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1st - apologies for the dump of a bunch of issues into a singular forum that really ought to be spread out .. and spam the entire forum.
2nd - let me preface this by stating I think this 3.5 version is one of the best releases I've played in quite a while. I can see the work you've put in trying to make the dungeon rooms & levels more interesting.. the parallelograms, the bat-rooms, the long winding hallways with intricate connection patterns, .. I even gave a snicker to the vault tribute to Pac-Man. I know you volunteer a lot of hours and labor into maintaining & improving the game. I would say, "well done!". Below are my thoughts and feedback for you given my first experience(s) with the game. I'm already on my 4th or 5th character, but I think I finally have a winner.
Item i: mimics are NOT visible if those items are squelched.
This happens with all mimic types, except chests.
Item ii: the item drop rates for utility rods, I think, needs to be tweaked a bit. It seems that after ~2500', the items you really needed but hardly ever saw prior to 2000' are rarely needed AFTER that depth as equipment and player attributes tend to catch up. E.g., though I often play a mage, rods of ID, Detection, Recall, Mapping, are often spotted sub 3000'. By then, characters tend to have supplies of !s of enlightenment, spells/scrolls/staves of ID, and ditto for mapping. In fact, by 3000', the player often has an arkenstone equivalent. I suppose it makes sense if one is playing sans artifacts, but in vanilla or rand-arts, those items are often generated too deep, too late in the game to be of use to the player. I would rather see them generated less often, but at higher depths 800~1500' to aid those mid-level characters... when they tend to need those items most. Ditto for some of the higher potions; I think the rarity may be increased while reducing the minimum level to find some of them. Right now there's just a huge dump of high level stuff in the deepest depths with quite a vacancy up top. Especially as the Up/Down potions no longer matter & Charisma's gone, there's quite a void of discovery between ~500' and ~1800' for potions.
Item iii: a lot of work went into dungeon mapping. There are times when a GV, though, is generated in the middle of the level and splits the level into two completely separate sections. Being a mage, this really isn't much of an issue. But, other classes would have to rely on wands of Stone to Mud or Tunnel several squares to connect a hallway between the two separate section levels. (see image enclosed for an example). But, if one is not aware of a level (via enlightenment or detection, et. al.), one may never know / notice there's another section to a given level.
Item iv: I think RandArts is even more enjoyable now that Charisma is no longer an attribute sucking option for the RandArts R.N.G. However, at the same time, the ↑ ↓ potions of brawn, intellect, contemplation, .. , have all but lost their worth. Even before I had max-stats, I had those potions squelched early on.
Item v: *Enlightenment* potions ought to also ID everything on the level rather than augment Int/Wis.
Item vi: plasma is annoying. Especially if/when a character has ImmFire or even double-resist up. Finding an immunity is hard enough, but if ImmFire won't stop plasma (which is around the same depths as when the plasma attacks begin), why bother? It makes ImmFire that much less attractive, in my mind.
Item vii: following that sentiment - attacks players cannot control / defend against - time, gravity, inertia, mana storms, water, ice, et. al. - I would like to see those attacks be weighed against either the player's Save % or AC or both. As with Blue Wizards forever sending my player afar, sometimes I get the save, sometimes I don't. I believe the character ought to have a defense mechanism for a majority of those attack types. For example, mana storms could be abated if a player is employing a magical shield, the "Shield" spell in R&S for mages, or make a separate "Mana shield" spell / prayer / rod / scroll type to magically ward off those indefensible attack types - gravity, time, inertia, water... .
Item viii: Race, not Class, should be the primary determination for HPs and initial AC adjustments. A Half-troll Mage ought to have more HPs than a Hobbit Warrior... in my mind. Yes, each race has its own hit-die, but the Class bonuses often supercede the main Race attributes. Further, I think the HP spread should be wider than 3/8ths to 5/8ths MAX HPs; something like 1/4th to 3/4ths would be more exciting. I know you're loathe to add more birth-options, but allowing the player to set the {brackets} on variance of HPs would be alluring.
