Crawl .20: Home of the Frog Dog

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Emmideer: Oct 20, 2011; Lovely night, no?; Grimey Drawer

Chakan posted:

I think he just protects you from moving quicker when stuff like that happens.

Yeah, figures. Annoying.

Zealot's sword is the only good weapon I've found all game but the *Rage is going to be the death of me.

# ? May 30, 2017 23:58

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# ? May 15, 2024 08:59

Internet Kraken: Apr 24, 2010; slightly amused

Deep Elf State is such an amusing team name it inspired this awful photo shop.

# ? May 31, 2017 00:04

Araganzar: May 24, 2003; Needs more cowbell!; Fun Shoe

The Deep Elf State is a threat to the Gnoll World Order.

Also my mummy made it to a lab and WHAT DO I DO???

code:

_A minotaur comes into view. It is wielding the +8 Wrath of Trog {antimagic, *Rage}.

a minotaur, wielding the +8 Wrath of Trog {antimagic, *Rage}, wearing a plate armour and wearing a steaming pewter amulet

Edit He killed me - got him many turns into zerk and it never went away, I guess maybe killing my snakes was extending it? I figured would have a chance to potion petition and crush him but he was just too strong and the rage never ran out. Well I learned my lesson, I lost a great character that could have won to trying to get that one awesome thing to put me over the top...

Araganzar fucked around with this message at 00:26 on May 31, 2017

# ? May 31, 2017 00:17

LogicNinja: Jan 21, 2011; ...the blur blurs blurringly across the blurred blur in a blur of blurring blurriness that blurred...

Well, I threw away a DEFE with great gear and amazing muts in a zig.

I, uh, do not have the hang of using Lignification on mummy floors.

# ? May 31, 2017 00:23

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

Any tournament teams still got room for one more?

# ? May 31, 2017 00:25

Canine Blues Arooo: Jan 7, 2008; when you think about it...i'm the first girl you ever spent the night with; Grimey Drawer

Araganzar posted:

- What would you change to alleviate these perceived issues?

I want to preface this all with a few things. First, I think any 'obvious' solution isn't. I stand by my claim that these problems are hard to fix and it's significantly easier to break the game than it is to address some of it's outstanding issues. Everything I'm suggesting is through the lens of someone who plays a lot of casters and not a lot of stabbers, so some of this might not apply universally to EV.

So, suggestions and such:

I think there is one piece of low hanging fruit that I'm honestly surprised hasn't been addressed in the past, so lets get that out of the way:

- Spell Failure chance of 1% and 2% is really stupid. There is nothing interesting there and the player treats it functionally as 'guaranteed to succeed'. When in doesn't, you don't feel like you took a calculated risk, so much as you got bitch-slapped by the dice. There a few solutions to this. A really easy one would be that if spell failure is below a certain threshold of something around 2.5%, it just gets set to 0.

Beyond that, I think a fundamental rethinking of the question, 'what is the nature of the MP pool?' might be due. That's kind of the major problem: You can't be Good Enough� at both casting and melee combat to make them effective because XP is limited for most of the game. A potential solution might be another class of weapon that casters can use that uses Spellcasting instead of weapon skill to check for hit and swing speed. Maybe you can evoke it to change it's element and bonus damage is applied based on the skill you have in that element. This would impart a lot of flexibility in how you approach combat as a caster, and it might force you to think about how you allocate experience. It just as easily could trample on the skald archetype a bit too much, but The Dream would to build some supporting systems to have this gradient, where on one side is a pure caster, and on the other side is pure melee and in the middle is this spellblade style that distributes XP across physical combat stats and elemental/spellcasting skills. That's much easier said then done, of course!

Something else to toy with might be reduced casting penalties from heavier armor, but with your armor type acting as a modifier to your mana regen. You can traverse the dungeon in with little AC and a robe, but you get a lot of MP regen for your sacrifice and can pave the way for a 'true, pure caster'. This kind of works with the Spellblade idea above.

We already have a Spellblade archetype in that supporting Charms are pretty common in many melee builds, but I think the elemental approach could be a different direction - one that traditional casters would probably be recommended to take as part of the kit.

