YASD 3.2.0, maybe?

[Kaze]

I've been playing various versions of vanilla on and off for the past 10 years, and initially thought 3.2.0 was the easiest one I touched so far... but then suddenly:

 [Angband 3.2.0 Character Dump]

 Name   Horolotko                                Self  RB  CB  EB   Best
 Sex    Female       Age             16   STR! 18/100  -1  -5  +6 18/100
 Race   Kobold       Height          36   INT! 18/100  -1  +3 +13 18/***
 Class  Mage         Weight          54   WIS! 18/100  +0  +0  +5 18/150
 Title  Warlock      Social       Liked   DEX! 18/100  +2  +1  +2 18/150
 HP     -14/687      Maximize         Y   CON! 18/100  +2  -2 +13 18/***
 SP     170/321                           CHR! 18/100  -2  +1  +2 18/110

 Level               40   Armor    [34,+96]     Saving Throw         78%
 Cur Exp        1545917   Fight   (+26,+15)     Stealth           Superb
 Max Exp        1545917   Melee   (+39,+32)     Fighting       Excellent
 Adv Exp        1812500   Shoot   (+49,+35)     Shooting       Excellent
 MaxDepth   3150' (L63)   Blows    4.0/turn     Disarming            91%
 Game Turns     2718922   Shots      1/turn     Magic Device         106
 Standard Turns  513022   Infra       70 ft     Perception        1 in 1
 Resting Turns   159668   Speed          26     Searching            66%
 Gold            274464   Burden  175.4 lbs

 You come from a litter of 5 pups. Your father was a fungus farmer, and
 your mother was a cook. You have brown eyes, a dark brown hide, and
 large, sharp teeth.


rAcid:.+....+.+.... rConf:.......+.....
rElec:......+.+.... Sound:.+.....+.....
rFire:.+....+++.+.. Shard:+............
rCold:.+....+.+.*.. Nexus:....+....+...
rPois:....+.+..+..+ Nethr:+........+...
rFear:.....+..+.... Chaos:.............
rLite:............. Disen:.......++....
rDark:......+.+.... S.Dig:......+.+....
rBlnd:.+....+..+... Feath:.+....+......

Light:.+........... Aggrv:.............
Regen:..........+.. Stea.:....+........
  ESP:+............ Sear.:....+.+..+...
Invis:......+...... Infra:....+.......+
FrAct:......+...+.. Tunn.:.............
HLife:............. Speed:..+++......+.
ImpHP:............. Blows:.............
ImpSP:............. Shots:.............
 Fear:............. Might:.+...........


  [Last Messages]

> Uriel, Angel of Fire disappears!
> Uriel, Angel of Fire grunts with pain.
> Uriel, Angel of Fire casts a spell, burning your eyes!
> You are unaffected!
> Uriel, Angel of Fire grunts with pain.
> You do not have enough mana to cast this spell.
> Your feel your head clear.
> You have 10 Potions of Restore Mana (j).
> Uriel, Angel of Fire grunts with pain.
> Uriel, Angel of Fire disappears!
> Uriel, Angel of Fire casts a fire ball.
> Uriel, Angel of Fire disappears!
> Uriel, Angel of Fire grunts with pain.
> Uriel, Angel of Fire casts a mana bolt.
> You die.

I have no idea at all what happened here. I'm somewhat certain she was at full health before the fireball.

[Derakon]

According to my somewhat out-of-date source, fireball does 1d(mlvl * 3.5) + 10 damage (for Uriel, max 223 before resists); mana bolt does 1d(mlvl * 3.5) + 50 damage (max 263 before resists). So yeah, that shouldn't be able to kill her if she was at full health before the fireball.

I'm a bit surprised that monster spells are 1dN, by the way. That seems excessively spiky.

[Magnate]

According to my somewhat out-of-date source, fireball does 1d(mlvl * 3.5) + 10 damage (for Uriel, max 223 before resists); mana bolt does 1d(mlvl * 3.5) + 50 damage (max 263 before resists). So yeah, that shouldn't be able to kill her if she was at full health before the fireball.

I'm a bit surprised that monster spells are 1dN, by the way. That seems excessively spiky.

Well, it makes a change from the flat breath damage, which is solely hp-based. But I quite like the idea of upping the minimum damage from balls and bolts.

To the OP: what was all that stuff about Uriel disappearing and grunting with pain?

[Kaze]

To the OP: what was all that stuff about Uriel disappearing and grunting with pain?

Rift.

I have to admit I was drinking while playing, which is definitely not a good thing with this game, but still I'm somewhat sure something odd happened somewhere. I have a pretty keen HP eye and mbf finger if stuff looks too hairy.

[Derakon]

Well, it makes a change from the flat breath damage, which is solely hp-based. But I quite like the idea of upping the minimum damage from balls and bolts.

Just changing it to 4dmlvl would smooth it out a lot. It'd also be an increase of ~15% in max damage.

By the way, I said that Uriel's mana bolt did 263 damage before resists. Well, you can't resist mana attacks, so part of that sentence was unnecessary. Oh well.

Given that you resisted fire (and assuming you didn't have Resistance up, which you should have done) you would have taken up to 337 damage on a really unlucky pair of rolls. With double fire resist your damage would have maxed at 287.

[Kaze]

you would have taken up to 337 damage on a really unlucky pair of rolls.

I definitely should have had at least that many HP.

Nonetheless, it's a good monster memory to start with.

[Tiburon Silverflame]

The unpredictable nature of the 1d200 kind of roll, might be a good thing...but still...it's probably too swingy.

But, the fire damage should probably be *much* higher. 1d(ML*3.5) means an average damage of less than 2 points per ML. (ML)d4 would do more. Given, say, ML = 60, we have 1d140, for an average of 70; 40d4 averages 100.

Note that, at least initially, I'd limit this to the resistable attacks like fire. Increasing damage on a mana bolt would make some already very tough monsters downright insane.

[Timo Pietilä]

The unpredictable nature of the 1d200 kind of roll, might be a good thing...but still...it's probably too swingy.

But, the fire damage should probably be *much* higher. 1d(ML*3.5) means an average damage of less than 2 points per ML. (ML)d4 would do more. Given, say, ML = 60, we have 1d140, for an average of 70; 40d4 averages 100.

Note that, at least initially, I'd limit this to the resistable attacks like fire. Increasing damage on a mana bolt would make some already very tough monsters downright insane.

I have said this before: I think there should be "storm"-variant for most ball spells, which is way more dangerous than just ball. Manastorm and darkness storm are seriously dangerous spells (without resist at least).