Crypt Cleanser
Posts: 747
Joined: Friday, 6th January 2012, 12:30
Wednesday, 2nd March 2016, 02:37
Luring reform
With all this talk of luring being overpowered in GDD I came up with some tentative ideas to make luring harder to do and hopefully more interesting. I know it's kind of weird but please keep an open mind.
First of all, luring requires a fishing rod. All characters start with a wooden fishing rod in their inventory. There are different types of rods but we'll get to that later.
Naturally, using a fishing rod requires bait, or a lure. The type of bait one would choose depends on the monster type being lured. A gold coin would be very effective for luring orcs, while many animals would chase a meat ration (good way to make food useful btw).
Now that we got a rod and bait, this is how luring works:
Let's say there is an enemy, a kobold, that you would like to lure. You select the best lure you have, for example a branded dagger, hide behind a corner, and cast the rod in the direction of the kobold (casting mechanics explained later). Hiding is important, or else intelligent monsters will not fall for the lure. Then wait (using the . key). The effectiveness of the bait affects how long it takes the enemy to notice the lure. When the bait is picked up, a message will be displayed in the message log about feeling a tug on the fishing line.
You must now use the next turn to reel in the line. Not reeling in right away will give the enemy enough time to detach the item from the line, or eat it if it's food. Reeling in the line moves the lure 1 tile per turn, and as long as it's being reeled in the enemy will follow. If the enemy sees the player and is intelligent, there is a chance that it will stop following.
When the enemy is close, swap to a weapon and go to town.
Controls: wield the rod, quiver the bait (gold coins would have to be moved to inventory). Then evoke the rod to enter casting mode. In casting mode, pressing a direction key will cast the rod in that direction. Evoke again to reel in the line.
A typical key sequence to lure an enemy looks like this with rod in slot d, bait in e and melee weapon in a: wdqevk.....vvvvvvvwa
This is how you hide while luring:
Types of rods: rods can be made from different materials. A starting wooden rod works decently, but it is susceptible to fire attacks, so you have to be careful around fire using enemies. If it gets burned you can't lure until you find another rod. You can find steel rods later in the game that don't get burned.
Rods can have egos that affect casting distance or chance of monster noticing the lure.
Luring skill: I think it would be cool to have a luring skill that affects how far you can cast your lure and other factors. There could be a chance that the fishing line gets tangled at low skill levels.
At this point you're probably sold on the idea but you might be wondering: how does this make luring less overpowered when there's nothing preventing a player from making an enemy chase them normally? The solution to that is to change enemy AI to work like fish. Enemies now run away when the player is in sight, exactly how fleeing worked in earlier versions, except not just at low health. This removes the unbalanced method of luring, and only the more balanced fishing rod luring can be used to lure.
However, we need two small tweaks to prevent fish AI from being stupid and abusable. First, if an enemy is cornered it turns around and fights AND all nearby enemies also become aggressive. Second, enemies who have been lured into melee range do not flee because they want the bait.
Additional thoughts:
- Enemy has chance to grab the item too tightly preventing reel in, stealing item?
- Drop the lure down a staircase and with enough patience lure something back up?
- Remove felids since they can't use rods?
Tell me what you think!
First of all, luring requires a fishing rod. All characters start with a wooden fishing rod in their inventory. There are different types of rods but we'll get to that later.
Naturally, using a fishing rod requires bait, or a lure. The type of bait one would choose depends on the monster type being lured. A gold coin would be very effective for luring orcs, while many animals would chase a meat ration (good way to make food useful btw).
Now that we got a rod and bait, this is how luring works:
Let's say there is an enemy, a kobold, that you would like to lure. You select the best lure you have, for example a branded dagger, hide behind a corner, and cast the rod in the direction of the kobold (casting mechanics explained later). Hiding is important, or else intelligent monsters will not fall for the lure. Then wait (using the . key). The effectiveness of the bait affects how long it takes the enemy to notice the lure. When the bait is picked up, a message will be displayed in the message log about feeling a tug on the fishing line.
You must now use the next turn to reel in the line. Not reeling in right away will give the enemy enough time to detach the item from the line, or eat it if it's food. Reeling in the line moves the lure 1 tile per turn, and as long as it's being reeled in the enemy will follow. If the enemy sees the player and is intelligent, there is a chance that it will stop following.
When the enemy is close, swap to a weapon and go to town.
Controls: wield the rod, quiver the bait (gold coins would have to be moved to inventory). Then evoke the rod to enter casting mode. In casting mode, pressing a direction key will cast the rod in that direction. Evoke again to reel in the line.
A typical key sequence to lure an enemy looks like this with rod in slot d, bait in e and melee weapon in a: wdqevk.....vvvvvvvwa
This is how you hide while luring:
Types of rods: rods can be made from different materials. A starting wooden rod works decently, but it is susceptible to fire attacks, so you have to be careful around fire using enemies. If it gets burned you can't lure until you find another rod. You can find steel rods later in the game that don't get burned.
Rods can have egos that affect casting distance or chance of monster noticing the lure.
Luring skill: I think it would be cool to have a luring skill that affects how far you can cast your lure and other factors. There could be a chance that the fishing line gets tangled at low skill levels.
At this point you're probably sold on the idea but you might be wondering: how does this make luring less overpowered when there's nothing preventing a player from making an enemy chase them normally? The solution to that is to change enemy AI to work like fish. Enemies now run away when the player is in sight, exactly how fleeing worked in earlier versions, except not just at low health. This removes the unbalanced method of luring, and only the more balanced fishing rod luring can be used to lure.
However, we need two small tweaks to prevent fish AI from being stupid and abusable. First, if an enemy is cornered it turns around and fights AND all nearby enemies also become aggressive. Second, enemies who have been lured into melee range do not flee because they want the bait.
Additional thoughts:
- Enemy has chance to grab the item too tightly preventing reel in, stealing item?
- Drop the lure down a staircase and with enough patience lure something back up?
- Remove felids since they can't use rods?
Tell me what you think!
