities of getting a Perfect Run. That bug was later fixed, and users have since found an approximately equal distribution of each room behind each door (as typical of a fair RNG)

But enough about that dead horse.

Here’s a similar idea: On the Dungeon Offers page, there is a 100 Gems offer for 15 Diamonds, which nobody in their right mind buys given how the 50-Gem offer gives you so much more for less. Instead, I’d like to see the 100-Gem offer being the ability to disable one trap (or if no traps are sprung, it reveals and then disables one trap). This increases the odds of a perfect run from 10% to 30%, if you can afford the Gems. (And yes, there are top-spending players out there with a lifetime surplus of Gems on hand, but remember these offers are time-limited to once per day.)

The problem with Perfect Runs is that the Dragonite reward is literally “all or nothing”. Even ACTUAL casinos don’t do that, players NEED the lesser (more common) prizes as psychological incentive to keep trying for the jackpot, and the current design just doesn’t have that.

As for some alternatives, there’s a wide range of ways that it COULD be done but just to list some ideas off the top of my head:

  • Defeating the Gem Dragon rewards ( = Dungeon Level) Dragonite for every trap NOT yet sprung (but always a minimum of 1 Dragonite). A Perfect Run gives a bonus +80 on top of this. This guarantees at least a token payout, but also incentivizes leveling up the dungeon and fighting the Gem Dragon ASAP, even if the rest of the run isn’t perfect.

  • After defeating all three Bosses for the day, any unopened Trap doors now become special bonus rooms: maybe the first can be a Boss Chest (same as Explore runs, including the chance of a Mimic Boss, scaled to Dungeon level) and the second (i.e. Perfect Run) can be a guaranteed Dragonite reward.

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