Mixed-blessing items

[takkaria]

(Posted to r.g.r.a, angband-dev and the forum. If you have suggestions, please reply in only one place.)

As I've mentioned before, I'm reordering the object list, and alongside this adding a few new items and removing a few others. For example, I am changing the mushroom effects so they are mixed-blessing and a little odd (as it has been pointed out, the purpose of mushrooms is pretty much entirely flavour, so they might as well be interesting.)

Anyway, I would like to remove entirely-bad stuff from the object list and instead have some mixed-blessing items that might plausibly be used. This especially applies when it comes to rings and amulets.

Mixed-blessing items don't have to be made up of already-existing item abilities, but could have new ones. I don't need especially many, just a few. More ideas for consumables (potions/scrolls/staffs/mushrooms) would also be nice, but not essential.

Suggestions?

[will_asher]

tossing cookies and ideas..

Berserk rage is already a mixed blessing with the -10ac, hmmm..
ring (or amulet or mushroom) of rage: gives pluses to to-hit and to-dam and more common criticals and penalties to ac, searching, and much slower regeneration. ..or maybe the rage thing is already a little overused.

scroll (or staff) or mass chaos: (affects both you and nearby monsters)
confuse + chance of slowing, stunning, scaring, minor gravity or chaos damage, blinking

DaJAngband has a ring of forgetfullness (replaces some other bad ring, I forget which), it's mostly bad (-1 WIS,INT and CHR and drain exp with light curse), but it also has resist fear. (not really a suggestion for V, but maybe it'll give someone an idea.)

I also plan to have a flag on the One Ring and one or two other cursed artifacts that stops regeneration completely, that's something that could be used for mixed-blessing things.

[Djabanete]

Hengband has a potion called "Neo-Tsuyoshi Special". I'm not completely sure of what it does, but experimentation has led me to believe that it temporarily gives you a very significant boost to combat stats (at least strength) but then drains stats once the effect is over. This seems like an interesting potion although it steps on the toes of Berserk Rage. (Obviously the name is bizarre and would need to be changed.)

Potions of Slowness could give temporary Free Action...

Have you considered adding "vulnerabilities"? (Which would cancel out resistances, or if there is no resistance, increase damage from appropriate sources.) These could be paired with items that give immunities, for example, something giving Immunity to Fire but Vulnerability to Cold...

Of course you could have a Potion of Acid, which damages you but provides temporary levitation...

For a high-level drawback you could have Degeneration, which occasionally drains a stat (permanently).

Yet more stupid ideas: a Mana Shield (stolen from Diablo obviously): while you have a Mana Shield up, damage is dealt to mana and not HP. Once the mana is chewed through, HP damage is doubled. Items could grant permanent Mana Shield (for instance, you could find a Mana Shield... hyuck hyuck) or you could get temporary mana shielding from a staff or an activation.


Well I hope maybe a little of that is useful, or will jog your imagination... I'll keep thinking. I know the intent is to make the useless items at least marginally useful, so I'll be thinking about that.

[Narvius]

Desperate Shielding (or something like that) ~ Invincible for a time, then decrease to 1 HP.
Hunger ~ Food that critically decreases your nourishment level (may even kill you) but makes you fearless, stronger and stuff (Full -> Hungry, maybe).
Recalibration ~ Randomly rerolls your stats, using as much stat points as you currently posses. Probably a recalibration trap.
Shift ~ Randomly Phase Doors you, makes you immune to physical attacks and unable to attack or shoot. Spells at halved cost and 0% fail, you take double damage from all sources that actually still can hit you (breathes, making them even more evil).
Morphing - Randomly changes your race! ^^ Maybe even normally non-playable races, like, say, Orc.

...

[Atarlost]

How about adding an addiction mechanic? For example this would allow Mushrooms of Speed which might give temporary +15 to speed, but have a 1 in 20 chance of permanently reducing your speed by -1. The potion could be deeper and a little weaker and remain non-addicting. Similar things could be done for other temporary boost effects. This would give mushrooms some reason for existing.

Another thought is to alter stat drain potions. Consider the following:
! of frailty: -1 con, -1 str, +1 int
! of clumsiness: -1 dex, -1 str, +1 wis
! of brutishness: -1 int, -1 wis, +1 str
! of rashness: -1 wis, -1 con, +1 dex
! of dullness: -1 int, -1 dex, +1 con
and so forth. The drains would have to be permanent, of course to prevent net stat gain when combined with restore potions, but they would allow the player to trade stats around.

I don't imagine mixed blessing rings or amulets would get much play unless they were extremely powerful or the negatives were trivial for some classes.

[Nick]

UnAndrew's list here is worth a look for creative drawbacks; some others I've thought of (and plan to use) include random poisoning and random HP damage.

Some items already in O: Rings of Aggravation (also give RFear) and a wand (artifact in O, but doesn't need to be) which makes a poison cloud which also poisons the player.

[Slonk]

Originally Posted by Atarlost

Another thought is to alter stat drain potions. Consider the following:
! of frailty: -1 con, -1 str, +1 int
! of clumsiness: -1 dex, -1 str, +1 wis
! of brutishness: -1 int, -1 wis, +1 str
! of rashness: -1 wis, -1 con, +1 dex
! of dullness: -1 int, -1 dex, +1 con
and so forth. The drains would have to be permanent, of course to prevent net stat gain when combined with restore potions, but they would allow the player to trade stats around.

I know EyAngband had these potions. FOr instance !Brawn increased STR at the expense of INT. Ey retained original stat potions as well; you could buy the mixed ones for ~1100 gp in the Black Market, IIRC.

[Djabanete]

Permanent Berserk and Permanent Fear seem interesting. Permanent Fear might only makes sense if it overcomes Fear Resistance.

Just some random ideas for rings:

Ring of Shadows (RDark, +Stealth, reduce light radius)
Ring of Fear Resistance (with Permazerk and/or Aggravation)
Ring of Cowardliness (+1/2 speed, Permafear through resist)
Ring of Delving (+3/4/5 tunneling, activates frequently for Stone-to-Mud)

More edited in as I think of them:
Ring of Light (RLight, +Search, increase light radius)

[Garrie]

To my mind, !Berserk Strength should massively drop int/wis... it's fair enough to use it to beef up a spell caster before engaging in melee but once you drink it you should _want_ to melee more than you want to spell cast... gaining some HP should not be the reason for drinking it.
A !/shroom that gives +10 speed but induces fear (ie, mushroom of paranoia)
(btw fear needs beefing up you should lose int/wis while scared)
Personally I don't object to outright nasty items... who said that a !CSW has to be equally good for all races that drink it (maybe what cures orcs is bad for humans which is why the flavours are random?). Speaking of which, more flavours and just make them race-specific...
Wand of aggrivation, so that the spell casters are too pissed to cast spells would be great.

[Fede]

Originally Posted by Garrie

Personally I don't object to outright nasty items... who said that a !CSW has to be equally good for all races that drink it (maybe what cures orcs is bad for humans which is why the flavours are random?). Speaking of which, more flavours and just make them race-specific...

In LoTR the medicine that orcs use to heal themselves heals also Merry, and fast. Then of course this doesn't mean it has to be like that in Angband.

Adding another curse could be interesting too. Has Angband the Ancient Morgothian Curse?