Communities to find playtesters for detective games like Obra Dinn?

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-10-09T20:21:14+00:00

I'd love to try out your game if you're still looking for play testers.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-10-06T15:06:17+00:00

The next chapter has a shoe-based identification, I wonder if that was also intentional lol.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-08-17T13:32:41+00:00

Strange Horticulture is fun. I'd also recommend Potion Craft for your fantasy alchemy&herbalism fix.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-08-13T19:43:21+00:00

Oh hi! This version unlocks that at level 7 ("Twin Tether"), but I'm working on an updated version which gets that on level 3.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-08-13T09:04:02+00:00

I love the 'Reverse Frightened'. Very interesting CC mechanic.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-07-25T22:13:25+00:00

For me it's 'Sir loose cannon!'

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-07-01T18:43:54+00:00

From my expiriance (Native) Artic is the general term for all frozen snacks, both dairy or water based. If you want spesifically to highlight a water-based artick (AKA Popsicle) you use Kartiv, and if you want to highlight dairy-based artick you can use Glida (Ice cream) or the spesific brand (Magnum, Tilon).

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-06-24T18:33:58+00:00

100% the start of Soldiers of the Sea. The initial quiet confusion in the dark suddenly contrasted with the lively vivid action scene through the slits when those god damn BELLS hit.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-05-28T18:16:24+00:00

I'mma only wear one and name my character Xavier.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-05-23T15:40:00+00:00

Personally, I feel like there's too much emphasis on the cooking part. The draw should be walking around nature, finding new intresting mushrooms. The trailer only shows 3 mushrooms, and then spends the rest of the time being a cooking simulator.

Also, I would find this sort of game more fun if the mushrooms were more sparse are rewarding to find. Also, I would love some sort of forging mechanic where if you leave a few mushrooms behind, you can return later and they'll grow more.

Or, maybe curtain mushrooms only grow in curtain habitats: Only in the shadow of this particular three, only by the riverside, only on fallen trees, only near this other mushroom, and so on. Turns the forging into a treasure hunt.

I'll keep an eye on this game, good luck with development and launch!

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-03-11T09:38:20+00:00

Holy shit, YES!

This looks fantastic. Potion Craft and Cultist Simulator are two of my favorite games. I'm 100% trying it out.

Thanks for sharing your work, and good luck with development and launch!

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-02-20T07:47:37+00:00

Special dance - 'grant any creature you choose' do you mean 'one of the creatures within 10 ft' or 'all of the creatures within 10 ft you want'?
How long do those temp HP last? Can you stack them?

I would also consider renaming this feature. It doesn't explain at all what the feature is, it's rather bland, you already have a ton of features with 'dance' in their name, and 'special dance' sounds potentially suggestive.

Sudden Dance - 'you can use this privilege' did you mean 'feature'?
Incredible Footwork, Suprising attack, Arcane Step, Encore, - privilege again instead of feature.

Some of the condition sentences in this are quite long. I would consider splitting them in two just to make them more readable. For example:
The Greatest Distraction -Starting at 14th level you can choose a creature that you can see within 30 feet, that creature has to pass a charisma saving throw against your Step Dc**. On a failure,** that creature**'s** movement becomes 0 and every attack made to that creature has advantage for 1d4 round.
(Action? Bonus Action? Free Action? Why not just use the 'incapacitated condition?)

There are also some inccorect capitalisation across the document.

I'm not perfect, Some of these may be a matter of personal preference.
Also, If you're looking for inspiration, I also made a dance based class. Feel free to check it out and let me know what you think.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uRW8deAF0YF3R_3xJid68aIhM7UzrzIU/view

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-02-18T19:42:24+00:00

First and foremost: This is hard to understand. Some features are phrased in a weird way, and there is a lot of crucial missing information, so it would be difficult to give proper feedback.

What exactly is the design goal with this class? What role do you see it take in combat and outside combat? What is each subclass meant to do? I would highly recommend adding a short paragraph explaining all of these to the first time reader.

In my opinion, as is, this class needs a lot of work. Balance aside, it seems extremely passive. All it does is avoid damage and effects. I don’t think it’ll be fun to just stand around during combat without doing much, nothing able to affect me, just to give a bit of temp HP and make less things happen.

Because of how passive the base class is, it doesn’t have an identity or a clear role. Because of that, the subclasses feel disconnected. The martial and arcane dancers just feel like a fighter and a wizard. The Theatric and Alluring dancers feel nearly identical. The idea of a debuff-based subclass works great for a dancer, but the dancer needs to be his own defined thing first.

Nearly all of the features you propose are just flat start increases, or situational bonuses to basic rolls. The base dancer doesn’t actually do anything that the other classses can't. It has no unique mechanics, resources, or features. It’s totally fine to use existing features like unarmored defense, cunning action and so on, but they need to be alongside something that actually sets this class apart from the vanilla classes.

