Z+Angband 0.3.0 beta released!

[Mangojuice]

Ah, that's pretty spiffy
Say, I think I found a real bug though - if you haven't learned a spell yet, its fail rate is displayed higher than it "should" be - that is, it goes down a bit when you actually learn the spell! It's as if it's treating it as having "zero" levels of specialization (which it does) - even though it's never possible to cast a spell without learning it! (Though that would be an interesting feature... )

Thanks, already fixed in my dev version.

[Mangojuice]

Yes, I'm using 0.3.1. I just reproduced it with a brand new character by entering the dungeon and then shutting down the Z+ process from the task manager. I'll send you a savefile.

Let me know what OS you use, too, just in case that matters.

[RogerN]

I just tried to reproduce that and it didn't work. You are using 0.3.0 or 0.3.1, right? The old ones did have a problem. The only one of my ".auto" backups I couldn't load properly was one for a dead character.

Yes, I'm using 0.3.1. I just reproduced it with a brand new character by entering the dungeon and then shutting down the Z+ process from the task manager. I'll send you a savefile.

[ekolis]

Ah, that's pretty spiffy
Say, I think I found a real bug though - if you haven't learned a spell yet, its fail rate is displayed higher than it "should" be - that is, it goes down a bit when you actually learn the spell! It's as if it's treating it as having "zero" levels of specialization (which it does) - even though it's never possible to cast a spell without learning it! (Though that would be an interesting feature... )

[Mangojuice]

When playing a priestly caster, are you SUPPOSED to get that "Do you want to learn such-and-such prayer" prompt every time you gain a prayer? It seems that it might be exploitable, if the random seed isn't saved somewhere in the savefile - otherwise you could keep hitting "N" until you get the prayer you want!

It's not as good as you think. If you say no, it'll give you a different prayer whether you want that one or not. And sometimes both randomly selected prayers will be the same and then you'll just get that one.

[ekolis]

When playing a priestly caster, are you SUPPOSED to get that "Do you want to learn such-and-such prayer" prompt every time you gain a prayer? It seems that it might be exploitable, if the random seed isn't saved somewhere in the savefile - otherwise you could keep hitting "N" until you get the prayer you want!

[Mangojuice]

Is it just me, or is the autosave function completely broken? If I manually save my character (Ctrl+S) then it loads fine. But any time Z+ does an autosave (such as when entering a new level), I cannot restore from that file. The application freezes or crashes when I attempt to load it. I lost a rather promising character this way The game crashed shortly after an autosave, and I lost the entire character because the savefile was corrupted.

I just tried to reproduce that and it didn't work. You are using 0.3.0 or 0.3.1, right? The old ones did have a problem. The only one of my ".auto" backups I couldn't load properly was one for a dead character.

[Mangojuice]

Still using 3.0 and I know the quiver is still experimental, but...

There seems to be a minor quiver problem... I have a light crossbow equipped and steel bolts in my quiver (inventory slot q).

If I press f, to fire, it asks fire which item, but displays no items to choose from. If I then press q (my quiver) it displays the content of my quivers as it should.

Ah. It should have displayed your quiver as a choice in the first menu; that's a bug.

A minor annoyance, but an annoyance none the less. And even once it is fixed, it seems it would still take 2 keystrokes to select an ammo (the quiver, then the ammo).
Solution: If a player has no ammo other than that in his quiver, why not simply display the ammo in his quiver by default.

EDIT: also the n (repeat) doesn't work after firing from the quiver. To repeat, you must press esc (clear), f (fire), q (quiver), a (ammo), then target and select. Needless to say, I'll be parking my quiver at home for a while.

The best way to use ammo out of your quiver is to inscribe it, e.g. with "@f1". Then you just press "1" when selecting your ammo and it chooses that batch of ammo, so you avoid the 2-keystroke thing. Unfortunately, both ways don't work properly with repeat, which I'll try to fix next version.

[buzzkill]

Quiver bug?

Still using 3.0 and I know the quiver is still experimental, but...

There seems to be a minor quiver problem... I have a light crossbow equipped and steel bolts in my quiver (inventory slot q).

If I press f, to fire, it asks fire which item, but displays no items to choose from. If I then press q (my quiver) it displays the content of my quivers as it should.

