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remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 05:18
by rchandra
Remove curse scrolls have been reduced in generation a few times. In an average game you will find plenty, in almost any game with 3+runes you will find more than you need - possibly not enough to do everything you want in Tomb. But games where you don't have any, you cannot reasonably try on any items. In the early game this is many games, so you can't try on items until you have IDed the scroll (or the items). I have had games recently where I have an item cursed in the opening floors (trying it on, or a mummy death curse) with a presumed ?rc (around 10 different scrolls found), and been stuck with the item through late Lair. Or I have one scroll, use it, then can't try anything again.

These games are not fun at all, it is like nethack (where most items are too dangerous to use without some testing). If I just put on my d:1 ring, even waiting until d:4 so I have some scrolls, it will be a cursed -4 protection and I have no ?rc. If I die with all these unused items, I will find that the +5 EV ring would have saved much damage (and thus other consumables) over the course of a game. So using these items is a form of startscumming. For another annoyance, I will have collected excess unIDed items which I cannot carry over the things that are useful (and mystery potions, which are often useless but need to be carried). So when I find a remove curse scroll, I will have to backtrack to all the items I want to try until I have cursed as many slots as possible.

I don't have any stats on how much of a problem this is, but if it is even remotely common (and IRC discussion suggests it is), this needs to be changed. The previous object generation stats focused on the mean, IIRC.

For reference, my ID strategy tends to not waste my remove curse scroll if I start with only one. But even if there's some super ID strategy that fixes this (and I do like the current ID game!), one shouldn't have to play super optimally to get to actually play the equipment game at all.

Other items with worrisome generation in terms of getting to play the game are enchant weapon, and maybe curing or heal wounds. I can elaborate on that later here or in another topic, if it's not self-evident.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 06:02
by Aule
rchandra wrote:Remove curse scrolls have been reduced in generation a few times.

first link = 1% decrease.
second link = 1% decrease.

Only very occasionally is this a problem for me. Most games generate plenty. According to the code you've spotlighted, it's second only to the identify scroll in likelihood to generate, so I'm not sure what you're doing to need so many.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 06:17
by Arrhythmia
Aule wrote:
rchandra wrote:Remove curse scrolls have been reduced in generation a few times.

first link = 1% decrease.


100 * (1 - (1120/1250)) = 10.4%

second link = 1% decrease


100 * (1 - (35/43)) = 18.6%

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 06:21
by Baldu3
I don't remember ever ever ever running close to out of remove curse after lair+orc unless I did tomb/hells. But most of my games I wish I had more before lair so I could play with floor thrash while it's actually treasure.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 09:30
by Sprucery
Of course one game is different from another, but I have to say that I've never thought that ?RC should be _more_ common. Yes, in the early game lack of rc affects item identification, but I think it's a good thing and makes games more interesting.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 10:51
by Hurkyl
Sprucery wrote:Of course one game is different from another, ... Yes, in the early game lack of rc affects item identification, but I think it's a good thing and makes games more interesting.

How does it make things more interesting?

The effect rchandra describes is that you can choose to do two things:

  • Pretend unidentified weapons and jewelry (and to some extent armor) don't exist until you are virtually certain you have a remove curse scroll
  • Gamble on crippling your character in the earliest part of the dungeon in hopes you have a cool item

I suppose some people could get a thrill out of the gamble, but I don't. Is there some other effect you're referring to?

Part of the problem is the rarity -- while it's surely the right play* to avoid wield/wear-iding items until you have ?RC or are desperate for a power-up, being stuck with a bad curse is infrequent enough that it feels more like the game is arbitrarily punishing you on occasion and the right play is just paranoia.

*: Once you're good enough, I mean. If you still have lots of trouble with the early game, gambling on a power-up is probably a better overall choice.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 11:50
by Bloax
Don't you just love the interesting effect on the game finding one of the rarest rings in the game has? A ring of regeneration can sure do wonders, and so can slaying.
Speaking of slaying, oh boy - you found one!

Except it's -6 slaying! HA HA SURE GOT YOU THERE SUCKER HAHAHAHA !!!

