Magnate's new egos

[Shockbolt]

I'm a little scared of Diablo-style things like Massive Maces of Massacre, but in principle I'm open to this kind of ego-item overhaul. It's basically a question aesthetics (and therefore taste), so there's no right or wrong, but I'm very attached to the quaint Tolkien/AD&D flavor of Vanilla and I'd be sad to see it go.

The other thing I'm worried about is ego items that are too junky or too close to regular items. For example the Daggers of Parrying [+2] basically add unnecessary verbiage to the game and nothing else. This is basically a question of balancing. I think that if you're going to add a suffix/prefix, it should MEAN something.

I think it would be cool to find, say, a Mithril Katana. But an Adamantite Scythe of Slicing of Westernesse is just too much. I guess I just hope that the finished product will be at least as elegant as the old/current one. (And yes, I know that Scythes of Slicing of Westernesse already exist, and I think they're a bit ridiculous )

I agree with the above, I also hope it won't move in the direction of Diablo-like items. I generally feel that weapons in Angband should be namewise equal to or less than what the artifact items and weapons are named, such as "Flame of the West".

Simple but efficient and quite nice. "A sharp Gondolin falchion of orc slaying" is more than good enough for me as an example for item/weaponry description, "names" should be reserved for unique items/weaponry. Sting, Glamdring, Phial of Galadriel to name just a few.

Having too many, too vivid names kinda spoils the fun of finding something out of the ordinary.

[Djabanete]

I'm a little scared of Diablo-style things like Massive Maces of Massacre, but in principle I'm open to this kind of ego-item overhaul. It's basically a question aesthetics (and therefore taste), so there's no right or wrong, but I'm very attached to the quaint Tolkien/AD&D flavor of Vanilla and I'd be sad to see it go.

The other thing I'm worried about is ego items that are too junky or too close to regular items. For example the Daggers of Parrying [+2] basically add unnecessary verbiage to the game and nothing else. This is basically a question of balancing. I think that if you're going to add a suffix/prefix, it should MEAN something.

I think it would be cool to find, say, a Mithril Katana. But an Adamantite Scythe of Slicing of Westernesse is just too much. I guess I just hope that the finished product will be at least as elegant as the old/current one. (And yes, I know that Scythes of Slicing of Westernesse already exist, and I think they're a bit ridiculous )

[takkaria]

I am sad to see these changes won't be in 3.4; I hope they will go in 3.5.

It all rather depends on the community response to them. If they're at the point where there is a broad consensus they are a good move, we'll include them. If it's considered that they break flavour, then maybe we need to see if we can reflavour them and then include them. And if people still think they do too much to damage flavour, maybe they'll never go in.

(I really want them to, though! I think they'll make the game a lot more interesting without introducing a ton of new features.)

[Magnate]

Agreed, and IMO the WTF factor should not be restricted to items but should apply to monsters and dungeon cretion as well. I remember the first time I found a greater vault that was definitely a WTF moment.

I meant something slightly different by "WTF factor". I wasn't so much thinking of the "oh WOW!" moments that (I think) you and Timo are now discussing, but of the "Angband isn't like this!?!" feelings that I think many people will experience on trying v4. For example, lots of the base item names for armour pieces have been changed, to remove references to their materials (e.g. Soft Leather Armour is now a Jerkin, Hard Leather Armour is now Banded Armour - shields are small/large/kite/tower/bulwark rather than wicker/metal/mithril etc.). But we'll see.

[Jungle_Boy]

This is actually more than joke. Game should produce WTF -effect every now and then. So called "unbalanced" items might not be unbalanced if you count that in. The One Ring for example (after making it a lot more rare) should be thing that absolutely nobody could resists putting in because it is so "overpowered".

If the WTF is "I'm walking in a shoe store", then that is something we need to fix. If it is something extraordinary happening very rarely, then there is no reason to "fix" it.

Agreed, and IMO the WTF factor should not be restricted to items but should apply to monsters and dungeon cretion as well. I remember the first time I found a greater vault that was definitely a WTF moment.

[Timo Pietilä]

Aww, I like the WTF factor.

