Whatever happened to 'restore artifact'?

[jrodman]

You misunderstand. Go back to my post. I wasn't being insulting or dismissive.

Yes, you were. Your starting point is that the views that were being advanced were just players complaining they don't like stuff being disenchanted, which was already not the case. Then when I answered your specific request you dismissed parts of it as being "just opinion" and thus unimportant, when most of what you posted yourself was in fact just opinion (no claims here as to whether that makes it important or not).

But you probably won't believe me, though it's quite evident you still are going to be doggedly dismissive:

This is to say that arguments that players may feel annoyed by the way disenchant currently works aren't good arguments.

Yes, categorically player enjoyment doesn't matter! Sure, you follow this up with an appeal to empiricism which is impossible in any event. Hogwash.

Player feel is not irrelevant to design, and is indeed a major component.

------

Also I thought 4.0 lets you redefine home size via constants file now, doesn't it? So you can keep alot more arts at home in case one of the three monsters with disenchantment in the endgame biffs your favorite shiny thing?

The bigger home is a nice quality of life change, though it has some flaws (it puts labels on entries that don't work, if you accidentally comment out the line it erases all your items). The flaws are fixable.

I don't think that really addresses the "random disenchanter bats" complaint at the start of the thread though.

[Bimbul]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I just reread the first post in this thread and there's all this debate on a loss of 2 to AC?


How is that game changing or even worth worrying about?

[debo]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I just reread the first post in this thread and there's all this debate on a loss of 2 to AC?


How is that game changing or even worth worrying about?

I don't understand it either. If disenchantment nuked the flags or dice or something on a weapon/armor, I would agree on alot of what was said already. But +hit, +dam, +AC? Who cares. 99% of what makes artefacts good in Angband is the intrinsics.

PosChengband has a death sword class that slowly (VERY SLOWLY) gains intrinsics (resists, brands, etc.) by absorbing weapons. It's almost impossible to get rDisen this way until really, really late in the game. If you get hit by a disenchantment attack, there's a pretty large chance that you'll lose literal hours of character progress in one turn. I think that mechanic is definitely a feels-bad one.

The only mechanic that was as needlessly experience-ruining in V, IMO, was nexus stat swap (i.e. the stupidest thing ever put into Angband.) It has since been defanged, IIRC. And yes, that one still lives on in PosCheng also. But you don't play that variant if you're looking for fairness

[krugar]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I just reread the first post in this thread and there's all this debate on a loss of 2 to AC?

How is that game changing or even worth worrying about?

The discussion rapidly moved into "Angband is not fun because it disenchants your artifacts". A big problem that removes all the enjoyment of the game and that mysteriously went unnoticed all these years until someone complained they lost 2 AC. *shrug*

Frankly, I'm out of this discussion. I stopped enjoying it the moment I'm acussed of being offensive, because apparently people have strong feelings about... something. I just hope that a) disenchant is not removed or nerfed and b) no new item that reverts an item back to what it was gets ever implemented.

[krazyhades]

The discussion about the role or fun of disenchantment comes up all the time if you look for it.

[Bimbul]

Gorlim, betrayer of Barahir is fun. Just tried taking him on with a Cl33 hobbit Rogue I have going.
DL had a 'not much interesting here' feeling but I was nervous went I stepped down the stairs. Turned out to have a whack load of uniques there - Lokkak (dead), queen ant (dead), Uldor the accursed (dead), Vargo Tyrant of fire (dead but took out 8 of my 10 healing potions).

Scatha the worm rocked up and - er no - not yet thanks so I teleported him off.

Last one was Gorlim. Zapped him with a rod of probing and discovered disenchantment was one of his things. So no melee - stood away and fired some arrows at him only to get bolts of raw magic fired at me every single turn.

Telport, recall - fek that. Lol.

I disagree with the 'not much interesting here feeling' - that level was quite 'interesting' enough thanks. Lol. Still got the leather armour hithlomir out of it, which is nice enough.

[Carnivean]

Vargo Tyrant of fire (dead but took out 8 of my 10 healing potions).

Vargo is a gotcha monster. If you're immune or heavily resistant to fire, then he can be a pushover, but otherwise he's a bit tough given that he will never provide a reward worth the risk, or indeed any reward.

[Bimbul]

Yeah I know but I kind of like just being a unique slayer. My reward is the XP gain - which wasn't so bad given I'm only CL33. I always have visions of Morgoth or Sauron summoning all the uniques I haven't killed - if I ever get that far. He did reduce my payload of stuff in my kit rather a lot. Fortunately all the spellbooks he took out were lying around on the floor on the same level.

Gorlim was worth more but not that much considering his dangerous attack - Kavlax seems to be in that territory too. I rather easily took out an 11 headed hydra on the next lvl down for just about the same XP reward.

