Angband Realism
Christian Lavoie
I don;t think it's THAT a bad thing. I mean, NOBODY would ever play a game
when you wake up in the morning, eat breakfast, attend school, have dinner,
call a friend, drink a beer, and go to sleep, every day of the year.
Fantasms have their place in such a game. This thread discusses where to put
the line between fantasms and realistic things.
Now, my point is that I want to know other's opinion on the following
'weird' things I know from rogue-like games (especially angband), and I want
to know what is your way to improve such a thing. Don't feel forced to
answer all of them. (Or, for that matter, *any* of them)
- You sleep at a completely weird schedule (read: when you are blind,
afraid, wounded, overbloating from excessive eating, lacking mana, etc.)
- You run every single step you make (although I didn't look at the code,
running may simply mean that you don't stop walking until some condition
occur. {like seeing a monster, entering a room, etc.})
-A scroll, a human, a half-titan a sword, a mouse and a dragon (you get the
point...) use the same space. (A single square)
- When using graphics, previously enumerated thing actually LOOK the same
size.
- You can virtually carry 99*23 = 2201 potions. Encumbrance anyone?
- Nothing except 6-9 buildings exist in a (I know, there are variants that
have more, I just don;'t play often, it's better, but it's still far from
perfect. My thanks to the authors for trying, and my wish of luck since
there's still ALOT of work to do.) town, a town that IS COMPLETELY CLOSED
FROM OUTSIDE WORLD.
N.B.: Another kind of such weirdness can be found on some of Moraff's games.
You can switch the dungeons you visit, but there are nothing in the world
except dungeons and green mountains. (Feel free to ask for Moraff's
coordinates, I just don't have them handy. Requirements: DOS-based (or DOS
capable) machine. Probably 256 colors, but it has been such a time since I
last played...)
- Mages virtually use the same equipment as fighters.
- Priest prays no god. They pray, that's it. (spelling anyone? 'they pray'
looks awful to me...)
- You can't stop yourself from tellin' others a thing is cursed. If it
wasn't id'ed while on the floor, why the hell does a shopkeeper knows it's
cursed? (See next comment about id'ing stuff)
- You CAN'T detect that a sword is flaming before you id' it. That big
bright aura around it just doesn't show off?
- Why do everything bad is cursed??? Why can't you find an uncursed (-1, -1)
sword. Let's face it: it could have corroded, there's a trap just right to
it. (Based on actual gameplay... =) )
- The same equipment that you found on the Kobold Lord fits you, even if you
are a half-Titan.
- You can find Dragon Scale Mails, but you never find dragon skin. (Sangband
is the one that allows chunk of * to create items no?)
- No one knows where do the shopkeeper feeds themselves.
- Monsters are just hanging around in the game. Sometimes enclosed foot to
foot in large rooms, sometimes enclosed behind a door, sometimes sleeping
right in the middle of a room.
----
The list ends here for now, since I've got to attend a philosophy class.
I'll extend the list as I found others.
Christian Lavoie
cla...@enter-net.com
UIN: 947212
Ivan Igor Tkatchev
Christian Lavoie <cla...@enter-net.com> wrote:
>
>Now, my point is that I want to know other's opinion on the following
>'weird' things I know from rogue-like games (especially angband), and I want
>to know what is your way to improve such a thing. Don't feel forced to
>answer all of them. (Or, for that matter, *any* of them)
>
>- You sleep at a completely weird schedule (read: when you are blind,
>afraid, wounded, overbloating from excessive eating, lacking mana, etc.)
It's not sleeping, it's resting. (hence, the ``R'' command.)
>- You run every single step you make (although I didn't look at the code,
>running may simply mean that you don't stop walking until some condition
>occur. {like seeing a monster, entering a room, etc.})
You don't actually move faster -- running is mostly a way to save
you from typing hassle.
>
>- You can virtually carry 99*23 = 2201 potions. Encumbrance anyone?
Well, I'd think this would be fairly easy if you rigged up a weird
sled-type thing to carry all your junk.
>- Nothing except 6-9 buildings exist in a (I know, there are variants that
>have more, I just don;'t play often, it's better, but it's still far from
>perfect. My thanks to the authors for trying, and my wish of luck since
>there's still ALOT of work to do.) town, a town that IS COMPLETELY CLOSED
>FROM OUTSIDE WORLD.
It's a refuelling camp outside the evil caves. Naturally the town won't
be a bustling metropolis.
Thomas Scott Moyles
> >- Nothing except 6-9 buildings exist in a (I know, there are variants that
> >have more, I just don;'t play often, it's better, but it's still far from
> >perfect. My thanks to the authors for trying, and my wish of luck since
> >there's still ALOT of work to do.) town, a town that IS COMPLETELY CLOSED
> >FROM OUTSIDE WORLD.