The goal with these kinds of ideas would be to introduce a Caster/Melee gradient, and to bring a different kind of significance to MP. Getting the systems just right would probably be pretty difficult, but I think it's a lot of unexplored space in the Crawl universe.

Not caster specific, but I think I'd consider swapping the rarity of Blink and Teleport scrolls. I think Blink is way more interesting to think about as a player since you are deliberately and tactically repositioning, where Teleport is the kind of thing you might want to pop in full panic mode. Maybe that's too strong to be afford dozens of Blinks per game, but it might be worth testing.

AC is good, and maybe more importantly is that Not AC is kinda bad. Nerfing AC is probably the way to go. In the GrFi game, I literally tabbed through all 4 branches of Hell - Nothing could really hurt me and it's not like I had amazing gear. Explicit diminishing returns might be a starting point, even though those kinds of mechanics tend to feel clunky. Maybe instead you punish EV more in heavy armor - EV isn't as 'good', but moderate EV with high AC is really powerful, and you generally have enough XP to max fighting, get your weapon to min delay, and have high Dodging and Armor skills, granting you a ton of mitigation against both physical and spells that have to roll to hit.

Maybe AC should be a % damage reduction instead of a flat number. It'd be a relatively easy way to implement diminishing returns and is both an implicit nerf to AC as a player, and an implicit nerf to melee damage and 'slaying' in general. Tuning that just right is probably going to be a massive nightmare though.

If the nature of MP as a resource doesn't change, I think the evocable channels need to be more reliable at some level of Evocations. If, for some reason, you put 27 levels into Evocations, you should *not* have a chance to become confused by a Crystal Ball.

Spellcasting could grant passive damage reduction against spell damage, say, 1 - 1.5% per level, or maybe instead of Spellcasting, it's the specific element that is linked to a damage reduction stat. Maybe Spellcasting grants a point of MR per level I'm just spitballing here and all this is more an exercise in brainstorming than it is serious, implementable suggestions. Stuff like this adds difficult-to-communicate complexity and isn't really ideal by itself.

I'm probably going to explore the idea of the Spellblade more on paper and maybe try to pitch something with actual number, systems and details if you're interested in that.

Focusing just on casters for a second, I think the thing I'd try to do is make the entire archetype more reliable...somehow. The genius of the current system is that because you are operating on limited resources, you often do have to make some really hard decisions and it's in those moments, when you feel like you make a really good set of decisions, that you feel great as a player. Hard decision-making is awesome and forcing the player into fair, but difficult scenarios is cool. That is so, so much easier said then done, but I think it's honestly close-ish right now and with a couple changes, we can get closer.

Canine Blues Arooo fucked around with this message at 00:30 on May 31, 2017

# ? May 31, 2017 00:27

Roctavian: Feb 23, 2011

Internet Kraken posted:

Deep Elf State is such an amusing team name it inspired this awful photo shop.

This reminded me that St. Roka is supposed to have a round halo (just a few more pixels up top) but I never got it to fit right...

# ? May 31, 2017 05:05

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

I've splat about 5 pre-Lair HOFi in a row now. I'm not supposed to be that bad at this game.

# ? May 31, 2017 11:24

Floodkiller: May 31, 2011

Internet Kraken posted:

Deep Elf State is such an amusing team name it inspired this awful photo shop.

I like the attention to detail with Donald :allears:

# ? May 31, 2017 14:08

hito: Feb 13, 2012; Thank you, kids. By giving us this lift you're giving a lift to every law-abiding citizen in the world.

Canine Blues Arooo posted:

- Spell Failure chance of 1% and 2% is really stupid. There is nothing interesting there and the player treats it functionally as 'guaranteed to succeed'. When in doesn't, you don't feel like you took a calculated risk, so much as you got bitch-slapped by the dice. There a few solutions to this. A really easy one would be that if spell failure is below a certain threshold of something around 2.5%, it just gets set to 0.

