[Announce] FrogComposband 7.1.toffee released

[Mocht]

Mocht: how is that different from any other project?

If you are a client and you pay for something then the person who made it might listen to you
But with respect to free software, developers will not enter into any discussions

[Gwarl]

Mocht: how is that different from any other project? As it happens, i understand both your points. The bottom line: if you want this option, it needs a different name--say Composband--quick mode. That name needs to be in the title, not just in the options, because it screws up the ladder, and as sideways said, it is a completely different game. Yes, it could be done as a fork, but also with ingame mechanics. The trouble is, it adds more work that *someone has to be willing to do and maintain.* This is why sideways mentions the fork: he alone can't afford to put in the time. If you want to do it, and it proves popular, it can be folded back in. That is why github exists, more or less.

If I repeat that Composband is not FrogComposband often enough people may eventually take it on board.

[Sideways]

If you don't understand why those options are popular then that shows a worrying distance between you and your players

If I don't understand why an option was popular I will seek to understand why it is that the option was popular, so that if the option ever is re-introduced I can make sure that the characteristics that once made it popular can be retained in the new, different context, which simply porting the old code would not necessarily achieve because the context is new and different. I'm not sure why you find this objectionable.

[Nick]

If I repeat that Composband is not FrogComposband often enough people may eventually take it on board.

You have much to learn about humanity

[Mocht]

... the new, different context ... the context is new and different

It would be logically sound for you to assert "Nup, I don't like it, not in my game", or "Too much hassle"; no player believes that Frog is significantly different to Pos

[Bostock]

I don't know, man, reading back over the months through the ladder posts and forum threads on Pos, I've gotten the feeling that Pos is sometimes even radically different from itself. Let alone a fork of it. :-)

[Sideways]

It would be logically sound for you to assert "Nup, I don't like it, not in my game", or "Too much hassle"; no player believes that Frog is significantly different to Pos

But neither of those assertions would (currently) be true. I may well decide, later, that I don't like it or that it's too much hassle; both of those are entirely possible future outcomes. But I haven't come to either of those conclusions yet.

I don't know, man, reading back over the months through the ladder posts and forum threads on Pos, I've gotten the feeling that Pos is sometimes even radically different from itself. Let alone a fork of it. :-)

You've hit the nail on the head. I know pretty well how different Frog is from Pos; I maintain the thing. But it's not just about the differences between Frog and Pos, but also the differences between different versions of Pos, and one of the most important differences to come into play here is a Pos vs. Pos one.

At one point, Chris changed monster density on small levels. When people say they want always_small_levels back, do they also want the old monster density back, or do they actually prefer the new monster density, or is the density something that doesn't matter at all, or something that individual always_small_levels players have different opinions about? And if I gave them the option of increasing monster density on small levels, would that option be something they'd still like to have when they were playing with always_small_levels off? Would they maybe even want higher monster density on big levels?

Another big thing (which is Pos vs. Frog): what kind of level do always_small_levels folks think of as "small"? The code for determining the size of a small level has changed, and deep dungeon Angband generates "small" levels that are actually pretty big. Do the always_small_levels players accept those levels as small, or do they want their small levels smaller than that? Do they want the same size of small levels regardless of depth, or do they want tiny levels in the early game and bigger small levels in the late game?

I don't know. That's why I need people's input. Seeking people's input is the opposite of stifling discussion.

[Derakon]

These options are extremely popular...you are making the exact same mistake that Chris made
You are also making another mistake
... Chris didn't see it, and you aren't seeing it either...

Dude. Chill. Cut out the ad hominem attacks. It's fine to feel strongly about a game, and to argue passionately for or against a change, but you can feel strongly without attacking the maintainers. Neither chris nor Sideways deserves to be treated the way you're treating them.

To get back to the topic at hand, though.

Regarding wanting the player to feel like they've accomplished a legitimate victory: the game is hard, but it is not equally hard for all setups. There's no comparison between a mismatched/weak race/class combo and a powerful one, right? Even two games with the exact same settings can be more or less difficult depending on the specifics of what happens in-game. Whether you readily find useful artifacts or have to claw and scrape for every minute improvement makes a big difference in how hard a victory was. I think players understand that, so they'll also understand that a win with unusual-rooms on is qualitatively different from a win with it off.

