Competition 239

[Nick]

Comp 239 is now up on the competition page, it's a PosChengband 7.3.5 Pious Water-Elf High-Priest, Benediction realm, World of Middle-Earth.

I don't know how the default comp ladder-ordering rules will go with PosCheng, let me know if I need to change anything and I'll ping pav.

[murphy]

I've been playing this variant a lot so I'll share a few quick hints.

From the wilderness, to see the world map, hit MM

The light mechanics are new. Some monsters have a dark aura, and will reduce your light radius by 10' if they occupy a square adjacent to you. So if you imagine a worst case, say, surrounded by eight shadow demons, your light radius is reduced by 80' and you probably can't see no matter how great your light source. So you won't be able to read a spellbook or a scroll. Therefore, it's useful (necessary, perhaps) to carry something you can activate in the dark (e.g. a staff or rod) that will help you escape from such a predicament.

[Sphara]

@murphy

Any tips are welcome.

Some wilderness encounters are brutal when you got no rConf or rBlind. A first trip to the Forest branch and back to the town was.. something else. Without a big stack of !CSW, I would have croaked to wilderness ninjas.

Also, I don't see any benefits moving in water as a water-elf. No attack/device/defense bonuses, no increased speed, nothing that I could notice. Are there any? Besides not drowning in deep water tiles?

[wobbly]

Pretty sure its move energy cost. Haven't looked at the actual code.

[Sphara]

Aight, that makes sense. There weren't big enough pools in the Forest to really take an advantage of this. Just one or two tile puddles.
If things get outta hands in the Forest, you don't run, you teleport

Lovely reminder from old times that amnesia attack. Not as horrible as in Moria/early Angband but annoying enough to make me itch.

[wobbly]

*Sigh* Why do some angband developers insist in making the UI more terrible? If you want to make the UI simpler make it like Sil, but make sure its actually tight and simple like Sil. Don't change it unless it is simplifying things. If you have an idea you think is good, make sure you have actual play testers who will actually play and confirm it actually works.

It happened to the latest NPP. Maybe the latest NPP had good stuff, and maybe not but its hard to tell because the UI makes it near unplayable. It's happened to PCB. The change to no moving on the world map might be ok, but... I can either hit run and move forever or I could manual move every bleeding step. I can see dungeon symbols on the world map, but can't view them in any way. Plus there are other changes which, I can see no reason except creating extra inconvenience. I mean I'm sure the changes made sense to Chris, but he cut himself off from feedback, because feedback means the possibility of criticism, so there are changes that are obviously bad to anyone trying to play the game.

[clouded]

chris come home dude....we just want to talk

[murphy]

A couple of tips about wilderness travel. The roads have a stripe down the center. If you run on that stripe you will follow the bends in the road. Also you can run through forest if you are in a tree when you start running.

Not being able to move in the world map, I don't think its a bad change. It has tactical ramifications, you can't rely on it as a way to escape danger. If a monster comes out of the mountains, or up dungeon stairs, that is much faster than you, it can be a challenge to figure out a way to escape.

I do wish there was a way that the dungeons could be labeled in the world map, instead of relying on memory which is which.

[Nick]

Congratulations to clouded for finishing in front - no game wins this time.

[wobbly]

Congrats clouded.

It looks like Chris copied some monster groups from V. Bill, Tom and Bert were together. I see the little dragon families. The fun one however is what happens with staves of summon hounds. I summoned Scruffy little dogs and ended up with pet filthy street urchins.