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ID Category Severity Reproducibility Date Submitted Last Update
0000217 [DCSS] FR: Other minor N/A 2009-12-20 07:04 2010-01-05 10:18
Reporter TGW View Status public  
Assigned To
Priority normal Resolution done  
Status closed   Product Branch 0.7 ancient branch
Summary 0000217: More level cuts
Description So it's been a while, and two levels off Hive and two levels off Lair do not prevent the game from being long.

Meanwhile, many branches become very boring part of the way in. Some (Crypt, Snake) have a rather limited variety of enemies, while others (Swamp) are tedious to navigate. These branches could be shortened and become more enjoyable, with the lost experience and loot made up through difficulty increases (as in Lair) and the recent influx of portal vaults.

The branches I think are most appropriate for length reductions are:
Swamp - Very difficult to navigate, with autoexplore being potentially lethal, and many enemies being annoying beyond reason. Cut to three or four levels.
Shoals - Due to cruel RNG, I haven't played it enough to know if Shoals are worth shortening on their own, but if Swamp is shortened they should probably go with it.
Crypt - Necromancers, skeletal warriors, random undead, maybe a curse skull / lich / vampire. The latter category could be increased in concentration, and the branch be cut to three or four levels.
Snake - Grey snakes, naga mages, greater naga, guardian serpents. If done with rPois, the rest of the branch turns into highly resilient or very fast popcorn. Three levels.
Dungeon - While probably the most variable branch, the dungeon is extremely long and doesn't have many features past D:19 until you're heading to Zot. The idea arose that the dungeon could decrease in size as it deepens. I like this.

Vaults is being changed, as far as I know, to a more interesting layout, and is not included in this list.
Additional Information
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-  Notes
(0000487)
Siber (reporter)
2009-12-20 07:17

 From a purely subjective player-who-has-never-really-won standpoint, I'd feel somewhat cheated by this when I eventually did win. There'd be the sense that I got a quicker, easier dungeon, and would never get to fully explore the 'real', full sized dungeon.
(0000488)
TGW (reporter)
2009-12-20 07:27

 But it doesn't have to be easier. The problem is all the empty levels with boring popcorn, not the branch ends and rare enemies. In the same way that Lair lost its rat levels, Crypt should lose its zombie levels.
(0000492)
KiloByte (manager)
2009-12-20 14:44

 Even worse, players are actively discouraged from seeing most branches of the game.

I'd propose a drastic solution:
* increase the number of runes needed to 5
* cut most branches by half (!)
* decrease exp needed to level by half
(0000499)
Eronarn (updater)
2009-12-20 23:30

 I'm in favor of this. I'd personally cut two levels off of Swamp/Shoals, Snake, Elf; a (further) level off of Orc, Lair, and Hive; a level off of Vaults. Then I'd turn Crypt/Blade into non-guaranteed portal vaults (possibly, also Hive). This represents -16 levels; I'd increase the number of portal vaults in the dungeon to make up about 2/3rds of that.

Changing the way the levels are generated also works: for example, the Hells are 7 levels each but don't feel anything like that because each one goes by so fast. Thus I'm in favor of options like the dungeon "resizing".

KiloByte: That is a bad idea because it would require significant rebalancing of things like resistances or piety or spellbook availability. Many characters already lack rPois by the time they "should" be doing Snake. It would be astoundingly worse if that many levels were cut.
(0000500)
due (developer)
2009-12-21 01:06

 Eronarn: How are you proposing people reach Tomb if Crypt is a portal vault?
(0000501)
TGW (reporter)
2009-12-21 01:55

 Put it in Vaults? Put it in D:20-27?
(0000519)
dpeg (administrator)
2009-12-22 14:00

 As I see it, the original request is completely off the mark. Yes, the game is long and we want to shorten it. But are doing this in a slow fashion on purpose! The point is that we don't want to deal with too many parameters in the balancing equation at once: experience, loot, food, threat. So far, we have removed a total of four levels (2 from Hive, 2 from Lair), without any compensation. And that's exactly the way I'd like to keep going. Next would probably be Vaults (together with the layout overhaul). There is really no reason to rush this.

It is interesting to see all those radical proposals, but who would test and tweak this afterwards? The comment by Eronarn (to Kilobyte) also applies to Eronarn's proposal.

Kilobyte: I see where you are coming from, but why start with 50%? Wouldn't it be more rational to start with 90% or so?
(0000528)
nrook (updater)
2009-12-22 19:49

 While I love kilobyte's proposal and would play more Crawl were it implemented, I don't have to deal with all of the fallout dpeg describes, so I don't really get a vote on the matter :). (Is there consensus that the game should be made considerably shorter, at least?)