Regarding wanting to be able to use the ladder to compare runs: this is a fair concern. Ideally you'd be able to filter the ladder based on options set, so you could compare your no-artifacts ironman unusual-rooms win as a shadow-elf high mage against other similar runs. Of course, even if you could do that, as noted above the specifics of how each run goes makes them much harder to compare. I'm not convinced that the value-add of more-comparable runs on the ladder is worth missing out on a popular option.

[Sideways]

Regarding wanting to be able to use the ladder to compare runs: this is a fair concern. Ideally you'd be able to filter the ladder based on options set, so you could compare your no-artifacts ironman unusual-rooms win as a shadow-elf high mage against other similar runs. Of course, even if you could do that, as noted above the specifics of how each run goes makes them much harder to compare. I'm not convinced that the value-add of more-comparable runs on the ladder is worth missing out on a popular option.

Comparability of runs on the ladder is something I view as a good thing, but it's not going to be a sticking point that prevents an option from being re-added. There are plenty of end-runs around that problem already: coffee runs are prominently marked as coffee in the version tag ("7.1.toffee (coffee)"), so everyone can see at a glance that they're coffee; easy_damage runs have special scoring; munchkin "wins" simply don't count as a win at all.

What I'm more concerned about is new players who aren't that familiar with the Angband community and probably don't even submit their characters to the oook ladder. There are people playing FrogComposband who have minimal previous experience with Composband, PosChengband or even Angband. I want them to be able to enjoy their first wins fully without lingering doubts that they only won because they turned every possible easy-mode on.

(To be clear, I'm not saying "always small levels" would be an easy-mode. I have no idea whether it would or would not be an easy-mode, and at this point neither does anybody else because the answer would depend on how it's implemented and what other options would go with it.)

[MITZE]

(To be clear, I'm not saying "always small levels" would be an easy-mode. I have no idea whether it would or would not be an easy-mode, and at this point neither does anybody else because the answer would depend on how it's implemented and what other options would go with it.)

Obviously I haven't used it recently, but I did use it frequently in games up to and including the you-know-what; in my experience, it did not make the game easier at all, and in fact made it harder—I remember getting an Angband quest for elder storm giants (dump doesn't say how many, but I think it was somewhere from like 12-20 at DL50), where detection covered 3/4 of the level . . . I had to -TeleOther them like mad at first.

[Mocht]

... it did not make the game easier at all ...

He doesn't want to restore it, but he doesn't want to say he doesn't want to restore it
Answering his irrelevant objections or responding to his strange tautologies won't help

[MITZE]

. . .

You're being more than a little rude, and moreover, that isn't going to help in getting anyone to take you or your opinions seriously.

Stop that, please.

[Sideways]

Obviously I haven't used it recently, but I did use it frequently in games up to and including the you-know-what; in my experience, it did not make the game easier at all, and in fact made it harder—I remember getting an Angband quest for elder storm giants (dump doesn't say how many, but I think it was somewhere from like 12-20 at DL50), where detection covered 3/4 of the level . . . I had to -TeleOther them like mad at first.

That doesn't surprise me. (It also sounds like something that wouldn't happen to a player with the default "all quests are for uniques" setting on )

It might play differently today; but at its mildest, I'd expect it to play like coffee-break mode without the coffee-break aspect - which doesn't sound like it would be a dramatic easy-mode.

--

Did you play your small-level games with or without the "always generate unusual rooms" setting? That one gives me far more intuitive misgivings than always generating small levels does; it sounds so much like something Composband would do, at least if Gwarl didn't hate allowing options. But people tie that together with "always generate small levels" quite a bit - and of course, it was a request for the unusual rooms option to be added back that sparked this discussion.

[Nick]

He doesn't want to restore it, but he doesn't want to say he doesn't want to restore it
Answering his irrelevant objections or responding to his strange tautologies won't help

Seems like trying to understand what exact change is actually being asked for isn't completely irrelevant, in fact may even be necessary before implementing it.

[MITZE]

That doesn't surprise me. (It also sounds like something that wouldn't happen to a player with the default "all quests are for uniques" setting on )

Ah, switching that option is an old habit, due to at one point the possibility of missing out on fame because it was possible to get an Angband quest for a unique you had already killed; if you did, I think you lost out on whatever fame you might've gotten from the quest completion. Not sure if a fix was ever implemented.

Did you play your small-level games with or without the "always generate unusual rooms" setting?

Without; I have enough trouble surviving normally, nevermind when every dungeon level comes with guaranteed vaults and OOD monsters

(Turning on small levels was originally done to theoretically speed my playing up; I didn't realize how much more dangerous that could make it until a good ways into the character.)