Rune-based ID

[Derakon]

My instinct is just attempt to increase the enchantment as currently; base AC is physical properties, + to_a is magical. Acid damaged gear can't be fixed.

If that's too irksome, we can add a Scroll of Repairing that restores a point of non-magical AC to damaged armor. I can't imagine it'd be too difficult to implement.

[Nick]

Then what would enchant armor scrolls do?
1) If acid damage, scroll fixes all acid damage, then adds magical bonus upon subsequent reading?

2) Tries to add +1 to acid and +1 to magical bonus?

3) randomly picks either acid or magical bonus?

My instinct is just attempt to increase the enchantment as currently; base AC is physical properties, + to_a is magical. Acid damaged gear can't be fixed.

[bio_hazard]

Two letter effects?



Actually, I think this throws up a problem with acid damage. Disenchantment reducing armor enchantments makes sense; acid doing so doesn't. My suggested fix is that acid reduces the base armor class.

Then what would enchant armor scrolls do?
1) If acid damage, scroll fixes all acid damage, then adds magical bonus upon subsequent reading?

2) Tries to add +1 to acid and +1 to magical bonus?

3) randomly picks either acid or magical bonus?

[Nomad]

So far, we've been calling this ID system "rune-based". At least in my mind, though, it has not been explicit that, for example, every item with resist fire has a particular physical rune engraved (stamped, burned, whatever) onto it which gives it the "makes the player resist fire" property. I have just taken learning the resist fire rune to mean being able to detect on inspection that the item gives resist fire.

I'm starting to think, though, that it should actually be made explicit that items carry physical runes. In particular, if we want to be able to examine what runes the player has learned, and get explicit messages on learning a new one, then the hand-wavy ambiguous approach starts to become confusing.

This was how it was handled in v4 with the affix system, and I think it worked pretty well there. Individual runes had randomly generated names in the same way as scrolls (I put together a bunch of vaguely Norse sounding seed names as a third section in names.txt, which are still available here if you wanted to recycle them) and had their own section on the knowledge menu. So when you inspected an item you could e.g. see that it had the known rune "Resist Fire" plus unknown runes named Ogg, Norn and Knud. Which is handy from an inventory management perspective because you can then see that, say, both those helmets you're carrying have the same rune and you can safely ditch one of them.

[Nick]

I think that approach is best. You should be able to Inspect an item and know it's properties and then you should also be able to know that it has N unknown properties. Those could be given two letter effects as well.

Two letter effects?

You can then have a new knowledge screen along with objects and monsters etc. that has runes.

Agreed.

Innate properties of an item should not be bestowed by a rune. A longsword isn't 2d5 because it has a Rune of 2d5 Dice inscribed on it; it's 2d5 because that's the damage that you take when you get whacked in the face by a sharp piece of steel of that size. IMO this speaks towards such "basic properties" (dice and base AC) being automatically known.

Eloquently put

When your average armor gets hit by acid, it suddenly acquires a negative AC rune. This is weird, but I think it's also enough of an edge case that it's not really worth worrying about.

Actually, I think this throws up a problem with acid damage. Disenchantment reducing armor enchantments makes sense; acid doing so doesn't. My suggested fix is that acid reduces the base armor class.

[Derakon]

So far, we've been calling this ID system "rune-based". At least in my mind, though, it has not been explicit that, for example, every item with resist fire has a particular physical rune engraved (stamped, burned, whatever) onto it which gives it the "makes the player resist fire" property. I have just taken learning the resist fire rune to mean being able to detect on inspection that the item gives resist fire.

I'm starting to think, though, that it should actually be made explicit that items carry physical runes. In particular, if we want to be able to examine what runes the player has learned, and get explicit messages on learning a new one, then the hand-wavy ambiguous approach starts to become confusing.

Opinions?

I see no harm in explicitly labeling things as runes. Well okay, I do see two potential issues:

1) Innate properties of an item should not be bestowed by a rune. A longsword isn't 2d5 because it has a Rune of 2d5 Dice inscribed on it; it's 2d5 because that's the damage that you take when you get whacked in the face by a sharp piece of steel of that size. IMO this speaks towards such "basic properties" (dice and base AC) being automatically known.

2) When your average armor gets hit by acid, it suddenly acquires a negative AC rune. This is weird, but I think it's also enough of an edge case that it's not really worth worrying about.

