How many turns do you "lose" when recalling back to town?

[bebo]

like the title says, i was wondering if it's just me or there are others that take an enormous amount of turns in town the first 2-3 times they recall back - around 10000 happened to me once!

this is mainly because i'm very short on cash and have to make more than one trip between shops because i can't afford the ?ID i need to identify everything, or because in order to buy that _TelSelf i have to go sell a bunch of different stuff in various shops, etc

(another main cause seems to be because i forget to resupply on ?WoR, but that's just me i imagine, once i lost a char because of that )

btw, i'm playing 3.1.1 r1229 right now, and i really like the little improvements, keep up the good work! us silent players might not say it often, but we really appreciate the constant development and effort that goes into it.

[Pete Mack]

If you are a reasonably high level caster, it is often more efficient to get around town via teleport self--certainly if you need to get to the other end of town.

But yes, 10K turns is easy to burn in town if you make a couple trips around. I try to recall when I am way down on HP or SP, or the nearest down stairs is off the map. It saves a few moves, at least.

[Donald Jonker]

like the title says, i was wondering if it's just me or there are others that take an enormous amount of turns in town the first 2-3 times they recall back - around 10000 happened to me once!

I wonder how much resistance there would be to activity in town not costing any turns. IIRC, you can't sell spell-branded arrows, so that abuse is out. The only obstacle I can think of is spamming ?blessing and the like so you don't have to cast or read the spell during your trip in the dungeon - but it seems that action should be disallowed on its own. Any other objections to turn-free towns?

btw, i'm playing 3.1.1 r1229 right now, and i really like the little improvements, keep up the good work! us silent players might not say it often, but we really appreciate the constant development and effort that goes into it.

Couldn't agree more. I'm almost of a mind to say that I'm more enthused by the improvements from 3.1.0 to 3.1.1 more than those from 3.0.9b to 3.1.0.

[Pete Mack]

Why town should cost time:
1. borg-style town scumming for cash should take time.
2. Casting useless spells for EXP should take time.
3. Resting for SP/HP should always require time.
4. There should be some reward for not returning to town so often, even if that reward is just a modest turncount.

Note that scumming branded ammo is no longer time-expensive, because the max fail rate is 50%. Probably such ammo should be discounted 90% in the stores, but it really doesn't matter unless there are speed boots for sale. (And even then, you would fill the weaponsmith with arrows before you could afford the boots.)

[zaimoni]

My turncount in town dropped considerably once I started screenshotting/screendumping each store the first time I entered it on each visit to town. (Gven how many other ways @ has eidetic memory where the player doesn't, I think of this as just completing the UI.)

If I don't rest to regain hp or mana, and don't use exploits like the "prayer wheel", I should be able to spend no more than 400 moves in town with careful planning.

("prayer wheel"/"rosary"/....: build up ~9900 normal-speed turns of Bless before recalling into the dungeon. Without regenerate, ~28 mana as a priest or ~42 mana as a paladin. Also viable with Protection from Evil at relatively low level (20's) with regenerate intrinsic.)

[bebo]

The only obstacle I can think of is spamming ?blessing and the like so you don't have to cast or read the spell during your trip in the dungeon

If I don't rest to regain hp or mana, and don't use exploits like the "prayer wheel", I should be able to spend no more than 400 moves in town with careful planning.

("prayer wheel"/"rosary"/....: build up ~9900 normal-speed turns of Bless before recalling into the dungeon. Without regenerate, ~28 mana as a priest or ~42 mana as a paladin. Also viable with Protection from Evil at relatively low level (20's) with regenerate intrinsic.)

I always thought recasting these spells when active simply reset the duration counter, with the exception of haste which if repeatedly recast had absolutely no effect - I suppose I missed something pretty big, huh? How exactly does the mechanic work? What's this "prayer wheel" trick?

I'm always hungry for techniques that increase my survival chance

[Pete Mack]

@bebo -
Haste self (or speed magic item) gives an additional 5 turns if you are already hasted.
All other buffing spells are completely accumulative.

[Magnate]

My turncount in town dropped considerably once I started screenshotting/screendumping each store the first time I entered it on each visit to town. (Gven how many other ways @ has eidetic memory where the player doesn't, I think of this as just completing the UI.)

Agreed. Given the recent suggestion that the contents of the home should be part of the knowledge menu, the last-seen inventory of each other shop could also be there. Obviously it would have changed by the time you recall, but I still think it would be worth adding. Just means adding another knowledge menu item - "Contents of stores/home".

[bebo]

All other buffing spells are completely accumulative.

wow, this seems really abusable with Tenser's Transformations if you have regeneration

[PaulBlay]

wow, this seems really abusable with Tenser's Transformations if you have regeneration

It seems really abusable fullstop.

Would there be howls of anguish if it was changed so that the times are _not_ additive? (Maybe make it an option?).

[Pete Mack]

I've never really seen it as abuse. Quaffing a pile !rCold before you go down frees up a slot in inventory for the cost of less efficient use of !rCold. It's hardly a problem. Warriors already have a huge problem with inventory management. Getting rid of cumulative buffs just punishes them even more.

[bebo]

yes, i was thinking more from a spellcaster point of view. In any case i think the current system is fine, it's hard to abuse with the items since there is no easy way to get enough of them to really mess up the balance

[zaimoni]

I always thought recasting these spells when active simply reset the duration counter, with the exception of haste which if repeatedly recast had absolutely no effect - I suppose I missed something pretty big, huh? How exactly does the mechanic work? What's this "prayer wheel" trick?

I'm always hungry for techniques that increase my survival chance

Both hp and mana are calibrated to return to full from zero in no more than ~332 normal speed turns without regeneration (limit value for infinite hp/mana, actual rate of total recovery is calculatable from this by adding ~2.7 mana to actual max mana, or ~7.3 hp to actual max hp.)

Any buff spell whose mana can be recovered strictly faster than the minimum duration of the buff can be augmented to durations well over 9,000 normal-speed turns in a very borg-like fashion, as long as the fail rate is low. (Speed's minimum duration turns into 5 turns, preventing this from being very useful. The two priest spells which this goes useful for first are Bless (very cheap and low fail rate) and Protection from Evil (very long duration when the fail rate finally gets low enough).

[Larvitz]

I've never noticed losing turns that way... I should pay more attention. But I have never won yet, let alone try to win with a low turn count... Oh how I wish I would win. =P

[tigen]

If it wasn't for flavor, you could replace the town entirely with a series of menus and remove the issue entirely... and the tedium of walking between shops.

That's news to me that you can keep stacking bless or potions etc to get thousands of turns of duration. That seems silly to me. Justified because warriors have inventory problems? Really? Why not give warriors an extra inventory slot instead of having bizarre game mechanics?

Also, why do we get XP for casting spells? I mean... why would you go up a level just casting a spell? Would a warrior get xp for merely swinging his new sword around in the air? No, he gets xp for using his skills to achieve a resulting dead monster.