Fun with new vanilla
Timo Pietilä
fun now than I had before with my current char (Hi-Elf Ranger). Maybe it
is the new ID system. Maybe monsters are somehow better now.
I think it is the new ID-system. Rangers used to *REALLY* suck at
identifying items, and now that has been fixed.
Just one observation: Armors are a lot cheaper than weapons. Ordinary
longbow costs more than weak ego soft bodyarmor. That is something that
doesn't feel right. Maybe this is fixed in 3.1.2.
Also there should be some method of getting feeling on potions, scrolls
and jewelry without risking putting on something that *really* ruins you
game or drinking potion that can kill you.
Timo Pietil�
Eddie Grove
> Also there should be some method of getting feeling on potions, scrolls and
> jewelry without risking putting on something that *really* ruins you game or
> drinking potion that can kill you.
IMO the right fix is to remove items that ruin your game when you try them.
The idea of pseudo without testing never made any sense to me at all.
The worst remaining culprits are curse scrolls. Also, jewelry with sticky
curses can ruin ironman games. I don't think there are any ruinous potions,
except !saltwater if you have no food.
Eddie
Timo Pietilä
Death and explosions have been removed? Potion of ruination also? That
is a good start.
Timo Pietil�
Bill
My recollection is that ToMe has had that feature for years, and
surely someone connected with Vanilla development must have looked at
the ToMe code.
I guess I've been sitting here thinking that scrolls, potions and
jewelery were left out because they were easy and the devs were
concentrating on the harder problem of ID by use.
Bill
Eddie Grove
> Eddie Grove wrote:
Yes.
The main drawback to testing potions now is losing the first one to testing.
There is still lose memories, but that is insignificant. Ruination wasn't so
bad back in 3.0, essentially setting off a secondary short statgain phase to
regain 18/100s, but with the reduced stat potions in 3.1 I agree it had to go.
Eddie
Wally the Grey
What about just weakening it? Either to hit only one random stat or to
allow restore xxx to work, maybe changing the name to Ravaging.
Eddie Grove
It is about the attack on TMJ. If you assume that by the time the player
reaches the depth of the potion identify will be plentiful, what is the point?
Before the point where identify is cheap, it might be game ruining.
If identify were eliminated entirely, you'd simply be adding a stage of extra
weakness for the player. Would that add to the fun of playing? It's hard to
say. I do not currently get any particular enjoyment from quaffing a potion
of lose memories once a game. It seems pointless.
There is something a bit similar to your suggestion called a mushroom of
debility. It drains current [not max] str or con and restores mana. It is
useful, unlike your proposed potion. I believe that you are more likely to
get a mixed item like that added to the V object list than an item with purely
negative consequences.
Eddie
Wally the Grey
> There is something a bit similar to your suggestion called a mushroom of
> debility. It drains current [not max] str or con and restores mana. It is
> useful, unlike your proposed potion.
My proposed potion is a less harmful version of a pre-existing one, and
one that might create an interesting situation some games or at least
keep players on their toes regarding testing unfamiliar items when
monsters are nearby. But yes, maybe give it an upside, like it gives xp
the first time one's quaffed or something.
voirin
> and jewelry without risking putting on something that *really* ruins you
> game or drinking potion that can kill you.
Rings have certainly been my downfall in ironman. I just disregard them in
early game as they are too frequently cursed. But I am inclined to think
that by introduction of additional 'feelings' to potions, scrolls and
jewelry; wont this make the game somewhat easier? Do we want this?
Timo Pietilä
I think goal should be getting rid of ID completely. Current system is
getting there and including those items in pseudo-ID system is the only
way to be sure that it will happen eventually.
OTOH if you wipe out dragon pit or clear big vault you have easily over
hundred items to go thru. Testing or even carrying that many items is
not something you want to do. There should be some method to "increase
basic knowledge" of item features so that in later game you can
accurately ID ego immediately without even picking it up and from
artifacts you get info what it can do.
Something like recognizing features more and more accurately without
actual connection to item itself in hand. If you recognize fire brand
you know if item has fire brand immediately. If you know what Free
Action looks like in item you recognize it immediately etc. etc.
Then we could re-introduce "self knowledge" -potions that fully ID
everything you are carrying immediately increasing your knowledge of
item features.
Timo Pietil�
Eddie Grove
> I think goal should be getting rid of ID completely. Current system is getting
> there and including those items in pseudo-ID system is the only way to be sure
> that it will happen eventually.
