Proposed Unique: Aten

[mellonbread]

One of the ways I think Tomb could be made more interesting is a more varied monster set, and while one unique wouldn't really change all that much, I think it would be a step in the right direction. Plus I really like Crawl's Greco-Roman monsters and uniques, and think it could use more drawn from Egyptian history/mythology.

Drawing from the "weaker than base monster type but shows up earlier" school of unique design (IE Boris, Prince Ribbit), Aten is a unique Orb of Fire. His stats would be the same as an ordinary Orb of Fire except that he would lack malmutate, and would have correspondingly lower HD. His description could be something along the lines of

"An avatar of the Sun Disc whose worship was declared heretical, Aten seeks to restore his rightful place in the pantheon"

followed by a quote from the Great Hymn to Aten,

"He saith: Thy rising [is] beautiful in the horizon of heaven, O Aten, ordainer of life. Thou dost shoot up in the horizon of the East, thou fillest every land with thy beneficence. Thou art beautiful and great and sparkling, and exalted above every land.. Thy arrows envelop everywhere all the lands which thou hast made."

His tile would be fairly simple, Aten is usually depicted as a circle with rays terminating in hands



My main concerns are that the design might be
a: too boring
b: actually much less threatening than a lot of other enemies in Tomb

Both of which could be addressed by giving him some other ability. Perhaps a monster version of firestorm, or immolation that he casts on a pack of weak summons before swarming you with them.

[TheArcanist]

b: actually much less threatening than a lot of other enemies in Tomb

I wouldn't be so sure about that. Even without Malmutate, Orbs of Fire still really, really hurt - even with lots of rF! This is especially true in a place like Tomb, where every other enemy can Torment you into oblivion.

Personally, I like the idea of this unique being an above-land Kraken - using those rays to constrict/surround the player(possibly dealing fire-branded damage in addition to the constriction) while it blasts them with brutal fire conjurations. Which are, of course, very, very loud. In Tomb.

[mellonbread]

Personally, I like the idea of this unique being an above-land Kraken - using those rays to constrict/surround the player(possibly dealing fire-branded damage in addition to the constriction) while it blasts them with brutal fire conjurations. Which are, of course, very, very loud. In Tomb.

I like this a lot, multi-tiled, tentacled monsters are some of my favorites and I think it's a shame they don't really show up outside of the shoals or the abyss.

If Aten gets tentacles and a constriction attack he should probably shouldn't have fireball, since the "get caught by tentacles/get zapped with fire magic while helpless" interaction is less interesting if the attack is going to hit you anyway, regardless of EV.

[Sar]

actually much less threatening than a lot of other enemies in Tomb

When I am doing Tomb, rF is not a priority. Hell, I probably dropped my rF jewellery somewhere in Crypt because I don't want it cursed. So I am killing mummies, all my stuff is cursed, I have no rF, suddenly this speed 15 thing comes into view and starts blasting 100 damage fireballs at me. Oh, and it doesn't have Malmutate, sweet! That means it just moves and shoots, moves and shoots. Hm. That doesn't sound harmless to me.

[DickhardLionheart]

It would be really sweet to have Tomb draw on Egyptian mythology a little more. That's a wonderful idea. Also, a new "boss" unique there would give real variety when fighting a horde of mummies.

However, I don't really agree with the "Aten" design. Basically, first of all, recycling plain monsters, while popular, does not add novelty here - you'll be facing lots of fire in the end game anyway. Orbs of fire will be met soon, too. Furthermore, making Tomb require rF++ would somewhat drastically increase the amount of requirements for Tomb, which are already high, and reduce player options in branch order.

How about an alternate Egyptian god design?

My suggestion would be Horus, probably the most well-known Egyptian god. He would be a swift falcon-man, preferably rendered in two squares in tiles like a pandemonium lord because of his divine status. Speed 15 and somewhat higher HD, otherwise resembling a greater mummy. However, being the sky god, he would have two special mythologically based abilities. First of all, he would be able to control winds like a spriggan air mage, the motivation here being that he can push clouds of fire away from the mummies. Second, he possesses the (mythologically important) Eye of Horus. He can paralyze with it like a giant eyeball.

I imagine him as being guaranteed in Tomb 3. Horus would be interesting because he reduces your ability to use clouds to kill mummies, because he makes the somewhat-useful stasis in Tomb more useful, and he reduces the utility of and opportunities for pre-buffing and stair-dancing, something we're all bored with in Tomb. He instead forces the player to make a meaningful choice between an all-out assault against the mummy horde to eliminate Horus, in order to then fall back on degenerate strategies and clear Tomb easily, or increased Tomb difficulty.

I could formalize these ideas into code if there's interest, but unfortunately I'm bad as a sprite artist.

[Moose]

Thematically, I'm bothered by the idea of a mortal directly fighitng a god, especially one so esteemed as Aten.

But to address the banality of the Tomb, I'd love to see uniques take the form of Pharaohs such as Neheb, Amenhotop, Akhenaten, Tutankhamun, etc ...

We already have 2 in the game (Menkaure, and Khufu), and I'd love to see more themed around the tomb. Perhaps replace all guardian mummies with output from a pharaoh-generator or something.

back to your point, I love the idea of a unique orb of fire, but not big on the tie to a god. Now maybe if you had a unique named Akhenaten (he was the first worshipping pharaoh of Aten), he would have the ability to transmute himself into an orb of the sun, which could conceivably have abilities like an orb of fire.

