iVanilla - no selling, ranged trap det, spell balances etc.

[Magnate]

Originally Posted by PowerDiver

IMO when you attack, you should continue attacking until disturbed. The same for archery [with the same ammo]. If you do not have enough energy left, that counts as a disturb.

You need to have both energy over 100 and energy >= max {all monsters' energies} for it to be your turn.

So suppose you have 4 blows, which means 25 energy per blow. If you somehow start at 130 energy, you get a blow and are down to 105 energy. Then, if 105 is high enough you get another blow immediately, else some monster gets its turn. Repeat until everyone is below 100, and then increment the game turn counter and add energy and continue.

This means that with 4 blows against a double speed opponent, you generally alternate two blows in between its turns rather than getting 4 blows and then it getting two moves.

There are obviously lots of approaches with different plusses and minuses. I'm not saying this is necessarily best, but it is my favorite.

That's rather lucky for me, since this is how I've started on it ...

[Derakon]

How would that scheme handle this situation?

Monster @ 110 energy
Player @ 120 energy with 25 energy cost/blow

Player attacks once. Now has 95 energy. Therefore disturb player; now monster's turn.
Monster casts a spell. Now has 10 energy. Game adds energy to everyone until someone can take a turn => player @ 100 energy, monster @ 15 energy.
Player attacks once. Now has 75 energy. 75 < 100; therefore disturb player. Game adds energy to everyone until someone can take a turn => player @ 100 energy, monster @ 40 energy.
Player attacks once...

In other words, this seems like it would lead to a lot of single blows. I agree that you should need at least 100 energy before you get a turn (otherwise you could do something other than attack and end up with negative energy), but I think you should continue attacking until you have less energy than at least one monster, or attacking again would give you negative energy. The way Eddie wrote it, it sounds like this wasn't what he was thinking of. Or did I misinterpret?

[PowerDiver]

Originally Posted by Derakon

How would that scheme handle this situation?

Monster @ 110 energy
Player @ 120 energy with 25 energy cost/blow

Player attacks once. Now has 95 energy. Therefore disturb player; now monster's turn.
Monster casts a spell. Now has 10 energy. Game adds energy to everyone until someone can take a turn => player @ 100 energy, monster @ 15 energy.
Player attacks once. Now has 75 energy. 75 < 100; therefore disturb player. Game adds energy to everyone until someone can take a turn => player @ 100 energy, monster @ 40 energy.
Player attacks once...

In other words, this seems like it would lead to a lot of single blows. I agree that you should need at least 100 energy before you get a turn (otherwise you could do something other than attack and end up with negative energy), but I think you should continue attacking until you have less energy than at least one monster, or attacking again would give you negative energy. The way Eddie wrote it, it sounds like this wasn't what he was thinking of. Or did I misinterpret?

When energy is less than 100, the player doesn't move yet, but isn't disturbed either. He just keeps on acting, the way you keep on acting turn after turn as you run.

I guess I screwed up my explanation. I was thinking of multiple ways to describe it and got them confused together. Sorry about that.

[Magnate]

Originally Posted by PowerDiver

When energy is less than 100, the player doesn't move yet, but isn't disturbed either. He just keeps on acting, the way you keep on acting turn after turn as you run.

I guess I screwed up my explanation. I was thinking of multiple ways to describe it and got them confused together. Sorry about that.

So when does @ stop acting? If not disturbed by external events (e.g. monster dying), is it when his energy is less than his energy required for another blow? That's the only way this approach makes sense to me, otherwise you dramatically weaken the first attack against a sleeping monster ...

[PowerDiver]

Originally Posted by Magnate

So when does @ stop acting? If not disturbed by external events (e.g. monster dying), is it when his energy is less than his energy required for another blow? That's the only way this approach makes sense to me, otherwise you dramatically weaken the first attack against a sleeping monster ...

You are right that this approach does dramatically weaken against a sleeping monster at the moment. In the long term, I think the fix to that is to make monsters awaken with -100 energy. The current method to hack so they do not attack the first move when they wake needs to be redone, unless I am confused how it works which is a possibility.

More generally, this system favors the defending monster. On average, against equal speed, if a monster steps next to you and you attack you will get half your blows before you start alternating its turn then your attacks. I think this seems fair.

