Fix Deep Dwarves


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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 20:17

Fix Deep Dwarves

Give them Slow Regen 2, not 3. This means "no regen when monsters in sight, normal regen when no monsters in sight".
Take away their /oH at start.

Done.

Why? Because right now, DD are tedious. You can heal, but tediously. And you have a very limited selection of gods if you don't want to eat up your maxMP like mad.

This way, during a battle, they have their same disadvantage, which can be offset by potions, wands, god abilities, whatever, but not regeneration. Just like now.
But outside of battle, they regen like normal. Which means that any god works for DD! (Except Beogh, but he sucks anyway. :P)
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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 20:24

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Well... they would be absurdly good if they could rest to heal but kept their damage shaving. Just no regen in combat isn't much to base a race around.

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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 20:25

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Yeah, I think they're fine the way they are. But I've never played one; I just like the concept~
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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 20:29

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

dowan wrote:Well... they would be absurdly good if they could rest to heal but kept their damage shaving.


They're already absurdly good, if they could regenerate health they would be straight up broken.

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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 21:28

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Then nerf them! They're really, really tedious and really, really broken.

Or if you just being MD back, I don't care about your weird experimental crystal-dwarf-thing. (I mean, mummies and gargoyles can regenerate, why not DD?)

People play dwarves because they are dwarves!

========

On the topic of MD: I really think they shouldn't have been removed. These deep dwarves are a challenge class: for your sanity! If it's a showdown between HO, MD, and Mi, well, the devs would never mess with their beloved Beogh, so removing HO is out of the question. Mi overlap strongly with both MD and Og in that they are "strong melee," but MD were removed.

And why would you even argue that MD are "not as flavourful or interesting" as Mi? The hell? Flavour's never mattered at all before in dev decisions, why start now? And interesting? INTERESTING? We have a magic glass cannon. It's literally "awesome at everything magic, awful at everything else." A five-year-old could have developed it! Or how about Octopodes? "No armour, constriction, good at Tm and melee and stealth." I can sum Op up in a few words. Or Tr. "Awesome at melee, no body armour, fast regen and metabolism." So what if Mountain Dwarves are "good at melee and defense, bad at magics, good with evo"? That's still more detailed than DE! And don't even get me started on Felids! They're just "no armour, good unarmed and magicks." That's all?! Sure! I'm fine with that! Personally, I don't care. But if you apply the "huh, it's not unique or detailed enough" rule to the other races, you wouldn't have many races at all. And what's wrong with a staple melee guy? Humans have their jack-of-all trades thing, Minotaurs can be removed or merged into Og/Tr, Hill Orcs have their messiah thing, and Dwarves are experts at defense and magical devices, while being pretty good with axes and maces. There. THAT SEEMS GOOD TO ME.
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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 21:41

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

What exactly is tedious about DDs?

( I guess that might be the case if you pick a silly god like Chei or Xom, but that is not normal.)

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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 21:41

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward: You're barking up several wrong trees. Not sure if you just want to rant or are interested in actual answer, but your style of posting doesn't really provoke replies.

Perhaps DD will disappear at some point (slow healing 2 is a really bad idea, by the way), but MD certainly won't come back. All the reasons why that species are cut still apply.

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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 21:58

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Do we have a rant section somewhere? That'd be fun to read.

Anyway, even if some of the races are simple to sum up, most of them have something unique going for them, and DD is one of the better examples; it harshly alters your playstyle.
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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 22:06

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote:People play dwarves because they are dwarves!
Apparently they don't, because those people didn't switch to Deep Dwarf. Clearly, the style of play was more important than the flavor of "dwarf".

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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 22:52

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

DD, for all their faults and brokenness, make health a strategic resource instead of tactical one - that's pretty much the entire basis of the species. Giving them slow healing 2 would completely obliterate that.

You can argue that health is so freely available that the "strategic health" thing doesn't work, but the solution there isn't to remove it. With limited health species, I feel like there is a delicate balance between "health is so abundant it doesn't matter" and "gets in unfun death spirals." DD tilt too far towards the former, but changing the balance is difficult.

One not-very-concrete suggestion for DD: it would be nice if their health recovery wasn't dependent on the same items as everyone else. As they're implemented now, you *can't* change how much healing is available to DD without changing it for everyone else, which obviously isn't going to be done for just one species. One option, which has been suggested before, is to make their health recovery somehow depend on exploration or XP.