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 12:42
by Sprucery
Yes, finding unidentified weapons/armour/jewelry and deciding whether to try them and possibly suffer the consequences _is_ interesting and fun.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 13:45
by Bloax
you know what's more fun than that
Spoiler: show
actually finding the god damn item instead of a completely useless trinket of frustration that actively tries to harm you for the sake of being Interesting and Fun

you might as well ^qyes if you put on a ring of negative slaying or a ring of -5 AC early on because it's not even worth bothering, and the same goes for -3 weapons on d:1

do you prefer jerking off with sandpaper so that the one time you don't do it, it'll be extra good? (oh and throw in some chili sauce in there every now and then for the one extra insulting time you put on a -6 ring of slaying)


Although I guess if you find it fun to avoid having an rPois monster (like water moccasins) spawn while you're stuck with a cursed -2 blowgun with no remove curse in sight then have fun with that, I certainly don't.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 13:57
by ackack
I do agree that there is presently a greater chance of ending up stuck with undesirable items for a while early than there used to be. I'm not sure this is a problem, though. It changes some of the early decisions into an actual gamble. If you're going to have cursed items at all --- and that's a separate issue that I'm agnostic on --- I think having them meaningfully influence behavior like this is good.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 14:08
by Sar
Bloax wrote:do you prefer jerking off with sandpaper so that the one time you don't do it, it'll be extra good?

wait I thought you liked Chei

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 14:28
by Sprucery
@Bloax: I guess you are playing a different game than me. How often do you find a -5 AC or a -6 slaying ring before you have found scrolls of remove curse? You make it sound like a common occurrence. If it happens once every 500 games, who cares? Personally I put on the first two rings I find. If they are good I won't try any more until I've found ?RC.

With weapons it's clear that if you try every glowing weapon you may be stuck with a cursed one. That's when you have to make a decision if trying the weapon is worth the risk.

It's a roguelike game, dammit.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 15:20
by nilsbloodaxe
Sprucery wrote:@Bloax: I guess you are playing a different game than me. How often do you find a -5 AC or a -6 slaying ring before you have found scrolls of remove curse? You make it sound like a common occurrence. If it happens once every 500 games, who cares? Personally I put on the first two rings I find. If they are good I won't try any more until I've found ?RC.

With weapons it's clear that if you try every glowing weapon you may be stuck with a cursed one. That's when you have to make a decision if trying the weapon is worth the risk.

It's a roguelike game, dammit.

And there are plenty of roguelikes that don't have this kind of mechanic. Crawl does not have to emulate Nethack or ADOM to be a roguelike.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 16:18
by Greyr
Sprucery wrote:@Bloax: I guess you are playing a different game than me. How often do you find a -5 AC or a -6 slaying ring before you have found scrolls of remove curse? You make it sound like a common occurrence. If it happens once every 500 games, who cares? Personally I put on the first two rings I find. If they are good I won't try any more until I've found ?RC.

With weapons it's clear that if you try every glowing weapon you may be stuck with a cursed one. That's when you have to make a decision if trying the weapon is worth the risk.

It's a roguelike game, dammit.


All roguelikes are just Brogue anyway.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 16:59
by Aule
Arrhythmia wrote:100 * (1 - (1120/1250)) = 10.4%

100 * (1 - (35/43)) = 18.6%


As to the first link being 1%, here are the relevant parts of the code that are not shown in the first link's summary:

http://s-z.org/neil/git/?p=crawl.git;a=blob;f=crawl-ref/source/makeitem.cc;h=2021bfd4438b148608a1f5ae983fca686b82a895
  Code:
2519             // total weight: 7824 if depth_mod < 4,
2520             //               8524 if 4 <= depth_mod < 7,
2521             //               8944 if depth_mod >= 7,
2522             //               and -1133 in sprint


http://s-z.org/neil/git/?p=crawl.git;a=blob;f=crawl-ref/source/makeitem.cc;h=484629d1baa34286c2acd46e3d53c9c99fed2c14;hb=20358d8b6632
  Code:
2519             // total weight: 7824 if depth_mod < 4,
2520             //               8524 if 4 <= depth_mod < 7,
2521             //               8944 if depth_mod >= 7,
2522             //               and -1133 in sprint


So the total weight is unchanged. Assuming (possibly wrongly) that the choice is linear and doesn't involve a stepdown function as so many other parts of the code do, the ratio of the change to the total weighted chance is properly calculated as follows:

Previously, it was: 1250/{7824, 8524, 8944} (excluding sprint)
which results in {16.0, 14.7, 14.0} as a percentages, rounded

Subsequent to the change, it is: 1120/{7824, 8524, 8944} (excluding sprint)
which results in {14.3, 13.1, 12.5} as a percentages, rounded

This results in actual, non-estimated decreases in chance, depending upon depth, of: 1.7%, 1.6% or 1.5%. Hardly off by the factor you suggest.

