[Announce] Poschengband 3.0.0 Released

[Susramanian]

Also, it is available in infinite abundance thru a town service.

I had forgotten that. Never mind that bit in my post above where I talk about houses filling up with *ID*-needing items

[Avenger]

To state that anything can have any attribute is complete bullshit. Could you please try to learn a little bit about the game before bashing it?

*ID* is important, but by no means essential. Also, it is available in infinite abundance thru a town service.

I'm not bashing it - indeed, it's by far my most played variant at the moment. It's simply been my experience while playing that abilities are very random - various rings or amulets of the same type have vastly different sets of properties and activations, for example.

Perhaps it would be fairer to say that many items and ego types can have a wide range of properties, of which the majority are hidden.

In any case, I do find myself *ID*ing everything just to be sure I'm not missing anything, even on items I end up selling, which is the point I was trying to make.

I apologize if I caused offence - that was certainly not my intention. Heng, Cheng, and Entro have long been favorite variants of mine, as was Posband, and I'm grateful to you for combining those concepts - the result is a game that appeals to my personal preferences on many levels.

Edit: I am aware of the town services, and move to Morivant for both the full inventory ID and the single item *ID* as soon as possible. As a berserker, I have quite a lot of gold to spare on those services, so it isn't really a huge issue as far as taking care of things in town(although doing so in the dungeon is still dodgy, once my inventory fills with pseudo-ids at my minimum autodestroyer setting). I don't know how well that translates to other classes, and in the dungeon, I would think the abundance of hidden properties would be a challenge even for classes with an Identify ability(are there any with a *ID* ability? If so, I have yet to ever get that far =P).

[chris]

I apologize if I caused offence - that was certainly not my intention. Heng, Cheng, and Entro have long been favorite variants of mine, as was Posband, and I'm grateful to you for combining those concepts - the result is a game that appeals to my personal preferences on many levels.

No, I apologize. I am perhaps a little oversensitive and read too much into your comments?

It's simply been my experience while playing that abilities are very random - various rings or amulets of the same type have vastly different sets of properties and activations, for example.

This is true. Rings and amulets have become much more like rand-arts ... except that the set of abilities is not really random after all. Rather, abilities are chosen from a suite of thematically consistent possible attributes.

So yes, it is fair to say that jewelry requires heavier use if *id* than it previously used to. Not knowing what is possible for each type of jewelry might be frustrating, especially if you don't want to miss something. For example, a Ring of Elemental Resistance might specialize itself on a single element and perhaps grant immunity, or weapon branding (but these are only possible late in the game).

The jewelry changes are the main reason why I added 3 extra inventory slots for this release. Also, scrolls of *id* are much more common (and come in stacks).

Perhaps it would be fairer to say that many items and ego types can have a wide range of properties, of which the majority are hidden.

Again, this is true.

Many egos are hard coded with fixed attributes (especially wrt weapons) but some also have the potential to have extra resists or the like (Pattern weapons, Trump weapons, ...) Eventually the player learns which ego types could benefit from *identification*. Also, there is usually no point *identifying* a pattern dagger, say, since the 1d4 damage dice render the slays rather worthless.

The various armors of single resists (together with resistance) have been folded up into a single ego type that does indeed require *idenitification*. Also there are quite a few new ego types that might have extra stuff that weren't around prior to 3.0. So I do agree that *id* is important.

However, after a bit of play you get a sense of which ego types are worth further investigation. And I rarely find my pack so full that I have to leave stuff behind when recalling back to town.

I guess part of my frustration is that people are complaining, but not offering ideas for change. Certainly, players don't want everything instantly *identified* upon generation to "remove the tedium"?

And I personally love the extra attribute egos that are present in Hengband, TinyAngband and XAngband, especially the last two that turn egos into mini-artifacts from time to time. And dragon armor in Hengband is always fun. Having fixed power items that are always the same is rather boring, after all.

