[User Guide Development] Questions

[takkaria]

Hmmm... but a rod of perception has sval 2, a staff of perception has sval 5, and a scroll of identify has sval 12, which doesn't seem to accord with what you suggest.

pval would seem to only apply to artifacts then, not to normal items (other than things like Rings of Weakness, which have -5)?

And the depth and rarity?

Depth and rarity are controlled by the A: line. pval also applies to ego-items.

I didn't quite make myself clear re: svals; each tval has its own set of svals, with no necessary relation between them, so identify items don't have to have the same sval between tvals.

[Psi]

pval would seem to only apply to artifacts then, not to normal items (other than things like Rings of Weakness, which have -5)?

Plenty of objects have pvals, Elvenkinds have a +stealth, Westernesse +Str/Dex/Con, Diggers +tunneling etc

[JamesDoyle]

Thanks Psi, I'd m issed digging tools; I'm ignoring eog-items for the moment until I get to writing them up.


Andrew, thanks for clarification. As far as I can see, sval is fairly redundant for normal objects (which is what I'm working on at the moment). I intend to ignore tval and sval in that case for the manual, as they're necessary for the programming, but don't give a player any useful information.

[JamesDoyle]

1. Does armour really offer no protection against missile attacks? (As Leon's manual states)
2. Why don't mithril shots have IGNORE_FIRE? (Mithril Arrows and Bolts do)
3. Does Phase Door have a propensity to transport you away from the current room? It seems that I end up in an adjacent room more often than not
4. Phase Door and Teleport – when the distances are referred to as 'up to', what exactly does that mean?
5. Rarity - how does that work, then? I notice it's in powers of 2, presumably it's something like 1/rarity chance, modified by level?

ETA: And I agree with Andrew's comments on his future plans, there are too many weapons and armour types, and the distinctions are not always obvious, or worthwhile, e.g. Double Chain Mail is identical to Augmented chain mail, except being 2 pounds lighter... and 50gp cheaper. Shome mishtake, shurely?

[zaimoni]

1. Does armour really offer no protection against missile attacks? (As Leon's manual states)

Unfortunately, yes.

The problem is that the arrow and boulder attacks are not implemented with ammunition, but as a spell with irresistible damage. No to-hit check is made either.

Some variants have fixed this, but V's implementation (so far) is straight from Moria here.

2. Why don't mithril shots have IGNORE_FIRE? (Mithril Arrows and Bolts do)

Ordinary shots aren't vulnerable to fire in the first place, so the IGNORE_FIRE flag is redundant for mithril shots.

3. Does Phase Door have a propensity to transport you away from the current room? It seems that I end up in an adjacent room more often than not
4. Phase Door and Teleport – when the distances are referred to as 'up to', what exactly does that mean?

The game will try fairly hard to pick a legal random location whose distance from the player's location is between half that distance, and the rated distance. If five hundred tries isn't enough, the reference distance is doubled, with a cap of 200.

Note that vaults are not legal teleport destinations. This means that Phase Door will reliably get you out of a Greater Vault.

5. Rarity - how does that work, then? I notice it's in powers of 2, presumably it's something like 1/rarity chance, modified by level?

Yes, at least in V3.0.9- [V SVN is different]

[roustk]

Note that vaults are not legal teleport destinations. This means that Phase Door will reliably get you out of a Greater Vault.

It also means that you can't shoot and scoot *within* a vault, or use PD to get around a Q with a hockey stick attack on you (in a vault; especially annoying with permanent walls).

Kevin

[JamesDoyle]

Unfortunately, yes.

The problem is that the arrow and boulder attacks are not implemented with ammunition, but as a spell with irresistible damage. No to-hit check is made either.

Yikes, no wonder I have so much trouble with giants. It sounds as if it may be less than straightforward to fix, but I'd hope that Andrew would look at this at some stage, as it's a bit bizarre.

And, more on topic, thanks guys, that clears up a good few things for the manual

[JamesDoyle]

I've been working spoiler information on the various types of magical item into the User Manual.

