Ridiculous death due, in my opinion, to flawed design.

[Gockel]

Wouldn't it be possible to make the use of a staff of probing available even if a monster is not in sight? when you just detected monsters so they're visible you could simply probe a monster as if it was in LOS... the probing could either be complete or maybe it would only give out some info: either
- info if it can kill you within one player turn with the currently equipped gear or
- info about the complete attack arsenal
- or maybe only which elements it is using so you can take care of your resistances

would be easily justifiable with something like " the monsters "vibrations" (or what the hell) are dampened by the walls...
it wouldn't bother veterans at all, wouldn't take all the risk away as you still wouldn't know about hp / spells / etc. of the monster, and it would be pretty helpful for preparation while not being as boring as simply reading the monster description.

being quite new to angband i don't know how this would go together with esp etc. + what to do about spells ( from what i heard of it, the info if a monster uses mana storm or such stuff should also be of slight interest to a player) but to me it seems fair enough to waste one slot on a staff of probing in exchange for useful but incomplete monster info...

don't know either if it would be a problem to code, just throwing at you what came to my mind a few times already...


oh, and actually i somehow liked the way it was done in zangband 240r5 (?) too, where the beastmaster sells info on whatever monster for ~3000 gold... can be a bit tedious to recall all the time, but in a way i liked it.

[fph]

Wouldn't it be possible to make the use of a staff of probing available even if a monster is not in sight? when you just detected monsters so they're visible you could simply probe a monster as if it was in LOS... the probing could either be complete or maybe it would only give out some info

We could have a staff/rod of probing return the complete info of all monsters in a given radius (without giving out their location). This would make it a truly useful item ("poor man's detect monsters").

[ewert]

Don't staves of probing already do LoS ... or was that in a variant.

Personally, since monster memory exists and is stored in savefile (which I start new one very often), I just use cheat_knowmonsterinfo. You use spoilers: you are "cheating". You play long time but don't save the savefile: you are missing on a feature of the game. So, just use the know all info option ...

[Timo Pietilä]

Having a "game tips" service for free in the General Store mightn't be a bad idea. (Unlike "rumours", game tips should always be true!)

When you're learning a game, there's a certain appeal to having the knowledge come from within the game itself, rather than having to plow through manuals before even getting started.

What do you think players are missing? Playing the game in first place just plain requires person to read the help through, otherwise he wouldn't know anything about what different commands do, or even what they are. At minimum you need to read command descriptions.

"game tips" are very hard to do concept, when even veterans can't agree how this game should be played. All you could do is tell exploits (which might be removed in next version), or monsters, and for monsters we really need that one tip: read the monster description.

So IMO basically we only need to make sure that help is readable and easy to understand, and monster description actually gives hints of monster abilities.

If you think we need something else, like those "game tips" give an example what kind of tips there could be (that doesn't ruin the game experience).

I can give few:

1) patience is a virtue
2) when in doubt, run
3) don't get greedy
4) small chances cumulate
5) if it is faster than you and you don't know it, assume it can kill you.
6) Speed, HP and damage output mean more than any of the high resists

For that we need an explanation what is considered high resist somewhere, which brings the question how do we deal poison? It acts like basic4 (double resists, constant damage reduction) but is treated like high resist (random resists), and it has damage cap between the two. It is an anomaly in resists.

Maybe we should make it pure high resist with variable resist, no double resists and 500 point damage cap. Add poison counter like stunning and cuts and make being poisoned a lot worse %-based damage, or if not damage, then hindrance to abilities, like confusion but much worse to to_hit and to_dam, maybe also speed. Hit hard enough without cure and you are dead.

[Timo Pietilä]

Don't staves of probing already do LoS ... or was that in a variant.

Personally, since monster memory exists and is stored in savefile (which I start new one very often), I just use cheat_knowmonsterinfo. You use spoilers: you are "cheating". You play long time but don't save the savefile: you are missing on a feature of the game. So, just use the know all info option ...

