The Tavern

If Crawl, for some important reason, had to cut 2 Gods, 2-3 Species, 1-2 Backgrounds, 1-2 Schools of Magic, 5 or more Spells, 5 or more Monsters, what would you vote for?
(Admittedly, there could be some crossover with Backgrounds and Magic Schools).

(copy-paste for easy list-making :mrgreen:

)

Code:: Gods [list=1][*][*][/list] Species [list=1][*][*][*][/list] Backgrounds [list=1][*][*][/list] Schools of Magic [list=1][*][*][/list] Spells [list=1][*][*][*][*][*][/list] Monsters [list=1][*][*][*][*][*][/list]

Gods

Sif Muna
Makhleb

Species

HE
Ha
Mf

Backgrounds

Mo
VM

Magic Schools

Poison
Charms

Spells

Haste
Repel Missiles
Bolt of Foo (except Fire)
Confusing Touch
Phase Shift

Monsters

Slower than Average Monsters (except maybe Torpor Snail, those are cool)
Goblins (or Hobgoblins, one or the other)
Elves or Kenku (Overlap)
Thrashing Horrors (I have never felt remotely threatened by these things)
Mummies

If Crawl, for some important reason, had to cut 2 Gods, 2-3 Species, 1-2 Backgrounds, 1-2 Schools of Magic, 5 or more Spells, 5 or more Monsters

I would quit playing.

Gods

Gozag
Beogh

Species

Deep Dwarf
Felid
Kobold

Backgrounds

Monk
Skald

Magic Schools

Charms
Earth

Spells

Animate Skeleton
Apportation
Beastly Appendage
Infusion
Summon Butterflies
Confusing Touch
Corpse Rot
Cure Poison
Repel Missiles
Searing Ray
Shroud of Golubria
Song of Slaying
Sticks to Snakes
Sure Blade
Throw Frost
Abjuration
Dazzling Spray
Flight
Inner Flame
Portal Projectile
Spectral Weapon
Teleport Other
Alistair's Intoxication
Animate Dead
Condensation Shield
Control Teleport
Force Lance
Passage of Golubria
Petrify
Summon Guardian Golem
Bolt of Magma
Gell's Gravitas
Ignite Poison
Iskenderun's Battlesphere
Silence
Summon Mana Viper
Bolt of Cold
Death Channel
Simulacrum
Spellforged Servitor
Borgnjor's Revivification
Death's Door
Necromutation
Glaciate
Singularity

Monsters

Ignacio
Lorocyproca
Green death
Ice devil
Soul eater
Neqoxec
Orange demon
Rust devil
Red devil
Iron imp
Quasit
Demonspawn other than "demonspawn" (which should not appear or be a valid polymorph target)
Diamond obelisk
Roxanne
Iron golem
Spellforged servitor
Ice statue
Obsidian statue
Orange crystal statue
Statue
Crystal guardian
Toenail golem
Ushabti
Guardian golem
Block of ice
Lightning spire
War gargoyle
Singularity
Lost soul
Battlesphere
Death cob
Sojobo
Tengu warrior
Tengu conjurer
Gastronok
Giant leech
Torpor snail
Swamp worm
Worm
Brian worm
Shadow wraith
Phantasmal warrior
Silent spectre
Hungry ghost
Phantom
Shadow
Drowned soul
Player ghost
Fannar
Deep elf knight
Deep elf fighter
Elemental wellspring
River rat
Porcupine
Rakshasa
Grand avatar
Alligator snapping turtle
Ghost crab
Baby alligator
Iron troll
Ghost moth
Queen bee
Apis
Death yak
Sky beast
The Enchantress
Spriggan defender
Spriggan rider
Spriggan berserker
Spriggan air mage
Spriggan druid
Urug
Orc high priest
Two-headed ogre
Death knight
Glowing shapeshifter
Burning bush
Ballistomycete
Hyperactive ballistomycete
Oklob sapling
Briar patch
Queen ant
Soldier ant
Seraph
Cherub
Emperor scorpion
Orb spider
Trapdoor spider
Tarantella
Redback
Giant mite
Shock serpent
Mana viper
Lava snake
Bone dragon
The Lernaean Hydra
Xtahua
Thorn hunter
Shambling mangrove
Deathcap
Wandering mushroom
Wiglaf
Jorgrun
Gnoll sergeant
Boggart
Gnoll shaman
Robin
Ophan
Great orb of eyes
Shining eye
Eye of draining
Giant eyeball
Golden eye
Hell hog
Holy swine
Raiju
Black bear
Felid
Natasha
Arachne
Asterion
Minotaur
Griffon
Chimera
Dissolution
Jelly
Wind drake
Lindwurm
Big kobold
Unborn
Electric eel
Murray
Curse toe
Curse skull
Octopode crusher
Unseen horror
Kraken
Tentacled monstrosity
Thrashing horror
Satyr
Faun
Polyphemus
Ettin
Cyclops
Spatial maelstrom
Insubstantial wisp
Jory
Jiangshi
Bennu
Raven
Fire bat
Vampire bat
Butterfly
Boulder beetle
Goliath beetle
Boring beetle
Death scarab
Vashnia
Naga warrior
Salamander firebrand
Salamander mystic
Salamander
Naga ritualist
Merfolk avatar
Water nymph
Siren
Mimic, if you can still count those as monsters
Frances
Maud
Donald
Josephine
Joseph
Erica
Maurice
Edmund