Item ix: Now that Charisma is a thing of the past, would be nice to re-enable the Auto-roller. I often read posts that essentially state cursed items were removed due to the annoyance they caused players. Well, wonderful, I hate hitting 'r'... its annoying. Give me back my auto-roller.
Please.
Item x: If / when / once a player kills Morgoth, the game kind of becomes anti-climatic quickly. What if a method existed where Morgoth & pals could reincarnate themselves later on... (like a really good number of turns later, maybe a million or so) and possibly hunt down the @ no matter which level in the dungeon she/he was on. The player would still be regarded as a WINNER for killing Morgoth the first time, but, "a cold wind suddenly blows through the dungeon" could be a precursor to something extraordinary about to happen.
Item xi: Along the lines of uniques grouping together, what if you had a group of semi-unique mobs. Mobs that are high level in nature, yet limited. E.g., what if the max number of Black Reavers or Greater Balrogs were limited to 10-50 in the game. That make those separate, smaller goals for the player to achieve in the course of a game, and, make it more special when Vecna or Gothmog summon in 'special friends'. Hellhounds for Huan. Maybe a semi-unique type of bear for Beorn.
Item xii: Semantics. "You see no more xxxx." That message rubs me the wrong way everytime. That message is sent irregardless of whether the action upon such consumable is taken or not. My preference would be that message is no longer broadcast, period. "You see no more scrolls of see invisible", "You have no more weapons of mass destruction", et. al. I think those messages can be eliminated from the game. If a repeat 'n' key is issued, the game could respond with a generic, "what are you trying to do again?" message.
Item xiii: Others have clamored for a Bigger Home. Perhaps let the character potentially buy out a store and make that a 2nd or even 3rd home. Let the character negotiate with the store owner, offer 1 mil AU + price of all inventory, or something like that. No, I'm not offering to code it, just offering the suggestion.. free of charge.
Ok - these are my ideas and observations of 3.5. I know some will hurl plasma bolts in my general direction, but I offer these as feedback for the developers and maintainers of the game.
'Bux.
2nd - let me preface this by stating I think this 3.5 version is one of the best releases I've played in quite a while. I can see the work you've put in trying to make the dungeon rooms & levels more interesting.. the parallelograms, the bat-rooms, the long winding hallways with intricate connection patterns, .. I even gave a snicker to the vault tribute to Pac-Man. I know you volunteer a lot of hours and labor into maintaining & improving the game. I would say, "well done!". Below are my thoughts and feedback for you given my first experience(s) with the game. I'm already on my 4th or 5th character, but I think I finally have a winner.
-------------------
Item i: mimics are NOT visible if those items are squelched.
The 125 gold pieces worth of copper {squelch} was really a monster!
One @ will be running along a seemingly clear hallway, full of "......." dots, and boom! suddenly you run over a Ring of See Invisible that was really a mimic!. I would suggest adding a condition in the code to see if an item type for the mimic is in the squelch list or not. If it is, choose another item to imitate. This happens with all mimic types, except chests.Item ii: the item drop rates for utility rods, I think, needs to be tweaked a bit. It seems that after ~2500', the items you really needed but hardly ever saw prior to 2000' are rarely needed AFTER that depth as equipment and player attributes tend to catch up. E.g., though I often play a mage, rods of ID, Detection, Recall, Mapping, are often spotted sub 3000'. By then, characters tend to have supplies of !s of enlightenment, spells/scrolls/staves of ID, and ditto for mapping. In fact, by 3000', the player often has an arkenstone equivalent. I suppose it makes sense if one is playing sans artifacts, but in vanilla or rand-arts, those items are often generated too deep, too late in the game to be of use to the player. I would rather see them generated less often, but at higher depths 800~1500' to aid those mid-level characters... when they tend to need those items most. Ditto for some of the higher potions; I think the rarity may be increased while reducing the minimum level to find some of them. Right now there's just a huge dump of high level stuff in the deepest depths with quite a vacancy up top. Especially as the Up/Down potions no longer matter & Charisma's gone, there's quite a void of discovery between ~500' and ~1800' for potions.
