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#1 |
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O-Combat
The birth_percent_damage option, which was kind of an experimental stub in 4.2.0, is now (essentially) full-blown O-combat. So, I'll give a brief summary of how this works.
The quick version is that all bonuses in combat (melee, missiles, or thrown weapons) are incorporated into the dice, rather than added on afterwards. To be more precise: +to-dam, slays and brands give extra sides to the weapon's damage dice, and critical hits add extra dice, and then the enhanced dice are rolled to give the total damage. For reference, regular Angband combat rolls the dice first, then multiplies by slays/brands, then adds on the to-dam, then multiplies/adds stuff for critical hits. I have got this out nice and early in the journey toward 4.2.1 so people can play with it and see how it works, and I can make necessary adjustments. It is intended to lead to pretty similar difficulty of play overall, but with local differences (big-dice weapons tend to be better, slays and brands are more valuable). I'm keen to hear opinions ![]()
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#2 |
Adept
Join Date: Apr 2016
Age: 50
Posts: 137
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Thanks Nick. I'll be keen to see how this plays
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#3 |
Adept
Join Date: Feb 2018
Location: London
Posts: 136
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I've tried it in 4.2.0 a few times, and found that it made the early game tougher and the end game easier (for melee based characters), and shooting almost useless.
I'm glad M wasn't actually using this thingy on me: ![]() the Mighty Hammer 'Grond' (9d9) (+5,+25) [+10] ... 6.7 blows/round. Average damage/round: 11635.3 vs. undead, 11635.3 vs. dragons, 11635.3 vs. demons, 6985.7 vs. trolls, 6985.7 vs. orcs, 4661 vs. animals, 4661 vs. evil creatures, and 2336.2 vs. others. |
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#4 |
Prophet
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 9,024
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For me the big issue with O combat has always been understanding the impact that any given change has on my damage. It had this "deadliness" stat that had extremely unclear effects on damage; clearly more was better but I didn't know what kinds of decisions to be making.
I guess what I'm saying is, documentation on the forums is fine, but documentation in-game is even better, especially if it's part of the item description. ![]() |
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#5 |
Knight
Join Date: Oct 2019
Posts: 905
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What does O combat stand for?
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#6 |
Prophet
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 9,024
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OAngband-style combat. OAngband, among other things, did a significant revamp of the combat system. As I recall the main changes were:
* As mentioned, all damage derived ultimately from your dice rolls. Magical enhancements improved those dice rolls, or multiplied the results, rather than applying extra damage directly. * Consequently, the bigger the dice on your weapon, the more damage you did, almost without exception. * Extra blows were much harder to come by, and capped at IIRC 4 blows/round, but most characters started with 2 blows per round. This is all fine; my issue was with a lack of clarity in the mechanics that achieved the above results, not so much with the results themselves. Though of course there's some concern if, say, the *thanc daggers are completely outclassed by an average battleaxe. ![]() |
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#7 |
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Yes, the option as in current 4.2.0 is completely broken. It is now close to balanced, I think.
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#8 | |
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Quote:
![]() So, I will give a blow-by-blow (as it were) description of how damage is calculated, and hopefully that will convince everyone just to use the 'I' command.
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#9 |
Prophet
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 9,024
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Ahh, there's the issue I was trying to remember: deadliness has diminishing returns! With +to-dam it's pretty straightforward; if deadliness were just a straight percentile improvement that would be more complicated but still fairly learnable. Diminishing returns have to be explained to everyone though IME. Is there at least somewhere (presumably the 'I' or 'C' screens) in-game that shows what your true multiplier due to deadliness is?
Do you have guidelines for how many dice weapons should have, and how big those dice should be, prior to applying all these multipliers? 3d18 is pretty spiky damage, and that's for an early-game weapon. Are late game attacks going to be more like 3d50 or 6d25? I guess by that I mean: do damage dice get significantly more numerous on deeper weapons? Speaking personally, I prefer heavily weighted distributions over flat ones, though I recognize others may feel differently. I guess that's more of an "aesthetics of systems design" kind of gripe. ![]() |
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#10 | |||
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Quote:
And with my philosophy for this thread of too much detail is barely enough, here's the deadliness table (starting at +1, 10 per line): Code:
5, 10, 14, 18, 22, 26, 30, 33, 36, 39, 42, 45, 48, 51, 54, 57, 60, 63, 66, 69, 72, 75, 78, 81, 84, 87, 90, 93, 96, 99, 102, 104, 107, 109, 112, 114, 117, 119, 122, 124, 127, 129, 132, 134, 137, 139, 142, 144, 147, 149, 152, 154, 157, 159, 162, 164, 167, 169, 172, 174, 176, 178, 180, 182, 184, 186, 188, 190, 192, 194, 196, 198, 200, 202, 204, 206, 208, 210, 212, 214, 216, 218, 220, 222, 224, 226, 228, 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, 242, 244, 246, 248, 250, 251, 253, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255, 255 Quote:
On the other hand Aulė at 18d1 (+19, +21) is +72% deadliness, so about 18d2, or about 18d4 with the acid brand or against demons or undead, 18d2 or 18d3 against evil, and 18d6 against dragons. Quote:
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