Hey, would you build your major cities on top of Angband? Just imagine
the repair bills, the amount of citizens killed each year by roving bands
of monsters, etc.
Obviously only insane shopkeepers show up, solely for the purpose of
selling equipment to even-more-insane adventurers looking to make gold
from the treasures of Angband. From the fact that the shopkeepers
occasionally disappear, we can derive the fact that either they're making
enough money to retire back to a major city, or that they ran afoul of
the monsters (or perhaps their clients). People would occasionally travel
to this far-off town in order to buy exotic items or to try and make a
buck off of the adventurers coming out of the caves (this would explain
the townspeople, and how they seem to regenerate incredibly quickly).
Just think of the town in Angband as a frontier town, supplying the basic
neccesities and items that are occasionally worthwile to the people going
off into the unknown.
Thomas Moyles http://www2.ucsc.edu/people/eject142
Eric Nastav
> Now, my point is that I want to know other's opinion on the following
> 'weird' things I know from rogue-like games (especially angband), and I want
> to know what is your way to improve such a thing. Don't feel forced to
> answer all of them. (Or, for that matter, *any* of them)
>
> - You sleep at a completely weird schedule (read: when you are blind,
> afraid, wounded, overbloating from excessive eating, lacking mana, etc.)
>
sleep after eating a lot. It's normal to sleep when you are mentally
fatigued(mana), it,s normal to rest when you are sick and/or hurt. Well,
knowing that when I'm blind would you walk around a dangerous place like a
dungeon knowing that it would increase your chances of encountering
hostiles?
> - You run every single step you make (although I didn't look at the code,
> running may simply mean that you don't stop walking until some condition
> occur. {like seeing a monster, entering a room, etc.})
>
take.
> -A scroll, a human, a half-titan a sword, a mouse and a dragon (you get the
> point...) use the same space. (A single square)
>
Just because a space is used to symbolize a specific thing doesn't mean
that that thing takes up EXACTLY that space. If that were true everything
in the game would be a cube or a square. So, no. A sword, dragon, human,
mouse don't take up the same space.
I can see you point about huge things like dragons. Maybe special
double wide corridors dungeons could be created. Actually, it's a good
idea to make all or most dungeon corridors below a certain depth double
wide. Not only for huge monsters, but to make it harder to combat hordes.
It's must too easy to lead them into a singel wide corridor so you only
have to fight one at a time.
> - You can virtually carry 99*23 = 2201 potions. Encumbrance anyone?
>
The reverse of this is true. You should be able to carry more of some
things and less of others. The best way to fix this would be to assign a
bulk factor to each item or a weight factor. Or both. But this might be
a pain to code.
> - Nothing except 6-9 buildings exist in a (I know, there are variants that
> have more, I just don;'t play often, it's better, but it's still far from
> perfect. My thanks to the authors for trying, and my wish of luck since
> there's still ALOT of work to do.) town, a town that IS COMPLETELY CLOSED
> FROM OUTSIDE WORLD.
>
Maybe other things are there, but they are just irrelevant. Why waste
space drawing farms?!
> - Mages virtually use the same equipment as fighters.
>
So.
> - You can't stop yourself from tellin' others a thing is cursed. If it
> wasn't id'ed while on the floor, why the hell does a shopkeeper knows it's
> cursed? (See next comment about id'ing stuff)
>
Maybe it's assumed you are a good person.
> - You CAN'T detect that a sword is flaming before you id' it. That big
> bright aura around it just doesn't show off?
>
Maybe there is a command word... Who says it's always glowing.
> - The same equipment that you found on the Kobold Lord fits you, even if you
> are a half-Titan.
>
Some magic things shrink or grow to fit...But I can see your point.
> - You can find Dragon Scale Mails, but you never find dragon skin. (Sangband
> is the one that allows chunk of * to create items no?)
>
Maybe beacuse dragon skin biodegrades like anything else. Maybe don't
you find chunks of any other creature's skin lying around. Thjat's silly.
You pick up the blue yeek skin. Gross!
> - No one knows where do the shopkeeper feeds themselves.
>
They are solar powered. Who cares. Do you want to get a message while
you are in the dungeon letting you know that the Weapon Merchant just
ate?! What the hell!?
> - Monsters are just hanging around in the game. Sometimes enclosed foot to
> foot in large rooms, sometimes enclosed behind a door, sometimes sleeping
> right in the middle of a room.