[Bimbul]

Interesting, my new level (DL45) has the same combination of feelings - I wonder who I can expect this time

(a patriarch, nearly had him dead then he summuned a shedload of Vampire lords, dark elven sorcers and greater demons - I bravely turned my tail and fled)

[Carnivean]

I always have visions of Morgoth or Sauron summoning all the uniques I haven't killed - if I ever get that far.

They do that. That's when you want to see Vargo around, rather than a stronger unique or strong undead in his place.

On the other hand, if you're having fun keep it up.

[Malak Darkhunter]

I remember disenchanter bats being highly annoying way back to moria days..but that is how they where intended to be. You rarely keep same equipment for an extended period of time unless you are preparing for endgame so you are discarding old used equipment anyways. Like what was stated earlier it's annoying, but it's kind of the same concept as acid damage, it happens and you can enchant back up. Once you make the effort to enchant items such as "Calris" to be more usable, things like this isn't that big a deal or very different. having a +9+9 favorite artifact really isn't that bad because they are still good. you can always get at least that through enchantment and keep on swinging until you find something better.

My question is, since the game has evolved to become less time consuming and faster and attempts to remove irritating game behavior seems to be the way nowdays. Is disenchantment one of those aggravating game behaviors needing to be nerfed, and artifacts just given full immunity? Stop the player from having to waste time with efforts to enchant back up?

-You find nice pair of pants on floor -More-
-you put them on- More-
-You are Disenchanted!-.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

My question is, since the game has evolved to become less time consuming and faster and attempts to remove irritating game behavior seems to be the way nowdays. Is disenchantment one of those aggravating game behaviors needing to be nerfed, and artifacts just given full immunity? Stop the player from having to waste time with efforts to enchant back up?

From what I can tell from this thread, opinion is split. I'm more in the "It ain't broke, so don't fix it" camp. I never wasted time enchanting artifacts back up from disenchantment. (Although I do enchant up weapons like Sting, The Glaive of Pain, or, rarely, Calris, as much as I can. ) To me disenchantment is the same as acid damage. Sure, artifacts are immune to acid, but egos aren't and often they're better than artifacts. I just avoid getting important items disenchanted. If I find a very early fabulous weapon before getting rDis, I'm doubly careful. An early Trident of Wrath will not be used against Mim, and his kin, unless @ is twice as fast and can just wail and bail on each swing. Disenchanter bats and molds get taken out with ranged attacks.

I don't think disenchantment is just an irritating game behavior. The early disenchanters are a warning of the truly dangerous ones that lie ahead. Removing it doesn't make monsters less aggravating, it makes them less dangerous. Why not just remove Mana Storm while we're at it since it destroys loot on the ground? Let's make Morgoth into a milquetoast and give trophies to all the kids simply because they participate?

[Bimbul]

They do that. That's when you want to see Vargo around, rather than a stronger unique or strong undead in his place.

That's a good point, Vargo is definitely better than having a black reaver summoned.

Although a massive pack of disenchanter bats in such a scenario would be a royal pain. I've not seen such a thing as disnchanter hounds - do they exist?

[Malak Darkhunter]

From what I can tell from this thread, opinion is split. I'm more in the "It ain't broke, so don't fix it" camp. I never wasted time enchanting artifacts back up from disenchantment. (Although I do enchant up weapons like Sting, The Glaive of Pain, or, rarely, Calris, as much as I can. ) To me disenchantment is the same as acid damage. Sure, artifacts are immune to acid, but egos aren't and often they're better than artifacts. I just avoid getting important items disenchanted. If I find a very early fabulous weapon before getting rDis, I'm doubly careful. An early Trident of Wrath will not be used against Mim, and his kin, unless @ is twice as fast and can just wail and bail on each swing. Disenchanter bats and molds get taken out with ranged attacks.

I don't think disenchantment is just an irritating game behavior. The early disenchanters are a warning of the truly dangerous ones that lie ahead. Removing it doesn't make monsters less aggravating, it makes them less dangerous. Why not just remove Mana Storm while we're at it since it destroys loot on the ground? Let's make Morgoth into a milquetoast and give trophies to all the kids simply because they participate?

Yeah I don't really have a problem with disenchantment as it is, I usually play carefully against known disenchanters. I rarely play with artifacts anymore, I find more of a challenge without them and a certain joy in the simplicity without them. I'm thinking disenchant is one of those things that teach you to be more careful, and to change it makes game easier.

[Bimbul]

I have a high elf rogue going too at the moment (different computers - hey why not) - this game is going to really annoy the original poster. Currently I have 3 pieces of kit with rDisen - a small metal shield of preservation, something (I forget) of elvenkind back at home and I've just found a small metal shield of elvenkind that is going to get discarded because, pfft, this shit is easy to find - lmao.

Sorry

[oh dear - now I have Anduril too - 4 x rDisen :-P)