A minor annoyance, but an annoyance none the less. And even once it is fixed, it seems it would still take 2 keystrokes to select an ammo (the quiver, then the ammo).
Solution: If a player has no ammo other than that in his quiver, why not simply display the ammo in his quiver by default.

EDIT: also the n (repeat) doesn't work after firing from the quiver. To repeat, you must press esc (clear), f (fire), q (quiver), a (ammo), then target and select. Needless to say, I'll be parking my quiver at home for a while.

[RogerN]

Is it just me, or is the autosave function completely broken? If I manually save my character (Ctrl+S) then it loads fine. But any time Z+ does an autosave (such as when entering a new level), I cannot restore from that file. The application freezes or crashes when I attempt to load it. I lost a rather promising character this way The game crashed shortly after an autosave, and I lost the entire character because the savefile was corrupted.

[Mangojuice]

Version 0.3.1 now available

So 0.3.0 turned out to have several bad bugs, especially for players who wanted to play priestly spellcasters. This demanded a quick fix-up, so Version 0.3.1 is now out which addresses these issues.

The most critical bug wasn't reported, but if you lost character levels or intelligence and this made you forget a spell, you would forget your spells one by one until they were all gone, and never get them back until you were totally back to where you had been.

Another bug that got fixed was one that made it hard for priestly types to learn the very first spell in their realm. (1st level Priests would be unable to learn spell #1 in most cases, no matter how many times they tried.) Also, a bug that could cause you to starve to death waiting for your "stun" to go away in some cases has been fixed. Also, a couple of bugs with quivers have been fixed.

A couple of new features were added, very minor ones. The targetting code now shows you the distance to the spot you are considering. It's now possible to descend a trap door when you are flying and hit the trap. Healing spells have been consolidated; Nature and Life now, properly, have an overlap for the weakest healing spell (but the life one has inherent power bonuses).

This goes to show the hazard with the speed of development I'm doing. When I make these rapid changes to the game, it really should go back to "alpha" status, and not regain "beta" status until it has been tested for a while. In retrospect, 0.3.0 was really an alpha release.

Anyway, it's up at the website now.

[Narvius]

I guess that would be their native depths, maybe?

[buzzkill]

Could you send me the savefile? I have some suspicions but it would be easier to figure out if I could see the savefile.

I'll e-mail the save file tomorrow. It's too big to attach here (even zipped).

and an unrelated bug, maybe... copied the following from my ladder post. Problem is I've never been to level 27. I've only been as deep as 18 or 19, in the first town dungeon. That's where the top kills took place.

[Top 10 deepest kills]

 1 Forest troll                         Level 27 (1350')
 1 Giant white dragon fly               Level 22 (1100')
 2 Jumping fireball                     Level 22 (1100')
 8 Zombie                               Level 19 (950')
 1 Undead mass                          Level 18 (900')
 2 Zombified orc                        Level 16 (800')
 8 Servant of Glaaki                    Level 16 (800')
 1 Baby red dragon                      Level 14 (700')
 2 Kobold chieftain                     Level 14 (700')
 2 Giant grey rat                       Level 14 (700')

[Mangojuice]

By repeatedly, do you mean more that 50 times.

I did manage to learn "satisfy hunger" after a few tries, but 50 attempts later and still no "detect evil".

Is it possible that I declined to learn "detect evil" earlier and that's why it won't let me learn it now. I don't think that I declined, but I may have. That "Do you want to learn <spell>" message caught me off guard the first time I saw it. I believe I hit [escape], but learned a spell anyhow.

Yes, you don't get to use the Y/N to select any spell you want. Basically, you get one of two random spells.

Could you send me the savefile? I have some suspicions but it would be easier to figure out if I could see the savefile.

[buzzkill]

OK, I verified that this happens, but just try studying repeatedly and you'll be fine. I don't know why that message comes up, it shouldn't.

By repeatedly, do you mean more that 50 times.

I did manage to learn "satisfy hunger" after a few tries, but 50 attempts later and still no "detect evil".

Is it possible that I declined to learn "detect evil" earlier and that's why it won't let me learn it now. I don't think that I declined, but I may have. That "Do you want to learn <spell>" message caught me off guard the first time I saw it. I believe I hit [escape], but learned a spell anyhow.