One way I think this should be improved is that when waiting, with '5' or rest or search, you should stay at 99 energy. If you do that, then when the monster steps next to you you will generally start with a full set of blows.

[ewert]

Originally Posted by d_m

I don't think eliminating hack and back for melee but leaving it for ranged is a good idea.

I think a simple implementation is best: if you have 4 blows/round, you attack until you've used 4 blows or until your target is dead. Then you lose (# blows used) / 4 of the energy you'd use for a full round of attacks.

I can imagine fancier approaches, but I think that one would help make melee more interesting without requiring too much revision.

This is the method I figured would be a nice quick hack back when I looked at melee code. But coding wise it would actually be "lose full round energy, if didn't use all attacks give back some", but yeah in essence like this. I also dislike single hit keypresses for a couple of reasons, one being more keypresses and two being the "problem" shown by extra shots (less risk vs quick monsters).

[ewert]

Originally Posted by PowerDiver

So suppose you have 4 blows, which means 25 energy per blow. If you somehow start at 130 energy, you get a blow and are down to 105 energy. Then, if 105 is high enough you get another blow immediately, else some monster gets its turn. Repeat until everyone is below 100, and then increment the game turn counter and add energy and continue.

That approach is definitely intriguing as well.

[ewert]

Annnnywayyyys ... as fractional blows is probably not on my nearby to-do list (as Magnate is working on it, I might do the hack if I run out of things to do), lets leave the frac blows talk.

I made some spell changes now:

Ball spells do dmg based on max radius and distance, so that it is a linear efficiency: 2 radius -> 100%, 66%, 33%.

The top end spells for mage and priests were changed:
Mana storm is now radius 4, and due to the above ball spell change, it is now a pretty darn massive area killer. Pits of stuff beware. Also changed fail/manacost to get rid of the pesky "max lvl max int and still fail wtf?"

Annihilation is gone, cheers! Say welcome to Smite, radius 0 ball (so it jumps to intended target). High dmg variance of 5d50 (5 d plvl) and double dmg on evil, so averages at 125 on non-evil and 250 on evil, but yeah can do 10dmg or 500dmg on evil. Very mana friendly. Honestly, does anyone want archery anymore with priests after this? Well against non-evil maybe.

These are totally untested at the moment. I think I will do the pseudo/id streamlining and unlimited-home options first before playtesting a mage with no-selling, unlimited home, randarts ...

[ewert]

I was also thinking about the status effects that maybe uniques could be affected in minor ways with them. Like slow monsters -> -2 speed. Confuse -> spell fail chance and hit rate reduction. Sleep monster -> less chance of using spells / breaths (drowsy and not quite grasping the situation).

If we consider a fight of 10speed vs 10speed, a successful slow would pay off after 5 rounds (100 energy used, 5 hits = 600 energy or 60 turns, vs. initial + 60*8 = 100 + 480 energy or 580 energy). At higher speeds it is less, but fights usually are also longer. Of course Sauron and Morgoth would be totally immune.

Then for the spellbook versions have level based effects, bolt beam ball and finally LoS. A mage clearing a pit -> LoS slow, confuse, manaaaa stoooooooorm! (Lina Inverse FireBall style )

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by ewert

Annihilation is gone, cheers! Say welcome to Smite, radius 0 ball (so it jumps to intended target). High dmg variance of 5d50 (5 d plvl) and double dmg on evil, so averages at 125 on non-evil and 250 on evil, but yeah can do 10dmg or 500dmg on evil. Very mana friendly. Honestly, does anyone want archery anymore with priests after this? Well against non-evil maybe.

How mana friendly? 250 average doesn't beat powerful missiles, but missiles can miss, which is a reason why people might want to use the spell instead. This would be great against evil summoners.

Don't make spells too powerful. Game is a bit too easy as it is, so some balancing act would need to be done too. I find priest spell "clairvoyance" and potions of Enlightenment a bit too powerful as they are now.

I suggest you change those to "map and illuminate entire level", but without item detection. Preferably with not showing the illuminated floor before you actually see it (like already illuminated unseen rooms in mapped area). Make potions of *enlightement* do what plain enlightement does now.