As to the second example, the total weight is already provided in the summary, with the following results:

http://s-z.org/neil/git/?p=crawl.git;a=commitdiff;h=fe1f5a6b0eb6
  Code:
-            // total weight:    735  if depth_mod <4
-            //                  846  otherwise
-            //                  -103 in sprint
+            // total weight:    784  if depth_mod < 4
+            //                  913  otherwise
+            //                 -112  in sprint
             item.sub_type = random_choose_weighted(
-                180, SCR_IDENTIFY,
+                200, SCR_IDENTIFY,
                 112, SCR_REMOVE_CURSE,


The total weight this time has changed, but the weight for the scroll has not. Assuming (again, and possibly wrongly) that the choice is linear, the ratio of the change to the total weighted chance is properly calculated as follows:

Previously, it was: 112/{735, 846} (excluding sprint)
which results in {15.2, 13.2} as a percentages, rounded

Subsequent to the change, it is: 112/{784, 913} (excluding sprint)
which results in {14.3, 12.3} as a percentages, rounded

This results in an actual decrease in chance of: 0.9% in either depth case.

I'm not going to code-dive further to see whether there is a stepdown function involved.

[Edit: removed references to subsequently redacted material]

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 17:12
by and into
Received a report (from someone who hasn't written in this thread, in fact, and thus a bystander who has no dog in this fight) about unnecessarily insulting comments. Made a few deletions/edits in other's comments.

Please keep in mind this is GDD and, beyond that, keep in mind that this argument concerns the generation percentages of the "remove curse" scroll in a free video game.

And beyond that, let's not lose the forest for the trees. Remove curse has become scarcer, and however one wishes to quantify that change mathematically, it is actually noticeable in game play. The main point of this thread is to discuss the role of remove curse in the game now that it is less common.

As one of the commits points out, the game play utility/effect of ?remove curse has been underexplored, precisely because it was so prevalent. Now it is less so, and developers might be curious what people think about this, so let's try to make GDD a good resource from which they can glean some relevant information.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 17:15
by Sprucery
nilsbloodaxe wrote:And there are plenty of roguelikes that don't have this kind of mechanic. Crawl does not have to emulate Nethack or ADOM to be a roguelike.

Crawl has that mechanic, and it is a good mechanic. If we remove the possibility of wearing a cursed -5AC ring on D:1, we should also remove the possibility of wearing a +5AC ring on D:1. Unless the goal is to make the game once again a bit easier. I much prefer the current situation.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 17:38
by Aule
and into wrote:let's not lose the forest for the trees. Remove curse has become scarcer, and however one wishes to quantify that change mathematically, it is actually noticeable in game play. The main point of this thread is to discuss the role of remove curse in the game now that it is less common.

I was simply adding my own point of view that I have not noticed it, and why I thought that would be so. I thought it would be difficult to detect a change of about 1% when the given frequency is double-digits, and that matches my own observation of not noticing the changes until they came to my attention in this thread. I had nothing to add further, so I thought that would be sufficient. Discussing it purely anecdotally isn't going to be highly productive, either, IMO, but ungracious intolerance for simple human error can derail anything. I could have not noticed it because I just don't pay attention. I appreciate the intervention, and the guiding hand.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 17:45
by TeshiAlair
I'm still in favor of an idea which was brought up a while ago, that being making cursed items more interesting.

I think it should go a similar route as to Contam: Typically powerful item with drawbacks.

Suggestions:

1. Make all cursed items curse on requip to make 2. work.
2. Make all cursed items at least average or better than average, with VERY rare exception.

Alternatively:
3. Make curses possibly do other things- for example, wielding a cursed weapon gives you -2 slay until you've gained x experience, or have it statrot you but removes the curse.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 18:13
by johlstei
Aule wrote:
and into wrote:let's not lose the forest for the trees. Remove curse has become scarcer, and however one wishes to quantify that change mathematically, it is actually noticeable in game play. The main point of this thread is to discuss the role of remove curse in the game now that it is less common.

