[Announce] PosChengband 1.0.0

[HugoVirtuoso]

I found ?new bug in the latest version: Apparently, the game no longer lets you sell "equipped items" to ANY stores. Is this intended?

[Roch]

I'd vote random - part of the evolution fixed, part variable, interesting overall.

[chris]

Since you ask, I have fond memories of playing as a Quylthulg during a Posband competition (78):

http://angband.oook.cz/competition.php?showcompo=78

Quylthulgs would be rather straightforward to implement. I've only hesitated up to this point because, for some reason, summoning based play has never been popular in Hengband. Perhaps if you are a -10 speed quivering mound of flesh it will become more entertaining?

Of course, some of the Hengband based summoning restrictions (like no xp or drops from work done by your pets) need to be removed.

Is it more fun to choose your evolutionary path or to have it happen randomly? (Nexus can evolve to one of Demonic, Rotting or Draconic which eventually branch back to Master for the final form).

[chris]

A small Death-Sword only release (1.0.30) has been pushed here:

[1] FA/SI only require 1 essence.
[2] Tengu and Death-Sword reward is Dagger of Westernesse
[3] High Resistances require 2 or even 3 essences rather than 1.
[4] Stormbringer is not cursed for Death-Swords.
[5] Death-Sword innate Hold Life wasn't working. Fixed.
[6] Death-Scythe blows reduced from 4 to 3. (I figure they will get +1 blow from Extra Blows essences).
[7] Player no longer displayed as "Cursed"
[8] Death-Swords may now increase their light radius.
[9] Wild and Order weapons no longer grant Slaying essences.

[chris]

Ring of Power monster race. Good/evil alignment paths. Each developed race has its own flavor of added powers/stat gains, reflecting the Rings possessing its way up the racial food chain, a more powerful racial type being able to control more of the Rings powers.

I like this ... Of course, you would have to "ride monsters" to move about

And Nazgul should be friendly to you!

"You feel precious ..."

EDIT: I like the idea of finally reuniting with Sauron to face The Serpent!

[fred]

Ring of Power monster race. Good/evil alignment paths. Each developed race has its own flavor of added powers/stat gains, reflecting the Rings possessing its way up the racial food chain, a more powerful racial type being able to control more of the Rings powers.

[Roch]

Since you ask, I have fond memories of playing as a Quylthulg during a Posband competition (78):

http://angband.oook.cz/competition.php?showcompo=78

[chris]

Version 1.0.29 is available here:

* Fixed bug when attacking monsters inside a wall.
* Monsters with innate attacks can now benefit from extra attacks.
* Added new monster race: The Death Sword. (Thanks to Arjen). This particular monster race is unable to wear any equipment. Instead, they simply are an animated weapon of a particular form, and they evolve to better weapons over time. To gain abilities, they need to absorb magical essences from the weapons they find, destroying these in the process (Use the Extra Information Screen to display your essences: Press '~' then 'x').

Any more crazy ideas for monster races? How about a fishy (kraken) that needs to stay in water?

[Derakon]

What objects would count as "edge" or "pommel"?

I was more thinking that the absorption/upgrade system could be applied separately to each component of the character. Thus you could replace your "armor" (sheath, pommel) without replacing your "weapon" (edge, point). If this system was used then you wouldn't be reincarnating your entire body when you upgraded; rather you'd do those upgrades piecemeal.

[chris]

Can you have an "animated rocket" race???? Or at least an animated rocket launcher.

I think Cyberdemons already count as this

[chris]

Perhaps the player could have equipment slots for "edge", "pommel", etc.? And those could be upgraded piecemeal. That way you'd have a meaningful equipment screen and more flexibility for the player.

What objects would count as "edge" or "pommel"?

I am worried that the lack of an equipment game will prove troublesome ... That's why I initially suggested the "reanimation" mechanic (i.e. reforging). But, I personally might like the absorption/grind approach just fine

To spice things up, each time you evolve you lose some of your essences in order to maintain a new, more powerful form. So yeah, you might want to store certain objects for the end. But probably, you will need to absorb everything you find anyway just to cover resists. And perhaps disenchantment is something to be avoided? (Fade evil laughter ...)

[Derakon]

Perhaps the player could have equipment slots for "edge", "pommel", etc.? And those could be upgraded piecemeal. That way you'd have a meaningful equipment screen and more flexibility for the player.

[chris]

Just a heads up ... I *am* working on this, but it is proving harder than expected. I'll probably need a few days, especially as this will play so differently that I better run a character or two once I am done.

I will need to give the player a dummy equipment object as the game gets rather unhappy with no equipment slots and refactoring the combat code is a project that might take a month of my time ... It needs to happen someday, but not today

Otherwise, the main obstacle is the 120 or so object flags that require sensible encodings. And display code. Man that is a PITA ...

