Chaos -> Confusion effect preventer?

[Timo Pietilä]

Hello.

There has been discussion about restoring chaos to give immunity to confusion effect (not the damage). Has that been done yet?

It bugs me that Gorlim managed to kill me with double-move off-screen dark corridor combination of water bolt + manabolt + shardstorm breating after emergency teleport staff usage. I had access to chaos resist, and I wonder if I could have saved myself using that one (I had very low failure with teleport other -wand, but being confused could not aim it to what I believe had to be Gorlim).

I think confusion is worse killer than all other elements put together, because resistance for that is so hard to find in time.

[nppangband]

It think chaose resist should prevent the confusion effect. I don't know why it was taken out. It was a great feature.

[Hariolor]

I'd second this - I find that I frequently lose promising characters to confusion. Often from an off-screen caster that nails me while I'm engaging something more dangerous. Partly my fault? Maybe, but I don't think adding rConf to rChaos would be unbalancing at all, especially if it doesn't reduce the damage.

[Tiburon Silverflame]

I don't agree that it wouldn't change the balance, as it would shift rConf down to the same priority as rShards or rSound...that is, relatively easy to live without. Actually, perhaps even a touch lower, because shards and sound have negative side effects, and a confusion attack, assuming you have the rChaos, wouldn't.

So now, you have a considerably easier choice for your equipment. Optimization becomes simpler, and that makes the game easier. The BIG reason why we need rConf isn't the breathers; it's the Touch to Confuse attacks. You're constantly forced to fix the confusion, therefore losing an action with very high frequency. That's when you're in huge trouble.

[miyazaki]

I think the two effects should be kept distinct. The dev team has responded to complaints about the deadliness of confusion several ways already: mushrooms that give temporary resistance and, more importantly, giving !CLW a confusion reducing effect. These are effective enough in a battle against spell-casters. I do agree that hummerhorns and umber hulks are super dangerous to low level characters because of their conf attacks, but there needs to some dangerous monsters or the game gets boring.

[fizzix]

I'd prefer them to stay separate also. If anything I would put in a clear mind spell. Just making the mushrooms more common might be enough.

[Tiburon Silverflame]

Several higher-end monsters also have touch to confuse. I lacked rConf once when the Cat Lord showed up. When the only good option is teleporting an opponent away, it's safe to say that opponent is dangerous.

Serious monsters with confuse attacks:
Lesser titan, greater titan (x4 each), chaos vortex (x3), GW of perplexity (which also has a confusion breath, so rConf for damage reduction would be helpful),

Uniques:
Ariel, Cat Lord, Thuringwethil, Atlas, Kronos

Of note, the only critters with confusion breath are the bronze dragons/dragonfly (up through the GW), Ethereal Dragon, and the aether critters...which have everything. But the big point is, they don't breathe every round, except for an aether hound pack where, given that there's multiple hounds, it's relatively likely that at least 1 of them will use a confusion attack. The melee confusions are threatened every round.

[Derakon]

A group of 10 aether hounds all in LOS and all moving twice as fast as you (i.e. you're moving at normal speed) will, on average, breathe 4 times at you for each turn you take (they breathe 1 turn in 5). Aether hounds have 19 different breath weapons; the odds of them not breathing confusion in such a horribly contrived situation are 80%. If you add in the chance of them using a chaos breath on you (which also confuses, unless you have either chaos or confusion resistance), then the odds are 64%.

So no, aether hounds are not especially likely to confuse you. Again, this is a horribly contrived situation; you have no business being near aether hounds without speed, and no business letting 10 of them get LOS of you at the same time. In the much more likely (but still pretty nonoptimal) case of having four hounds in LOS that are moving at the same speed you are moving at, they will breathe, on average, 1 time per turn, with a per-turn odds of not breathing confusion of 95% and of not breathing either confusion or chaos of 89%.

Monsters with melee confusion attacks should not be meleed unless you have resist confusion or are confident of being able to take them out with a lot of melee flailing. In other words, avoid Hummerhorns. Titans should just be avoided in general; they're not worth fighting because of their massively strong melee attacks and their general-purpose summoning spells, not because of their confusing touch.

Really my only problem with confusing melee attacks is that if you don't know about them, they can be very hard to escape once you've been snared. Once you do know about them, avoiding them is generally fairly straightforward.

[fizzix]

Serious monsters with confuse attacks:
Lesser titan, greater titan (x4 each), chaos vortex (x3), GW of perplexity (which also has a confusion breath, so rConf for damage reduction would be helpful),

I would add nightmares in this group. They tend to show up before I have rconf or +10 speed. They are very dangerous when they first show.

[miyazaki]

I would add nightmares in this group. They tend to show up before I have rconf or +10 speed. They are very dangerous when they first show.

Yeah, I forgot about those buggers. More dangerous than titans, because they show up a lot sooner.

[Tiburon Silverflame]

Derakon, the fact that you *do* have to avoid them, and the fact that the only way you learn which ones put you at risk (well, one might assume that the 2 titan uniques can be assumed to have it because the 2 regular titans do)...we're talking potentially several character deaths.

And titans have "come to me"...so it's not going to be that easy to remain away.

Mostly, tho, you're really reinforcing the point: you don't melee confusers without rConf...so letting rChaos stop confusion, *would* make the game somewhat easier by making them easier to address.

[Magnate]

I'd prefer them to stay separate also. If anything I would put in a clear mind spell. Just making the mushrooms more common might be enough.

Agreed. Chaos is chaos and confusion is confusion, let's leave them separate. Happy to make rconf easier to find though - or to follow Eddie's suggestion of separating breath resistances from status effect resistances. Then you could make resistance to confusion status quite common, yet leave resistance to confusion breath quite rare. Or something.

[LostTemplar]

Maybe allow saving throw to block melee confusion attacks, this will help if not fight confusing monsters, but at least escape from them.

[Derakon]

Derakon, the fact that you *do* have to avoid them, and the fact that the only way you learn which ones put you at risk (well, one might assume that the 2 titan uniques can be assumed to have it because the 2 regular titans do)...we're talking potentially several character deaths.

Potentially, sure, but more likely, one character with resist confusion is going to discover many of these attacks. Remember that melee confuse attacks can be discovered even if you have resist confusion.

And titans have "come to me"...so it's not going to be that easy to remain away.

Don't get into LOS with them. As soon as you get reliable monster detection you should be avoiding the entire sector where a dangerous monster is, unless you know the dungeon layout well enough to know what's safe to walk in.

Mostly, tho, you're really reinforcing the point: you don't melee confusers without rConf...so letting rChaos stop confusion, *would* make the game somewhat easier by making them easier to address.

It would, yes, but it's overkill. I don't think that making resistance to the confusion effect more common is necessarily the right answer either. A better response would be to make melee confusion attacks less powerful. Something along the lines of the nerf to paralyzation (that ensures you always get at least one action after recovering from paralysis) is called for here, IMO.

[Timo Pietilä]

Agreed. Chaos is chaos and confusion is confusion, let's leave them separate. Happy to make rconf easier to find though - or to follow Eddie's suggestion of separating breath resistances from status effect resistances. Then you could make resistance to confusion status quite common, yet leave resistance to confusion breath quite rare. Or something.

Kind of like blindness "resist" protects against darkness and light breath side-effects?

If that is done I vote that those are removed from "resists" and moved to "abilities" like Free Action.