[Announce] FrogComposband 7.0.cloudberry released

[Sideways]

Werewolves will start with food and light in 7.1.toffee.

[ShadowTechnology]

Originally Posted by Sideways

Werewolves will start with food and light in 7.1.toffee.

Do you have a release date in mind for 7.1.toffee?
Maybe it could be the subject of the next monthly contest.

As the first non-7.0.x release, should we expect more changes compared to previous incremental releases?

[Sideways]

Originally Posted by ShadowTechnology

Do you have a release date in mind for 7.1.toffee?
Maybe it could be the subject of the next monthly contest.

As the first non-7.0.x release, should we expect more changes compared to previous incremental releases?

7.1.toffee was originally intended to be a relatively radical update, but due to various delays (I got sidetracked for a while, and filthy rag testing has consumed a lot of time) most of the more dramatic changes have been postponed. The change list for 7.1.toffee is fairly similar in length and tone to most previous releases, there's a couple big things (Cornucopia, and regular jewelry randarts) but mostly it's tweaks, bugfixes and small improvements/additions.

A pre-release of toffee went up on github and angband.live today, usually it takes a week or two of testing and last-minute changes from pre-release to official release so expect toffee at some point in the first half of March.

[ShadowTechnology]

Originally Posted by Sideways

7.1.toffee was originally intended to be a relatively radical update, but due to various delays (I got sidetracked for a while, and filthy rag testing has consumed a lot of time) most of the more dramatic changes have been postponed. The change list for 7.1.toffee is fairly similar in length and tone to most previous releases, there's a couple big things (Cornucopia, and regular jewelry randarts) but mostly it's tweaks, bugfixes and small improvements/additions.

A pre-release of toffee went up on github and angband.live today, usually it takes a week or two of testing and last-minute changes from pre-release to official release so expect toffee at some point in the first half of March.

Thanks. Looking forward to it. For those of us who can't easily use angband.live (due to satellite latency), we will get a first look at the Orc and Boit (?) races, yes?

[Sideways]

Originally Posted by ShadowTechnology

Thanks. Looking forward to it. For those of us who can't easily use angband.live (due to satellite latency), we will get a first look at the Orc and Boit (?) races, yes?

Yes, also the dreaded Filthy Rag, which is still somewhat beta due to my repeated failures to survive long enough to get a feel for what their endgame is like.

[emulord]

I think the filthy rag is FAR too weak right now. I played it a whole bunch to try to get the feel for it. Only make it up to about level 30-35 at best with any character because Im not the best player. The speed at getting to that level was very noticeable however.

Compared to the death sword levels 1-30
Less damage
Similar HP
Better AC
Similar skills
Less resists, abilities due to essences being split across slots and not being able to absorb as many egos as death swords.


Compared to a random character 1-30 (Chaotic Nibelung Wild talent)
Less Damage
Less Skills
Less HP
Less AC
Less Resists
Less utility (Activates from equipment, spells)

I think they'd be balanced if they upgraded in body type like the death swords do. Only needing 1 essence at Filthy rag for a pip would help early game, and then you can increase the requirements as the armor type improves to give a smoother gameplay like the Death sword.

Also, to get to level 30 it took 2 death sword attempts, about 11 filthy rags, and 1 normal character. Yes being overpowered late game is a balancing factor, but if its that difficult to actually get there is it still overpowered? You wouldn't win any competitions in speed

[Sideways]

What I'd like is for filthy rags to be not-easy, but also not-grindy in a way that encourages playing at the limits. I am not sure how to go about that, any ideas would be welcome; I will likely need to play them more to figure it out; but for now I need to play different characters so development doesn't get bogged down entirely.

[clouded]

My issue with rags is that they are very challenging without any potential power boosts from finding items (literally only devices matter) and no unique abilities or mechanics. To me it's just very uninteresting, too much so to play even for bravado.

Just to throw an idea out there: they could destroy all armour types for their bonuses and be able to wield a number of aux armour types increasing with level. Jelly slots so you could have your base rag and gloves and boots, or gloves and helm, or two gloves etc.

And then throw in some abilities. These could be symbiosis themed or if going with the above idea you could unlock abilities based on what aux armours you have equipped, for example wearing many cloaks gives you some stealth things, helms defensive things, boots evasive things, gloves offensive things.

[Nivim]

Originally Posted by Sideways

What I'd like is for filthy rags to be not-easy, but also not-grindy in a way that encourages playing at the limits.

I think it might be easier to accomplish this by stepping back, not playing Filthy Rags, and avoiding getting to attached to their current implementation. Rags, like the other two item mimic races, are based around grinding from the ground up, and removing the grinding means re-designing them. The fact that they are weak exacerbates the problem, but isn't the cause:

1. Unlike a Weaponsmith, they do not get choices with regards to using essences that may be optimized to go deeper, or to get boosts at parts of the game which are being difficult for them.
2. The rate at which they can dive is still largely defined by HP, damage, and Speed, and all of those come slowly, and only steadily in the case of HP.
3. Even the luckiest single equipment drop, such as strong Slaying gloves or early boots of Speed, is not very meaningful to them, often only affording another 2-4 DLs of depth. Averages and raw quantity are what count, so only sustained runs of lucky equipment drops tend to be lucky in practice*, and the only way to make that kind of luck is with the Personality or sustained diving well beyond the depths the character can currently handle— the former only takes about 20% off the grind rather than getting rid of it, and the latter is still slow, and can be even slower than shallower depths due to fewer creatures that can be killed in a timely fashion, which means you're spending lots of time at those depths, which means on average you make a mistake or get unlucky and die.
4. Rags lack mechanics that might distract from the grind or disincentivize it; they do not have a racial boss they can make a goal to hunt down, do not have any abilities that might let them ignore their bonuses and devices in even narrow circumstances, and do not have any pseudo-Ironman that would force them to stay at the depths they get good loot and die by law of averages.

Longer than I'd thought I'd write, but I was suspicious there was some detail in there you were missing while I lacked any idea which one it could be. I think you even brought up one or two of these at some point?


*One reason I tended to not use the in-built armour-detection ability they have is because I usually considered armour less valuable than devices, and so I was going to be using Detect Objects regardless.

[Sideways]

Originally Posted by Nivim

[*]Rags lack mechanics that might distract from the grind or disincentivize it; they do not have a racial boss they can make a goal to hunt down, do not have any abilities that might let them ignore their bonuses and devices in even narrow circumstances, and do not have any pseudo-Ironman that would force them to stay at the depths they get good loot and die by law of averages.

Yes, this is my problem really. I've been trying to think of a good mechanic that would accomplish this, but it isn't clear what that would be. My original idea was to have bad things happen if the turncount got too high, but you've proved that turncount isn't a good proxy for grinding.

Coffee-break mode is this mechanic to some extent, I suppose, though like wobbly has said it's still possible to grind in coffee-break mode. Certainly I feel like coffee-break rags aren't that dull, and that's one reason I've resisted redesigning rags from the ground up. Though before I do anything dramatic like forcing rags to always play in coffee-break mode, I'd like to actually get beyond the mid-thirties on a coffee-break rag...

Originally Posted by clouded

My issue with rags is that they are very challenging without any potential power boosts from finding items (literally only devices matter) and no unique abilities or mechanics. To me it's just very uninteresting, too much so to play even for bravado.

Rag melee isn't half bad once they've got going. I would expect endgame rags to kill things in melee more than with devices. (Certainly they are very device-heavy in the early game, even with combat-happy personalities, and more without them.)

Possibly I should reduce the rag stat maluses a bit to make early-game melee more accessible with non-combat-oriented personalities.