You can't actually remove mummy, ghoul, etc. monsters because of player species but I definitely think human, high elf, deep elf, deep dwarf, hill orc, halfling, spriggan, minotaur, tengu, draconian, formicid, vine stalker, demigod, demonspawn, mummy, ghoul, felid, and octopode should not generate or be possible to polymorph to or be placed in vaults, yes.

duvessa wrote:Gods
Gozag
Beogh
Species
Deep Dwarf
Felid
Kobold
Backgrounds
Monk
Skald
Magic Schools
Charms
Earth
Spells
Animate Skeleton
Apportation
Beastly Appendage
Infusion
Summon Butterflies
Confusing Touch
Corpse Rot
Cure Poison
Repel Missiles
Searing Ray
Shroud of Golubria
Song of Slaying
Sticks to Snakes
Sure Blade
Throw Frost
Abjuration
Dazzling Spray
Flight
Inner Flame
Portal Projectile
Spectral Weapon
Teleport Other
Alistair's Intoxication
Animate Dead
Condensation Shield
Control Teleport
Force Lance
Passage of Golubria
Petrify
Summon Guardian Golem
Bolt of Magma
Gell's Gravitas
Ignite Poison
Iskenderun's Battlesphere
Silence
Summon Mana Viper
Bolt of Cold
Death Channel
Simulacrum
Spellforged Servitor
Borgnjor's Revivification
Death's Door
Necromutation
Glaciate
Singularity
Monsters
Ignacio
Lorocyproca
Green death
Ice devil
Soul eater
Neqoxec
Orange demon
Rust devil
Red devil
Iron imp
Quasit
Demonspawn other than "demonspawn" (which should not appear or be a valid polymorph target)
Diamond obelisk
Roxanne
Iron golem
Spellforged servitor
Ice statue
Obsidian statue
Orange crystal statue
Statue
Crystal guardian
Toenail golem
Ushabti
Guardian golem
Block of ice
Lightning spire
War gargoyle
Singularity
Lost soul
Battlesphere
Death cob
Sojobo
Tengu warrior
Tengu conjurer
Gastronok
Giant leech
Torpor snail
Swamp worm
Worm
Brian worm
Shadow wraith
Phantasmal warrior
Silent spectre
Hungry ghost
Phantom
Shadow
Drowned soul
Player ghost
Fannar
Deep elf knight
Deep elf fighter
Elemental wellspring
River rat
Porcupine
Rakshasa
Grand avatar
Alligator snapping turtle
Ghost crab
Baby alligator
Iron troll
Ghost moth
Queen bee
Apis
Death yak
Sky beast
The Enchantress
Spriggan defender
Spriggan rider
Spriggan berserker
Spriggan air mage
Spriggan druid
Urug
Orc high priest
Two-headed ogre
Death knight
Glowing shapeshifter
Burning bush
Ballistomycete
Hyperactive ballistomycete
Oklob sapling
Briar patch
Queen ant
Soldier ant
Seraph
Cherub
Emperor scorpion
Orb spider
Trapdoor spider
Tarantella
Redback
Giant mite
Shock serpent
Mana viper
Lava snake
Bone dragon
The Lernaean Hydra
Xtahua
Thorn hunter
Shambling mangrove
Deathcap
Wandering mushroom
Wiglaf
Jorgrun
Gnoll sergeant
Boggart
Gnoll shaman
Robin
Ophan
Great orb of eyes
Shining eye
Eye of draining
Giant eyeball
Golden eye
Hell hog
Holy swine
Raiju
Black bear
Felid
Natasha
Arachne
Asterion
Minotaur
Griffon
Chimera
Dissolution
Jelly
Wind drake
Lindwurm
Big kobold
Unborn
Electric eel
Murray
Curse toe
Curse skull
Octopode crusher
Unseen horror
Kraken
Tentacled monstrosity
Thrashing horror
Satyr
Faun
Polyphemus
Ettin
Cyclops
Spatial maelstrom
Insubstantial wisp
Jory
Jiangshi
Bennu
Raven
Fire bat
Vampire bat
Butterfly
Boulder beetle
Goliath beetle
Boring beetle
Death scarab
Vashnia
Naga warrior
Salamander firebrand
Salamander mystic
Salamander
Naga ritualist
Merfolk avatar
Water nymph
Siren
Mimic, if you can still count those as monsters
Frances
Maud
Donald
Josephine
Joseph
Erica
Maurice
Edmund

