Returning to the dungeon

[Angdrim]

Hello All,

I'm new here, but not new to Angband. I started playing in the mid/late 90s. The version I was playing was probably something around 2.7, although I don't actually remember the number. After playing on-and-off for about ten years, in 2005 or so I finally had a winning character (still playing the old version from the 90s). After that I stopped playing Angband.

Fifteen years later the coronavirus hit, and I was bored at home, and Angband used to be my favorite computer game, so I downloaded the new version. I've been playing 4.2.0 for several months, and already have a pair of winning characters, including an ironman win. (Human paladin and elf rogue, respectively.)

It's still basically the same game that I remember, but there have been some pretty shocking changes. My first reaction is that it feels like Angband on amphetamines. Everything comes at you more quickly. You can dive faster and get better stuff earlier and more frequently. No more spending the first day or so of a new @ throwing iron spikes at white worm masses.

The net effect of the differences between 2.?.? and 4.2.0 is to make the game MUCH easier.

I'm curious to see how accurate my recollections of the old game are, so I tried to download 2.7.4, but it won't run on my computer. Probably because it was written for Windows 95 (or whatever). Does anybody know how to get a copy of an old version that will run on Windows 10?

Thanks in advance. I'm glad to be back.

[Selkie]

I'd forgotten about iron spikes. I seem to remember jamming doors shut with them for some reason.

[fph]

Angband.live has version 2.9.3 playable online, if that is old enough for your test.

[Sideways]

Welcome back to Angband!

There's a lot of old Angband versions, including old Windows releases, on rephial; you can check which of them still work on Windows 10. (For really old versions like 2.7.8 you can try downloading the DOS version and running it through DOSBox.)

The big easification started at 3.0.0, so anything before that should be fairly difficult; some 2.x versions might be easier than others, but all are devilishly hard compared to 3.x and 4.x.

[Angdrim]

Thanks! I'll try out angband.live, although the version that I was playing was certainly older than that. There were still ghosts of old characters, and they seem to have been taken out prior to 2.9.3.

A few questions:

Is walking on lava immediately deadly? Lava didn't exist last time I played Angband. I found a vault with a pool of lava and some items on an island in the middle of it. You can't phase door in a vault (and hope to land on the island); being scared of walking on lava the only thing I could think to do was to cause some earthquakes and hope that the items don't get squished. (And unfortunately I didn't have anything to cause earthquakes.)

Why is there lava in town? I mean, if you can go DOWN to get to Angband, the town must be perched on the top of Thangorodrim, which was volcanic, so maybe that's the reason?

Does Calris still exist? I haven't found in on any of my trips through the dungeon. Sure, it aggravated monsters, but I loved that beast of a sword.

[Sideways]

Is walking on lava immediately deadly?

Walking into lava causes a fair bit of damage and can kill an early-game character outright, but a mid-game or late-game character should have enough HP to survive, and fire resistance helps.

Does Calris still exist? I haven't found in on any of my trips through the dungeon. Sure, it aggravated monsters, but I loved that beast of a sword.

Calris still exists, and still aggravates monsters, though like most old artifacts it has been modified somewhat since 2.x.

[Adam]

Walking into lava causes a fair bit of damage and can kill an early-game character outright, but a mid-game or late-game character should have enough HP to survive, and fire resistance helps.

And fire immunity makes you suffer no damage in lava. Be aware that big fire breathers can cause tiles turn into lava.

[Bill Peterson]

Hello All,

Does anybody know how to get a copy of an old version that will run on Windows 10?

Thanks in advance. I'm glad to be back.

OmnibandTk is Angband 2.9.3 and runs on Windows 10. If you want gameplay to be the same as Vanilla 2.9.3 you do have to set certain options.

[Selkie]

Does Calris still exist? I haven't found in on any of my trips through the dungeon. Sure, it aggravated monsters, but I loved that beast of a sword.

Funnily enough I found Calris yesterday but it was useless for my gnome mage despite +5 Constitution. Provides resistance to disenchantment which is rarer than most resistances, but it is cursed and makes it hard to hit anything. I'm using the pike Tiliarc instead which has +3 strength and intelligence and +2 speed.

[invisibletroll]

Angband and Nethack were difficult or impossible to play for many Amiga users because of the system requirements. Many people just don't realize that kind of things. They think everyone had the money back in the days.

[fph]

Why is there lava in town? I mean, if you can go DOWN to get to Angband, the town must be perched on the top of Thangorodrim, which was volcanic, so maybe that's the reason?

If I remember correctly, it was added also to showcase the new terrain type when it was added to the game. So that players do not see it for the first time in a deep vault.
I think that the long-term program is to make more extensive use of different terrain types in the dungeon, but there are lots of things on the developers' plate right now.

[Pete Mack]

Correct. It also was intended as simple decoration. It is encoded as 2+d3 lava streamers. In principle, you could extinguish them with dragon breath/cold ball wands.

[Ed_47569]

Hello All,

I'm new here, but not new to Angband. I started playing in the mid/late 90s. The version I was playing was probably something around 2.7, although I don't actually remember the number. After playing on-and-off for about ten years, in 2005 or so I finally had a winning character (still playing the old version from the 90s). After that I stopped playing Angband.

It's still basically the same game that I remember, but there have been some pretty shocking changes. My first reaction is that it feels like Angband on amphetamines. Everything comes at you more quickly. You can dive faster and get better stuff earlier and more frequently. No more spending the first day or so of a new @ throwing iron spikes at white worm masses.

The net effect of the differences between 2.?.? and 4.2.0 is to make the game MUCH easier.

Thanks in advance. I'm glad to be back.

Welcome back, I started playing uMoria on the old Acorn Archimedes computers at my school in the 1990s, didn't even know about Angband until one of the older students tipped me off! First Angband version I played was 2.7.x but didn't win legitimately until 3.0.5. The game certainly became easier with version 3.0, which added new ego items and artefacts, plus beefed up many existing artefacts. Some of the most dangerous monsters like Dracolich / Dracolisk were moved from 2250' to 2750' and so on, in an attempt to stop scumming for certain resistances at 2000'. Speed items also became more common.

Probably the easiest versions were around 3.1 / 3.2, but since then balance has improved significantly. Version 4.2 onward has made the game significantly harder again, with a large reworking of the monster list. I find I lose many more characters now (mostly play warriors) than I did with 4.1.3 and earlier. The lower levels in particular are much harder than before.

All in all I would say the current game balance and improved UI has made it the most enjoyable since I started playing.

[Sky]

i remember in 2.something, doors where completely different - it took a lot of time to open one (a remnant of D&D's pick locks skill), mobs also took longer to open them, and you could spike the door shut, forcing mobs to have to either bash it, or find another way around.

I'm not really sure how the change happened, but back then, i welcomed it - it may have taken away some of the tactical depth, but opening doors by just walking up to them was sooooo much easier.

Also, puts the Destroy Doors scrolls into another perspective - there was a time when these things were actually useful!

[Selkie]

I remember when there was a charisma stat and the only thing it affected was the cost of buying/selling in shops.

Half trolls had such low charisma that sometimes racist shop keepers wouldn't even let you through the door.

Not sure what version got rid of charisma, but Angband died that day /s