Even with no ID at all, why should it be necessary to have pseudo on potions?
Why should it be necessary to have pseudo on jewelry if there is no sticky
curse? There would be a limited number of flavors, and you could learn them.
> OTOH if you wipe out dragon pit or clear big vault you have easily over
> hundred items to go thru. Testing or even carrying that many items is not
> something you want to do. There should be some method to "increase basic
> knowledge" of item features so that in later game you can accurately ID ego
> immediately without even picking it up and from artifacts you get info what it
> can do.
>
> Something like recognizing features more and more accurately without actual
> connection to item itself in hand. If you recognize fire brand you know if
> item has fire brand immediately. If you know what Free Action looks like in
> item you recognize it immediately etc. etc.
You just pointed out a blind spot of mine. I've been assuming that the way to
do this is to learn things like fire brand, but I've also been assuming a
binary approach. I never considered e.g. being 50% likely to notice a fire
brand on a weapon.
I've been assuming for this approach that there is a "rune" on each object
that is visible, and either you know it or you don't. One way to manage
partial knowledge is to assume e.g. that there are 3 separate runes that are
equivalent in granting fire brand, so there would be 3 steps of learning.
On a separate note, do you have an opinion about requiring a successful hit to
learn attack plusses? Have you ever unwielded damage bonus items because you
had too many weapons to learn and didn't want to kill monsters too quickly?
Eddie
Paul Murray
> voirin wrote:
>>> Also there should be some method of getting feeling on potions, scrolls
>>> and jewelry without risking putting on something that *really* ruins you
>>> game or drinking potion that can kill you.
>> Rings have certainly been my downfall in ironman. I just disregard them in
>> early game as they are too frequently cursed. But I am inclined to think
>> that by introduction of additional 'feelings' to potions, scrolls and
>> jewelry; wont this make the game somewhat easier? Do we want this?
> I think goal should be getting rid of ID completely. Current system is
> getting there and including those items in pseudo-ID system is the only
> way to be sure that it will happen eventually.
Just to offer one differing opinion here.
The direction the game seems to be heading in is not one I'm favour of.
Angband has shops, it has word of recall, it has easy id. These are all
part of what makes it different from other roguelikes. The direction
seems to be being shaped by a small number of very experienced players
who find the game too easy and want to make it into more of a challenge
game. Recent changes are exactly the sort of things that should (and in
previous times and maintenance regimes would have been) put into a new
variant for people to try out, rather than being added to vanilla.
Timo Pietilä
> On 2009-10-06, Timo Pietil� <timo.p...@helsinki.fi> wrote:
>> voirin wrote:
>>>> Also there should be some method of getting feeling on potions, scrolls
>>>> and jewelry without risking putting on something that *really* ruins you
>>>> game or drinking potion that can kill you.
>>> Rings have certainly been my downfall in ironman. I just disregard them in
>>> early game as they are too frequently cursed. But I am inclined to think
>>> that by introduction of additional 'feelings' to potions, scrolls and
>>> jewelry; wont this make the game somewhat easier? Do we want this?
>> I think goal should be getting rid of ID completely. Current system is
>> getting there and including those items in pseudo-ID system is the only
>> way to be sure that it will happen eventually.
>
> Just to offer one differing opinion here.
> The direction the game seems to be heading in is not one I'm favour of.
> Angband has shops, it has word of recall, it has easy id. These are all
> part of what makes it different from other roguelikes. The direction
> seems to be being shaped by a small number of very experienced players
> who find the game too easy and want to make it into more of a challenge
> game.
Direction of the development has been for a long time just opposite of
that. Try Frog-Knows. Even I have difficulties beating it. Or Moria
which angband is based on. Current vanilla is _easy_. It really should
not be this easy. Problem is to find balance between frustrating and
challenging, make game difficult without making it slow.
> Recent changes are exactly the sort of things that should (and in
> previous times and maintenance regimes would have been) put into a new
> variant for people to try out, rather than being added to vanilla.
Goal is not to make ID difficult, just opposite. Ideally you should not
need ID at all. Note that _need_. Gameplay impact is small, this is more
a UI thing than gameplay thing. Just because ID has been and is easy to
get. Now that it even reveals all attributes of the item making *ID*
obsolete it is even easier than before. Pseudo is faster and all classes
have strong pseudo.
