GV and LV frequency

[Timo Pietilä]

If you want to make graveyards tempting, you have to make it possible for characters to tackle them without dying. Currently that... doesn't really work, IMO. Though I can think of a way to do it without unbalancing things, which I'll post elsewhere.

You can empty graveyards pretty easily without dying. It just requires some patience to get all the monsters where you want them when you want them. Point with graveyards IMO is not to be "tempting" but "intimidating". Something to avoid in the dungeon. Same thing as Zoos.

[Timo Pietilä]

Checking the code, this actually does not matter. Room generation looks like this:

1. Select room type and location.

2. See if room fits on map (or overlaps other rooms)

3. If it fits, select specific room

4. Mark all parts of the room as filled

So at the point where it's checking if the room fits it's using the default size for GVs (66 x 44) which is friggin huge, much larger than any actual vault. It also forces LVs to fit in a 33x22 block, even if they're the tiny hidden vaults.

If that is the order of doing things wouldn't it be fixed by using the actual vault size +1 to each direction instead of default value? Vault dimensions are IIRC into edit-files.

[fizzix]

If that is the order of doing things wouldn't it be fixed by using the actual vault size +1 to each direction instead of default value? Vault dimensions are IIRC into edit-files.

yes, that is indeed correct. However, I'm not sure how to do this without rewriting large chunks of the code. This is only an issue for GVs, I think an easier approach would be to treat GVs separately.

The next step, and it's very easy to do, is to change the place where GVs were generated in the normal code, and make them into Medium vaults. Make medium vaults 33x22 (current size for lesser vaults) Make all lesser vaults 33x11 or less. This is a more detailed project. I should have a working version of the code with better GV frequencies up by this weekend at the latest. Then I may try my hand at some vault construction.

[fizzix]

I have a working version with different GV frequencies.

The algorithm looks like:

Make level

Attempt Greater vault:
At dlevel 100 or above vault probability is (devel/199)*(probability vault fits on level, about 37%)
Every 10 levels below (starting with 99) the probability goes down by a factor of 2/3

If GV is not attempted or fails go into the normal room generating loop with the exception that GVs have been temporarily placed with another attempt at LVs.

GV percentages have been tested and look like:

* Dlevel GV frequency
* 100 18%
* 90-99 10.8-12%
* 80-89 6.4 -7.2%
* 70-79 3.7 - 4.2%
* 60-69 2.1 - 2.4%
* 50-59 1.2 - 1.4%
* and less than 1% below 50 */

As soon as I figure out how to upload a new version to git I can post the code online. Unfortunately, the website is opaque to my meager intellect.


The goal, and I'll start working on this soon, is to create a new class of vault (medium vault). The lesser vaults will all fit in 33x11 blocks. The medium vaults will fit in 33x22, the current size for lesser vaults. These will probably include some of the more powerful lesser vaults (diagonals and turnabouts) as well as some of the weaker greater vaults (snake maze) along with several newly created vaults of my own design.

Lastly, some of the weaker GVs will be made more powerful. These are heavily weighted now to the end of the dungeon. Medium vaults will appear much earlier on.

edit: thanks to Nick's advice, version is now up on http://github.com/fizzix/angband

[fizzix]

I've added medium vaults, added two new (medium) vaults. Beefed up some of the flaccid greater vaults.

I adjusted the medium vault probability so that it's about right. At dlevel 40, a lesser vault has a 16% probability of become a medium vault. This jumps up to 24% at dlevel 60 and 32% at dlevel 80. (lesser vault frequency also goes up.)