ID scroll nerf

[tedric]

https://gitorious.org/crawl/crawl/commit/aa3bbeabe4c6e333958300e16c3cc01298703e4b

Why

[Sar]

because

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In general there's less of a need for lots of identification now that jewellery identifies on equip

[TeshiAlair]

Is there a use for ID beyond potions and "I hope this isn't a weapon of distortion"?

[Klown]

Slowly dropping the ID minigame and going the way of ToME's no mystery items.
<3

[Sar]

Identifying randarts for Contam, identifying wands, identifying known wands to know exact number of charges, identifying decks and cards in decks.

[Sandman25]

Slowly dropping the ID minigame and going the way of ToME's no mystery items.
<3

And I like it. It is so great to know you are wearing stasis or conservation.

[Siegurt]

Not surprisingly, I hate it, but I've said several times I like the ID game and actually previously had a lot of fun finding different ways to figure out if jewelry was one of the several things left on the list. But I acknowledge I'm in the minority for liking parts of crawl that are not skill training, and combat tactics.

[DracheReborn]

Siegurt: probably you might want to weigh in here

https://crawl.develz.org/wiki/doku.php? ... tification

I kinda like the ID mini game too, but I admit after a while it feels algorithmic (i.e. there's a certain decision tree I go through, and it doesn't change much from game to game).

[TeshiAlair]

Concur with Siegurt

[TheDefiniteArticle]

actually previously had a lot of fun finding different ways to figure out if jewelry was one of the several things left on the list

That stuff is exactly the problem with the ID game. It is spoilery and promotes tedious behaviour, like standing in front of an adder while changing rings every few turns.

But I acknowledge I'm in the minority for liking parts of crawl that are not skill training, and combat tactics.

It's not that I don't like that other stuff (I'm totally cool with spoilers and I like Nethack a lot), it's just that every part of Crawl except those two violates Crawl's own design goals (crawldevs hate Nethack a lot).

Change the design goals and it's all good, but right now they conflict with having any significant ID game.

[TeshiAlair]

Idea: To remove the scroll ID game from potions, making it one more step towards being unnecessary, have a (moderately common) wand called "wand of the alchemist" that IDs potions that typically spawns with only one or two charges. This preserves potions being a random element (which I think is good), but detaches it from scrolls.

[Siegurt]

That stuff is exactly the problem with the ID game. It is spoilery and promotes tedious behaviour, like standing in front of an adder while changing rings every few turns.

I'm not sure if I would call personally it "spoilery" that a ring of resist poison will identify itself if you would take poison damage, although I suppose one could simply mention that in the 'unidentified ring' description to avoid it being a 'spoiler'. I guess it's further a spoiler that adders do poison damage, of course I suspect the average new player will discover this more quickly then they'll find a ring of resist poison, but nevertheless monster attack flavors are currently 'spoiler' information.

That the behavior in question is tedious is a matter of opinion, and I fully acknowledge my opinion on what's tedious or not doesn't match the prevailing one.

But I acknowledge I'm in the minority for liking parts of crawl that are not skill training, and combat tactics.

It's not that I don't like that other stuff (I'm totally cool with spoilers and I like Nethack a lot), it's just that every part of Crawl except those two violates Crawl's own design goals (crawldevs hate Nethack a lot).

Change the design goals and it's all good, but right now they conflict with having any significant ID game.

Here's the design goals as the are in the manual:

Major design goals

• challenging and random gameplay, with skill making a real difference
• meaningful decisions (no no-brainers)
• avoidance of grinding (no scumming)
• gameplay supporting painless interface and newbie support

Minor design goals

• clarity (playability without need for spoilers)
• internal consistency
• replayability (using branches, species, playing styles and gods)
• proper use of out of depth monsters

Now looking those over, I don't see that there's no room for anything but skill training and combat tactics, the ID game (as it was) certainly skirts the edge of spoilerdom (As discussed this is easy to revise), and potentially minorly flouts grinderlyness (although since there's not an infinite number of things to ID, it's not "scummy" in the traditional sense) I don't see how these goals "conflict with any signifcant ID game" however.

[duvessa]

the ID game (as it was) certainly skirts the edge of spoilerdom (As discussed this is easy to revise)

Why do you think it hasn't been revised yet, then?

[Siegurt]

the ID game (as it was) certainly skirts the edge of spoilerdom (As discussed this is easy to revise)

Why do you think it hasn't been revised yet, then?

