Healing from resting

[acvar]

I also don't think that item destruction is the worst offender to Crawl's interface. In my experience, that's the constant and mindless resting (we're doing it all the time, and while it is generally automated --not automated when poisoned which is really annoying to me

I agree wholehartedly with this sentiment. I would like to make a suggestion that may eventually lead to fixing this. Let me make this clear. What I am proposing is not a final solution. It is also probably not a balanced solution. It is not meant to be either. It is only meant to be a testbed to see if a no-rest/less-rest environment can be accomplished. I think that ultimately a great deal will have to change to get all the way there, but you have to start someplace.

Add a function similar to the following:

foo ()
counter = counter +1
If (threat in line of sight) then counter = 0 endif
if counter > constant then
set health to full
set mana to full
remove most status effects like slow, confusion, etc.
endif
endfoo

No really new code is neccessary since there are already parts of the code that do everything being done here. The function would be called every tick of the clock. Not sure what value to use for constant, but again this is not about balance, just about testing to see if such a mechanic would fix the problem.

The basic idea is that you really should only worry about time while in an encounter. The time between encounters should not be relevent. This function basically starts an encounter whenever a threat is in line of sight, and ends it if no threat is around for a constant time period. Once the encounter has ended all the things you would normally hit 5 to heal/get rid of beomce irrelevent.

[BrewFall]

Wouldn't this let you pop around a corner any full heal in one turn?

IMO resting is annoying because it is interrupted by filling mp... then getting hungry... then HP is full and you're ready to go. It takes a lot of fives.

[Sandman25]

rest_wait_both = true

makes you rest until both MP and HP are full. If you don't like warning about hunger, you can use

easy_eat_chunks = true
easy_eat_gourmand = true
easy_eat_contaminated = true
auto_eat_chunks = true
message_colour ^= mute:You feel hungry

[BrewFall]

I'll have to try these. They seem quite helpful!

[reaver]

You can do this with some fancy lua magic in your rc file, as discussed here.

The problem is that rc functions by default access information from the turn they were called. i.e, if you try to make a function that waits until you're healed even if you have to hit "5" multiple times, a naive implementation where you check if your hp's full won't work. Some people like elliptic know how to get around this but I've never discovered how or received a straight answer when I've asked.

[duvessa]

The problem is that rc functions by default access information from the turn they were called.

...As opposed to accessing information from turns in the future? Just call the function each turn.

Anyway I'm pretty sure neither of those are what acvar was trying for:

The time between encounters should not be relevent.

Presumably this means that you should not have to rest for a whole bunch of turns in the first place. That's a major reason you always run back to explored territory to rest, and early in the game, some characters even want to carefully pick the level they rest on to avoid tripping the OOD timer. More importantly, all game it causes piety decay, which leads to things like stopping resting shortly before completely regenerating.

[XuaXua]

rest_wait_both = true

makes you rest until both MP and HP are full. If you don't like warning about hunger, you can use

easy_eat_chunks = true
easy_eat_gourmand = true
easy_eat_contaminated = true
auto_eat_chunks = true
message_colour ^= mute:You feel hungry

These settings suck when you are running from something and you are hungry and have chunks on you. You will turn the corner, out of view, and suddenly chow down.

[Grujah]

auto_eat_chunks only works with autoexplore, it won't chow down food if you move manually.

[galehar]

Instead of adding some weird hack which encourage manipulating LOS for fast healing, let's just improve how 5 works. The whole point of the feature is that you press the key only once and you're rested. It doesn't work very well with default options, so let's fix that instead.

rest_wait_both = true

Let's make that default. I don't see any downside.

easy_eat_chunks = true
easy_eat_gourmand = true
easy_eat_contaminated = true
auto_eat_chunks = true
message_colour ^= mute:You feel hungry

Those are probably be left off by default. Note that easy_eat_gourmand and easy_eat_contaminated are obsolete. The last one isn't needed.

Regarding poison, I made a proposal which would might improve resting it off quite a bit. I got almost no feedback on it though.

auto_eat_chunks only works with autoexplore, it won't chow down food if you move manually.

Yes. It used to trigger also on "running", which is what xuaxua was complaining about I think, but it has been fixed. auto_eat only triggers on resting and autoexplore. Maybe also travelling not sure about this one.