You know, does anything actually break if we just cantrip low level spells at high levels of skill? Like, lets say average skill 12 is enough to make level 1 spells 0% fail and no mana cost. Having Magic Missle for free means I don't need to pillardance all the time and I'm not even convinced it's broken. It just means it's not so gosh darn imperative to have a source of MP channeling.

I don't know how you'd interact cantrips with INT and heavy armor casting penalties, but I feel like breakpoints in the realm of average skill 12/18/23 to cantrip level 1/2/3s would feel pretty wizardly. It does mean hard breakpoints which is against the spirit of Crawl. So maybe instead the system is like "As you improve your spell cast chance on a spell already at 1%, it instead starts giving you chance to cast it for no mana cost. At some breakpoint it becomes 0% mana and the free cast is guaranteed" or something.

# ? May 31, 2017 16:42

Chakan: Mar 30, 2011

The first thing that comes to mind with that is hybrids would be a little strange as they're often casting low-level spells by nature. Still, that's certainly a good idea and I think it'd be cool to cast level 3 spells for free at 27 in all relevant schools or something similarly onerous.

e: maybe a god foxused on weaving multiple weak spells. Would probably be too complex and there's a lot of god choices for hybrid players already...

ee: As an aside, holy crap I'm bad at this game again. I'm back to my old havit of getting unlucky early and just diving headfirst into a very dangerous situation. I probably didn't have a good answer to the centaur on d:2 but what I did only made it worse. Playing focused in the early game is so hard sometimes.

Chakan fucked around with this message at 16:53 on May 31, 2017

# ? May 31, 2017 16:48

hito: Feb 13, 2012; Thank you, kids. By giving us this lift you're giving a lift to every law-abiding citizen in the world.

Chakan posted:

The first thing that comes to mind with that is hybrids would be a little strange as they're often casting low-level spells by nature. Still, that's certainly a good idea and I think it'd be cool to cast level 3 spells for free at 27 in all relevant schools or something similarly onerous.

Right, but hybrids are also casting at low spell power. They basically just get the failure rate down to something acceptable and then stop training.

The reason I like the idea working this way is that it actually doesn't give any spike power budget - by the time you cantrip a level 1 spell you have way better things you can be doing in an individual turn. It just means that, if you're improving casting skills a lot, you have some every-turn options on par with the weapons that the hybrids are using instead.

# ? May 31, 2017 16:52

Araganzar: May 24, 2003; Needs more cowbell!; Fun Shoe

Dear god I have made it to Depths with 3 runes at 23,804 turns. V5 was stupid as hell at XL18.

That is easily twice as fast as I've ever gone - my lowest turn count win was a GhWr at 53k and I don't have any other wins under 70k turns. I have no rpois, no rf except from a ring of fire, no relec except from swapping to a randart baxe, I have rage available but it's on bloodlust so it's a huge risk. I can do it if I can just find a decent resist ring or armor...

code:

araganzar the Executioner (Deep Dwarf Fighter)     Turns: 23659, Time: 03:24:54
Health: 187/187    AC: 45    Str: 26    XL:     20   Next: 38%
Magic:  25/25      EV: 12    Int: 11    God:    Makhleb [******]
Gold:   1620       SH:  0    Dex: 12    Spells: 8/19 levels left
 
rFire    + . .     SeeInvis .   a - +9 executioner's axe (freeze)
rCold    . . .     Gourm    .   (shield currently unavailable)
rNeg     + . .     Faith    .   P - +5 crystal plate armour {rC+}
rPois    .         Spirit   .   F - +2 helmet
rElec    .         Reflect  .   A - +2 cloak
rCorr    .         Harm     .   m - +2 pair of gloves
MR       +++++     Rnd*Rage +   B - +2 pair of boots {Stlth+}
Stlth    ..........             D - necklace of Bloodlust {*Rage +Rage MR++ Int-
Regen    0.0/turn               Q - ring of protection from magic {MR+, !d}
MPRegen  0.2/turn               R - ring of fire {rF+, rC-}

Anyone good at winning fast? I was going to 66% clear Depths and then dive Zot. Not sure if I clear the Zot 5 vault to the orb or ninja or it what. The single haste potion is a real issue.

