[spoiler] Easy way to kill Morgoth and other monsters

[eMeM]

First thing I think current Angband is too much geared towards long ranged combat. You can deal as much damage as in hand to hand combat. Many monsters can't harm you when they can't hit you and when you stay away there's no risk of additional bad effects from monster's attacks. Also when using sling/bow/xbow every additional shot gives more moves. You can heal yourself if something goes wrong in between shots. In hand to hand combat you don't have that choice. It's no brainer choice even for warrior. Optimal game.

Second thing, when you fight from distance you can stay out of monster's LOS (line of sight). Only thing you need is telepathy to know exact position of approaching enemy. With rune of protection you can kill strongest enemies in one corridor. But if they will finally get to you, you can always phase out and build another corridor.

Against regular monsters with no pass/crush wall ability you can dig a long diagonal corridor, hide behind a wall and shoot at them as they will come.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfU-jcn_YiM&t=10m1s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwqJPG92dTk

Against Morgoth you just need to stay one step behind a wall (any corridor will do) and wait until he gets closer to shoot at him and teleport him away when he's close to seeing you. Repeat until he's dead. Don't allow him to see you and you won't need to heal/banish/teleport yourself.

You don't need destruction scrolls, don't need anything to restore stats. Few healing potions will be enough sometimes you won't have to use them at all! Big speed (fear of Morgoth's double moves), banishment are not necessary although they might be useful because teleport away is prone to failure.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-Ed3-BSOmE?t=1m25s - that's not 100% perfect example because he saw me few times.

[Philip]

Perhaps we should introduce some sort of symmetrical LOS to prevent abuse like that.
EDIT: That is, if we all agree this should change.

[Derakon]

Yeah, this isn't fantastic. I think that 4GAI makes some effort to improve this kind of behavior. One thing I've often thought is that Morgoth ought to move very slightly erratically; just enough to screw up plans that depend on precise positioning.

There's a number of ways to cheese the final fight, though, and short of making the monsters a lot smarter (with consequent effects on game balance), the simplest solution is to just not use them. First-time winners will appreciate figuring out "easy" ways to beat the game; veterans can challenge themselves by imposing artificial restrictions.

[eMeM]

LOS is long standing problem. Maybe Morgoth should move diagonal as long as possible and then in straight line:
. . . . . .P
. . . . ./
. . . ./
@--/

Or first straight line and then diagonal but I'm not sure if it wouldn't lead to other problems because player is moving. Current LOS is very intelligent because player and every monster havetheir own LOS but Angband is not a multiplayer game so easier approach "If I can see it it can see me, and It can't see me if I can't see it." would solve many problems.

[half]

LOS is long standing problem.

From what I recall, Line of Fire is also an issue in V. Sil has asymmetric LOS (well, it is symmetric in the sense that it is the same equation for the player as for the monster, but it isn't always the case that if X can see Y, Y can see X). But Sil has symmetric LOF (in both senses). I seem to recall that this fixes many of the problems.

In Sil, X has LOS to Y if and only if there is a straight uninterrupted line from the centre of X's square to any point on Y's square. X has LOF to Y if and only if there is a straight uninterrupted line from the centre of X's square to the centre of Y's square. I think the former is the same as in V, but the latter was added somewhere early in NPP's history that Sil diverged from.

There are plenty of old (and excellent!) threads on the advantages and disadvantages of various combinations.

[Mikko Lehtinen]

In Zangband, line of sight = line of fire. IIRC, it's been a long time.

Perhaps in addition to that behavior (?), Zangband 2.6.2 introduced a new option:
"Added an ironman_los option for those who want to play without any line of sight abuses."

I don't know what that means exactly.

[Derakon]

NPP's solution (and thus Sil's solution) is quite good IMO -- you can sometimes see monsters without them being able to see you, but you can only shoot monsters if they can shoot you. It doesn't eliminate abuse entirely -- you can still use spells that hit everything in LOS (e.g. Dispel Evil). But that's a much smaller window for abuse.

[AnonymousHero]

Heng, Entro, etc. go even further and have monsters target the square next to the player with splash spells/breaths. It's a continuum of options, but if you're going to prevent abuse of LoS/LoF you might as well go all the way. Otherwise you'll just encourage further abuse of ASCs (and other similar constructs).

[eMeM]

I wonder how many players fight with Emperor Quylthulg without LOS abuse.

[fph]

NPP's solution (and thus Sil's solution) is quite good IMO -- you can sometimes see monsters without them being able to see you, but you can only shoot monsters if they can shoot you. It doesn't eliminate abuse entirely -- you can still use spells that hit everything in LOS (e.g. Dispel Evil). But that's a much smaller window for abuse.

You forgot "spamming OoD or poison cloud to damage an out-of-sight monster behind a corner".

[Nick]

Morgoth in FAangband has solved this problem

[Timo Pietilä]

LOS is long standing problem. Maybe Morgoth should move diagonal as long as possible and then in straight line:

It isn't actually LOS-problem, it is the targeting problem. They don't follow same rules. In hockey-stick you shoot well past your LoS accurately and without problems. You should not be able to target place that far outside your LoS.

My suggestion is that you should only be able to shoot where you can see. LoS still doesn't have to be symmetric, that one turn advantage you get from chess knight move is something I think is there deliberately. It too works both ways, monsters can use it too.

[Philip]

Morgoth in FAangband has solved this problem

FAangband. The variant that already solved everything.