Frazband - a new Angband variant
fraz...@tiscali.co.uk
If it does, apologies for the double post.)
I'd like to announce a new Angband variant I've been creating, called
Frazband. I've created a little website for it at
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/frazband/
It's based on a mostly re-Tolkienised Zangband 2.6.2. I can't claim a
central unifying philosophy for it, (though there are philosophies
involved in its creation), so I'll just outline the more important
changes for now.
Most notably, it introduces a new magic system, (though at present it's
more of a reorganisation of the old one, few new spells have as of yet
been added or removed.) The main goal here is to allow the discovery of
new spells to be spaced out more evenly instead of being bunched up in
sets of eight, as well as making incremental expansion and the addition
of new spells easy.
It introduces a difficulty level which the player can set, (in addition
to all the ironman options), and also makes reload capability a
supported option which heavily lowers your score, rather than a cheat.
A host of new monsters have been brought in, including some *really*
tough non-uniques at the lowest levels which are better avoided.
Monster AI has been improved, particularly for mages, who will now try
to keep their distance and shoot spells at a PC warrior instead of
charging, and many different types of general monster behaviour have
been introduced, no longer just the binary hostile/friendly options.
There are some new types of monsters, and a couple of new monster
abilities, in particular, some monsters may now summon specific
subordinate creatures. And since the damage from melee attacks from
most monsters gets pretty pathetic deeper in the dungeon compared to
spells, some of them have been beefed up in this department. Since a
lot of our changes are bad for warriors, fighter-types now have more
hitpoints and can use melee skill to boost armour class to compensate.
And various other things have been changed. Including the ability to
eat those mushrooms which "look quite tasty".
Many more interesting things are planned for the future!
konijn_
> (Note: this message may turn up again, because of a silly news server.
> If it does, apologies for the double post.)
So far so good for the double post ;)
>
> I'd like to announce a new Angband variant I've been creating, called
> Frazband. I've created a little website for it at
>
> http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/frazband/
>
> It's based on a mostly re-Tolkienised Zangband 2.6.2. I can't claim a
> central unifying philosophy for it, (though there are philosophies
> involved in its creation), so I'll just outline the more important
> changes for now.
>
> Most notably, it introduces a new magic system, (though at present it's
> more of a reorganisation of the old one, few new spells have as of yet
> been added or removed.) The main goal here is to allow the discovery of
> new spells to be spaced out more evenly instead of being bunched up in
> sets of eight, as well as making incremental expansion and the addition
> of new spells easy.
So far, so good. I compiled it on my Mac PPC without a hitch and it
works ;)
It looks fine, and I actually started playing with a default ranger
klackon, is there actually help on the multiple magic types ? 1 major
remark : eye stalks should be red !!!! Not blue.
The dying but reloading instead of restarting is interesting, at least
in this case I did not restart but simply reload since death to blue
eyestalks just doesnt seem very fair ;)
Thanks for putting in efforts so that the Angband nation gets some more
variety, I only have 1 question for now : who are the people that
worked on this ?
T.
Nick McConnell
wrote:
> I'd like to announce a new Angband variant I've been creating, called
> Frazband. I've created a little website for it at
>
> http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/frazband/
IMHO it's a good idea to provide a windows version as well; I've taken the
liberty of putting one here:
http://angband.oook.cz/faangband/Downloads.html
Welcome to the Guild of Maintainers whose Variants Start with 'F'.
Nick.
--
Nick McConnell
FA + "Ooog" DN L:42 DL:57 A+ R++ Sp w:Rog
FA*/A/NPP/O/Po/St/Un W/L H- D c-- f- PV+ s- d++ P++ M+
C-- S- I* So+ B+ ac GHB SQ? RQ+ V-/V+@ F:NPP notes, etc.
Benjamin Mann
General help on them is available in the "new magic system" section in
the online help system, specifying what type of magic each combination
is useful for.
> 1 major remark : eye stalks should be red !!!! Not blue.
Well, since there's no obvious "logical" colour for a floating eye, the
ideal colour would probably be what you would expect, which would
depend on what you're used to. However, Angband uses orange and
Zangband uses blue, (the colour Frazband has "inherited"), so there's
no easy answer to that either. Although given their slightly "trappy"
nature, perhaps a "warning-type colour" is more appropriate...
