DJA: Tossing around ideas

[will_asher]

(This thread is for me to toss out ideas about DaJAngband development and see if anyone has any input.)

Matthias pointed out that my alchemist class needed some improvement and I agreed, so I'm switching out some of the class spells.

I replaced the element bolt spell (boring) with an enhance wand spell which enhances the damage or effectiveness of wands (and if you're at least character level 30, you can enhance rods, elemental rings, and some activatable artifacts also). I just got an enhanced wand of slow monster to work on Sangahyando of Umbar while testing the spell in wizard mode.

I figure that's a good start for improving the alchemist class. I don't know if I'll put in potion mixing though. (Supposedly, all the spells in the alchemy realm are potions or formulas of some kind. Of course with any realism, this would make the spell take much longer to cast, but certain qualities of realism are best to leave out..)

Also, thinking about re-introducing the passifist class. As a passifist, the object of the game would be changed (I'll probably have to find a way to implement the destruction of the One Ring which I think I can do -the rarity of the One Ring would have to be specially changed for the passifist class so that he'll find it.), and you'd get experience for a bunch of things besides killing monsters, but no XP for killing anything that's alive (maybe an XP penalty instead). My previous attempt at a passafist class a while back didn't work very well, but I think I can make it work.
I would be like a variant within a variant. Then again, I might never get around to implementing it. There are other things of high priority.

[konijn_]

Yeah,

disclaimer is that I never played your game, but for someone that claims on the website to change things from Vanilla to make it more consistent, pacifists dont really cut it ;]

Alchemists are interesting, best implementation so far is ToME I think. I also think SAngband essences are very cool and Hellband stole the alchemy potion idea and some of the code out of Ey. I am guessing with the infamous search for gold creation, alchemists might be able with some processing to increase the effectiveness of weapons and armor ( base dam, stealth, weight .... )

What are your other things of high priority ?

T.

[Dark]

Hi.

I've just started on Daaj again after a miner absense.

I really like the monster list, ---- and I can even now make use of the coloured stars option now I have a decent sized 32 inch monitor.

One thing though I'd really like to see added to the game is the ] list onscreen items command from Vanilla, sinse, ---- just as with the monster list command it can really help with limited field of vision issues, and insure I don't miss things in the corner of the screen.

Of course, it's not quite as essential as list monsters, ---- sinse obviously onscreen items won't usually come and try to eat me, but if it could be added to Daaj it would make my life slightly easier by saving me have to spam the targiting command to help with viewing the screen.

[will_asher]

Ack! I wanted to make some artifact torches and lanterns to have an artifact with cool powers with the drawback that it could run out of light. But I can't put an activation on them because light fuel and activation timeout both use the same variable. how annoying. of course I could change that, but it would be more trouble and I don't feel like it. I guess I'll just make them egos without the activation.

@Dark- I don't know about getting the object list from vanilla into DaJAngband. I haven't looked at it in the vanilla code yet, but I'll see how complicated it would be. You mentioned separate quests in another thread: sorry, I have no interest in putting separate quests into DaJAngband (except maybe for the destruction of the One Ring, but that won't be anytime soon, if ever).

@konijn- Who claims on the website to change things from Vanilla to make it more consistent? I never claimed that.
To answer your question about what else I have on high priority, here are some other things on my to-do list for DaJAngband:
- themed levels (already almost done, but not in any released version yet)
- have home inventory in the knowledge menu.
- improve certain classes which aren't really finished (alchemist, war mage..)
- separate level feelings for danger & treasure
- possibly make monsters wake each other up (either with shout of pain from damage or
asking their buddies to help)
- possibly split weapon skills from melee/ missile/ throwing into sword/ priestly&staffs/ polearms&axes/ bone&improvised weapons/ crossbows/ bows/ slings/ throwing. (would need to make another page to the character screen.)
- possibly make drained stats recover over time (very slowly)
Things to try to bring in from new vanilla:
- character history
- autostart
- the object list

[Dark]

I would've thought the list objects command worked similarly to list monsters, --- though of course I'm not certain of that knowing nothing about code.

It has however been in for at least a couple of versions, ----- though I haven't seen it in any varients I've played, though I'm guessing it's not a commonly used command, ---- useful as i'd find it.

As for quests, to be perfectly honest I couldn't imagine them working in a single dungeon varient like Daaj at all, ---- afterall, it's slightly hard to be told to go to specific locations in the dungeon when there aren't precisely any, ---- and attempting to talk to npcs mid dungeon among all the monsters could get a litle weerd (not to mention the lack of inventory slots for quest items).

I hear some varients have done it, but I'm uncertain as to how this works, ---- or indeed as to how much it'd spoil the symplicity of a single dungeon game.

for Daaj, as I said, exploring the dungeon, finding gold and items, and meating new monsters is enough.

