Remove oklob vault (img)

[RBrandon]

Why pain


Seriously, though, this vault is a little silly. It violates the "no-brainer" portion of the design philosophy as the best course of action would be to return with a wand of digging or similar to bypass the vault. Either that or it violates the "no-grinding" as I remove all my armour and plink away at the plants with wands and magic missile. Or skip 5/8 of lair and handicap my experience. Just seems like a vault that is best handled by skipping should not be placed in an unskippable area.

IMO the game would be better off without any oklob plants (or maybe with other dangerous plants mixed in) but this vault is a little over the top.

[Hurkyl]

One could argue that the real problem here is with levels that generate all of the stairs next to one another.

[reaver]

This vault, and others like it, provide a variety of chooses you're ignoring:

Do I go down a shaft to avoid the Oklobs?
Do I drink a potion of invisibility?
If I do, do I attack the plants while invisible?
Once I'm downstairs, what happens if I run into a dangerous situation? Do I go back into the Oklob firing line or run into unexplored territory?
Do I use a wand of digging?
Should I try to strip down and cross or would that kill me?
Should I wear some spare armor temporarily?

These questions are very rarely raised by procedural generation, and are fun to solve. I've always found Oklob vaults a highlight of the character I'm playing. Once I solved one with a ring of invisibility, another time with a potion...

Also, you can't grind to kill the Oklobs because they can shoot acid from the edge of the LOS. (Unless you're using cloud spells, but that's a problem with cloud spells).

One could argue that the real problem here is with levels that generate all of the stairs next to one another.

The vault purposely places the stairs together so you have to go through it.

[RBrandon]

Perhaps "no-brainer" wasn't the best choice of words, but even the solutions you gave rely on items that I'm not guaranteed to have. (invisibility evocable, wand or book, digging wand or book) I can agree that this isn't a bad thing in itself, but this early in the game I see it as a problem. Four oklob plants do enough damage to the non acid-resistant to wreck most strategies that don't involve invis.

By grinding I meant spamming spells with them hopefully not shooting and 5ing hp back but with 4 in LOS that would be silly.

Edit: I also agree with the adjacent stairs point in general as I feel such levels tend to restrict choices usually more than giving them. Though I will have to say grouped up stairs are worse than grouped down stairs in that respect.

[Grimm]

I think this is a great challenge vault. Always a tense time when I find it.

[dpeg]

Seriously, though, this vault is a little silly. It violates the "no-brainer" portion of the design philosophy as the best course of action would be to return with a wand of digging or similar to bypass the vault. Either that or it violates the "no-grinding" as I remove all my armour and plink away at the plants with wands and magic missile. Or skip 5/8 of lair and handicap my experience. Just seems like a vault that is best handled by skipping should not be placed in an unskippable area.

I made this vault, and I think it serves its purpose just fine. As you point out, there are a number of ways to go about it, and I don't think it is entirely trivial. In my opinion, the chance for all stairs should be higher, and more vaults should do something like this (thankfully, Lemuel came up with a number of thought-provoking vaults which can cluster stairs).

IMO the game would be better off without any oklob plants (or maybe with other dangerous plants mixed in) but this vault is a little over the top.

Oklobs work quite well in that depth, I'd say: they'll rarely kill you outright (I certainly don't that) but they will make you assess your situation and reconsider.

This is in GDD but should really be moved -- things are working as designed here.

[njvack]

Perhaps "no-brainer" wasn't the best choice of words, but even the solutions you gave rely on items that I'm not guaranteed to have.

Your OP suggests a solution that doesn't involve any funny items: skip the end of Lair. You don't need to go there yet. Hell, you don't need to go there ever, even if there's a rune branch down there; there are 15 runes in the game so you could decide you never wanted to deal with those oklobs and still win. Look on the bright side: Rupert wasn't in there

I'm with dpeg; this vault is doing exactly what it's supposed to.

[Tiber]

I'm amazed that nobody else has pointed out that you can use hatches to avoid the vault entirely, at the cost of not being able to easily retreat back upstairs.

[njvack]

Do I go down a shaft to avoid the Oklobs?

OK reaver said 'shaft' instead of 'hatch' but whatevs

[RBrandon]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

things are working as designed here.

This is in fact why I posted this thread in game design discussion, to get an idea of the design choices behind this vault.

