Mr. Wickham the Elf Mage (long)

[Derakon]

options have been taken away from the player, making game less intetesting im on to play something else.

Will you please try a character that isn't so outright terrible before dismissing the game out of hand? Get a higher starting STR and DEX and see if your complaints still have merit. It's certainly possible that the game is now too stingy, but right now I feel your statements are being very heavily colored by the fact that you're playing the competition character, so it's difficult to know what degree of correction would be warranted.

[Malak Darkhunter]

You value stealth way too high, I have no trouble with a comp char whatsoever, I find things, can fight things and that's about as bad char as it can be for stealth and stats.

In fact I'm about as fast as you are in respect of clvl and turncount and I'm not as deep as you are and I still have far better equipment. You probably fight wrong things, or avoid things too much or dive too fast.

Maybe you just don't know how to play non-stealthy non-melee chars. This current comp is good practice for that. After that try Dwarf Priest. Those have bad stealth as well, but are still the easiest class in the entire game.

If you want stealth use Rings of Mouse. Those give huge stealth benefit if you just want to sneak around without waking things up. You can't melee things (much without very good weapon), but you can get +6 - +8 stealth very early.

BTW. I don't see how you can say that shops don't have good equipment. I have seen by 400k turns ego-items in all shops selling items that could be ego (except cloaks in general) and rings of resist poison, BoS +10, HXbow of Extra might and many other great things in BM (I could afford only that ring, HXbow was gone before I had money to buy it). Dungeon also gave Tensers at 650' (dropped by orc), but obviously that was not very useful for warrior. This is pretty consistent with my other games in 3.4. Maybe you have just been unlucky with shops.

IMO flavor has not gone anywhere, it's still all there.

beat game several times with dwarf priest, as well as in moria, they have detection, infravision, group spell attacks, very different.
Found very uninteresting things in shops during my run, i felt made game less exciting, and more boring.
There seemed little improvement in weapons from levels 10-30, levels 30 to 40 where a desert and very uninteresting, i found barely any stat potions or good gear, i wont waste my time with that kind of struggle or grind,
options have been taken away from the player, making game less intetesting im on to play something else.

[Timo Pietilä]

It has absolutely nothing to do with the competition, what it is about is how colorless and flovourless V has become, it's just not fun to play anymore, the player is being steered towards playing a certain way and i dont like it.

Hobbits, gnomes, elves can probably do pretty good because of stealth, they hava a tremendous advantage to dive, without decent equipment availiable in shops(stealth) othet class types make for aggravating gameplay trying to dive without stealth to find good items.

V does not have a balanced system dependant on class anymore, when stealth gear was more availiable in shops other player classes were fun as well.

You value stealth way too high, I have no trouble with a comp char whatsoever, I find things, can fight things and that's about as bad char as it can be for stealth and stats.

In fact I'm about as fast as you are in respect of clvl and turncount and I'm not as deep as you are and I still have far better equipment. You probably fight wrong things, or avoid things too much or dive too fast.

Maybe you just don't know how to play non-stealthy non-melee chars. This current comp is good practice for that. After that try Dwarf Priest. Those have bad stealth as well, but are still the easiest class in the entire game.

If you want stealth use Rings of Mouse. Those give huge stealth benefit if you just want to sneak around without waking things up. You can't melee things (much without very good weapon), but you can get +6 - +8 stealth very early.

BTW. I don't see how you can say that shops don't have good equipment. I have seen by 400k turns ego-items in all shops selling items that could be ego (except cloaks in general) and rings of resist poison, BoS +10, HXbow of Extra might and many other great things in BM (I could afford only that ring, HXbow was gone before I had money to buy it). Dungeon also gave Tensers at 650' (dropped by orc), but obviously that was not very useful for warrior. This is pretty consistent with my other games in 3.4. Maybe you have just been unlucky with shops.

IMO flavor has not gone anywhere, it's still all there.

[wobbly]

The only way you can dive with a warrior class in 3.4 is overall great luck on gear, because it certainly isnt availiable in town! And now its rare in the dungeon, if you dont have stealth or good gear your toast and numerous trips to town for ccw and telep gets old quick, i prefer my shops thank you.

My kobold warrior is having no trouble diving. Sure kobolds have decent stealth, but I'm tending to fight monsters more often then not rather then sneaking past them. As for stealth items, I'm leaving a trail of rings of the mouse all across the dungeon. I'm unsure why your having trouble finding them.

[PowerWyrm]

Hobbits, gnomes, elves can probably do pretty good because of stealth, they hava a tremendous advantage to dive, without decent equipment availiable in shops(stealth) othet class types make for aggravating gameplay trying to dive without stealth to find good items.

I've always considered +stealth as totally marginal in Angband. I would use a +infra item over +stealth any time. A lot of the dangerous monsters have zero alertness anyway...

[Derakon]

Try rolling up a more optimized warrior character using the point-buy system and see if you can dive then. You can't dive not because your stealth is bad, but because your offense sucks and your stealth is bad. And your HP are terrible. And you can't use devices well.

