On 27.03.2023 23:38, Keith Simpson wrote:
> On Sunday, March 26, 2023 at 1:18:16 PM UTC-4, Janis Papanagnou
> wrote:
>> Personally it seems to me that - with arbitrary changes at least -
>> that can only be anticipated by being fully spoiled; this
>> basically means source code studies, since the (indeed long but in
>> that respect not very helpful) article in Wikipedia doesn't the
>> least cover the basics. This is what I have learned (on the
>> meta-level).
>
> When Hack and NetHack first came out, there were no spoilers, at
> least none that I knew about.
There have always been spoilers. (That you don't know them should
make you a bit more reserved, also with your imputations below.)
I haven't played Nethack when its first release came out. I started
with NH-3.0.9 (in the early 1990's, IIRC). I played it continuously
until NH-3.4.3, until NAO stopped its support for it.
I tried some NH-3.6.x version, played (I think) two games, ascended
one of it. Didn't like it. Quite some changes have obviously been
promoted by the Spork developer who became member of the post NH343
development team, and his footprint can certainly be seen.
> The 'world wide web' didn't exist as it does today back then.
The WWW was unnecessary since Usenet was much more populated at
these times, specifically this newsgroup. You could get so much
information and exchange experiences that you could become spoiled
to any degree you wanted.
Today this newsgroup is effectively dead. (Nobody [here] seems to
care about Nethack any more, and if I'd not occasionally have had
populated it with [slashem] posts or lately (sort of) spammed it
with [evilhack] posts...) So this previously important channel
effectively drained as source for information exchange, spoilers,
etc.
The NH-Guidebook was good enough to get a well informed start. With
that and with some caution based on common sense players were able
to reach far even if unspoiled. (If own experiences don't match or
if memories are faint have a look at the "Ellora" story as a hint.)
Of course there are single special cases that must be experienced
the hard way (like an exploding bag of holding[*]), but a lot other
things could be derived (like Medusa turning one to stone), or that
it would be - here in EvilHack[**] - unwise to wear "the One Ring"
as it comes cursed.
[*] Actually an unnecessary nuisance, that could be fixed in a more
balanced way (i.e. without the guaranteed frustration of losing
quite _everything_ carried that was collected during a long game);
and there's many options I can think of here to punish the player
(for his ignorance or sloppy play) without completely frustrating
him/her.
[**] Yes, this is a positive example that something is derivable.
> And not everybody knows how to source dive - I
> certainly didn't when I first started playing. I didn't even know
> about Elbereth until after my second ascension. So you play, you
> experience what comes your way, you remember/take notes, and if you
> die, you try again, armed with the new knowledge you've acquired.
> That's how it was done 'back in the day' and frankly it's a bit
> distressing to see some players who won't try out *any* new game
> unless they're completely spoiled beforehand. You can spoil yourself
> if you want to, the wiki has a rather large entry for EvilHack, but I
> would recommend experiencing it fresh. As long as you've been
> playing, wouldn't that be refreshing in a way?
This is actually what I am (or what I was) doing with EvilHack.
(Should be quite obvious if you inspect the many posts/advertisment
for [evilhack] I've posted recently.
In the past I've tried out several roguelike variants (omega, ularn,
moria, adom), but none (IMO) competed with Nethack. Currently I am
also trying out several variants (as you see), but from those I have
seen only Slashem appears appealing [to me] (despite a _few_ things
that I dislike); Slashem made quite some excellent design decisions.
But 90+% unexpected, underivable effects in a game... - how could that
be "refreshing". (That's at best frustrating, because common sense
doesn't help.) And the whole balance factor is, erm.., disputable in
that variant (as far as my early/midgame experience and my observations
of other games on a server goes).
(BTW, I wasn't attentive; are you maybe the developer of EvilHack?
that would - with the developer knowledge - at least explain why you
are so keenly defending it. Being open to criticism might help. If
you don't care, I care even less, mind.)
>
>> Some recent cases; yesterday I wrote that Recently I got an
>> arch-lich at the orc-haunted mine-town variant. Okay, bad luck! -
>> Hmm.., bad luck, or bad game design? - Nethack has occasionally
>> also shape changers that appear in deadly shapes early game. (Have
>> the odds changed in this variant? Subjectively it seems to me that
>> this unbalance has become standard here.)
>
> Alex, I'll take 'bad luck' for $800 please.
>
> Shape changer odds of spawning hasn't changed from regular NetHack,
> neither have poly trap odds in the mines. I'm betting something
> stepped on a poly trap and you just got an unlucky RNG roll. It
> happens. I'm confident it's not due to bad game design.
The RNG decisions are no bad game design, sure.
But bad (unbalanced) design is, say, if polytraps appear at too
shallow levels (arch-lich at minetown?), or if the outcome of a shape
transformation is far out of depth. Okay, you may say; "shit happens".
But such design consequences are not "refreshing" but just foster
frustration.
>
>> I already reported about unexpected and _arbitrary_ attack types,
>> like deadly illness from quite early appearing locusts; which has
>> no counterpart in real life (and I wondered about any rationale for
>> that). - What to do? - recently I died the second time (this time
>> in the Rat's mines-end level) to locusts hordes; no escape path, no
>> hilarious stack of any healing potions this time, that would have
>> been necessary.
>
> Locusts and their attack type was imported from SporkHack. That
> variant has been around for a *long* time - given your experience,
> I'm surprised you hadn't ever come across it until now.
Frankly, I cannot say whether I've played/ascended a Spork game or two
or not, I really just don't recall. But above I've already said what I
think about many of the design changes in Spork (that sadly found also
their way into Nethack, and as you say obviously also in EvilHack).
In any way; implementing (or borrowing from another game) some stupid
(=unbalanced, =non-derivable) "locust" concept doesn't make it any
better. YMMV.
Janis
--
BTW, how brain-dead is it to change the "satiated / continue eating"
default value from 'no' to 'yes'. - Variant developers should take at
least minimum care to enhance (not worsen) the user interface of their
games. (And that's not the only UI issue some newer roguelikes have.)
I hate bad user interfaces. And implementations seem to degrade instead
of learning from sophisticated implementations (or from common sense,
unless not available).