Holy Enemies

[Velikolepni]

The trunk update from the third of May contains the following line:

Followers of good gods no longer get a chance to turn holy enemies neutral.

Maybe I am the only one, but I like to roleplay my characters, especially if I follow one of the "good" gods. I honestly don't want to fight holy monsters if I follow the Shining One, it just doesn't feel fitting for the character. (Yes, I know that the "good" gods don't have any problems with the player genociding orcs or other species, but I can work around that - I cannot justify a paladin fighting an angel)

What is the reason behind the proposed change? Is it holy Pan making it sometimes easier for followers of the good gods to get the demonic rune? I just don't get it - turning holy monsters neutral was such a small yet flavorful part of the game.

[Sar]

  Code:

2f8e1e8 | Chris Campbell | 2014-04-28 01:17:12 +0100

Don't turn holies neutral when worshipping a good god
It's almost never relevant (with Mennas being possibly the only edge
case), and has a number of negative effects: dungeon generation depending
on the player's god in Pan, strange interactions with getting additional
chances to convert on piety breakpoints, and generally a lot of code for
a pretty questionable gain. Flavour-wise it seems perfectly reasonable
that the holies in the dungeon just all see you as insufficiently pious,
or some kind of a heretic (as is the case for non-holy religious
monsters).

Kept some of the holy speech for the case where an Elyvilon worshipper
pacifies a holy.

I really dislike this change because turning holies friendly was ~flavourful~ and didn't break too many things in my experience. Probably would work better as Jiyva's friendliness (no piety requirement).
The fact that Holypan was a factor in this change just makes me hate Holypan more (even though the worst Holypan monsters were mercifully removed). I would much rather prefer for Holypan to go, though.

[Velikolepni]

strange interactions with getting additional
chances to convert on piety breakpoints

That has never been a problem for me. Could the chance of convertion be just min((piety+20)/200, 0.99) or something like that? No need for piety breakpoints.

generally a lot of code for
a pretty questionable gain

But the code is already there, it's not like this is a requiested feature.

As for Holy Pan - one of my favorite Crawl experiences was my assault of Holy Pan with my demonspawn Abyssal Knight. Corrupting the altar of the Shining One after killing the seraphim guarding it was the crowning moment of my second 15 runes run. I don't think that it should be removed - Just prevent its generation for followers of the good gods. The current system works quite well in that regard and I don't see any need for changes.

[crate]

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12312

[KittenInMyCerealz]

I just entered the holy pan as a TSO-worshipper and slaughtered everything :/
Didn't feel right.

Also with most of the monsters removed from holy pan (/abilities removed), it was quite boring.
I also missed phoenixes Imo they were the coolest holy enemy, but i admit they were kinda problematic.
But the only reason they were problematic because of corpses being problematic to remove, and that is still a problem on other monsters as well. Crawl should just add a function similiar to praying over corpses for them to disappear, that every character could use.
And then re-implement phoenixes.

[XuaXua]

I cannot justify a paladin fighting an angel)

Then it's a good thing there isn't a paladin "class" in this game.

[nagdon]

I also think that attacking/being attacked by holies while following a good god is a bizarre, annoying and unfun thing. This makes the good gods feel like copies of Makhleb with better propaganda -- while it is completely natural that a demon serving Makhleb attacks a mortal follower of Makhleb, an angel of Zin should NOT attack a priest of Zin (while they both get divine powers from Zin, so probably neither of them is heretic).

The old mechanism (they are not always peaceful, but if you're pious enough then they are probably peaceful) was acceptable, but I think making them always peaceful would be better than that. If Jiyva can make the slimes neutral, then why can't the good gods make their servants not attack allied (=following a good god) mortals?

I know that the old implementation of making holies neutral was irrational/buggy, as it allowed you to completely retry conversion when you reached a piety breakpoint -- for example if you'd oscillate between * and ** and always looked at an angel after reaching **, then eventually you'd convert the angel. This could have been easily handled by storing a piety requirement for each holy creature ("this angel will become neutral if you reach 123 piety") -- these could be random or depend on the HD of the holy (in this case, probably 6 star piety should guarantee success, I can't imagine the avatar of a benevolent god being attacked by the god's own servants).