Timo Pietil�
The Wanderer
> Paul Murray wrote:
>
>> On 2009-10-06, Timo Pietilä <timo.p...@helsinki.fi> wrote:
>>> I think goal should be getting rid of ID completely. Current
>>> system is getting there and including those items in pseudo-ID
>>> system is the only way to be sure that it will happen eventually.
>>
>> Just to offer one differing opinion here.
>> The direction the game seems to be heading in is not one I'm favour
>> of. Angband has shops, it has word of recall, it has easy id. These
>> are all part of what makes it different from other roguelikes. The
>> direction seems to be being shaped by a small number of very
>> experienced players who find the game too easy and want to make it
>> into more of a challenge game.
>
> Direction of the development has been for a long time just opposite
> of that. Try Frog-Knows. Even I have difficulties beating it. Or
> Moria which angband is based on. Current vanilla is _easy_. It really
> should not be this easy. Problem is to find balance between
> frustrating and challenging, make game difficult without making it
> slow.
Depends on what criteria you're using. Some people don't find the game
particularly easy; I, for one, have never so much as made it past
stat-gain.
The advanced players deserve to have a challenge, yes, but that doesn't
mean that the less advanced players don't also deserve a chance to do
more than just repeat the first however-many levels ad infinitum.
>> Recent changes are exactly the sort of things that should (and in
>> previous times and maintenance regimes would have been) put into a
>> new variant for people to try out, rather than being added to
>> vanilla.
>
> Goal is not to make ID difficult, just opposite. Ideally you should
> not need ID at all. Note that _need_. Gameplay impact is small, this
> is more a UI thing than gameplay thing. Just because ID has been and
> is easy to get. Now that it even reveals all attributes of the item
> making *ID* obsolete it is even easier than before. Pseudo is faster
> and all classes have strong pseudo.
IMO, however, pseudo is - at the very least - not nearly fast enough to
be practical.
In one fairly-recent game, on my first trip into the dungeon I found
quite a few items on DL1, and by the time I hit DL8 and CL8 my pack was
full - and not a single one of the items from even DL1, much less
deeper, had pseudo-IDed. I would have expected at least a few of them,
possibly all of the ones from DL1, to have become "known" by that point.
Since my pack was full, I had to go back to town to clear things out,
and the items got sold off - and thus pseudo-ID never had a chance to
kick in. (This pattern is typical of 3.1.1 games in my experience.)
For a reference example, in another recent game I put on one of a stack
of Soft Leather Armor - relying on the strength of the stacking to mean
that it wasn't cursed - and before too long its basic stats IDed
themselves. In order for pseudo-ID for a "being carried" item to be
useful, I would expect it to take no more than three times as long as
that "ID while being worn" took, possibly no more than twice. (Not to
mention that the "ID while being worn" was probably still too slow to
make it practical to wear something for a while just to ID it, even if
you know it's not cursed, instead of because you expect to use as
primary armor.)
Pseudo-ID becomes irrelevant to me fairly early in the long-term game,
since I play exclusively mages at this point (though it's not yet
trivial for me to get one to the point of learning Identify). However,
if I were playing something which doesn't get such easy access to the
Identify spell and thus had to rely on pseudo-ID more or less
indefinitely, I expect that I would find the present speed of pseudo-ID
to be so slow as to be unplayably frustrating.
--
The Wanderer
Warning: Simply because I argue an issue does not mean I agree with any
side of it.
Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.
Eddie Grove
> In one fairly-recent game, on my first trip into the dungeon I found
> quite a few items on DL1, and by the time I hit DL8 and CL8 my pack was
> full - and not a single one of the items from even DL1, much less
> deeper, had pseudo-IDed. I would have expected at least a few of them,
Pseudo depends upon cLevel, so it is not very effective in the early game,
especially if you play high-elf mages whose level goes up more slowly.
> Pseudo-ID becomes irrelevant to me fairly early in the long-term game,
> since I play exclusively mages at this point (though it's not yet
And by the time it becomes effective, it is irrelevant to you.
This is at least partly an artifact of playing mages.
Each time pseudo "activates", items in the pack have only 1/5 chance of being
noticed. Thanks to variance, it might take considerably longer than 10 times
as long for a particular item. In the early game, you need to wield them if
you want them to pseudo in a reasonable amount of time.
