Remove featherfall or make it useful

[Hariolor]

I'm just going to float this out there:

How about a trap damage formula that runs something like

TDam = %CharMaxHP, where %<100

This way accidentally stumbling on a trap will never kill anyone if they are at full HP. However, if a trap does 99.9% MaxHP, and you're short even 1hp, you could insta-die.

This may provide the benefit of making traps scale with the player across all classes and levels, while preserving the notion that (damage-causing) traps should be *very* dangerous if the @ is not careful, particularly if there are baddies around.

edit for clarity: TDam can be any %, not necessarily 99.9%...

[krugar]

TDam = %CharMaxHP, where %<100

Yes. I didn't make it clear this time around, but on the original suggestion I do refer that HP is in fact player max HP. Or, for matters of angband mechanics, the player's Level * Hit Die.

Hence why it can eventually be turned into a final formula that can use the dice abstraction taking into account player's current depth, averaged hit die between classes and expected level progression at that depth.

[buzzkill]

How about a trap damage formula that runs something like

TDam = %CharMaxHP, where %<100

I still don't like it. Are we now proposing merciful traps. It's the dungeon's job to kill you, not hold your hand. Properly 'balanced' trap shouldn't instakill (non-diving) healthy players. It's a non-issue IMO.

[nullfame]

Interesting to note my post was simply ignored. Being that isn't even the in-game formula, but just the concept formula. Should learn to not write so much. A waste of time and effort.

That isn't fair. I read your post. Some things I agree with, some things I don't, some things I don't understand. It doesn't mean I ignored it.

I agree that it should be in relation to depth. When you say "damage is defined in relation to player HP" I don't agree or at least don't understand what you mean. If you mean that you should take *expected* HP and what % you want to take from expected HP and use those as inputs to create your level-to-damage formula, I would agree with that. That also seems obvious to me.

When you say "You must be careful when defining HP has something that should never influence damage progression. That assertion is almost always wrong," I'm not sure if "has" should be "as" and if so whether I agree with your statement. I think the character's current HP, max HP, or even level for that matter should never be taken in to account when calculating damage (or, if it is, should not increase damage as you level). I think expected HP always should be and you couldn't create a balanced game without doing so.

[Hajo]

If we are about traps and such ... Unangband has some funny sorts of traps.

There is a hidden machinery with tripwires that shoots clay pots and urns at you. If your character is lucky, they can catch some of the pots. I find that imagination hilarious, to stroll through the dungeon, suddenly have pots flung at you and in a sort of reflex catch the one or other

Now I must find out what such ancient pottery is good for ...

[nppangband]

Unangband has more sophistaced traps too. I assume it is the same concept that NPPAngband also has - regions and terrain features.

Correct. Andrew and I have borrowed alot of ideas from each other over the years.

[Hariolor]

I still don't like it. Are we now proposing merciful traps. It's the dungeon's job to kill you, not hold your hand. Properly 'balanced' trap shouldn't instakill (non-diving) healthy players. It's a non-issue IMO.

Buzzkill,

These traps would not be any more merciful than a "balanced trap". They could easily kill any player, provided they are encountered at less than maxHP.

I am proposing this as a method FOR balancing traps. If your criteria is that balanced traps should not kill a healthy character at a depth appropriate for their level and class, this achieves that. As the player goes lower, traps can simply do an increasingly higher % of MaxHP. I don't know about you, but a trap that leaves me with 1 hp on DL 65 when I'm CL 20 is pretty terrifying. Probably as good as instadeath, but not *quite* as abrupt.

[nullfame]

These traps would not be any more merciful than a "balanced trap". They could easily kill any player, provided they are encountered at less than maxHP.

I'm still with buzzkill here. A level 1 character stepping on a dl99 damage trap even at full HP (13? 15?) should die. Period. Don't ask me how she got there.

IMO you should take the average HP of a Human Ranger and a Human Rogue with educated guesses of what their CON boosts will be at a given level to determine expected HP and scale your damage from there. Would it hurt a Hobbit Mage more? Yes. Would it hurt a diver more? Yes. Would it hurt a over-powered clearer less? Yes. That's the point.

For me a trap should take no more than 1/3-1/2 of your expected HP but buzzkill is a self-proclaimed meanie so this may be where we start to disagree

I definitely favor more interesting trap effects. Chaos, gravity, electricity, time, sound, disenchantment, aggravate, drain mana all sound fun and (relatively) easy since the effects exist.

[buzzkill]

These traps would not be any more merciful than a "balanced trap". They could easily kill any player, provided they are encountered at less than maxHP.

You should be extra careful when wandering injured. Trap detection is currently *infallible*, so this shouldn't be a problem. Even so, I believe I suggested a DL100 trap inflicting about 250-300 points of damage. That shouldn't even kill a character that's already half-dead.

[Tiburon Silverflame]

nullframe's suggestion is along the lines I was suggesting. The dungeon can be divided into sections; the biggest dividing line is, of course, stat gain territory, because this is where the big improvement (relatively speaking) happens.

I also agree that 250-300 points is about the right range for DL100 trap damage. It's definitely enough that you'll take notice, but not so much to be devastating in itself. That's the proper role of traps in this game, IMO. More generally speaking, I'd say average trap damage should be in the 1/4 to 1/3 range of typical max hit points, on every level.

[fizzix]

I also agree that 250-300 points is about the right range for DL100 trap damage. It's definitely enough that you'll take notice, but not so much to be devastating in itself. That's the proper role of traps in this game, IMO. More generally speaking, I'd say average trap damage should be in the 1/4 to 1/3 range of typical max hit points, on every level.

Sure this covers pits and acid/flame traps. But if you want to beef up traps, you need to do something about dart and gas traps too.

[Daniel Fishman]

Currently, though, it doesn't really matter, because past about level 15, everyone has perfect and cheap trap detection anyway, and traps only affect people who are careless (apart from create-traps spells, I suppose). Any revamp of traps, IMO, should ideally change that - in a way that neither penalises warriors further, nor forces players to be highly paranoid. Although I'm not entirely sure how this would be achieved.

[andrewdoull]

No attack should scale with HP, ever.

What utter nonsense and you, if anyone, should know better than to say that.

Take paralyzation. That attack scales 100% with your hitpoints. You will be 100% paralyzed regardless of how many or how few hit points you have.

Andrew

[PowerDiver]

What utter nonsense and you, if anyone, should know better than to say that.

Take paralyzation. That attack scales 100% with your hitpoints. You will be 100% paralyzed regardless of how many or how few hit points you have.

Andrew

That is the opposite of scaling. No difference in effect in relation to number of hp.

Paralysis is a timer, or counter, or call it what you will. The change to that counter does not currently scale one iota with your hitpoints.

[fizzix]

Currently, though, it doesn't really matter, because past about level 15, everyone has perfect and cheap trap detection anyway, and traps only affect people who are careless (apart from create-traps spells, I suppose). Any revamp of traps, IMO, should ideally change that - in a way that neither penalises warriors further, nor forces players to be highly paranoid. Although I'm not entirely sure how this would be achieved.

remove the spell entirely. Traps need to be searched for. Amulets and rings of searching now become very powerful in the early game. Alternatively, make disarming scale with trap difficulty, so that you have a good chance of setting off a high level trap.