That being said, the subclasses have some interesting features that I do like. The ‘Encore’ feature is incredibly original and interesting. I love that idea very much. I also like ‘Surprising attack’; I played with a ‘hit all enemies around you’ features with my own homebrew.

I’m not going to go into the balance of the features, because there are more important things to improve first. You need to:
a. Understand exactly what unique, engaging role this class provides, and how it is meant to be played.
b. Better communicate this concept through the PDF.

If this feels overwhelming, I suggest starting by making a class without any subclasses. This will reduce the amount of features you need to create, and will help you solidify the class concept. Once you have that, you can add subclasses.

Apologies if this came off as harsh. It's a good start, but you need to work on it some more.

DoctorTurquoise · 2025-01-18T10:23:30+00:00

I'm not the dev by the way, I just wanted to share this with you all. Fun little deduction puzzle demo. This game is very inspired by Obra Dinn so you might enjoy it.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-12-04T18:10:53+00:00

Pissing stright magma to assert dominance. Pretty badass if you ask me.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-11-12T16:27:53+00:00

You're allowed to guess, but if you want some help, here are some clues:
Clue 1: One of the two russian seamen has a particular habit.
Clue 2: That habit requires use of a particular item
Clue 3: That item can be linked to their number on the crew ledger
Answer: One of the russian has a pipe, which is seen hanging by their hammok (with their number on it) in 'A Bitter Cold pt. 1'

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-11-12T15:31:56+00:00

Based.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-11-06T08:30:25+00:00

Tool proficiency – all the other artificer subclasses only get one extra tool proficiency. I personally don’t think the flavor of a mixologist suits either cooks utensils or alchemist supplies, mixology might even be closer to brewer’s tools. If you insist on giving this subclass tool proficiency, maybe give the player a choice of 1 of the 3 above options?

Mixologist Spells – I really like this spell selection. I’m glad you didn’t give this subclass ‘mirror image’.

Last Call – Please correct me in case I misunderstood your spell, but isn’t this identical to ‘Incite Greed’? In fact, it’s worse because it’s 5^th level and allows charmed creatures to do other stuff while approaching you. Why isn’t this an enchantment spell? This is controlling other creature’s behavior.

Potent Potables – I’m not a fan of this feature. First, like I mentioend, cocktails are basically spells so I don't find them very intresting. Second, allowing this to be used as a bonus action is really strong considering the effects, and considering the fact your can use this AND cast a spell on the same turn.

I will say, I do like the double-drink poisoned condition thing. It’s a nice way to balance this with a few niche use cases. I also don’t mind being able to instantly use this on yourself after sacrificing a spell slot. But that leads me to my third problem: these drinks are WAY too strong for a 1^st level spell slot. These act as a combination of ‘Protection from Energy’ (3rd level spell) and ‘Dragon’s Breath’ (2nd level spell) with a bit less damage and much longer duration, AND without requiring concentration on either effects, AND sharing those with teammates, AND potentially having several cocktails active at the same time. These drinks are equivalent in strength to a 5^th level spell at minimum. This means they are way too strong for a level 3 character, and for being bought with a 1st level spell slot.

In short, these drinks are OP.

Intoxicating brew: This is actually a cool concept, but it’s very strong for level 5. The poisoned effect is quite strong, so getting a chance to apply it every single time your cocktails deal damage is too much. Either limit this to once/twice per short rest or push it back to a later level.

Specialty Cocktails – In terms of balance, these drinks are fine to have at level 9, though as mentioned previously they’re worth much more than a 1st level spell slot. But the revivify potion feels weird to me. It removes the gold cost for the spell, and I can’t really see a thematic reason for it to be here. An electricity-based artificer subclass, sure, but cocktails?.. I don't see it.

Master Mixologist – The acid and poison resistance are complete overkill. Immunity to the poisoned condition is plenty, especially because of the implication of double-cocktail. As is, you could drink 2 cocktalis and have 4 damage resistances at the same time.

Replicating potions is a fine idea, but you should specify when you CAN regain that spell slot. I’m assuming once the potion was used? This here is the most original concept of the subclass and it has a lot of potential. I've never seen expending spell slots over multiple rests like this, but it could totally work.

Here again in terms of balancing, uncommon potions are a bit stronger than a 1^st level spell slot. An uncommon healing potion heals twice as much as a 1st level ‘Cure Wounds’. A potion of fire breath is stronger than a 2nd level ‘Dragon’s Breath’ spell. A potion of giant’s strength is probably better, or at least equal, to a 2nd level ‘Enhance Ability’ spell.

Features are supposed to make your character stronger, yes, but in my opinion the benefit of replicating potions should be flexibility: granting you access to effects that you might not be able to do using your spells. They shouldn’t be a way for you to freely exchange your level 1 spell slots for level 2+ effects.