I was simply adding my own point of view that I have not noticed it, and why I thought that would be so. I thought it would be difficult to detect a change of about 1% when the given frequency is double-digits, and that matches my own observation of not noticing the changes until they came to my attention in this thread. I had nothing to add further, so I thought that would be sufficient. Discussing it purely anecdotally isn't going to be highly productive, either, IMO, but ungracious intolerance for simple human error can derail anything. I could have not noticed it because I just don't pay attention. I appreciate the intervention, and the guiding hand.

You are misunderstanding though. Remove curse scrolls are now 1% less of the total scrolls that are dropped, that does not mean they are 1% rarer. Using your numbers, going from say, 14% to 12.5% is a (14-12.5)/14 = 0.11, or an 11% decrease in the amount of them in a game. That is why your math was wrong, you correctly reasoned about and calculated the wrong thing.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 18:22
by Sandman25
Current remove curse situation is similar to mutation situation: while there are nice mutations, they are not going to win a game for you while really bad mutations can kill you easily. After exploring multiple floors under effect of ring of teleportation, amulet of inaccuracy and -5 AC (not all in the same game of course) I am not going to experience it again. Having unknown +6 AC ring and +7 ring of slaying is optimal from winning prospective, at least for players who consistently reach Temple/Lair.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 18:28
by johlstei
The cost of wearing a -6 AC ring is the same as the opportunity cost of not wearing a +6 AC ring. Of course I can't speak to the average unidentified ring, if that is weighted towards the negative then I suspect it is not, but I've never not put on an unid ring because I was scared of what it could be.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 18:45
by Sandman25
johlstei wrote:The cost of wearing a -6 AC ring is the same as the opportunity cost of not wearing a +6 AC ring.


No, as I mentioned earlier it depends on player. If I get to Lair without any rings in 90% game, it is very likely that difference between help from +6 AC ring and damage from -6 AC ring is huge (something like 50% vs 99%). Also let's not forget about ring of teleportation, there is no good equivalent for that (similarly there is no good equivalent for teleportitis, blinking is not even close).

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 18:53
by johlstei
Sandman25 wrote:
johlstei wrote:The cost of wearing a -6 AC ring is the same as the opportunity cost of not wearing a +6 AC ring.


No, as I mentioned earlier it depends on player. If I get to Lair without any rings in 90% game, it is very likely that difference between help from +6 AC ring and damage from -6 AC ring is huge (something like 50% vs 99%). Also let's not forget about ring of teleportation, there is no good equivalent for that (similarly there is no good equivalent for teleportitis, blinking is not even close).


Why do you say that? Each point of AC is as good as the last. I mean, I guess I could see the argument that there is some sort of curve, and being behind the curve is way worse than being ahead of it is similarly good, but I don't think that's the case, and I think you are underestimating +6 AC if you believe that. You're not hitting any diminishing returns by nature of the distribution of attack damage when you first enter lair.

Yeah, there's also teleportation, but also resist fire and resist cold and resist poison(in lair? yes please) and control teleport and protection from magic etc.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 20:00
by rchandra
Note that even having _some_ RC lets you still have tradeoffs in using items. For example, sometimes I've left on a ring of loudness or something because RC was low, and not using my only scroll let me keep trying on items. But when you have _no_ RC, you aren't getting to play.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 20:47
by gammafunk
Aule wrote:The total weight this time has changed, but the weight for the scroll has not. Assuming (again, and possibly wrongly) that the choice is linear, the ratio of the change to the total weighted chance is properly calculated as follows:


The statements you're making re. the second commit are misleading because, as you can see in the commit, the weight assigned to different base item types has changed: we generated fewer scrolls in total with that commit (about 11% fewer) as well as fewer potions, generating a bit more of other item types, and then shift the sub-type weights withing scrolls and potions to keep some (like enchant armour) the same overall and reduce others (like remove curse) overall.

I think it's more helpful to think in terms of how many scrolls are generated, since that's what we're ultimately looking at when assessing if there's too much of something: how many do we have in inventory at a certain point. As I say in the commit, it's about 8 fewer remove curse scrolls in the game, and in 0.15 we're seeing about 35 rc scrolls on average if one clears all typical 3-rune locations and portals (namely D, Sewer, Ossuary, Orc, Elf, Bailey, Lair, Swamp, Snake, IceCv, Volcano, Lab, Trove, Vaults, Crypt, Bazaar, WizLab, Depths, Zot). An actual game would likely have a bit fewer on average since since some of those portals might not be seen or completed, and of course branches like Crypt and/or Elf are often skipped.

