Gold and no_selling

[ewert]

Dudes ...

Touting my own horn here, but I already went through this and I think already mentioned it in one thread as well, as soon as I noticed you didn't change the base gold formula for 3.2.

Remove the whole stupid "infinite variance" part, first off. Second, try these values for a base to start tweaking from. Has worked okay for me for the "pre-endgamelevels". When you start clearing pits of dragons for breakfast, because you are "going up to sell all the time" comparitively speaking, you start to amass lots of gold, but early/midgame it has worked for me (and fizzix I think, yes?)

void make_gold(object_type *j_ptr, int lev, int coin_type)
{
	int sval;
	int k_idx;
	s32b avg, spread, value;

	/* This average is 20 at dlev0, 105 at dlev40, 220 at dlev100. */
	/* Follows the formula: y=2x+20 */
	avg = 2 * lev + 20;
	spread = lev + 10;

	/* With no_selling, increase gold drops */
	if (OPT(adult_no_selling)) 
	{
		avg = 10 * lev + 50;
		spread = 5 * lev + 25;
	}

	value = rand_spread(avg, spread);

	/* Pick a treasure variety scaled by level, or force a type */
	if (coin_type != SV_GOLD_ANY)
		sval = coin_type;
	else
		sval = (((value * 100) / MAX_GOLD_DROP) * SV_GOLD_MAX) / 100;

	/* Do not create illegal treasure types */
	if (sval >= SV_GOLD_MAX) sval = SV_GOLD_MAX - 1;

	/* Prepare a gold object */
	k_idx = lookup_kind(TV_GOLD, sval);
	object_prep(j_ptr, k_idx, lev, RANDOMISE);
	j_ptr->pval = value;
}

[ewert]

I also have money created from treasure veins be 3x the dungeon lvl, so going for veins in early/midgame is quite worth the trouble.

[fizzix]

Originally Posted by ewert

Dudes ...



Remove the whole stupid "infinite variance" part, first off. Second, try these values for a base to start tweaking from. Has worked okay for me for the "pre-endgamelevels". When you start clearing pits of dragons for breakfast, because you are "going up to sell all the time" comparitively speaking, you start to amass lots of gold, but early/midgame it has worked for me (and fizzix I think, yes?)

If I remember correctly, early game drops were too high. This was most evident in the town where I was getting 100 gold drops from aimless merchants. After dlevel 10 or so, ewert's formula works well.

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by ewert

I also have money created from treasure veins be 3x the dungeon lvl, so going for veins in early/midgame is quite worth the trouble.

That's actually one thing I mean to write about. Treasures in veins were too weak for the effort of digging. They should be worth more. I'm glad to hear that they are being worked on.

[ewert]

Originally Posted by fizzix

If I remember correctly, early game drops were too high. This was most evident in the town where I was getting 100 gold drops from aimless merchants. After dlevel 10 or so, ewert's formula works well.

Yeah forgot about the town drops. However, since drops at low dlvls are quite rare (sometimes feels like there is more veins than normal gold drops), it might even suffice to make the town level much less.

Actually, the static bonus could probably be just removed or changed to minuscule amounts ... it's not a big deal after a few levels, and it is the one that messes up town and the very few first levels (<10).

So maybe:

avg = 2 * lev + 5;
spread = lev + 2;

/* With no_selling, increase gold drops */
if (OPT(adult_no_selling)) 
{
	avg = 10 * lev + 5;
	spread = 5 * lev + 2;

Or something.

[PowerDiver]

Originally Posted by ewert

I also have money created from treasure veins be 3x the dungeon lvl, so going for veins in early/midgame is quite worth the trouble.

Humph. What a way to reward the wrong thing.

The game is supposed to be about adventurering, not mining.

I'd rather seeing digging a square take a reasonable number of game turns, say 10^6 for a str 15 char with a pick at a first guess, but then checkerboards would be impassible.

Do it if you must, but please don't include it in any measures of play balance. Especially please don't use it as an excuse for lower money drops.

[fizzix]

Originally Posted by PowerDiver

Humph. What a way to reward the wrong thing.

The game is supposed to be about adventurering, not mining.

I think mining should provide an alternate route for a beginner level player to pick up gold in the early dungeon. It's a crutch for new players and once you learn what you need to buy in town and what you can go without, you won't do it anymore.

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by fizzix

I think mining should provide an alternate route for a beginner level player to pick up gold in the early dungeon. It's a crutch for new players and once you learn what you need to buy in town and what you can go without, you won't do it anymore.

I still mine sometimes. Not because I have to but because I can. There is no reason to not to mine gameplay or otherwise.

[Sirridan]

Just make sure the game isn't *about* mining in the early game, and we're good.

Anyway, I'm pushing the 50's in dlvl... high end hydras and ancient D's sometimes drop 5-8k each, however this is rather rare. I'm picking up about ~500-1000 gold per dlvl. Still poor though. Maybe we could add 'money vaults' ala Nethack? (No guards to steal it from you though )

[Derakon]

The reason to not mine is that the return on game-time invested is minimal, and in the meantime more (awake) monsters are spawning. Logistically, mining doesn't really make sense, but it doesn't hurt flavor-wise so I have no problem with it. New players will quickly learn that there are more efficient ways to make cash which don't require them to carry diggers.

If you want to add the occasional bonanza payout, import treasure pits (filled with creeping coins). In my experience they tend to pay out 5-30k depending on composition.