>
DO you know they are just hanging around. Maybe they are having an
orgy! Maybe they are eating dinner. What's wrong with sleeping in the
middle of the room. If you have things like umber hulks moving through
walls it seems pretty smart to sleep in the middle.
Please don't tell me you want furniture icons.
Eric
Christian Lavoie
>sleep after eating a lot. It's normal to sleep when you are mentally
>fatigued(mana), it,s normal to rest when you are sick and/or hurt. Well,
>knowing that when I'm blind would you walk around a dangerous place like a
>dungeon knowing that it would increase your chances of encountering
>hostiles?
What I meant is that you and I sleep on a semi-regular basis (I can't say I
sleep on a regular basis, after all, I'm a computer geek! =) )
> Just because a space is used to symbolize a specific thing doesn't mean
>that that thing takes up EXACTLY that space. If that were true everything
>in the game would be a cube or a square. So, no. A sword, dragon, human,
>mouse don't take up the same space.
In-game yes. Although floor stacking exists, a single louse takes as much
floor space as a titan.
> I can see you point about huge things like dragons. Maybe special
>double wide corridors dungeons could be created. Actually, it's a good
>idea to make all or most dungeon corridors below a certain depth double
>wide. Not only for huge monsters, but to make it harder to combat hordes.
Damn great idea dude.
>> - You can virtually carry 99*23 = 2201 potions. Encumbrance anyone?
>
> The reverse of this is true. You should be able to carry more of some
The reverse is true, but I just can find something that is more heavy that
encumbrant. Armors? Nope... GOLD!
Gold just isn't existing... But I agree that solutions such as banks removes
the challenge of thief-like abilities of Nibelungs.
>things and less of others. The best way to fix this would be to assign a
>bulk factor to each item or a weight factor. Or both. But this might be
>a pain to code.
Not that much...
If the total weight of your equipment is greater than your strength allows,
you lose speed.
If the total encumbrance factor of your equipment is greater than a certain
number (see below) you ... lose sight of certain squares? Lose speed? Armor
class? Stealth?
> Maybe other things are there, but they are just irrelevant. Why waste
>space drawing farms?!
That's a rather good point.
>> - Mages virtually use the same equipment as fighters.
>>
> So.
Have you ever read about Gandlaf wearing a full plate armor??? Or Merlin?
>> - You can't stop yourself from tellin' others a thing is cursed. If it
>> wasn't id'ed while on the floor, why the hell does a shopkeeper knows
it's
>> cursed? (See next comment about id'ing stuff)
>>
> Maybe it's assumed you are a good person.
Then it could be stated as the game is restrictive on that point. But yes,
you've got a point there too.
>> - You CAN'T detect that a sword is flaming before you id' it. That big
>> bright aura around it just doesn't show off?
>>
> Maybe there is a command word... Who says it's always glowing.
Agreed.
>> - You can find Dragon Scale Mails, but you never find dragon skin.
(Sangband
>> is the one that allows chunk of * to create items no?)
>>
> Maybe beacuse dragon skin biodegrades like anything else. Maybe don't
>you find chunks of any other creature's skin lying around. Thjat's silly.
> You pick up the blue yeek skin. Gross!
What I was trying to show, is that you don't know how *any* of the items are
created. I was showing that the angband world could be a bit more detailed,
seeing a bit of interactivity between the items you transport and the
surroundings.
By the way, another thing that sounds awful, are the corpses leaved by
monsters. You kill a paladin, and what have you got??? A rodent corpse!
>> - No one knows where do the shopkeeper feeds themselves.
>>
> They are solar powered. Who cares. Do you want to get a message while
Yeah, and the night???? Where do they find power??? =) (Just kidding)
>you are in the dungeon letting you know that the Weapon Merchant just
>ate?! What the hell!?
I was actually talking about where do they find the stuff they are selling
you. It was mostly connected to the closed-town statement.
>> - Monsters are just hanging around in the game. Sometimes enclosed foot
to
>> foot in large rooms, sometimes enclosed behind a door, sometimes sleeping
>> right in the middle of a room.
>>
> DO you know they are just hanging around. Maybe they are having an
>orgy! Maybe they are eating dinner. What's wrong with sleeping in the
>middle of the room. If you have things like umber hulks moving through
>walls it seems pretty smart to sleep in the middle.
> Please don't tell me you want furniture icons.
I won't. I promise. =)
Actually you're right, it would look a bit too crowded and making the
difference between the characters (not to mention we would lack characters)
would become a bit harsh.
