Feedback on Trunk deployment (.11)

[sgrunt]

I just found an Ashenzari altar vault that reveals which Lair branches will show up. "You have a vision of the Shoals and Snake Pit!"

I believe that's one of Grunt's vaults; it was only recently modified to be that explicit (previously it just showed representative critters/terrain, with a vague message about that being elsewhere in the dungeon.)

Correct on all counts. The original vault design didn't show anything specific; it was only relatively recently that I had the idea to have it show Lair branches (which needed some extra Lua functionality I implemented).

I'm just curious. I saw a patch that introduced randart rods a while back on the tracker. Will this ever be actually introduced into the game?

Given the lack of discussion on the issue (https://crawl.develz.org/mantis/view.php?id=5814) I would imagine it won't make it into 0.11. Sgrunt's been a wild man with the code updates, though, so I'm sure if it gets widespread attention and support he can get it added relatively quickly.

What I need right now is feedback on whether the current set of restrictions on those rods is adequate; one way or another, it's not going to turn up in 0.11, but once 0.11 becomes a stable branch and I figure out what more needs to be done in the way of balancing, it will probably land.

[pubby]

What I need right now is feedback on whether the current set of restrictions on those rods is adequate; one way or another, it's not going to turn up in 0.11, but once 0.11 becomes a stable branch and I figure out what more needs to be done in the way of balancing, it will probably land.

Having haste on a rod definitely seems problematic, and form transmutations on a rod don't make sense to me, especially because AFAIK forms don't give the same penalty to evocations as they do to spell casting.

Also, having a maximum spell level of 6 seems like they would generate rods worse than the unrand ones. Spells like OOD, haunt, conjure ball lightning, and malign gateway would work great on artefact rods.

Oh, and the sum of the spell levels should add up to somewhere between 12-16 to be on-par with the current rods. This might be a better restriction than only allowing 3 spells.

[eeviac]

holy cow a rod with malign gateway on it would be freakin' awesome

[XuaXua]

Do Mangrove Trees (or at least those in Swamp) have a greater resistance to flammability than, say regular trees?

I ask because new Swamp is seriously easier than old Swamp for those with lightning or fireball abilities.

[dd]

Is it just me or are hill giants way more common in the early-mid dungeon now? I seem to be running into them constantly...

[jejorda2]

The autopickup menu is a very helpful addition. I find myself adjusting it before I enter portal vaults, because I want to pick up enchant weapon scrolls I find in there so I won't leave them behind, but in the general dungeon I want to leave them on the ground to save for later.

Could there be a three-way toggle where the third option is "pick this up if I'm in a level that will disappear when I leave it?" Use +-* for the indicators like the skill screen does.

[evilmike]

Is it just me or are hill giants way more common in the early-mid dungeon now? I seem to be running into them constantly...

Just you.

[XuaXua]

Is it just me or are hill giants way more common in the early-mid dungeon now? I seem to be running into them constantly...

Just you.

No, not just him.

[galehar]

Could there be a three-way toggle where the third option is "pick this up if I'm in a level that will disappear when I leave it?" Use +-* for the indicators like the skill screen does.

It's already a 3-way toggle (default, forced on, forced off). And there's options. I don't think we should make it more complicated.

[dd]

Had a crash in snake 2 while fighting Aizul.

[sgrunt]

Had a crash in snake 2 while fighting Aizul.

That looks like bug #6001, fixed in newer trunk builds than what you're playing.

[dd]

Ok, thanks.

[XuaXua]

I don't care for the new symbol for chopping in Tiles; it's too small and looks lost on a highlighted (in-use / equipped item) background. Hand Axe of Chopping, eh.


EDIT: Actually a lot of the new symbols don't seem as distinctive as the prior ones. And they feel... smaller?

[ontoclasm]

The new icons I made for everything but weapons and armour are, in fact, larger than many of the old ones, and in some cases 1 pixel smaller. The weapon / armour brand icons are indeed smaller -- as was specifically requested in the implementable. I believe there was a plan to show plusses / inventory letters on the icon or something.

