Search • The Tavern

Opportunity attacks make the game more tedious to play than pillar dancing ever did, while simultaneously dumbing down combat. This change is so absurd and detached from how DCSS works as a game that I don't think there's any common ground for understanding or discussion. I'm just left hoping that m...

I like summoning a lot in its current state because the design encourages the player to use multiple different summon spells at the same time, and there's a wide selection of summoning spells to choose from. In my opinion it's currently the best designed spell school (note: I do NOT necessarily want...

I just finished a 15 rune game with a minotaur of Zin with a +9 holy executioner's axe, >50 AC and ~25 EV (over 30 EV with Vitalize for hard fights), all resists, amulet of regen. Zin has a chance to block Hell effects, for those who don't know. Plus he always blocks mutation hell effects. I hope th...

If the goal is to make Hells harder I have a suggestion: replace or alternate the existing Hell effects with an effect that randomly summons groups of powerful monsters on top of the player. It will make Hell effects more deadly and it also solves the grinding problem.

The draining is too much. I very quickly end up with -30% max hp, or even 100 max hp missing. Often within 200 turns. If the goal is to put time pressure on the player, it's achieving the exact opposite. Because I'm forced to leave and kill garbage in Abyss or Pan for 10 minutes to get my hp back. T...

The status quo is better than option 1.

You're saying you're doing something with petrify but I'm not sure what. Are you petrifying then stabbing them? Never seen anyone do that so I don't know how well it works. Or you're using LRD on them? Haven't really tried this either. Out of the spells in your library you should get bolt of magma a...

Borgnjor's vile clutch is a spell. With a Spriggan I would be more inclined than usual to get the Abyssal rune because with their fast movement speed they don't have to fight often, as long as they keep moving. If I had the regen spell or a regen item I'd definitely do Abyss.

I've won some games using mostly iron shot, it's possible. You do run out of food and it can be tedious. Basically, you're discovering that some character builds are more tedious to play than others. Now that BVC exists you can simply use that to kill everything, it's part earth so you can even keep...

For this character specifically, I think fighting, axes, armour, dodging and shields skills are more valuable at this moment than spending xp on blink. I wouldn't bother getting spells at all, would train the previously mentioned skills until the end. Evocations/invocations are also an option if you...

There are two Lair branches per game and one of them will be poison themed (Snake and Spider) while the other will be water themed (Swamp and Shoals) and you can visit the one easier for your character first. You can also do Dungeon until D:15 before entering a Lair branch; D floors are generally le...

What happens to the equipment when a follower dies? You make it sound like it disappears.

The reward for training a spell school to a high level is a strong spell. That's kind of the whole point. You train a skill. You get a good thing in exchange. I don't get the "controlled blink is too good" thing. Like yeah, it's good, and that's why you have to train a (mostly) non-damage ...

Turn off polearms.

Agony is very good. Pain is also so good that it might be worth learning even at this level, for finishing things that have been agonied a few times, but something else works too.

Okawaru piety works pretty well. The first paragraph of the commit describes a problem that doesn't exist.

relevance of potion/scroll weight I enjoy using weight knowledge to increase my consumable-using efficiency, and I never looked up weights. But hey, the way this thread is going, let's just jump straight to having all items identified, because it seems like someone will always find something to com...

when you care about mitigating both types of shield penalties, could it make sense to train more Shields than weapon or spell schools? No. Shields skill will never make you better at spellcasting or better at fighting. All it does is remove part of the penalty from wearing a shield in the first pla...

You can test things like this with a test character and wizmode.

In addition to this change, why not have monsters not pick up items at all, and have them sometimes generate with a consumable instead (which will be destroyed when they die as per this change). They already can't pick up items you've already seen, which is illogical for unspoiled players. So extend...

If it takes a turn to use the command I think it wouldn't lead to too much micromanagement. It would just replace whatever action you'd otherwise do.

I think the ancestor blocking LOF could be justified as being part of the experience of playing with the single strong ally god. Because if you want to play with an ally you might want the "managing an ally" gameplay experience (I do), and that involves the ally blocking LOF. It could be m...

They can't generate on D:1 but iirc there's a chance that a monster that can generate on the floor below generates next to the down stairs on your current level after x turns have passed, or something like that. Basically an adder can spawn on the down stairs in D:1 while you're exploring. It's not ...

duvessa wrote:My favourite part of this list is that it suggests giving Wr a scroll of blinking

I don't get it.

A +9 quickblade is kinda enough to carry you to the end, but its not that great against medium/high AC enemies. It will still kill them but not as fast as other weapon types. Potions of might and berserk are stronger than usual when using a quickblade. You can use the quickblade to progress until yo...

Personally I'm a lot more annoyed by Enrola (or whatever the name of the Ogre Mage is): a couple of times I met him somewhere like D:10 and got teleported in Abyss with a lvl 10-11 character. It wasn't an instant kill but it could as well have been. Or my pet peeve: weapon of distortion that imho s...