That's BTW one thing that I would definitely like to have outside of savefile. I don't use cheat_knowmonsterinfo or spoilers, so I really hate to use new savefile. Before 3.something that broke the savefile compatibility I had used same savefile for something like 15 years. It was rather complete (Your ancestors have killed 32579 snagas and 2 of your ancestors have been killed by it. Something like that)

[Derakon]

Timo: the fundamental problem with telling newbies to read the help files is that nobody wants to read help files. Yes, they have to read the command descriptions; no, they're not going to read anything more than that if they can possibly get away with it. This has nothing to do with how good the help files are and everything to do with it being more fun to learn by playing than to learn by reading. All of the one-off tips that Civilization shows you during worldgen are also in the manual, but I guarantee that 90% of players, if not more, learn them first from the tips, not the manual.

The tips that I'd envision being in such a system would focus on minor spoilers and tactical advice. Things like:

* Cure Critical Wounds potions also cure blindness and confusion. Carry lots; they're cheap.
* Potions of Heroism will keep you from being frightened.
* Staves of Teleport can be used even when confused or blinded.
* Breath attacks deal 1/3rd the monster's current HP in damage, up to 1600 for fire/cold/acid/electricity and 800 for poison.
* Resistance cuts damage to 1/3rd for fire/cold/acid/electricity/poison, but are less effective for other elements.
* Resistances on your gear stack with temporary resistances from spells and items.
* Never underestimate the value of Constitution. Hitpoints keep you alive.
* Rods of Probing can tell you about a monster's abilities.

You get the idea. Some of this stuff is spelled out in item descriptions, but players don't realize their significance. Some of it isn't spelled out anywhere in the help. It's all useful.

[bio_hazard]

I can think of a few more-

-Quivers can hold different types of ammo, but after 99 they will take up more inventory slots
-Many items are bad, but few are cursed to the point of needing magic to remove them.
-Congratulations on finding a nice item! if you don't want to accidentally sell, drop, or destroy it, consider inscribing it (the '{' command) with !s!d!k
-A bigger weapon isn't always better- make sure to check your blows per round using 'I'nspect
-Can't keep track of all the information on the screen? You can add extra windows to show previous messages, items on the floor, monsters present. Set these up from the '=' menu.

Obviously, get too big a list of these and new players will tune out. I know this would be a lot of work, but something like Crawl's tutorial mode would be fantastic. Contextually-appropriate hints and instructions, for example dealing with stores, first entering the dungeon, level feelings, running, picking up items, spells, etc.

[Magnate]

I can think of a few more-

-Quivers can hold different types of ammo, but after 99 they will take up more inventory slots
-Many items are bad, but few are cursed to the point of needing magic to remove them.
-Congratulations on finding a nice item! if you don't want to accidentally sell, drop, or destroy it, consider inscribing it (the '{' command) with !s!d!k
-A bigger weapon isn't always better- make sure to check your blows per round using 'I'nspect
-Can't keep track of all the information on the screen? You can add extra windows to show previous messages, items on the floor, monsters present. Set these up from the '=' menu.

Obviously, get too big a list of these and new players will tune out. I know this would be a lot of work, but something like Crawl's tutorial mode would be fantastic. Contextually-appropriate hints and instructions, for example dealing with stores, first entering the dungeon, level feelings, running, picking up items, spells, etc.

Guys, this is great stuff. I don't know anyone who wants to code any kind of hint or rumour function, but if someone gathers these together and PMs me (I had long since stopped reading this thread - I just happened to have an idle moment) I'll stick them in my docs branch as "hints.txt" which we could ship with 3.2 and have available from the top-level ? menu.

It's a start, at least.

[Timo Pietilä]

Timo: the fundamental problem with telling newbies to read the help files is that nobody wants to read help files. Yes, they have to read the command descriptions; no, they're not going to read anything more than that if they can possibly get away with it. This has nothing to do with how good the help files are and everything to do with it being more fun to learn by playing than to learn by reading.