Richard Allman
>
> - You run every single step you make (although I didn't look at the code,
> running may simply mean that you don't stop walking until some condition
> occur. {like seeing a monster, entering a room, etc.})
>
Actually, you don't but the run command has no functional effect
_except_ to use up energy points. I've already puitin a request for
revamping the runcodew so you actually get a speed bonus based on
STR&CON
> -A scroll, a human, a half-titan a sword, a mouse and a dragon (you get the
> point...) use the same space. (A single square)
Good point, but "sizing" objects would get rid of all those
oh-so-lucrative baby dragon pits.
> - When using graphics, previously enumerated thing actually LOOK the same
> size.
'cause the graphics _are_ the same size....that's why it's called _role
playing_
?
>
> - Nothing except 6-9 buildings exist in a ...
town that IS COMPLETELY CLOSED
> FROM OUTSIDE WORLD.
Not in Kang., Kam, and the newest Zang. They have expanded towns and
exterior wilderness quest areas. For real depth of geography, try
Omega, which has a huge capital city (including houses, where the
shopkeepers actually live), villages, temples, a bunch of dungeons,
etc...ADOM ditto . But they're both much more complex to learn, as
well, and have a very different feel. Depends, I guess, on what you
want from a game. Nobody ever slammed Dungeon Hack for not
realistically simulating fuedal eceonomics...
>
>
> - Mages virtually use the same equipment as fighters.
While Gnadalf didn't wear plate armor, he _did_ wield a bichin'
sword...actually, using a few types of armor lowers your spell points, a
technique that should be followed up and expanded. Monks actually
_lose_ AC if they wear too much tinfoil...
> - Priest prays no god. They pray, that's it. (spelling anyone? 'they pray'
> looks awful to me...)
YES!YES!YES! my biggest complaint has been the lack of real character
as far as magic systems go. This is slowly being addressed, esp. in
Zangband, but it seems to me that priest and palading magic should be
totally different from the others, starting with requiring an equipped
holy symbol!
And etc...
ERA
The Enigmatic One
>>> - Mages virtually use the same equipment as fighters.
>>>
>
>Have you ever read about Gandlaf wearing a full plate armor??? Or Merlin?
Er, yeah.
Merlin, especially in earlier versions of the tales, was known for his
prowess in battle as well as magic. He'd weild sword or axe and charge in
wearing full armor, helm, etc.
Sorry, but bad example.
-The Enigmatic One
Ethan Sicotte
> > - Nothing except 6-9 buildings exist in a ...
> town that IS COMPLETELY CLOSED
> > FROM OUTSIDE WORLD.
So what? Then you start asking patently absurd questions like: what do pits
full of dragons eat, and then you start making up stupid answers about
magical sustenance...bah.
This from a person who gets in trouble for insisting on realism in paper
and pencil rpg's. Call me inconsistent.
> While Gnadalf didn't wear plate armor, he _did_ wield a bichin'
> sword...actually, using a few types of armor lowers your spell points, a
> technique that should be followed up and expanded. Monks actually
> _lose_ AC if they wear too much tinfoil...
I've ranted before about the source of this widespread notion that says
spellcasters must be weapon/armor free or else it's somehow not right (the
Dying Earth novels via D&D play balance), so I won't do it again, but...
For game balance and flavor, as the game is now, moving further from
weapon/armor usage seems like a good idea. Then again, if I ever made a
variant there'd be some seriously pumped mage-likes running around, just to
see how many complaints I'd get. Ha.
> Zangband, but it seems to me that priest and palading magic should be
> totally different from the others, starting with requiring an equipped
> holy symbol!
This is easy enough: make the holy symbols weildable in the amulet
position.
Better yet: a priest starts with a holy symbol amulet that does nothing but
allow spells. Holy becomes an ego flag that can appear in different forms,
with set or semi-random effects. So you might have a Holy medium leather
shield of resist fire. This way the Holy flag would have some positive
effect for any character using such equipment--I'm against class exclusive
items--and would enable the priest/paladin/other to cast his or her spells.
Perhaps higher level spells may require certain types of Holy, or certain
strengths of it, to cast. The numbers could be finagled so the spell
enabling items, rather than the spell books themselves, are the hard thing
to find. Or both.
Such a system could be expanded to totally replace the exisiting system of
books, if anyone felt like it. Just have different spell items, some holy,
some, er, magical, or just one or the other. This could be taken toward
psiband in one extreme, or an expansion of Zang style magic in the other.
Julian Lighton
Christian Lavoie <cla...@enter-net.com> wrote:
>>things and less of others. The best way to fix this would be to assign a
>>bulk factor to each item or a weight factor. Or both. But this might be
>>a pain to code.
>
>Not that much...
>
>If the total weight of your equipment is greater than your strength allows,
>you lose speed.
