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I’ve gotten back into Angband recently after playing a lot of 3.5 back in the early 2000s. I love the class redesigns and general improvements to the game. The blackguard is a very neat class that has a lot more depth to the playstyle than the typical warrior bump attack. However, I think the current combat regen and SP system need some work.
One key issue is that for all stats and all classes, improving the stat in stat gain is beneficial in some way; even WIS for mages improves saving throw slightly. This isn’t true for blackguards and INT, which is awkward because it’s a key stat.
BGs are intended to fight in an injured state and spend spell points to recover HP. Their “base” HP regen is 1/2 that of a paladin or warrior, but they also regen HP as SP decrease naturally. In the code, SP decrease at the same (percentage) rate as HP and are converted into a percentage of *lost* HP at the normal rate. Simply, a BG without SP or at full HP regenerates at 1/2 normal rate, equal to normal rate at 50% HP, and 1.5x normal rate at 0% HP. This scaling is effective in the early game and works well for compensating the low one-blow early game damage with increased healing at lower health. It’s even more effective when supplemented by combat regen. Note that as implemented, this rate is not affected by max HP or SP- only by injury and whether the BG has SP. This healing rate is substantially lower, even at 0 HP, than what Paladins or Warriors get with regen.
Fighting at low HP is supplemented by combat regen, which converts SP spent on spells into one-half of lost HP, so a BG using 10% of SP to cast at 60% HP would gain 0.5*0.1*0.4 = 2% of max HP. This works great at certain phases in the game, but there’s an awkward inflection point where increasing INT to around 18/70 or 18/80 drastically increases SP. This ends up drastically decreasing healing from casting the same spells, which is a problem because BGs have no real way to spend large amounts of SP to deal damage until Forceful blow, which- between it’s high fail rate and chance to simply miss- is not a great option, and it’s not available until level 38 and not really castable until the early 40s.
Werewolf form is another issue with HP regen. Although werewolves get native regen, they can’t cast, so they only get normal regen at full HP and equivalent to regen with a regen item at 0% HP. Werewolves also can’t cast, so combat regen doesn’t work. Berserk also further increases damage taken, and shifting back to cast ends up losing a turn.
This situation means that BGs with low stealth are quite a bit squishier than warriors and much squishier than paladins even as they pull the whole dungeon, and increasing INT further decreases this survivability. It also invites undesirable play like phasing and spam-casting Venom to heal, then werewolf and getting back into the fight. Or, using tons of consumables, which doesn’t seem like a good outcome for combat regen.
To summarize, I think increasing INT should always be beneficial to BGs, and they should have worse HP regen than warriors around full health but better regen by around 50% HP to compensate for avoiding healing. They should be able to take advantage of combat regen through casting even at high SP. There shouldn’t be as much of a trade-off between low fail rate and combat healing.
Some ideas:
Items of regen could also affect passive SP -> HP conversion. This would make BGs with SP regen at normal rate at 100% HP, +regen rate at 50% HP, and 150% +regen rate at 0% HP.
A spell to temporarily drastically increase passive SP burn to increase passive healing for werewolf form.
More effective book 3 spells that deal closer to bump damage at 4-5 blows per round with higher SP cost. I don’t love this solution alone because fun attacks like whirlwind and maim foe still really fall off at high SP.
Reworking combat regen to have an “expected” max SP, possibly based on character level. Excess SP above this amount are beneficial and below this amount are inefficient.
One key issue is that for all stats and all classes, improving the stat in stat gain is beneficial in some way; even WIS for mages improves saving throw slightly. This isn’t true for blackguards and INT, which is awkward because it’s a key stat.
BGs are intended to fight in an injured state and spend spell points to recover HP. Their “base” HP regen is 1/2 that of a paladin or warrior, but they also regen HP as SP decrease naturally. In the code, SP decrease at the same (percentage) rate as HP and are converted into a percentage of *lost* HP at the normal rate. Simply, a BG without SP or at full HP regenerates at 1/2 normal rate, equal to normal rate at 50% HP, and 1.5x normal rate at 0% HP. This scaling is effective in the early game and works well for compensating the low one-blow early game damage with increased healing at lower health. It’s even more effective when supplemented by combat regen. Note that as implemented, this rate is not affected by max HP or SP- only by injury and whether the BG has SP. This healing rate is substantially lower, even at 0 HP, than what Paladins or Warriors get with regen.
Fighting at low HP is supplemented by combat regen, which converts SP spent on spells into one-half of lost HP, so a BG using 10% of SP to cast at 60% HP would gain 0.5*0.1*0.4 = 2% of max HP. This works great at certain phases in the game, but there’s an awkward inflection point where increasing INT to around 18/70 or 18/80 drastically increases SP. This ends up drastically decreasing healing from casting the same spells, which is a problem because BGs have no real way to spend large amounts of SP to deal damage until Forceful blow, which- between it’s high fail rate and chance to simply miss- is not a great option, and it’s not available until level 38 and not really castable until the early 40s.
Werewolf form is another issue with HP regen. Although werewolves get native regen, they can’t cast, so they only get normal regen at full HP and equivalent to regen with a regen item at 0% HP. Werewolves also can’t cast, so combat regen doesn’t work. Berserk also further increases damage taken, and shifting back to cast ends up losing a turn.
This situation means that BGs with low stealth are quite a bit squishier than warriors and much squishier than paladins even as they pull the whole dungeon, and increasing INT further decreases this survivability. It also invites undesirable play like phasing and spam-casting Venom to heal, then werewolf and getting back into the fight. Or, using tons of consumables, which doesn’t seem like a good outcome for combat regen.
To summarize, I think increasing INT should always be beneficial to BGs, and they should have worse HP regen than warriors around full health but better regen by around 50% HP to compensate for avoiding healing. They should be able to take advantage of combat regen through casting even at high SP. There shouldn’t be as much of a trade-off between low fail rate and combat healing.
Some ideas:
Items of regen could also affect passive SP -> HP conversion. This would make BGs with SP regen at normal rate at 100% HP, +regen rate at 50% HP, and 150% +regen rate at 0% HP.
A spell to temporarily drastically increase passive SP burn to increase passive healing for werewolf form.
More effective book 3 spells that deal closer to bump damage at 4-5 blows per round with higher SP cost. I don’t love this solution alone because fun attacks like whirlwind and maim foe still really fall off at high SP.
Reworking combat regen to have an “expected” max SP, possibly based on character level. Excess SP above this amount are beneficial and below this amount are inefficient.
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