Page 1 of 1

Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Sunday, 1st June 2014, 19:14
by dck
I think the logic for removing the speed boost from spider form was not very good.
No one went for that spell in the same way they went for oldswift because not only does it have a huge price in terms of defenses by the time people who were not Tms could have it available, it also synergizes with UC which isn't a particularly popular choice of weapon skill. Furthermore, spider has always had antiwiz and that paired with the 2.5 turns going in and out of a transmutation takes just makes it not practical in any real danger situation to kite enemies in spider form; or perhaps just not practical enough that it's the better option anyway, by the time you can reliably kill through the -Wiz you could've done it without spider.
Vampires have a more boring spider form as a racial ability, felids are a race built on kiting. I believe if those two options are considered acceptable then spider should also be, because it wasn't a escape option strong enough that people who were not Tm would actually get it "just in case" (this is mostly because escape options are very cheap and plentiful in crawl) and for Tm it was a legitimately useful spell that could be used to wear down plenty of threats.

What's worse, the new spider form heavily encourages kiting for Tm because you still have huge evasion and poisonous UC; while with old spider you could just roll your ev and hit things to see if you got lucky and then if you got hit just crabwalk away using your movespeed, new one makes you want to make the best out of your poison by applying it then walking away immediately, since if you do get hit you can't just waltz out of danger.

The removal commit mentioned swiftness briefly and the change swiftness saw was an overwhelming improvement indeed, but the change to spider form missed the point of the spell, which is sad because it was a pretty cool spell with interesting drawbacks that still managed to feel strong.
Mind you, that's another thing about magic. It's supposed to do something and open up possibilities, this sounds not very relevant but I think spells the player casts should be important enough that it doesn't amount to just "getting your buffs up" for a percentual increase in efficiency. This change makes the spell blander and removes a lot of the impact from using it or having it available at all.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Sunday, 1st June 2014, 20:33
by duvessa
dck wrote:Vampires have a more boring spider form as a racial ability, felids are a race built on kiting. I believe if those two options are considered acceptable
not sure everyone would agree with the antecedent in that conditional

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Sunday, 1st June 2014, 21:24
by Klown
A level 3 spell that gets comments like 'get spider form = win' is pretty hardcore.
Maybe swapping it to level 4, dropping ice form to level 3 would be a better 'nerf'

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Sunday, 1st June 2014, 21:35
by crate
I think new spider form is much better than old spider form. Of course, I'm also a strong believer that poison is still a bad mechanic that should go away (though at least monster->player poison is less annoying now).

I have definitely heard of people learning old spider form purely for movespeed, btw. In fact doing so was probably the "right" decision much of the time, though personally I wouldn't bother since I'd rather die than use spider form to flee.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Sunday, 1st June 2014, 21:59
by nagdon
I also think that the old spider form was better. It was an interesting spell, with lots of benefits (general UC damage boost, defensive boost (tiny size) for some characters, speed boost for escape, poison source against poison-vulnerable foes) and drawbacks (no weapon/throwing, -Wiz, melds all armor (weaker defenses for lots of characters), poison vulnerability, lower maxhp, hated by TSO and Zin). This way it usually had at least one useful effect for a significant percentage of characters, but was really effective for those who used all of its effects (typicall early-game transmuters). It was a strong escape spell in many situations, but it is hard to fight (or kite with ranged attacks) in Spider Form (without UC) and the changed (after the early game usually reduced) defenses made using it a nontrivial decision.

The new version is still useful for UC specialists, but now it is only useful for them and maybe a few low-level mages with absymal defenses who happen to find it; this makes it a solid but uninteresting spell. The Swiftness nerf was needed, because it was a useful spell for everyone; but Spider Form has nontrivial costs, so I think it could keep the speed boost. Also note that it is a level 3 spell (not level 2 like swiftness) and other level 3 spells like Mephitic Cloud, Conjure Flame and Passwall also offer good escape options.

Maybe swapping its level with Ice Form (and nerfing Ice Form UC and buffing Spider Form UC) could help the speed boost on a low-level spell problem, but I think even this isn't neccessary.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 09:52
by Roderic
Has the possibility of throwing cobwebs to stop enemies ever been considered? This would be a substitute for a fleeing capacity and helpful for the poison attack.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 15:18
by Leafsnail
Spider Form still seems like a really useful level 3 spell for transmuters - when you get it it's probably both a damage and a defense buff. I don't think it has to serve another purpose, and if it does then that purpose probably shouldn't be "backup swiftness".

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 15:22
by damiac
Definitely a corner case, but not an insignificant one:
This is a huge nerf to NaTm survivability .

It's a less huge nerf to any other Tm survivability, but still significant. I suppose that was the point though.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 16:46
by archaeo
damiac wrote:It's a less huge nerf to any other Tm survivability, but still significant. I suppose that was the point though.

I mean you don't have to suppose, damiac. MarvinPA helpfully supplied his reasoning right there in the commit:
Without giving movement speed it's still an easily castable form that provides a lot of early damage and evasion. The movement speed made it much stronger by also being a reliable escape, and was problematic in some of the same ways as old Swiftness.

It's not like he had some secret agenda he was carrying out to keep NaTm from being the power class of 0.15. Nah, we just have a spell that does too much for too little of a cost.