>
>If the total encumbrance factor of your equipment is greater than a certain
>number (see below) you ... lose sight of certain squares? Lose speed? Armor
>class? Stealth?
Can't carry anything more seems to make the most sense to me.
>>> - Mages virtually use the same equipment as fighters.
>>>
>> So.
>
>Have you ever read about Gandlaf wearing a full plate armor??? Or Merlin?
Merlin's been addressed in another post. As for Gandalf, nobody (or
almost nobody, some of the minor characters described arriving to
defend Minas Tirith might) wears anything resembling full plate armor
in LotR, especially when they're running around in the wilderness,
which they spend most of their time doing.
"Mages shouldn't wear heavy armor" is mostly an AD&Dism.
--
Julian Lighton jl...@fragment.com
"ISO 9001 certification is a license to kill!" -- MST3K
Lahjik
Christian Lavoie wrote in message <6sna55$boo$1...@nr1.ottawa.istar.net>...
snip snip snip
>>> - You can't stop yourself from tellin' others a thing is cursed. If it
>>> wasn't id'ed while on the floor, why the hell does a shopkeeper knows
>it's
>>> cursed? (See next comment about id'ing stuff)
>>>
>> Maybe it's assumed you are a good person.
>
>Then it could be stated as the game is restrictive on that point. But yes,
>you've got a point there too.
bah, that is why players need an EVIL flag. a rogue, or an EVIL class (like
the obvious ones in zangband)would tend to cheat shops. of course, maybe
shops would cheat them too....
lahjik
Eric Nastav
> What I meant is that you and I sleep on a semi-regular basis (I can't say I
> sleep on a regular basis, after all, I'm a computer geek! =) )
>
So you mean like bio-rhythm type stuff. Hhmm...would people really
enjoy the game more if they were made to rest every 1600 moves for 800
moves?
I don't think so. But who knows.
> > Just because a space is used to symbolize a specific thing doesn't mean
> >that that thing takes up EXACTLY that space. If that were true everything
> >in the game would be a cube or a square. So, no. A sword, dragon, human,
> >mouse don't take up the same space.
>
> In-game yes. Although floor stacking exists, a single louse takes as much
> floor space as a titan.
>
A louse doesn't necessarily take up the same space as a dragon. It is
symbolized that way, yes. But that's like saying,"Well, I picked few lice
out of my friend's hairs and put them under a microscope and they didn't
look like "l"s.
On corpses and the skeletons and skulls left around. There is a LOT of
potential for these and necromancy spells. 10th level spell Animate
Skull, which would create a Flying Skull pet.
Or Cast a necromantic blessing on a skull. When you throw it at a
beastie it ignites with a dark fire and explode on impact.
Eric
J.C. Laverty
Gandalf did use a long sword, a weapon not generally associated with the
magely...
- Dheiyghne -
Ethan Sicotte
> potential for these and necromancy spells. 10th level spell Animate
> Skull, which would create a Flying Skull pet.
> Or Cast a necromantic blessing on a skull. When you throw it at a
> beastie it ignites with a dark fire and explode on impact.
While that's true, to make it useful there'd have to be a lot more dead
animal bits lying around that all the non-animative spells users would have
to slog through.
Eric Nastav
Hehe. There already is a lot to slog through when you get to a high
level. But you are assuming that there would only be one way to
implement this. If you have guilds, you could have skeletons and such for
sale in the necro guild.
The way ADOM does it is when you kill a monster you get a corpse that
slowly decays. Depending on the corpse and your race, you can possibly
use it as food. But corpses could be used for this purpose. Spells:
Create Hound Zombie(corpse not included), Create Novice Zombie(for novice
paladins, mages, etc.), Create Orc Zombie, etc.
Eric
Richard Allman
city size; I was responding to that post. Think you got your posts
mingled a bit....Ditto my commmentary re. Gandlaf- the original poster
was compaining about the same-equipment usage of various classes, which
complaint he defended by pointing out that G never wore heavy armor. To
which I made the above response. However, while I don't think MU's
should be necessarily equipment-lite, in most *bands, the magic using
classes become fighter-mu's beyond a certain level, which I personally
think is a bit unbalanced. With maxed stats and access to the same
equiopment as any fighter, there is little difference in gamepley to me-
just more carnage. Would like to see expnded restrictions on certain
types of items, as well as mage-specific equipment (more of) in the
future.
Alexander Deyke
- There's a town. In the town, there are stores that sell stuff. Give
them an artifact and they sell it for several thousand gold. Next time
you go to the store, it's gone. Who bought it, the singing, happy
drunk with the gold piece or the battle-scarred veteran with the shard
of pottery? Also, where do these people come from? Begging isn't good
if the merchants are always in the stores and the player can't give
money. And how do the stores profit? They may get a few gold pieces
for beginning equipment, but they give thousands of coins for a good
artifact. They should be glad that monsters can't use stairs.
