Add auto-explore to Angband 4.0

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by Dwarf

All of the examples you give are very high-level monsters.

Gravity hounds appear around 1600'. That's 1/3:th through the game. Dracoliches at around 2000' which is still early game. Plasma hounds same. Nexus vortex way before stat gain. Native. In vaults much earlier.

I get to stat-gain in about hour of playing, which makes those monsters early game monsters to me. I get much slower deeper in dungeon.

Which monster of those is very high level in your opinion?

Maybe you just play very long time at early levels? Your suggestion actually implies that you tend to not only clear every level but actually explore every nook and corner, and that makes early game much more dangerous and slow. To compensate that you probably keep your char at overkill-status compared to monsters that are native at the depth. You can't keep your char at that status very long, at stat-gain you start meeting monsters that can kill you even at clvl 50 if you stumble upon them unprepared and unaware.

That's actually the beauty of the game, you can't let your guard down, there are monsters or group of monsters that can kill you no matter how buff you are. You have to apply some tactics to deal with them.

[Dwarf]

Originally Posted by Timo Pietilä

Gravity hounds appear around 1600'. That's 1/3:th through the game. Dracoliches at around 2000' which is still early game. Plasma hounds same. Nexus vortex way before stat gain. Native. In vaults much earlier.

I get to stat-gain in about hour of playing, which makes those monsters early game monsters to me. I get much slower deeper in dungeon.

Which monster of those is very high level in your opinion?

Maybe you just play very long time at early levels? Your suggestion actually implies that you tend to not only clear every level but actually explore every nook and corner, and that makes early game much more dangerous and slow. To compensate that you probably keep your char at overkill-status compared to monsters that are native at the depth. You can't keep your char at that status very long, at stat-gain you start meeting monsters that can kill you even at clvl 50 if you stumble upon them unprepared and unaware.

That's actually the beauty of the game, you can't let your guard down, there are monsters or group of monsters that can kill you no matter how buff you are. You have to apply some tactics to deal with them.

The one almost 30 level character managed to find an excellent bow early, followed by rod of acid balls and good armor. I played dwarf paladin, since I remember Angband had some balance issues, so that playing dwarf fighter/cleric/paladin was much safer than say elf/halfling ranger/mage. I didn't clear every level, I dived to around dungeon level 25 and scummed for good level feelings. Got two stat increases before teleporting to insta-death from a mob of paralyzing undead. There was no point were auto-explore would have killed me in any of the games, but teleporting did. A good run anyway, and I didn't even mind about having to press 3 keys for every fired arrow.

Most new players will do worse than me, and won't get to the monsters you mention early, unless they cheat with save files. Do you want to develop the game for the people that have already played it for years? In that case the game will vanish, since other players will find the archaic interface with tens of commands slow and plain weird. Auto-run and macros are not enough.

[Carnivean]

Originally Posted by Dwarf

There was no point were auto-explore would have killed me in any of the games, but teleporting did.

In my understanding, these 2 things are essentially equal. Auto-explore takes real game turns, but no user turns, but in all other aspects they are the same. They both take you into the unknown, where the occupants can kill you before you are ready.

I think that's why there is a backlash against it. You're in essence telling everyone that they should jump around the map, into whatever is there, especially new players who don't understand the risk.

Unless I'm wrong, and they are completely different?

[Dwarf]

Originally Posted by Carnivean

In my understanding, these 2 things are essentially equal. Auto-explore takes real game turns, but no user turns, but in all other aspects they are the same. They both take you into the unknown, where the occupants can kill you before you are ready.

I think that's why there is a backlash against it. You're in essence telling everyone that they should jump around the map, into whatever is there, especially new players who don't understand the risk.

Unless I'm wrong, and they are completely different?

Teleporting is something you have to do, if you get greedy and have to take the risk of ending in auto-death. Auto-explore you can stop using when you want. Teleporting will put you in the middle of monsters frequently, auto-explore will almost always put you at edge of vision from monsters.

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by Dwarf

Teleporting is something you have to do, if you get greedy and have to take the risk of ending in auto-death. Auto-explore you can stop using when you want. Teleporting will put you in the middle of monsters frequently, auto-explore will almost always put you at edge of vision from monsters.

You are saying that you would not have run into those paralyzing monsters with auto-explore? In twisty corridor that's always the risk, starting from dlvl 1, unless you do detect monsters and deliberately avoid the monster in question.

If you want to make auto-explore as smart as human and being able to detect monsters and then avoid them, then what is the point of playing the game? Just get a borg and use it as screen saver.

[Dwarf]

Originally Posted by Timo Pietilä

You are saying that you would not have run into those paralyzing monsters with auto-explore? In twisty corridor that's always the risk, starting from dlvl 1, unless you do detect monsters and deliberately avoid the monster in question.

I wasn't saying that. In a twisty corridor you will at worst run to a single monster, with a pack behind it. Besides, this is what the current auto-run does, a feature you are already most likely using. Teleportation can put you in the middle of a pack, this is what causes teleportation auto-deaths.

Originally Posted by Timo Pietilä

If you want to make auto-explore as smart as human and being able to detect monsters and then avoid them, then what is the point of playing the game? Just get a borg and use it as screen saver.

There wouldn't be a point. Good thing nobody has suggested that in the thread.

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by Dwarf

I wasn't saying that. In a twisty corridor you will at worst run to a single monster, with a pack behind it. Besides, this is what the current auto-run does, a feature you are already most likely using.

I do detect monsters before engaging running, and running stops fairly regularly at things. Auto-explore would not do that, if I have understood the whole concept correctly.

[Dwarf]

Originally Posted by Timo Pietilä

I do detect monsters before engaging running, and running stops fairly regularly at things. Auto-explore would not do that, if I have understood the whole concept correctly.

The DCSS version stops after visual sight of a monster, picking up an item on a non-ignore list, and when there seems to be nothing left to explore. In addition the movement speed is slow enough for the player to halt the auto-explore. You can try it to see how it works.

[Derakon]

In any case, I think you're being needlessly apocalyptic about Angband's chances. Yes, there are definitely things we need to do to improve the user interface, and we could certainly stand to be friendlier to newbies. You said you gave 4.0 a look-see, well, 4.0 is wholly a cleanup of the code, with (ideally) no gameplay-level changes, but the idea is that 4.1 will follow fairly closely on its heels with actual changes.

In the meantime, Angband is not going to die. I mean, people still play NetHack, for crying out loud, and it hasn't had an update in twelve years!

[Antoine]

I think it would be awesome if Angband had an auto-explore command that had a significant chance of getting you killed on deeper levels.

A.