Eddie
Timo Pietilä
> On 10/08/2009 06:40 AM, Timo Pietil� wrote:
>> Direction of the development has been for a long time just opposite
>> of that. Try Frog-Knows. Even I have difficulties beating it. Or
>> Moria which angband is based on. Current vanilla is _easy_. It really
>> should not be this easy. Problem is to find balance between
>> frustrating and challenging, make game difficult without making it
>> slow.
>
> Depends on what criteria you're using. Some people don't find the game
> particularly easy; I, for one, have never so much as made it past
> stat-gain.
>
> The advanced players deserve to have a challenge, yes, but that doesn't
> mean that the less advanced players don't also deserve a chance to do
> more than just repeat the first however-many levels ad infinitum.
What seems to be the problem for your survival? Maybe I can help. Of
course I have been playing this game almost as long as it has existed,
so I might not "see" an obvious weakness somewhere.
So, what kills you and why?
Timo Pietil�
The Wanderer
> The Wanderer <wand...@fastmail.fm> writes:
>
>> In one fairly-recent game, on my first trip into the dungeon I
>> found quite a few items on DL1, and by the time I hit DL8 and CL8
>> my pack was full - and not a single one of the items from even DL1,
>> much less deeper, had pseudo-IDed. I would have expected at least a
>> few of them,
>
> Pseudo depends upon cLevel, so it is not very effective in the early
> game, especially if you play high-elf mages whose level goes up more
> slowly.
That I didn't know, and it does explain how other classes can manage to
survive relying on it later in the game.
>> Pseudo-ID becomes irrelevant to me fairly early in the long-term
>> game, since I play exclusively mages at this point (though it's not
>> yet
>
> And by the time it becomes effective, it is irrelevant to you. This
> is at least partly an artifact of playing mages.
True enough. I was not aware that its effectiveness depended on level -
I was under the impression that pseudo-ID worked exactly the same way at
all times, no more likely (or faster) to take effect at CL50 and max
stats than at CL1 and whatever stats you happen to start with. If that's
not the case, it should perhaps be documented. (...though for all I
know, it is, and I just haven't noticed because I haven't reread the
docs in recent versions.)
> Each time pseudo "activates", items in the pack have only 1/5 chance
> of being noticed. Thanks to variance, it might take considerably
> longer than 10 times as long for a particular item. In the early
> game, you need to wield them if you want them to pseudo in a
> reasonable amount of time.
Which means that pseudo-ID is useless as a means of determining cursed
vs. uncursed status - which, I would think, is precisely what it would
be most important for - in the early game. (In fact, I seem to recall
that "faster and stronger pseudo-ID" was presented as the answer when I
objected to "ID by equipping" on the grounds of sticky curses...)
The Wanderer
> The Wanderer wrote:
It varies from game to game, and in 3.1.1 it seems to be different from
what I'd gotten used to before that.
Prior to 3,1.1, what killed me after I'd gotten far enough to have the
Teleport Self and Identify spells was usually one of three things: sheer
carelessness, unexpectedly high spell failure rates (i.e. bad luck with
the dice), or running across a monster I wasn't familiar enough with yet
(or was, but couldn't avoid for some reason). Confusion and blindness
were probably next in line. None of that seems like the sort of thing
advice could help with; however, aside from the "carelessness" point
(which I don't see how to avoid without also becoming so
paranoid-cautious as to remove all fun from the game), I'm not sure how
other people could avoid running across those same things, so possibly
there's something I'm missing.
More recently, I don't have a large enough sample set to say for sure (I
haven't been playing as much, because of the annoyance of having to
re-define my macros every game because they don't all get restored
correctly - I understand that bug's been fixed, but if so it doesn't
seem to have been released that I've heard about), but it does seem that
I'm dying earlier and more often, and I think part of it is that things
which weren't dangerous before are now; for one example, in the same
game I used as the first example in my previous post, I was killed by a
flock of novice mages who kept *successfully* confusing and/or blinding
me. (In earlier versions, those spells almost never seemed to take
effect, so I didn't consider such a flock to be especially dangerous.)
Beyond that, I'd have to think about it quite a bit and probably play
for a while to bring examples to mind, and right now I need to leave for
work fairly soon. Possibly I'll come back to this tomorrow.
Eddie Grove
> Which means that pseudo-ID is useless as a means of determining cursed
> vs. uncursed status - which, I would think, is precisely what it would
> be most important for - in the early game. (In fact, I seem to recall
> that "faster and stronger pseudo-ID" was presented as the answer when I
> objected to "ID by equipping" on the grounds of sticky curses...)