[chris]

Permacurse shouldnt ever be a random flag imo. It should be only on *terrible* items. Permacurse is so harsh, its a flag that means "This will be good enough for the rest of the game, and swaps arent allowed"

It is indeed horribly unfair. But the game is rather unfair in many ways (Random speed system, Amberite blood curse, Chaos patron rewards, etc.). Also, there is an out: permanently cursed items can be removed.

My thoughts were that if cursed rand-arts are allowed to have this attribute (and they always have) then so should cursed ego items. But I don't have a strong objection to removing it though my preference would be to limit it to powerful egos.

[Avenger]

I guess part of my frustration is that people are complaining, but not offering ideas for change. Certainly, players don't want everything instantly *identified* upon generation to "remove the tedium"?

My suggestion would simply be to significantly cut back on the number of properties which remain hidden from standard identification. I don't know whether this is easier said then done - I thought there were some item flags that affected hidden properties, but I could be mistaken on that.

You are probably correct that it will become easier to determine what needs to be *ID*'d the more I play, but I think it would be fair to say that the proportion of items needing that level of identification is noticeably higher then in other variants.

One more brief note - now that all jewelry comes in a single color(as far as I've seen, at least) shouldn't mimics match that color? A brown = isn't very sneaky if every other ring in the game is green

[Derakon]

chris: is there something you find distasteful about the way Vanilla handles things right now? Which is to say, Identify is *Identify*. Functionally it sounds like you're moving towards this anyway by making scrolls of *Identify* more common.

In what situations do you want a player to know the "stat line" of an item (e.g. "Warhammer of Slay Rodent (3d3) (+4, +9) (+2)") without knowing all of the specific flags on that item? What does forcing the player to make uninformed decisions about gear add to the game?

[Arjen]

chris: is there something you find distasteful about the way Vanilla handles things right now? Which is to say, Identify is *Identify*. Functionally it sounds like you're moving towards this anyway by making scrolls of *Identify* more common.

3 towns have a *id* service, so if you don't need *id* in the dungeon, you will be fine.

[Avenger]

3 towns have a *id* service, so if you don't need *id* in the dungeon, you will be fine.

The question, then, is whether you do need *id* in the dungeon. For certain purposes, such as upgrading with new gear mid dive, or choosing what to bring up after a big vault, I would venture to say that you do.

[Arjen]

The question, then, is whether you do need *id* in the dungeon. For certain purposes, such as upgrading with new gear mid dive, or choosing what to bring up after a big vault, I would venture to say that you do.

The alchemy (5) shop does sell *id* scrolls in piles. They are not always available, but not uncommon either. So that is doable.

[Derakon]

Right, so, given the existence of *ID* in piles, what is the purpose of having both ID and *ID*?

[Arjen]

Right, so, given the existence of *ID* in piles, what is the purpose of having both ID and *ID*?

2400 au difference. Buying 50 ids is doable at the start, 50 *id* is expensive

[Derakon]

So the question then becomes, is this an important distinction? Is it important that *ID* be expensive?

Basically I'm trying to get you to analyze the game design decisions instead of just accepting them as fiat.

[chris]

chris: is there something you find distasteful about the way Vanilla handles things right now? Which is to say, Identify is *Identify*. Functionally it sounds like you're moving towards this anyway by making scrolls of *Identify* more common.

Yes, I do indeed find this change objectionable.

Regarding object identification, the historical system is not perfect. The mechanics of pseudo-id are simply crazy when object drop rates are high. Spending large amounts of time pack shuffling and then resting for long periods of time in the dungeon is just nuts, and some classes needed to rest for entire game days before pseudo-id would kick in. So I previously changed the pseudo-id mechanic very heavily (It's now much quicker and becomes instaneous and, more importantly, happens "underfoot" once the player reaches CL35). Variants like Zangband that ratcheted up the object drop rate have been forced to make regular Identify much more common, nay, universal, to compsenate. This is OK, and pseudo-id is only really important in the very early game when gold is scarce, and later on as a means of directing the application of plentiful identification (alas, carrying more that 20-50 identify is impractical).

