feature/monster

[Pete Mack]

Always keep in mind that a fully balanced game is a recipe for grinding. It is the imbalances that make for interesting game economy.

[Philip]

I'll probably have some thoughts on this later, but first, before I forget, I wanted to link the thread about Hounds that you asked us to remind you about way back when.

While looking through old threads to find that one (I vaguely remember there being such a thread, and that's basically it) I also found a thread about monster and object density, in which you suggested you would take a look at monster density in the late game.

The main argument I would like to make as regards monsters is that if monsters are going to be more interesting (not all of them have to be, of course, but some will), players need to have a good reason to fight them at depth, or encounter some sort of difficulty in getting rid of them without a fight. If you make dragons very interesting to fight at depth, but the reward is the same as that for killing a pack of orcs or trolls two rooms over, then the mechanical reward and fun are dragging the player in different directions. There are a couple ways of dealing with this. You could make all monsters interesting at depth primarily as a tactical obstacle to get around, though this would likely be a bit boring. You could filter out weak monsters from deeper levels. You could force objects to drop at the level of the monster and not the dungeon. You could use the O system where OOD monsters drop gold instead of their normal drop. Personally I think tying drops to monster level and not dungeon level is the most elegant method, but it's possible that filtering out weak monsters late in the game will turn out to be desirable anyway.

[Nick]

I'm currently working on a thorough re-examination of monster behaviour and the monster list. I'm planning to do this in two parts:

• Implementation of new required code and
• Actual list redo.

The first part should contain some new monster attack types, more complex group behaviour, wandering monsters (awake, but not aware of the player), monster shapechanges, and maybe some other stuff. My current aim is to have this done and out for examination once the current competition is finished, so January 2019. Then the list rework will happen gradually, and with more frequent public updates.