Hm. This might be the fundamental difference between us old veterans and new younger players. I'm used to read through manuals, fast skimming reading if nothing else. It is also pretty much requirement for my job. I didn't think that people don't want to read manuals, I just thought they don't think reading it would be useful.

[Zyphyr]

Hm. This might be the fundamental difference between us old veterans and new younger players. I'm used to read through manuals, fast skimming reading if nothing else. It is also pretty much requirement for my job. I didn't think that people don't want to read manuals, I just thought they don't think reading it would be useful.

Many games these days come with essentially useless manuals. I've seen a few which were 2 pages of "How to Install the Game", a 1 page quick-reference on the controls, and the rest backstory for the game. I've also seen manuals that were clearly written around an early version of the game and the game had undergone major alterations before release, rendering muh of the content in the manual either incorrect or irrelevant. It really isn't surprising that people don't bother reading manuals.

[Atarlost]

The difference between Angband and solitaire is that no solitaire spread takes twenty hours to complete.

I know people who play solitaire for two reasons. Either because it's quick or because it's nonviolent, noncompetitive, and non-time-sensitive. Angband falls into neither category.

[Atarlost]

The manual is what you read when you wish you were playing the game but can't. Either because it's still installing, you're waiting for your computer to boot, you're at a loading screen, or in the WC. In game manuals don't satisfy that requirement.

Heavily hyperlinked stuff like the CIV IV civelopedia can generate the wiki walk effect when you have to go into them to look something up and wind up reading a large, meandering chunk, but even then the chances of someone reading the whole thing are slim.

What might help would be to give full monster knowledge for low level stuff at game start and declining levels through stat gain. That would get people used to looking at monsters because it wouldn't be a complete waste of time for a new player who doesn't yet have a developed monster memory.

The other thing that would help would be some sort of new game plus consolation prize. It's the complete lack of progress that turned me off Angband for several years the first time I tried it.

[ewert]

The manual is what you read when you wish you were playing the game but can't. Either because it's still installing, you're waiting for your computer to boot, you're at a loading screen, or in the WC. In game manuals don't satisfy that requirement.

True, especially the WC part. Though I break that rule myself all the time, I'm a pre-planner kind of gamer so heck, I may make spreadsheet efficiency calculations and strategy plans before even beginning to play ...

Heavily hyperlinked stuff like the CIV IV civelopedia can generate the wiki walk effect when you have to go into them to look something up and wind up reading a large, meandering chunk, but even then the chances of someone reading the whole thing are slim.

I read Civ V civilopedia in-game top to bottom except skipped military units ... =P

What might help would be to give full monster knowledge for low level stuff at game start and declining levels through stat gain. That would get people used to looking at monsters because it wouldn't be a complete waste of time for a new player who doesn't yet have a developed monster memory.

Or huge blaring signs in a single page "read this if new to game" where it says that big ugly monsters reside in the dungeon who may kill unwary and unprepared players in a single turn. And to suggest that if you are not the kind of player who can handle "hardcore" mode in Diablo for example, turn on cheat-death and know-monsterinfo until you have learned the game somewhat ...

[Rizwan]

I can think of a few more-

-Quivers can hold different types of ammo, but after 99 they will take up more inventory slots
...

-Can't keep track of all the information on the screen? You can add extra windows to show previous messages, items on the floor, monsters present. Set these up from the '=' menu.

Obviously, get too big a list of these and new players will tune out. I know this would be a lot of work, but something like Crawl's tutorial mode would be fantastic. Contextually-appropriate hints and instructions, for example dealing with stores, first entering the dungeon, level feelings, running, picking up items, spells, etc.

I think only one is needed
MONSTERS CAN INSTA-KILL YOU
(caps for emphasis only)

[Feloniousmonk]

Ironically, this thread has gotten me back into playing the game after a two month absence.