As for how readable or distinctive they are, I can't say anything to that, since they seem fine to me. I wizmoded up a trident of piercing and the vorpal icon is pretty clearly a super-bright blue thing on a dull green background. I would note that the old icons a) had no outlines, and thus vanished into anything of a similar color, b) were a bunch of strange sizes like 13x17 and a hodge-podge mix of styles, and c) were in many cases stick-figures doing unclear things to other stick figures.

Sorry if you don't like them, I suppose. Most of the feedback I've gotten has been positive.

[Deimos]

I think it's more of a case of us not being used to them. I'm not totally sure which icon is which myself, and it has caused a few deaths so far.

[pubby]

I like most of the new graphics - thanks for contributing them.

I don't like a few in particular though:

int/dex/str should only be used for the gain potions, not the boosts like brilliance, etc. This is especially true as they do more than just boost stats. Might should be a flexed bicep, agility should show motion blur similar to the speed icon, and brilliance should be a brain.

The enchant scrolls are very hard to read. Enchant weapon 2 looks too similar to enchant weapon 3 - a darker sword for more contrast would help, and the enchant weapon 3 should use a different yellow color. Or the entire sword could just be a matching color instead of having it be white. The same goes with enchant weapon 1 and vorpalize weapon.

The armour helmet is too hard to read when zoomed out. In my opinion it should be a piece of body armour like it previously was.

The teleport icon confuses me because it resembles the old staff of enchantment too much. Not really a huge issue, but I feel it could resemble the teleport trap more.

The holy weapon needs more contrast as it looks like a big orange blob.

Otherwise they look great!

[XuaXua]

int/dex/str should only be used for the gain potions, not the boosts like brilliance, etc. This is especially true as they do more than just boost stats. Might should be a flexed bicep, agility should show motion blur similar to the speed icon, and brilliance should be a brain.

This is pretty much what I wrote on the bug implementable.

[roctavian]

The teleport icon confuses me because it resembles the old staff of enchantment too much. Not really a huge issue, but I feel it could resemble the teleport trap more.

IMO, the teleport trap should be made to resemble the new teleport icon -- I will probably make one that does. We're moving toward greater graphical consistency, even if the steps along the way may seem jarring.

Teleportation is a really good example. Consider how we had a green swirly as the floor trap, eight rays of purple as the scroll, and two arrows pointing across one another as the ring icon. None of those images relate.

[ontoclasm]

I suppose I agree with you on !brilliance etc - I started with weapons and armour, so I'd already made the "INT" icons and just used them.

As such, I remade them, and ?rech as well:

[dd]

I still think the poison icons should be consistent in colour with the poisoned condition icon.

[ontoclasm]

The color for poison has been inconsistent pretty much forever. Many poison spell icons are magenta, as is the condition icon, but OTR is expressly green, as are all poison projectiles and clouds. I'd rather just change the condition icon to green if we want a consistent poison color.

[dd]

I'd rather just change the condition icon to green if we want a consistent poison color.

That'd be fine.

[XuaXua]

I'd rather just change the condition icon to green if we want a consistent poison color.

That'd be fine.

Unless you're color-blind.

[roctavian]

In that case, it'll only be a problem if the player is color-blind and also illiterate.

[dd]

Plants can be poisoned?

[cerebovssquire]

Plants can be poisoned?

Yes, however, this isn't new to Trunk. Only with Poison Arrow though, they resist normal sources.

[dd]

Plants can be poisoned?

Yes, however, this isn't new to Trunk. Only with Poison Arrow though, they resist normal sources.

Huh, that seems a bit weird to me. Plants don't have a circulatory system or anything, why would they be affected by poison of any kind...

[ludamad]

Plants can be poisoned?

Yes, however, this isn't new to Trunk. Only with Poison Arrow though, they resist normal sources.

Huh, that seems a bit weird to me. Plants don't have a circulatory system or anything, why would they be affected by poison of any kind...

Magic.

[roctavian]

I love player-monster symmetry. "The octopode shouts!" is my new favorite bit of Crawl text.

[pubby]

Plants can be poisoned?