I will admit I have got slightly irritated at times by being killed by something which I don't have a resistance for, simply because I haven't seen that item.

I've had several games end at around lvl 8-10 through being slept or confused to death by a gang of monsters, ---- when I've never found anything that gives resistance irritatingly, and I can't use a scroll of phase door to escape, ---- then again, i suppose that's just part of the game and one thing I must learn to handle, --- my last game for instance was going incredibly well up to dungeon lvl 7 (character level eleven), when I didn't run away quick enough from an arangutang! ---- now there's! an embarrassing way to die!

[d_m]

Things to try to bring in from new vanilla:
- character history
- autostart
- the object list

I am the author the object list in Vanilla. The code is mainly introduced in object/obj-util.c. I can try to dig up the initial patch for the object list if you're interested.

EDIT: revision 941 first introduced the object list.

[will_asher]

alchemist spell ideas

Thinking up ideas to make the alchemist class more unique and interesting, and I thought of adding a 'mimmic wand' spell. I just finished implementing it. You choose a wand to mimmic the effect of and then you can cast the spell to get the effect of the wand without bothing about things like limited charges or having it in your inventory. Higher level alchemists can also mimmic rods with the same spell, but only combat wands or rods can be mimmicked. (In a previous message, I mentioned the enhance wand spell: If you chose to mimmic an enhanced wand, then the spell will mimmic the enhanced wand effect.) This spell has a variable mana cost based on the wand or rod you are currently mimmicking.

The mimmic wand spell pretty much obsoletes most of the other spells in the alchemist's 'chemical combat' spellbook, so I'm going to think of at least one or two more new spells to replace them with. I'd like to give the alchemist at least one spell using actual potions (instead of just referring to the spells as 'formulas' in-game), but I can't think of a good way to do that. any suggestions?


@d_m: thanks, but I'm hoping that looking at the code for the obect list in the recent version will be enough for me to figure it out. I'll let you know if it isn't. (A lot of the new code is much harder for me to understand than the code I based DJA on).

my last game for instance was going incredibly well up to dungeon lvl 7 (character level eleven), when I didn't run away quick enough from an arangutang! ---- now there's! an embarrassing way to die!

The orangatan will only get angrier if you consider that an embarassing way to die. (but at least you didn't call it a monkey)

[will_asher]

One more thing, a code question:

I don't know how to add terrain features, but I thought of a possible way I could do it. I thought I'd go ahead and ask if it'll work since that'd be a lot easier than coding it and finding out that it doesn't, and someone who knows the language better would probably be able to answer the question easily.
Anyway, I noticed that the declaration for the door feature looks like this:

/* Doors */
#define FEAT_DOOR_HEAD	0x20
#define FEAT_DOOR_TAIL	0x2F

..and I thought, 'the game doesn't need 16 types of doors' and looked where the types of doors are used in the code and thought 'the game doesn't need 8 levels of stuck door difficulty.' So I wondered if I could just change that to:

/* Doors */
#define FEAT_DOOR_HEAD	0x20
#define FEAT_DOOR_TAIL	0x2D

#define FEAT_NEW_FEATUREA 0x2E
#define FEAT_NEW_FEATUREB 0x2F

..then code the properties of the new terrain features. So would that work?

EDIT: I see that I would have to change

/* Create jammed door */
cave_set_feat(y, x, FEAT_DOOR_HEAD + 0x08 + rand_int(8));

to

/* Create jammed door */
cave_set_feat(y, x, FEAT_DOOR_HEAD + 0x08 + rand_int(6));

in object2.c but otherwise it looks to me like it would work(?)

[Nick]

..then code the properties of the new terrain features. So would that work?

That's part of it. You'll also need to add your new features to terrain.txt as numbers 46 and 47, and make sure that any code to do with stuck doors doesn't assume it has 8 levels of difficulty (it shouldn't, but it may).

[evets]

Interesting variant! It intrigued me so I gave it a short try, I may play some more. I like some of the ideas you have for new classes, but I don't think they'll all work out to be very effective, but still, good ideas. For instance I like the barbarian class, it's cool idea: more effective with heavier weapons due to increased crit! However some classes seem a little redundant. i.e.: Thief *and* assassin *and* rogue? Archer *and* ranger?

Also, I noticed a few bugs:
- Using point-based character creation, if try to put less than the minimum or more than the maximum points in a stat, it re-rolls your money and gives you a new random amount of cash. Not a big enough amount to make a difference, jsut weird.
- some of the hotkeys are messed up. For instance, 'a'im is swapped with 'z'ap. When I went to aim my new wand, I hit 'a' and it said "you have no rods to use." So I hit 'z' and it says "which wand would you like to use?". o.O Also, the run macro is mapped to comma (',') instead of period ('.') . That's really annoying, since that's the button I press the most playing angband. :X

Other than those few minor wrinkles, it looks like an interesting variant! Keep working on it!