I didn't know about the Tzitzimeh rename and I was really confused when I saw them because I thought it was a different monster. The "x fiend" naming scheme is pretty useful. When I was new to doing extended, looking for "fiend" in the name really helped me learn the extended mon...

I'm not a fan of the Pan change either. The reason Pan was shortened is for those who wanted to get the runes but had to go through too many random levels to get the special levels. Therefore, here's an idea that keeps Pan fast for those who want fast runes and simultaneously restores Pan to how it ...

Giving kobolds nightstalker would be cool but only if demonspawn got another cool mutation in exchange!

Nah if the crawl code makes it possible to do a species like this in the first place (really not sure about this), you can easily code turning like that or whatever way you want.

Sounds very interesting. Have you thought about just taking 1 turn to turn into any other direction? Or would that be too strong? I feel like it would improve the playability a lot. Some personal opinions: I'd prefer if it could worship gods, adds more variation. I don't think it's too complex. Summ...

I mostly don't use non-wand evokables, animate skeleton, zombies, Yred, ranged weapons. For decent to strong combos, using only your main choice of offense, either a weapon or spells, is enough to win. And I'm fine with a slight disadvantage if it means cutting out some unenjoyable gameplay. --- Not...

The conventional wisdom was probably "don't train fighting until you have a good weapon skill level for your weapon (except the slowest base types)" and that is still true pretty much. My criteria for Vaults vs Abyss vs Slime is: Vaults: character is stupidly strong in all regards. Regen i...

What I was getting at, but didn't state explicitly (and should have), is that it would be nice to explore different ideas, looking for one that not only meets the goal of having an easy caster race but also offers something new in general.

You didn't mention kobold's small size evasion bonus. Forgot how much that is. But regardless, yeah, I never noticed how silly this comparison is. I'd propose a medium rework giving them some unique characteristic.

Maybe I'm in the minority, preferring mobile casters. The reason Ozo's Armour was changed is purely because some players casted the spell constantly while exploring because it is optimal to do so. And some people consider that to be a bad thing because it leads to common interruptions and key press...

Is there something that indicates that new players might have difficulty learning how to use magic compared to melee? If the answer is yes, is that a problem? Because even if the answer is yes, it's not a significant difference is it. For a new player, this race might help them learn certain aspects...

The point of stone walls is to prevent you from being able to break the wall or pass through it*. So it's good that you can't passwall through it. This is also why transparent stone exists, for when you want to show something inside a vault but don't want the wall to be breakable. *if I don't mentio...

I didn't even notice but what the hell, rods were great. They were like the only evokables that were fun to use.

There's also the problem that some octopus rings aren't worth wearing over randart rings. Even if you have the trident and (some) rings, you don't want to make use of the mechanic in the late game not only because the weapon is bad at that point, but also because some of the rings are bad, and the b...

You may want to visit GDD where summoners are discussed right now. I had read that thread. I think you want to make summoning weaker because it's too strong. If that's the case, just try to make it weaker. Encouraging hybrid summoners and making summoning weaker are things that can overlap but they...

Hybridization-encouraging monsters

Why? I feel like there's a good balance between all character types.

Idk personally I often come close to running out of food when I play "pure mages", often even with gourmand.

Just a variety of tavern memes that have, shall we say, an enigmatic relationship with reality. ⋅ Summon butterflies ⋅ Gods can be ranked based on how strong they are at 0* or 1* ⋅ Shatter is strong, even though it knocks down walls, sends everything running to you, an...

In my opinion many of the attributes for this species shouldn't be there (UC lower than everything else, draining, Ash, permanent wrath, no mutations, only buckler, god ability nerf, regeneration). Many of these are attempts at addressing weird special cases that don't need to be addressed, because ...

duvessa wrote:Quarterstaff damage down, since this is my only option for fixing how they're a no-brainer starting weapon when available.

Isn't the drawback that you can't realistically find an upgrade and end up with a bad weapon, or wasted skill points and having to train a new skill from 0? I think that's fair.

You'd save it to get a hell rune or something but yea it's mostly not something you'd want to use.
I don't know the reference.

I run away from Deep Troll packs much more often (pretty much every time) than from many other Depths monsters. They're very dangerous. Another thing I want to mention is that just because a monster doesn't bring you to the brink of death by itself doesn't mean it's a bad monster, and in fact the ga...

While the game should be at least as fun to play for an unspoiled player as for a spoiled player, that doesn't mean that all possible ways of gaining an advantage by spoiling yourself should be eliminated, because that is beyond the goal of making the game fun for an unspoiled player, and is silly a...

I agree that melee characters are better than characters that cast damage spells. I don't think that fatigue is a good mechanic. It would encourage players to walk away even more than what is currently a "good" amount of walking away, and that would be too much time spent on walking away i...

3. Not-single caustic shrikes
2. Spark Wasp
1. Shock Serpent

Search found 747 matches