Variant Idea

[Narvius]

I just had an idea for a new variant.

It would be like Vanilla, but your dead adventurers are saved and when you reach the level where they died (with the next adventurer), you face the dead one's ghost. (S)he drops either something (s)he had, or something that reflects his/her skills. A superintelligent Guy could drop a good Ring of Intelligence. A warrior an enchanted weapon.
Really powerful adventurer-ghost (ones of those who reached clvl 50, for example) would drop special artifacts, named after them, for example "Narvius' Longsword", "Half-Troll Club" or crap like that, which would inherit a part of their traits. Resists, sustains and so on.
The ghost would use spells and skills the adventurer had - a mage would blow you away with some spells (s)he learnt when living, a ranger would shoot you and so on. Depending on clvl they would also learn extra skills, like summoning. A counterweight for the players' smartness is needed.
And a "reset dead adventurers" option would be needed, of course. You don't want to have 50 powerful ghosts on one level.
And something to prevent exploiting (create an adventurer with a 18/90 stat, drop everything, let him/her be killed by something, then go, kill him/her and get a nice Ring of [Stat]).

[Big Al]

There used to be player ghosts in Angband 2.7.9, but they were removed in newer versions - and they still exist in some variants (oangband and ToME, I think).

[xxitheworld]

This sounds really like a feature in Nethack, where you would fight ghosts of your dead players and then find their grave nearby with all their loot, most of it being cursed

As for the 50 ghosts on one floor, nethack countered this by having only a chance of spawning the ghost and its grave in a game, it would not ALWAYS be there

[Anne]

Nethack's version of this wasn't so bad, but some variants made the ghost just as powerful and with the same equipment as the living character had been. I came to hate that, because a puny wizard at early levels would nearly always die to a big beefy warrior that was out of depth for that level. I actually got to the frustration point where I started removing the ghost files from my game in order to be able to play the weaker starting characters when I wanted to.

[kathoum]

Originally Posted by Anne

Nethack's version of this wasn't so bad, but some variants made the ghost just as powerful and with the same equipment as the living character had been. I came to hate that, because a puny wizard at early levels would nearly always die to a big beefy warrior that was out of depth for that level. I actually got to the frustration point where I started removing the ghost files from my game in order to be able to play the weaker starting characters when I wanted to.

Having just lost a FAA Druid to a ghost, I strongly agree. I'm definitely going to wipe out the 'bone' dir and make it readonly.


The young Green Elf had just entered Amon Rudh (850') with a WoR, and she was warned that there was a Spirit waiting for her. She lacked all of the following:

• See Invisible
• Res Blindness
• Res Confusion
• Speed (I didn't find a single !Speed with that char, let alone a Speed item)
• Staff of Teleportation

So she decided to take the first stair she could see.

While she was dispatching a group of orcs in a corridor, she got blinded by something invisible. She quaffed her !CCW, only to find herself confused the following round. The next !CCW was the last thing she remembers, here in the Halls of Mandos...

[Nick]

Originally Posted by kathoum

The young Green Elf had just entered Amon Rudh (850') with a WoR, and she was warned that there was a Spirit waiting for her. She lacked all of the following:

• See Invisible
• Res Blindness
• Res Confusion
• Speed (I didn't find a single !Speed with that char, let alone a Speed item)
• Staff of Teleportation

So she decided to take the first stair she could see.

While she was dispatching a group of orcs in a corridor, she got blinded by something invisible. She quaffed her !CCW, only to find herself confused the following round. The next !CCW was the last thing she remembers, here in the Halls of Mandos...

Thanks for the boost to my EMFH credentials