A place for FA questions and ideas for improvement

[Zikke]

And what is this "Black Breath" I am afflicted with and how do I get rid of it?

[Psi]

You can get it from various sources, but to break it you need to eat athelas (or maybe a !Life...?).

[Nick]

It would be nice to be able to scroll the world (M)ap using the arrow keys, so that you can see where you're headed without viewing memap.txt. You could also view terrain type and distance, something memap.txt doesn't offer. This would be especially useful for new players (unless wandering aimlessly through the wilderness is part of the fun).

and maybe a bug... when recalling to a wilderness level on which I had previously fallen through a trap door the (M)ap incorrectly labels it as a dungeon (although no stairs exist). I've noticed this more than once.

Yeah, this map could certainly be reworked (ie made into something other than the massive hack it is now). I've noticed that dungeon thing too - there must be some portion of the record of that underworld level I'm failing to wipe.

[buzzkill]

Improved pseudo-ID

I'm palying a druid, apparently a class with weak pseudo ID. INT 9, WIS 16, LEV 16 and has only pseudo-ID'd 1 item so far. The hard leather he has been wearing for 10's of 1000's of turns has still not been pseudo-ID'd. Keeping up with Staffs of Perception and Scrolls of Identify are sucking away all of my gold and my home has become a stockpile of un-ID'd weapons and armours.

Here's my proposal (actually 3 of them).

1st... an item should be pseudo-ID'd faster (much faster) when you are actually wearing it or wielding it. This is a no-brainer. Maybe even full ID with long term, extended use.

2nd... classes/races should be better able to pseudo-ID items natural to their class/race. Fighters would have a bonus pseudo-IDing swords and heavy armour, mages with robes and staff weapons, elves and rangers with bows and leathers, maybe assassins could p-ID hmmm (maybe poisons and other harmful potions and mushrooms). As for game balance, negative bonuses could be applied to items that are alien to a particular class/race.

3rd... the ability to take some time and actually (X)examine a particular item. Like tunneling, this command would auto-repeat until a result is obtained or 99 turns have passed (that is how tunneling works, isn't it?). HP/MANA would not regenerate (or at a slower rate) while examining an item. AS a result, that particular item would (most-likely) be pseudo-ID'd, "You feel the broadsword you are examining is good" or not "You are still unsure of the nature of the broadsword". As a game-balancer (as if weak or no regeneration wasn't enough) you could make the player so absorbed in his examination that he may not notice approaching creatures until they are already upon him.

As always, feedback is appreciated.

[Slonk]

As for the first suggestion above, it has already been done in at least one other variant (Ey). Ey even goes so far as the full ID after extended wear.

[Psi]

1st... an item should be pseudo-ID'd faster (much faster) when you are actually wearing it or wielding it. This is a no-brainer.

...and is already the case. Please note that IIRC druids have the slowest pseudo of all classes and they have weak pseudo - so {average} equipment never pseudos at all (which I hate). Also of course, {excellent} and {special} stuff also pseudos as {good}.

[buzzkill]

...and is already the case. Please note that IIRC druids have the slowest pseudo of all classes and they have weak pseudo - so {average} equipment never pseudos at all (which I hate). Also of course, {excellent} and {special} stuff also pseudos as {good}.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
What does IIRC mean?
Is there any place where comprehensive information like this exists???

Well, that explains a lot, but I still think that one should be able to take the time to closely examine a particular item and possibly get a "feel" for it.

[Psi]

What does IIRC mean?

If I recall correctly IIRC

Is there any place where comprehensive information like this exists???

Yes... but unfortunately it is the source code.

[Nick]

Well, that explains a lot, but I still think that one should be able to take the time to closely examine a particular item and possibly get a "feel" for it.

I am planning to make changes to pseudo-ID in the next version (see, for example this thread in r.g.r.a), and the sort of things that are bothering you are the reason why.

[Zikke]

Out of curiosity, some questions regarding FA:

1) What is the difference between identify and "perilous identify"?

2) What exactly governs where the Staff of the Kelvar will illuminate? Is it a fixed radius around any "animal"-flagged creature?

3) Is there any guideline on where to farm for the advanced spellbooks? I've been hanging around 50-60 looking through vaults but have only found a ton of the Resistances and Escapes, and 1 Grimoire of Power, and I'm almost clvl 50. Itching for more spells... Do I need to go deeper?

4) What's the level limit and guardian of Tol-In-Gaurhoth? Is this info listed somewhere? I couldn't find it anywhere in-game.



Thanks!

[Nick]

1) What is the difference between identify and "perilous identify"?

Perilous identify can sometimes hurt and confuse the player.

2) What exactly governs where the Staff of the Kelvar will illuminate? Is it a fixed radius around any "animal"-flagged creature?

Yes.

3) Is there any guideline on where to farm for the advanced spellbooks? I've been hanging around 50-60 looking through vaults but have only found a ton of the Resistances and Escapes, and 1 Grimoire of Power, and I'm almost clvl 50. Itching for more spells... Do I need to go deeper?

