Movement Speed?

[sffp]

So Movement Speed still has not been clearly defined. It's still completely undocumented for a new-comer to Angband. This is a Newb Trap. It should be removed from vanilla and kicked back out to the off-shoots.

I've seen some of your posts in other threads. You make some good points/suggestions occasionally. But here you really sound like a petulant child.

Nick and the others do work. You're taking shots from the peanut gallery.
Maybe take the tone down a little.

[NCountr]

The Mother of All Reviews

This effect only happens for powerful monsters (POWERFUL flag or spell power 80 or more), and if the damage after resistance is greater than 500, and if it passes a random roll. So a player with a single source of RCold hit by a maximum strength cold breath from a powerful monster has a one in 16 chance of DEX damage. A player with double resist has zero chance.

Incorrect. I had double-resist on at the time, so the code's broken or the algorithm is.

These happen far more often than you may think.
The stench sickens you. ... and CON goes down? Seriously?

The point is not to make semi-random side-effects for POWERFUL mobs to counter what has happened over the years to player equipment.

Nick -- you've done great work in making the dungeons more interesting. The layouts of normal levels are far better compared to what we had in 3.0. Kudos for that. The cavern and vault levels are still annoying and ought to be removed completely.

But, adding in STAT damage for powerful mobs using basic elemental attacks calls into question the whole ramification for "resists". The basic argument back in 3.x was players were having it too easy with simple resists, so double-resists were required to stave off POWERFUL mobs at that point. But then player equipment ratcheted up in power to make it easier for players to have double-resists anyway.

Then came plasma... <insert_eye_roll> . The fire that could over-power RFire. Because too many players were having it too easy with double-resists. Oh, and mages were too powerful, as always.

Now we have a plethora of undefensible attacks: mana, plasma, water (one of my favorites), ice, gravity, force (because that sounds so different from gravity), and of course ... Time.

With the exception of mana, all of those should be stricken from the game. The whole paradigm of how one poses obstacles and impediments to the progress of the character needs a huge overhaul. You should not be adding petty penalties willy-nilly to players---who, for all practical purposes, play the game in a cogent manner. Some of the mob tactics have improved to make tackling them more of a challenge, that is good. I like how you've broadened their activities; the packs of unrulings are great fun.

- While player power in general, with mob power, has been in disarray for quite some time, the point of Angband is what? To make it so a player who's trudged through 50-levels suddenly get trounced by an unexpected, indefensible attack at 3500' ? or, in the case of STAT reduction, plinked away at by those over-whelming elemental attacks? Is that how you intend to improve Angband?

For me, traditionally, Angband has been about navigating the higher mobs and uniques past 2000' to get to Morgoth and finishing the game. The life-threatening part is typically < 2000'. I think that's always been the case and I'm rather fine with that. I can start over sooner. Now, I'm wondering what sort of extra-punch the U's and D's might have that here-to-fore double-resist handled because someone, some time ago, whined that his win was too-easy and mobs should be harder. Maybe next time, tell him to put down his Mace of Disruption of Extra Attacks and play without it. Why penalize everyone else because his warrior has 8-10 swings a round (I guess more with Movement Speed bonuses now) and 1200+ health?

[NCountr]

I've seen some of your posts in other threads. You make some good points/suggestions occasionally. But here you really sound like a petulant child.

Nick and the others do work. You're taking shots from the peanut gallery.
Maybe take the tone down a little.

I'm still wondering what "Movement Speed" is. I've had a character with +2 Movement speed on for some time now, and I still cannot comprehend how or what it is. I've not seen a FAQ for it. No discussion of it other than in this thread here. So... what is it?

Frankly, I'm not here to appease everyone and be all chummy. I think that's how we've seen a lot of Feature Creep happen to the game over the years. Sure, I'm in the Peanut Gallery, but aside from Nick, who isn't? Nor does it invalidate some of my data points.

[archolewa]

Frankly, I'm not here to appease everyone and be all chummy.

Then why are you here? I understand not wanting to appease everyone, thats a fools errand. Someones going to be annoyed anout something in any group larger than 0.

But this is a forum for people to come together and discuss a game that they all love. The *whole point* is to be chummy and discuss the finer points of the game, talk about things they dont like, things they do and changes they'd like to see made (and not made) in the future, and yes even have disagreements. However, it is completely possible to have arguments without belligerence.

So if you aren't here to be chummy, I ask again, *why are you here*?

[Ed_47569]

Then came plasma... <insert_eye_roll> . The fire that could over-power RFire. Because too many players were having it too easy with double-resists. Oh, and mages were too powerful, as always.

Now we have a plethora of undefensible attacks: mana, plasma, water (one of my favorites), ice, gravity, force (because that sounds so different from gravity), and of course ... Time.

I am pretty sure all of these have been in the game since 2.4 (Frog-Knows). I wonder if any of the old Warwick people who might lurk on this forum could confirm?

As for the stat-drain with elemental breaths, I remember that being a thing around version 2.5.x or 2.6.x when Charles Swiger was briefly the maintainer. I think that was removed by Ben for 2.7.x. In any case, it's so rare that it is almost inconsequential. By the time you encounter such attacks you will have plenty of options for restoring stats.