Yes, however, this isn't new to Trunk. Only with Poison Arrow though, they resist normal sources.

Huh, that seems a bit weird to me. Plants don't have a circulatory system or anything, why would they be affected by poison of any kind...

Xylem and phloem.

[palin]

Huh, that seems a bit weird to me. Plants don't have a circulatory system or anything, why would they be affected by poison of any kind...

Pollutants poison plants normally. Simply they're not poisoned by the same poison as animals.

[JeffQyzt]

Agent Orange?

[Jabberwocky]

Agent purple.

[XuaXua]

Love the "post-dual" vault. Found it twice now in two different plays. Never fails to be hilarious.

[dd]

Huh, that seems a bit weird to me. Plants don't have a circulatory system or anything, why would they be affected by poison of any kind...

Pollutants poison plants normally. Simply they're not poisoned by the same poison as animals.

So what you're saying is, poison arrow is basically plant poison mixed with animal poison?

[palin]

So what you're saying is, poison arrow is basically plant poison mixed with animal poison?

I don's see why a poison spell could not generate different kind of poison to be able to affect as many living creatures as possibile. Keep in mind that Poison Arrow is so foul it poisons even poison-resistant monster sometimes.

[galehar]

It's magic poison

[palin]

It's magic poison

It's the conclusion I was trying to drive dd to.

[Denniz]

I like the new symbol on potions and scrolls. I have to admit that some are hard to make out with my poor eyesight. Mostly the ones that are real busy or faint. It sucks getting old...

[XuaXua]

I like the new symbol on potions and scrolls. I have to admit that some are hard to make out with my poor eyesight. Mostly the ones that are real busy or faint. It sucks getting old...

I like the too, but they are harder to make out than the prior ones, especially the curse and remove curse.

[retch]

I just found an Ashenzari altar vault that reveals which Lair branches will show up. "You have a vision of the Shoals and Snake Pit!"

I believe that's one of Grunt's vaults; it was only recently modified to be that explicit (previously it just showed representative critters/terrain, with a vague message about that being elsewhere in the dungeon.)

Correct on all counts. The original vault design didn't show anything specific; it was only relatively recently that I had the idea to have it show Lair branches (which needed some extra Lua functionality I implemented).

I'm just curious. I saw a patch that introduced randart rods a while back on the tracker. Will this ever be actually introduced into the game?

Given the lack of discussion on the issue (https://crawl.develz.org/mantis/view.php?id=5814) I would imagine it won't make it into 0.11. Sgrunt's been a wild man with the code updates, though, so I'm sure if it gets widespread attention and support he can get it added relatively quickly.

What I need right now is feedback on whether the current set of restrictions on those rods is adequate; one way or another, it's not going to turn up in 0.11, but once 0.11 becomes a stable branch and I figure out what more needs to be done in the way of balancing, it will probably land.

it's neat and all, but i got a vision of the spider nest. which included two rock worms. separated from me by transparent rock. on dungeon level 2.

[nicolae]

it's neat and all, but i got a vision of the spider nest. which included two rock worms. separated from me by transparent rock. on dungeon level 2.

I think the rock worms got removed in a recent commit.

[sgrunt]

it's neat and all, but i got a vision of the spider nest. which included two rock worms. separated from me by transparent rock. on dungeon level 2.

I think the rock worms got removed in a recent commit.

Specifically, commit b79baea81ad137340373d8d9813d25dbdd69d384. If you're still seeing them after that, it's a bug.

[blueeyedlion]

I don't like how It automatically asks you if you want to sacrifice things. If I am auto exploring and the message pops up, I want to be able to say "no" and check what the object is, not have it left behind when auto exploring resumes.

[galehar]

I don't like how It automatically asks you if you want to sacrifice things. If I amC auto exploring and the message pops up, I want to be able to say "no" and check what the object is, not have it left behind when auto exploring resumes.

Can't you read the line just above the prompt? I guess you're talking about the case when there's too many items and they are not displayed. Yeah, would be better if the prompt gave the list of sacrificiable items.