Of course, this doesn't change the fact that it is a bit of a nerf, but I bet the devs will be on the lookout for a huge spike in Tm deaths. Instead of focusing on the difficulty of the background (which, like all the "hybrid" bros, will probably always be a little tough just because of the skill costs), it would probably be better to figure out ways to make tmut a less boring background and less boring spell school.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 17:01
by stickyfingers
Also, NaTm is nerfed the least of all transmuters here.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 17:34
by damiac
Why do you say that? NaTm got to cast spider form to change their move delay from 1.4 to 0.8. Everyone else got 1.0 to 0.8. Nagas went from unable to walk away from normal speed monsters to able to walk away from normal speed monsters. Everyone else went from keeping pace with normal speed monsters to being able to walk away from normal speed monsters.

Also, sorry if I missed something, but is there an easy way to cross reference this to the commit text people are quoting?

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 18:01
by nagdon
archaeo wrote: Instead of focusing on the difficulty of the background (which, like all the "hybrid" bros, will probably always be a little tough just because of the skill costs), it would probably be better to figure out ways to make tmut a less boring background and less boring spell school.


Transmutation is my favourite spell school, Passwall and Ignite Poison are on my list of the 5 most interesting and unique spells in the game (the others are Orb of Destruction, Sticky Flame and Malign Gateway) and I also like the form spells. There are spells with just one main effect and spells with multiple effects/side effects/interactions and most Transmutations (except Stoneskin and maybe Sticks to Snakes and Blade Hands) fall into this second category. These side effects make using these spells a nontivial decision (for example while Haste always helps, casting Statue Form is not always a good idea). Some transmutations had effects which were unique, but boring/annoying to use (for example Fulsome Distillation/Evaporate, old Sticks to Snakes), but I think the current ones are not problematic this way.

The Transmuter background itself could become more interesting if it'd have more low-level spells instead of Blade Hands and maybe Ice Form. No other hybrid spellbook contains level >=5 spells and the only other level 4 spell in them which isn't single school in the main school of the book is Leda's Liquefaction in the AM book. Unfortunately this would probably require new Transmutation spells (ideally two new level 3 form spells). In my opinion the ideal low-mid level transmuter would use 2..4 form spells of roughly equal level depending on the situation (having form spells of equal level, not just an upgrade path of them would be great), plus Sticks to Snakes.

A less drastic change would be simply giving all form spells infinite duration until cancelled, this would at least remove recasting the same spell before every battle. They all have nontrivial drawbacks and most of them disallow armour, so even cast-before-wearing-heavy-armour abuses wouldn't be problematic.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 18:44
by stickyfingers
damiac wrote:Why do you say that? NaTm got to cast spider form to change their move delay from 1.4 to 0.8. Everyone else got 1.0 to 0.8. Nagas went from unable to walk away from normal speed monsters to able to walk away from normal speed monsters. Everyone else went from keeping pace with normal speed monsters to being able to walk away from normal speed monsters.

Also, sorry if I missed something, but is there an easy way to cross reference this to the commit text people are quoting?

Nagas lost 1/3 of movespeed bonus. Other races lost 3/3 of movespeed bonus.
Spider form still gives nagas the ability to maintain distance from average monsters. It doesn't give any such new ability to other races.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 19:00
by damiac
Ah, well that's the detail I missed. I thought spider form movespeed removal meant spider form wasn't going to change move speed at all anymore. So now spider form just has 1.0 move delay instead of 0.8?

In that case, I totally understand why you'd say NaTm is the least nerfed.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 19:06
by Roderic
nagdon wrote:
archaeo wrote: Instead of focusing on the difficulty of the background (which, like all the "hybrid" bros, will probably always be a little tough just because of the skill costs), it would probably be better to figure out ways to make tmut a less boring background and less boring spell school.


The Transmuter background itself could become more interesting if it'd have more low-level spells instead of Blade Hands and maybe Ice Form. No other hybrid spellbook contains level >=5 spells and the only other level 4 spell in them which isn't single school in the main school of the book is Leda's Liquefaction in the AM book. Unfortunately this would probably require new Transmutation spells (ideally two new level 3 form spells). In my opinion the ideal low-mid level transmuter would use 2..4 form spells of roughly equal level depending on the situation (having form spells of equal level, not just an upgrade path of them would be great), plus Sticks to Snakes.



I am still struggling with what, but I think that stones should be transmuted into something.

Besides, it would be nice to transmute albeit temporarily the weapon of an enemy to its poorest version

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 19:21
by stickyfingers
damiac wrote:Ah, well that's the detail I missed. I thought spider form movespeed removal meant spider form wasn't going to change move speed at all anymore. So now spider form just has 1.0 move delay instead of 0.8?

Yes.

http://s-z.org/neil/git/?p=crawl.git;a= ... 94d49bc417
See how the only thing that changes is the "mv" variable, from 8 to 10, and nothing about retaining natural speed in this form.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 19:41
by damiac
Now how do you know where to look for this link? I don't know much about git hub, but if I knew how to get to the link you just sent me I wouldn't have asked so many stupid questions.

Thanks guys.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Monday, 2nd June 2014, 19:51
by Kate
http://s-z.org/neil/git/?p=crawl.git;a=summary has the complete list of commits, and a search bar if you know what you're looking for specifically.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Wednesday, 4th June 2014, 19:11
by skjarl
I'd like to see spider form remove the cold/slow vulnerability on Draconians while it's in effect.

Re: Spider form movespeed removal.

PostPosted: Wednesday, 4th June 2014, 22:13
by neil
skjarl wrote:I'd like to see spider form remove the cold/slow vulnerability on Draconians while it's in effect.


That was supposed to have been fixed a few weeks ago, but there was a bug in the fix. It should be working correctly once the servers update.