At the beginning, if you wield something cursed you just start a new game.
There are many fewer cursed non-jewelry objects, so it doesn't happen often.
Try not to wield unIDed jewelry unless you have a source of remove curse.
By the time you have enough invested in your character that would be a pain,
pseudo is good enough to determine cursed wieldables [other than jewelry].
Eddie
Timo Pietilä
> On 10/08/2009 12:27 PM, Timo Pietil� wrote:
>
>> The Wanderer wrote:
>>
Avoidance is important. I would say the most important thing in the
game. Nobody can survive without knowing how to avoid bad situations.
To be able to avoid things you need good detection. With mage that
should not be any problem.
> Confusion and blindness
> were probably next in line. None of that seems like the sort of thing
> advice could help with; however, aside from the "carelessness" point
> (which I don't see how to avoid without also becoming so
> paranoid-cautious as to remove all fun from the game), I'm not sure how
> other people could avoid running across those same things, so possibly
> there's something I'm missing.
What is your basic survival kit? What do you bring with you in the dungeon?
> seem to have been released that I've heard about), but it does seem that
> I'm dying earlier and more often, and I think part of it is that things
> which weren't dangerous before are now; for one example, in the same
> game I used as the first example in my previous post, I was killed by a
> flock of novice mages who kept *successfully* confusing and/or blinding
> me. (In earlier versions, those spells almost never seemed to take
> effect, so I didn't consider such a flock to be especially dangerous.)
If you can be killed by novice mages you are in trouble. That is _early_
in the game. I haven't noticed any change in those, so either you were
unlucky now or have been lucky before.
> Beyond that, I'd have to think about it quite a bit and probably play
> for a while to bring examples to mind, and right now I need to leave for
> work fairly soon. Possibly I'll come back to this tomorrow.
OK.
Timo Pietil�
Billy Bissette
dnWs8faPAiFPXn...@giganews.com:
> On 10/08/2009 11:15 AM, Eddie Grove wrote:
>
>> The Wanderer <wand...@fastmail.fm> writes:
>>
>>> In one fairly-recent game, on my first trip into the dungeon I
>>> found quite a few items on DL1, and by the time I hit DL8 and CL8
>>> my pack was full - and not a single one of the items from even DL1,
>>> much less deeper, had pseudo-IDed. I would have expected at least a
>>> few of them,
>>
>> Pseudo depends upon cLevel, so it is not very effective in the early
>> game, especially if you play high-elf mages whose level goes up more
>> slowly.
>
> That I didn't know, and it does explain how other classes can manage
> to survive relying on it later in the game.
I pretty much only play mages myself, and for the same reason
pretty much never noticed how pseudo could be so effective for
others.
Though if you are playing a mage, what are you doing on DL1 in
the first place? I'm not an optimized speed player like Eddie, or
even particularly concerned about turn counts and the like, but
you really should just dive down those first levels. And how
much particularly useful stuff do you plan to find in those
earliest dungeon levels anyway?
The Wanderer
> The Wanderer <wand...@fastmail.fm> writes:
>
>> Which means that pseudo-ID is useless as a means of determining
>> cursed vs. uncursed status - which, I would think, is precisely
>> what it would be most important for - in the early game. (In fact,
>> I seem to recall that "faster and stronger pseudo-ID" was presented
>> as the answer when I objected to "ID by equipping" on the grounds
>> of sticky curses...)
>
> At the beginning, if you wield something cursed you just start a new
> game.
No, I don't.
If I have the risk of something I could equip being cursed, I don't
equip it.
There are rare exceptions - mostly in the vein of jewelry - but they're
so rare as to be almost not worth mentioning in the first place.
You might argue that this is a side effect of my playing mages, who have
ready access to Identify most of the time - but in fact it's the other
way around; I play mages because this is so important to me, because not
being able to do this (as other classes pretty much couldn't, at least
until recently, and possibly still can't) is just so much not an option.
> By the time you have enough invested in your character that would be
> a pain, pseudo is good enough to determine cursed wieldables [other
> than jewelry].
We appear to have different criteria for "enough invested".
By my standards, it's never worth risking a curse without the immediate
ability to remove it, not even with a brand-new CL1 character
(special-tactics games aside). If the character is unimportant (or
worthless, or what-have-you) enough to throw away on that kind of risk,
it's unimportant enough that I should just start the new game
immediately and not even bother trying the item in the first place.
