So you want to contribute but can't code?

[Raxmei]

I think Banishment is a perfectly good name for what the spell does but the difference between Banishment and Mass Banishment isn't obvious from the names. Something like Selective Banishment and Area Banishment.

[ekolis]

Zone Banishment vs. Man-to-Man Banishment? :P

*gets trampled by a horde of basketball players*

[jens]

I have edited artifact.txt, and started a thread about it:

http://angband.oook.cz/forum/showthread.php?t=4512

[Magnate]

Interesting - thank you for your work. Grateful if you could start a new thread for discussion. In fact, I'd be grateful if anyone contributing to any of these issues could start a new thread instead of replying to this one - otherwise it will turn into a monster.

I'll save my comments for the new thread.

[jens]

Yeah, that's a great idea, would have done that if you hadn't explicitly said to post in this thread in the OP ;-)

[Magnate]

Yeah, that's a great idea, would have done that if you hadn't explicitly said to post in this thread in the OP ;-)

I meant "post here" as in "post here on Oook", not "post here in this thread"! Will clarify.

[Timo Pietilä]

the Mithril Shod Boots 'Stormbringer'
- Meant as high end boots.

Stormbringer is sword. Specifically a Blade of Chaos. That name is famous enough that it is a bit blasphemy to use it to anything than a sword.

Could you invent a new name for those boots, otherwise I get an urge to change that in my games.

[Derakon]

Howzabout "Stormwalker"?

[Timo Pietilä]

Howzabout "Stormwalker"?

I like that. Much better than Stormbringer.

[MattB]

Hi Magnate,

Is this sticky dead, or are you still after contributions on any of this?

[Magnate]

Hi Magnate,

Is this sticky dead, or are you still after contributions on any of this?

Hi Matt, I don't think much if anything of what's left on the list has been done since I last edited the OP, but I've been inactive on V for a year or so now. The best person to check with would be fizzix, though takkaria also dropped in with a flurry of commits up until a few weeks ago.

[fizzix]

Hi Matt, I don't think much if anything of what's left on the list has been done since I last edited the OP, but I've been inactive on V for a year or so now. The best person to check with would be fizzix, though takkaria also dropped in with a flurry of commits up until a few weeks ago.

Actually takkaria is probably a better bet right now. I'm absolutely swamped, and will continue to be until January.

[MattB]

Actually takkaria is probably a better bet right now. I'm absolutely swamped, and will continue to be until January.

Thanks fizzix and Magnate for your answers.
I guess I'll just post a thread on this forum and see if anyone's interested.

[Magnate]

Thanks fizzix and Magnate for your answers.
I guess I'll just post a thread on this forum and see if anyone's interested.

I'm pretty sure you could choose any of the things left in the OP and nobody would complain. Some people might even like it ;-)

[Nick]

I am reposting Magnate's original, with links corrected and editorial changes to reflect events of the last 4 years.

I got inspired to post a list of outstanding tickets that could be done by someone who doesn't know how to code. All contributions welcome - please base your changes on the versions of the edit files to be found here. (If you are a coder, there are over 300 other tickets, so please don't feel tempted to do these ones!)

Disclaimer: this doesn't mean that whatever anybody produces will automatically be included - at the very least it has to get a nod from takkaria as a good enough solution/implementation. My assumption is that anybody inspired to work on one of these things will post a new thread linking to their work, and discussion will ensue automatically. If that doesn't happen, I'll make sure I start a thread myself before committing any of these.

Come up with better names for Banishment and Mass Banishment.

Fix the mage spell list so that the mage's damage output scales smoothly throughout the game, and so that resistable attacks do more damage (per unit mana) than unresistable ones. Also make sure that the spells are spread across the books in such a way that makes none of the books useless (or so essential that you can't live without it). Yes this will need subsequent work to code the changes, but an updated spell.txt is the best way to start this.

Remove branding spells from both realms. To do this properly means editing p_class.txt as well.

For races and classes:
Rebalance classes - some of this stuff will need coding, but again an updated p_class.txt file would be good.

Update races - likewise for p_race.txt.

COMMENT: 4.2 will be revamping classes - see this thread for lots of discussion.

monster spell messages - lots of people have noted that the messages in the latest dev versions are less flavourful than their predecessors. So we need a text file for these, which has this format (one stanza per spell):

F: RSF_FOO
A: Message that is printed when the spell is cast by a visible monster (use %^s for the monster's name), e.g. %^s points at you, incanting terribly!
B: Message that is printed when the spell is cast by an unseen monster, e.g. Something utters a terrible incantation!
C: Description that is printed in monster recall after "It can", e.g. cause critical wounds
D: A message which is printed when the player saves (i.e. anything more flavourful than "You avoid the effects!"), if the spell allows a save

The list of monster spells is here - this file also contains the fragments of the above messages which are currently used, so this is what you need to improve on.

COMMENT: Elsairon has this underway

There are other tasks like it (for the messages arising from the elements, so feel free to have a go at those too.)

Review which monsters have NO_SLEEP, NO_CONF, NO_FEAR and NO_STUN. In general fewer monsters should have them, to make those effects more useful (the monsters still get a save), but there could be some which don't but ought to. While you're there, you might as well do the same for IM_FIRE/COLD/POIS/ELEC/ACID too ...

Add monster mana - there's a branch which has support for this already, but we need someone to go through monster.txt and assign a mana rating to each monster (0 for those with no spells, obviously). We also need a mana cost for each monster spell (RSF_FOO). Both Sangband and NPP have monster mana (and probably FA and others), so please look at those for some guidance. Hint: takkaria likes the NPP implementation.

Add more monster races - this is as simple as creating new RF_ flags for new monster races and adding them to the relevant monsters in monster.txt. If you're feeling clever you can add them to this as well.

Add more monsters - this is a general free-for-all ticket which contains a bunch of recommended sources (and also links to other monster tickets mentioned above).

COMMENT: The monster list is up for revamp in 4.2 too, but by all means have a go at any of this. I think the jury's still out on whether we have monster mana or not.


... and some non-gameplay-related tickets:
Context-sensitive help content - this should be in a file like this:

C: context for this help (e.g. light has gone out)
D: description of this help (e.g. You need to refuel your light source, or find another one).

... yes it'll need coding, but it will help to have the content available.

Check font licences for the new fonts (the ones ending in 'x'). Ideally we need the licences for all of them concatenated into a single text file (but showing clearly which font uses which licence).

Design a new scoring system - open season on this. Yes it would need coding, but a document which describes it would be a great start (and would be included as a help file).