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Post Tuesday, 19th July 2016, 23:27

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

1. I will admit I was ranting, and about a topic not quite related to the OP.
2. People like dwarves, but they may not like dwarves quite so much as they hate tedium.
3. I think that it's fine to have an interesting slowregen3 race, but imagine this. You play elves. You like elves. Then one day, HE are removed (controversial removal) and DE are given some weird trait, like being unable to move. They have to move by blinking around, which limits them to starts with either Lugonu or a book of blinking. You can still play them, but it gets tedious to constantly blink and blink and blink. They're also buffed to the point of brokenness, but you can't balance player-tedium with character-strength. So nobody plays much anymore.

That's what it's like for me.

(I will admit that I don't know whether DD originally had SR3. Did they start out with it, or was it a "we need EVERYBODY to be special" change?)
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 01:00

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Moved from GDD, feel free to complain away about Mountain Dwarves here and/or to post a new GDD thread (or to search for the various other recent discussions on the topic) for actual DD design discussion if you like.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 01:18

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Thanks. CYC makes more sense for this now.
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 02:40

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote:dwarfs


When they talk about MD not being interesting they mean "has gameplay that is different from other races in a meaningful and interesting way". Yeah "squishy elf who is good at magic" is not very interesting in a world-building sense, but it still means that playing DE feels different from playing other races.

There's nothing wrong with having a staple melee guy, but Mi and MD were BOTH staple melee guys without a lot to differentiate them other than the name/flavor, and crawl devs have clearly indicated that they aren't going to have both at once.

If you want to argue that dwarfs have better flavor than minotaurs, then argue that. You're much more likely to convince someone to rename "Minotaur" to "Dwarf" (and chop the horns off) than you are to get both in at once.

Personally, I think you're in the minority with "playing dwarfs because they are dwarfs". I choose races more for their gameplay than for their flavor.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 03:49

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Well, I like both gameplay and flavor. Sometimes I like to play a HESk because of the interesting hybridization, and sometimes I want to be an elf. Because elfs are cool.

Thanks for explaining "interestingness". I would say that D/MD are more interesting than Mi, since they tend to be more defensive. Whether Mi are glass cannons or bulwarks, they're stepping on someone's toes. And there are far more dwarven uniques than Mi uniques.

And do you have a good rebuttal of my "blinkelf" comparison? Sometimes you just want a defensive melee guy, not a weird crystaldorf. How many species are similar to dwarves, anyway?
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 04:32

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Also hill orc are like, exactly the same as MD were. And I don't see how MD is more "defensive" than Mi, the only real difference is Mi gets a good innate headbutt... which triggers when you are attacked.
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 05:36

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote:And there are far more dwarven uniques than Mi uniques.

Because Jorgrun is the equal of TEN Asterions!

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 06:23

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Magipi wrote:What exactly is tedious about DDs?

( I guess that might be the case if you pick a silly god like Chei or Xom, but that is not normal.)


You will be surprised to see this: http://crawl.xtahua.com/crawl/morgue/ca ... 015959.txt
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 06:28

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote: And there are far more dwarven uniques than Mi uniques.


1 > 1 ?????
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 06:50

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

MarvinPA wrote:Moved from GDD

Seriously, you should make a GDD subforum called GDDTrash or something, and use that to dump unwanted stuff. CYC is the place of innocent fun, and these topics are just the opposite.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 07:07

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

it's fun anyway and CYC was never innocent
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 08:58

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

I think deep dwarves should be renamed to something not involving dwarves so people will stop coming around talking about playing as dwarves. Fantasy fetishism: not a good look.

e: Realized I outlined a problem without giving a constructive solution. I suggest they be called "Dank Dudes."
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 09:28

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Shard1697 wrote:Also hill orc are like, exactly the same as MD were. And I don't see how MD is more "defensive" than Mi, the only real difference is Mi gets a good innate headbutt... which triggers when you are attacked.
Mi got the headbutt as part of the HO/Mi/MD changes!

There is a question of how different species (or backgrounds, or gods) should be. That's not static, and in fact, these days the threshold is much higher than it used to be (compare HD and MD, or El and GE and HE from the really old versions). So when we decided that there's too much overlap between HO/Mi/MD, then --as has been said correctly-- HO was protected by having a branch and a god, and it was a tossup between MD and Mi. At this point, it's a completely arbitrary decision which name to keep. I lobbied for MD removal, because I like Greek stuff, the labyrinth and the headbutt, and I don't like the canonisation along Tolkien and D&D. This is 100% subjective, but shouldn't matter too much, because the underlying species is a merge of the two ancestors.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 16:04

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

I'm fine with MD being gone now, these arguments are rather good. But DD should definitely be improved. As I said, you can't balance in-game OPness with out-of-game tedium.
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 17:04

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote:I'm fine with MD being gone now, these arguments are rather good. But DD should definitely be improved. As I said, you can't balance in-game OPness with out-of-game tedium.