# ? May 31, 2017 18:04

Harvey Mantaco: Mar 6, 2007; Someone please help me find my keys =(

took me 5 years

code:

 Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.19.5 (tiles) character file.

12731943 Coojoog the Minotaur Porcupine (level 27, 273/273 HPs)
             Began as a Minotaur Artificer on May 27, 2017.
             Was the Champion of Zin.
             Escaped with the Orb
             ... and 15 runes on May 31, 2017!
             
             The game lasted 10:54:22 (128538 turns).

Coojoog the Minotaur Porcupine (MiAr)             Turns: 128538, Time: 10:54:23

Health: 273/273    AC: 42    Str: 28    XL:     27
Magic:  40/40      EV: 33    Int: 11    God:    Zin [******]
Gold:   4472       SH: 23    Dex: 23    Spells: 4 memorised, 36 levels left

rFire  + + +      SeeInvis +    G - +9 trishula (holy)
rCold  + + .      Gourm    .    P - +3 pearl dragon scales
rNeg   + + +      Faith    .    C - +3 shield {reflect}
rPois  +          Spirit   .    v - +0 hat "Caqom" {rElec rCorr SInv}
rElec  +          Reflect  +    c - +1 cloak of the Crushed Planets {rF+ MR+ Regen+}
rCorr  +          Harm     .    X - +2 pair of gloves "Xitufa" {rElec MR+ Regen+}
MR     ++++.                    Q - +0 pair of boots of Dolicu {rPois rF+ Str+3 Stlth-}
Stlth  ..........               B - macabre finger necklace {rN+}
                                S - ring of Wishful Thinking {+Fly rPois rF+ rN+}
                                J - ring "Tuthrobe" {rPois rC++ Str+7 Int+3}
                                j - ring of Robustness {AC+8}

@: very slightly contaminated, hasted (expiring), very quick
A: retaliatory headbutt, horns 2
a: Recite, Vitalisation, Imprison, Sanctuary, Donate Gold, Renounce Religion,
Evoke Flight
0: Orb of Zot
}: 15/15 runes: decaying, slimy, silver, golden, iron, obsidian, icy, bone,
abyssal, demonic, glowing, magical, fiery, dark, gossamer


You escaped.
You worshipped Zin.
Zin was exalted by your worship.
You were not hungry.

You visited 18 branches of the dungeon, and saw 90 of its levels.
You visited Pandemonium 2 times, and saw 24 of its levels.
You visited the Abyss 4 times.
You visited 1 ziggurat, and saw 20 of its levels.
You also visited: Sewer.

# ? May 31, 2017 19:06

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

Harvey Mantaco posted:

took me 5 years

Five years for a win or a Minotaur Artificer win? Either way, congrats!

# ? May 31, 2017 19:16

Prism: Dec 22, 2007; yospos

FulsomFrank posted:

Five years for a win or a Minotaur Artificer win? Either way, congrats!

I assumed a 15 rune win.

Definitely congrats though!

Edit:

S - ring of Wishful Thinking {+Fly rPois rF+ rN+}

Apparently going "I believe I can fly!" really works.

Prism fucked around with this message at 19:20 on May 31, 2017

# ? May 31, 2017 19:18

Harvey Mantaco: Mar 6, 2007; Someone please help me find my keys =(

15 Rune win.

I told my wife and 6 year old. NO ONE UNDERSTANDS HOW IMPORTANT THIS IS.

# ? May 31, 2017 19:19

odiv: Jan 12, 2003

Did she say, "Wait, I thought you finished. Why are you playing again?"

# ? May 31, 2017 19:22

Harvey Mantaco: Mar 6, 2007; Someone please help me find my keys =(

odiv posted:

Did she say, "Wait, I thought you finished. Why are you playing again?"

No I think I'm done for a bit.
Kid said "Is that the ugly game where the buttons don't make sense?"

Yes. yes it is. and it's dead.