There's also the relevant question of how many ?rc you should have by what depth, which is something we were concerned about when making these reductions. We'd maybe like to avoid further special-casing the consumable generation by depth like we do for e.g. torment/holy word, but increased generation at early levels is at least easy to do.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 21:31
by and into
It is also worth pointing out perhaps that while cursed badweapons are particularly devastating to a melee dude, ?enchant weapon can be used if nothing else to remove curses as well.

Also, can vanilla stuff be generated cursed (outside of things like acquirement while worshiping ash)? I thought things had changed so that's not the case, but I'm pretty sure a nondescript +0 blowgun generated cursed in a 0.16 game... Maybe I am misremembering, though. At any rate, less ?rc in the context of knowing when you are gambling (glowing/runed/artefact stuff is either going to be better than average, or else cursed—and likely worse than average) at least makes sense to me in terms of design.

I would recommend getting rid of the plain mummy item curse on death. They matter more now, I guess, which is usually what you want in an enemy ability, except that in this case it involves punishing the player for killing a monster, a slow monster no less, which ends up making it much worse.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 21:41
by Aule
gammafunk wrote:The statements you're making re. the second commit are misleading because, as you can see in the commit, the weight assigned to different base item types has changed: we generated fewer scrolls in total with that commit (about 11% fewer) as well as fewer potions, generating a bit more of other item types, and then shift the sub-type weights withing scrolls and potions to keep some (like enchant armour) the same overall and reduce others (like remove curse) overall.

Not intentionally misleading, though. I didn't dig far enough to see the overall relationship between the weights of different item types. I see johlstei's and your point and I agree. Before your posts, the same thought came to me, but I thought better not to add anything more. I do not pretend to be anything other than someone with a point of view, and that is why I liberally use "seems," "if," "possibly wrongly," et al. Humility. Politeness. I don't subscribe to any fictitious fallacy of perceived personal perfection, and I never will. No one should. If you only want people who think they are perfect and never in error to post, then make an announcement and I'll gladly step aside.

I think it's more helpful to think in terms of how many scrolls are generated, since that's what we're ultimately looking at when assessing if there's too much of something: how many do we have in inventory at a certain point. As I say in the commit, it's about 8 fewer remove curse scrolls in the game, and in 0.15 we're seeing about 35 rc scrolls on average if one clears all typical 3-rune locations and portals (namely D, Sewer, Ossuary, Orc, Elf, Bailey, Lair, Swamp, Snake, IceCv, Volcano, Lab, Trove, Vaults, Crypt, Bazaar). An actual game would likely have a bit fewer on average since since some of those portals might not be seen or completed, and of course branches like Crypt and/or Elf are often skipped.

So even 11% fewer means that instead of having ten scrolls by point X, you'll likely have only nine. My point still stands that this is not a catastrophic reduction. Indeed, you omitted one possible reason for a low scroll count, and that is chasing turncounts. Whereas that may be something to shoot for, the tradeoff is made maybe a little more clear by the reduction.

I have always cleared every level I encountered, first by seeing the map in its entirety, then by pressing 'o' until I see "Done exploring." I also don't finish many games, averaging probably somewhere around XL 12, so with my own experience at the lower total numbers of those character levels (which incidentally would show the maximum finds for those games, having cleared them), it's should be no surprise that I would fail to notice one less of a scroll in the possible dozen I'd have found by then, roughly speaking.

I maintain that the change really is miniscule, and after all this is said and done I fail to understand the castigation I'm receiving because I don't agree that it's a tremendous cut. Is this a discussion, or is it groupthink? In essence, I'm only attesting to what I think is the accuracy of the second sentence in the OP:

rchandra wrote:In an average game you will find plenty, in almost any game with 3+runes you will find more than you need - possibly not enough to do everything you want in Tomb.

I've experienced being stuck with a tele ring, too, but it most often doesn't happen. Unfun games do happen. I think the new rate is fine.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 21:42
by Aule
and into wrote:I would recommend getting rid of the plain mummy item curse on death. They matter more now, I guess, which is usually what you want in an enemy ability, except that in this case it involves punishing the player for killing a monster, a slow monster no less, which ends up making it much worse.