Next time simply go Makhleb. This whole topic is pointless.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 17:14

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

it's lame to have a species which is not fun unless you use one specific god

and also is just kind of super broken

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 17:24

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Well, it's not just one specific god, there's a few that work. But in general I agree with you that DDs are a square peg jammed into the round hole that is dcss. And having to play even trivial encounters carefully because your health is a strategic resource kind of sucks too.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 18:15

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

THERE SHOULD NOT BE A SPECIES THAT SHOEHORNS YOU INTO PLAYING MAHKLEB
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 18:25

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

You could also play Elyvilon, Trog (trog's hand), or Pakellas.
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 18:31

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote:THERE SHOULD NOT BE A SPECIES THAT SHOEHORNS YOU INTO PLAYING MAHKLEB


Actually, there should,
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 18:35

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Yeah... you don't have to play just mahkleb, I don't even think he's the best option. Maybe the most fun one though.

But honestly, I suspect a well played DD could win without a HP or charge restoring god. Every point of MP is a recharging scroll, and they have good EVO apts. I guess I agree that DD are not in a great state in crawl, but I disagree with your specific mahkleb related complaint.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 20:05

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

jwoodward48ss wrote:And do you have a good rebuttal of my "blinkelf" comparison? Sometimes you just want a defensive melee guy, not a weird crystaldorf. How many species are similar to dwarves, anyway?


Well as I mentioned before, I pick races more for their gameplay effect than their flavor. So if I really liked High Elf gameplay before they were changed to blinkelfs, I would just pick a race that plays similarly rather than a race with "elf" in the name.

Although actually I haven't really played HE and I don't know what their niche is. Good Fighter who's good at charms? I guess if I wanted to do skald stuff I'd switch to Mf/Hu/maybe Ha.

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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 20:14

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

HEs are decent all around characters with great stat growth and low HP.

They are a little bit similar to tengus... not exactly the same, mind you, but pretty similar.
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Post Wednesday, 20th July 2016, 23:22

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

dowan wrote:But honestly, I suspect a well played DD could win without a HP or charge restoring god. Every point of MP is a recharging scroll, and they have good EVO apts. I guess I agree that DD are not in a great state in crawl, but I disagree with your specific mahkleb related complaint.
They absolutely can, but you are still very strongly incentivized to play certain gods over others... Mak in particular because Mak is such a strong god already.
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Post Thursday, 21st July 2016, 00:10

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

arandomperson12 wrote:You could also play Elyvilon, Trog (trog's hand), or Pakellas.


You can also use Ru, or TSO in the post-game.
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Post Thursday, 21st July 2016, 00:11

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

dowan wrote:But honestly, I suspect a well played DD could win without a HP or charge restoring god. Every point of MP is a recharging scroll, and they have good EVO apts. I guess I agree that DD are not in a great state in crawl, but I disagree with your specific mahkleb related complaint.


I know Bloax won DD^Chei that went without renewable healing until he found Leech right at the end.
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Post Thursday, 21st July 2016, 00:16

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

I did a DDHu of Chei once (iirc without vamp, too, but using slings all game).

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Post Thursday, 21st July 2016, 01:16

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

Yeah, I won a DDNe^Nemelex once as well, without vamp. Yes, I had Vampiric draining, which was a bit tedious to use, and Zot was a slog, but other than that it was fine. Mak definitely makes DD less annoying to play, but there's a good selection of gods that are *reasonable* to play, and win, DD.
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Post Thursday, 21st July 2016, 20:12

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

ion_frigate wrote:DD, for all their faults and brokenness, make health a strategic resource instead of tactical one


But that's not true for nearly all DD games, since the player goes with vamp weapon or Mahk or Pakellas or whatever.

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Post Friday, 22nd July 2016, 03:04

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

It's MAHK, not MAK. (Admittedly, the weird H was the only way to get into the "evil gods" meeting. Beogh was let in because he had the h, and he carried a big axe. Y-read-emelenmul and KIQUKQUEADBHDA were obviously in, and Lugonu threatened to throw the rest of them into the abyss. Makleb couldn't use force (what good is GREATER DESTRUCTION against gods?), so he had to add a weird h. It was either that, or ally with Fedhas Madash and become Moklob.
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Post Friday, 22nd July 2016, 04:10

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

it's not mahk or mak

it's makh

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Post Friday, 22nd July 2016, 04:22

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

see?
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Post Friday, 22nd July 2016, 12:47

Re: Fix Deep Dwarves

It's Mark Khleb. He's some guy that got lost in the dungeon, and whoever built his altars only heard his name and spelled it wrong.

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