[Nick]

I'm still wondering what "Movement Speed" is. I've had a character with +2 Movement speed on for some time now, and I still cannot comprehend how or what it is. I've not seen a FAQ for it. No discussion of it other than in this thread here. So... what is it?

It's like extra shots, but for movement. +1 movement speed will mean that each step you walk will take 1/2 the energy it normally does; +2 will make that 1/3. Many game mechanics don't have explicit description of how they work, just a suggestive name and the rest is for the player to discover.

[Nick]

Sure, I'm in the Peanut Gallery, but aside from Nick, who isn't?

Well, there's these people.

[NCountr]

It's like extra shots, but for movement. +1 movement speed will mean that each step you walk will take 1/2 the energy it normally does; +2 will make that 1/3. Many game mechanics don't have explicit description of how they work, just a suggestive name and the rest is for the player to discover.

&#189; the energy? How much "energy" does it take to take a step normally?
For all the belly-aching about Newb Traps, how about Inexplicable Senior Moments? Where is this "energy" defined?

[NCountr]

I ask again, *why are you here*?

I could give a cryptic answer ala Nick here, but I'll give you a terse answer: to improve the game.

I don't see why being chummy is a prerequisite to that end. Seriously, how far has that gotten the game in the past few years?

[Pete Mack]

Whatever your speed, 2 steps at +1 moves takes 1 player turn. At +2, you get 3 steps. I dont know why you find this difficult.

[Nick]

Incorrect. I had double-resist on at the time, so the code's broken or the algorithm is.

OK, here's the code for the powerful attack side-effect:

	/* Occasional side-effects for powerful cold attacks */
	if (context->power >= 80) {
		if (randint0(context->dam) > 500) {
			msg("The cold seeps into your bones.");
			effect_simple(EF_DRAIN_STAT, source_none(), "0", STAT_DEX, 0, 0, 0,
						  0, &context->obvious);
		}

context->power is the spell power of the monster, or 80 if the monster has the POWERFUL flag. context->dam is damage after adjusting for resistance - if you have double resist, that random value can only be more than 500 if the original damage is more than 4500, which is well over the 1600 cap on cold damage.

So the other possibility is that damage isn't being adjusted correctly. I can't absolutely rule that out, but that function has been essentially unchanged for 4 years, and I would expect it would have been noticed before. I've checked where temporary resists are applied, and that also looks OK.

On the other hand, maybe your temporary resist had run out without you noticing, or maybe you had a curse giving cold vulnerability.

Has anyone else experienced this issue?

[NCountr]

The stench sickens you.

OK, here's the code for the powerful attack side-effect:

	/* Occasional side-effects for powerful cold attacks */
	if (context->power >= 80) {
		if (randint0(context->dam) > 500) {
			msg("The cold seeps into your bones.");
			effect_simple(EF_DRAIN_STAT, source_none(), "0", STAT_DEX, 0, 0, 0,
						  0, &context->obvious);
		}

context->power is the spell power of the monster, or 80 if the monster has the POWERFUL flag. context->dam is damage after adjusting for resistance - if you have double resist, that random value can only be more than 500 if the original damage is more than 4500, which is well over the 1600 cap on cold damage.

So the other possibility is that damage isn't being adjusted correctly. I can't absolutely rule that out, but that function has been essentially unchanged for 4 years, and I would expect it would have been noticed before. I've checked where temporary resists are applied, and that also looks OK.

On the other hand, maybe your temporary resist had run out without you noticing, or maybe you had a curse giving cold vulnerability.

Has anyone else experienced this issue?

Confirmed. Bile demon with double-resist Poison up, still losing CON on each breath. I'll look at the code in a bit. Maybe I can locate the logic-bug.

[NCountr]

Whatever your speed, 2 steps at +1 moves takes 1 player turn. At +2, you get 3 steps. I dont know why you find this difficult.

So, how is that not Speed +10, then?

[Nick]

Confirmed. Bile demon with double-resist Poison up, still losing CON on each breath. I'll look at the code in a bit. Maybe I can locate the logic-bug.

Bile demon is going to be breathing poison for 800, so single resisted would be 266 and double-resisted 88. The relevant side-effect code is

		if (randint0(context->dam) > 200) {
			msg("The stench sickens you.");
			effect_simple(EF_DRAIN_STAT, source_none(), "0", STAT_CON, 0, 0, 0,
						  0, &context->obvious);
		}

As far as I can see this means context->dam must be > 200, which makes it look like damage adjustment is not working correctly. It shouldn't be a cap not being applied issue, as uncapped the unresisted damage at full HP would be 808. I don't suppose you noticed how much damage the breath was doing?

[Pete Mack]

Because moves are steps, and moves are applied AFTER speed, so a +1 moves player with +10 speed. can walk or run 4x faster than normal speed. This is exactly how shots work, though shots are in units of 0.1 (4.2.0 and later only.)

So, how is that not Speed +10, then?