[sanka]

The really relevant proposal for poison regarding 5 smashing was to make poison damage deterministic, and calculate maximum damage (with regeneration) in advance, so the game can display final health after resting, and a single press of 5 can wait for the poison to disappear instead of having to re-press after every bit of damage.

Changing the formula alone won't help with this. Except if you change the damage (including regeneration) to so high that you can (almost) never wait out poison, but it would be a very big balance change, not just for formicids.

[acvar]

Non of the solutions are truely fixing the problem. They are just putting a rather ineffective band aid on a gaping wound. The problem is not that there are things that make resting inconvienent. The problem is that you need to rest in the first place. Taking a nap in the middle of an adventure after every incounter is the problem. Making it more convienent to take that nap is not the solution. Currently it takes multiple hundreds of turns to heal up at times. I am proposing a system where that is cut to just a fraction of that time. A system where it is reasonable to just hit "o" and go on you way knowing that in most cirumstances you wil be ready for battle before you see another threat. I am putting forth a system where there is the "encounter" where resources like hp and mp are relevent and must be managed, and outside the encounter those things become irrelevent. Hp and mp should not matter when exploring only when in the middle of an encounter.

[jejorda2]

What if you only heal on turns when you attack, are attacked, or when an unexplored square comes into view? Then resting wouldn't work and we wouldn't do it. It would become optimal to keep a pet rat around, so there would have to be some limit on what can heal you or how many hp you can get from the same enemy. Base regen rates might need to be increased.

[TeshiAlair]

How about healing rate increases exponentially when not next to a monster and standing still, starting at less than normal, and going up from there. This way, after only like 5 turns, you'll be fully healed, but kiting won't be effective unless you get quite far away, at which case you can probably 5 anyway. Additionally, it makes "catching your breath" viable- hiding behind a conjure flame to heal up a bit, at the cost of MP.

[galehar]

The really relevant proposal for poison regarding 5 smashing was to make poison damage deterministic, and calculate maximum damage (with regeneration) in advance, so the game can display final health after resting, and a single press of 5 can wait for the poison to disappear instead of having to re-press after every bit of damage.

That doesn't sound very realistic though (to implement, not "game realism". Also, resting being interrupted by poison damage is configurable, so this can already be worked around anyway. My proposal is much more about making poison tactically relevant, but the (drastically) reduced duration could also help alleviate the resting issue. Maybe it's a bit off-topic after all.

The problem is that you need to rest in the first place.

Why is it a problem? crawl isn't an old-school RPG where encounters and exploration are totally separated. The fact that monsters wander in while you're resting or looting the corpses or sacrificing them or butchering them or picking up your ammo is relevant. Your proposal is going to create weird tactics of go hide in a corner for a couple of turns and get instantly regenerated, then go back do all the above safely.

Currently it takes multiple hundreds of turns to heal up at times.

It's also a single keypress (assuming good options and cleared area).

I am proposing a system where that is cut to just a fraction of that time.

Real time or game time? Cutting down the real time is mostly a matter of better options and interface. Cutting down game time is... What's the point of reducing game time resting? It does have the side effect of reducing real time resting, but I think it's better to address directly the latter.

[XuaXua]

auto_eat_chunks only works with autoexplore, it won't chow down food if you move manually.

Yes. It used to trigger also on "running", which is what xuaxua was complaining about I think, but it has been fixed. auto_eat only triggers on resting and autoexplore. Maybe also travelling not sure about this one.

Thanks; I will be re-instantiating the settings because manually eating chunks sucks.

[Sprucery]

FWIW, I totally agree with galehar.

[Sandman25]

Right, game time should not be 0 for HP regeneration. Even games without food/MP (ToME4) don't heal you instantly because part of the tactics is to avoid being at low HP even if there are no monsters around since there can be more monsters around next corner.

[BrewFall]

A more radical idea would be giving the player a full heal and MP after resting 20 turns or so, but no regeneration otherwise. However, this would break a lot of things so consider it only as food for thought.

[acvar]

Why is it a problem? crawl isn't an old-school RPG where encounters and exploration are totally separated. The fact that monsters wander in while you're resting or looting the corpses or sacrificing them or butchering them or picking up your ammo is relevant. Your proposal is going to create weird tactics of go hide in a corner for a couple of turns and get instantly regenerated, then go back do all the above safely.

