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ID: Category: Severity: Reproducibility: Date Submitted: Last Update:
2283 FR: Gameplay Balancing minor N/A 2010-08-14 23:59 2011-07-01 22:46
Reporter: minmay Local or Remote: Local  
Assigned To: Kate Operating System: Linux  
Priority: normal Console or Tiles: Tiles  
Status: closed Product Branch: 0.8 ancient branch  
Product Version: Resolution: done  
Projection: none      
ETA: none Fixed in Branch: 0.9 ancient branch  
Summary: 0002283: Absurd, ludicrous, and altogether quite silly loot in baileys
Description: This has been brought up many times already but nobody's ever bothered to fix it. As such I've gone through all the current vaults, identified those that I think are problematic, and proposed these changes:

bailey_axe_1 gives up to nine (average six) of any good_item. I think this is okay, maybe slightly too much. However, using "any good_item" can occasionally generate acquirement-level amounts of gold, that is to say, thousands. I think it would be better to use * or | glyphs instead.

bailey_axe_2 gives, as per the description, one stack of very good potions. Said stack can be two potions of experience, three potions of cure mutation, or eight potions of gain Str/Int/Dex. That seems like a lot. Just one of any of those would be plenty, especially when combined with the other loot available (basically other good potions and probably a good halberd of electrocution).

bailey_axe_3 gives exactly six of any good_item, suffers from the same issue as bailey_axe_1.

bailey_axe_4 also gives exactly six of any good_item, so it suffers from the same problem. It also gives a ring or a few potions of levitation for crossing the water in the vault, but levitation is generally abundant anyway. Note that this one is generally somewhat more difficult than bailey_axe_1 or 3.

minmay_bailey_axe_hex_keep...what was I thinking with the loot here? Main loot is 16 good consumables (from potion of agility to scroll of enchant weapon 3) and two great consumables (gain stat, experience, cure mutation, acquirement). Cut this in half. Maybe give only four good consumables. The second loot chamber, with the orc knight which had to become an orc warlord, is just embarrassing, there are FIVE great consumables and four | glyphs, plus twelve $ glyphs. Take out the consumables and have only two | glyphs, then either get rid of the warlord or his band of six hard_axe_fighters. With that done, the secret door could probably be made a normal door (it never stays closed for long anyway).
It's worth noting this is pretty much the hardest axe bailey by far, but that doesn't justify the ridiculous loot it has right now.

bailey_polearm_1 gives one good_item (crystal) plate mail/(steam/ice/gold) dragon armour, one good_item orcish cloak/gloves/helmet/boots/(large) shield, one | glyph and eight $ glyphs. In my experience that armor tends to be incredibly good, so I'd only give one of the two, perhaps replacing the other with a * glyph.

bailey_polearm_2 is my personal favorite of the baileys, it's dangerous and interesting. Loot is three items, split randomly but even between: | glyph, (armor/fighting/shields) manual/good_item (bardiche/executioner's axe), potion of experience/scroll of (acquirement/enchant armour/enchant weapon 3). I think this is ideal.

bailey_polearm_3 gives three books or stacks of scrolls, generally giving either something awesome (four scrolls of acquirement and book of Annihilations) or something crappy (six scrolls of immolation and some worthless randart book). I think this one is fine as it averages out well. It also happens to be devoid of polearms, but personally I like that; we can always add a bailey_somethingthatsnotaxesorpolearms.

bailey_polearm_4 gives up to twelve (average six) of any good_item. Same problem as bailey_axe_1/3/4.

bailey_polearm_5 has six $ glyphs, nine good potions and twelve good scrolls. This is too much; I'd cut the scrolls and potions in half. One nice thing about this one, however, is that it tends not to give very many of the really powerful items.