I am glad, however that you mentioned the depth of the vault, as I would contest that this vault is depth appropriate. This is actually the cause for my dislike of oklob plants as a monster: they are a high-damage ranged threat when I usually go to lair to postpone the high-damage ranged threats in deep D. I don't know the exact way acid damage works, but I feel as if it has always done quite a bit to me. In the situation in the OP I suppose this was exacerbated by being a draconian, but regardless I can imagine opening this vault door and being one-shotted by four oklobs coming into LOS simultaneously. While that obviously worst case scenario, the item degradation that acid causes makes it worse yet. I don't expect everyone here to share my oklob hate, of course

I do see there are more strategical and tactical choices that I missed in my evaluation and that the vault's unorthodoxy is a draw for some. Instead of removal then, would a "scrawled warning" door be more appropriate? Another thought would be to have this vault guarding some good loot instead of down stairs.

[dpeg]

It is not fully clear to me from the message list but didn't Schwarznadel enter an exclusion area? If so, dying is harsh but he was warned. If not, the vault has been evil to him.

[Amnesiac]

I actually think that there should be more of this kind of vaults were you can't easily go to the next level without solving some problem. I love this stuff and I think that vaults and portals are the best. I mean, you spend most of the time repeating the same action to kill your enemies, but these places make you think. Isn't that great?

[pratamawirya]

I can imagine opening this vault door and being one-shotted by four oklobs coming into LOS simultaneously.

This actually happens: http://rl.heh.fi/morgue/schwarznadel/mo ... 102406.txt

One way to solve it: give the vault a runed door.

[Siegurt]

From the posted morgue:

  Code:

Really walk into a travel-excluded area?
[Y]es or [N]o only, please.
Really walk into a travel-excluded area?
Marking area around the oklob plant as unsafe for travelling.
2 oklob plants come into view.
The oklob plant spits acid at you.
The splash of acid hits you! The acid burns!
The oklob plant spits acid at you.
The splash of acid hits you! The acid burns!
* * * LOW HITPOINT WARNING * * *
The oklob plant spits acid at you.
The splash of acid hits you! The acid corrodes your +0 shield! The acid burns!
* * * LOW HITPOINT WARNING * * *
The oklob plant spits acid at you.
The splash of acid hits you!
The acid corrodes your +1 pair of gauntlets!
The acid burns!
You die...

You'll note that he didn't "open the door and die" the door was already open, and he had to deliberately walk into the auto-excluded area. That being said, it does kinda suck when you don't have the tools needed to access half the lair with out death and/or lots of corroded equipment. I often don't have spare cloaks, hats, gloves, boots, body armour. by the time I get to the place where this particular vault can occur. If I encounter this I usually just have to say "Well damn, I guess I just miss out on half the lair's worth of exp and loot until I can come back here properly equipped, by which point it won't be relevant"

[Siegurt]

I mean, you spend most of the time repeating the same action to kill your enemies, but these places make you think. Isn't that great?

Actually these kinds of things might make you think the first time you encounter them, particularly if you don't have lots of experience with oklobs, once you do though, there's not really any "thinking" involved.

[TwilightPhoenix]

Well, if you play the exact same kind of character every single time, then yeah, you won't need to think since you'll have the exact same solution available to you every time (or you'll wait until it's available). If you constantly change what character you play, you'll discover that each one has to approach this vault more or less differently and that some will have the tools to clear or bypass it when they encounter it while others will have to wait a bit.

And if DO ALL OF LAIR NAO is such a big deal rather than going over to visit Orc for a bit if your character doesn't have an immediate solution, then you can always switch to Fedhas. Otherwise a visit to Orc or someplace else for a little while will get you the XP or loot you need to deal with this vault. Even if it's just junk armor for absorbing corrosion while you run past or kill them since Orc will give you plenty of junk armor.

[Sandman25]

Well, if you play the exact same kind of character every single time, then yeah, you won't need to think since you'll have the exact same solution available to you every time (or you'll wait until it's available). If you constantly change what character you play, you'll discover that each one has to approach this vault more or less differently and that some will have the tools to clear or bypass it when they encounter it while others will have to wait a bit.

Could you please elaborate on that?
I see only 2 options - invisibility and cloud spells. Maybe Summoning if you feel risky. Getting 70+ damage in a single turn means DE cannot safely use conjurations, Sp cannot safely run away, Tr cannot ignore the damage.

[njvack]

I see only 2 options - invisibility and cloud spells.

Then you didn't actually read TP's post, in which he suggested Fedhas and waiting to do Lair. If you really want to take the vault but absolutely can't find invis (really? no potions?), you can generally dig so as to give you a better vantage and not open yourself to fire from all the oklobs at once. Maybe you can find a spot to bank lightning shots into them without risk. Maybe you can dig so you can take the stairs out of sight of all of them.

You could go Lugonu and corrupt the level.

You could go Jiyva and let neutral jellies take out the oklobs.

You could go Zin and sanctuary your way out of it (I think?)