- You can carry 23 Full Plate Armors or 23 rings. However, you can
carry millions of gold. You can find copper that equals the gold,
meaning that you are actually carrying more coins than your gold. The
stores can hold scores of armors, yet they can't hold more than 24
different rings.
- Monsters can drop artifacts, yet they can't pick them up. If a
monster drops an artifact, he still does as little damage as if he had
a cursed broken sword or nothing at all. Also, one would expect a
paladin to drop some shiny plate armor and a sword and a mage to carry
spellbooks and wands. Not so. They can do all the magic they want
without books or staffs, yet the player needs them. Thieves can steal
stuff, yet player thieves can't.
- Where did the stuff come from? A player enters the dungeon and finds
stuff all over the floor. Yeah, it could come from previous
adventurers, but where did they get it from? All that stuff doesn't
just appear. Also, if someone had Ringil, Bladeturner, and Fingolfin,
why didn't he just beat up the monsters? And if they find a potion of
augmentation, why didn't they just quaff it? And there are never
adventurers in the town. There are some people in the dungeon, but
they always attack the player and don't have 23 items each.
- The player can just sit down and rest for a few hundred turns.
Suddenly, he sees that his items are magical. He is cured of all
poison, blindness, etc. and regains all hit points. I imagine that
dungeon floors aren't good to rest on, especially when the innards of a
mob of orcs lie scattered around the room.
- When the player enters a level, there are lots of items and
monsters. He gets the stuff, exterminates the monsters, and leaves.
He returns later and finds it filled as much as before. Not only is
there more stuff lying around, but there are also many monsters that
decided that they'd come in and sleep a while. The walls are all
rearranged, too. Some monsters decide that they want to go into a room
and fill completely (pits). Some just sit around in vaults full of
exceptional items, wishing they could pick up stuff.
- The dragons, mice, paladins, and demons all join forces against the
player.
- Thieves can sneak past monsters without them detecting him, but he
still has to physically fight them if he wants to level (or spend years
picking locks). No matter how stealthy he is, he can't pick pockets,
rob stores, etc. How does he win the game? The only way to win is to
kill Morgoth. This is rather unfair to thieves. There should be many
ways to win, maybe including getting enough money to retire, stealing
an item from Morgoth, or something like that.
- You can't beat up stores, even if you're a level 50 player. You
can't even get back the ring of speed you ID'd by selling.
--
Alexander Deyke
mailto:ade...@psd.k12.co.us
This space intentionally left blank.
Dean Anderson
> I've ranted before about the source of this widespread notion that
> says
> spellcasters must be weapon/armor free or else it's somehow not right
> (the
> Dying Earth novels via D&D play balance), so I won't do it again,
> but...
>
A lot of stuff in Angband is taken from the Rolemaster RPG. (Black
Reavers and all the wacky elements such as Nexus, Nether & Time for a
start).
The way that game handles magic vs armour is that mage-types cannot wear
much or carry much of any type of stuff because it impedes the flow of
magical anergies to their bodies. Priestly-types can war and carry as
much organic stuff as they want (wood, leather etc) but get penalties
for lots of metal. No reason is given for this but one can assume
religious factors.
Mentalist-types (Zang+Cthang Mindcrafters and Psi folks) can wear as
much armour of any type as they want as long as they don't use helmets.
> > Zangband, but it seems to me that priest and palading magic should
> be
> > totally different from the others, starting with requiring an
> equipped
> > holy symbol!
>
> This is easy enough: make the holy symbols weildable in the amulet
> position.
Not a bad idea. How about using the existing Blessed flag, and expanding
it to other types of item than weapons.
In a similar vein, you could make the various magic books wieldable in
the off hand, and then only allow spells cast from the wielded book.
This would prevent mages using shields, and mean that they may have to
spend actions swapping books from time to time if they want to use
spells of varying type of magic (Zang+Cthang) and power level.
Dean
Lahjik
>- You can't beat up stores, even if you're a level 50 player. You
>can't even get back the ring of speed you ID'd by selling.
I don't knwo about your characters, but my lv 44 yeek rogue (trump) in
Zangband has some serious change, like 3Mil. (and maybe another mil in my
house).
lahjik
Greg Wooledge
>On Thu, 3 Sep 1998, Christian Lavoie wrote:
>> In-game yes. Although floor stacking exists, a single louse takes as much
>> floor space as a titan.
