[User Guide Development] Questions

[roustk]

I think the latter rather than the former; there isn't a significant hole for rElec, there are 33 artifacts with it compared to 37 for RAcid, 43 RCold and 49 RFire. Those are pretty comparable figures

Of those, 19 artifacts provide resistances or immunities to all four elements, bringing the list to: 14 rElec, 18 rAcid, 24 rCold, 30 rFire.

Of those 14 that provide rElec but not all four basic resistances, 3 provide one other resistance (Thunderfist, Fundin Bluecloak, Gil-galad) and 3 provide two other resistances (Amrod, Amras, Ingwe). That leaves only 8 artifacts that provide rElec but no other basic resistance.

[PowerDiver]

I think the latter rather than the former; there isn't a significant hole for rElec, there are 33 artifacts with it compared to 37 for RAcid, 43 RCold and 49 RFire. Those are pretty comparable figures.

There is in fact a significant hole, because of the way they are used. I bet if you looked at dumps of chars at 2500' or deeper, and checked the artifacts actually being wielded, you would see a different pattern.

You get rFire from Cubragol or Carlammas, and iAcid from Thorin. Thus, fire and acid resistance are often of little interest. It turns out, over and over and over, that using standarts my main question is how to cover rElec. Some of the major weapons give rCold or iCold, and Nenya is a whole lot easier to find than Vilya.

It is still probably a typo, but IMO a ring of lightning would be reasonably priced at ten times as much as a ring of flames.

[JamesDoyle]

1. What is the actual effect of DRAIN_EXP?

You lose a fixed amount of exp from max exp every fixed number of turns.
Whatever the specifics are, it is irrelevant.

thanks, that was my expectation but I wanted to check.

2. There are two artifacts - Power Dragon Scale Mail 'Bladeturner' and the Cesti of Fingolfin - where the actual base AC is different to the normal for that type, i.e. Bladeturner is [50, +35] whereas 'normal' PDSM is [40, +15], and the Cesti are [5, +20] compared to normal cesti at [2, 0]. Wouldn't it make more sense if these were [40, +45] and [2, +23], or am I missing something?

Normal cesti are base 5. Just as weapons can come with different dice,
it seems reasonable for armor to come with different base AC. It just means
you can recognize the artifact before you identify it. This was [is?] particularly
true of NPP.

Oops, you're correct about base cesti. I must have mistaken it because I was sure there are two armour items (Bladeturner being one), and only two where the base is different. But I guess there's ony 1! So whereas I think your point about being able to recognise them might have some value, if it were true, then such items would be in the majority, not 1 out of 49 items. Perhaps this was ported over from NPP?

2. Why is the Ring of Lightning 5000gp when the other three elemental rings are 3000, and all four have completely parallel stats?

It actually makes sense. The standard artifacts are set up to miss rElec.
OTOH, it is probably just a typo.

I think the latter rather than the former; there isn't a significant hole for rElec, there are 33 artifacts with it compared to 37 for RAcid, 43 RCold and 49 RFire. Those are pretty comparable figures

3. Ammunition of Slay Evil and of Venom cannot be Mithril; why not? Every other sort of ego-item ammunition can be

Probably added later by someone not familiar with the format.
Again, I am just guessing wildly.

Seems reasonable

Finally, my game query/feature request: I'd like to be able to view the list of known items when in a shop. This used to be possible, but has gone in 3.0.9

I think that anything unaware should be listed as such. In my patch in the store

(c) 3 scrolls of identify (unaware)

Well, that one opened a can of worms! I admit I'm one of those people who buys items in stores to identify them, and it's a pain to have to come out of the sotre to check if I know them. I feel that if a decision has been taken to remove that, it's an overly prescriptive decision - people who don't want to take advantage of it don't have to, and for those who do, you still can, it just takes long and make the game merely annoying, not better. BUT, I also agree that you shouldn't automatically be able to recognise seomthing just from seeing it in the shop - that would save cash, but make the early game at least a little boring.

[zaimoni]

For some reason, that is considered abuse.

It makes identify frequency in stores (both scroll and staff) overabundant in the early game, and dramatically increases the odds that an early-game unidentified scroll is bad.

It used to be that if you inspected a shop item you could see its flavor, but that was removed.

It is important, at least if you are diving, to know which items you should buy to gain awareness of the flavor.

As long as the decision is made to keep intentionally broken eidetic awareness of items seen in stores, it strikes me as equally "abusive" to show flavors in stores, and have an item knowledge menu at all. Both reward meticulous out-of-game per-game record keeping.

(It does suggest that the save screen dump in the stores was also intentionally torn out for the new store code.)

Except for rebalancing identify frequency, banishing the usefulness of meticulous out-of-game record keeping makes sense. The simple ways are either remove the item knowledge menu completely on top of not showing flavors in stores, or fix eidetic awareness of items seen in stores.

Naturally, I think fixing eidetic awareness is better. [This went into Zaiband 3.0.8 alpha, idea attributed jointly to USENET Eddie Grove and Timo Pietella(sp? Accent marks may be needed for perfect spelling, local notes are lousy).]

[PowerDiver]

Eh...wouldn't it be simpler just to make the scrolls aware if you see them in a shop, automatically?

For some reason, that is considered abuse. It used to be that if you inspected a shop item you could see its flavor, but that was removed.

It is important, at least if you are diving, to know which items you should buy to gain awareness of the flavor.

