Dicefolk

Written by Rob Larkin on 7/22/2024 for SWI  

Dicefolk really does something different. There are many roguelike strategy games in the market, and many of them very good. The roguelike aspect keeps each run fresh while the strategy most often centers around deckbuilding or some other mechanic. Dicefolk starts in this same vein, randomly generating maps across three levels, or worlds as they are called in the game. The maps are filled with enemy encounters, an item shop and a dice shop, one optional mid-boss, a final boss that completes the level, and various event nodes that provide new characters, or chimera, to replace and upgrade members of your party or other power ups that can be equipped or permanently upgrade your chimera's base stats.

You must unlock enough of the map by defeating enemy encounters to locate the final boss, but you do not need to 100% any map to progress. You begin each game with three generic base chimera of a similar type depending on which summoner you choose. You start with the single straightforward battler summoner and progress to more complex summoners and their mechanics as you gain XP depending on how far you ultimately progress in each run. This is all pretty standard faire with the genre, and it's presented well enough in Dicefolk. 

Where Dicefolk begins to differentiate itself is in its strategy. As the name suggests, actions for each combat round are mapped to a set of dice. Whatever you roll for that round, that's what you can do. This holds for both your party of chimera as well as your opponent. So, boosting and improving your dice becomes one critical aspect, as much as boosting and improving your chimera itself. Big beefy heroes can't do much if you're rolling "skip turns" on two of your three dice. The other strategy aspect is that each of your three chimera take a position in a round, with the one closest being designated the leader, while the other two flanked to either side are in waiting roles. To execute the attacks or guards or whatever rolls you received for the round, for the most part it is the leader that takes those on, unless you use a rotation roll to swap out the chimera's places. This is an essential strategy that allows you to both line up your strongest units to dole out the damage, as well as rotate them out to protect them when damage is incoming from the other side. Again, it's all done well enough and provides an interesting experience. 

But where Dicefolk does that thing that's really different, is in how as the player you have total control over how every round plays out - both your and your opponent's actions. This isn't the simple turn-based I'll deal mine and then set up a counter strategy for what they've telegraphed type of execution. You can play out every action from every die for every round at any time, in any order. You've got a shield roll? Great! Dial it in to your leader and then absorb the enemy's tankiest melee with the next action. Got a weakened character up front? Rotate them out before executing the next blow from your opponent. Ready to deliver a blow but a tough unit with a counter attack special ability is positioned as the enemy leader? Rotate the other side's chimera to a squishier target. The combinations and rotations are entirely up to you, even which character in the backline a ranged attack will zero in on. I'm not sure I've ever felt this in control playing similar games.

But with that level of control comes a counter to keep things balanced - I found Dicefolk to actually be quite challenging with most of my runs seemingly doomed to failure. You've got to run a gauntlet in every level of several battles with spots to heal few and far between. Your generic base chimera are not up to the task and RNG takes a big toll on the probability of any run as you will only have a limited number of opportunities to improve them. Also the RNG on the various items and powerups must be in your favor, as there is a great number of options out there but far fewer that will actually synergize with the team you've put together. I made mistakes along the way and learned from them, but in the end I felt the vast majority of my unsuccessful runs had nothing to do with poor choices I made along the way, but were wholly down to a lack of good options I had to select when selecting upgrades to either my party or inventory. 

As for the mechanics of the actual software on the device, Dicefolk handles extremely well the various quality of life aspects like providing all the info you need on-screen with textboxes on hover. There is a Compendium from the main screen but I never felt I needed it. Your first run dumps you into a tutorial and pieces in the basics. It's easy and pleasant to build from there. It also has a seamless integration of controller or touchscreen support for the Switch. No evidence of a lazy port here like so many PC to Switch translations I find myself so often lamenting. I have no criticisms for the handheld experience. Top marks all around for taking advantage of the Switch's hardware. 

 

In so many ways Dicefolk measures up well to a game like Slay the Spire. And I drop that particular game in here because having purchased and played it across three separate gaming systems, it is frankly my own personal favorite and the gold standard for the roguelike strategy genre. Both well utilize the formats they present themselves on, introducing you to the mechanics and creating the space to discover winning formulas on your own. Both present an excellent user experience where you are not having to flip back and forth constantly with a compendium, although it is there. Both create a gameplay progression where you have to carefully choose your upgrades to equip yourself for the challenges around the next corners. But where Dicefolk starts to fall just a half step short is in the fact that there are far fewer opportunities to make those choices. Each level in Slay the Spire offers 15 nodes to either run into an enemy encounter or a power up. Every enemy encounter offers at least a new card choice for building your deck, and sometimes a powerful relic to really amp your gameplay. It's true that often RNG will be unkind and your choice of card or relic really won't help your build. But it is in the volume of choices where Slay ultimately excels. Runs are not dependent on Relics and bad card options can be made up for later with good ones. Besides the game favors small decks over large ones anyway so skipping a choice is often the best play. 

However in Dicefolk, your run is entirely dependent on getting the better Chimera from the generic base ones, upgrading them with a few items to polish them off, and upgrading your die to provide more viable options in combat round to round. But unlike Slay where you have so many opportunities to do this, most of Dicefolk's encounter nodes are enemy encounters with no real reward. You get some gold for the shops and maybe some berries for healing but you are not offered a tangible chance at improving your party at every step, you are rather just trying to survive most of them unbloodied to crawl forward to the much fewer nodes where you can make that material upgrade. The most significant core of Dicefolk's upgrade system is in swapping out your chimera (followed closely by actually swapping out the face of your die itself). And while there is added value in tanking damage into ones that are on the chopping block and moving them out for shiny, better pieces with full health, despite there being three shrines in every level where you can upgrade characters you can only choose once before waiting until the next stage. The three shrines just map to three options. Unlock all three shrines you know exactly what you've got. Make an early choice and the remaining shrines disappear. If you have the gold there is a 2nd node that provides a single one-off character change but I rarely found much there worthwhile. Two games with similar concepts and progressions but one presented with much less opportunity to make that progression. 

So what we've got in Dicefolk is excellent, even if I find it that half-step behind my true leaders of the genre. It's a challenging game made fair by giving you complete control over how every round plays out. It brings to the table a faultless user experience that takes full advantage of the Switch and its hardware. There is depth and strategies to be learned through failure. If there was a way to offer more opportunity to improve your hand I think it could close that half-step. One way might actually be to thin the herd or buff the chimera. There are so many on offer but most of them feel underpowered and not up to the task. It's a really tough balance to strike and I don't envy any game designer set out with that task. Buff the weaker chimera too much and the game becomes too easy. Leave them as is and most of my failures seem less my fault and just the nature of RNG. There's this niggling sense that RNG is a greater agent in my success or failure than even myself. I am comfortable with where Dicefolk is at, and I do enjoy it greatly as-is; but there is still that half-step gap. That should not deter you, because this is a class-leading game worth giving a try that even has a demo for PC if you're anywhere on the fence.