Making the game harder, take two

[pampl]

I like the idea of powerful magic backfiring- Destruction could have a chance of causing ruination, TO might cause TP self, maybe mass banishment could cause TP level... OTOH that's taking an element of the game (avoiding monsters) that currently is (sometimes) determined entirely by player skill and adding an element of luck to it. Not sure if that's the way people want the game to be harder.

[Nick]

Oh yeah I forgot - you have so many neat ideas that you don't use anyone else's .... ;-)

On the contrary, I steal most of my ideas. Just not from you.

[Magnate]

Why on earth would I have done that?

Oh yeah I forgot - you have so many neat ideas that you don't use anyone else's .... ;-)

[Nick]

It just occurred to you? Or did you perhaps read my to-do list from 2.9.3's randart patch ... ;-)

Why on earth would I have done that?

[Magnate]

It just occurred to me that instead of making things less effective, it might be more fun to give them drawbacks. So, for example, monsters might get an increased chance to wake up every time they're detected. Or, to modify Philip's idea, teleport other could haste and/or heal the monster, and the range could be randomised so it might land quite close to you. Or *Destruction* could have a chance of draining a stat.

It just occurred to you? Or did you perhaps read my to-do list from 2.9.3's randart patch ... ;-)

Seriously, there is a world of possibilities here. I particularly like the idea of short-range TO replacing the existing wands, with rods of TO having greater range but being much deeper.

[Nick]

It just occurred to me that instead of making things less effective, it might be more fun to give them drawbacks. So, for example, monsters might get an increased chance to wake up every time they're detected. Or, to modify Philip's idea, teleport other could haste and/or heal the monster, and the range could be randomised so it might land quite close to you. Or *Destruction* could have a chance of draining a stat.

[Philip]

One more note. Teleport Other is too strong, right? How about making it heal up monsters. Maybe implement chance to resist and on fail it would heal AND haste or something. On the other hand, chance to resist however done will probably unbalance classes.

[Philip]

I actually like the idea of nerfing exp rewards. Though I'd rather see it based on total number of creatures killed along the lines of Londorth's suggestion, rather than resetting each level as buzzkill suggested.

One interesting side-effect of Londorth's suggestion is that it would be preferable to take on OOD enemies even if you encounter them earlier than you'd like to, in order to capitalize on the proportionately higher exp reward.

I'd also like to point out mumaks as an example of ridiculous xp reward relative to risk. The things are mildly annoying at worst for even a fairly low-level character, but give very generous experience - and they often appear in groups. What's up with that?

Tangentally, I think everyone would agree that having pits in the game is a good thing, but I will second (third?) the notion that having invulnerability, or even a double-resist is often enough to make a pit of otherwise daunting foes seem fairly benign. This is exacerbated by the fact that even great wyrms are easily TO'd away. I think adding a %chance to resist TO would help this, but that's a different topic...

It's not a different topic entirely, we are talking about making the game harder.
On the diminishing experience, would it apply in smaller quantities to other creatures of the same character?(you kill a yellow jelly and for a white jelly you get a bit less, but the diminished exp for another yellow jelly is more) Maybe it would apply only for stronger creatures diminish weaker creatures benefits, so you would kill that ancient dragon or such before rather than later, when it's safe. Or is my idea too far off and more variantish? This idea, even the diminishing returns idea would require a lot of rebalancing.

[Londorth]

One interesting side-effect of Londorth's suggestion is that it would be preferable to take on OOD enemies even if you encounter them earlier than you'd like to, in order to capitalize on the proportionately higher exp reward.

This consequence of the idea had not occurred to me! I'm not sure whether I like it or not. But if the goal is to reward risk more, then this is certainly going to achieve that.

Ahh well, I'm pleased it wasn't a dumb idea, at least

[Hariolor]

I actually like the idea of nerfing exp rewards. Though I'd rather see it based on total number of creatures killed along the lines of Londorth's suggestion, rather than resetting each level as buzzkill suggested.

One interesting side-effect of Londorth's suggestion is that it would be preferable to take on OOD enemies even if you encounter them earlier than you'd like to, in order to capitalize on the proportionately higher exp reward.

I'd also like to point out mumaks as an example of ridiculous xp reward relative to risk. The things are mildly annoying at worst for even a fairly low-level character, but give very generous experience - and they often appear in groups. What's up with that?

