Angband Philosophy III: Theme, Races and Monsters

[PowerWyrm]

Isn't one of the monsters even named for some annoying git the original developers knew, or is that just apocryphal?

That's Draebor.

[Nick]

Even FAAngband doesn't always hew specifically to Tolkien. Isn't one of the monsters even named for some annoying git the original developers knew, or is that just apocryphal?

IIRC Draebor was named after a fellow student of the original Angband developers.

When I first released FA 0.1.0 in 2005 Sampsa Lahtonen sent me so many bug reports (signing himself The Bug Reporter or The Complainer) that I threatened to name a unique after him. Memories...

[wobbly]

A suggestion with the biggest dragons. I understand why ancient dragons waste turns on junk spells but why do great drakes do the same? A great storm wyrm breathes 1 in 16? & wastes 3 in 16 on junk spells (could have those wrong). I'm not sure why you wouldn't want it going at the player in melee instead. You could fold a status effect into the breath. Electric-blind instead of cast blindness or similar.

[Pete Mack]

Because big elemental breaths are brutal to warriors (and big electric breaths are brutal to pre-heal-spell paladins.) Remove those junk spells and warriors will never fight wyrms without immunity (rather than just rarely do so.)

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Just a thought, the fact that Angband is not "strictly" Tolkienien may be a saving grace from copyright infringement.

[debo]

Cyberdemons pls.

[Gwarl]

You know I read this post & your previous & I'm still trying to work out what you're actually saying. I mean maybe your saying the current situation is balanced because it came from Moria & Moria is awesome. Maybe your saying it isn't because it was balanced for Moria & the game isn't Moria anymore. Shrug. I can agree with using the FA list just as I can agree with using Vs current list or Os list all of which work in various ways despite their issues. I would hope kobolds make it in renamed or not because they are fun & it'd suck to lose a working race that's fun to play.

2nd one. Moria was an imperfect game but it fit one man's vision of what choosing between races should be like. Dunadan and high elf stick out like a sore thumb in the angband race list with good reason; they don't fit in with the general scheme of the other races.

When talking about balance I just feel we should keep in mind which things are balanced over which other things, so we can know where we're starting over from.

[Derakon]

Your beloved half-trolls also weren't in Moria. Just sayin'.

[Mondkalb]

In FAangband Nick lets some of the "better" races start in more dangerous environments, some given a few levels and equipment extras.

Maybe that could be a trade-off for better starting stats - throw them a few levels deeper in the dungeon?

[Voovus]

Your beloved half-trolls also weren't in Moria. Just sayin'.

Um. What? Moria races were: Human, Half-Elf, Elf, Halfling, Gnome, Dwarf, Half-Orc and Half-Troll. Yes, I have Moria open in another window.

[Derakon]

Um. What? Moria races were: Human, Half-Elf, Elf, Halfling, Gnome, Dwarf, Half-Orc and Half-Troll. Yes, I have Moria open in another window.

How odd. The Moria I remember playing stopped at Half-Orc. I distinctly remember looking at the Half-Troll and wondering why I would bother with Half-Orcs any more because the trolls did everything the orcs did and more.

[PowerWyrm]

One thing to do with monsters: increase the rarity of the C family. Currently, it's not Angband, but Wolfband.

[wobbly]

Played the start with a dwarf warrior. There was 15 dlvl of pure boredom then a sudden danger spike when packs of gnome mages & big dark elf packs start. Surely better to bleed some of that spike into the levels leading up to it?

[wobbly]

Master mystics are important but bleargh theme-wise
Trolls are thematic but become boring
Troll master mystic is hilarious but not quite right
Trolls with knockout are thematic
Somewhere in there is better theme with similar gameplay

[Derakon]

You could maybe make the Troll Chieftan have Mystic-style stunning melee, and make Troll Priests able to summon natural monsters. Then the combination of the two (often appearing together thanks to the Chieftan's escorts) would roughly equal a Master Mystic.