If wandering neutral holy creatures are undesired, make them go to the staircases, or simply disappear with a message like this: "$GOD_NAME be with thee, mortal! I was here to [slay|find|eradicate] a $EVIL_CREATURE, but my presence would also be useful in other places. I hope you can defeat it instead of me!". Here $EVIL_CREATURE is an evil creature randomly selected on the level (with 1/3 chance), the highest HD evil enemy on the level (1/3 chance) or any evil creature which could be generated on the current level (1/3 chance).

[Velikolepni]

Then it's a good thing there isn't a paladin "class" in this game.

Sure, but that wasn't the point.

In one of my latest trunk games (YASD unfortunately) I was playing a HuFi of the Shining One and around D15 came to a vault that contained a daeva trapped behind glass walls. The daeva began to immediately smite me, so I was getting messages of the kind "the daeva invokes the wrath of the Shining One against you". How can it invoke the "wrath" of my deity against me if I have 6 stars of piety and am not in penance? Doesn't the Shining One know who he is smiting? Has the terrible secret been laid bare before us : the Shining One is actually schizophrenic! (The Shining Two?)

All this to say that either way something needs to be changed to have consistent flavor.

[Bim]

I 100% don't get why these flavorful bits have been removed. It seems as though someone out there is so hell bent on making it the most drilled down hack and slash that they haven't thought about the atmosphere and interesting non-combat parts of the game. So what if it breaks Holy Zig? Only a very few people will ever find it, but they'll often come across Mennas/other angels and feel it's a bit weird killing them.

I know GDD is often ignored, but please, please change this back.

[giovform]

I 100% don't get why these flavorful bits have been removed. It seems as though someone out there is so hell bent on making it the most drilled down hack and slash that they haven't thought about the atmosphere and interesting non-combat parts of the game. So what if it breaks Holy Zig? Only a very few people will ever find it, but they'll often come across Mennas/other angels and feel it's a bit weird killing them.

I know GDD is often ignored, but please, please change this back.

Agreed. My last game was basically holding Tab all the way down. Bash me, but I would remove auto explore, auto fight, reduce a lot the dungeon size and the number of trivial fights. I lose a lot of details of the dungeon and vaults while the char is auto exploring (also 99% of the nice console messages about what is happening are simply ignored because there are just too much messages coming due to the fast pace of the game using the autos). You can say, just don't use it, but again, the dungeon size makes it a little prohibitive (and with all the others using it, I feel I would be the only one "wasting" my time). I remember when playing Diablo I used to pay attention to a lot of details of the dungeon because the char speed allowed that - this helped to create the nice atmosphere the game had.

[duvessa]

There is no inconsistency here. In DCSS, the "flavour" of TSO, Zin, and Beogh exists specifically to mock 1. the "paladin" class from D&D, 2. real-world Christianity (and to a lesser extent other Abrahamic religions). One of the ways they do this is hostility towards their own worshippers. You could see this in the old system already: holy monsters only reliably turned neutral if you had very high piety.

You can certainly argue that is shitty flavour, but inconsistent flavour? No. And I'd rather the game ADHERE TO ITS OWN DESIGN GOALS than compromise them to accommodate a few people who want to roleplay a paladin in a game with toenail golems and sentient cats with nine lives.

[Velikolepni]

And I'd rather the game ADHERE TO ITS OWN DESIGN GOALS than compromise them to accommodate a few people who want to roleplay a paladin in a game with toenail golems and sentient cats with nine lives.

I must be dense, but I still don't get how making holy monsters always hostile makes the game more consistent with its stated design goals. Beogh has a similar mechanic in that not all orcs become friendly after conversion. Jyiva makes slimes neutral. It's all fine.

[Jeremiah]

On the positive side, this change makes it possible for a follower of Zin or Elivylon to get a eudemon weapon without incurring penance or switching to TSO.

