Monster Hostilities


Questions, Explanations, Howtos

Dungeon Dilettante

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Joined: Tuesday, 28th August 2012, 20:50

Post Tuesday, 18th December 2012, 19:57

Monster Hostilities

How would I go about making it so that, for example, hobgoblins are always hostile to cockroaches and vice versa? I have no experience with any code, Lua or otherwise.

Vestibule Violator

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Post Tuesday, 18th December 2012, 20:24

Re: Monster Hostilities

Probably a wand of enslavement is your best bet, although if you're willing to invest in hexes you can use the spell.

And in case anyone misunderstands me, I know this is the coding forum and not the game advice forum, but his question is like asking "How do I install a new front door? Please be advised that I have no experience with building anything, let alone with hammers, screwdrivers or saws."

Real advice to the OP is get some experience with coding, Lua or otherwise and then look at the source code. If you have issues after that I'm sure people will be happy to help.

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Slime Squisher

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Post Tuesday, 18th December 2012, 20:48

Re: Monster Hostilities

rebthor wrote:Real advice to the OP is get some experience with coding, Lua or otherwise and then look at the source code.


May I suggest that a real piece of advice to the OP should be that monsters attacking each other would pose a nasty balance problem? I'm thinking of orc raiding parties in Elf1 here ;)
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Dungeon Master

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Post Tuesday, 18th December 2012, 22:09

Re: Monster Hostilities

It would be quite difficult. Monsters are either friendly, neutral or hostile. There isn't any simple way to make them hostile both to you and to another monster type. And monster AI isn't the easiest thing to start hacking on, even to an experienced programmer.
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Dungeon Master

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Post Wednesday, 19th December 2012, 11:26

Re: Monster Hostilities

It's also not really a good idea from the point of view of design. Roguelikes are made to be about a superhero against the world. It feels out of place if parts of the opposition fight each other instead of you. (And this is not just theoretical: it's something I learned from Jeff's report on POWDER.)

Imagine that you, a cockroach and the hobgoblin are in a room. Will the hobgoblin attack the cockroach despite your presence? You (as the player) would feel neglected. By the way, it's a feature that'd be cool at most once; after that, players would start looking for exploits. So what if the hobgoblin prefers you over the cockroach? Then the new code is wasted: there is no point in having cockroaches and hobgoblin fight bitter battles off-screen.

If you want to, you could make a vault containing a cockroach and a hobgoblin corpse (or vice versa) and leave it at that.
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Crypt Cleanser

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Post Wednesday, 19th December 2012, 22:14

Re: Monster Hostilities

dpeg wrote:(And this is not just theoretical: it's something I learned from Jeff's report on POWDER.).


It did work (very) well in Siren the wanderer, and more recently in Rogue Survivor. (and if it matters, was the only way to beat some level of DOOM at higher difficulty level)

Although I would agree with the dev team, first start to learn how to code (at least the tools,and the basics of C++), then try some easier hack in the code to familiarize yourself with it.

Also while what you plan is "easy" to hack with the current code, it would add more (maybe a lot) interest points through the map, and greatly increase resource (proc) usage for no visible positive effect on the gameplay.

Dungeon Master

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Post Wednesday, 19th December 2012, 22:21

Re: Monster Hostilities

varsovie: I am certainly not saying it can't be done, but simply adding in-fighting between monster types A and B (here cockroaches and hobgoblins; in Nethack circles, the suggestions of elves and orcs was common) will not do.

Coming up with something interesting in that direction is already hard, but the potential for abuse is not to be neglected either: players have lured silent spectres through the dungeons (from Crypt to Zot, I presume). Given that the early dungeon has highest mortality, I wouldn't be surprised if someone found a practical use for cockroaches-vs-hobgoblin fighting (and "practical" does not mean well designed, or fun to play).

I could see some prospects as soon as there is a consumable thrown into the equation. Brogue has wands of discord and they're very interesting, and fun to play!
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Crypt Cleanser

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Post Thursday, 20th December 2012, 10:18

Re: Monster Hostilities

Crawl has needle of frenzy (I love it) and enslavement spell/wand/god ability control undead and to an extend various summons and every time you confuse something.

My comment was oriented gameplay wise. In Shiren nearly all monsters type have levels (or rank, in Crawl it could be orc --> orc priest ---> orc high priest...), each one WAY more nasty and dangerous than the former. When a monster kill another (more often by "accident") or get possessed by a spectre (fleeing foe with 4 HP), then you know something level up (like slurping noise in Crawl). That makes monster killing each other a bad thing for you.

In rogue survivor you're simply to weak to attack any group, you must wait so that two are clashing to get some lucky shot and some precious XP/loot.

In doom you simply do not have enough ammo to kill everything, so you must trick the AI into killing each other.

I'm not saying it would necessarily be a good idea for crawl, at least not without heavily modifying existing mechanics just look how some are so verbose when they see all their XP killed by trap or when a foo friendly fire with a nasty spell, but it can be done (even in a roguelike) and be good fun wise and gameplay wise.

PS, if I recall in Brogue it was a staff, but it could be a good idea for an Hexe spell, and area of effect on the player that could turn monsters neutral/frenzy.

Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 20th December 2012, 16:13

Re: Monster Hostilities

Idea: a Translocations/Transmutations spell that swaps your place with an enemy and makes all other enemies that can see it hostile to it.
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Crypt Cleanser

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Post Thursday, 20th December 2012, 16:51

Re: Monster Hostilities

Or even without swapping, a spell that makes a foo *look* dangerous, so other monsters may/will attack him. (Just to see D&D fight each other)

Abyss Ambulator

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Post Thursday, 20th December 2012, 17:36

Re: Monster Hostilities

Worship Elyvilon. Pacify half of the monsters in a mob and leave the rest hostile. Then walk away. There'll be an agreeable amount of death left when you come back.
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