Tangentally, I think everyone would agree that having pits in the game is a good thing, but I will second (third?) the notion that having invulnerability, or even a double-resist is often enough to make a pit of otherwise daunting foes seem fairly benign. This is exacerbated by the fact that even great wyrms are easily TO'd away. I think adding a %chance to resist TO would help this, but that's a different topic...

[buzzkill]

Suggestion - scale experience by how many of the same monsters you have already killed. First orc - x. Second orc - 0.9x. Third orc - 0.81x. Fourth orc - 0.729x. That means that however many orcs you kill, you can only get 10x experience, forcing you to engage other opponents. Done right, it would also make the experience multipliers for the better races far greater penalties too - it might literally be impossible to get a high elf mage to 50th level.

I had an idea along these lines long ago, but I don't think I ever posted it, not then in my own thread, which is the whole purpose of that thread. To jot down my crazy ideas in case I some day create my own variant.

Any-hoo, it was something like this, IIRC. At any given CL (character level) you are only awarded full XP for the first kill of any particular enemy. Half and then continue to half XP awards for kills of identical enemies. Thus (I love thus), if a CL 7 character kills a hill orc, he will be awarded full XP for that kill. If he kills another, he gets half, kills another and only gets 25%. This XP penalty continues until he attains CL 8 (at which point all XP awards reset). It encourages, if not necessitates (mid/late game), killing a variety of monsters.

The only exception I would apply is that if you kill a unique, then you get full XP for all it's escorts. Hopefully, encouraging the killing of uniques (in depth). If you don't kill it, you get nothing. No more farming escorts, except for drops.

Probably too radical for most, but I like it. We certainly have the variety of monsters needed to make it work.

[Derakon]

It is not particular to the special artifacts. All artifacts are much more common.

Well, that should be easily fixed! The artifact drop rate is readily-tweakable. Cut it by a factor of 2 and see what it's like.

[Londorth]

Well Philip's experience matches mine - find something(s) you can kill relatively easily, and kill lots of them, avoiding the things you know you have trouble with. Ultimately it's not that exciting, which is why I was wondering how to nerf it. And I don't think it's entirely true that it's only in the middle - Wyrm can really get you up a lot even at the end.

I forgot potions of experience - for my idea to work, they'd probably need nerfed or limited in some way (artifact potions?)

Another possible advantage is that it might make artifacts that drain experience much more of a compromise (assuming they drained rather faster than currently), which might lead to more interesting choices.

I pick on rings because the other special artifacts aren't game changers (generally they're a bit of a disappointment), and armor and weapons are not identified by enlightenment or treasure location, so you have to go into every vault. Even if you don't scum, once you see an un-id'd ring on level 98, you go get it.

[PowerDiver]

Yes. I am definitely up for nerfing enlightenment, and I don't think I'm alone.

It is true that special artifacts (rings, lights and neckwear) have been somehow made more common at some point during the 3.1 series. Just consider how many people have found The One in the last 12 months - more than I can remember ever reporting it in the preceding decade.

It is not particular to the special artifacts. All artifacts are much more common. The recent move to add more vaults and to add great items to nests, to make the game more "interesting", will further exacerbate the situation going forward.

Take a look at the current comp. The last time I looked, 3 of the 4 dumps at the top included Feanor.

[Magnate]

I find it a bit odd that you pinpoint artifact rings. I don't scum for rings (generally don't scum at all, in fact), so your concern is basically a non-starter for me. Of course, enlightenment showing all objects on the level is something I make use of all the time, but not for ringarts; more for targeting my dungeon exploration. Is that so bad?

Yes. I am definitely up for nerfing enlightenment, and I don't think I'm alone.

It is true that special artifacts (rings, lights and neckwear) have been somehow made more common at some point during the 3.1 series. Just consider how many people have found The One in the last 12 months - more than I can remember ever reporting it in the preceding decade. Rings of power are also found more often (and their randarts). I think this is a side effect of the rebalancing of other drops (weapons, armour, consumables etc.), and I'm not too worried because special artifacts are a TOTAL hack at the moment and it's a much better use of time to rewrite them completely rather than to analyse and fix this commonness issue.

That said, if I don't get to that by the time takk wants to release 3.3, I'll tweak the specials a bit ;-)