you know you can just delete crawl.exe right

I figured this topic was only created with the hope that I would post in it

also ".exe" lol

Gods

Gozag-I only played one game, but I didn't enjoy it much
Ashenzari-I like it too much for too many characters, and it makes it hard for me to want to get rid of curses

Species

Halfling-Why not minotaur?
Deep Elf-Why not Tengu?
Octopode

Backgrounds

Necromancer-Let Kiku be more valuable.
Fire Elementalist-there are too many elements, and fire/ice is too cliche with too little differentiation. Fire damage in general should go, along with rings.

Schools of Magic

Fire
Conjurations- Earth already gives irresistible damage. Raise the spell level of all multi school conj spells.

Spells

Embrace-by the time there are corpses, you don't need this.
Control Teleport-use consumables or slots.
Throw Frost-too close to icicle.
Summon Butterflies-could be a L6 spell
Animate Skeleton-needs to be used in combat. Maybe like confusing touch or slimify?

Monsters

Fire Giants-Already have frost giants.
Sheep-Yaks and yaktaurs should combust, along with Elephant-replacing Mammoths.
Mummies-just need better curses.
Ironheart Preserver-rarely matters.
Norris-no good reason, just needed to finish the list.

Never mind the crawl binary, he's trying to make crawl fail to compile! He cut lightning spires without removing the spell summon lightning spire!

what the fuck, you actually read all of that?

As a computer programmer gammafunk is probably skilled with the use of the 'grep' command. Very advanced I know.

No, I actually just checked the summons spells specifically because I was curious which he'd like to remove. I suspect he'd like to remove XXX as well, rather than just have it make large abominations (since he removes tmons), but I could be wrong. Leaving in abjuration but not taking out aura of abjuration was a bit of a surprise, not sure if that was an omission.

But to be quite honest, I think duvessa has given us an abridged monster/spell removal list, and I feel a little cheated.

gammafunk wrote:I suspect he'd like to remove XXX as well, rather than just have it make large abominations (since he removes tmons), but I could be wrong.

xxx is as fine as any other summon spell, I just think tmons is a dumb hostile monster

gammafunk wrote:Leaving in abjuration but not taking out aura of abjuration was a bit of a surprise, not sure if that was an omission.

it's the other way around; I honestly think abjuration should be removed and aura of abjuration should not

gammafunk wrote:But to be quite honest, I think duvessa has given us an abridged monster/spell removal list, and I feel a little cheated.

this is true, i didnt even bother to include monster/rod/etc spells

Gods
- Gozag (lame unless mu/sp)
- Beogh (only ho)
Species
- high elf (not really unique)
- ghoul (chunks don't rot anymore, not super interesting. like a troll but not)
- halfling or kobold (they're similar, one can go)
Spells
- conjure ball lightning (excessively loud and dangerous, requires open spaces, rarely worth the risk)
- shroud of golubria (meh, who bothers)
- poisonous cloud (strictly worse than freezing cloud, even found in the same book)
- leda's liquefaction (some find it useful, not me)
- tukima's dance (most useless spell in the game, if you can hex something you can enslave it which is much better)
- death's door (just use borgnjor)
- mass confusion or alistair's intoxication - one should go, they're too similar
Monsters
- keep all the monsters, they add variety
- add new monsters and branches

duvessa wrote:40. Brian worm

Spoiler: show

The culling occurs naturally in crawl, no need to give them any ideas *cough*.