You can hatch down and either hope for invis sources later in lair, or read ?tele before you take the stairs back up, and maybe quaff !agility so you're unlikely to get blasted by everyone when you come upstairs. Or bring a legion of followers with to take the hits while you wait for your tele to pop.

There are lots and lots of ways to deal with this. Also dpeg is right; this belongs in advice.

[Sandman25]

I see only 2 options - invisibility and cloud spells.

Then you didn't actually read TP's post, in which he suggested Fedhas and waiting to do Lair. If you really want to take the vault but absolutely can't find invis (really? no potions?), you can generally dig so as to give you a better vantage and not open yourself to fire from all the oklobs at once. Maybe you can find a spot to bank lightning shots into them without risk. Maybe you can dig so you can take the stairs out of sight of all of them.

You could go Lugonu and corrupt the level.

You could go Jiyva and let neutral jellies take out the oklobs.

You could go Zin and sanctuary your way out of it (I think?)

You can hatch down and either hope for invis sources later in lair, or read ?tele before you take the stairs back up, and maybe quaff !agility so you're unlikely to get blasted by everyone when you come upstairs. Or bring a legion of followers with to take the hits while you wait for your tele to pop.

There are lots and lots of ways to deal with this. Also dpeg is right; this belongs in advice.

I cannot imagine how my last character (DDBe with EV 6 and no invisibility) would solve the puzzle, that's why I asked. Of course switching gods is not an option here.

[TwilightPhoenix]

Many characters have access to summons. A follower of Trog, Yred, and several other gods can all can produce summons. There's also summoners. And also the Box of Beasts. These can either kill the Oklobs or give you a distraction to run by.

Earth Elementalists can LRD the walls near the Oklobs. If there's a monster near an Oklob, Petrify + LRD works great. They, and also anyone with the wand or found the spell, can either Dig their way to the stairs or create passages that lets them deal with one Oklob at a time.

If there's water nearby, any fire spell, ideally Conjure Flame, can produce steam to mask your passage.

Air Elementalists get Repel Missiles and Swiftness, limiting their exposure. As said, there's also creative use of bouncing electricity.

Characters who are sneaky enough can just waltz by without even using Invis. Of course, Invis works better.

Fire Elementalists can drop Fireballs from out of LOS (and so can anyone with the wand). If they have access to summons who don't mind it, they can also use Inner Flame to create suicide bombers.

Straight Conjurers can just use the prism spell whose name I forgot. Though they can also AoE from out of LOS with IMB, though this is a bit unreliable.

Yellow Dracs resist acid, so they're not as scared of Oklobs.

Followers of Fedhas can, of course, just waltz on by and, in fact, can create their own Oklob vault if they feel like it.

Anyone who's fast or has access to a source of fast (Swiftness spell, Speed potion, boots of running, whatever) can just attempt to run by.

A durable melee character in full armor can just tank the acid and kill them (though should keep an escape plan in mind... though really that applies to every solution). There's plenty of junk armor available in Orc if yours isn't enchanted or randarted enough to shrug off corrosion.

I could probably keep going if I wanted to because there's probably at least another dozen solutions, but I don't feel like it.

Edit: And this topic got moved in mid-post. Woot I guess?

[Siegurt]

Here's a list of some ways I can think of to deal with that vault:
Cloud spells
Invisibility
Fireball (Wand/spell)
LRD
Fulminant Prism
Cblink (Scroll/Spell)
Summons (Including Makleb's demons and BiA)
Dig and the ability to take out one at a time.
rCorr And noncorrodible equipment
rCorr And corrodible equipment you don't care about.
Sufficient HP and noncorrodible equipment
Sufficient HP and corrodible equipment you don't care about.
Use hatches to go up and down to avoid it altogether

That's just off the top of my head.

[Silk]

Also, sticky flame breath may be sufficient provided you find a Wand of Digging. Carve out the lower right corner of the vault, move in, Sticky Flame the plant, move behind the wall for cover. Repeat the last three steps until profit. Repeat the same process for the other plants as well.

[dpeg]

Hey guys, now that you've collectively shown the vault to be trivial, I need to come up with something more ... interesting.

[Amnesiac]

That would be great

[Siegurt]

Hey guys, now that you've collectively shown the vault to be trivial, I need to come up with something more ... interesting.

Well, it's trivial (Actually ranging from trivial through annoying up to and including very very risky) if you have any appropriate tools that you can or are willing to burn on it, it's near-impossible (Without just gobs and gobs of luck) if you don't. Roughly half the characters I play would have no way at all to pass this vault by the time they get to it the other half do. I'm not sure if it's intended to be a "Stop here and turn back unless you have one of X tools at your disposal" or a "Try to figure out how to get past this interesting yet challenging obstacle, that you should definitely be *able* to pass by this point"

There's nothing wrong with a "You can't go this way unless you have X" particularly if it's something that you can definitely go get. I think ultimately though all "Things you can get by in some fashion once you figure out how" become "Things that you can't pass until you meet X requirement" with enough replay.