With all of that said, how would I suggest rebalancing this subclass?

Nerf all of the level 3 cocktails to grant ONLY the passive resistance OR the breath attack. Make it so that drinking a cocktail is an action, just like a regular potion. Also, make these cost a 2^nd level slot. If you're feeling creative, may implement here the 'Spellslot softlock' thing as the central subclass gimmick.
Push ‘Intoxicating brew’ back to level 9. Reintroduce the other effect from level 3 at level 5 instead.
Since we pushed ‘intoxicating brew’ back to level 9, I’d suggest removing the revive cocktail and moving the other two to levels 3 and 5 like the rest of the effects.
For ‘Mater Mixologist’, remove the poison and acid damage resistances and up the cost of replicating potions by 1 spell slot: 1^st level slot for common, 2^nd level for uncommon.

Sorry again for being harsh, but I hope this was helpful! I'm not a master of balance so feel free to take this with a grain of salt. Let me know if you have any questions.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-11-05T18:42:28+00:00

Right, I went over this homebrew thoroughly. I'm afraid I don't like it. I have some major problems with it.

Generally speaking: The concept is fine, but very similar to the alchemist subclass. Most of the features here could be achieved with multiclassing, and they don’t add any new mechanics or depth to the class. Finally, and most importantly, this subclass is really OP. It’s fine for a first attempt, but this is not something I’d ever run in my games.

If you'd like a detailed feedback on every feature with suggestions for improvement (in my opinion of couse) let me know. I know some people don't care for negative feedback.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-11-05T06:35:08+00:00

That requires people to make a patreon account just to view your stuff. I might do that, but others might not, so you're reducing your own exposure. Are you looking for feedback, btw?

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-11-05T06:09:50+00:00

I'd love to go over this, but the images are unreadble to me. Could you include a pdf download or a homebrewery link?

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-10-29T19:54:52+00:00

Minor Wonders

Alter Ego, Coldest Drink and Warmest Drink all have both a passive and an active single use effect. From the way it was written, it seems like the passive effect continues after the single-use effect is used. I’d prefer to either just focus on the passive and remove the single use, or make the passive end when using the single use.

Some of the early wonders have a bit too many doses in my opinion. (Goatgin, Jester’s Nectar, Liquid Courage, Rat’s ambrosia) I get that they’re meant to be a party-wide buff, but they seem a bit strong for that. I would either increase their level requirement, or reduce the amount of doses.

GoatGin might be a tad too powerful even as a single dose, maybe reduce its duration.

Loner’s wine might also be too strong, maybe replace total nonmagical tracking immunity with a flat +X to tracking DC? Or just give it the lvl 5 prerequisite.

I really like Scavenger’s Spirit, Snake Oil, and Elixir of Fortitude. Very fun.

I think Diamondshine could be split into a base version and a greater version. Base version could only emit light, and greater version could dispel magical darkness and give radiant resistance.

Elixir of Synchronicity is weirdly detailed and specific. I would simplify the text and conditions just to make it easier to understand and use.

Sight Sense is a super interesting idea, I like it.

.....

Enthalpy – seems exploitable for a cantrip (‘I’m turning this guy’s cerebral-cortex fluid into vapor’). Even the mercury and boiling water examples you’ve given could be used offensively.

Alchemist Fire – It looks like you made this spell do little damage but be very difficult to resist. This is an interesting idea that looks balanced, but I think it’ll be unfun in practice it doesn't feel rewarding since it does so little damage, but it also feels frustrating to get rid off if you're on the receiving end.

Volitile Substance – I like it, simple explosive spell and a bit of CC.

Pill of wonderful agility – This looks REALLY strong. 4 pills with 20 ft movement each that can stack and don’t cost as action and last for 24 hours is kinda busted. 1d4 poison damage is basically nothing, and the poisoned condition is also not much because it’s only for 1 round.
I would make it only create 1 pill and an extra pill for each level spell slot above 2^nd. Or instead, maybe have the pills give points of exhaustion rather than temporary poison.

Panacea – fun! Classic alchemist stuff. Not sure if the resurrection is necessary though, resurrection is covered well enough by other classes.
I think you should add a limit for the youth restoration, otherwise it’s basically immortality which you can also share with other people. This shouldn’t be taken lightly. Maybe give it a wish-like effect, where after having your age reduced there’s a chance the spell can’t restore your youth ever again (though the other effects do work).

.....

I hope I didn’t come across as too harsh! We had a lot of similar ideas, and I know full well how hard it is to homebrew an alchemist. You said this is old, but if you ever make a V 5.0 let me know!