[will_asher]

Interesting variant! It intrigued me so I gave it a short try, I may play some more. I like some of the ideas you have for new classes, but I don't think they'll all work out to be very effective, but still, good ideas. For instance I like the barbarian class, it's cool idea: more effective with heavier weapons due to increased crit! However some classes seem a little redundant. i.e.: Thief *and* assassin *and* rogue? Archer *and* ranger?

The thief, rogue, and assassin classes are a little too similar at the moment, I admit, but the archer and ranger are really not that similar because the ranger is not nearly as much like an archer at it is in V (no extra shots with every 10 levels). The ranger is more of a druid/warrior with good bow skill. The archer is all range focussed with some useful alchemy-realm spells (especially once he finds the missile magic spellbook). And the thief, rogue, and assassin do have some important differences (different magic realms, the thieves' speed bonus, assassin bonus vs sleeping monsters). And the thief is a significantly weaker fighter than the other two and better with magic. There's also the psycology/role playing factor: even the name of the class makes a difference.

Also, I noticed a few bugs:
- Using point-based character creation, if try to put less than the minimum or more than the maximum points in a stat, it re-rolls your money and gives you a new random amount of cash. Not a big enough amount to make a difference, just weird.

That is a known bug, and honestly I think it's more of a quirk that doesn't harm anything and don't think it's worth fixing.

- some of the hotkeys are messed up. For instance, 'a'im is swapped with 'z'ap. When I went to aim my new wand, I hit 'a' and it said "you have no rods to use." So I hit 'z' and it says "which wand would you like to use?". o.O Also, the run macro is mapped to comma (',') instead of period ('.') . That's really annoying, since that's the button I press the most playing angband. :X

This is because the roguelike keyset is set to default (I don't know why they call the other keyset the original keyset, when the roguelike keyset is the real original keyset..). Just change the keyset option to the way you like it and it'll be back to the way you're used to.

[zaimoni]

This is because the roguelike keyset is set to default (I don't know why they call the other keyset the original keyset, when the roguelike keyset is the real original keyset..).

The original keyset has been called that since Moria.

Also, the original keyset is a lot more likely to agree with the internal command dispatcher on what the commands are, than the roguelike keyset.

[Dark]

I've been using the original keyset myself, ---- infact using arrow keys and home end etc sinse my screen reader needs the number pad and I've never got my head around the roguelike ones.

A for aime wands and Z for zap rods always seem to work for me.

Extra terrane would be fun especilly from an exploration and tactics point of view, I already like the different shaped rooms and extra amounts of rubble.

I'm not sure how this would work with too many classes, sinse I've only briefly tried many of them, but I really like the quiver option and the ability to carry amo without using inventory slots.

Perhaps different classes could have intrinsic access to extra inventory items in a similar fashion to allow them the advantage of extra slots and ability to carry more types of items.

These could include a scroll case for the magical types, a potion kit for alchemists, and maybe something to carry books for priests. Optionally mages could have a wand holder as well.

Of course, none-magical classes shouldn't have access to such things sinse it wouldn't make sense for a barbarian or warrior to carry such schollarly equipment with them.

Maybe this could also be an advantage for some of the thief classes, sinse they've got to have ways of carrying away their loot efficiently.

appologies if this is a mad idea or one which won't work coding wise, it's just I'm currently playing a warrior and thus inventory management is becoming a major issue, and so i got to thinking what advantages some classes could have in this way.

Btw, what are dust bunnies for? if anything? I've now picked up two, and their just taking up space, but I'm loathed to destroy them until I find out if they're any use or not, ---- especially considdering they seem to be a relatively uncommon drop.

I've also made it to dungeon lvl 23 and am stil going, assuming that my save file survived the user accounts issue I had recently. i don't see why it shouldn't, sinse all the Daaj save files are in the Daaj folder, not in anywhere which would'vee been affected by my accounts desaster.

Oh, and I gave that blasted monkey a good dose of what for! take that!

[will_asher]

ah the dust bunnies.. Honestly I don't know what I was thinking when I put them there. It's a mystery. (They're not good for anything.)

Containers have been suggested for V before. Inventory management is one of the big challenges of the game, and I've already made it a little easier with the quiver. And it'd be quite a lot of trouble (at least for me) to code.

[Dark]

Fair enough, it was just a thought given inventory management importance.

At least I can now send those dustbunnies to dustbunny heaven and have a free slot, ;D.