[tcjsavannah]

I hated this vault the first few times I saw it, especially if it was guarding the stairs instead of just some middling loot. While I still do not like the idea of clustered stairs (don't get me started on the ambush vaults) I do think that getting past this vault is like the rest of crawl - daunting to the inexperienced, a mild diversion to the experienced.

[Siegurt]

Yes, and i'm not debating that the vault is deadly if you are unprepared and particularly if it's layout is previously unseen. Merely that "opening the door and dying" isn't something that happened in this instance.

[nago]

I've just cleared this vault with my HOEE on Lair:1 and it wasn't particularly difficult (the worst part I hate of acid attack is corrosion, which I find quite stupid too). You guys forgot one great way to deal with Oklob plant: (wand of) polymorph.
Their MR is low and it's quite easy (at least with dig/lrd) to enter in the los of one, try to polymorph and retreat before suffering attacks. Too bad I had enough charge only to polymorph one.

[Lasty]

I just learned that polymorph is a terrible way to deal with oklobs now that treants exist. Good bye MfTm of Chei in Lair:4, who was steamrolling everything until he found this vault and turned two of the oklobs into treants, each one of which alone could kill him easily.

[Hurkyl]

I just ran into this vault in my game.

I came at it from an angle that I couldn't see any Oklobs when I opened the door. Then when I stepped inside, I was immediately in range of four of them.

[Sandman25]

I had Oklob plant near Lair 1 upstairs in my last game (when you enter Lair the Oklob starts shooting at you). Removing CPA when going for lair runes was silly.

[and into]

Low MR, and while Oklobs are immune to confusion (I think) they are definitely susceptible to Enslvavement. I first realized this a while ago in Crawl Sprint, actually, Enchanters can abuse the Oklob in Red Sonja to hilarious results by keeping it enslaved constantly. Wands of Enslavement are very, very common, and usable by anyone. So Polymorph is out but Enslavement works. Alternately if you can enslave a couple of elephants or the like, they might be able to take out two of the Oklobs, making the vault more manageable permanently, rather than just getting by.

Siegurt, I think you've kind of contradicted yourself, in saying that the vault requires "little thought" to experienced players, but then also saying that "not everyone has the tools to get past it," which is something that varies from game to game and thus provides a slightly different challenge (and perhaps at least a little thought) for different characters. And the case of apparent unavoidable insta-death was actually not that at all. Overall I'd say the vault is very well designed—not something that should spawn every game, but good for its frequency and depth, as it stands.

I'd argue that nearly any character will have *some* tools—maybe not best, but something—to get past it without having it mar their entire game (by skipping a large part of Lair for a long time). I mean, I could maybe see an Oklob vault protecting L2 in a game where Lair spawned on D8 being a real roadblock if you had funny luck with RNG (no wands or whatever), but then again D8 lair is already a gift and you can push a bit onward in dungeon and come back stronger and with more options. And anyway, the sooner players learn that the usual branch order is more guide lines than hard-and-fast rules you must follow—the better.

[Siegurt]

Siegurt, I think you've kind of contradicted yourself, in saying that the vault requires "little thought" to experienced players, but then also saying that "not everyone has the tools to get past it," which is something that varies from game to game and thus provides a slightly different challenge (and perhaps at least a little thought) for different characters.

]

Not at all, if you've experienced this vault enough times with enough different types of characters, you know the all different ways you can pass it, it doesn't require any thought or figuring out out *once you've done it enough times*. And that doesn't mean you'll always have one of those ways available to you when you get there. In this context "experienced player" means "has lots of experience with this particular vault" not "has experience with crawl in general" That isn't to say that it requires no thought the first time you encounter it (And of course a player with more general crawl experience will come up with a solution with less effort than someone who is newer)

As far as I know, there's no way to challenge anyone with a set puzzle which will continue indefinitely to provoke people to have to think of new solutions. I don't think that's a bad thing, it's just a "something that is". Nor do I think this particular vault is poorly designed. It's not like it prevents you from playing the game or winning, in some cases it just means you have to go do something else and come back to it.

[BlackSheep]

An experienced player knows all the different ways to "pass" everything, so I'm not sure what makes this vault special other than that it confounds inexperienced players.

Whether experienced or inexperienced, the vault creates choices since many of the ways of dealing with it involve spending consumables, risking permanent equipment damage, or taking a chance on a one-way stair.