The primary source I've been using is edit/object.txt, and I've also been referring to Stephen Lee's object spoilers, specifically info/obj-long.txt. I've a number of questions arising from this:

1. Stephen's spoilers are from 2.7.8; I'm assuming that where they differ to object.txt, it's the latter which (as a game file) is more up to date and reliable.
2. Where the spoiler has info which is NOT in object.txt, how reliable is the spoiler info? For example, where it gives details of Rod recharging periods, how to calculate bonuses on stat Rings, etc.
3. Most of the F_ flags are pretty obvious; some I'm not sure about:
- SHOW_MODS
- LITE
- EASY_KNOW (this seems to indicate the item can be identified with normal Identify, but it's also on spellbooks - why?)

Specific questions
4. Free Action resists paralysis and slowing, right?
5. Ring of Aggravate Monster does exactly the same as the Scroll?
6. Why is the Ring of Lughtning 5000gp when the other three elemental rings are 3000, and all four have completely parallel stats?
7. Amulet of Infravision - does each +1 gives 10' extra?
8. Amulets - it's not indicated, but presumably the Amulets of Weaponmaster, Trickery and Devotion can be cursed? And Infravision too?

Cheers

[Pete Mack]

I've been working spoiler information on the various types of magical item into the User Manual.

The primary source I've been using is edit/object.txt, and I've also been referring to Stephen Lee's object spoilers, specifically info/obj-long.txt. I've a number of questions arising from this:

1. Stephen's spoilers are from 2.7.8; I'm assuming that where they differ to object.txt, it's the latter which (as a game file) is more up to date and reliable.
2. Where the spoiler has info which is NOT in object.txt, how reliable is the spoiler info? For example, where it gives details of Rod recharging periods, how to calculate bonuses on stat Rings, etc.
3. Most of the F_ flags are pretty obvious; some I'm not sure about:
- SHOW_MODS
- LITE
- EASY_KNOW (this seems to indicate the item can be identified with normal Identify, but it's also on spellbooks - why?)

Specific questions
4. Free Action resists paralysis and slowing, right?
5. Ring of Aggravate Monster does exactly the same as the Scroll?
6. Why is the Ring of Lughtning 5000gp when the other three elemental rings are 3000, and all four have completely parallel stats?
7. Amulet of Infravision - does each +1 gives 10' extra?
8. Amulets - it's not indicated, but presumably the Amulets of Weaponmaster, Trickery and Devotion can be cursed? And Infravision too?

Cheers

I don't know about SHOW_MODS, but
- LITE means it gives light radius +1.
- Free Action is immunity from paralysis (except due to stunning) and to the magical slowing spell. Gravity, Inertia, potions, Brain Smash, and traps will still work. Brain Smash is instead affected by saving throw.
- EASY_KNOW means at most one scroll of ID is required to fully ID all similar objects.
- AoInfravision - yes, 10' per +1.
- Weaponmastery, Trickery and Devotion can never have negative pvals. (They can be cursed in 3.0.9 and later, but they are still useful.) All other pval rings can have cursed negative pvals. (You really don't want to use Holy Orb on a cursed "Trickery.)
- Ring of Aggravation wakes up all monsters within 200'. It doesn't haste them in LOS.
- I don't know about spoiler info that's not in object.txt, but if they disagree, the objects file will be accurate.
- Rod recharging IS in objects.txt, in the E: lines:
E:ACTIVATION:RECHARGE
Recharge time will be n + 1dn time, so for Trap Location it is 50 turns + 1d50.

[CunningGabe]

- EASY_KNOW means at most one scroll of ID is required to fully ID all similar objects.

Here's a good example: rings of Slow Digestion have EASY_KNOW, and consequently, whenever you pick one up (or look at one) you know whether it's cursed or not. Rings of Dexterity don't, so you don't know off-hand whether the ring is cursed or not, or how much it will affect dexterity (that is, you don't know its pval).

