[Un] Race and class balancing

[andrewdoull]

Originally Posted by Bandobras

Weight is race-dependent and with some minor variations. Size is only initially race-dependent. I you talk about realism, I think if in this world a charactere can get 4 times more intelligent or strong, he may as well quadruple his muscles' weigh. Think about it as growing up, superhero powers, drinking too much magical coca-cola, or anything you like. Perhaps characters should age quicker (now they do slowly, IIRC), if growing up is a plausible explanation.

I decided to go with a size stat because of the hobbits in Lord of the Rings. There's at least 1 instance (the Ent draught) where hobbits definitely increase in size as a result of drinking something. Its also a fantasy trope that heroes are taller than others.

Besides which, realism in a fantasy game isn't the greatest of arguments.

If you have game-play objections, however, I'm all ears.

P.S. I think we have a problem with Nexus swapping stats in Un, if it's not disabled. It's basically a disaster or an exploit rendering races moot. The reason is that you cannot max stats in Un and you don't have any "maximize" mode, so Nexus swaps forever everything related to stats, unlike in V. I guess nexus could have it's effect timed, perhaps with the same timer as the long-lasting stat drains in Un.

You're right - nexus is really problematic. Not just for stat gain - but for changing the starting race as well (there's not as much impact, because we are not using maximise anymore).

Andrew

[Bandobras]

Originally Posted by andrewdoull

for changing the starting race as well

You mean nexus can change the race? Like the mushrooms of Metamorphosis in S? I must have understood you wrong...

BTW., what about my previous post?

[andrewdoull]

Originally Posted by Bandobras

BTW., what about my previous post?

Working on it... got a list a mile long. Of course, I'm actually working on something else, as you may have noticed from SVN or my blog.

Edit: My mistake, I thought Nexus also did race change...

[Bandobras]

Wow, I'm in a creative binge ---- it always happens when I should be doing something totally different, requiring creativity, but I don't feel like starting.

Another idea to distinguish Shadow Fairies (and Goblins, perhaps) from Hobbits: Devices skill. For it to make difference, critical activations from O would be nice. To change the shallow levels tactics we'd need a wand of Sparks from S, make the effects of Wonder and the chances of confusion, slowing,etc. via devices depend on the skill, add the ability to trigger any jewelery inducing teleportation (high-fail activation, removed together with curse), make the staff of Light shallower than the wand and cheaper and give it a chance to blind adjacent monsters (weaker chance than of the wand and not targetable, but the staff is useful) and/or make the staff of starlight shallower and cheaper, give a high chance of frighten all monsters in LOS when breaking ('k') magical devices, depending on their level and the skill.

P.S. Wow, you are fast.

r1362 | andrewdoull | 2007-08-28 21:26:09 +0200 (Tue, 28 Aug 2007) | 1 line
- Add wands of spark. Adjust shallow wand depths and prices. Made staffs of star
light shallower and cheaper.

[andrewdoull]

Originally Posted by Bandobras

Wow, I'm in a creative binge ---- it always happens when I should be doing something totally different, requiring creativity, but I don't feel like starting.

Another idea to distinguish Shadow Fairies (and Goblins, perhaps) from Hobbits: Devices skill. For it to make difference, critical activations from O would be nice.

Agreed. On to do list.

To change the shallow levels tactics we'd need a wand of Sparks from S,

Now done.

make the effects of Wonder and the chances of confusion, slowing,etc. via devices depend on the skill,

To do list.

add the ability to trigger any jewelery inducing teleportation (high-fail activation, removed together with curse),

Thanks for reminding me. I'll do this now.

make the staff of Light shallower than the wand and cheaper and give it a chance to blind adjacent monsters (weaker chance than of the wand and not targetable, but the staff is useful) and/or make the staff of starlight shallower and cheaper,

I've gone with staff of Starlight as Light is quite a nice weapon.

give a high chance of frighten all monsters in LOS when breaking ('k') magical devices, depending on their level and the skill.

[Bandobras]

I'd like to ask for help estimating how big the wand of Spark damage should be. How big is it in S? How does it compare to to the wand of Magic Missile and to the standard mid-game arrows (+0, +0) show with a (+0, +0) short bow? How do the latter two compare to each other in V, NPP and O? Is there a wand of Spark in any other variant?

Thanks.

[Satyr]

Wand of spark damage in S is skill dependent and ranges from 1d6 to 1d24, MM is fixed at 2d6, standard arrow + long bow is 3x 2d2 = 6d2 (boni to deadliness propably cancel out with the lousy accuracy early on) BUT the weak point of wands of spark is their limited range, they just hit the next three squares (though all of them). Don't know if that arc-type damage is implemented in Un at all.

[andrewdoull]

Originally Posted by Satyr

BUT the weak point of wands of spark is their limited range, they just hit the next three squares (though all of them). Don't know if that arc-type damage is implemented in Un at all.

I've adopted the same code as Sangband for projections and do this.

Wands of spark 50% of the time in Un will beam for 112 gravity damage. This is a bug

[Bandobras]

Originally Posted by Satyr

Don't know if that arc-type damage is implemented in Un at all.

Oh, thanks a lot. Yes, the wands work exactly the same in Un, only the damage is different.

Let me see, I'd try some guesswork. For a CL3 S character if he puts points in devices, he gets Spark for 2d11 = 6 on average, if he puts points in bows, he gets 4d2 + (criticals - misses) from a short bow, let's say it evens out to = 6, and mm is 2d6 = 7.

Currently in Un short bow is 2d6 + 2 from oil coating + 1 from criticals - 2 from misses = 9, spark is 3d5 = 9, mm is 3d4 = 7.5. So it seems mm is somewhat overpowered in S, because it does not increase in power. In Un only bows increase in power and they enable useful coatings, so perhaps the wands are too weak until Un gets critical activations. But at the start it seems OK, so I'd propose no changes for wip6a.

[Fuma]

They do have a "critical activation". 50% chance of a gravity beam