# ? May 31, 2017 19:24

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

Harvey Mantaco posted:

No I think I'm done for a bit.
Kid said "Is that the ugly game where the buttons don't make sense?"

Yes. yes it is. and it's dead.

Everyone thinks they're done for a bit until you hear about a new release adding (or removing) something you think sounds cool and BOOM you're back in again

# ? May 31, 2017 19:28

Old Dun Cow: Sep 5, 2006

FulsomFrank posted:

Everyone thinks they're done for a bit until you hear about a new release adding (or removing) something you think sounds cool and BOOM you're back in again

Yes, that was the noise Qazlal made when I came back.

# ? May 31, 2017 19:31

lizardhunt: Feb 7, 2010; agreed ->

favorite .20 change: Ignition

# ? May 31, 2017 19:31

Araganzar: May 24, 2003; Needs more cowbell!; Fun Shoe

oh god I'm in Zot now at 26,831 turns and I still don't have resists....this is going to end badly...

edit: gently caress MADE IT TO ZOT 5 AND ZOT TRAPS ON BOTH VAULT ENTRIES

Araganzar fucked around with this message at 19:48 on May 31, 2017

# ? May 31, 2017 19:36

Scaramouche: Mar 26, 2001; SPACE FACE! SPACE FACE!

I love the macabre finger necklace. Wish there was a macabre hand necklace.

# ? May 31, 2017 20:01

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

Scaramouche posted:

I love the macabre finger necklace. Wish there was a macabre hand necklace.

What about the macabre set? Whole equipment with eerie properties and bonuses...

Actually, making armour sets would be badass.

# ? May 31, 2017 20:06

Araganzar: May 24, 2003; Needs more cowbell!; Fun Shoe

Araganzar posted:

oh god I'm in Zot now at 26,831 turns and I still don't have resists....this is going to end badly...

edit: gently caress MADE IT TO ZOT 5 AND ZOT TRAPS ON BOTH VAULT ENTRIES

Hell yeah!

quote:

2729468 araganzar the Executioner (level 23, 218/218 HPs)
Began as a Deep Dwarf Fighter on May 30, 2017.
Was a High Priest of Makhleb.
Escaped with the Orb
... and 3 runes on May 31, 2017!

The game lasted 04:25:21 (28594 turns).

I got super aggro and said gently caress it and dove depths and zot. Fought six orbs at once with a bunch of other poo poo and burned a ton of Makh Piety. Almost died on the orb run to a combo of a damnation high-EV pan lord and tormentor. Almost twice as fast as my fastest win, about 3 times faster than my second fastest...I'm pretty stoked right now.

Araganzar fucked around with this message at 20:17 on May 31, 2017

# ? May 31, 2017 20:09

Floodkiller: May 31, 2011

FulsomFrank posted:

What about the macabre set? Whole equipment with eerie properties and bonuses...

Actually, making armour sets would be badass.

FR: Vecna's Head

# ? May 31, 2017 20:11

Araganzar: May 24, 2003; Needs more cowbell!; Fun Shoe

Floodkiller posted:

FR: Vecna's Head

To equip this item you must remove an eyeball! This is a significant sacrifice!

# ? May 31, 2017 20:18

Yngwie Mangosteen: Aug 23, 2007

FulsomFrank posted:

What about the macabre set? Whole equipment with eerie properties and bonuses...

Actually, making armour sets would be badass.

You'd almost never get more than one piece in a game.

# ? May 31, 2017 22:56

Glagha: Oct 13, 2008; AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAaaAAAaaAAaAA
AAAAAAAaAAAAAaaAAA
AAAA
AaAAaaA
AAaaAAAAaaaAAAAAAA
AaaAaaAAAaaaaaAA

I mean, the trident/rings of the octopus king already exists as a good model for how armor sets would turn out.

# ? Jun 1, 2017 00:36

kickascii: Mar 30, 2010

Harvey Mantaco posted:

No I think I'm done for a bit.
Kid said "Is that the ugly game where the buttons don't make sense?"

Yes. yes it is. and it's dead.

My wife calls this game Stick Man.