> Thanks for putting in efforts so that the Angband nation gets some more
> variety, I only have 1 question for now : who are the people that
> worked on this ?
Just me, Benjamin Mann. Now actually in the header of this post,
hopefully. (As well as everyone responsible for ZAngband and its
predecessors, obviously.)
Benjamin Mann
> liberty of putting one here:
>
> http://angband.oook.cz/faangband/Downloads.html
>
> Welcome to the Guild of Maintainers whose Variants Start with 'F'.
Thanks! I've put it on my website now.
ekolis
One thing I think is missing from this variant, though, is the ability
to turn off the item graphics in stores. IMO it's too easy to "cheat"
by looking at items in a store and noticing that "ooh, that mushroom of
poison is red, I'd better not eat any red mushrooms I find!" Some might
not consider that cheating, just clever observation, but a lot of
variants at least provide an option to turn off the graphics in stores
;-)
Also, with the new spell system, how come there's no way to view your
magic skills after the game starts? Or am I just missing something, or
are they irrelevant as they only determine your starting spells or
something?
Christophe
> Nifty spell system! :-D Keep up the good work!
> One thing I think is missing from this variant, though, is the ability
> to turn off the item graphics in stores. IMO it's too easy to "cheat"
> by looking at items in a store and noticing that "ooh, that mushroom of
> poison is red, I'd better not eat any red mushrooms I find!" Some might
> not consider that cheating, just clever observation, but a lot of
> variants at least provide an option to turn off the graphics in stores
> ;-)
It has been quite a long time since ZAngband displayed the icon/colored
letter for unkown flavour items in stores. Not sure what version has
been used for Fraz but in that case, you should check if you really get
information about those items before you find them for real.
konijn_
Fourmion, the Klackon Ranger is now clevel 19 and cruising on dlevel 22
due to some trap doors ;)
The wilderness is puzzling, at first ( after 3 cities, no dungeon ) I
thought, cool they must force some centering of cities around the
player start location. Then I thought after find 7 cities, wow, they
must put all cities in the center, cool idea. Now after an excursion to
the south I found more ... cities. So arer there any other dungeons
left ?
I like the Spell Scrolls, I found one with the Word of Death at very
early level, giving me 3000 gold and setting my character up,
mushroomboy gave me a westernesse +2 ;)
Recall scrolls after the initial drought come in good supply, not
outrageous amounts ( forcing me to dive longer than in other varians )
but good enough. Teleport scrolls are rare, but then again I almost
never need them. Curing potions have been found plenty. So really this
variant has all my Z peeves corrected, or I am really lucky.
1 final note : out of the box Frazband allows @ to run with shift-arrow
key, but Zangband out of the box does not allow me to run, why ? I am
not familiar with that part of Angband.
Cheers,
T.
konijn_
> <Mega zip>
>
Some further follow up :
-selecting items from the floor for ID ( with the '-' key, does not
show the name of the item
-Gangrels eh, someone might get an angry lawyer letter ;)
-Gangrel ancilla's cut severely ( quite in theme, but this means
impossible to defeat in close combat because of stun risk ) _and_ they
summon like nuts. Suffice to say that a quest for 12 Gangrels Ancilla
is pure suicide :(
Good game nonetheless !!
T.
>
> Cheers,
> T.
The Fury
Roger
1. Interesting spell system! I really like it so far.
2. When I learned my first spell, I didn't realize immediately that I
needed to write it down in a book. I then proceeded to the dungeon
with an empty spell book! You should consider prompting the user to
write down any new spells that they learn; it would probably ease
player frustration. When would you ever want to learn a spell without
writing it down?
3. I found an odd entry in the Birth Options screen. Immediately
beneath "Nightmare mode" there is an option named "Number 211", with a
description of "(null)".
4. I would *really* appreciate an option to automatically display lists
(e.g. automatically display inventory when selling items). If the
option is already there, could you point me in the right direction? I
thought that the original ZAngband displayed lists by default.