Let players throw a pebble from the ground to attract mon

[bel]

It is very annoying to carry stones in your inventory to attract monsters. Plus Felids can't throw at all, so they have to carry junk wands. It is very annoying on a stealthy character and serves no real purpose. Surely one can assume that the character found a pebble on the ground to throw at a monster without damaging it, like we assume that everyone carries a backpocket knife for butchering.

[dpeg]

There's been a recent stealth nerf: monsters shout now, stone or not.

[nago]

Personally I still use stone throwing after the nerf (despite the difference being very noticeable, making stone-throwing pretty much useless) because it's the only way I know to make autofight to stay still instead of rushing towards the enemy (and unexplored areas).

[bel]

There's been a recent stealth nerf: monsters shout now, stone or not.

I know that. But just because a monster shouts doesn't invalidate the tactic. Even if they shout, odds are that the other monsters haven't seen me. Plus, many monsters can't shout.

The current alternatives are to shout yourself (which goes in all directions, instead of just one direction) which opens up the possibility of getting swarmed from another direction you haven't seen.

[Sar]

Not all monsters can shout - green slimes, derived undead.

[Kate]

Personally I still use stone throwing after the nerf (despite the difference being very noticeable, making stone-throwing pretty much useless) because it's the only way I know to make autofight to stay still instead of rushing towards the enemy (and unexplored areas).

autofight_wait does this.

  Code:

autofight_wait = false
        If true, ===hit_closest_nomove while not in range of an enemy will
        wait for a turn instead of aborting autofight.

[njvack]

And if something is going to shout, I'd rather it do so 8 tiles from my position than immediately at my position. If the pack is remotely dangerous, I'll retreat to draw off the first member anyhow.

[KoboldLord]

Since throwing a pebble is an annoying and undesirable feature, perhaps instead of providing an infinite supply of implicit pebbles it would be better to remove the unwanted feature entirely. The purpose of the pebble is to alert one specific monster to the player's location without broadcasting that specific position to other monsters that may be nearby, so perhaps a monster that shouts upon noticing the player should automatically transfer its knowledge of the player's position to all other monsters in its shout radius. It might make it a bit tougher to break up packs this way, but monsters exist in pack form for a reason, so perhaps it would be a good thing to make it more difficult to avoid fighting monsters in the way they were designed to be fought.

[bel]

Pack monsters wander towards each other anyway I think, that's why they are always found together even after they are awake. I don't see what is undesirable about isolating something from a pack.

[bel]

Was just reminded of this, necro'd this post, since I don't really see any objections raised in the thread.

Also, there is a separate case I thought of: often I carry around some junk as a summoner/necromancer, so I can throw it at monsters to make my allies attack it, instead of "t"elling them, which is loud. This would also solve that issue. Though, one could simply make "t"ell non-loud.

[duvessa]

repurpose tt to make you say "yo" at all monsters in los, only waking up those monsters instead of making noise and alerting out of los monsters. shouting can be like tr or something. not sure what to do about the case where youre silenced, maybe if you do it while silenced you fart instead and the monsters in los smell it

[spudwalt]

I often hang onto Sting or Magic Dart after it stops being useful so I can use it to plink random monsters wandering by without necessarily alerting all their friends.