[XuaXua]

And I'd rather the game ADHERE TO ITS OWN DESIGN GOALS than compromise them to accommodate a few people who want to roleplay a paladin in a game with toenail golems and sentient cats with nine lives.

I must be dense, but I still don't get how making holy monsters always hostile makes the game more consistent with its stated design goals. Beogh has a similar mechanic in that not all orcs become friendly after conversion. Jyiva makes slimes neutral. It's all fine.

He does have a point with the Daeva evoking TSO against a worshiper of TSO.

Then-again, maybe the Daeva is a much better / higher ranking devotee of TSO and is disappointed that the player is not as TSO-y as he is and therefore the player must be smited to learn his lesson.
Or the Daeva sees a challenge to his position.

[Bim]

There is no inconsistency here. In DCSS, the "flavour" of TSO, Zin, and Beogh exists specifically to mock 1. the "paladin" class from D&D, 2. real-world Christianity (and to a lesser extent other Abrahamic religions). One of the ways they do this is hostility towards their own worshippers. You could see this in the old system already: holy monsters only reliably turned neutral if you had very high piety.

You can certainly argue that is shitty flavour, but inconsistent flavour? No. And I'd rather the game ADHERE TO ITS OWN DESIGN GOALS than compromise them to accommodate a few people who want to roleplay a paladin in a game with toenail golems and sentient cats with nine lives.

I'd say that's a stretch - in no shape or form does having Holy enemies be neutral to you compromise the design goals. I don't think the 'subtle humor' is anything that most people will get or see - I've certainly never heard those particular reasons before. Also, it's not just a few people who want to roleplay a paladin (I don't roleplay anything really) but that it seems weirdly inconsistent to a lot of people.

Being struck down by TSO wrath when you follow TSO is just inconsistent, and anything else is just grasping at straws to pull it in. If for some reason we are so painfully against making Holy enemies neutral, at least change the text to a 'brings down the wrath of their god' instead

[damiac]

There is no inconsistency here. In DCSS, the "flavour" of TSO, Zin, and Beogh exists specifically to mock 1. the "paladin" class from D&D, 2. real-world Christianity (and to a lesser extent other Abrahamic religions). One of the ways they do this is hostility towards their own worshippers. You could see this in the old system already: holy monsters only reliably turned neutral if you had very high piety.

And whose ass did you pull this out of? Because when you are smited by zin, it doesn't say 'You are smitten by the Daeva's different interpretation of the wrath of Zin". It says you are smitten by zin himself.

[duvessa]

It says "the wrath of The Shining One", and TSO smites you because the daeva is asking TSO to smite you. The daeva is doing this because it is an enemy.

I'd say that's a stretch - in no shape or form does having Holy enemies be neutral to you compromise the design goals.

Neutral monsters are really awful in terms of the design goals and I'm glad there's been some progress in eliminating them: it is in many cases beneficial to manipulate neutral monsters in some way (to kill other monsters, to kill themselves for equipment, piety, just to get them out of the way, etc) which is really bad for reasons that are hopefully obvious. Then there's the awfulness specific to holy monster conversion (you can join a god to break a whole bunch of monsters and vaults).
I don't know what you're talking about with "subtle humor", I haven't heard any mention of the word in this thread until now. I don't think dpeg and Eronarn's attempts at "edgy" jokes are funny either, but that is entirely irrelevant as far as I am concerned.

[XuaXua]

I don't think dpeg and Eronarn's attempts at "edgy" jokes are funny either, but that is entirely irrelevant as far as I am concerned.

This only goes to prove by exclusion that duvessa loves my jokes.

[Velikolepni]

An alternate proposal would be to make all the angels, daeva, etc that one encouters be "fallen" ones. If furthermore, they are not able to smite or if the smite messages are changed, then the problems would mostly go away. I still think that it would be a pity and a change for the worse. Having neutral monsters in no way ever took away from my enjoyment of the game and in some cases greatly contributed to it.