[zaimoni]

Finally, my game query/feature request: I'd like to be able to view the list of known items when in a shop. This used to be possible, but has gone in 3.0.9

I think that anything unaware should be listed as such. In my patch in the store

(c) 3 scrolls of identify (unaware)

Eh...wouldn't it be simpler just to make the scrolls aware if you see them in a shop, automatically?

[PowerDiver]

1. What is the actual effect of DRAIN_EXP?

You lose a fixed amount of exp from max exp every fixed number of turns.
Whatever the specifics are, it is irrelevant.

2. There are two artifacts - Power Dragon Scale Mail 'Bladeturner' and the Cesti of Fingolfin - where the actual base AC is different to the normal for that type, i.e. Bladeturner is [50, +35] whereas 'normal' PDSM is [40, +15], and the Cesti are [5, +20] compared to normal cesti at [2, 0]. Wouldn't it make more sense if these were [40, +45] and [2, +23], or am I missing something?

Normal cesti are base 5. Just as weapons can come with different dice,
it seems reasonable for armor to come with different base AC. It just means
you can recognize the artifact before you identify it. This was [is?] particularly
true of NPP.

Old questions:
1. Is Scarabtarices a person? If so, where does the name come from?

I would wildly guess from some D&D campaign.

2. Why is the Ring of Lightning 5000gp when the other three elemental rings are 3000, and all four have completely parallel stats?

It actually makes sense. The standard artifacts are set up to miss rElec.
OTOH, it is probably just a typo.

3. Ammunition of Slay Evil and of Venom cannot be Mithril; why not? Every other sort of ego-item ammunition can be

Probably added later by someone not familiar with the format.
Again, I am just guessing wildly.

Finally, my game query/feature request: I'd like to be able to view the list of known items when in a shop. This used to be possible, but has gone in 3.0.9

I think that anything unaware should be listed as such. In my patch in the store

(c) 3 scrolls of identify (unaware)

[JamesDoyle]

So, I've finally got around to completing the artifacts section of the UM. Having dived right through the raw data file and the spoiler file, I've a couple of questions to put to people, as well as reminding you of some that I could still do with answers to from earlier. Also, one query not for the UM, but for my interest.

New questions:
1. What is the actual effect of DRAIN_EXP?
2. There are two artifacts - Power Dragon Scale Mail 'Bladeturner' and the Cesti of Fingolfin - where the actual base AC is different to the normal for that type, i.e. Bladeturner is [50, +35] whereas 'normal' PDSM is [40, +15], and the Cesti are [5, +20] compared to normal cesti at [2, 0]. Wouldn't it make more sense if these were [40, +45] and [2, +23], or am I missing something?

Old questions:
1. Is Scarabtarices a person? If so, where does the name come from?
2. Why is the Ring of Lightning 5000gp when the other three elemental rings are 3000, and all four have completely parallel stats?
3. Ammunition of Slay Evil and of Venom cannot be Mithril; why not? Every other sort of ego-item ammunition can be

Finally, my game query/feature request: I'd like to be able to view the list of known items when in a shop. This used to be possible, but has gone in 3.0.9

OK, on to monsters and combat...

[ekolis]

Ah yes, Multiband... is that variant still around anywhere? It was pretty cool, except for a few glitches here and there which I can't recall at the moment... maybe something like having to manually switch classes to use certain abilities or something :P

[Bandobras]

Both are done quite well in MultiBand, a very interesting, totally forgotten variant. Actually, many of my characters were starting the game buying off begginer magic book and tearing it to pieces to get Phase Door scrolls out of it. The other scrolls obtained that way were sold, making it almost as cost-effective as puchasing Phase Door from Alchemist, unless the stats responsible for tearing ability and RNG were very bad that day.This is a nice way to almost guarantee Phase Door in town, without making the shops boring.

[Garrie]

Oh yeah, and one more thing... Non-casters who find spellbooks should get XP for destroying them! Otherwise they're just junk to sell to the store for a few gold pieces... Or maybe take a cue from UnAngband and let the stores offer special services or extra items for selling spellbooks...

Another idea would be if non-relevant spell casters could use *any* spell/prayer book as if it were a scroll for *any* spell it contains.

priest finds a copy of Incantations and Illusions - and can use it as though it were a scroll of teleport, or stone-to-mud, or whatever.

I guess there might need to be some rebalancing but at least it would fix the "TMJ" for wrong-flavour spellbooks (phase door, teleport, teleport other, cure spells are always useful). I could see *any* class hording books with the prayer "alter reality".

That said, I also agree with the idea of Paladins getting XP for destroying opposite aligned spell books. Problem is, V doesn't have alignment...

[Garrie]

Dwarf Fortress adventure mode would have been nice too, but I hear it's not all that implemented yet...

As a DF Fortress Mode player, adventure mode (even adventuring through your own abandoned fortress, which seems to be the main reason adventure mode exists) is a bit dissapointing so far.

I like the idea. However it seems that "toady" has been putting 99% of dev time into AI type issues for fortress mode, and as that is what the game is really about that is probably a good thing.

Of course he could always open the source and invite collaboration on areas he doesn't want to devote his own time to right now...

[Narvius]

It's interesting for some little village slaughters.

[ekolis]

Ah yes, JADE, the mythical game, lol... hopefully that Biskup guy will put out a demo or something soon; the screenshots and videos look rather enticing! Dwarf Fortress adventure mode would have been nice too, but I hear it's not all that implemented yet...

[Narvius]

I guess your ideas would be better for JADE (y'know, ADOM 2) than for Angband. And I don't know what's so bad about the shop... it's not really important. At least later.