Anyway, here's my take on the matter:

Gods
1.Gozag (♫ Midas is king and he holds me so tight / And turns me to gold in the sunlight ♪
2. Ely (Take the one thing that makes something unique and remove it and this is the result...)

Species
1. Human (I can literally hear the "boos"!)
2. Demigod
3. Halfling

Backgrounds
1. Skald
2. Berserker
3. Abyssal Knight
4. Chaos Knight
5. Warper
6. Arcane Marksman

Schools of Magic
1. Charms
2. Poison

Spells
1. Disjunction
2. Dispersal
3. Gell's Gravitas
4. Teleport Other
5. Tukima's Dance
6. Song of Slaying
7. Dragon Form
8. Alistair's

Monsters
1. Water Nymph (The sexual repression of crawl must be enforced!)
2. Wiglaf (Was left out in a previous calling I dare not mention)

@duvessa: Don't take this the wrong way, but you seem to be dissatisfied with pretty much all aspects of the game in any post I ever read from you, why even bother with crawl anymore? Surely there is a game that better accomodates your needs? Forgive me if I'm wrong.

How is it possible that nobody mentioned formicids? They are bad, nobody likes them, and they have nothing to do with the world of Crawl (There is no formicid monster in the whole game that I know of.)

Also, I would like to create a new category: "Other", and immediately nominate Shadow Traps there.

Maybe I don't have anything in the way of online cred, since I'm usually one of those filthy offline players, but...meh. I'll throw in my 2 cents.

Gods

Gozag ('golden touch' is interesting, but a lack of conduct and most abilities boil down to materials - potion, merchant, duplicate item)
Kiku (Yred fits the 'dark magic/death' angle better, and it's a god based on a single magic school. Maybe merge with Yred?)
Sif Muna (Conduct is so bland that you don't even think about it, amnesia/channeling/books are all available without a god)

Species

HE (nothing really unique enough to make it stand out)
Fe (interesting idea, but seems like troll and octopode cover its unique points better, and they avoid the 'extra lives' bit)
Dg (I gather this isn't a popular opinion, but given that its only noteworthy gimmick - no god - can be done with any species...)

Backgrounds

Gl (seems like it could be merged with Fi without much of a loss)
As (as others have pointed out, could be subsumed into Hu with weapon 'blowgun')

Schools of Magic

Poison Magic (loses relevance after midgame, since demons/mummies resist)
Hexes/Charms (combine the two, as 'Enchantments,' since that covers enchantments on self, gear, and enemies)

Spells

Haste (powerful/uncommon potion becomes spam-in-every-fight spell)
Deflect/Repel Missiles (combine or eliminate one)
Control Teleport (adds little game value, item already provides this)
Throw Flame (just add a space or so of range to Flame Tongue to compensate)
Confusing Touch (those who'd get a real benefit from it have a much stronger incentive to stay out of melee)
Spellforged Servitor (no to 'make copies of me to cast my spells for me')
Bolt of Fire (I know, I know, but just bump Bolt of Magma up a level to compensate, also helps keep Fire/Ice from being perfect mirrors)
Mass Confusion (boost Alistair's, since it's a more interesting area-effect confusion spell)
Summon Lightning Spire (as with players' "let me make traps" ideas, having players make stationary features is...meh)
Dispersal (seems unnecessary with Disjunction around)
Sticks to Snakes (remove, or expand to make it more relevant, and for longer)
Cure Poison (not often used, fits better with god-magic - healing/curing - and duplicated by common potion)

Monsters

Snapping Turtle/Alligator Snapping Turtle (same monster, just different toughness)
Baby Alligator (just a weaker alligator)
Hobgoblin (only real value is monster diversity - means more 'different' enemies on D1)
Big Kobold (same as Hobgoblin)
Deep Elf Conjurer (no shortage of conjuring elves, and it's what the mages do already)
Deep Elf Sorcerer (its functions are served by the DE Demonologist, High Priest, Annihilator)
Fire Bat (just a flavored bat)
Vampire Bat (same)
Komodo Dragon (basically a solo death yak)
Iron Golem (by the time you encounter them, they're popcorn)
Iron Troll (do we need this flavor of troll?)