[Psiweapon]

I personally don't care much abut this since I hardly ever play good gods, but:

1) It's unflavorful

2) If this trend of streamlining fetishism continues unchecked, at some point in the future DCSS's main competitor will be Progress Quest.

[Bim]

By subtle humor I meant:
[quote="duvessa" In DCSS, the "flavour" of TSO, Zin, and Beogh exists specifically to mock 1. the "paladin" class from D&D, 2. real-world Christianity (and to a lesser extent other Abrahamic religions).[/quote]

Not that you were attempting a joke, just that I don't really believe in that description of the flavor - I've never heard it put like that before, and if it was a joke/mockery it was lost on me.

Neutral enemies have never been a problem (hell we have a whole god dedicated to making enemies neutral) and while there may be very specific cases where worshiping TSO might break a vault, how is that any different to worshipping Jiyva and getting all of the slime stuff?

I'd be completely fine with turning all angels to 'Fallen Angels' if that's the best we can do, but I personally find it quite a nice feeling when you stumble across something that could have been horrible (Daeva) and it's friendly/neutral.

[KittenInMyCerealz]

Having neutral monsters in no way ever took away from my enjoyment of the game and in some cases greatly contributed to it.

This.

[duvessa]

Neutral enemies have never been a problem (hell we have a whole god dedicated to making enemies neutral)

what about the problems I just told you they had?

how is that any different to worshipping Jiyva and getting all of the slime stuff?

it isn't which is why I said all neutral monsters are bad (because I think all neutral monsters are bad ("all" includes neutral monsters that are neutral because of jiyva))

[Bim]

Neutral enemies have never been a problem (hell we have a whole god dedicated to making enemies neutral)

what about the problems I just told you they had?

Because those problems are minor, and are balanced out/should be balanced out by god wrath in the case of TSO ( like killing Mennas to get his sword). Yeah, if we had heaps of neutral creatures that'd be different, but even following TSO Holy creatures are so rare that it's not an issue.

[nilsbloodaxe]

Being struck down by TSO wrath when you follow TSO is just inconsistent, and anything else is just grasping at straws to pull it in. If for some reason we are so painfully against making Holy enemies neutral, at least change the text to a 'brings down the wrath of their god' instead

Inconsistent with what exactly? There are plenty of gods in this game whose followers attack and kill each other (Beogh, Makhleb, Yred). I might agree that it is inconsistent that Ely worshipers attack each other, with her whole pacifism thing. However, it isn't like TSO and Zin aren't gods that depreciate violence. I think some of the idea that this is inconsistent has to do with notions of "good" and "holy" from outside the crawl universe, which is meaningless. Plus, it isn't like you don't have followers of the same god ruthlessly killing each other in the real world.

[Bim]

Being struck down by TSO wrath when you follow TSO is just inconsistent, and anything else is just grasping at straws to pull it in. If for some reason we are so painfully against making Holy enemies neutral, at least change the text to a 'brings down the wrath of their god' instead

Inconsistent with what exactly? There are plenty of gods in this game whose followers attack and kill each other (Beogh, Makhleb, Yred). I might agree that it is inconsistent that Ely worshipers attack each other, with her whole pacifism thing. However, it isn't like TSO and Zin aren't gods that depreciate violence. I think some of the idea that this is inconsistent has to do with notions of "good" and "holy" from outside the crawl universe, which is meaningless. Plus, it isn't like you don't have followers of the same god ruthlessly killing each other in the real world.

That's all true, but also a little bit abstract in some ways. From a logical player stand point getting - smited by TSO, when you follow TSO - seems weird and as though the player has done something wrong, especially playing a god who is virtuous in conduct. Beogh, Makhleb, Yred are all evil/violent gods by their nature, so are happy with infighting/underhanded tactics, whereas TSO/Zin are by their nature opposed to that kinda thing.

Again, I wouldn't mind so much if it was better signposted or they were turned to fallen angels or whatever, but it just seems weird that your own god smite you when you've done nothing wrong.

[Patashu]

If this trend of streamlining fetishism continues unchecked, at some point in the future DCSS's main competitor will be Progress Quest.