Oh no, did your Stick Man die again?

# ? Jun 1, 2017 00:51

Canine Blues Arooo: Jan 7, 2008; when you think about it...i'm the first girl you ever spent the night with; Grimey Drawer

kickascii posted:

My wife calls this game Stick Man.

Oh no, did your Stick Man die again?

Tell her that's offensive to our kind and you'd thank her for calling your character, 'Potential Champion of the Orb of Zot'.

# ? Jun 1, 2017 01:28

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

Dead on Zot 5 because I forgot with Qazlal I can summon elementals as chaff.

# ? Jun 1, 2017 06:07

redneck nazgul: Apr 25, 2013

PMush Perfect posted:

Dead on Zot 5 because I forgot with Qazlal I can summon elementals as chaff.

You still looking for a team? We can make one when I get off work, I've got one 15 rune under my belt and can probably get more by abusing God's Most Perfect Race, Vine Stalker.

(edit: If anyone wants an easy win, make a Vine Stalker melee dude, use a rapier/quick blade, stack strength for heavy armor/large shields. Get your strength/dexterity combined above 49 so that you proc the bite on every attack. Try it with Gozag for nearly infinite potions that actually heal you.)

redneck nazgul fucked around with this message at 06:21 on Jun 1, 2017

# ? Jun 1, 2017 06:11

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

redneck nazgul posted:

You still looking for a team? We can make one when I get off work, I've got one 15 rune under my belt and can probably get more by abusing God's Most Perfect Race, Vine Stalker.

Found one, but thank you!

Edit In retrospect, still pretty happy with my performance, considering I never found a weapon better than a +4 demon blade or a +0 double sword. I got as far as I did because of good fundamentals, not on the back of any particular great drop. Of course, I lost a lot of resources getting myself out of reckless situations, but to come that close to winning at least helps me feel like I can win, even if I didn't.

# ? Jun 1, 2017 06:13

kickascii: Mar 30, 2010

Damnit! Lost my Spriggan with 3 runes. Why does airstrike do so much damage, I'm a tiny land bound creature!!!! :argh:

# ? Jun 1, 2017 07:00

Ferrinus: Jun 19, 2003; i'm finding this quite easy, i guess in part because i'm a fast type but also because i have a coherent mental model of the world

Canine Blues Arooo posted:

I've written about it before (I can't remember if it was in this thread or an earlier one), but the insane randomness-determined feast or famine surrounding your MP pool makes playing a dedicated spellcasting character feel really weird and often bad. The insane difference in efficiency and reliability between spending, say, 9 mana on a glaciate rather than 8 mana on a crystal spear, let alone 1 mana on a magic dart, creates a really odd playstyle that's really counterintuitive to someone who isn't used to Crawl. Like yeah, sure, Firestorm is a more efficient way to kill nine monsters than Crystal Spear. But why is Firestorm nearly always also a more efficient way to kill one monster? Well because it doesn't miss and likely does about as much damage and because an end-game caster isn't really mana-limited anyway, just turn-limited.

Here's what I think: that it should be harder to just instantly refill your mana pool or otherwise cast level 9 spells endlessly thanks to such things as Vehumet's mp-on-kill or staff of channeling spam, but that some combination of high level, high spellcasting, high int, and low armor encumbrance should straight up reduce spell MP costs. So like maybe if you're wearing a robe rather than full plate you get a decent discount on Firestorm, but, more importantly, you can throw Mystic Blasts at-will, for free. As well, Singularity could be rebalanced and brought back to the game.

Edit: I just dug up my old posts on this subject in like the 0.15 thread and they were literally in response to your ruminating on the weirdness of high-level casters! What a world, what a world.

Ferrinus fucked around with this message at 07:27 on Jun 1, 2017

# ? Jun 1, 2017 07:16

Darox: Nov 10, 2012

That's just because LCS sucks. Chain lightning (and even ignition when it lines up) is fine for mana efficiency. And the way that higher level spells get more and more mana efficient is GOOD for dedicated casters. Firestorm/Glaciate/whatever is your reward for getting three different skills to ~20 or higher.

