New features for Angband from variants

[Hugo]

The argument for the quiver is "it's a UI feature that makes it less fiddly to play the game". What's the argument against it? It doesn't make archery any stronger that I can see, just less annoying.

Hi Andrew,

If each ammo type in the quiver still costs you an ammo slot, than there is no argument against it that I can see. But if the quiver takes a single slot in the inventory and allows several types of ammo, then it will affect balance since it allows the player to carry all kinds of branded and slay ammo that he has without having to leave other stuff at home.

(Of course, you could offset this by allowing a succesful fire attack a chance to destroy the whole quiver at once, including everything in it ... BWUHAHAHAHA )

[takkaria]

Hi Andrew,

If each ammo type in the quiver still costs you an ammo slot, than there is no argument against it that I can see. But if the quiver takes a single slot in the inventory and allows several types of ammo, then it will affect balance since it allows the player to carry all kinds of branded and slay ammo that he has without having to leave other stuff at home.

Ah. I never had any intention of implementing the latter kind.

[andrewdoull]

Ah. I never had any intention of implementing the latter kind.

But that's how the quiver works. It uses 1 inventory slot for every 99 ammo you carry, irregardless of type...

Andrew

[Bandobras]

I'm for including the quiver as seen in other variants. To compensate, weaken archery is some minor other way, e.g. one most related to the feeling that V archery is too strong. Then see if it got balanced.

The reason is, two of the ways quiver improves gameplay are only present in the implementation that merges all ammo to 99 stacks in inventory. These two are: much more frequent tactical diversity of using different ammo kinds for different situations and much less UI managment decisions of the boring and counterintuitive kind (are the 2 arrows of Slay Giant worth the inventory slot? the home slot? should I shoot the better arrows first or the weaker ones from a smaller stack first, so as to break them earlier and free the slot? how to find enough scrolls to merge several small stacks of arrows of Flame? should I discard a stack of ordinary arrows of *Rare Brand*, because they do not have a chance to stack with the seeker arrows I most frequently find on my current depth or should I discard one of the stacks of non-ego seeker arrows? will I get more in the shops for the stack of 43 arrows of Foo or 17 arrows of *Bar*?).

[Hugo]

I'm for including the quiver as seen in other variants. To compensate, weaken archery is some minor other way, e.g. one most related to the feeling that V archery is too strong.

Probably by calculating archery slay/brand bonus the same way as melee slay/brand bonus. That would reduce the unbalancing effect of being able to carry aroound every kind of slay and brand ammo you've ever found without sacrificing half your inventory slots.

[AR_chie]

stealth in V

maybe someone asking for that already, but maybe not. I wander how it is possible that wearing heavy armour you didn't make more noise? Maybe all this armour wich have minus to AC should have the same minus to stealth?.

[Elsairon]

Sounds like a neat idea. Might give a consideration for rogues to wear lighter armor types. Maybe stealth penalty equal to the armors 'to hit' penalty.

[Atriel]

I tend not to post about [V] because i fell [V] bland, easy, exploitable, etc... but still is the perfect introduction to someone that never played roguelikes and also a start to pick some variant, so i picked up [V] again to teach two newbies, and now i feel i am enlightened enough to talk about some points and bugs.

First, i want to thank Andrew Sidwell and all those that helped in the improving of Angband

Now, what i have found playing:

1. The squelcher is very bad and also doesn´t work very well, as it is now, because:

1.a. BUG: Dealing with stuff in the floor, and i use a lot the key (-) (i think most veterans use it), i can see the whole list of crap. Funny, once i saw (and had to deal with) the same crappy cursed dagger 4 times because ghosts kept picking it up... IMHO, by the actual squelch without destruction proposal (nice idea), all the stuff should be invisible even dealing w/ stuff in the floor.
Maybe also a new key to turn invisible crap on/off should be implemented, just to see how huge the sea of crap is after i clean that giant pit

1.b. I think this may be only a matter of work, but the list of potions, scrolls, etc is not based on anything...? Take a look at [O] squelcher, all the stuff is grouped, cursed first, potions of restore together, potions of stat together...

1.c. I feel that [V] squelcher really needs a feature from Heng or Tome: kill all weapons that could deal less (average/maximum) damage than X or kill specific SVals. I have a long sword of slay evil, so i probably don´t want a broken dagger holy avenger, when i have 6 blows.

