FAangband 2.0.1

[quercus]

Do the following qualify as "beneficial magic effects" for the Enhance Magic specialty? If so, which aspects of the spells are modified (duration, stat gains, damage modifier, etc.)?

-Temporary brands such as Smite Evil, Demon Bane, etc.
-Polymorphic spells such a Bat Form, Bear Form, Vampire Form, etc.
-Vampire Strike (as healing spell of sorts)

[quercus]

I don't fully understand the description/effects of the Holy Light specialty of priests and paladins. I have noticed the light radius and light resistance bonus. However, the damage modifier does not seem to be viewable or noticeable.

The damage bonus does not appear when examining a weapon as though the character gains an innate melee brand of slay evil, slay undead, or a light brand (pretty sure light/darkness brands are not a thing). I cannot say that evil, undead, or light sensitive monsters seem any easier to dispatch in melee combat. Critical hits do not appear to be more frequent either. Likewise, the combat messages with unbranded weapons do not change to "you smite the undead/demon/evil creature," for example or "you strike with extra force..."

The description indicates that it "causes undead, evil, and light-sensitive creatures to take extra melee damage and makes them fear your light-based spells." The last bit about light-based spells sounds like it would be very helpful, especially early in the game, but I have never witnessed an otherwise non-light sensitive evil or undead creature suffer any effects (neither damage nor frightening effects) from a light based spell after choosing the Holy Light specialty.

Does it only effect a creature if it is undead AND evil AND already light-sensitive? If so, that would be somewhat useless because such creatures would be susceptible to light-based attacks anyway without the Holy Light specialty. Or does it function like a very low level scare monster spell that can't even frighten a cutpurse. Again, that too would be somewhat useless.

Ultimately, Holy Light feels like wasted specialty selection as opposed to Martial Arts where the effect is pretty obvious. I think it would be pretty neat if you actually did get an innate slay evil melee damage bonus from Holy Light that could stack with the Martial Arts specialty.

[backwardsEric]

Originally Posted by quercus

Do the following qualify as "beneficial magic effects" for the Enhance Magic specialty? If so, which aspects of the spells are modified (duration, stat gains, damage modifier, etc.)?

-Temporary brands such as Smite Evil, Demon Bane, etc.

The temporary brands and slays gain duration (1.5 times the duration without the specialty) but there's no effect on the damage modifier.

Originally Posted by quercus

Polymorphic spells such a Bat Form, Bear Form, Vampire Form, etc.

The only effect on the polymorphing spells is the duration of the beneficial timed effect that some of them have immediately after transforming (super heroism for warg and werewolf forms and the vampiric attacks that the vampire form has for a period of time).

Originally Posted by quercus

Vampire Strike (as healing spell of sorts)

Enhance magic has no effect on the damage or healing from Vampire Strike.


In general, Enhance Magic only affects timed effects that are applied to the player. The beneficial ones gain in duration (1.5x). The +hit and +armor from the blessing timed effect increase (an additional +5 for each). The +armor from the shielding timed effect increases (an additional +15). The +hit from the heroism timed effect increases (an additional +6). The bonus to melee skill from superheroism increases. The bonus to speed from temporary speed increases (+13 rather than +10) as does the bonuses from temporary infravision and stealth. There's an outstanding issue, https://github.com/NickMcConnell/FAangband/issues/343 , that the spell descriptions don't reflect the bonuses from Enhance Magic.

[backwardsEric]

Originally Posted by quercus

However, the damage modifier does not seem to be viewable or noticeable.

The effect from Holy Light on weapon damage is not currently shown in object descriptions and, since it's not handled like a slay for undead or evil, there isn't a message like those for a slay when the weapon hits a vulnerable monster.

Originally Posted by quercus

The description indicates that it "causes undead, evil, and light-sensitive creatures to take extra melee damage and makes them fear your light-based spells." The last bit about light-based spells sounds like it would be very helpful, especially early in the game, but I have never witnessed an otherwise non-light sensitive evil or undead creature suffer any effects (neither damage nor frightening effects) from a light based spell after choosing the Holy Light specialty.

