[Announce] FrogComposband 7.1.salmiak released

[ThatFishNemo]

Alright, glad to hear your feedback. I can understand how much work it would take forever to get the proper damage dice for innate attacks with hundreds of monster bodies you could possibly possess so that has a lower priority over spell rates that can be critical to a character an any give moment.

I believe Blue Mages do start with a magic missile wand for this reason, but I don't think the suggestion of also letting them start with the spell is unreasonable. Though it feels somewhat unintuitive, they are currently allowed to learn "Shoot" from snagas, which makes it easier for them to get off the ground.

Oh so does this mean that blue mages can also learn "Throw Boulder"? Thats amazing, it would work as nice substitute for essentially all the bolt spells since the damage would be really consistent, its unresistible and it stuns too. If only I could ever make it that far with them.

Lich is one of the strongest monster races; so while the argument makes perfect sense in itself, I would consider drawing a different conclusion from it. Liches are too strong and ought to be nerfed

Oh dear not my precious liches. Well if you were to nerf them, maybe it could be by splitting some of their powers into an alternate sub-race for them (I saw some notes about an idea for a Black Reaver line in the source code, maybe they could get the mana storm instead) Archliches are stupendously strong and only have their low hp and lack of good melee holding them back, even then their melee isn't the worst against living enemies since it drains hp very reliably. The Black Reaver line could probably get most of the Archlich's offensive talents with a strong melee and maybe offensive spells that could be castable but not mainly used and it wouldn't get summoning spells or telepathy, it would be like an undead Hru which would bash its way into rooms and pummel everything in its path. Archliches could then be focused more onto the ranged front with summons to back them up/provide distractions, maybe by making them have less hp to give them a need to flee from battle into the cold walls of the dungeon (Removing Passwall for Archliches spoils the immersion so that should 100% stay)

This is my experience with them, too! But plenty of other people are doing well with them; barely a week ago, we had a player get his first ever win in the game with a Quylthulg. Bostock even won an instant-coffee thrall quylthulg, a combination that takes craziness to a whole new level.

So I'm inclined to think Quylthulgs do have enough upside even in the early game, and it just takes a different approach and playstyle - one I don't personally seem to have - to fully tap into it. Late-game Quylthulgs are definitely very strong.

What Bostock did was amazing, considering that I've never even made it back to the surface in thrall mode, so I haven't given up. I've started a few more, currently I have a Clvl26 Quyl, and I can see how they really rise as the game goes on, summoning ancient dragons at DL36 of the Troll caves with a wand/staff of Haste monsters in nothing short of impressive. But as usual I'll have to be careful not to let a single monster evade my view, especially in quests where tons of speedy monsters are packed into a tiny space with no room to teleport to safely (Looking at you Old Man Willow). I'll post a dump if I win (die) maybe I'll realize the error of my ways eventually.

[Sideways]

This has been a nice update, and overall an amazing variant. To make a long story short I'll just state the things that bug me the most.

-Possessors:
When possessing a form with spells, the spell list does not show the fail rate of the spells you have. I'm not sure this has been brought up before so if there's a reason behind it I'll be up to hear it.

I'll look into this, but I suspect you're just right and the failrates can be and should be displayed in the spell menu.

How exactly is the damage for the attacks of your innate possessed form calculated, it doesn't seems to match the damage dice of the regular monster's attacks. Would like to have some proper closure on whether to use the innate attacks for a Lesser titan or an ego sword with a nice slaying property.

It's based on the damage dice, but the first effect on a hit gets the usual bonuses and additions you also get in regular combat, as well as a small additional bonus if it's a "melee-type" hit (hit, punch, kick, claw, bite etc.).

A proper average-damage display for Possessors is high on my to-do list. Unfortunately it's also a coding nightmare - not unimplementable, but definitely a pain to implement.

Blue Mage:
Would it be fine if they could just get magic missile at the beginning to give them a bit of an easier time to start. Blue mages essentially have to play the earliest part of the game as warriors since offensive spellcasters only start appearing when you would be nearing the bottom of the Thieve's Hideout.; I don't know if its just my bad luck or I'm not searching the wilderness for novice mages and mindcrafters quick enough, but fighting Mungash as a mage with no spells is very difficult.

