Translocations Spell: Blink Allies Encircling

[Berder]

Translocations is the school of positioning, and getting the right position for your allies is a major concern for summoners and necromancers (and Beogh/Yred worshipers). It would be nice if tloc had another spell besides recall to help improve ally positioning.

Level 5-7 Translocations spell: blink allies encircling
Blinks each of your allies to the nearest position to the player character that is adjacent to an enemy in LOS, or as close as possible to an enemy if no adjacent positions are available. You remain stationary.

[archaeo]

I'm not sure that this would be a great use of spell levels, Berder; by the time my summoners/necromancers would be learning level 5-7 tloc spells, I'm usually invested enough in my core school that I'd rather be spending my turns creating more dudes. Furthermore, while "getting the right position for your allies" is indeed important, I can't think of many circumstances where I'd spend 5-7 MP to get allies someplace else instead of just walking away from threats while my allies attack.

As for Yred/Beogh, by the time I might pick up a level 5-7 spell, I usually have so many allies that I leave them off-level and recall them all at once if there's a threat.

[mps]

This would be a great use of spell levels. The effect Berder describes would stop some or all monsters from approaching you and keep your summons attacking every turn much more consistently than they do moving on their own. It would achieve the first faster and more effectively than recall in many situations.

The problem is that this would be too strong. It would make damage from summonings much more front-loaded, so that the comparison between summons and conjurations becomes even more laughable. Monsters that are otherwise able to chew through a lot of undead or summons with fireballs/hellfire/whatever would be considerably worse off being instantly surrounded and re-surrounded. This includes a lot of the strongest monsters in the game. Sure, mobbing endgame monsters with summons is already good, but at least monsters have a sporting chance of getting near you sometimes.

[Sprucery]

I also think that it would be very powerful. But balance can be adjusted by the spell level. It wouldn't be the new Singularity anyway...

[archaeo]

maybe I should clarify: I don't think it would be useless, I just think that as a summoner or necromancer, I usually have too many spells I want memorized anyway, whereas worshipping Beogh and Yred means I usually have enough followers that this spell wouldn't be much more helpful than hitting t a after recalling my huge swarm of allies. Personally, by the time I got around to learning a level 5-7 tloc spell, I'd have memorized haunt/dcall as a Su/Ne, or I'd have already won the game with Beogh or Yred.

[Speleothing]

Recall already exists?

[Berder]

Recall already exists?

This spell would place allies adjacent to the enemy rather than yourself.

[mps]

The proposed spell differs very substantially from recall -- it has a much stronger positioning effect. It would be completely broken when used with kiku or yred zombies, for example, an area where recall is already quite strong. I think it'd be pretty broken in combination with elemental force and nemelex summons too. Then there's sack of spiders...

I think if it worked with summonings-school summons only, it might be alright, but it would still be a substantial buff to what is already the strongest spell school.

[Berder]

In my experience, summoning is not particularly strong. Sure it's more MP efficient than conj but the fights last a long time compared to conj, while you get smited, airstriked, pproj'd, flayed, or hit with bolt spells, or fast enemies in open areas can run past the summons. Summoning also makes it difficult to use chokepoints properly because your summons need open space to fight and you must remain in LOS of the enemy. And then there's the 50% XP cost. If I'm a fragile mage, I'd rather blast the enemies with conjurations so the fight is over quickly and predictably. If I'm not a fragile mage I'd rather be casting buffs than summons.

If you look at viewtopic.php?f=5&t=15936 you see that Su ranks medium-low among classes for streaking. (So does Ne, btw)

[Sandman25]

In my experience, summoning is not particularly strong. Sure it's more MP efficient than conj but the fights last a long time compared to conj, while you get smited, airstriked, pproj'd, flayed, or hit with bolt spells, or fast enemies in open areas can run past the summons. Summoning also makes it difficult to use chokepoints properly because your summons need open space to fight and you must remain in LOS of the enemy. And then there's the 50% XP cost. If I'm a fragile mage, I'd rather blast the enemies with conjurations so the fight is over quickly and predictably. If I'm not a fragile mage I'd rather be casting buffs than summons.

If you look at viewtopic.php?f=5&t=15936 you see that Su ranks medium-low among classes for streaking. (So does Ne, btw)

I don't think you should mention airstrike, proj, flay or bolt spells when talking about Su. It's optimal to become a hybrid with most species so by the time you encounter those abilities, you are powerful enough that you are fighting along with your summons.
I rate Su among the best backgrounds (in the same league with IE and Ne), those summons allow to kill even Grinder and Sigmund.
Streak stat is not that relevant IMHO, I believe most players are not patient enough (or value their time more than I do) so they don't play optimally as Su.

[mps]

The streaking data is a product of people's playing preferences, not optimal play. People intensely dislike "optimal" ally play, even though it's good AF. I see the same thing in my own experience with Su's -- I die because of impatience, not because I can't easily wreck everything. But it's an interface thing. In turncount terms, you're still killing things very fast w/ little down time for resting, etc.