For an effigy of the sun though, I'd love to see something like Ozcubo's refridgeration that did heat damage instead as well as the orb-of-fire style fireballs. Only problem with that is that in the tomb, such a spell could and would be used to kill mummies. He could be tweaked to only cast that spell when no mummies are in his LOS, or grant immunity to player-hostile mummies (The god aten is protecting his disciples).

I know this game eschews (when it can) ties to outside Lore, but we already have this tomb, and I'd love to expand on its egyptian theme. Scarab Beetles, Asps, jackals, Anubis, named mummies, and more!

[Sar]

How exactly do you use clouds to kill mummies in Tomb?

[DickhardLionheart]

How exactly do you use clouds to kill mummies in Tomb?

Lamp of fire is powerful in Tomb 3. YMMV I suppose, but I've used it, and seen lots of people use it. It would be interesting to have those clouds blown back in your face on the stairs.

I'm definitely not saying it's overpowered or too useful. However variety in tactics in having different elements to consider would be fun. As it is Tomb:3 strategy feels somewhat one-dimensional.

[Sar]

I did forget about lamp of fire, actually! Though I am not sure how much of its damage is impact damage. Big mummies aren't -rF like the basic ones, and they have pretty silly HP.

[mellonbread]

making Tomb require rF++ would somewhat drastically increase the amount of requirements for Tomb, which are already high, and reduce player options in branch order.

This is true. However I think making Stasis necessary would also increase the amount requirements for Tomb.
Full disclosure, I've only cleared Tomb once (Demonspawn Gladiator of Kiku) but I didn't come across a single source of Stasis the whole run (then again, I ended up splatting against an Orb of Fire, so maybe you have a point).

Thematically, I'm bothered by the idea of a mortal directly fighitng a god, especially one so esteemed as Aten.

I don't know if I'd call Aten "esteemed." While Horus, Ra and the sun were very important in the Egyptian pantheon, Aten as the Sun Disc was basically a footnote until Akhenaten came along. The transformation idea is neat but it seems like until he transforms Akhenaten would be yet another mummy priest, something I feel like Tomb has more than enough of. Still it's cool from a flavor perspective, and could give stealthy characters a small chance to neutralize a dangerous threat if they catch him off guard before he transforms.

[DickhardLionheart]

making Tomb require rF++ would somewhat drastically increase the amount of requirements for Tomb, which are already high, and reduce player options in branch order.

This is true. However I think making Stasis necessary would also increase the amount requirements for Tomb.
Full disclosure, I've only cleared Tomb once (Demonspawn Gladiator of Kiku) but I didn't come across a single source of Stasis the whole run (then again, I ended up splatting against an Orb of Fire, so maybe you have a point).

Stasis is something you do tend to come across often, and it has very few uses in the game in general. One sometimes mentioned use is Tomb. It is indeed relatively useful because it prevents the slowing from death curses and paralysis by sphinxes. However, by Tomb:3 you'll be stair dancing with abandon, and always hasting before going downstairs, so most people don't choose to use stasis. Haste is often considered almost a necessity, it seems.

Why I wanted to include my proposed "Eye of Horus" there is specifically because this is the place where stasis is almost-useful and now it would become even more useful, possibly "good", giving variety. Here it would mean a choice of strategies (stasis vs haste) with many advantages to both.

[spudwalt]

I could formalize these ideas into code if there's interest, but unfortunately I'm bad as a sprite artist.

Hey, don't worry about that. If push comes to shove, you can just make a placeholder sprite that looks kinda like a reskinned unseen horror or something. We've used crappy placeholder sprites before, like for the formicid venom mages that never actually made it into the game:

I know this game eschews (when it can) ties to outside Lore, but we already have this tomb, and I'd love to expand on its egyptian theme. Scarab Beetles, Asps, jackals, Anubis, named mummies, and more!

I'm still waiting for mummified felids to show up.

[wizzzargh]

Infinitely respawning high-speed mummified felids

No more "stairdance and rest" tactics to beat tomb, only eternal suffering

[TheArcanist]

Infinitely respawning high-speed mummified felids

No more "stairdance and rest" tactics to beat tomb, only eternal suffering

May as well give each of those felids Symbol of Torment and Summon Greater Demon. You know, so they aren't too easy

[wizzzargh]

That would be redundant, since mummies already have those abilities.

No, to add the true flavor of postendgame, better have the cats explode in Hellfire when they die.

[Hurkyl]

I did forget about lamp of fire, actually! Though I am not sure how much of its damage is impact damage. Big mummies aren't -rF like the basic ones, and they have pretty silly HP.

Still, filling those narrow 2-wide passages with clouds of flame is worth a lot of damage.

[reaver]

I'm pretty sure most people do the Tomb after Zot, at least 1-4, so this doesn't really follow the "early game monster" thing. That said, Sar brings up a good point that this would take people by surprise.

I would wait until the current Tomb changes have been resolved/considered before exploring this idea further, though.

Thematically, I'm bothered by the idea of a mortal directly fighitng a god, especially one so esteemed as Aten.

Tiamat already exists, although the description was recently changed to an "avatar" justification.