Speaking of dragons... (another idea)

[Grotug]

So as I recall a major focus of the 4.2 overhaul was to make deeper monsters more dangerous so that the deepest dungeon is more distinguished from like DL60. One such group of monsters that became more difficult were dragons. However, I had an idea for Smaug that could be applied to some other deepest monsters as well, something that would give Smaug (and some others) a little more character and danger without adding summons or non-thematic breath attacks to their retinue, and that is to do more with movement speed on select enemies.

Maybe it's too complicated to program, but maybe there could be an added behavior, something kind of on the lines to berserk mode that berserkers enter (is that actually more than just hasting themselves?) But instead of a monster hasting itself, it gets a brief burst in movement speed; the practical effect of which is kind of similar to summoning @ to the monster (like what Lorgan does), but which would play out in a much more interesting and alarming way on screen.

So envision Smaug with +1 native movement speed. So now he is more difficult to run away from. But in addition to giving him a regular movement speed of +1 around the dungeon he'd also have the ability to enter brief bursts of movement speed +3 for three turns (provided he is some distance from @). (After all, why should only @ get a boost in movement speed, but not monsters?)

This might have an added benefit of helping to nerf some the stone to mud trickery that ranged attackers like to exploit so much, too. A powerful monster would be able to get to @ that much quicker by having the ability to enter burst movement speed while they don't have LOS of @. I would say that probably only a very select few monsters would get this burst movement speed ability.

Could also consider using movement speed on very early monsters like crows or even Grip and Fang to have them remain difficult to get away from, but without them getting in two turns of attack on each turn.

[Cryomaniac]

Gensouband has a similar monster ability - some strong high level monsters can teleport themselves to the player's area even when out of line of sight, making it far harder to get away from them. It's easier to implement than adding a separate temporary monster effect boosting movement speed (I'm not familiar with current Angband codebase - theoretically should be doable, not sure how easy it will be), though it's more thematically vague with giving monsters arbitrary teleportation abilities.

I'm definitely sure early game monsters should not have a similar ability - they're already good at killing weaker early game players, there's no need to make them even more aggressive.

[Sky]

.. i think in general that Uniques are too easy when you know what to do, and their AI should be smarter. Buffs such as Haste are reasonable, but i am not sure if Angband's code, and - no offense meant - Nick's coding skills, allow for much more.

[Grotug]

Originally Posted by Cryomaniac

Gensouband has a similar monster ability - some strong high level monsters can teleport themselves to the player's area even when out of line of sight, making it far harder to get away from them. It's easier to implement than adding a separate temporary monster effect boosting movement speed (I'm not familiar with current Angband codebase - theoretically should be doable, not sure how easy it will be), though it's more thematically vague with giving monsters arbitrary teleportation abilities.

I'm definitely sure early game monsters should not have a similar ability - they're already good at killing weaker early game players, there's no need to make them even more aggressive.

I was actually suggesting movement speed on early enemies not to make them more dangerous but less, but still surprise and scare the player. For example, you can have a blood falcon have normal speed but give them +3 movement speed. They are still surprising the player with their speed and rushing of the player, without also killing them (since they'll only do 1 round of damage instead of 3).

[Grotug]

Originally Posted by Sky

.. i think in general that Uniques are too easy when you know what to do, and their AI should be smarter. Buffs such as Haste are reasonable, but i am not sure if Angband's code, and - no offense meant - Nick's coding skills, allow for much more.

Hmm... I was absolutely baffled when Mim outsmarted me once; the most unpredictable and confusing behavior of an enemy I've ever experienced in this game, but it worked:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDIVku_OsxU&t=2831s (pardon the swearing).

I thought I had Mim fooled into falling into my trap that all the other monsters always do; boy was I wrong in this instance.

[Cryomaniac]

Originally Posted by Grotug

I was actually suggesting movement speed on early enemies not to make them more dangerous but less, but still surprise and scare the player. For example, you can have a blood falcon have normal speed but give them +3 movement speed. They are still surprising the player with their speed and rushing of the player, without also killing them (since they'll only do 1 round of damage instead of 3).

You don't need a special movement boosting ability in this case, you just would need a way to separate movement speed and action speed in monster.txt.