V 3.5 now in feature freeze

[DaviddesJ]

Oh, and for the record, I *don't* agree with eliminating carrying stuff back and forth to town. If you folks want to play no_selling, up to you.

My point about stores recharging items only applies to games with no_selling. I think the philosophy of that setting is to eliminate the unproductive activity of running back and forth to town, as much as possible. If you like running back and forth to town, that's very different.

[Oramin]

Ok, fair enough.

Regarding the earlier discussion of monster memory, I like having to find out what monsters do instead of knowing everything instantaneously. In other words, I'm happy with the design as it is, including the "cheater" setting for people who want infinite knowledge without earning it. Sure, you can just look it up in the spoilers, but then you can also backup your save file.

However, if you want to make monster knowledge easier, you could have two options.

1. Have Scrolls/Staves of Probing which can be purchased in the stores.

2. Have Scrolls of History which can be found/purchased which give you information about monsters.

[fizzix]

My point about stores recharging items only applies to games with no_selling. I think the philosophy of that setting is to eliminate the unproductive activity of running back and forth to town, as much as possible. If you like running back and forth to town, that's very different.

Is it that fundamentally different from running back to town and buying a new teleportation staff when yours runs out? Or buying as many as you can afford and stashing them at home in case the shops are empty? Or the even worse, resting on dlevel 1 until the stores restock?

[DaviddesJ]

However, if you want to make monster knowledge easier, you could have two options.

I don't want to make monster knowledge easier. It's already super-easy, I just turn the setting on, this is a good design. I very much appreciate it. It makes the game easier and more fun to play than in the "old days" when I would consult external references.

I'm just saying that I think that marking all of the games played this way as "cheating" fractures the community unnecessarily. It would be better to separate it from the "cheat" settings like "infinite lives". I don't think looking up monster data (however you do it) is much like resurrecting yourself forever. If you do think so, then you'll probably have a different opinion than me about this.

[Oramin]

I suppose it depends on how you look at it, David.

In other games, you have to rely on your memory/experience or external sources for information about monsters. The monster memory is a convenient substitute for *your* memory within the game so you don't have to take notes. It is not (or at least shouldn't be) a source of free infinite knowledge about monsters.

Besides, as an experienced player, you should already all the monsters in your monster memory. When I screwed up and accidentally overwrote my character file, I made a point of probing all the monsters in the following game so that my monster memory would be complete again.

Edit:

sources -> monsters

[takkaria]

So the infinite recharging in town wasn't a goal, just a side effect? What happens if you sell them the more powerful items (the ones they aren't supposed to recharge)?

No, it was a goal. I said - I thought it was dodgy that shopholders sold 0 charge things, so I made them recharge it. And as Derakon said, items not normally stocked by the stores are not recharged.

[DaviddesJ]

No, it was a goal. I said - I thought it was dodgy that shopholders sold 0 charge things, so I made them recharge it. And as Derakon said, items not normally stocked by the stores are not recharged.

So, it's dodgy that shopkeepers sell 0 charge things, but they still do sell 0 charge things if those are things they wouldn't normally recharge?

It still seems a bit odd to me, but if they are only recharging items that are the same items that they always sell and you could always buy just by waiting for the store to restock, then it's certainly not a big deal. Thanks for explaining.

[DaviddesJ]

Besides, as an experienced player, you should already all the monsters in your monster memory. When I screwed up and accidentally overwrote my character file, I made a point of probing all the monsters in the following game so that my monster memory would be complete again.

So, when you play, you want to have all of the information in your monster memory from the start, and you don't want to be marked as a cheater for it? But, when I play, you think it's really important to mark my games as cheating, because, say, the last time I played the game it was on a different computer?

The fact that you can start from the beginning with everything revealed in your monster memory just illustrates my point that it's clearly not "cheating" in the same way that having infinite lives is. If it were, you shouldn't do it either.

[Derakon]

The shopkeeper clearly has some way to get access to charged staves of certain types, since they sell them normally. There's a few ways to explain that:

1. They buy up empty staves, cast Recharging, and build the resulting occasional item destruction into their operating costs.
2. They have access to a fail-safe Recharging spell, at least for lower-leveled staves.
3. They can make the staves themselves, or have a supplier who can make them (but where does the supplier come from? Some mythical location that isn't built upon a gigantic dungeon of monsters?).