I am sorry galehar, but I don't believe for a second that you are actually this stupid. I don't believe that you are unaware that the current practice is to run around a corner and hit 5 some number of times to heal now. My proposal would not increase this behavior and you know it. In fact my proposal would decrease this behavior since it would drastically reduce the number of turns you need to stay out of site of any monsters. If you are actually this stupid then I appologize for accusing you of being intelectually dishonest.

Yes it is true that there will be fare fewer instances of monsters wandering in while you are waiting to heal, but I am willing to bet that this loss is far less then the gain of smoother overall gameplay. Just like changing how skills were assigned experience diminished the game in some aspects it was overall a HUGE imporvement to gameplay as it removed one of the most tedious parts of crawl.

[Sandman25]

Why is it a problem? crawl isn't an old-school RPG where encounters and exploration are totally separated. The fact that monsters wander in while you're resting or looting the corpses or sacrificing them or butchering them or picking up your ammo is relevant. Your proposal is going to create weird tactics of go hide in a corner for a couple of turns and get instantly regenerated, then go back do all the above safely.

I am sorry galehar, but I don't believe for a second that you are actually this stupid. I don't believe that you are unaware that the current practice is to run around a corner and hit 5 some number of times to heal now. My proposal would not increase this behavior and you know it. In fact my proposal would decrease this behavior since it would drastically reduce the number of turns you need to stay out of site of any monsters. If you are actually this stupid then I appologize for accusing you of being intelectually dishonest.

Yes it is true that there will be fare fewer instances of monsters wandering in while you are waiting to heal, but I am willing to bet that this loss is far less then the gain of smoother overall gameplay. Just like changing how skills were assigned experience diminished the game in some aspects it was overall a HUGE imporvement to gameplay as it removed one of the most tedious parts of crawl.

I am not sure everyone is on the same page here. Currently it takes 100+ turns to heal so retreating behind a corner from any speed monsters does not help much. With your proposal ("drastically reduce the number of turns you need to stay out of site of any monsters") it will be optimal to retreat behind a corner and spend a couple of turns to heal 50+ HP while waiting for monster to come into LoS.

[njvack]

Something I've been wondering about for a while. Let's say:

* Characters do not heal by resting.
* All characters except DD get Makhleb-style heal-on-kill, scaling with MaxHP. +Regen increases this amount.
* Divine sources of healing work as they do now, as do potions and wands.
* Dj can do whatever.

My sense is that this is too simple to work, but would smarter people tear it up for me?

[damiac]

Sure thing.

What happens when a fight starts going bad, and I just barely escape with my life. Now, I can't just heal up, I have to use limited consumables? Or go and scum around until I find some rats to kill?

That would make the game insanely harder, and a lot less fun on top of it.

[Siegurt]

Perhaps also "Healed by exploration" ?

[njvack]

I think Crawl might have too much real estate for heal by explore to work well; "run back three levels to heal" would suuuuuck. Though it does create an interesting tension between exploring (which yields monsters that turn into experience) and leaving space unexplored as a hedge for later healing.

A tweak to the idea would have some limited amount (say, up to MaxHP's worth) of "buffer" -- healing that would overfill your HP fills that buffer, and as you rest, your buffer would transfer to your HP (just like rest-to-heal does now).

There'd be a lot *less* resting to heal, but more than none. But: I don't think a technique like this to recover MP would work nearly as well; MP is spent in a very different way than HP, so there's still be rest-for-MP...

[Sandman25]

The best thing in crawl is autoexplore, that heal-on-explore feature would remove it basically.

[pubby]

rest_wait_both = true

makes you rest until both MP and HP are full. If you don't like warning about hunger, you can use

easy_eat_chunks = true
easy_eat_gourmand = true
easy_eat_contaminated = true
auto_eat_chunks = true
message_colour ^= mute:You feel hungry

This too:

  Code:

rest_delay = -1

All characters except DD get Makhleb-style heal-on-kill

Before any tough fight you should go find some popcorn enemies and kill them to regain HP. It's both scummy and tedious.

[acvar]

And there is also no reason to do it. If you want to remove healing by resting all together all you have to do is up the count on consumables that restore health/mana. Personally I find the constant spamming of 5 to regenerate mana far more annoying the healing hps.