2. The game seems slighty easier (or i´ve got better? second try and clvl 4x)

3. The ammount of crap dropped has risen a *LOT* from 2.9.x (and variants based on)... Now i know why it is not impressive to brag off when one finds 7 egos in [O].... dammit, i´ve found 31 egos and 6 artifacts in ONE vault at dlvl 35! And even thought i was walking in a sea of {excelent} magic stuff, most of them were crap. That char is going on, clvl 41, second [V] char this week.
Point 3 has SEVERAL reverberances... and must be studied with care.

3.a. A solution was already proposed in the feature request page, Mass Identify, but IMHO, Mass Identify is the ugliest, clumsiest way to fix the TMJ problem. It would be like putting a bandaid in an infected wound spewing pus non-stop. There is a thread discussion in the RGRA where some big names, Leon, Bahman, RR and others discussed that some years ago, and by the time the thoughts about Mass Identify were the same as mine.
So please, pretty please, do not implement Mass Identify... and instead focus on fixing TMJ. I have a nice proposal to fix it, if someone wants to hear i can explain. Else, i will implement it in my own variant someday (dreaming) lol

4. BUG: Shift+direction seems not to be working.

5. 4GAI would be nice or 4.5G too... every time i find a monster pit it feels like hiting the jackpot in [V]... in [O] or [Entro] sometimes i have to run all over the level with 30 trolls running after me before i find some teleport lol
well, this would kill the exploit of U turns... and make monsters stop hitting each others... but then i am unaware of the complexities of AI programming. Anyway, just a sugesiton.

About other stuff being planned in the future feature list other than Mass Identify:

6. Teleport Level having a delay? Even if having half a chance of being 1 turn, it would become useless.

7. It would be nice if the detection area would become like the one in FA/O/Heng/Entro, circular, player in center. Because really, the way area detection is now is ugly and goofy, if i set characters small, i can detect all the map in one zap, and if i detect just as i go, i detect some lame rectangle area or must scroll to find the rectangle i wish... is this what is planned as feature?

8. I really like pseudo id as is in the future feature list, masking all cursed items as excelent. It would give ?remove curse and ?*remove curse* some use. But _instant_ pseudo id is something that imho deviates too much... maybe make the time to pseudo slighty faster for all classes?

Everything else in the to-do feature list seems pretty good

EDIT: I just went to the bug tracker to post those bugs, and i see most of them are solved and (YES!) all detection will be circular

[Bandobras]

6. Teleport Level having a delay? Even if having half a chance of being 1 turn, it would become useless.

8. [...]But _instant_ pseudo id is something that imho deviates too much... maybe make the time to pseudo slighty faster for all classes?

I don't agree with you on those two. Why and why?

[Hugo]

I do agree with the former. Teleport Level is the last way out, one that I only use if I see no other option at all. Don't forget that fleeing danger with this spell does come at a price. First, there a 50% chance that you'lll end up even deeper even thought the fact that you had to flee might be an indication that you were too deep already. And second, if you have already stowed lots of nice stash in an empty cornor of the level, ready to take with you when recalling back to town or going to another level, you'll lost that all, forever. Why would I use a spell that has a 50% chance of landing me in even deeper trouble, and a 100% chance of losing all my precious loot if that spell does not at least guarantee me that I'll be rid of my current foes?

Angband is supposed to be a game where death is always caused by some error of the player. That means that the player must always have some way to escape a hopeless situation. Teleporting within the level are not 100% safe, since you might end up next to another non-sleeping nasty. Teleport Other is useless when surrounded. Stair creation takes two turns (one to create the stairs, the second to use them). That leaves only Destruction and Teleport Level as guaranteed escapes. I see no reason to remove one of them from the game.

[Atriel]

Hugo said it all about what i think of teleport level;
If TL receives this nerf, *Destruction* that is already awesome would become uber godly. So a bigger nerf to *Destruction* would be needed to! Maybe a delay to *Destruction* of 1 to 2 turns to counteract the delay to Teleport Level of 0 to 1 turn, just to make them balanced.
In this situation, players would need to preview situations a little bit better, with more detection, more paranoia, etc....
Really, IMHO, better not to mess with them 2.