I play a ton of casters and the biggest problem is usually the lack of defenses. If something fast gets in your face or has a crossbow/javelins/spells that's way more dangerous to a caster. It's the same old issue, melee characters only need two skills for damage (and fighting gives you extra health already) while casters typically need three minimum and more likely will branch out to 4-5. That means they have less xp to spare on fighting/dodging/armour/shields.

On the flip side casters can obliterate threats that are a serious concern for melee characters without issue. A caustic shrike or juggernaut is trivial to kill if you can fire poison arrows or orbs of destruction at it from distance.

As an aside, using sticky flame kiting on a monster with rF++ is not the best idea and not using IOOD on demonic crawlers instead is maybe your fault CBA.

# ? Jun 1, 2017 08:32

someone awful.: Sep 7, 2007

Worshipping xom, doing z:5, with teleportitis, and permanent teleport traps on both lung chokepoints, is a very stressful way to have to win the game. Would not recommend (except the xom part).

# ? Jun 1, 2017 11:25

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# ? May 15, 2024 08:59

Heithinn Grasida: Mar 28, 2005; ...must attack and fall upon them with a gallant bearing and a fearless heart, and, if possible, vanquish and destroy them, even though they have for armour the shells of a certain fish, that they say are harder than diamonds, and in place of swords wield trenchant blades of Damascus steel...

Darox posted:

That's just because LCS sucks. Chain lightning (and even ignition when it lines up) is fine for mana efficiency. And the way that higher level spells get more and more mana efficient is GOOD for dedicated casters. Firestorm/Glaciate/whatever is your reward for getting three different skills to ~20 or higher.

I play a ton of casters and the biggest problem is usually the lack of defenses. If something fast gets in your face or has a crossbow/javelins/spells that's way more dangerous to a caster. It's the same old issue, melee characters only need two skills for damage (and fighting gives you extra health already) while casters typically need three minimum and more likely will branch out to 4-5. That means they have less xp to spare on fighting/dodging/armour/shields.

On the flip side casters can obliterate threats that are a serious concern for melee characters without issue. A caustic shrike or juggernaut is trivial to kill if you can fire poison arrows or orbs of destruction at it from distance.

As an aside, using sticky flame kiting on a monster with rF++ is not the best idea and not using IOOD on demonic crawlers instead is maybe your fault CBA.

I agree.

I play almost exclusively casters or hybrids. I've gotten a couple trog wins and an okawaru troll that didn't cast, but otherwise every character I've won the game with has had at least 10 in a casting skill. Personally, I think MP in Crawl is pretty much okay. I find it's pretty reasonable for the game to expect you to find ways to conserve MP, either through god powers, weapon skills and consumables. The fact that casters have to deal with luring and kiting more is definitely a problem with MP, but it's also a problem with luring and kiting as obviously optimal tactics in general, and that problem mostly goes away relative to melee by the end of lair if you set your character up the right way and play well.

I especially feel like if MP management is going to be loosened, it should be restricted to "caster gods". Perhaps Vehumet, Sif Muna, or in fact a new caster god, could let you choose 1 or 2 spells up to level 4 to become cantrips that don't cost MP and have 0% spell failure. But I like that "pure" caster status is limited to characters who worship a few deities. It's hardly as if magic is useless to other characters! And if MP management weren't a significant issue, hybrids would be less fun to play, since you'd have much less need to ever use your weapon. I think the problem isn't that casters have to manage resources more, it's that magic in general is now objectively and significantly weaker than heavy armor melee, on top of putting far more onerous demands on the player to make it work. The reasons for this have already been made quite clear in this thread: enemies have been added that are uniquely dangerous for casters, while extremely powerful, but problematic spells have been removed. The answer is probably to slightly reduce the relative power of AC, improve the power of EV at high levels, make it harder to get very high numbers in both, and add some new spells, specifically level 6+ charms and MR independent hexes.

And also bring back singularity.

# ? Jun 1, 2017 12:05

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Crawl .20: Home of the Frog Dog

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