Option 1 looks like option 2 except that sometimes when you sell a staff to the store, they don't put it up for sale. That seems suboptimal. Option 3 results in shopkeepers selling staves with 0 charges, since they can't recharge them on their own. Also suboptimal.

[DaviddesJ]

3. They can make the staves themselves, or have a supplier who can make them (but where does the supplier come from? Some mythical location that isn't built upon a gigantic dungeon of monsters?).

I always assumed that the shopkeepers just buy and sell. Sometimes people come through town (when you aren't there) and buy out of their inventory and also sell them stuff. That's where everything comes from.

[Oramin]

So, when you play, you want to have all of the information in your monster memory from the start, and you don't want to be marked as a cheater for it? But, when I play, you think it's really important to mark my games as cheating, because, say, the last time I played the game it was on a different computer?

The fact that you can start from the beginning with everything revealed in your monster memory just illustrates my point that it's clearly not "cheating" in the same way that having infinite lives is. If it were, you shouldn't do it either.

If I play on a different computer then I have absolutely no problem having an empty monster memory. As I indicated, the monster memory is a convenient substitute for your memory; I mostly remember what the monsters do.

And, besides, does your new computer *not* have access to the spoilers?

Edit:

Also, to make it clear, I had that information because I took the time to probe every monster in the first game after I overwrote my character file. So I "earned" the knowledge instead of being given it for free.

[DaviddesJ]

Also, to make it clear, I had that information because I took the time to probe every monster in the first game after I overwrote my character file. So I "earned" the knowledge instead of being given it for free.

This is exactly my point. Making people "earn" ease-of-play conveniences through inconvenient hassles is, to my mind, a dated and offputting idea. You could require people to move one space at a time until they "earn" the right to use the run command, by taking 100,000 steps, or something. But it's just annoying. If there are things that make the game more fun to play, then just let everyone have the same fun, that's my approach.

[DaviddesJ]

My latest thought is to provide a way for players to generate complete monster information files and install them in the save directory, before they start. Then you could achieve full information by installing the file, rather than changing an in-game option, and get rid of one option setting entirely, and bypass the whole "cheat" question. It would just use the existing mechanism for carrying over data from a previous game.

[Oramin]

Ok, let me explain this a different way.

Suppose you are playing a game with a persistent map.

In the beginning, in order to have a copy of the map, you have to engage in copious note taking.

Finally somebody decides that is inconvenient and includes an automapping feature so that a record is kept of the map where your character has explored.

See the difference between the map that you have earned by exploring and having the full map revealed in-game the instant you start playing?

Or how about if you are playing a game where you speak with NPCs and the conversations are the same between games.

In the beginning, in order to have a copy of the conversations, you have to engage in copious note taking.

Finally somebody decides that is inconvenient and includes a log of the in game conversations so that a record is kept of conversations that your character has had.

See the difference between the log of conversations that you have earned by exploring and talking to NPCs and having every conversation in the log before you've ever played the game?


There's a difference between a convenient method of recalling information you have already earned by playing the game and getting free information.

[DaviddesJ]

I've got all of the information about every monster's abilities. It's in the source code and spoiler files, I can just read it, this has always been true for the 20+ years I've been playing the game. The question is only about convenience. I am always going to have the same information, it's just a question of how many keystrokes it takes to consult it. Fewer keystrokes is better than more, that's my opinion. Making people do extra keystrokes to do something they are going to do anyway is an outdated concept and I'm glad we are moving beyond that in other areas.

Listen, you aren't going to change how I want to play and I'm not going to change how you want to play. I don't even want to try. Please stop trying to persuade me I should like what you like. I know what I like. Earning the right to use fewer keystrokes when playing, by going through some laborious process, isn't one of the things that I like.

If I'm a "cheater" for turning on full monster memory in my game, and I'm also a "cheater" for tabbing over to my browser window to look at spoilers during the game, then you're also a "cheater" for probing all of the monsters in one game and then consulting that monster memory in the next game. I think none of these are "cheating" (unlike, say, infinite lives). They just reflect different preferences about how to play.