Aaand that's all that comes to mind at the moment. Sleep-time now.

"Very high stats" is also characteristic of Dg and sure, you can play any species godless, but Dg allows you to play a game where that isn't an idiotic choice if you intend to win.

Gods: Gozag, Ru (I like the concept of first one but the gameplay seems lacking, like the sacrifices of the second one but everything else seems weird).

Species: Ha and maybe HE.

Backgrounds: Zealots except maybe for CK.

Magic: but I like them all... Fire and maybe Conj.

Monsters: some named Ds, elves and Sp. Also swamp worms. Kill swamp worms hard.

Sandman25 wrote:I would quit playing.

I would play the latest uncut version instead.

Sprucery wrote:
Sandman25 wrote:I would quit playing.

I would play the latest uncut version instead.

I wouldn't be able to continue playing game written by devs who went nuts. Also maybe it would help to revert the change.

Magipi wrote:How is it possible that nobody mentioned formicids? They are bad, nobody likes them, and they have nothing to do with the world of Crawl (There is no formicid monster in the whole game that I know of.)

Also, I would like to create a new category: "Other", and immediately nominate Shadow Traps there.

I like formacids, and there was a monster version, but it wasn't interesting enough, so it got clipped.

Gods

Beogh
Yred
Gozag, though I think Gozag's problems are more readily fixable compared to all the issues with perma-allies

Species

Felid
Deep Dwarf
Merge HE/Ko into one thing
High Elf—kind of on fence about that, could stay or go

Backgrounds

Skald
Necromancer (see below)

Schools of Magic

Necromancy; would entail some changes to Kiku. Some Necro spells could be moved to other schools.
Charms

Spells

Charms
Most necromancy spells
Wait, cure poison still a spell?
Ignite poison
Mesmerize/Fear (as enemy spell for the latter)
Cause Fear
There are some others that aren't great but I'm mostly okay with

Monsters

Spriggans
Mummies that don't have jobs as "guardian" "priest" or "greater"; lose death curses
All the demonspawn in Pan
Remove submerge, or else remove all enemies that submerge
Orb spider (probably okay if you remove its wonky AI)
Stationary enemies
Curse Skull
Curse Toe
Worm
Goliath Beetle
EDIT: Red Devils, too, yeah

I had also noticed that duv cut abjuration without cutting aura of abjuration, which I'd be curious to hear more about. Then again, my primary use for abjuration is to allow me to train summoning to 10 so that I can learn aura of abjuration, so I might be inclined to agree with whatever the reason is. My list:

Gods

Nemelex
Gozag

Species

kobold
high elf
vampire

I was surprised how easy it was to pick these three

Backgrounds

assassin
wanderer

This was more tricky, I don't have a problem with any of the backgrounds, and wouldn't care if we had more. They don't feel like they add much "bloat" to me.

Schools of Magic

summoning
poison

This one was again very simple. About the only summoning spell I ever use is aura of abjuration. If removing the school meant monsters didn't summon either, then I wouldn't even need aura of abjuration. Poison is a distant second but I'd still not miss it much. Plus that would make spider form easier to cast as pure transmutations

Spells

corpse rot
death's door
haste
Leda's Liquefaction
Alistair's Intoxication

Monsters

orb spiders
red devils
orb spiders
red devils
red devils

I don't like monsters that I can't hold down tab to make dead. Red devils are much worse than orb spiders, who at least have a cool concept, even if it's annoying and best countered by a +0 blowgun with 0 throwing skill.

There are many monsters who are vulnerable to poison:
http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Category:Po ... nerability

http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Category:Cold_vulnerability

Sar wrote:Ru (I like the concept of first one but the gameplay seems lacking, like the sacrifices of the second one but everything else seems weird).

. . . :'(

At least everyone wants to keep caustic shrikes.

I'm sorry!