[evilmike]

For what it's worth, I don't like the prompt either. Although my reason is just that I don't like being prompted when it's unnecessary.

I'd like to have an easy way to disable it so it always defaults to 'no' (if there isn't one already), if nothing else.

My reason for this opinion is that it's easy to press p and then o if you want to sacrifice something, or just o if you don't want to sacrifice anything (which is easier than the way it is now, where you need two keystrokes).

I'd also sugest making it so pressing 'o' a second time counts as a 'yes' for this prompt. Similar to how when eating stuff, you can press ee.

I think a good option would have three settings: always no, always yes (autosacrifice), and prompt. I think the "always no" option should be default.

At the very least, I hope it doesn't stay the way it is now in 0.11.

[galehar]

I made the prompt quickly, because the previous behaviour was really buggy. I knew it would need some polish and I have never planned to leave it like that for 0.11. A sacrifice_before_explore option with yes/no/prompt values sounds like a great idea. I suppose with no, it should still tells you the list of sacrificiable items, flag them as dropped (so they are not greedy anymore), and not start exploration. Or would you like a 4th behaviour where you're not even told there are sacrificiable items, they are flagged as dropped and exploration starts immediately? I'm not sure why anyone would want that.

[Tiber]

  Code:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
559a7a8 | Steve Melenchuk | 2012-08-11 13:40:26 -0600

Abilities tab for local tiles, using the fancy new abilities tiles.
This works like the spell tab, but with intrinsic/evocable abilities,
invocations, and ZotDef abilities.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
28a9c8c | Steve Melenchuk | 2012-08-11 11:34:04 -0600

Show tiles in Ability menu, using dd's ability tiles (#6054).
This also adds redone backgrounds for equipped (and cursed equipped)
items to match the recently added new item slot background.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I have wanted this for so long. But I can't seem to get this to show up. I've tried messing around with tile_layout_priority, but that just seems to make the minimap disappear and stack the different displays in tabs under the inventory, but still shows no ability tab.

[sgrunt]

But I can't seem to get this to show up. I've tried messing around with tile_layout_priority, but that just seems to make the minimap disappear and stack the different displays in tabs under the inventory, but still shows no ability tab.

Are you running a new enough trunk build? You'd need at least 0.11-a0-3206-g559a7a8 for the tab to be present; it appears directly under the spell memorisation tab if empty, and will float below the minimap if it isn't.

Also, you can thank dd for making this possible with the ability tiles.

[evilmike]

I made the prompt quickly, because the previous behaviour was really buggy. I knew it would need some polish and I have never planned to leave it like that for 0.11. A sacrifice_before_explore option with yes/no/prompt values sounds like a great idea. I suppose with no, it should still tells you the list of sacrificiable items, flag them as dropped (so they are not greedy anymore), and not start exploration. Or would you like a 4th behaviour where you're not even told there are sacrificiable items, they are flagged as dropped and exploration starts immediately? I'm not sure why anyone would want that.

I think the '4th behaviour' you describe would be better. Also, if there's a thing that gives you a list of sacrificable items, it probably should happen when autoexplore _arrives_ at the stack... this way there's no need to interrupt the player when they try to autoexplore away from it. If you press 'o', it should just flag the items as dropped and start autoexplore. If the player already has the information (from when they arrived at the items), then it's their choice to ignore the items.

This would be ideal for nemelex followers, who can safrifice pretty much everything. It's not too unusual for a follower of nemelex to want to ignore certain items, without picking them up or sacrificing them. This can also be accomplished by messing with the options on the '^' screen, but that's a fairly advanced thing which most players don't know about.

Ashenzari is similar (I'm not sure how the current system treats his sacrifices). With him, you generally want to be very selective about sacrificing scrolls.

Ely followers would usually want to sacrifice, but there are some cases where they might want to ignore the item.

For other gods, you'd pretty much always want to sacrifice. But like I said, if the player has the information, it's their choice whether to press 'p' or 'o'. Autosacrifice before explore would be ideal for these gods (that is, the ones that take corpse sacrifices). Pressing 'o' for them would be kind of like a macro that does 'po' (which I've heard some players are using already).