The Wanderer
> The Wanderer <wand...@fastmail.fm> wrote in news:KO-
> dnWs8faPAiFPXn...@giganews.com:
>
>> On 10/08/2009 11:15 AM, Eddie Grove wrote:
>>> Pseudo depends upon cLevel, so it is not very effective in the
>>> early game, especially if you play high-elf mages whose level
>>> goes up more slowly.
>>
>> That I didn't know, and it does explain how other classes can
>> manage to survive relying on it later in the game.
>
> I pretty much only play mages myself, and for the same reason pretty
> much never noticed how pseudo could be so effective for others.
> Though if you are playing a mage, what are you doing on DL1 in the
> first place?
Having not yet found a staircase down, that's what.
> I'm not an optimized speed player like Eddie, or even particularly
> concerned about turn counts and the like, but you really should just
> dive down those first levels.
I do. Otherwise I'd probably have been CL10 at least by the time I hit
DL8, and would have filled up my pack probably before DL5.
> And how much particularly useful stuff do you plan to find in those
> earliest dungeon levels anyway?
Not a lot - but you never know what will be worthwhile, when you have so
little to begin with.
The main reason I step out of my way to look into rooms for items in the
first few floors, however, is in hopes of finding unidentified item
flavors so that I can sell them off and learn what they are. (Or
identify them by other means, but the ones I find in that first dive are
almost never worth trying by any other approach.) I just pick up armor
and the like when I run across it in the process.
Ray
> On 2009-10-06, Timo Pietilä <timo.p...@helsinki.fi> wrote:
>> voirin wrote:
>> I think goal should be getting rid of ID completely. Current system is
>> getting there and including those items in pseudo-ID system is the only
>> way to be sure that it will happen eventually.
> Just to offer one differing opinion here.
> The direction the game seems to be heading in is not one I'm favour of.
> Angband has shops, it has word of recall, it has easy id. These are all
> part of what makes it different from other roguelikes.
I think there's a middle ground here to add some depth to the game
instead of removing some.
How about a "detect_curse" ability? As a spell, lower level than
identify and available earlier. As a scroll, about half the cost
and rarity of ID or remove-curse. As a character ability,
appropriate to priests and paladins above a certain level.
Or how about current "detect_traps" ability extending to include
cursed items?
Bear
Magnate
>
> Just one observation: Armors are a lot cheaper than weapons. Ordinary
> longbow costs more than weak ego soft bodyarmor. That is something that
> doesn't feel right. Maybe this is fixed in 3.1.2.
No, it isn't. I note that you chose longbows as your example: this is an
accurate reflection of the fact that missile weapons are vastly overpowered
in V. A humble sling went from 4gp to over 200gp when power-based pricing
was introduced in 3.1.1.
Let's face it: would you rather have an unenchanted longbow, or weak ego
soft bodyarmour? Eddie often doesn't wear any body armour at all until he
finds a non-weak ego.
If you think that armours are cheaper than *melee* weapons, please let's
continue the debate. But for missile weapons I'd say that pricing is Working
As Designed. Tone down the power of missiles and the prices will fall.
CC
Timo Pietilä
> "Timo Pietil�" <timo.p...@helsinki.fi> wrote
>>
>> Just one observation: Armors are a lot cheaper than weapons. Ordinary
>> longbow costs more than weak ego soft bodyarmor. That is something
>> that doesn't feel right. Maybe this is fixed in 3.1.2.
>
> No, it isn't. I note that you chose longbows as your example: this is an
> accurate reflection of the fact that missile weapons are vastly
> overpowered in V. A humble sling went from 4gp to over 200gp when
> power-based pricing was introduced in 3.1.1.
>
> Let's face it: would you rather have an unenchanted longbow, or weak ego
> soft bodyarmour? Eddie often doesn't wear any body armour at all until
> he finds a non-weak ego.
Eddies playstyle is what I call "crazy diver". He's hardly fair model
for ordinary player.
I usually try to get AC to around 50 ASAP (makes meleeing orcs much
easier) and resistances to all four if I can (from armor. From ring or
amulet there are usually better uses). So for me leather armor of resist
lightning if I don't have it already is WAY more valuable than any
ordinary melee/missile weapon. Armors or resist acid are particularly
valuable because those wont get damaged by acid.
> If you think that armours are cheaper than *melee* weapons, please let's
> continue the debate. But for missile weapons I'd say that pricing is
> Working As Designed. Tone down the power of missiles and the prices will
> fall.