About pseudo ids, instant pseudo id is a concept that would break long standing conventions rooted in Angband tradition, and more important, is not widely tested variants (but Un/S?) but just making the pseudo id faster would barely change gameplay. Maybe, if instant pseudo id were to be adopted, a chance to a pseudo to be completely wrong based on stats, like in S (good as excelent, some excelent egos as good, excelent as cursed...) should also be implemented, and the real pseudo id would be felt after some time...

[Hugo]

Maybe a delay to *Destruction* of 1 to 2 turns to counteract the delay to Teleport Level of 0 to 1 turn, just to make them balanced.

And that would sacrifice the last guaranteed escape. With no guaranteed escapes in the game anymore, players would have to choose between taking far more risks (and hence ending up with far more inevitable deaths), or always making sure to have enough buffer to withstand at least *TWO* rounds of hostile fire. IOW, people would be encouraged to either play slower and scum more, or play Angband as a game of chance.

I'm glad you brought this up, for I wanted to add this in my previous reply but forgot aboout it - so now I have the chance

Angband needs a guaranteed escape. Not for free - but both Destruction and Teleport Level do already come at a price. In fact, Teleport Level comes at an even higher price than Destruction!

[Bandobras]

Angband is supposed to be a game where death is always caused by some error of the player. That means that the player must always have some way to escape a hopeless situation.

I don't see the implication here. I agree Angband should be fair, that is ideally it should have no unavoidable insta-deaths, just as it should not have insta-deaths delayed by 1 turn if the player cannot escape in 1 turn, delayed by 2 turns if no escape in 2 turns is possible, etc. Basically, it means, players should start in safe places on the level and no monster-generation should occur too close to the player (and traps should take percentage of hit-points, potions should damage only as far as 1 HP, if they are supposed to be tried, monsters should not kill in one shot from outside of detection range, etc., etc.).

But problems with initial placement of player should not be cured by TL or Destruction (I agree Destruction should also be nerfed). And if the player, by her own choices, puts herself in a hopeless situation, why offer her 100% sure escape? I agree it's fun to let her survive, nevertheless, from time to time, by allowing Teleports or any other risky actions or lucky feats. But 100% escape makes surviving hopeless situations a standard and well-calculated practice, not unique events you write on the forum about.

Conlcuding, I think Angband should be fair, but not 100% forgiving (20% for hopeless situations is max). Problems with fairness should not be cured (or rather obscured) by forgiveness. Otherwise you teach people to set and then automatically ignore 30% HP warnings in the early game (it will be forgiven, so what's the problem?) and conscious incorporating hopeless situations into standard late-game tactics (I have 4 TL, so I can afford 4 near-deaths on this level, let's take on that vault!). There is also a mad escalation of monster power and 90% or higher ways of escaping death (huge healing, immunities, TL, Genocide, etc.) instead of a true balance. In the result, O the shame!, most deaths are instadeaths (overpowered monsters) or deaths of boredom (overpowerd escape) instead of a slow, dramatic bleeding to death in an unequal fight, unwisely initiated 30 turns earlier, as an interesting story should have.

[Atriel]

Dude, your ideas are great, but are aeons away of what Angband is now; A real drastic change. But would go nice in a variant!

[Bandobras]

Dude, your ideas are great, but are aeons away of what Angband is now; A real drastic change. But would go nice in a variant!

Thanks. This may be why I like UnAngband. But, I think, Angband is not that far from what I'd like and the real problem is it's going further and further away. Moria, with all its flaws, seems better in terms of hardness consistency, because while it's cruel and unpredictable, at least it does not try to obscure the balance problems with cheap escapes. We are still balancing Angband between "is it winnable?" and "is winning too easy?", instead of "is the average early- or mid-game trip down and back up to town a thrilling experience? is the action well-paced? are dangerous moments spaced evenly and do they usually depend on player previous actions? aren't there too many deus-ex-machine situations?", etc. I think it's worth it to even break the ability to win with TL delay, if it improves the everyday gamepley experience. _Then_ start working on the end-game.

Edit: OK, so I'm unfair: we are also balancing it via "are there still those stupid breakpoints, like FA, BASE, statpotions, conf+blind+sound lock, healing stack for final fight". But too often we balance it like "ok, you have 5 TL now, so you can muck around at 30ft heavily detecting without Base without risk". Or something. It's too cheap.