Caves ranked, monsters rebuilt — the long road to a real hunting ladder

Where we are: this rebuild is about 50% done — Map Levels 1 through 12 of roughly 25 ranked cave tiers are designed, balanced, and loaded (Oma through Prajna). That’s taken around 40 hours so far. The live monster and spawn tables are being rebuilt on this system next; higher caves (13+) come after.

We’ve been deep in the caves.

Not a quick damage tweak — a full rebuild of how hunting progression works on Mir Vengeance. Every major cave group now has a clear Map Level, its own monster definitions, SQL-backed drop tables, and a combat curve that actually climbs. We’re also rebuilding the live monster and spawn tables on this system.

1. Caves got ranked We grouped maps into hunting tiers and assigned Map Levels so the world reads as a ladder instead of a jumble of similar difficulty. Early Oma ground stays soft. Mid mines and temples ramp evenly. Bug Cave sits as the early-game peak everyone knows. Tomb, Treepath, Zuma, and the Prajna caves continue from there.

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2. We checked the ranges — then fixed them Live spawns were audited cave by cave: who actually walks those maps, what their peak HP and DC looked like, and where the curve jumped or flattened for no good reason. Mid caves were brought onto an even ramp into Bug Cave, which stays the baseline for the early game. Later caves grow from Tomb → Treepath / Zuma → Prajna Cave → Prajna Temple.

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3. Same name does not mean same monster A CaveMaggot in the early mines is not the same CaveMaggot deeper in the world. Tongs in the lower mines are not Bug Cave Tongs. A Toxic Ghoul on the Prajna Island intro is a lighter preview — the full Stone Cave version hits much harder. Each cave-group now gets its own definitions (normals and specials), so tuning one zone no longer silently changes another.

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4. Drop files moved into SQL Monster drop tables are being pulled out of loose text files and into the database — versioned with the monster, easier to audit, and ready for the site and tools to read the same data the server uses.

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5. Rebuilding monsters & spawns We’re clearing the old monster and spawn tables and rebuilding them using this method — Map Level suffixes, per-cave combat, and SQL drops. Expect a cleaner world when the cutover settles: one definition per cave, one ladder through the content you’ve been farming for years.

What this means for you

• Early caves should feel like a proper warm-up, not a random roulette.
• Bug Cave remains the familiar early peak — the ramp below it is smoother.
• Later caves (Zuma, Prajna) are meant to feel like real steps up, not flat copies of Tomb.
• Familiar names can hide new difficulty — watch the zone you’re in.

More tuning will follow as we playtest the rebuilt tables. If something feels off after the cutover, tell us — this system exists so we can fix caves individually without breaking the whole world.