I am not sure everyone is on the same page here. Currently it takes 100+ turns to heal so retreating behind a corner from any speed monsters does not help much. With your proposal ("drastically reduce the number of turns you need to stay out of site of any monsters") it will be optimal to retreat behind a corner and spend a couple of turns to heal 50+ HP while waiting for monster to come into LoS.

You do realize that there is a huge difference between a "couple" of turns, 10 turns, and a couple of hundred turns right. Being out of sight for 2 turns would cause some stupid tactics to become viable. Being out of sight for 10 turns would not allow you to just pop behind a corner mid combat, but would still drastically reduce then need for the 5 key.

[Sandman25]

Being out of sight for 10 turns would not allow you to just pop behind a corner mid combat, but would still drastically reduce then need for the 5 key.

You have just created a new kind of kiting - fight a normal speed monster until wounded, then cast new Swiftness and stay out of sight during 10 turns to restore HP.

[acvar]

You have just created a new kind of kiting - fight a normal speed monster until wounded, then cast new Swiftness and stay out of sight during 10 turns to restore HP.

And how exactly is that any different then casting swiftness and running to the nearest stairs to restore you HP? Swiftness lets you end encounters and heal up end of story. Can we have a few more examples of how things will change while really staying the same?

[njvack]

If you want to remove healing by resting all together all you have to do is up the count on consumables that restore health/mana.

Getting a hundred !Curing / !HW / !Magic you can use whenever you want would be a gigantic balance change, I think.

I would honestly be shocked if getting rid of rest-to-regen in Crawl is practical.

[njvack]

The best thing in crawl is autoexplore

Hm... there's a part of me that agrees, and a part of me that thinks that if exploring is so boring that people want to automate it, that's kind of its own problem.

All the auto* things (including '5', actually) are excellent at what they do, but they feel a little like band-aids on larger design challenges. They may be the best solutions to those challenges in a roguelike the size and age of Crawl, but they feel band-aid-ish to me.

[dpeg]

acvar: A system like this would work in principle -- but only with "honest" players. As soon as players take it account, it'll lead to problems (which have been mentioned already).
[Off-topic: Also, I only replied to you because the original thread title included my name. Your mode of communication (including "Do the devs actually play this game?" from another thread, or your reply to galehar here) does not make it easy to take you serious. I think you care about the game, and that you do have something on-topic to say. If you can get your points across without personal attacks, you'll get more and better replies, in case you care about that.]

jejorda2: Your idea is a start but the proposal would lead to "monster parking" (leave easy monsters alive, to be able to regenerate in a pinch). This could also be addressed but indicates that it's not so easy to find a really good solution. (There are games that do it, but I find it hard to slap it onto an existing, big game like Crawl. That's why the only thing I came up with in this direction are Vampires and Deep Dwarves -- easier to invent special rules via species/god rather than changing basic mechanics.)

TeshiAlair: This solves pillar dancing nicely but does have its own quirks. However, I think this could work in a game (again, not sure I'd slap this onto Crawl).

galehar: Yes, a good interface can address this, but I believe that wait-for-heal is clumsy design. It's certainly not the worst mechanic, as many games show. Here are the problems that I have with this:

• A single turn (or action, or aut) is a tactical unit. Resting up not so much. It speaks for the current mechanic that in-battle healing is a thing -- Troll (leather) regeneration, ring and spell do matter. You can see the disparity between the two modes by advice like duvessa's to go into explored territory to heal up (or maybe even a level up).
• As I see it, Crawl consists of fights (where each space and each turn matter) and in between, you rest/travel/explore. For the latter, individual squares (tiles) don't matter much, hence auto-travel and auto-explore. And neither do turns, hence the resting command.
• The worst combination is when resting is not possible -- e.g. when you're poisoned or resting is interrupted for other, non-urgent reasons. This is really aggravating to me. Regarding your poison proposal: as I said, go for it! It will improve status quo immediately. (I just still think that the "poison slows movement" idea proposed here is an even better solution, but that's off-topic and shouldn't discussed here.)