SHOW_MODS is a flag that means "in the object description (i.e., in the pack), show the modifications to to-h and to-d". In other words, because a Dagger has SHOW_MODS, you see it as a Dagger (1d4) (+3, +5) and not just a Dagger (1d4). The only nonweapon (currently) to have this flag is the Ring of Slaying. Currently, though, the flag is superfluous - the code currently displays the to-h and to-d values of any weapon (even if it doesn't have the flag), and anything that effects to-d (like a ring of damage). Perhaps we should just remove the flag.

Gabe

[takkaria]

Currently, though, the flag is superfluous - the code currently displays the to-h and to-d values of any weapon (even if it doesn't have the flag), and anything that effects to-d (like a ring of damage). Perhaps we should just remove the flag.

+1.

I would also comment that perhaps spoilers are something you should talk to Hugo about, since he has up-to-date ones for Angband 3.0.8. For example, full object information is available at: http://www.juti.nl/hugo/Angband/Spoiler/obj-long.spo. I would have mentioned this earlier but I haven't been paying quite enough attention...

[JamesDoyle]

Here's a good example: rings of Slow Digestion have EASY_KNOW, and consequently, whenever you pick one up (or look at one) you know whether it's cursed or not. Rings of Dexterity don't, so you don't know off-hand whether the ring is cursed or not, or how much it will affect dexterity (that is, you don't know its pval).

SHOW_MODS is a flag that means "in the object description (i.e., in the pack), show the modifications to to-h and to-d". In other words, because a Dagger has SHOW_MODS, you see it as a Dagger (1d4) (+3, +5) and not just a Dagger (1d4). The only nonweapon (currently) to have this flag is the Ring of Slaying. Currently, though, the flag is superfluous - the code currently displays the to-h and to-d values of any weapon (even if it doesn't have the flag), and anything that effects to-d (like a ring of damage). Perhaps we should just remove the flag.

Gabe

Thanks, that makes sense for SHOW_MODS. But for EASY_KNOW, isn't there then redundancy with HIDE_TYPE? I'd assumed that handled that from the opposite end, i.e. don't show actual values or cursing on variable items - as HIDE_TYPE applies to all the variable items?

Pete - thanks for yours too - I didn't realise Amulet of Devotion gave light, that's what confused me. Altrhough not sure about Rods - there isn't an E line in object.txt - are you thinking of a different file?

Andrew - thanks for the heads-up on the updated spoiler. Off to get it now.

[Pete Mack]

Pete - thanks for yours too - I didn't realise Amulet of Devotion gave light, that's what confused me. Altrhough not sure about Rods - there isn't an E line in object.txt - are you thinking of a different file?

\

Sorry about that--it's a very recent addition, only in the SVN (3.1.0) branch. It's a huge improvement, but I guess that doesn't help you. If you want, you can use the current SVN version.

Changes later than ~June 2007 are specific to 3.1.0

[CunningGabe]

Thanks, that makes sense for SHOW_MODS. But for EASY_KNOW, isn't there then redundancy with HIDE_TYPE? I'd assumed that handled that from the opposite end, i.e. don't show actual values or cursing on variable items - as HIDE_TYPE applies to all the variable items?

The HIDE_TYPE flag indicates that the object shouldn't show what kind of modification it gives, just give the value. So, for example, an amulet of Trickery boosts your speed, searching, stealth, and infravision, but it's just described as An Amulet of Trickery (+N). Compare this to some ego-armors - for instance, armor of Elvenkind. This displays as a Soft Leather Armor of Elvenkind (+N to stealth).

Again, there's actually a lot of hard-coded logic that makes this flag not particularly useful, but there you have it

[JamesDoyle]

I'm back, and back to working on the manual! And for those who might be vaguely interested, I was absent due to campaigning for election to the local council, which result in a win by 554 votes, on a swing of 12.5%

Some questions related to the powers of ego-items:
1. IMPACT is the effect described in the obj_good spoiler as Cause Earthquake, I assume
2. Leon's work referred to items which conferred immunity to various elemental attacks, but there's nothing in the files I can see which could be this; is this reference a relic, or from another variant?
3. The only effect of Blessed weapons is to remove the penalty for clerics/paladins?