RNG is teasing a returning player

[Magnate]

I am with you on the wacky low-level archery thing: given 3*2d6 oil, a bow doing less than 21 dam/turn is worthless.

Except that oil is heavy and single use.

The ones that bug me the most are the crazy damage per turn, and the effectively unbounded healing from weak potions. If you want to make !CCW, etc more powerful, make them scale with player level--not with player HP.

!CCW shouldn't be useful in melee without taking a rest, full stop. That means it absolutely can't heal more than 70HP/turn (at most!).

The damage issue is of course on everybody's radar, and will be addressed. I've never had a strong opinion on the percentage healing - it certainly fulfilled its original objective of preventing healing potions becoming junk, but I'm not sure that it's overpowered. People still don't use CLW or CSW in the endgame, and they only use CCW because !Healing has become so much less common than it used to be.

I don't think I agree with your basic premise: why shouldn't !CCW be useful in melee without resting? In the second half of the dungeon a large proportion of monsters can do upwards of 200 damage in a round, and you often have to deal with more than one. What's the basis of your assertion that it should be limited to 70hp?

[will_asher]

Arguably triple damage for oil is a bit much, though the clearest impact so far seems to be reducing the excessive deadliness of Maggot's dogs, which IMO is a good thing. I think the best compromise would be to give oil the new x2 "weak fire" brand, when it comes in. 2* 2d6 for a one-shot item that weighs 1lb doesn't seem too bad

I changed the entry in object.txt for flasks of oil to to 1d6 (x3 with fire brand) damage.

[Pete Mack]

I don't use !CLW, but I have used *CLW* very effectively in the late game.
15% of 400 HP damage (60HP) is enough to stand against high level demons in melee.

Consider a Bile demon in melee: it should be a pretty scary opponent. It does 8d8*2 + 9d9 = 117 nominal damage in melee, reduced to ~.6*8d8*2 + 9d9/6 = 51 damage/turn with armor effects. THrow in some misses, and the Bile Demon is doing ~40 dam/turn. With CCW at 70dam/turn, you can afford to get in 1 attack per potion in straight up melee. That's not very useful. (Contrast this with the expected 100 - 130 HP you get now: that's something like 3 rounds of melee, and it's enough to heal a significant part of its breath attacks at single resist.)

Summary: I would never have taken on multiple bile demons in 3.0.8. In 3.2, it's easy.

[LostTemplar]

I'd love to play more FA, but you know my views on connected stairs.

FA now have dungeon only mode. In this mode disconnected stairs are allmost the same as in V.

[takkaria]

I don't use !CLW, but I have used *CLW* very effectively in the late game.
15% of 400 HP damage (60HP) is enough to stand against high level demons in melee.

Consider a Bile demon in melee: it should be a pretty scary opponent. It does 8d8*2 + 9d9 = 117 nominal damage in melee, reduced to ~.6*8d8*2 + 9d9/6 = 51 damage/turn with armor effects. THrow in some misses, and the Bile Demon is doing ~40 dam/turn. With CCW at 70dam/turn, you can afford to get in 1 attack per potion in straight up melee. That's not very useful. (Contrast this with the expected 100 - 130 HP you get now: that's something like 3 rounds of melee, and it's enough to heal a significant part of its breath attacks at single resist.)

Summary: I would never have taken on multiple bile demons in 3.0.8. In 3.2, it's easy.

OK, just checked in a change so that CLW/CSW/CCW heal 20/40/60 HP respectively, without the percentage stuff. Let's see how that plays. (Currently in staging, will be in master sometime this week.)

[takkaria]

Oh, OK. Those all look like good changes.

I guess I'd thought more in terms of "nerf off-weapon brands, nerf off-weapon extra blows, nerf damage bonuses on non-weapon arts, nerf rune of protection, nerf extra shots, nerf percentile healing potions, and nerf vault-cracking with TO and mass banishment". [EDIT: and remove DObj from Clairvoyance, and reduce the ability to stairscum]

Flasks of oil are now less damaging, brands are removed from elemental rings, and percentile healing has been removed in favour of healing x HP per potion. Also in the past few days: true mimics, destruction removes artifacts, TO is now a bolt. These changes will be in the nightlies sometime in the week.

When I get a chance, I'll look at reducing off-weapon damage too. Enjoy!

[d_m]

Flasks of oil are now less damaging, brands are removed from elemental rings, and percentile healing has been removed in favour of healing x HP per potion. Also in the past few days: true mimics, destruction removes artifacts, TO is now a bolt. These changes will be in the nightlies sometime in the week.

When I get a chance, I'll look at reducing off-weapon damage too. Enjoy!

Also cavern levels and some labyrinth bugfixes.

[pampl]

Am I correct in assuming that big changes = lots of time needed for testing = a long time until next release?

[takkaria]

Am I correct in assuming that big changes = lots of time needed for testing = a long time until next release?

Big releases typically happen a bit less often than twice a year, so I wouldn't expect 3.3 until June.

[takkaria]

Also cavern levels and some labyrinth bugfixes.

Also, stat drain gets fixed on level up and restore stat potions are gone.

[Siggesigge]

Also, stat drain gets fixed on level up and restore stat potions are gone.

So what does this mean if you're lvl 50 already? Rod of restoration finally has a use?

[pampl]

So what does this mean if you're lvl 50 already? Rod of restoration finally has a use?

Plus if you're level 50 you probably get stat potions and potions of augmentation fairly regularly.

[Derakon]

I'm curious about cavern levels. I've always hated having to venture out into a big open space like FA's wildernesses or Z-style arena levels. Are caverns anything like that, or just a more organic approach to room styling?

I'm curious to see how well warriors will stand up in melee with the C*W nerf. Back in the day I'm pretty sure I relied heavily on !Healing in the late game to be able to take down big targets (well, that and the wail'n'bail tactic, but blind teleporting when low on HP is a tad risky). Not saying the nerf's a bad idea by any means; I'll just have to try it and see how it goes!

Also: I never really relied on oil much. The characters that need it for damage are too weak to be able to carry much and can't hit the broad side of a barn anyway. 3d6 looks good on paper, but it was always too unreliable for me. Everyone else can take things out in melee or with a proper bow instead, and save on weight.

[d_m]

I'm curious about cavern levels. I've always hated having to venture out into a big open space like FA's wildernesses or Z-style arena levels. Are caverns anything like that, or just a more organic approach to room styling?

Caverns are not "open levels" although there is the possibility for some large rooms.

If you're interested I can explain the details of how they are created but I'd rather people experience them before deciding (based on my explanation) if they like them or not.

[Antoine]

Yes, I am the worst.

I can only speak for myself but I have a very high opinion of the work you have done on V, including but not limited to the professionalism you have brought to the development process, the work you have done on the interface side and the attempts you have made to communicate the dev team's efforts to the community. Please keep it up!

A.