This is actually more than joke. Game should produce WTF -effect every now and then. So called "unbalanced" items might not be unbalanced if you count that in. The One Ring for example (after making it a lot more rare) should be thing that absolutely nobody could resists putting in because it is so "overpowered".

If the WTF is "I'm walking in a shoe store", then that is something we need to fix. If it is something extraordinary happening very rarely, then there is no reason to "fix" it.

[Magnate]

I love the WTF factor as well :| cannot wait to playtest this

Well, if you can build it yourself, it's in the v4 repo. If not, we should have the autobuilder set up in the next few days. (If you missed the v4 announcement, it's here.)

[flechette]

I love the WTF factor as well :| cannot wait to playtest this

[Jungle_Boy]

You read my mind (or perhaps you read the wiki page). There will definitely be more flexibility for randarts using this system. We've also worked out how to adjust the number of artifacts during the game, so we're not limited to choosing how many to randomise at the start. We can start the game with (any or all of) the standard artifacts, and then generate randarts during the game.

Please rest assured that it will be made available for playtesting - it's just going through some initial balancing to try and minimise the WTF factor when you first play it.

Aww, I like the WTF factor.

[Magnate]

It sounds to me like this is a great (positive) change from a base code perspective - more flexible, easier to tweak and so on. There is already significant balancing work needed - wouldn't this make that work much easier to do? Why not go ahead and plug in all the changes, if not for 3.4 at least for 3.5? There are some things you can't change by half measures, and reworking the issues with item generation is one of them. Earlier is definitely better than later here.

Also, it sounded very cool to playtest.

Another thought - with the underlying code more flexible, the randart option could be extended - standard artifacts and egos, or random artifacts and egos.

You read my mind (or perhaps you read the wiki page). There will definitely be more flexibility for randarts using this system. We've also worked out how to adjust the number of artifacts during the game, so we're not limited to choosing how many to randomise at the start. We can start the game with (any or all of) the standard artifacts, and then generate randarts during the game.

Please rest assured that it will be made available for playtesting - it's just going through some initial balancing to try and minimise the WTF factor when you first play it.

[Taha]

It sounds to me like this is a great (positive) change from a base code perspective - more flexible, easier to tweak and so on. There is already significant balancing work needed - wouldn't this make that work much easier to do? Why not go ahead and plug in all the changes, if not for 3.4 at least for 3.5? There are some things you can't change by half measures, and reworking the issues with item generation is one of them. Earlier is definitely better than later here.

Also, it sounded very cool to playtest.

Another thought - with the underlying code more flexible, the randart option could be extended - standard artifacts and egos, or random artifacts and egos.

[Zyphyr]

I was a bit unclear. I was actually trying to say what you just said but apparently failed badly

For what it is worth, I understood you.

[EpicMan]

I don't really understand this logic. If things are broken now, then we can either fix what we have now and then replace it with something which will be "broken" until fixed again, or we can just skip the first "fix it" step and replace one broken thing with another broken thing.

About the only reason I could see for first fixing the current broken system (beyond things like concerns about the pace of new development) is to establish a baseline for what we want object allocation to be like. But we have Angband 2.9.x / 3.0.x for that.

I was a bit unclear. I was actually trying to say what you just said but apparently failed badly

[Iapetus]

I am sad to see these changes won't be in 3.4; I hope they will go in 3.5.

Me too. I don't know about the development stuff but as a player more variation in egos would be good thing and personally I don't see any reason not to change them. Granted balance will be an issue but this change provides more tools/options to do the balancing.

Anyway, thanks to everyone involved in developing Angband and it's variants I've wasted a lot of time playing them.

[Derakon]

Furthermore, there are issues right now with item generation/distribution and game balance, so altering/breaking balance is not a valid reason to not make this change because balance is messed up right now.

I don't really understand this logic. If things are broken now, then we can either fix what we have now and then replace it with something which will be "broken" until fixed again, or we can just skip the first "fix it" step and replace one broken thing with another broken thing.

About the only reason I could see for first fixing the current broken system (beyond things like concerns about the pace of new development) is to establish a baseline for what we want object allocation to be like. But we have Angband 2.9.x / 3.0.x for that.