Does it only effect a creature if it is undead AND evil AND already light-sensitive?

The additional fear applied from light-based spells should affect either undead, evil, or light-sensitive monsters. The monster only has to be in at least one of those categories. At best, the fear is only applied 20% of the time, and there's an additional saving throw (depending on the player's level compared to the monster's level) that can further reduce how often the fear is triggered. When the fear is triggered, you should see '... is dismayed by the Light' rather than the usual '... cringes from the light'.

[quercus]

Can anyone help to quantify the melee bonuses of certain races, classes, or specialties. Attributes such as polearm_skill, woodsman, or the Holy Light specialty do not appear to be readily quantifiable in-game (at least not to me). I did find some formulas in player-calc.c and player-atttack.c and have a a general idea about what some of these do mathematically, but less so about the practical implications for the gameplay experience. I'm not much of a programmer therefore a plain English explanation would be helpful.

For example, what would be the quantifiable difference (to-hit, avg damage per hit, or other) between a Lv10 dwarf paladin wielding a spear (1d6)(+1,+1) vs a rapier (1d6)(+1,+1), assuming the number of blows are the same? With or without Holy Light against a cave troll? What if it's blessed or not?

I know some of these scale up with player level, but it is unclear to me how impactful it is. I can't tell if an Ent priest is better off avoiding a halberd like its a brush fire even if it is enchanted. How much less bad would it be if it was blessed? Will it even matter by player level 20 or a certain STR/DEX threshold because the overall effect is negligible?

I'm similarly curious about things like the dodge bonus for dwarves in the mountains. Is a longbeard better off running through Ered Luin in naught but his skin because of the weight based evasion formula, or is the best heavy armor still the better protection in most cases even if the weight cancels the evasion? The latter probably, but I imagine a better understanding of the numbers would inform certain tactical decisions in special circumstances (e.g. take off the heavy armor for a dodge bonus to avoid hits when surrounded because the armor won't deduce damage dramatically and you'll take more hits wearing it) or generally to optimize your equipment.

[Chryana]

Hello,
I have been playing an ent druid with the power strike ability. My character has been almost exclusively playing unarmed. This is supposed to give a chance to confuse monsters and I see plenty of messages to that effect in the console (e.g. You uppercut and attempt to confuse the filthy street urchin.), but my character is now level 34 and I cannot say I remember seeing a monster being confused by a melee attack even once. My character has had very low dexterity for most of the game (3-5), which may also have an impact.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Chryana

Hello,
I have been playing an ent druid with the power strike ability. My character has been almost exclusively playing unarmed. This is supposed to give a chance to confuse monsters and I see plenty of messages to that effect in the console (e.g. You uppercut and attempt to confuse the filthy street urchin.), but my character is now level 34 and I cannot say I remember seeing a monster being confused by a melee attack even once. My character has had very low dexterity for most of the game (3-5), which may also have an impact.

Yes, probably. The confusion effect is more likely of you have a good to-hit, and DEX contributes to that.

[Chryana]

Thanks for the incredibly quick reply to my last post, that was really kind.
I still cannot confirm I saw any monster being confused by unarmed attacks, but in any case I mostly cast the confusion spells when a monster is vulnerable to it; it seems far more useful than in Vanilla. (Even Glaurung is vulnerable(!).)
In any case... I found a chest with gleaming black runes whose trap I set off five times in a row before I disarmed it. Every time, I had an ominous message "Let the darkness have thee!" in the console. I couldn't but check the code and it seems meant to do something bad, but nothing much happened... My saving throw is 100% though.
Finally, I had a crash when a Maia of Aulë caused the ceiling to collapse, but I see something similar was reported earlier and it may be fixed in newer versions of the code.
I'm sorry if this post is a bit rambling, I don't have any questions; I only thought you may find this mildly interesting.

[Angloki]

Neat! I loved Fangband.))