I like a lot about the god: permanent sacrifices + no piety decay ever + drain for abilities. You can cut off your arm! This is cool. The abilities though - you get a passive Recite-but-better, you get CBlink-but-better (I won a game with Ru and I didn't even realise you can aim it not on monsters!), you get Slouch-but-better (or Apocalypse-but-better, if you wish). I don't really feel like they have a coherent theme, and the favour feels tackled on at best and questionable at worst. You reveal some Lovcraftian great truth to a pack of bees and an ooze and they all die from the revelation? Seems silly even by Crawl standards. I know criticism is cheap, but I can't offer any solution.

And "Ru" is a silly name.

Yeah I don't feel Ru's abilities really coherent or thematic but they're cool to use so I'm okay with that . And passive effects are so good for me from every point of view

Lasty wrote:
Sar wrote:Ru (I like the concept of first one but the gameplay seems lacking, like the sacrifices of the second one but everything else seems weird).

. . . :'(

At least everyone wants to keep caustic shrikes.

You got to be stronger

It is impossible to satisfy everyone: if you expose yourself and present something to the public (as you did), it's inevitable that some will find it lackluster or even outright horrible. This is why games are not made by concensus! The crucial question is if *you* like playing Ru -- if you do, you can be assured that you are not alone and others like it, too.

Given the nature of this thread, we only hear about shortcomings and not much about good things. Gozag is pretty much my brainchild and nobody seems to like the gold god. However, I really know what I want with the god and while it's not perfect, the deity can get where it should. Two other points of comparison: Fedhas and Ashenzari drew a lot of criticism when they were young, now they seem to be generally accepted. People in this forum love to trash Beogh, but I know for sure that Beogh is a great gateway for bonding players.

We need more content from you, not less! Ru flavour is excellent, and mechanics can be improved with time. Nothing to worry about.

dpeg wrote:Ashenzari ... generally accepted.

duvessa wrote:
dpeg wrote:Ashenzari ... generally accepted.

dpeg wrote:We need more content from you, not less! Ru flavour is excellent, and mechanics can be improved with time. Nothing to worry about.

Agreed on everything before this quote, and the more content part as well. I think it's the other way around with flavor/mechanics, though. Ru's flavor is kind of strange and doesn't really relate to most of the rest of crawl, but the mechanics are awesome and it's one of my favorite gods. I mean, you'll never beat Chei, but Ru's as close as you can get

I voted to cut Gozag, but to be fair, I haven't really invested in actually learning Gozag/getting a win with it yet, so to be fair, it's a fairly uninformed opinion.

Also, Ru has led to several awesome .16 clan names, such as "Ru Mad Bro" and "RU Afraid of the Dark - The Tale of the Hacked-Off Hand". Or take it another way and go with "AWBW - Ru-Tang is for the Children". I'm sure there will be others as more clans sign up, clan names have always been pretty creative in the tournaments I've seen...

Know people are going to laugh at me for this, but...

duvessa's a guy?!?

What?

tasonir wrote:
dpeg wrote:We need more content from you, not less! Ru flavour is excellent, and mechanics can be improved with time. Nothing to worry about.

Agreed on everything before this quote, and the more content part as well. I think it's the other way around with flavor/mechanics, though. Ru's flavor is kind of strange and doesn't really relate to most of the rest of crawl, but the mechanics are awesome and it's one of my favorite gods. I mean, you'll never beat Chei, but Ru's as close as you can get I voted to cut Gozag, but to be fair, I haven't really invested in actually learning Gozag/getting a win with it yet, so to be fair, it's a fairly uninformed opinion.

Also, Ru has led to several awesome .16 clan names, such as "Ru Mad Bro" and "RU Afraid of the Dark - The Tale of the Hacked-Off Hand". Or take it another way and go with "AWBW - Ru-Tang is for the Children". I'm sure there will be others as more clans sign up, clan names have always been pretty creative in the tournaments I've seen...

You would be always right with what you say, and I haven't be as precise as I could: of course, gameplay trumps flavour. Also, flavour is cheap and can be amended to whatever is necessary.

So what I really meant when saying that about Ru (and it's just a statement about Ru) is this: 1. Ru works as a god right now (i.e. the conduct is clear enough, as are the rewards, the god changes what's going on in your game, as a god should, and powers are strong enough to be noticeable). 2. The connection between powers and flavour is perhaps not as strong as possible (I'd think that the powers are more generic than necessary) but my point is that the flavour is so strong that it will allow us to improve that part over time -- for example by modifying powers slightly, or perhaps just some wording.