In general, my assessment of magic schools centers around how they complement actually good chars (i.e. melee dudes), as opposed to stereotypical mage background builds. Fact: Summonings is good. Even so, straight summons is better than everything else you might be tempted to do with mage background other than w/ necromancers (or going Trog and burning book).

[Berder]

I don't think you should mention airstrike, proj, flay or bolt spells when talking about Su. It's optimal to become a hybrid with most species so by the time you encounter those abilities, you are powerful enough that you are fighting along with your summons.

What does that have to do with anything? If you're fighting alongside your summons, you're still spending time in LOS of everything.

airstrike/smite/pproj/flay/chant word of entropy/chant fire storm/water strike/awaken forest/bolt spells/penetration ammo/fast enemies.

Also observe that Smite and bolt spells are threats from like D:2 onward.

Fighting alongside summons is much different from normal melee use of chokepoints, which would involve simply breaking LOS when such an enemy comes into view.

Streak stat is not that relevant IMHO, I believe most players are not patient enough (or value their time more than I do) so they don't play optimally as Su.

Most players never win a game. Also, nobody plays optimally. Optimal play would mean you virtually always win, so all races and classes are almost equally strong with optimal play, so it's pointless to compare how strong something might be with hypothetical optimal play.

Streak stats just show how often good players win when they're definitely just trying to win and not speedrun.

In turncount terms, you're still killing things very fast w/ little down time for resting, etc.

That's only relevant for speedruns - and after 0.11, summoner is terrible for speedruns.

  Code:

<halberd> !hs * x=cv
<Sequell> 4585027. [cv=0.17-a] Sapher the Executioner (L26 DDWr of Makhleb), escaped with the Orb and 15 runes on 2015-04-14 11:22:20, with 75023051 points after 19063 turns and 12:08:08.
<halberd> !hs * su x=cv
<Sequell> 81864. [cv=0.11-a] elliptic the Demonologist (L23 MuSu of Sif Muna), escaped with the Orb and 15 runes on 2012-09-13 19:39:50, with 52436210 points after 27371 turns and 8:00:10.
<halberd> !hs * su x=cv cv>0.11-a
<Sequell> 47044. [cv=0.17-a] JacquesDerrida the Imperceptible (L27 MfSu of Ashenzari), escaped with the Orb and 15 runes on 2015-03-09 17:03:07, with 30648000 points after 48013 turns and 8:57:38.

[mps]

Well, the problem is only gamma has the grit to do summoner speedruns anymore. Testament to the indomitabilty of the human spirit, rly.

[archaeo]

In my experience, summoning is not particularly strong.

Dude c'mon. The ranged threats you mentioned are threatening for basically all characters, and I don't think playing with allies makes one any more likely to have trouble with them, especially since, with allies, you have a great chance of those ranged attacks heading in another direction. Meanwhile, all the other attacks are all but harmless thanks to the wall of meat you can have surrounding you whenever it's necessary.

FWIW, I think you do you often do your arguments a disservice by frequently referring to the streaking data, if only because the thread inevitably gets muddied by people taking issue with your interpretation of the data. You could be 100% correct about how that data should inform Crawl's design and it would still be counterproductive because of this, as I am demonstrating with this metadisagreement.

after 0.11, summoner is terrible for speedruns.

I think this depends on what you mean by "terrible for speedruns." Are they terrible to play? Yes, a really fast DESu run requires silly amounts of RNG luck. But are they capable of extremely fast times? Yes, a DESu^Sif with excellent RNG could get a top 5 score. Personally, I think the only reason we haven't seen it yet with modern summons is because gamma doesn't grind out runs like PR, Sapher, tabstorm, and keymash did.

n.b. your query also misses gamma's 49k summoning "win" that quit with the orb on D:1.

[Sandman25]

What does that have to do with anything? If you're fighting alongside your summons, you're still spending time in LOS of everything.

Sorry, I missed your reply yesterday. I mean a MfSu will be very similar to MfGl except it will have some Harpies or Naga Sharshooters when fighting monsters with PProj. It will have slightly less HP and maybe slightly less AC/EV also.

[Berder]

In my experience, summoning is not particularly strong.

Dude c'mon. The ranged threats you mentioned are threatening for basically all characters, and I don't think playing with allies makes one any more likely to have trouble with them, especially since, with allies, you have a great chance of those ranged attacks heading in another direction. Meanwhile, all the other attacks are all but harmless thanks to the wall of meat you can have surrounding you whenever it's necessary.

In theory, maybe. Any thoughts on why it doesn't show up in the stats?

