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As in I'd like one. Why does DCSS love the number 27 so much? Also, why are the devs so adamant about keeping the limited inventory system (52 items max) rather than the more flexible and useful system like ADOM uses? No arguments or fights, I just want to understand why things are the way they are. Anyone care to educate me?

the nice thing about 52 items as a limit is you can select any item in your inventory with one (or two if you want to count the shift key) keypress(es)
it's not possible to add more items but keep that feature (unless you want to add items to other symbols; numbers are out of the question because they are used for selecting partial stacks)

for why 27 you'd have to ask Linley
it's a good number though; 3^3
much better than silly multiples of 5 or 10

I think the 27 thing will burst. There are way too many good designs for species-gods-backgrounds.
Sure, they'll remove the halfling to make room once species hits 27. But eventually they won't want to drop anything and there will be some octocat stalker thread in GDD screaming to be added.

Also, dungeon levels went from 27 to 15(or 20 if you count depths) :mrgreen:

Wait...are you kidding? Species get removed because this limit exists in the selection screen??? WTF?

skjarl wrote:Wait...are you kidding? Species get removed because this limit exists in the selection screen??? WTF?

Well not yet, but we have 26 species now.
I've seen at least one dev say they'd like to keep the 27 limit, though.

I was annoyed when the djinni vanished. -_-

I've said on several occasions that in the distant future, I'd love to have 27 of species, backgrounds and gods each. This is not just numerical fetichism: players are used to an amount of data about this size -- Crawl features about two dozen species and backgrounds since a long time. (It's slightly different with the gods, which started out at exactly 12, but there are some letters still available

).

On the other hand, *some* kind of upper limit is a good idea, too: do you recall how overwhelming species, backgrounds and their abbreviations were back when you started out? Also, while players like to complain about the one species/god that's "worst" (in whatever sense) -- see the recurring Mummy and Cheibriados threads --, to a designer there's always one species which is least differentiated. And that one's a natural candidiate for removal. (This is what happened to Mountain Dwarves. Things are different for Djinni: that species has never properly existed.)

Then again, the 27 is not sacrosanct: the length of the Dungeon branch was cut in half without much ado.

To sum it up: there is no fixed cap for species or backgrounds. Trying to keep it at 27 will force us to reassess the currently existing content which quite possible can lead to cuts. This has been good for the game since 0.1, and will continue to do so.

Species haven't been getting cut because the devs want to preserve a 27 species cap (which they haven't even hit yet) they've been getting cut because they're boring. Look at grey elves (for a player who can't pick between a high elf and a deep elf!) and sludge elves (what if high elves were exactly the same except for a slightly higher transmutation aptitude?)

I don't know why the devs are talking about the possibility of removing mummies, though, aside from the fact that vampires do a similar thing (no death from hunger) while being generally a lot better balanced and more interesting.

Sort of like how vine stalkers are basically djinni only better balanced and more interesting.

That said, there are two things I will say:

1. I don't want this game to ditch ALL of the "mundane" species. Not every species needs to be wacky and totally change the game experience. At the very least we should keep the elves, humans, and honestly I would totally support the return of the mountain dwarves, if only so that Crawl will have the "basic" races again. Halflings, eh, I couldn't care less. I mean, when was the last time anyone actually played a halfling?

2. I sincerely hope Crawl does NOT hardcap the species just to prevent rotating flavor-of-the-month species. You know, eventually we will get to a point where we have only species we like, and then what do you do if you're at a cap but you just have this great new idea? Start dropping things you like! But then people complain, so you bring that back and drop something else... I don't think the devs are dumb enough to let this happen, but just saying.

Knight9910 wrote:1. I don't want this game to ditch ALL of the "mundane" species. Not every species needs to be wacky and totally change the game experience. At the very least we should keep the elves, humans, and honestly I would totally support the return of the mountain dwarves, if only so that Crawl will have the "basic" races again. Halflings, eh, I couldn't care less. I mean, when was the last time anyone actually played a halfling?