This is a common complaint I see, but it's a big strawman. Devs are never going to make orc priests smite less, gnolls less likely to annihilate you in packs with halberds or berserk orb guardians not wallop you to death. The game will remain hard and challenging. Please respect this fact

[Bim]

If this trend of streamlining fetishism continues unchecked, at some point in the future DCSS's main competitor will be Progress Quest.

This is a common complaint I see, but it's a big strawman. Devs are never going to make orc priests smite less, gnolls less likely to annihilate you in packs with halberds or berserk orb guardians not wallop you to death. The game will remain hard and challenging. Please respect this fact

I'd say there's a big difference between things being hard and things being interesting. While I agree that DCSS is still the very best RL and there have been some very good additions recently (mainly the new gods), the removals have been pretty heavy handed and come across like an overzealous attempt to get rid of percieved 'tedium' rather than meaningful change.

[duvessa]

making the game less tedious is a pretty good meaningful change imo

[crate]

If you read the manual you will see that one of the major design goals is pretty much precisely described as "getting rid of perceived 'tedium'".

[Sar]

one of the major design goals is pretty much precisely described as "getting rid of perceived 'tedium'"

so when will everything past Lair be removed then

[KittenInMyCerealz]

I would like to see someone explain how turning holy monsters always hostile decreases tedium.
All it does is remove a shitton of flavor, for no other reason than "muh streamlined as possible gaem"

[khalil]

one of the major design goals is pretty much precisely described as "getting rid of perceived 'tedium'"

so when will everything past Lair be removed then

Same time they cut down lair to 4ish levels.

[nilsbloodaxe]

I would like to see someone explain how turning holy monsters always hostile decreases tedium.
All it does is remove a shitton of flavor, for no other reason than "muh streamlined as possible gaem"

I think duvessa pretty much summed it up. However, I would also point out that the "decreases tedium" thing was brought up in a more general context, it was not specifically about holy enemies. There are other reasons to remove mechanics from games other than tedium. And no, it does not remove flavor, it changes it sure, it removes a mechanic (that admittedly existed because it is flavorful).

[Bim]

Getting rid of things that are tedious is a great goal, but this has been conflated to mean 'anything which is permanent' (drain, corrosion, some forms of mutation, etc) and anything which is flavor and not immediately stabbing/shooting.

[crate]

last i checked drain still exists and corrosion still exists and both effects are actually more meaningful than they were before the changes

[nilsbloodaxe]

Getting rid of things that are tedious is a great goal, but this has been conflated to mean 'anything which is permanent' (drain, corrosion, some forms of mutation, etc) and anything which is flavor and not immediately stabbing/shooting.

This is just patently false. Drain is not gone, corrosion is not gone, and both have improved and are more interesting now. Most of the flavor that they have removed are a bunch of boring ass enemies (slugs), bad vaults, and crappy tiles. Everything else that you keep claiming is removing flavor is removing a mechanic. Sure many of these mechanics were introduced because they are supposed to be flavorful, but again that is not actually flavor. Moreover, just because a mechanic is flavorful doesn't mean it is good. "Elbereth" in Nethack is a great example of this, it is flavorful but what it does in the game is a mechanic. The flavor is from Tolkien, but you could easily replace it with "YHWH" and the mechanic would act the same way, and still be flavorful (the Bible). And it is stupid.

I would also add that a lot of flavor has been ADDED since I first started playing way back in 0.3.4 days. Plenty of new enemies, some quite interesting, 2 branches, artefacts, uniques, vaults, tiles, and a lot more.

[Bim]

I'm not continuing this as it's a complete derail, but my point was Drain and corrosion used to be a lot more permanent, along with things like item destruction.

Holy Enemies being neutral was a completely inoffensive mechanic that gave Holy followers a chance to avoid some nasty fights and made logical sense (to many). I'd like to see it reinstated as I (and others) enjoyed it, whilst the reasons against it seem rather non-existent, that's all.

[crate]

so who misses nausea
i sure dont

[Sar]

sickness was much better anyway