I think it's because no-one thought it was interesting or important enough to add things like "This ring might be identified if you wear it, and if not, it might be identified while being worn if it would effect you." to the description of unidentified items.

I assume that's because there were always more interesting or important things to do. Which to me merely indicates that the "lack of spoiler-info" while a game design in principle, isn't something that most dev's find interesting or exciting enough to crusade through every single part of the game looking for opportunities to fix.

[Leafsnail]

I don't think clarity (a minor design goal) was the problem with the jewelry ID minigame, to be honest. It's actually the meaningful decisions requirement (a major goal) that it falls foul of. "Should I perform this tedious but completely risk-free action to gain relevant strategic information" is not an interesting thing to consider, it's just an action that wastes your time.

[Moanerette]

Is this meant to be active in trunk then? I just got two uses out of a single ID scroll.

[tedric]

because

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In general there's less of a need for lots of identification now that jewellery identifies on equip

I mean, yeah, sure, that's technically true or whatever -- the problem with this logic is that the scenario in which I have more than a dozen unknown potions/scrolls is way more common than the scenario in which I have more than a dozen ID scrolls. The whole ID thing has never bothered me much nor driven me to tedium, but I definitely don't find it "interesting" that strategic consumables might be sitting in my stash for thousands of turns, and would rather drink them now please. Letting some of the ID scrolls I do find continue to have a chance to ID multiple items would be swell. That's all I'm saying.

[KoboldLord]

My internet moneys are on two major versions before the ID mini-game is completely gone. Everything that makes it interesting in Nethack or other roguelikes has already been purged, so the only reason it is still here at all is the fact that it has always been here.

I can always play a game of Unnethack when I decide I really want to play ID mini-games. That game even has unidentified monsters! Dragons spawn with a random description, each of which has a breath weapon of a different element. One of them is disintegrate, which is instant death if it hits you. Have fun figuring out which one that is!

[Patashu]

I can always play a game of Unnethack when I decide I really want to play ID mini-games. That game even has unidentified monsters! Dragons spawn with a random description, each of which has a breath weapon of a different element. One of them is disintegrate, which is instant death if it hits you. Have fun figuring out which one that is!

Is this a joke?

[KoboldLord]

Is this a joke?

Dragons have been substantially modified in UnNetHack. All dragons have been given new names and have their breaths, resistances, and colors randomized, with the exception of chromatic dragons, which possess all breaths, and all resistances except for magic resistance. As result it is impossible to predict breath type based on name or color. This behavior has been made a bit more friendly in the current version - dragons are randomized at the start of the game, but all dragons of the same name/color are of the same type - identify one, identify all of that type. They auto-identify upon witnessing the breath attack. In addition, a new type of breath attack has been added - a lava breath that does heavy fire damage and melts walls instead of bouncing.

Gold dragon scales and scale mail function as an infinite light source, in addition to providing the resistance that gold dragons possess in each individual game. Chromatic dragon scales and scale mail provide all resistances (including reflection) except magic resistance.

The following are the names given to random dragons in Unnethack:

leviathan
tatzelworm
lindworm
guivre
sarkany
amphitere
wyvern
draken
gold dragon

It isn't actually as bad as it sounds, but what I was saying is entirely true. Whether that qualifies as a joke is probably a matter of personal preference.

[Viashino_wizard]

I guess it's further a spoiler that adders do poison damage, of course I suspect the average new player will discover this more quickly then they'll find a ring of resist poison, but nevertheless monster attack flavors are currently 'spoiler' information.

They are indeed, which is why a monster's AF is now listed in xv.

[red_kangaroo]

I can always play a game of Unnethack when I decide I really want to play ID mini-games. That game even has unidentified monsters! Dragons spawn with a random description, each of which has a breath weapon of a different element. One of them is disintegrate, which is instant death if it hits you. Have fun figuring out which one that is!

Yeah, UnNetHack is awsome. And deadly.

And I'm also sad due to the loss of IDing.

[and into]

Quite apart from the general question of how much IDing is good for Crawl: I was never a big fan of ?identify sometimes giving extra uses, anyway. Always was frustrating when you had exactly one item you needed to ID, so you use a scroll to ID it, but then learn you wasted one or two extra IDs. I mean yeah, I know that in those cases it doesn't really matter, but it still annoyed me to feel like I was pressured into arbitrarily wasting something. Consumables that scale in usefulness from normal to 300% effectiveness is too large a range; it becomes difficult to plan for best usage. So I like this change.