As an example, I believe that Trog's flavour got stronger by each of the following steps: Might removed (leaving Rage as the only offensive power boost), shifting gifts towards more damage and anti-magic, burning books. Neither of these is crucial for the god (though it's good that Might is no more a god power), but they help with the theme-gameplay interaction. This was a long process, and Ru is very young, a mere god child

Dpeg and Lasty, I wasn't intending this thread to needlessly criticize people's projects. However, I feel that Crawl is like an ever-expanding collage put together by some blessedly creative people. But, as it develops, some features of Crawl fit less well than they did before, and some don't fit well yet, and more importantly, these things take up space that could be used by better fitting features. It seems like most of the more recent content is designed around Not Stepping on Feature X's Toes. For example, I think Ru's sacrifices are fantastic and but the abilities, while powerful and fun in isolation, feel uncoordinated. If Makhleb were cut, that would free up space for Ru, right?

(Also, since Dpeg suggested removing the Haste spell, I've been wondering more and more if Crawl would be better without Charms, at least, as they currently exist.)

treerex5 wrote:Know people are going to laugh at me for this, but...

duvessa's a guy?!?

What?

minmay wrote:When I was like 7 and was first introduced to Sonic the Hedgehog I would constantly fantasize about being Tails in real life, because I thought it would be so cool to be able to fly and fix airplanes and machines and stuff. Plus sometimes foxes would come by my house and I thought they were really cool and always wanted to leave meat out for them and stuff. But I also decided I was too heavy to fly, so instead, whenever my parents weren't in the room I would jump and try to glide like Knuckles, because that would still be pretty cool and I figured Knuckles must be about as heavy as me because he could punch through walls and stuff. But I could never get the hang of it and I was too scared to try jumping down the stairwell to get more air time.

I've never fantasized about being Duvessa though, that would be weird. I originally made this account to post this and made a few more relevant posts when people mentioned Duvessa in certain contexts, then it became my main account when "minmay" was deleted.

dolphin: Oh, I don't mind the thread. It *is* interesting to see what players think on the matter. However, it is important to realise that even if you don't like a feature, it can still be good for something. This is not the dreaded "if you don't like it, then don't do it" argument!

For example, species, backgrounds and god are independent of each other, and while it is bad to increase their numbers, in principle more do no harm. Of course, you have witnessed removals of species and backgrounds, when we thought they weren't sufficiently distinguished (a notion that also changes with time... I believe the metric for species distinction has become coarser over the years). It's true that no god has ever been removed (one god came close), but gods are a bit better protected, since you don't see them when starting a game. So the list of gods can only overwhelm a new player when she is reaching the Temple for the first time, whereas the long lists of species or backgrounds can scare away people before they have started.

This point does not hold for monsters, spells, branches, items -- content that can come up in every game. While it is true that at large more gets added than removed (for reasons I explained elsewhere), things do get cut. PleasingFungus recently pointed out that the net gain in new monsters is much smaller than often bemoaned on these pages. Also, it is one thing to scream "off with their heads" all the time, but something very different to come up with good monster designs. In general, it's hard to say whether a new monster will work or not. So it's great when someone steps up and implements a new idea. Time and testing will tell if it is good enough to keep, or even to spread the gimmick to other monsters, or whether it's better culled.

Can I remove Gozag twice?

Actually I'd probably go for Gozag and Qazlal either way since in addition to personally hating the way Q noise changes the game the clouds in general just promote some bad things (walk around to kill any melee monster for free, how fun) that aren't really fixable without a big rework.

idk about races, definitely dd/fe and I don't actually play anything but humans so idk about any others

monk and warper backgrounds

the way charms are implemented in crawl is generally bad but at least the spells in it make sense, necromancy has a weird mix of random effects for not a lot of reason plus some effects are problematic (permanent allies) so it could use a redoing, though a lot of the non-ally spells are fun

not going to bother answering the rest since like minmay I'd probably have a lot of spells and monsters (probably not as many spells) and I don't want to figure out a list

I'd probably remove fcloud over pcloud because yes they're pretty redundant and while yes fcloud is better I think pcloud has a better spot within poison magic than fcloud does within ice magic (alternatively you could get rid of both since they do cause some problems but there are ways to fix them) and that's the most important consideration to look at when deciding which one to remove

The Tavern

The Culling Question

The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question

Re: The Culling Question