Item iii: a lot of work went into dungeon mapping. There are times when a GV, though, is generated in the middle of the level and splits the level into two completely separate sections. Being a mage, this really isn't much of an issue. But, other classes would have to rely on wands of Stone to Mud or Tunnel several squares to connect a hallway between the two separate section levels. (see image enclosed for an example). But, if one is not aware of a level (via enlightenment or detection, et. al.), one may never know / notice there's another section to a given level.
Item iv: I think RandArts is even more enjoyable now that Charisma is no longer an attribute sucking option for the RandArts R.N.G.
However, at the same time, the ↑ ↓ potions of brawn, intellect, contemplation, .. , have all but lost their worth. Even before I had max-stats, I had those potions squelched early on.Item v: *Enlightenment* potions ought to also ID everything on the level rather than augment Int/Wis.
Item vi: plasma is annoying. Especially if/when a character has ImmFire or even double-resist up. Finding an immunity is hard enough, but if ImmFire won't stop plasma (which is around the same depths as when the plasma attacks begin), why bother? It makes ImmFire that much less attractive, in my mind.
Item vii: following that sentiment - attacks players cannot control / defend against - time, gravity, inertia, mana storms, water, ice, et. al. - I would like to see those attacks be weighed against either the player's Save % or AC or both. As with Blue Wizards forever sending my player afar, sometimes I get the save, sometimes I don't. I believe the character ought to have a defense mechanism for a majority of those attack types. For example, mana storms could be abated if a player is employing a magical shield, the "Shield" spell in R&S for mages, or make a separate "Mana shield" spell / prayer / rod / scroll type to magically ward off those indefensible attack types - gravity, time, inertia, water... .
Item viii: Race, not Class, should be the primary determination for HPs and initial AC adjustments. A Half-troll Mage ought to have more HPs than a Hobbit Warrior... in my mind. Yes, each race has its own hit-die, but the Class bonuses often supercede the main Race attributes. Further, I think the HP spread should be wider than 3/8ths to 5/8ths MAX HPs; something like 1/4th to 3/4ths would be more exciting. I know you're loathe to add more birth-options, but allowing the player to set the {brackets} on variance of HPs would be alluring.
Item ix: Now that Charisma is a thing of the past, would be nice to re-enable the Auto-roller. I often read posts that essentially state cursed items were removed due to the annoyance they caused players. Well, wonderful, I hate hitting 'r'... its annoying. Give me back my auto-roller.
Please. Item x: If / when / once a player kills Morgoth, the game kind of becomes anti-climatic quickly. What if a method existed where Morgoth & pals could reincarnate themselves later on... (like a really good number of turns later, maybe a million or so) and possibly hunt down the @ no matter which level in the dungeon she/he was on. The player would still be regarded as a WINNER for killing Morgoth the first time, but, "a cold wind suddenly blows through the dungeon" could be a precursor to something extraordinary about to happen.
Item xi: Along the lines of uniques grouping together, what if you had a group of semi-unique mobs. Mobs that are high level in nature, yet limited. E.g., what if the max number of Black Reavers or Greater Balrogs were limited to 10-50 in the game. That make those separate, smaller goals for the player to achieve in the course of a game, and, make it more special when Vecna or Gothmog summon in 'special friends'. Hellhounds for Huan. Maybe a semi-unique type of bear for Beorn.
Item xii: Semantics. "You see no more xxxx." That message rubs me the wrong way everytime. That message is sent irregardless of whether the action upon such consumable is taken or not. My preference would be that message is no longer broadcast, period. "You see no more scrolls of see invisible", "You have no more weapons of mass destruction", et. al. I think those messages can be eliminated from the game. If a repeat 'n' key is issued, the game could respond with a generic, "what are you trying to do again?" message.
Item xiii: Others have clamored for a Bigger Home. Perhaps let the character potentially buy out a store and make that a 2nd or even 3rd home. Let the character negotiate with the store owner, offer 1 mil AU + price of all inventory, or something like that. No, I'm not offering to code it, just offering the suggestion.. free of charge.
Ok - these are my ideas and observations of 3.5. I know some will hurl plasma bolts in my general direction, but I offer these as feedback for the developers and maintainers of the game.
'Bux.
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