[fizzix]

So far, we've been calling this ID system "rune-based". At least in my mind, though, it has not been explicit that, for example, every item with resist fire has a particular physical rune engraved (stamped, burned, whatever) onto it which gives it the "makes the player resist fire" property. I have just taken learning the resist fire rune to mean being able to detect on inspection that the item gives resist fire.

I'm starting to think, though, that it should actually be made explicit that items carry physical runes. In particular, if we want to be able to examine what runes the player has learned, and get explicit messages on learning a new one, then the hand-wavy ambiguous approach starts to become confusing.

Opinions?

I think that approach is best. You should be able to Inspect an item and know it's properties and then you should also be able to know that it has N unknown properties. Those could be given two letter effects as well.

You can then have a new knowledge screen along with objects and monsters etc. that has runes.

[Nick]

A point of terminology

So far, we've been calling this ID system "rune-based". At least in my mind, though, it has not been explicit that, for example, every item with resist fire has a particular physical rune engraved (stamped, burned, whatever) onto it which gives it the "makes the player resist fire" property. I have just taken learning the resist fire rune to mean being able to detect on inspection that the item gives resist fire.

I'm starting to think, though, that it should actually be made explicit that items carry physical runes. In particular, if we want to be able to examine what runes the player has learned, and get explicit messages on learning a new one, then the hand-wavy ambiguous approach starts to become confusing.

Opinions?

[Derakon]

Nice to see that rune-ID has come full circle and we are back to using consumables to ID stuff. :^)

*rimshot*

The difference being that now, you only have to ID things once! Also, presumably the rarities of these items will be set so that you will still want to make use of ID-by-use when possible.

[nikheizen]

Nice to see that rune-ID has come full circle and we are back to using consumables to ID stuff. :^)

[Derakon]

This assumes that all attributes are identified by dl 70, which is the (rather surprising) max depth for the DI scroll.

Yeah, once Nick provides a working "identify random rune" implementation, I'll happily add a scroll ("Scroll of Runes"?) that invokes it, which should fix that issue, by allowing players to learn runes that they haven't seen on gear before (like ESP, drain experience, etc.).

I took a quick look at the existing learn-rune functions (obj_learn_unknown_rune and player_learn_everything are the chief suspects), though, and didn't see an obvious easy way to make a randomized version, though. If this were Python I'd create a mapping of unlearned runes to lambdas that call the function to learn that rune, and then select a random key from the mapping...maybe something similar can be done in C. But my knowledge of C is sufficiently out-of-date that I didn't want to try it.

[Pete Mack]

This assumes that all attributes are identified by dl 70, which is the (rather surprising) max depth for the DI scroll.

I just copied the Scroll of Detect Invisible entry (adjacent in the item list) when I made the Scroll of Identify entry, so unless Nick bothers to adjust things, they'll be pretty common but not sold in shops.

[GenericPseudonym]

Some quality of life things which I think would improve things.

I think almost all flavored items should be ID'd immediately on use regardless of whether the effect is noticeable. The comp character (a kobold rogue) can never ID-by-use potions of neutralize poison, for example. All potions and scrolls should be ID'd immediately.

Effects that would do something if you are damaged, or have a status effect but don't do anything otherwise should also be ID'd. This includes curing, cure light wounds etc. Other utility items should also be ID'd as well, detect evil/invisible and probing.

The only thing that should not be ID'd are wands and staves that affect monsters. And you should be given a message to that extent. Something like, there are no monsters to notice the effect.

Ok enough about that.

The fact that stores don't give the base value is really weird. Can it even be learned? I bought some boots from the armorer and I still don't "know" what the base value is, even though I know the pluses. Is this really intended?

Either you're doing some stuff out of order with wizmode or something broke.

My character started without knowledge of the base armor values of his gear, but learned them the first time he took a hit.

I'm not sure if weapon enchantment is the same rune as armor enchantment, but if it is you might get the problem you're having if you ID an enchanted weapon before ever being hit by a monster, probably as a result of wizmoding things.

[spara]

The fact that stores don't give the base value is really weird. Can it even be learned? I bought some boots from the armorer and I still don't "know" what the base value is, even though I know the pluses. Is this really intended?

Try some meleeing, then drop them and pick them up again. There seems to be a bug there.

[spara]

Think of the non-target one not as a magical scroll but just a leaf out a book telling you what powers that particular rune endows?

And the reason for the scroll to always identify an unknown rune is that @ automatically ignores the known ones. Works for me. By the way, the game could automagically stop spawning runes once @ has learned the last rune. Sort of auto ignore.