> A louse doesn't necessarily take up the same space as a dragon. It is
>symbolized that way, yes.
Sorry, but a louse *does* take up exactly the same amount of space that
a dragon does, in every way that matters. They both occupy precisely
1 Square of space, and their occupation of that part of the dungeon
prevents any other creature from simultaneously occupying that space,
or any part thereof. So, for all practical purposes, all creatures
"fill" the 1 Square of space that they currently occupy.
Yes, by real world reasoning, this is nonsense. But it is how the
game works. There are a lot of "silly" things that roguelikes do,
such as having every creature move by instantaneous space-shifting in
little quantum leaps. (You can occupy *this* Square or *that* Square,
but you can't be halfway in between them.) It's much simpler to program
the game that way, that's all.
--
"Daddy, why do those people have to | Greg Wooledge
use Microsoft Windows?" | wool...@kellnet.com
"Don't stare, son; it's not polite." | http://www.kellnet.com/wooledge/
Remco Gerlich
> Hehe. There already is a lot to slog through when you get to a high
>level. But you are assuming that there would only be one way to
>implement this. If you have guilds, you could have skeletons and such for
>sale in the necro guild.
Or make it possible to dig holes in an Undead Pit (Graveyard), that will
yield a skeleton of some nameless abomination...
--
Remco Gerlich - scarblac at dds dot nl
Vs lbh ernq guvf, lbh'er n hfrarg nqqvpg.
Jan-willem van Eys
>> in the game would be a cube or a square. So, no. A sword, dragon, human,
>> mouse don't take up the same space.
CL> In-game yes. Although floor stacking exists, a single louse takes as
CL> much floor space as a titan.
It's a *giant* louse :-)
Would you prefer a square which contains 1000 lice? Imagine the breeding speed of those hordes! <shiver>
CL> The reverse is true, but I just can find something that is more heavy
CL> that encumbrant. Armors? Nope... GOLD!
Maybe your AC should go up when you're carrying a lot of gold? Maybe you're carrying paper money (no... BAD idea... salamanders & paper isn't a good combination)
CL> By the way, another thing that sounds awful, are the corpses leaved by
CL> monsters. You kill a paladin, and what have you got??? A rodent corpse!
skeletons... not corpses. What's he doing with a skeleton I wonder...
I like the edible corpses in Adom, BTW.
CL> I was actually talking about where do they find the stuff they are
CL> selling you. It was mostly connected to the closed-town statement.
Others haul this stuff up from the dungeon, just like you.
--
Greetings,
___
_________(. .)_________
V
/ \
X X
JAVE.
.. Put the cat out? I didn't know it was on fire!
Eric Nastav
> What about these?
>
> - There's a town. In the town, there are stores that sell stuff. Give
> them an artifact and they sell it for several thousand gold. Next time
> you go to the store, it's gone. Who bought it, the singing, happy
> drunk with the gold piece or the battle-scarred veteran with the shard
> of pottery? Also, where do these people come from? Begging isn't good
> if the merchants are always in the stores and the player can't give
> money. And how do the stores profit? They may get a few gold pieces
> for beginning equipment, but they give thousands of coins for a good
> artifact. They should be glad that monsters can't use stairs.
>
Yes, well the Drunks are actually gods who are just posing as beggars.
There's a very rare version of
an old help file that documents this type of stuff.
All the people in the
town are born from the head of a titan named Helmiculite. He has 233
female red yeek lovers who implant their eggs in his ears. From there
they migrate through his skin and into his brain where they get
nourishment from.
They pupate and mature in the brain and then climb out the other ear.
The ground around the titan's head is littered with undisarmable teleport
traps.
The battle scarred veteran used to be a potter. But noone bought
anything from the potter, so he close his shop and became a warrior. He
never gets any experience because everything he kills is on less than
50ft. below ground.
> - You can carry 23 Full Plate Armors or 23 rings. However, you can
> carry millions of gold. You can find copper that equals the gold,
> meaning that you are actually carrying more coins than your gold. The
> stores can hold scores of armors, yet they can't hold more than 24
> different rings.
>
Yes, but copper weighs less than gold. But takes up more space since
you have to have more copper pieces to equal a gold piece.
The Plate armor actually is collapsable.
> - Monsters can drop artifacts, yet they can't pick them up. If a
> monster drops an artifact, he still does as little damage as if he had
> a cursed broken sword or nothing at all. Also, one would expect a
> paladin to drop some shiny plate armor and a sword and a mage to carry
> spellbooks and wands. Not so. They can do all the magic they want
> without books or staffs, yet the player needs them. Thieves can steal
> stuff, yet player thieves can't.