I believe Blue Mages do start with a magic missile wand for this reason, but I don't think the suggestion of also letting them start with the spell is unreasonable. Though it feels somewhat unintuitive, they are currently allowed to learn "Shoot" from snagas, which makes it easier for them to get off the ground.

Its telling when a Lich's Nether ball spell does around 145 damage at level 30 or so for 15 SP but a Ring's breath spell does 160 damage for 30 SP and doesn't change much.

Lich is one of the strongest monster races; so while the argument makes perfect sense in itself, I would consider drawing a different conclusion from it. Liches are too strong and ought to be nerfed

-Quylthulgs
Oh this one. THIS ONE is the one I've really been bashing my head in for. This race is like nothing I've ever seen, even the Sorceror class in this variant seemed tame compared to this, and they have negative AC and no melee capabilities from dawn till dusk. Quyls are essentially helpless, Quyls are what Yeeks would look like in the face of an Archon. But I forgive them because they get their own personal army and that absolutely rocks. Yet there are always several things that need to be said.
As a Quyl, you are essentially committing yourself to playing a no-hit run. Its sounds like an over exaggeration but when you find yourself getting killed by pretty much anything your pets couldn't kill before they get to you, you failed a phase door, used teleport and landed in a nest of dragons, or just had any enemy with 'Teleport To' exist. Reading " the -foo- commands you to return" is essentially just a prelude to the death screen. The speed penalty they get is too severe in my opinion, I know you have to play the race carefully, but losing a character instantly because you essentially didn't have yourself constantly hasted for the entire game is very disheartening, its been about 3 days with over 25 attempts and not one Quyl I've had has made it to level 30 and every single death had been either failing a spell, not noticing something for one turn or "It commands you to return" seeing the 50% hp warning, clicking <more> and watching my hp plummet below the absolute zero. I'd really suggest that the speed penalty for quyls be reduced or maybe even outright removed once you hit lvl20 and become a nexus, because by then you'll be at a depth where a lot bunch of non-pack enemies are hitting +10 speed and basically become instant kills should you not be in the cover of your army.

This is my experience with them, too! But plenty of other people are doing well with them; barely a week ago, we had a player get his first ever win in the game with a Quylthulg. Bostock even won an instant-coffee thrall quylthulg, a combination that takes craziness to a whole new level.

So I'm inclined to think Quylthulgs do have enough upside even in the early game, and it just takes a different approach and playstyle - one I don't personally seem to have - to fully tap into it. Late-game Quylthulgs are definitely very strong.

[ThatFishNemo]

This has been a nice update, and overall an amazing variant. To make a long story short I'll just state the things that bug me the most.

-Possessors:
When possessing a form with spells, the spell list does not show the fail rate of the spells you have. I'm not sure this has been brought up before so if there's a reason behind it I'll be up to hear it.

How exactly is the damage for the attacks of your innate possessed form calculated, it doesn't seems to match the damage dice of the regular monster's attacks. Would like to have some proper closure on whether to use the innate attacks for a Lesser titan or an ego sword with a nice slaying property.

-Blue Mage:
Would it be fine if they could just get magic missile at the beginning to give them a bit of an easier time to start. Blue mages essentially have to play the earliest part of the game as warriors since offensive spellcasters only start appearing when you would be nearing the bottom of the Thieve's Hideout.; I don't know if its just my bad luck or I'm not searching the wilderness for novice mages and mindcrafters quick enough, but fighting Mungash as a mage with no spells is very difficult.

-Rings:
One of my favorite races to play aside Liches and Quylthulgs. The idea is so funny but feels so nice to try out. Of course I have some problems, but take these more like asking for guidance rather than suggesting changes. Rings are, as I'd expect, fragile. But their hp seems to be so low that advancing to deeper levels takes a large amount of time. It doesn't really help that your ringbearers can toss you at any moment, especially after they summon a huge horde and have them all turn on you at once in the middle of a quest.
Basically progression is really really slow for rings since a lot of their spells damage doesn't scale well and drain their mana incredibly quickly. Its telling when a Lich's Nether ball spell does around 145 damage at level 30 or so for 15 SP but a Ring's breath spell does 160 damage for 30 SP and doesn't change much. But since they overall have some of the greatest potential to grow and gain extremely powerful abilities and permanent resists, this is somewhat balanced for them. But not everyone wants to farm for good jewelry at Zul