Here's my theory: it has to do with the typical plan for a Su vs a primary melee fighter. When a melee fighter spots enemies in the open, his first reaction is to lure them back to some chokepoint where he can handle them 1v1 or 1v2. But fighting in a chokepoint is not that great for Su, because his summons are more effective in the open. So the Su's first reaction is to just immediately summon some stuff and perhaps yell to direct them at the enemy. So now he's yelled in an open area and more things show up - and some of them are fast, and the summons can't prevent them from getting at the Su because it's an open area. And if something shows up that can hit him through his summons, he's in an open area and can't break LOS.

Another theory is that summons deal damage more slowly than a strong melee character or mage, particularly if you have a corridor situation. So that bolt-shooting/smiting/etc enemy has more time to hit you. I lost my last Su (actually a KoEE) to a shock serpent, at xl20, because it simply kept ignoring my summoned greater demons and shooting at me. If I had been using strong melee it would have been dead already.

FWIW, I think you do you often do your arguments a disservice by frequently referring to the streaking data, if only because the thread inevitably gets muddied by people taking issue with your interpretation of the data. You could be 100% correct about how that data should inform Crawl's design and it would still be counterproductive because of this, as I am demonstrating with this metadisagreement.

I'll never apologize for looking at the facts. If others have a problem with the facts, that's their problem. This is a matter of principle.

I think this depends on what you mean by "terrible for speedruns." Are they terrible to play? Yes, a really fast DESu run requires silly amounts of RNG luck. But are they capable of extremely fast times? Yes, a DESu^Sif with excellent RNG could get a top 5 score. Personally, I think the only reason we haven't seen it yet with modern summons is because gamma doesn't grind out runs like PR, Sapher, tabstorm, and keymash did.

That's all speculation. gammafunk has played 1369 summoner games - more games than Sapher has ever played total.

n.b. your query also misses gamma's 49k summoning "win" that quit with the orb on D:1.

jd's 15 rune su beats that with 48k.

[Sandman25]

Optimal play for Su who got several monsters in LoS is to retreat into a corridor and then to an exit from that corridor. Then Su summons several things and now we have 3 allies (one of them can be PC) attacking a monster who is still in corridor. It is very time consuming and everyone is lazy to do it all the time of course.

Yes, luring is too powerful.

[Sandman25]

I'll never apologize for looking at the facts. If others have a problem with the facts, that's their problem. This is a matter of principle.

Streak data are facts (player A ended 5 game streak with character XxYy of G). Statistics from that is not a fact, it is just statistics. Players play in different ways (remember elliptic and Animate Skeleton?), with different goals (I was streaking Mu of Chei ignoring other gods and ignoring optimal backgrounds for streaking), with different patience (how much luring is enough), different mistakes (theoretical example: forgot to equip stasis and got killed by paralysis, background is not important here) and different luck (theoretical example: MiGl got banished by Erolcha from autoexplore, TrHu didn't get banished). So any conclusions drawn from streaks are not facts. I am sure I can create some query which will show some non-sense because those streak stats ignore majority of factors.

[archaeo]

In theory, maybe. Any thoughts on why it doesn't show up in the stats?

Personally, I just think your streak data analysis relies on a relatively small data set that's subject to a lot of noise. I checked the first dozen streak-breaking Su losses, and I saw several games where the player died in ways that would've killed any background, for example. There are so many variables in any given Crawl game that the raw numbers aren't ever good at telling the whole story.

Furthermore, I think ally play generally and summons in particular are unpopular, especially with the tenpercenters and talented streakers you've favored in your sampling. I think this would probably hold true even if you added DK to your streak analysis and did queries on Beogh and Yred.

I'll never apologize for looking at the facts. If others have a problem with the facts, that's their problem. This is a matter of principle.

I mean, do what you want, I'm just saying that I think you invite people to dismiss the entirety of your argument by supporting it with an analysis you already know people disagree with.

I don't need to give an example: you are reading one right now. Nobody's talking about Blink Allies Encircling! Mods should feel free to move this entire debate to a CYC thread, imo, since we've ventured really far off topic.

That's all speculation. gammafunk has played 1369 summoner games - more games than Sapher has ever played total.

Maybe, but from my experience as a spectator, Sapher and PR both would do speedrun attempts for hours every day, and gamma doesn't. The number of attempts is only one factor, and I think gamma would probably end up getting a sub-25k time in short order if he spent 100% of his Crawl-related time on grinding out DESu runs.

Of course, gammafunk seems to legitimately enjoy the journey and not the destination when it comes to speedrunning, which is awesome and fine.

[Berder]

Your arguments against looking at the data are all deeply flawed, but you're right, this is not the place for that discussion.

[archaeo]

In that case, to bring it back to your OP: do you have a case for adding this to the game? Your OP merely says "It would be nice if tloc had another spell besides recall to help improve ally positioning." I say it'd be too weak, mps says it'd be too strong, and that's about as far as we got before getting sidetracked by the idea that summoners need to be buffed.

After thinking more on it, I think the big hurdle is that ally play is supposed to be about non-magical positioning. There's a reason that the only spells that create allies right next to a target are high-level spells like haunt and dcall.