>
They CAN pick up artifacts. They don't know they are artifacts since
they can't read. If they can't read they can't use ID scrolls or cast the
ID spell. By default all monsters are illiterate.
Do you really know the novice paladin is a novice paladin. He might
just look like one. He could just be a really good actor.
Maybe the mages have self-destruct spells on their books. Player
thieves can steal stuff, it's just a lot easier when the victim is dead.
> - Where did the stuff come from? A player enters the dungeon and finds
> stuff all over the floor. Yeah, it could come from previous
> adventurers, but where did they get it from? All that stuff doesn't
> just appear. Also, if someone had Ringil, Bladeturner, and Fingolfin,
> why didn't he just beat up the monsters? And if they find a potion of
> augmentation, why didn't they just quaff it? And there are never
> adventurers in the town. There are some people in the dungeon, but
> they always attack the player and don't have 23 items each.
>
It all came from me. I made all of it out of Acorn Squash.
Who said someone had these things? Where did you come from? Things
like you don't just appear.
All the other adventurers avoid you. I think it has to do with some
type of conspiracy. They are most likely in league with the Random Number
Generator.
> - The player can just sit down and rest for a few hundred turns.
> Suddenly, he sees that his items are magical. He is cured of all
> poison, blindness, etc. and regains all hit points. I imagine that
> dungeon floors aren't good to rest on, especially when the innards of a
> mob of orcs lie scattered around the room.
>
Actually, you can't rest while poisoned. Blindnes goes away after so
many turns. So suggesting that sleep cures it is inaccurate.
Luke Skywalker slept in the guts of some two-legged hairless camel
things in Return of the Jedi. Orc guts can't be much worse.
> - The dragons, mice, paladins, and demons all join forces against the
> player.
>
Yes, well, that's part of the cummunist conspiracy.
> - Thieves can sneak past monsters without them detecting him, but he
> still has to physically fight them if he wants to level (or spend years
> picking locks). No matter how stealthy he is, he can't pick pockets,
> rob stores, etc. How does he win the game? The only way to win is to
> kill Morgoth. This is rather unfair to thieves. There should be many
> ways to win, maybe including getting enough money to retire, stealing
> an item from Morgoth, or something like that.
>
Stealing enough money to retire would make a boring game and noone would
play.
Eric
Greg Wooledge
>There's a very rare version of
>an old help file that documents this type of stuff.
> All the people in the
>town are born from the head of a titan named Helmiculite. He has 233
>female red yeek lovers who implant their eggs in his ears. From there
>they migrate through his skin and into his brain where they get
>nourishment from.
I must confess, I've never seen this "help" file. Do you have a URL
for a copy of it by any chance?
> They CAN pick up artifacts. They don't know they are artifacts since
>they can't read. If they can't read they can't use ID scrolls or cast the
>ID spell. By default all monsters are illiterate.
No, monsters are actually incapable of picking up artifacts from the
ground. However, sometimes parts of monsters spontaneously transform
themselves into artifacts at the moment of the creature's death. That
sword you're wielding may once have been Ugluk's small intestine.
> Do you really know the novice paladin is a novice paladin. He might
>just look like one. He could just be a really good actor.
But the monsters have little signs on them. Even if you've never seen
one before, you can immediately tell a chaos hound from a clear hound,
just by reading the words on its little sign. (The signs on the giant
white lice are really small -- it's fortunate that your character has
perfect eyesight, and can read them even from 200 feet away.)
> Luke Skywalker slept in the guts of some two-legged hairless camel
>things in Return of the Jedi. Orc guts can't be much worse.
Those animals were most definitely furry, not hairless. And it was in
"The Empire Strikes Back", not Jedi.
Time Pilot
(Alexander Deyke) wrote:
>
> - Monsters can drop artifacts, yet they can't pick them up. If a
> monster drops an artifact, he still does as little damage as if he had
> a cursed broken sword or nothing at all. Also, one would expect a
> paladin to drop some shiny plate armor and a sword and a mage to carry
> spellbooks and wands. Not so. They can do all the magic they want
> without books or staffs, yet the player needs them. Thieves can steal
> stuff, yet player thieves can't.
>
This is a definate problem. Monsters should drop apropiate items. I.e
Novice archer : Arrows or bolts
Novice ranger : ~ and wands or potions
Paladins : Scrolls or armor
Warriors : Melee weapons
Mages : Books or scrolls
Rogues : Whatever they stole
Dark Elves : Elvish Things (Waybread,enchanted arrows,Poisons)
Preists : Money or Books
Rogues should be able to steal gold from monsters.
=======
Time Pilot <haxo...@hotmail.com>
There is no way they can keep up with us.