-Quylthulgs
Oh this one. THIS ONE is the one I've really been bashing my head in for. This race is like nothing I've ever seen, even the Sorceror class in this variant seemed tame compared to this, and they have negative AC and no melee capabilities from dawn till dusk. Quyls are essentially helpless, Quyls are what Yeeks would look like in the face of an Archon. But I forgive them because they get their own personal army and that absolutely rocks. Yet there are always several things that need to be said.
As a Quyl, you are essentially committing yourself to playing a no-hit run. Its sounds like an over exaggeration but when you find yourself getting killed by pretty much anything your pets couldn't kill before they get to you, you failed a phase door, used teleport and landed in a nest of dragons, or just had any enemy with 'Teleport To' exist. Reading " the -foo- commands you to return" is essentially just a prelude to the death screen. The speed penalty they get is too severe in my opinion, I know you have to play the race carefully, but losing a character instantly because you essentially didn't have yourself constantly hasted for the entire game is very disheartening, its been about 3 days with over 25 attempts and not one Quyl I've had has made it to level 30 and every single death had been either failing a spell, not noticing something for one turn or "It commands you to return" seeing the 50% hp warning, clicking <more> and watching my hp plummet below the absolute zero. I'd really suggest that the speed penalty for quyls be reduced or maybe even outright removed once you hit lvl20 and become a nexus, because by then you'll be at a depth where a lot bunch of non-pack enemies are hitting +10 speed and basically become instant kills should you not be in the cover of your army.

These are all the things I remember having to say for now. Of course despite this I love this variant its got so many choices for you to take and the many different ways to play are tremendous fun, I really do hope you keep up the good work on Frog and I can't wait to see the next update (Actually I can, who knows if there would be a huge game changing fix in the next one. Take your time please)

[Sideways]

Seems normal-ish, I thought you meant ~1.53 blows with claws and not 2.53

Claw attacks eventually cap at 4.00/round, and as they get more powerful they also get "heavier", making them slightly harder to gain blows with. (Playing as a Chaos Drake actually means you are getting slightly more blows than another dragon would with the same STR and DEX, because chaos dragons are fairly weak at melee compared to other dragons, but that also means their claws are not as heavy.)

[Sauken]

Ok, found the stats.
Str: 18/63
Int: 18/25
Wis: 9
Dex: 18/27
Con: 18/30
Chr: 18/39

Melee: Excellent
Attack: Your Claw (3d4)
Blows: 2.53

Attack: Your Bite (3d9)
Blows:1.00

Does this seem normal?

I'll put the dump up as well.

http://jsbin.com/xaxehelome/edit?html,output

[Sideways]

Are blows for the dragon monster race being calculated correctly? My dragon, even with 18/70 strength only gets 1.5x blows for claws and bite stays at 1x. Is this normal?

I would expect more claw blows with 18/70 STR, but if your DEX is extremely low (say 10 or 11) then it would be normal. Bite takes some time to get beyond 1 blow/round.

[Sauken]

Are blows for the dragon monster race being calculated correctly? My dragon, even with 18/70 strength only gets 1.5x blows for claws and bite stays at 1x. Is this normal?

[archolewa]

How exactly does a Rage-Mage's "Detect Magical Foes" decide whether or not an enemy is a "magic user?" It doesn't seem to detect all enemies that use spells (i.e. black knights).

[Sideways]

The basic XP formula for a monster in Frog is [monster-dependent XP value] * [monster's native level] / [CL + 2]; it's very similar to V's formula of [XP value] * [monster level] / CL, though Frog has a lot more extra complications, including the partial credit for just damaging a monster.

Because CL+2 is used as a divisor, you do get less XP from any given monster at higher levels; therefore, delaying a quest does mean you get less XP from the monsters in it. But in the meantime, you did other things at a lower CL and got more XP from those

In coffee-break specifically, because XP gain is boosted in the dungeon, you could in theory "win" XP by delaying town quests so you can kill dungeon monsters at a lower CL; but in practice this is likely to be counterproductive and any gain would be negligible since most leveling-up happens in the dungeon anyway.