However, I do like Eronarn's proposal of turning Crypt into a portal vault. Swamp is often tedious to navigate, but its central concept is cool and mandates it be kept. Crypt doesn't have an interesting central concept: zombies and skeletons are inherently boring enemies. I don't think much would be lost turning Crypt into a portal vault (though a home would have to be found for the branch end vaults).
(0000558)
dpeg (administrator)
2009-12-24 13:53

 Crypt is home to the curse skulls and skeletal warrions. Also, I have some plans for the crypt, for example using reduced vision (for players and monsters).
(0000562)
TGW (reporter)
2009-12-24 18:19
edited on: 2009-12-24 18:21

 Curse skulls are very uncommon and skeletal warriors (especially in a corpseless branch) are just another group of poison-resistant melee fighters.
(0000571)
b0rsuk (updater)
2009-12-24 22:44

 Hey, I have an idea too. Let's cut...

Vaults.

Vaults is one of good examples of grind. True, early levels can be dangerous, but it doesn't get harder until V:8. It's largely the same as Lair - relatively safe area with plenty of food and items. I'm baffled why more people don't recognize it. Save for an occasional vault, it doesn't get much worse than a single giant or pack of yaktaurs. Whereas other supposedly boring branches are relatively short and have their identities, Vaults is 7 levels of the same.

Normally I would be in favour of cutting some of mentioned branches, except they often have a nice niche as food challenges. Hive used to be a food challenge without PR. Crypt certainly can be, especially if you let skeletal warriors hit you (a lot of time spent resting). Snake Pit can also be very food consuming without PR.
(0000595)
Eronarn (updater)
2009-12-26 02:45

 Vaults is going to be significantly changed to be more interesting. See the wiki page about it: http://crawl.develz.org/wiki/doku.php?id=dcss:brainstorm:branches:vaults [^]
(0000602)
doy (developer)
2009-12-26 07:27

 Yeah, I really don't see why the solution here is "things are boring, better remove them". I'm much more in favor of taking the boring things and making them more interesting. I really don't think crawl would be as fun if it were significantly shorter... there are plenty of games that fill that niche already, mostly because it's much harder to make a longer game that remains interesting throughout. We're already most of the way there, and I don't think we really should throw that out. (That said, cutting branch depths and replacing the missing levels with new portal vaults would be a decent way of making things more interesting, just gradually, as dpeg said.)
(0000608)
TGW (reporter)
2009-12-26 07:50

 In my opinion, this game would be more fun with shorter branches.

This does not eliminate the possibility of portals. Rather, I think portals are amazing and awesome and should continue to rise in frequency to mitigate this level loss. Length is not the problem here. It's monotony, and reducing branch length is the easiest way to do that.
(0000610)
doy (developer)
2009-12-26 07:58

 Sure, it's overall game length that I don't really see a need to shorten significantly... how that's distributed is much more up in the air.
(0000672)
Twinge (updater)
2009-12-28 06:41

 I don't think it should be significantly shorter, but slightly shorter seems good.

Vaults doesn't seem like easy street 1-7 to me, in my (admittedly limited) experience; there's enough bands of ogres, yaktaurs, and other nasties to generally keep me on my toes the whole way down. Not really the same of elf, snake, and swamp - all could be 1-2 levels shorter without too much impact.

For swamp, it would seem like applying the idea of the level itself being smaller would be a solid one. Even if the reduction isn't huge (maybe 85% current size?), it would already be a fair bit less tedious to explore the whole area.

I'd loosely think that swamp should be reduced in level size and 4 levels, snake 4 levels, and elf 5 levels (I'd keep orc at 4 and hive at 2). But dpeg is right, this is something that can definitely be implemented slowly, and that is probably the best way to go about it - only change one variable at a time and see how ot goes.
(0000842)
dpeg (administrator)
2010-01-05 10:18

 Branch shortening will come, but never as drastic as proposed here. Crypt won't become a portal vault and Swamp won't be removed. Closing. (There is really not much to do: this is a subject where agreement will never be reached and I am not willing to risk the whole game by seemingly attractive radical propsal. Note that our approach to the game, shortening branches & Hive, is already considered radical by some.)

- Issue History
Date Modified Username Field Change
2009-12-20 07:04 TGW New Issue
2009-12-20 07:17 Siber Note Added: 0000487
2009-12-20 07:27 TGW Note Added: 0000488
2009-12-20 14:44 KiloByte Note Added: 0000492
2009-12-20 23:30 Eronarn Note Added: 0000499
2009-12-21 01:06 due Note Added: 0000500
2009-12-21 01:55 TGW Note Added: 0000501
2009-12-22 14:00 dpeg Note Added: 0000519
2009-12-22 19:49 nrook Note Added: 0000528
2009-12-24 13:53 dpeg Note Added: 0000558
2009-12-24 18:19 TGW Note Added: 0000562
2009-12-24 18:21 TGW Note Edited: 0000562
2009-12-24 22:44 b0rsuk Note Added: 0000571
2009-12-26 02:45 Eronarn Note Added: 0000595
2009-12-26 07:27 doy Note Added: 0000602
2009-12-26 07:50 TGW Note Added: 0000608
2009-12-26 07:58 doy Note Added: 0000610
2009-12-28 06:41 Twinge Note Added: 0000672
2010-01-05 10:18 dpeg Note Added: 0000842
2010-01-05 10:18 dpeg Status new => closed
2010-01-05 10:18 dpeg Resolution open => done

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