The exact depths and rarities are in lib/edit/object.txt; the short answer is yes

4) What's the level limit and guardian of Tol-In-Gaurhoth? Is this info listed somewhere? I couldn't find it anywhere in-game.

It's not available in-game - I guess partly as a surprise for new players. The deepest level is IIRC 85, and the guardian is Sauron.

[buzzkill]

I am planning to make changes to pseudo-ID in the next version (see, for example this thread in r.g.r.a), and the sort of things that are bothering you are the reason why.

I read the thread. I see change, but not necessarily improvement. You may just be complicating the system with no apparent benefit. And it's not that I was bothered by it (the weak pseudo-ID). I just didn't understand why it was so bad with this particular character. I know angband is a learn as you go game, but a better understanding of the rules would help greatly.

I like the game to be hard, but not impossible. FA is. I also like realism. Which FA lacks to a certain extent. When I had my first, self proclaimed, great character, I felt invincible. I thought I would march all the way to Angband 99-100 and battle to the death. Things didn't work out the way I thought they would, and I think he fell around level 30, far short of his goal. That's not what I wanted to happen, but that's OK. I don't cheat, backup my characters, stair scum (and let's face it people, stair scumming IS cheating)or kill FA in order to cheat death.

To which... as I've said before (somewhere in this forum) I don't like the infallibility of detect traps, it just works too well. Nothing in life is perfect (certainly not a rod or staff you found in the LV 10 wilderness). For those of you who would argue that at higher levels traps can kill you instantly, I agree (so what). Perfect detection, is not the answer. Would imperfect detection make the game impossible? I don't think so. And for many, the game is nearly impossible already, so why not make it realistic as well.

Pseudo-ID shouldn't be perfect either. Just because you feel an item is cursed or average or superb doesn't mean that it is, especially for low levels characters. Is my first level fighter so knowledgeable that he can determine with absolute certainty that the quarterstaff he just found is +0,+0 (average) rather than -1,-2 (cursed). I don't think so. If he was that smart his boots wouldn't be on the wrong feet and a novice mage wouldn't have just kicked his ass.

I don't like that the ability to stair scum exists either, and it could be easily solved. Just retain the prior dungeon level, monsters and all, for about 50-500 turns, determined randomly, so if someone were to try and scum they would simply keep revisiting the same level (with the monsters they just fled from waiting for them, as it should be). Or, simply lock the door to the previous level for 50-500 turns. Resting on a staircase should be forbidden (really, who camps out on a staircase, unless of course GOD himself couldn't follow you up the stairs, then maybe..) and resting to near a stairway could induce monster aggravation.... and/or maybe monsters that are aware of you should have the ability to "follow" you from one level to the next (just a bit of Pac-Man type delay when going through the tunnel/staircase).

I'm done ranting for now.. more later..

[Zikke]

Maybe there should be a ruleset for one difficulty and another ruleset for a harder "elite" difficulty. I personally don't have a problem being able to stair scum, use a perfect Detect Traps (it is magic after all, not subject to 'human' error), etc. I find the game hard enough as it is, but some people that want it really hard may need an elite mode setting (taken from Diablo games, there could be a better word for it). There could be alterations to the depth spawning of some monsters or reduced items, etc. for this mode.

Do any variants have different difficulty settings? (besides Ironman and the AI tweaks in the options)

[Mangojuice]

I don't like that the ability to stair scum exists either, and it could be easily solved. Just retain the prior dungeon level, monsters and all, for about 50-500 turns, determined randomly, so if someone were to try and scum they would simply keep revisiting the same level (with the monsters they just fled from waiting for them, as it should be). Or, simply lock the door to the previous level for 50-500 turns. Resting on a staircase should be forbidden (really, who camps out on a staircase, unless of course GOD himself couldn't follow you up the stairs, then maybe..) and resting to near a stairway could induce monster aggravation.... and/or maybe monsters that are aware of you should have the ability to "follow" you from one level to the next (just a bit of Pac-Man type delay when going through the tunnel/staircase).

I'm done ranting for now.. more later..

I thought about this for Z+Angband, but I felt like (1) making monsters able to follow you from level to level is a bit too nasty, but (2) keeping the previous dungeon level around for a period of time opens up a way to get a perfectly safe area to rest in, and then go back to a hard battle. I think, realistically, the way to solve the stair-scumming problem is to have the game detect it and punish you in an appropriate way. For instance, if the game detects that you've been stair-scumming recently, it may start generating levels with no treasure or monsters near you... until you stop stair-scumming and explore a level, and then it goes back to normal. Or, the safeguards keeping nearby monsters sleepy when you enter a level could be undone when you're stair-scumming, or the game could randomly have the stairs collapse behind you on occasion, or something.

Or, heck, it could just mark you as a cheater.

[Psi]

Perilous identify can sometimes hurt and confuse the player.

It is a lot worse than that if you are not a warrior though! Each use takes 20SP and if you have less than that, you get paralysed (with no check for FA). I lost a promising thrall to that. Storm Troll woke up and beat me to death before I got another turn.