So, regular identify is plentiful, and needs to be so. It is also cheap. Sure it is subject to fiery assaults of frustration, but this is seldom crippling.

Having an increased number of hidden powers was an intentional game design decision for this release, albeit one that some players may not like. Personally, I have always found hidden powers to be enormously enjoyable in games like Hengband and something that is amazingly conducive to replayability. Having played Hengband as much as I have, over a period of 10 years along with hundreds of winners, I still find the game extremely fun. I can't say the same for Vanilla.

Having a game which favors object variability (and hence replayability and, at least for me, fun), Identify is simply too common and too cheap to reveal all object attributes at once. Having the player unsure of what an object does leads to strategic decision making. Even before the changes that I have made, this was a strong component of every game I played in Hengband, especially, as Avenger mentions, after clearing a large vault. There is some skill and a good deal of luck in deciding what to keep and what to discard after such a situation, and simply removing this aspect from the game entirely is one instance of simply making the game easier in response to complaints of tedium. It is taking the easy way out. Having ubiquitous Identify that reveals objects completely is too much, in my opinion. To overstate my objections for purposes of rhetoric, why not just have objects spawn completely identified to save players the tedium? The same arguments to removing *identify* apply here as well (in a matter of degree).

You absolutely do not need to *identify* every object in the game. You absolutely do not need to never miss a particular goody in order to win the game. You will never clear every level, nor clear every vault, nor slay every unique, nor kill every monster you meet, nor find every artifact nor every once in a blue moon awesome object. It's not possible to do so, and not even remotely necessary for success. Optimal play is not required (nor even possible, IMO)!

Personally I never use *identify* at all within the dungeon except on rare instances when I stumble upon a stack of scrolls. I also rarely find myself in situations of object overload except in the early game when the player is literally showered with all manner of flavors of mushrooms, potions, wands, rods, staves, scrolls, etc, but this is not an issue with *identify*. There is, of course, the occasional large vault, but that only happens a few times in a game.

All of this is, of course, just my opinion. It is a lot of work in making a variant (even after starting with a mature, well designed game like Hengband) and as such, something that I will only do if I personally find the game fun.

My sincerest apologies if I wrecked the game at all recently. But this is, after all, just a game. I appreciate feedback (eventually) and often do make changes in response to it (even if I don't mention it at first ... Perma-curse, for example, has been made more rare). But I probably won't make changes that I, rightly or wrongly, disagree with.

[Arjen]

Well, I still like poschengband. Just takes a lot of time so not playing a lot lately.

Trying out the keep-the-cursed-stuff tactic, but I only get {cursed} not the other types, new update?

And still, this is *your* game as you are the developer, so you can actually do as you like.

And i like the hidden powers too, and I also only *id* in town. So I still think you are on the right way concerning the development of poschengband. Just that I might keep the auto destroy on {cursed} if I keep disliking it. Altho the increased packsize helps.

[Avenger]

Sound reasoning certainly makes it easier to swallow. Thanks for the post, Chris.

Trying out the keep-the-cursed-stuff tactic, but I only get {cursed} not the other types, new update?

I have also noticed this - even cursed randarts still pseudo-ID as cursed, rather then terrible.

In a variant where cursed egos can occasionally be worth using(my current character is using a cursed Morningstar at the moment), differing pseudo-ID indicators would be quite helpful.

As Arjen stated, keeping {cursed} on autodestroy simplifies things a lot, and prevents you from bringing a bag full of crap up in the hope that it might be worth using. Why not give us worthless and terrible back, so we can keep basic cursed stuff on auto-k, and preserve the egos in case they turn out to be worthwhile? Those of us that don't want those, either, can put {worthless} on auto-k, and of course arts will not be destructible, so those will still stand out no matter what.