[Arjen]

This is your idea, so I'll let you decide the best approach. I'll just let you know what is possible and we'll go from there:

[1] Adding new monsters is possible and perhaps even desirable. I was thinking we could add 'Diamond Edge' and 'Mace of Disruption' monsters

If adding new monsters isn't that hard, you could create an evolution for every weapontype (sword/blunt/polearm/axe) except Axes don't have anything after great axe 4d4? Maybe add a Dwarven Axe equal to the high tier weapons of the other 3 classes.

If this is possible, Ill start thinking about a way of evolution of every type.

[3] For attacks, we can do one of two things. Either give the player an equipped object and use the normal attack code. Or we can give the player innate attacks. The equipped object approach would be easier to implement since all the code for all the various slay flags is already implemented. Also, the object ... I mean the player ... will show up in the Equipment dump.

Giving the player an equipment slot feels wrong; you are the weapon, you can't equip or unequip that weapon. But I don't know how hard it is to fix that slays problem you mention. And being able to "view" yourself somehow like you would with equipment will make keeping track of yourself a lot easier (or else you need a lot of Self Knowlegde potions).

[4] But we need to decide about other equipment slots. The realistic option is none! But perhaps we could give a few jewelry slots and say that the weapon is "adorned".

You might need something to get enough speed or fill some nasty resistance holes. But maybe start (for playtesting) without slots.

Agreed. For the evolutionary approach, if the player is in the form of a Death Sword, then their equipped weapon is a long sword. Rather, the player is a long sword If they are a Hellblade, then the player is a Blade of Chaos (6d5). And if the player is a Death Scythe, then, well, the player is a Death Scythe (10d10). Probably, we should keep the same expected damage dice, though the Death Scythe should not get all the slays automatically. And perhaps number of attacks can be limited to balance the power.

Limit it to 4 blows (like most innate monsterraces) and seriously increase weaponweight with the last evolutions. A Broken Sword weights like 1.5 lbs. but a mace of disruption is already 40.0 lbs. I don't know about a Death Scythe, but maybe 50 lbs isn't that bad, or make it that you need 18/*** to get the final blow.

Sounds good. I like the Death Scythe retaliation, but then we really do need to limit their blows.

Retaliate only applies 1 blow right? But if it too powerfull to have 1x 10d10 retaliate, maybe give a 50% chance to retaliate (or less if needed). But monks do have very high dices too with retaliation (but without slays).

Item slots? What can a sword realistically wear? Not armor I hope

I called it item slots by the lack of a better name, but these are the amount of weapons you can drain for your abilities. You should be able to drain more when leveling up.

My thoughts on absorption was to track everything by flag, rather than by object. For each flag, then, their would be a formula as for how to translate the number of absorbed essences into player attributes. So, absorbing infravision would be fairly easy up to maybe 100', but then would become more difficult. Absorbing Slay Evil would be rather difficult: perhaps you need 10 essences before you actually get slay evil.

Ow is this what you mean in your previous post? Could work pretty well. When you drain a weapon you gain it's abilities but need more of the same ability to actually "activate" it or improve it (stats and such). This way you need more than finding a few great weapons. But you do need to make a difference between stuff you do or do not have (resists) and stuff you can increase (infra, stats, stealth).

But how do you make it work if you have drained for example 2x a fiery weapon giving you 2x resist fire and +2 light radius? The brand is an ability you do or do not have (and let's make the light always max at +1 radius), but the resist fire can be stacked to get 65%. So you will have as ability 1x Fire brand and 2x resist fire. So we happen to find a third fiery weapon (to keep stuff simple), instead of using it's abilities you choose to drain it to strengthen the 2 previous absorbed fiery weapons. Can you make it this way you improve the fire brand (easy part as you only have it once) but only one of the 2 fire resists (as you only add one essence of fire resistance and not 2).

So to make it short Firebrand: (0/5) -> (1/5) Fire resist (#1): (0/5) -> (1/5) Fire resist (#2): (0/5) -> (0/5)

(I hope you understand )

Anyway, these are just my thoughts. Feel free to suggest alternatives if you had something different in mind. I'll let you know if you suggest something that is too difficult (or "impossible).

This idea just popped up in my mind when I read your post in my character dump, didn't really thought it through. So feel free to contribute. I'm not good with working something out in detail, just rough ideas.

You also mentioned something about loosing everything when evolving, I would do it different, giving you the power to remove all abilities when activated, but keep your abilities when evolving or else you wouldn't use some items until you are at your final form, giving that form a huge boost compared to the previous ones.

[debo]

Can you have an "animated rocket" race???? Or at least an animated rocket launcher.