This I agree with. At the very least, let them only curse items being actively worn, not those in inventory, which would greatly reduce the need for so many, esp. taking on tomb.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 22:36
by duvessa
and into wrote:It is also worth pointing out perhaps that while cursed badweapons are particularly devastating to a melee dude, ?enchant weapon can be used if nothing else to remove curses as well.
Guess which other scroll generates less now?

Remove curse generation was also greatly reduced in 0.8. So there's a medium/long-term trend here of reducing the player's chances to try on items. It's true that recently there was a reduction in the number of unidentified items that are useful to try on (albeit in a way that was a strict nerf)...but if you go back a couple more versions to this commit you can see the end result is that a much larger proportion of glowing/runed items are cursed than ever before. All of this combined means that curses have become far more visible than ever before, and I'm not convinced that's actually a good thing.

and into wrote:I would recommend getting rid of the plain mummy item curse on death. They matter more now, I guess
No they don't matter more now, they mattered 0 and they still matter 0, because you can just drop your cursable items or park them on another level or whatever.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 23:03
by KoboldLord
The best solution, of course, is just to give up on the item identification mini-game entirely. It's almost gone already, and putting that sacred cow down now would be a mercy to the cow as well as being delicious hamburger.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Monday, 15th September 2014, 23:41
by Sprucery
Noooooooooo!

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 01:35
by Brannock
KoboldLord wrote:The best solution, of course, is just to give up on the item identification mini-game entirely. It's almost gone already, and putting that sacred cow down now would be a mercy to the cow as well as being delicious hamburger.


While I'm ambivalent on removing Identification entirely (I like "unwrapping" my presents), I note that removing identification would also provide a good solution to the "kobold with an unknown weapon of distortion" problem.

Removing identification would also necessitate the obliteration of "inaccuracy, ?useless, !confusion, et al.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 01:38
by Brannock
Also if you removed identification, to make curse stay relevant you'd have to add more curse-item type attacks into the game, and to make good gear generate cursed so the player has to make a decision if they want to wield that cursed +3 war axe knowing that they'll eventually have to burn a ?remove scroll on it.

Ashenzari would also be somewhat weakened. Removing identification would have a lot of ripples on the game.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 02:47
by Quazifuji
KoboldLord wrote:The best solution, of course, is just to give up on the item identification mini-game entirely. It's almost gone already, and putting that sacred cow down now would be a mercy to the cow as well as being delicious hamburger.


I'm in favor of this too, but I'd like to hear the dissenting opinions' reasoning. The thread's made it clear that some people do still like the ID minigame, and I'm pretty sure this discussion has happened before, which means there are reasons the idea has been rejected in the past. What were the reasons?

TeshiAlair wrote:I'm still in favor of an idea which was brought up a while ago, that being making cursed items more interesting.

I think it should go a similar route as to Contam: Typically powerful item with drawbacks.

Suggestions:

1. Make all cursed items curse on requip to make 2. work.
2. Make all cursed items at least average or better than average, with VERY rare exception.

Alternatively:
3. Make curses possibly do other things- for example, wielding a cursed weapon gives you -2 slay until you've gained x experience, or have it statrot you but removes the curse.


I really like this idea. Wear-IDing items is a pure gamble that I find uninteresting early in the game and pretty trivial later in the game when cursed items are rarely more interesting than just bad items that make you use a scroll of remove curse.

Ashenzari, I think, shows how cursing has the potential to be a much more interesting mechanic, if the emphasis isn't on "gotcha" moments when you equip ID early in the game, but more on items that having an unequip cost, similar to contamination, distortion, or vampiric. Making curse scrolls rarer and making cursed equipment better than average but work like the curse ego on randarts would make curses much more interesting to me. They'd still make wear-IDing risky if IDing stays, since you might be a character who depends on weapon switching and there's a risk that the cursed item will be worse than your current one, but there won't be any characters who get stuck wielding a -2 weapon for four floors of the dungeon cursing the game for not generating a remove curse scroll, and when you do get a good cursed item it would create an interesting decision rather than the current trivial "read remove curse if you have it."

The downside, I suppose, is that Ashenzari already somewhat captures this mechanic for people who like it (but I think there's some merit towards it only happening to select equipment instead of just cursing everything like Ash worshippers), and that if remove curse scroll generation was decreased you'd need to find some way to help out Ash worshippers if you didn't want a big nerf against them.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 03:35
by Ayutzia
cool guy who deleted my post: this is why nobody likes Tavern

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 06:02
by Sprucery
Quazifuji wrote:I'm in favor of this too, but I'd like to hear the dissenting opinions' reasoning. The thread's made it clear that some people do still like the ID minigame, and I'm pretty sure this discussion has happened before, which means there are reasons the idea has been rejected in the past. What were the reasons?