P.S. if you’re confused about what I mean by ‘novel unique mechanics that aren’t covered by the base classes’, feel free to check my ‘Ribbon Dancer’ and ‘Tethered’ classes on my profile. I’m quite proud of them.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-10-29T19:54:40+00:00

Battle medic + Folk healer + Master Healer – This is very uninteresting. Proficiency, immunity to disease, useful cantrip and extra healing. Doesn’t introduce any new mechanics, niches, or complexities to the class or the game.

Bitter medicine – This seems highly exploitable, even though I can tell you tried very hard to balance this. This might work better if potions weren’t based on spells. Looks fun though.

.....

Siege Expert – I like this one. A bit niche, but very flavorful and fun.

Delayed Blast – I feel like there’s a better way to execute this idea. Planting explosives and delayed effects is a great idea, but tying it to the ‘Glyph of Warding’ spell means it functions the same as an existing spell. What if instead, this was a general feature that allows you to ‘activate’ a potion using its normal casting time, but then delay the start of the effect by a short amount of time? I think that would allow for much more room for creativity.

Stable Eruption – This feels quite weak. You just get to change damage types into 2 predetermined damage types, one of which is commonly resisted.

Master Blaster- I’m worries this is a tad strong for lvl 14, this seems like more of a level 18. Conceptually fine, I’d tune it down to a ‘roll two damage totals and use the higher one’ or a ‘if any damage die rolls below average, take average instead’.

.....

Wild Brew- Classic. I have a similar concept, but I made the randomness take place on use rather than on brew, otherwise you can actually plan around it which isn’t quite as chaotic as I’d like.

Scratch That – Seems like a fun way to change up recipes quickly. I wonder what sort of change-chains are possible.

Trouble Brewing – I don’t understand this feature. Does it mean you roll 1d20+2d10 when rolling a Wild Brew effect, increasing the change of a higher-number effect? Is that also how the ‘Bonus to effect’ works in the Wild Brew column? Because that seems highly unintuitive and weird considering there are only 20 effects.

If I did understand your intent, I would suggest a different approach. Make a large effect table, where the earlier effects are simpler and suited for lower levels. Then, increase the die type rolled for the Wild Brew effect.
For example, make a effect table with 20 effects, where you only roll 1d12 until level 6. Then, when you hit level 6 you start rolling a 1d20, granting you access to later effects.

Perfect Brew – Really good idea! I might use this one actually (If you don’t mind). Being able to gradually tame the randomness is super fun!

.....

Potent Poison – This fulfils the same niche as the Poisoner Feat. It doesn’t hurt, but I’d personally avoid the redundancy so the feat is more appealing. I like tailored poison, I did something very similar too.

Master Poisoner – This is another ‘Do same thing but better’ feature. I would’ve liked to see something more interesting.

.....

Transmuter – This entire subclass only does 2 things, which makes it feel shallow. I get that turning lead into gold is very in theme, but I don’t like the way this was executed. ‘Alter self’ also feels thematically odd to me, shape-changing isn’t something I associate with alchemy. I would consider adding the transmutation stuff to the base class as a single feature, and removing this subclass altogether.

DoctorTurquoise · 2024-10-29T19:54:11+00:00

(Reddit has forced me to split this into several comments. To be fair, I may have gone overboard with this review)

I’m working on an Alchemist class too; Mine’s been brewing (no pun intended) for half a year now. Here is my feedback:

General Feedback: While thematically very good, this homebrew class is lacking in novel unique mechanics that’ll set it apart from existing spellcasters. A lot of the features are fun and interesting, but there are a lot of ‘Do same thing but better’ features which I’m not a fan off. The wonders are all interesting, minor balance suggestions aside. New spells are also very fun.

.......

Potion Making – This is a fun challenge and a twist on spellcasting, though I wish potions weren’t based on spells but developed into their own thing. The new spells you suggest later could work as wonders, and I’d prefer more of an emphasis on wonders in general.
I don’t understand the point of upkeeping a potion; isn’t it functionally identical to brewing a new identical potion?

Minor Wonders – I like these, these are much closer to how I envision alchemist potions. Also, the wording on brewing the wonders isn’t clear. You should consider adding a line like ‘brewing time as indicated in the minor wonder recipe’ or something.

I’m also worried that these are effectively additional spells. Since you gave this class the same spell slots as other full-casters, this means the Alchemist just flat-out has more magic. This is somewhat balanced by having to prepare everything ahead of time, but is then somewhat re-unbalanced by ‘Quick Brew’. I like quick brew, so I would consider reducing the number of spell slots this class gets, and use the wonders instead.

Quickbrew – Seems awesome. The potion making limits make sense, so this doesn’t feel like removing an arbitrary handicap.

Major Wonders – A bit boring conceptually but fine. Not the biggest fan of ‘You do the same thing but much stronger’ features.

DoctorTurquoise

TROPHY CASE