Normally warriors have excellent melee and good missile weapons to back them up. The fact that you're playing a Human with the standard roller is having a huge impact on how hard (and how fun) the game is.

[Malak Darkhunter]

So basically you've been handed a bad character (a human warrior with the standard roller -- that is, flat-out, a bad character), and you're blaming the shops for the fact that you're not having fun?

It's a competition. It's meant to be hard. It's not going to be representative of normal play, unless you normally play bad characters.

It has absolutely nothing to do with the competition, what it is about is how colorless and flovourless V has become, it's just not fun to play anymore, the player is being steered towards playing a certain way and i dont like it.

Hobbits, gnomes, elves can probably do pretty good because of stealth, they hava a tremendous advantage to dive, without decent equipment availiable in shops(stealth) othet class types make for aggravating gameplay trying to dive without stealth to find good items.

V does not have a balanced system dependant on class anymore, when stealth gear was more availiable in shops other player classes were fun as well.

The only way you can dive with a warrior class in 3.4 is overall great luck on gear, because it certainly isnt availiable in town! And now its rare in the dungeon, if you dont have stealth or good gear your toast and numerous trips to town for ccw and telep gets old quick, i prefer my shops thank you.

[Derakon]

Ah, thanks for the clarification. Shows what I know.

[Magnate]

Assuming you're talking about the damage multiplier on wands and the like due to device skill, I think that's been in for a long time. We just didn't know about it.

I think Timo did indeed mean device damage, and it went in in 3.1.2 (Dec '09). Commit 19684a9, to be precise.

[Derakon]

Diving without stealth is pure suicide, i found no stealth egos at all in 2 runs in comp123, iwithout shops supplying good items no stealth classes are meat, v has steered more in balance for fast diving yes but only for stealth characters, sorry but sang, fa, npp, are just more fun and have a good reward system for all characters.

So basically you've been handed a bad character (a human warrior with the standard roller -- that is, flat-out, a bad character), and you're blaming the shops for the fact that you're not having fun?

It's a competition. It's meant to be hard. It's not going to be representative of normal play, unless you normally play bad characters.

[Malak Darkhunter]

Shops are useful only at very early game in both versions (barring very lucky finds in BM), if your game relies on buying equipment from shops you should try diving a bit faster. Dungeon is far better source for items.

Diving without stealth is pure suicide, i found no stealth egos at all in 2 runs in comp123, iwithout shops supplying good items no stealth classes are meat, v has steered more in balance for fast diving yes but only for stealth characters, sorry but sang, fa, npp, are just more fun and have a good reward system for all characters.

[Derakon]

no bonus to equipment damage with high device skill

Assuming you're talking about the damage multiplier on wands and the like due to device skill, I think that's been in for a long time. We just didn't know about it.

[Timo Pietilä]

Exactly explain to me why 3.4 is easier than 3.0.9? I disagree completly.
In 3.0.9 their was still decent items in shops to buy, making game easier.

In 3.0.9 their was still stat restore potions, making game easier. and I believe that 99 limit quiver.

3.4.0 is harder than any version I have ever played, it's aggravating and repetitive shopping at the black market to find something decent to use, their is very low object generation.

3.4.0 has reduced stat's on character level up, 1 blow per round combat on game begining.

So how do you get that 3.4 is in any way easier than 3.0.9?

Quiver didn't exist, no full ID on items using normal ID-scroll, no easy early item detection except with rogue spell, staves and scrolls, worse hounds, cursed items, less powerful base item types, less artifacts, no immediate recognition of artifacts, slow pseudo and weak pseudo, monsters no yet "balanced" for fast diving, no lose one-gain one -potions, no bonus to equipment damage with high device skill, no ego DSM:s to mention few.

Shops are useful only at very early game in both versions (barring very lucky finds in BM), if your game relies on buying equipment from shops you should try diving a bit faster. Dungeon is far better source for items.

[Malak Darkhunter]

Object generation is reduced compared to the days before Too Much Junk went into effect, but all of the items that are no longer generated are ones that you would not have wanted to use anyway because they're too weak. At least that's the theory.

I understand the theory but it makes for a very dry and boring dungeon. Early Uniques drop weak magic items, not very exciting, and that's your best hope to find something interesting.

[Derakon]

Exactly explain to me why 3.4 is easier than 3.0.9? I disagree completly.
In 3.0.9 their was still decent items in shops to buy, making game easier.

In 3.0.9 their was still stat restore potions, making game easier. and I believe that 99 limit quiver.

I'm pretty sure the quiver didn't exist until 3.1.2 at the earliest. And you didn't get stats restored on levelup.

3.4.0 is harder than any version I have ever played, it's aggravating and repetitive shopping at the black market to find something decent to use, their is very low object generation.

3.4.0 has reduced stat's on character level up, 1 blow per round combat on game begining.

As noted in another thread, you're playing a character that was generated with the standard roller. If you do point-buy you can still get very powerful melee from the start of the game.

Object generation is reduced compared to the days before Too Much Junk went into effect, but all of the items that are no longer generated are ones that you would not have wanted to use anyway because they're too weak. At least that's the theory.