[GrimaTheBold]

[QUOTE=Sideways;147214]You get 20% of the XP and the pet gets the remaining 80%, except on Quylthulgs (both you and the pet get the full XP) and Rings (same as Quylthulgs in the special case of the ringbearer). Note that what you get is 20% of the XP that would otherwise go to the pet; that might be higher or lower than 20% of the XP you'd get for scoring the kill yourself, since monster XP calculations are not quite identical with player calculations, and the monster's level likely does not equal your level. There are also some additional tweaks for the faster game speeds.

This comment about XP reminds me of a more general question I've been wondering. Is XP per kill reduced the higher the CL is? I'm asking because sometimes I'll skip the quests (after Pest Control) for a while and just keep on diving in Angband, then eventually go back and waltz through a bunch of them (Orc Camp, Old Man Willow, Tengu, Dark Elven Lords, Vapor Quest, etc). By doing this, am I getting fewer total XP than if I did those quests earlier? If I tackle these at CL 30-35 instead of 20-25, is it a major reduction in earned XP or minor? I play in coffee-break mode.

[Sideways]

Messing around with the latest version. One thing that I very much miss from (modern) Angband is that a weapon's damage and blows are shown in the weapon description.

It would be *really nice* if we could have that in Frogcomposband as well. As it is now, I need to equip the weapon and then jump down to the Melee category to see what my blows and damage are. Putting it in the weapon description would save me a bunch of key strokes (w,aCmEscw,a).

Unfortunately that is unlikely to happen. The code for supporting it in V is already a massive headache, and V only has a single weapon slot. In Frog it would have to be a massive headache^8 because the number of weapon slots isn't fixed and is usually higher than 1.

Frog blows are considerably less tiered than V's; unless your blows are at the maximum or minimum (or your STR or DEX is at 18/***), you can pretty much take it for granted that adding more STR or DEX will give you more blows per round.

[archolewa]

Messing around with the latest version. One thing that I very much miss from (modern) Angband is that a weapon's damage and blows are shown in the weapon description.

It would be *really nice* if we could have that in Frogcomposband as well. As it is now, I need to equip the weapon and then jump down to the Melee category to see what my blows and damage are. Putting it in the weapon description would save me a bunch of key strokes (w,aCmEscw,a).

Modern Angband also provides how much more strength and dex you need to get the next tier of blows (i.e. with +1 Dex you would get 1.5 blows with this weapon). That would also be really nice to have visible, especially when deciding which stat to increase after clearing a dungeon or on level up.

[CyclopsSlayer]

I recently itroduced an old friend to Frog. He had played Moria/Vanilla/Zang/Heng back many years ago. He asked a few questions about things I had just taken for granted.
This made me think of a few quality of life things;

1. (X, Y) It isn't definitively stated anywhere I've seen how Melee Weapons and Combat items only add to melee to-hit and to-dmg, Archery items only to Ranged combat, Wizardry items only to Magic.

1a. What all counts as Ranged Bows/Slings, sure. Thrown? Does that Spike add +Y damage? That flask of oil?

1b. Is it definitively stated somewhere that when dual-wielding Rings only affect the matching hand's weapon? Or that other items bonuses are split?

2. Armor limitations. Should there be a display indicator somewhere that says 'this char can only wear 14.4 Lbs before suffering detrimental effects'

I am sure that there are more, but damned if I can think of them right now.

[Bucephalus]

Potions of invulnerability reduce satiation, despite this not being documented anywhere and not making sense.

The action cost for movement affects how far a player can walk on the map before getting hungry. Speed doesn't.

The "decrease mana" flag reduces spell failure rates by 3% although it's not clear why. (OK. Nevermind. You quietly fixed this in Salmiak.)

"Hellfire" is described as doing extra damage to good monsters, but doesn't. (You... fixed this, too. Whatever.)

Jewelry of wizardry with bonus damage has a nominal to-hit bonus, but the bonus is always 0 and spells don't miss.

Cockatrices are still in the game despite being the worst

[HugoVirtuoso]

Cannot be destroyed...by chaos? Lightning?