Can't speak for anyone else, but to me it's just that it is fun, I like it. I really wouldn't like all items to be identified from the start, that would be boring.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 06:38
by Hurkyl
Sprucery wrote:@Bloax: I guess you are playing a different game than me. How often do you find a -5 AC or a -6 slaying ring before you have found scrolls of remove curse?

Not often; but then I don't often wield/wear un-ID'd weapons/jewelry until I have a variety of unknown scrolls.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 07:42
by Bloax
It doesn't even matter if I find them before I find remove curse (if I do then it's just straight to the ^qyes because fuck that shit), but finding them after finding remove curse is even worse than before.
because you happened to find a high roll (and rare) item

except it's completely useless because they have to be Interesting &^DDD Fun

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 07:59
by Sprucery
So you think the game would be better if only good items spawned? Well, to each his own, I guess. I prefer there to be good and bad items.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 08:01
by Bloax
the amount of good items is already controlled by how often they spawn and exactly how good they are

i see no need to throw in an extra insult of actually having the former occur but the resulting item basically being a big "fuck you" to your face

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 08:17
by Sar
I think it's funny.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 18:17
by TeshiAlair
Question- I don't mean this to be snarky, but is there a reason this is considered worse design than allowing D1 adders, gnolls, or jackal packs?

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 18:30
by johlstei
D:1 giant lizards are tougher than D:1 gnolls, not that I really have a problem with either.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 19:25
by Igxfl
johlstei wrote:D:1 giant lizards are tougher than D:1 gnolls, not that I really have a problem with either.

Is this another one of those oblique hints about how speed is the only relevant stat?

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Tuesday, 16th September 2014, 19:28
by johlstei
Igxfl wrote:
johlstei wrote:D:1 giant lizards are tougher than D:1 gnolls, not that I really have a problem with either.

Is this another one of those oblique hints about how speed is the only relevant stat?

It's not the only relevant stat, especially on things with ranged attacks, but for melee monsters it kind of is. Gnolls are more dangerous if you're cornered and/or haven't found stairs/cleared enough space to pillardance, but you should really only die to them if you're being careless. D:1 adders are certainly more dangerous than them but you listed those.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Friday, 19th September 2014, 20:51
by PleasingFungus
KoboldLord wrote:The best solution, of course, is just to give up on the item identification mini-game entirely. It's almost gone already, and putting that sacred cow down now would be a mercy to the cow as well as being delicious hamburger.

nah.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Friday, 3rd October 2014, 20:16
by grisamentum
KoboldLord wrote:The best solution, of course, is just to give up on the item identification mini-game entirely. It's almost gone already, and putting that sacred cow down now would be a mercy to the cow as well as being delicious hamburger.


The only thing that bothers me about this post is the mixed metaphor!

;)

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Saturday, 4th October 2014, 23:45
by The Ferret
Could just make all backgrounds start with a scroll of remove curse.

If having ?rc identified for everyone is a problem (which I don't think it is), make it a "vial of purifying water" or whatever, that only ever generates in your starting inventory.

Or maybe expand the concept of giving everyone a "get out of jail free" card to more than just remove curse, give everyone a unique non-generating consumable item that can be evoked exactly once to remove curse, identify, heal wounds or teleport.

Re: remove curse scrolls

PostPosted: Sunday, 5th October 2014, 00:09
by mikee
The Ferret wrote:Could just make all backgrounds start with a scroll of remove curse.

If having ?rc identified for everyone is a problem (which I don't think it is), make it a "vial of purifying water" or whatever, that only ever generates in your starting inventory.

Or maybe expand the concept of giving everyone a "get out of jail free" card to more than just remove curse, give everyone a unique non-generating consumable item that can be evoked exactly once to remove curse, identify, heal wounds or teleport.

I don't think any of these would really help. The perceived problem is that when you decrease the mean number of an item generated you're also decreasing the number possible to be generated when you're reasonably unlucky (like a few standard deviations below the mean), and some people find that new number leads to intolerable play. Probably a stronger change than just +1 per game would be needed if that is a problem.