That is true too. Normal enchanted non-ego weapon costs easily much more
than weak ego-armor.
Just being ego should count something, around 500 gp I would say. AC
bonuses and other features should come in top of that. Ego is rare, and
rarity should cost something. Just like mithril armors costs more.
Same obviously applies to weapons, just being ego should count something.
Timo Pietil�
The Wanderer
(Eurgh. I never intended for it to be this long before I replied.)
> The Wanderer wrote:
>
>> On 10/08/2009 12:27 PM, Timo Pietilä wrote:
>>> What seems to be the problem for your survival? Maybe I can help.
>>> Of course I have been playing this game almost as long as it has
>>> existed, so I might not "see" an obvious weakness somewhere.
>>>
>>> So, what kills you and why?
>>
>> It varies from game to game, and in 3.1.1 it seems to be different
>> from what I'd gotten used to before that.
>>
>> Prior to 3,1.1, what killed me after I'd gotten far enough to have
>> the Teleport Self and Identify spells was usually one of three
>> things: sheer carelessness, unexpectedly high spell failure rates
>> (i.e. bad luck with the dice), or running across a monster I wasn't
>> familiar enough with yet (or was, but couldn't avoid for some
>> reason).
>
> Avoidance is important. I would say the most important thing in the
> game. Nobody can survive without knowing how to avoid bad situations.
>
> To be able to avoid things you need good detection. With mage that
> should not be any problem.
It normally isn't. What *is* a problem in that regard is when I either
misjudge what I *need* to avoid, or wind up in a situation where I can't
avoid it anyway (no non-blocked escape route, not fast enough to get
away without dying first, et cetera).
>> Confusion and blindness were probably next in line. None of that
>> seems like the sort of thing advice could help with; however, aside
>> from the "carelessness" point (which I don't see how to avoid
>> without also becoming so paranoid-cautious as to remove all fun
>> from the game), I'm not sure how other people could avoid running
>> across those same things, so possibly there's something I'm
>> missing.
>
> What is your basic survival kit? What do you bring with you in the
> dungeon?
I'm not entirely sure how the former is defined. The latter depends on
how far into the game I am.
On the first trip down, I take the default mage supplies (a few torches,
some rations, MB1, a dagger, and one WoR) and whatever armor I can
afford - which is significantly less since the price rebalancing than it
had been before, by about a factor of two to AC.
On the second trip down, I add at least MB2 and hopefully MB3, better
armor if I can afford any, and - if possible - an additional WoR (to
guard against destruction). I would also add !CCW or !CSW, and a longbow
and arrows, possibly in lieu of the armor improvements - but most of the
money I've managed to accumulate on the first dive has gone into
identifying things before sale.
On the third trip down, I hopefully add MB4 (unless I don't think I'll
manage to hit an appropriate level before returning to town), continue
to improve equipment, and start to think about !CCW and the like. At
this point, I probably have the Identify spell, so money is becoming
less of a problem.
I often don't survive long enough for a fourth trip down, and what I
bring with me when I do is either an extension of the pattern from
previous trips, or varies depending on what I've found in the dungeon.
(For instance, I've generally found a lantern or the Phial by this
point, and start carrying that instead of the torches.)
The same applies to fifth and sixth trips. If I'd bothered to keep
track, I could probably count games in which I make it much past that
number of trips on one hand (excluding my early clear-all-levels days,
in which the increased supply of found items meant many more trips back
to town because of a full pack).
>> seem to have been released that I've heard about), but it does seem
>> that I'm dying earlier and more often, and I think part of it is
>> that things which weren't dangerous before are now; for one
>> example, in the same game I used as the first example in my
>> previous post, I was killed by a flock of novice mages who kept
>> *successfully* confusing and/or blinding me. (In earlier versions,
>> those spells almost never seemed to take effect, so I didn't
>> consider such a flock to be especially dangerous.)
>
> If you can be killed by novice mages you are in trouble. That is
> _early_ in the game. I haven't noticed any change in those, so either
> you were unlucky now or have been lucky before.
I've been killed by novice mages a time or two since then (mainly poor
judgment and/or bad luck with the dice), usually on the first trip down,
but not enough to make much of a pattern. While I do think I was unlucky
at the time, I also do think that I'm seeing a lot more success from
their confusion attempts now than I'd ever been used to before.