on morgul weapons

[bebo]

The new changes to ID (which I really like) mean that in the early stages of the game I, and I'd imagine many other players, essentially try to wear and use every type of equipment I come across on the dungeon floor, mainly because ID scrolls/staves/spell are not available, or abundantly so.

This dramatically increases the chances of equipping a morgul weapon if found. Now, this is normal and reasonable, cursed items are a great and fun part of the game, except in this case for essentially 3 reasons:

1) they can be found at really shallow depths (actually, but this may just be a case, all the ones i found were before dl25 or something)

2) they are heavily cursed

3) they aggravate

Any combination of two of these would be fine, but all three together mean essentially a death sentence, you're better off suiciding your character rather than hoping to find ?*remove curse* in time in the early dungeon levels.

I would like to propose a minor change, essentially either

a) make it so they apper only after dlvl40 or something, and at the same time make them more common
(but this dramatically reduces their impact, as everyone has easy access to ID at that point)

or, better

b) romove aggravation, possbily adding some other nasty side-effects like ImpHP & ImpSP

Thoughts?

[Pete Mack]

I would agree with you except for one thing. Accidentally wielding a Morgul weapon is much less likely than a disastrous stat swap. Both are potentially game ending but nonfatal events. And it is possible to break the curse by enchanting the weapon.

[bebo]

And it is possible to break the curse by enchanting the weapon.

Isn't this possible only with "normal" cursed items? I thought heavily cursed items couldn't be uncursed this way; hmmm...... this changes things

Regarding stat-swap, I agree with you on almost everything, except that nexus monsters appear much deeper than morgul weapons.

[Tatami]

I recently did this. Equipped a morgul weapon. Bought a stack of +hit enchant scrolls to try and salvage the character and the fifth scroll broke the curse. Lucky I had a few thousand au saved.

[zaimoni]

Regarding stat-swap, I agree with you on almost everything, except that nexus monsters appear much deeper than morgul weapons.

True, but I'm far more likely to find nexus monsters first even when playing like a sloth [ambling around at -2 speed and so on]. Also, nexus resist almost always isn't there before @ can use it.