A Few Questions/Observations From an Old Player

[Patashu]

Yes, it is an importance detail but it is only becomes important if the game has implemented saving throws in the proper manner.

Specifically, suppose that most monsters have a penalty to their casting ability such that 26 percentage points are added to your saving throw. Then 70% is changed to 96% and 74% is changed to 100%.

I would appreciate it if you wouldn't correct me when I understand what I'm saying and you clearly didn't.

This is my bad. My intuition of how Angband works under the hood (studying the monster definition files, etc) makes it obvious to me that there's no such thing as a monster spell strength or in fact any kind of factor that could be included into saving throw to make it anything but a straight %, but to someone who hasn't looked at Angband the same way I have it is not obvious. I completely was unaware of how you look at Angband, and I apologize for this misunderstanding.

[Nick]

O/FA have the facility to vary the save depending on the monsters, but it is only done rarely, and mostly for the nastier effects (eg confusion, hallucination, paralysis) of poison, cold, fire etc. attacks from powerful spellcasters.

[wobbly]

The text Oramin quotes from the help file does read that way though & could do with changing to be clearer.

[DaviddesJ]

Yeah, modifying the saving throw based on the monster level would make sense, but it's never been part of the game, as far as I know.

[Derakon]

A quick scan of the code turns up this bit in mon-spell.c:

            /* Allow saving throw if available */
            if (re_ptr->save &&
                    randint0(100) < p_ptr->state.skills[SKILL_SAVE]) {
                msg("You avoid the effect!");
                continue;
            }

Looks like monsters have no actual skill at casting spells. They just pick nastier spells to nail the player with. This is part of why CONF, SCARE, BLIND, etc. are "wasted turns" for most late-game monsters; even a warrior will have at least a 60% saving throw, so odds are decent they'll avoid the effect via saving even if they aren't immune.

[Oramin]

This was the text I was talking about:

A Saving Throw is the ability of a character to resist the
effects of a spell cast on him by another person/creature.
This does not include spells cast on the player by his own
stupidity, such as quaffing a nasty potion. This ability
increases with the level of the character, but then most
high level creatures are better at casting spells, so it
tends to even out. A high wisdom also increases this abil-
ity.

And, yes, Derakon was correct that I was talking about the boots.

[Derakon]

Oramin was talking about the boots of Wormtongue, not the monster.

As far as I'm aware, your saving throw is always a straight "is 1d100 less than the percentage shown on your character sheet". It is never adjusted by the skill of the monster.

[Oramin]

The question was what effect Disenchantment would have on Wormtongue's weapon values and I believe you just answered it (no effect).

[Timo Pietilä]

Ok, now I'm curious about Disenchantment attacks and Wormtongue.

Did I miss part of the question? I don't see anything relevant to Wormy in rest of the message. Wormy doesn't disenchant.

I'm not sure disenchantment affect non-weapon combat bonuses anymore in 3.4.1. I just tested with debug-mode created gauntlets of power and summoned disenchanter eye. After 12 disenchants those gauntlets still have their original (+4,+4) combat bonuses, just AC is now [5,+0]

[Oramin]

There's something in one of the help files about your saving throw improving while the monsters' casting skills improve. Ambiguous enough to mean it might be programmed the way I suggested.

[DaviddesJ]

Yeah but the difference between 74% and 70% might actually be the difference between 100% and 96% depending on the way saving throws are implemented in the game.

(invitation to the code-readers; something I am too lazy to do)

I guess I haven't read the code, but I thought that saving throws are very simple---there's a percentage chance and you make it or you don't.

[Oramin]

It's not an implementation detail, it's an importance detail. The difference between 96% and 100% is simply more important than the difference between 74% and 70% purely because in the former case you go from 'I usually won't be hit by this status effect, but I have to plan for it happening' to 'this will never ever hit me, I no longer need plans for it happening, and in the latter case it goes from 'this will usually hit me' to 'this will usually hit me, just slightly less often'. The former case is worth sacrificing other things for potentially, the latter case not so much.

Yes, it is an importance detail but it is only becomes important if the game has implemented saving throws in the proper manner.

Specifically, suppose that most monsters have a penalty to their casting ability such that 26 percentage points are added to your saving throw. Then 70% is changed to 96% and 74% is changed to 100%.

I would appreciate it if you wouldn't correct me when I understand what I'm saying and you clearly didn't.

[Patashu]

Yeah but the difference between 74% and 70% might actually be the difference between 100% and 96% depending on the way saving throws are implemented in the game.

It's not an implementation detail, it's an importance detail. The difference between 96% and 100% is simply more important than the difference between 74% and 70% purely because in the former case you go from 'I usually won't be hit by this status effect, but I have to plan for it happening' to 'this will never ever hit me, I no longer need plans for it happening, and in the latter case it goes from 'this will usually hit me' to 'this will usually hit me, just slightly less often'. The former case is worth sacrificing other things for potentially, the latter case not so much.

[Oramin]

Seems to me that the difference between a saving throw of 74% and 70% is pretty negligible. You aren't going to allow catastrophic things to happen either 26% of the time or 30% of the time.

On the other hand, the difference between a saving throw of 96% and 100% can be pretty big.

Yeah but the difference between 74% and 70% might actually be the difference between 100% and 96% depending on the way saving throws are implemented in the game.

(invitation to the code-readers; something I am too lazy to do)

As it is, I'm just going to use Trickery and carry Devotion as a swap for Darkness attacks (or I could just find the Arkenstone).

Edit:

I should call them "Implementors" instead of "code-readers" just for the Zork reference (Beyond Zork, I think).

[DaviddesJ]

Seems to me that the difference between a saving throw of 74% and 70% is pretty negligible. You aren't going to allow catastrophic things to happen either 26% of the time or 30% of the time.

On the other hand, the difference between a saving throw of 96% and 100% can be pretty big.