Mountain Dwarf doesn't need to return because we have Minotaur and Hill Orc which you play the same way you would Md.

I think 27 species/backgrounds/gods is way too much. It already takes a very large number of games and a very long time to figure out what all the gods do, unspoiled, and 19 is pretty far short of 27; even at that number I think removing gods would probably be better for the game than adding more.

I'm of the opinion that more content is better than less content.

Well, maybe I should say more GOOD content. But still.

dpeg wrote:do you recall how overwhelming species, backgrounds and their abbreviations were back when you started out

It was overwhelming in a positive way: "Wow, I have so many different things to try!". However, I can't agree with a statement like this:

Knight9910 wrote:I'm of the opinion that more content is better than less content.

because it doesn't say anything about content quality.

Sar wrote:because it doesn't say anything about content quality.

Which is why I added the second line.

Not "maybe". Adding content that is not good, or even bad, makes game worse for its players.

So getting back to the importance of 27, it's really, genuinely the case that nobody besides the original creator actually knows why 27?

Kaeoschassis wrote:So getting back to the importance of 27, it's really, genuinely the case that nobody besides the original creator actually knows why 27?

As far as we know. I mean, I suppose someone could ask. Linley can't be that hard to find, right?

Presumably Linley liked the number. A friend of mine in high school, his favorite number was 27 because it is three cubed, 3^3, and also 3 less than 30=3*10, which is pretty neat I suppose. Maybe that's why Linley liked it too. Or maybe because its digits include the only even prime and 7, a number steeped in numerological curiosity.

Seriously if the number were "30" you wouldn't even note it as odd. You gotta expand your mind, get outside of those boring multiples of 10.

Actually, you're wrong, and_into. We don't think it's odd because our minds are small or closed off. Actually, it's exactly the opposite.

As you said, multiples of 10 are boring and predictable. Any tiny, simplistic mind could decide to include 30 of something. It's easy, obvious, almost like a knee-jerk level response to round the number up to the nearest multiple of 10.

But the number isn't 30. It's 27, and that speaks to the possibility of something bigger. It gives it a mystery. Why is it 27? Is it because it's 3 cubed? Is it because it's 3 less than 3 times 10, or 3 times 9? Or maybe it's not math at all, maybe the number 27 held some personal significance to Linley. Or it could be absolutely nothing; maybe he just thought 27 seemed like a good number. Maybe he included it so many times just so he could cackle with devious delight at watching people wrack their brains trying to figure it out.

But then again, small minds hate mystery. They can't stand the idea that there are things they don't know or understand, so they tell themselves that it must be nothing at all and they block it out. Soooo, I guess that explains why the thought of us asking why angers you so much that you had to call us all small-minded.

(Yeah, I know. But hey, you did shoot first.)

I don't have much time, logging in at a public library but they'll find me soon anyway. I spoke to Linley to get to the bottom of this. Wish I could unlearn what I know. The council of the 27 have been trying to keep him quiet. The mountain dwarves found out, that's why they had to go. Dpeg was a patsy, they blackmailed him into saying it was because they were too similar to other species. Go back to 0.3, the clues are all there. Hidden unique in the source code, can't generate. Search the code, break the code. Find the Grassy Gnoll, he's Yiuf's brother, his flavor text speaks the truth. Soylent Green is merfolk. Soylent Green is merfolk. Soylent Green is merfolk.

[I wasn't angry and didn't mean to insult you Knight9910, I was just foolin', sorry if it came off serious for some reason. I don't think you are small-minded.