Brewfall: What I think would be a quite foolproof attempt is to rest (full or only partial, like maxhp/2) whenever entering a new level.
The other good approach (but again, easier to use in a game you start developing from scratch) is to only use consumables for healing -- this is essentially like healing for exploration, but in discrete chunks instead of continuously, and without the drawbacks, as far as I can see.

njvack: Healing (only) for kills is not good for reasons already mentioned; Vampires and Deep Dwarves sometimes get into that. Players would be encouraged to park easy monsters somewhere (e.g. sheep or yaks in Lair), in order to be able to retreat and heal up in a pinch. (Again, this can be solved in a manner that I fancy anyhow: monsters disappear when the game thinks they're not relevant anymore, exempting uniques.)
I said something about the band-aid thing above. (Roughly, I agree.)

[acvar]

dpeg: No I am not concerned with what others think of me, and if I need to "felate" others to get things done then I am just not interested. If somebody can't handle the truth then they just need to avoid me.

Your mode of communication (including "Do the devs actually play this game?" from another thread, or your reply to galehar here) does not make it easy to take you serious.

Well tell me how people who have actually played the game could have ever thought that a spell that doubled your actions was balanced at any level little lone at 6th level. Please tell me how anobody that ever played the game could think that nasea was a good idea. Yes they removed it, but how did it ever get in the game in the first place. And then there is sickness. Do you think sickness is a good mechanic? Does anybody who has played the game think that a mechanic that encourages you to mash 5 a half a dozen times is really a good mechanic?

A system like this would work in principle -- but only with "honest" players. As soon as players take it account, it'll lead to problems (which have been mentioned already).

I saw a couple of supposed problems that either were not possible, or already occured in the current game. Can you give a legitimat concern because I have not seen one yet. I am sure there are some, but I already stated that this was not meant to be a final or balanced solution, just something to test to see how it ACTUALLY effects game play.

The worst combination is when resting is not possible -- e.g. when you're poisoned or resting is interrupted for other, non-urgent reasons.

This reminds me of something that recently occured when I was playing. I had just got done with a big battle and was below 50% of my hp so I hit 5 to heal up. A few hp latter an orc wandered around the courner so I killed it and hit 5 again. A few more hp later another orc came into view and I charged and killed it and again hit 5. About a dozen hp late another orc appeard on the scene and once again I killed it and hit 5. With about a 4th of my hp still to go yet another orc showed up. By this time I was so annoyed that I just held down the fucking 5 key with the orc whailing on me the whole time until I was up to full health and then killed the damn orc. Anobody that does not see this situation as bad design (on numerous levels at that) is not very good at design.

Now allow me to put a fine point on things. Devs prepared to be insulted.
You just killed an ogre and are below 50% hp, what do you do? You hit 5. (heal hp)
Your a starting spellcaster and you just killed a kobold without it ever getting near you, what do you do? You hit 5. (regain mana)
You just killed an asp that poisoned you, what do you do? You hit 5. (cure poison)
You just walked over a blade trap with no monster to be seen, what do you do? you hit 5. (disarm traps)
You are sick because of a komodo dragon, what do you do? You hit 5, you hit 5, you hit 5, etc, etc..... (cure sicness)
You just killed a hord of baddies with beserk, what do you do? You hit 5. (cure slow and aux)
You just slaughtered a whole room full of monsters by stabbing them to death while invisible, what do you do? You hit 5. (cure contamination)
You just used haste to run up the stairs and escape an unfavorable encounter, what do you do? You hit 5. (contamination)
This list is already far to long and I have not even begun to scracth the surface of when it is optimal to hit the 5 key. Taking a fucking nap should not be a fix all solution. Anybody that thinks this situation is good game design is a fucking moron. There is no polite way to say it that actually gets the point across.

[roctavian]

You're being needlessly histrionic, and your solution to the perceived problem creates further problems.

[MDvedh]

This list is already far to long and I have not even begun to scracth the surface of when it is optimal to hit the 5 key.
[...]
Anybody that thinks this situation is good game design is a fucking moron.

Actually, I think that's OK game design and I do not think I'm a fucking moron.
Reasoning: I believe the only good way to regenerate health is actually regeneration of health or using divine/quaffed/evoked healing. All other ways are leading to strange, counter-intuitive and overcomplicated mechanics like the one proposed.
Your health should not become full just because nobody is looking at you for a couple of seconds. Because it makes no sense. Because that's not how things work.

The only thing that may (but not has) to be changed is how 5 works with poison.

[galehar]

Insults, profanity and personal attacks. Nice thread suicidal acvar. Locked.