tl;dr version attached to post. I also made a minor, mostly cosmetic adjustment to minmay_bailey_hex_keep.
Steps To Reproduce:
Additional Information:
System Description:
Relationships
Attached Files: ? file icon fixedbailey.des [^] (29,954 bytes) 2010-08-14 23:59 [Show Content]
Issue History
Date Modified Username Field Change
2010-08-14 23:59 minmay New Issue
2010-08-14 23:59 minmay File Added: fixedbailey.des
2010-08-15 02:17 KiloByte Note Added: 0007221
2010-08-15 03:09 minmay Note Added: 0007222
2010-08-15 20:41 rob Note Added: 0007227
2010-08-16 21:15 herself Note Added: 0007254
2010-08-16 21:26 minmay Note Added: 0007257
2010-08-20 16:20 reid Note Added: 0007445
2010-08-20 16:24 reid Note Edited: 0007445
2010-08-20 16:28 reid Note Edited: 0007445
2011-06-23 02:30 Kate Note Added: 0013524
2011-06-23 02:30 Kate Status new => resolved
2011-06-23 02:30 Kate Fixed in Branch => 0.9 development branch
2011-06-23 02:30 Kate Resolution open => done
2011-06-23 02:30 Kate Assigned To => Kate
2011-07-01 22:46 minmay Status resolved => closed

Notes
(0007221)
KiloByte   
2010-08-15 02:17   
> bailey_axe_1 gives up to nine (average six) of any good_item. I think this is okay, maybe slightly too much. However, using "any good_item" can occasionally generate acquirement-level amounts of gold, that is to say, thousands. I think it would be better to use * or | glyphs instead.

We have the problem with gold over and over, hacked in places in various ways, usually by replacing them by | which is harder to use in a list of alternatives.
I do think the root issue, "gold good_item" invoking acquirement is a misdesign in the first place. It should give a decent pile, yeah, but nowhere close to acquirement. Vault-makers can do "acquire gold" for that.

> bailey_axe_2 gives, as per the description, one stack of very good potions. Said stack can be two potions of experience, three potions of cure mutation, or eight potions of gain Str/Int/Dex. That seems like a lot. Just one of any of those would be plenty,
Again, this is a bug, and in this case, one that already has been fixed.

I would definitely fix the gold issue and not change the rest -- especially parts that were fixed already.
(0007222)
minmay   
2010-08-15 03:09   
I just looked at the latest version, and this line is still there:
ITEM: potion of experience q:2 w:30 / potion of cure mutation q:3 w:30 /\
        potion of gain intelligence q:8 / potion of gain strength q:8 /\
        potion of gain dexterity q:8
For those unfamiliar with the syntax, that q:8 means it places 8 of that item.
(0007227)
rob   
2010-08-15 20:41   
The bug that was fixed was that a plain "potion of experience" could still give a stack of three potions, IIRC. That was after I got 6 potions of experience from the hex bailey.
(0007254)
herself   
2010-08-16 21:15   
> or eight potions of gain Str/Int/Dex. That seems like a lot. Just one of any of those would be plenty
But getting eight bonus points as a mutation adds a great flavor: you need to avoid bad muts, because a cure mutation potion will ruin your carrying cap, or spell power, or EV. I think on the char who got them, when a nexoquec (spelling mistake? nvm) got past "rMut and gave me berserktits I just went on with clarity and postponed drinking !cureMut as long as possible. And I thought it was very fun.

Also: getting one potion of gain stat makes me go ,,meh'', drink it asap, and forget about it. Getting a bigger stack (4+?) makes me go ,,wow'' and think if I should drink them now or wait and imo makes the game more interesting.
(0007257)
minmay   
2010-08-16 21:26   
Although that is a fairly interesting situation, I think eight potions is WAY too much. Humans only get 13 natural stat increases throughout the entire game, and they aren't exactly insignificant.
(0007445)
reid   
2010-08-20 16:20   
(edited on: 2010-08-20 16:28)
"any good_item" can also produce items a player may not even recognize as loot; in bailey_axe_4 I happened to get a bottled efreet, a falchion of freezing, 8 needles of slowing, a meat ration, a beef jerky, and something else that wasn't of note and I now can't figure out what it was. With the way they were scattered all over the level, I started to wonder where the secret doors were.

e: apparently the missing item was a stack of 2810 gold pieces. Anyways, what I'm trying to say is both the low end and the high end of the range of items produced should be brought towards the middle.
(0013524)
Kate   
2011-06-23 02:30   
Should be much more reasonable now, thanks.