]

So...let's guess how many species, backgrounds, and gods will be in DCSS 1.0 (which at this pace is 43 years or so, unless they do faster releases like proposed before

)

Species: 48
Backgrounds: 31
Gods: 33

Klown wrote:So...let's guess how many species, backgrounds, and gods will be in DCSS 1.0 (which at this pace is 43 years or so, unless they do faster releases like proposed before )

Actually, I believe they've said that the game has already reached the point where it could be considered a stable 1.xx release, but they are purposefully keeping the 0.xx version scheme for clarity and historical purposes. It's on the homepage.

http://crawl.develz.org/wordpress/faq#version

and into wrote:I don't have much time, logging in at a public library but they'll find me soon anyway. I spoke to Linley to get to the bottom of this. Wish I could unlearn what I know. The council of the 27 have been trying to keep him quiet. The mountain dwarves found out, that's why they had to go. Dpeg was a patsy, they blackmailed him into saying it was because they were too similar to other species. Go back to 0.3, the clues are all there. Hidden unique in the source code, can't generate. Search the code, break the code. Find the Grassy Gnoll, he's Yiuf's brother, his flavor text speaks the truth. Soylent Green is merfolk. Soylent Green is merfolk. Soylent Green is merfolk.

[I wasn't angry and didn't mean to insult you Knight9910, I was just foolin', sorry if it came off serious for some reason. I don't think you are small-minded. ]

My God, it... it's all true!!! What have we wrought?! WHY DID WE PLAY GOD?! WHYYYYYYY???!!!

[Also, apology accepted.

]

duvessa wrote:I think 27 species/backgrounds/gods is way too much. It already takes a very large number of games and a very long time to figure out what all the gods do, unspoiled, and 19 is pretty far short of 27; even at that number I think removing gods would probably be better for the game than adding more.

I don't agree with this because it's possible to stagger content. Simplest example is with gods - a new player might not know Jiyva even exists for months until they get good enough to find their first Jiyva altar. Just move a few gods past the temple and players will never see them until they're pretty good, and maybe not try them until they get a win or two. (Note: I do not actually want to do this, just an example to show how to manipulate content like this.)

With species and backgrounds it's harder, but I've heard proposals here before about adding meta-unlocks to Crawl. Basically you would only start with maybe 3 species and 3 backgrounds. As you played longer on your account/computer, you would unlock more and more species/backgrounds - for example, you could unlock Abyssal Knights the first time you were banished, and unlock Naga, Merfolk, Vinestalkers, and Formicids when you first obtained the serpentine, barnacled, decaying, and gossamer runes, respectively. Of course, there would be a password to fully unlock everything if you were an expert and didn't feel like playing a gimped version of Crawl.

I don't think this level will be reached for a long time though - once we reach 27 of everything, I'm sure spending time improving existing content would be better than trying to create more. There a definitely a few species that could be combined or removed.

As for 27, I don't know why it was originally created, but I'm pretty sure the reason it's stayed around is to prevent bikeshedding. For example, instead of arguing over whether skill levels should end at 30 or 25 everybody just agrees to end it at 27.

Pretty sure 27 was chosen because of this

I would actually like to see a few more late game gods in the same vein as Jiyva.

Knight9910 wrote:I would actually like to see a few more late game gods in the same vein as Jiyva.

Zin could be made a lategame god, since there's little reason to worship him until that point anyway.

You don't like going into Orcish Mines and preaching Word of Zin to heathen scum while beating the crap out of them? How heretical.

Edit: also Imprison and Sanctuary are good forever.

Yeah, recite is awesome almost always. The other stuff is situational, but extremely powerful in those situations. 100% rmut is just an extra little nicety, just like curing all mutations.

My theory is that in Rogue, the amulet of yendor is on the 26th dungeon level, so in Crawl the entrance to zot was traditionally on level 27. And after that, the number got used for skill caps and stuff, because why not.

This might be coincidence though, since the amulet can be found on any level from 26 onwards, and I don't know if there is actually maximum depth there.

Perhaps 27 was chosen because of Johnson, Jones, Hendrix, Joplin, Morrison, Alexander, Cobain & Co. ;)

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