Remove hunger costs from casting

[jejorda2]

If each channeled MP cost 10 gold, it would be hard to abuse channeling, but easy to use it in tough spots.

[Sandman25]

It always surprises me how threads "let's make casters' life less annoying" transform into "let's stop MP regeneration", "let's make MP cost gold" etc.

[archaeo]

The problem IMHO isn't the natural regeneration of MP, it's the sources of channeling combined with the ability of players to min-max when they have such a source.

I feel like this could be solved by doing a bit of a channeling overhaul, as one can see in the other thread devoted to the subject. I like the idea of channeling providing substantially more MP but requiring more turns. Alternately, you could make it give more MP but make channeling cause exh, or add glow, or be an XP-charged evoker, or etc. etc.

Honestly, I feel like you could just make Sif act as though you channeled every turn and it wouldn't be overpowered, like some kind of aggressive MP Regen+ linked to invo skill. Frankly, with casting/channeling hunger the way it is, a mild MP Regen ability would likely end up just being a Sif nerf.

[dowan]

What if we removed spell hunger, and replaced it with nothing at all. Then do the same thing to channeling. What's the big problem? Channeling's main cost is you have to worship Sif(A huge opportunity cost), plus 10 aut per use. The hunger aspect rarely matters. If it's that important to you to replicate the effect of going into starving during a long fight, channeling could stack up a debuff called "Tired" that eventually causes a channel to take 2 turns, and gets rid of the "tired" effect (Just like eating a fruit after getting starving from channeling). You could remove the staff of energy if that's considered a big problem for some reason (once again, its real cost is 10 aut).

Are mummy spellcasters OP? They're still worse than a BE. So why does spellcasting and channeling need a second limiter, when it's already worse than not spellcasting and channeling?

[johlstei]

It always surprises me how threads "let's make casters' life less annoying" transform into "let's stop MP regeneration", "let's make MP cost gold" etc.

Honestly I want something to change to make melee characters lives better, and somehow splitting spell hunger from exploration hunger would have a large positive impact I think.

[Tenaya]

What if we removed spell hunger, and replaced it with nothing at all.

If we did that then the only limitation to currently high-hunger cost spells would be MP. This would be tactically very different than the current condition where over-reliance on high-hunger spells requires strategic consumable trade-offs.

[Sandman25]

If we did that then the only limitation to currently high-hunger cost spells would be MP. This would be tactically very different than the current condition where over-reliance on high-hunger spells requires strategic consumable trade-offs.

What do you mean as "strategic consumable"? All spells are hungerless with staff of energy

[tasonir]

My main issue with current spell hunger is actually how it's displayed: having a spell you use often at 5 # or 6 #'s can be an issue, but the issue is almost entirely solved by going to 4 #'s. Going to 0 #'s is generally a waste. It's because the #'s aren't linear, so 5# could be 280 spell hunger, and 4# could be 130, or ~46% of the original. Of course it could also be going from 201 to 200, but you can gain a significant amount of spellcasting/int and only slightly budge the #'s. Imho showing the numbers here would be pretty clear because there's no real formula at all, all you have to show is the scale (a ration is 5000 nutrition, a chunk 1000), and the player knows all they need to know.

In short, there's a fairly large critical point somewhere around the 4 # range, and you should just ignore hunger costs in the 1-3 # range.

If spell hunger is entirely removed, this is also fixed, although if spell hunger is staying, I'd say make this into an actual number and give the nutrition values for ration and chunk to provide scale.

[Sandman25]

Alternatively just make the scale linear (if you don't want to show it in % of chunk)

[Sprucery]

I wonder why the scale isn't linear in the first place?

[Sandman25]

It is similar to spell power.

Display spell hunger as a spellpower-style bar instead of as food types

http://git.develz.org/?p=crawl.git;a=co ... c5198945c7

[dowan]

What if we removed spell hunger, and replaced it with nothing at all.

If we did that then the only limitation to currently high-hunger cost spells would be MP. This would be tactically very different than the current condition where over-reliance on high-hunger spells requires strategic consumable trade-offs.

Well, they're basically unlimited consumables, and as Sandman pointed out, there's a relatively common item that totally removes that cost anyway (Surprisingly, it's not considered an OP item). Also you're forgetting the main strategic cost of casting high hunger cost spells, which is the XP you spent to get that spell castable.

A weird side effect of removing spell hunger would be that it would be a little more viable to raise evocations or invocations to increase your MP pool, although usually you raise spellcasting for more spell levels anyway, not for MP and reduced hunger.

[Siegurt]

FWIW I've seen a staff of energy in less than half of my games where it would be applicable, and wielding a staff of energy is an opportunity cost (as you can't weld an enhancer staff)

[Sandman25]

Enhancer staff is overrated for level 9 spells, it can be seen in wizard mode where you can see spell power as number. Level 9 spells require very high skill levels in magic schools and decent Int so spell power is subject to very serious stepdown.

[dowan]

What if Sif allowed hungerless casting and channeling. Would that make you more likely to take her? Would it be a no-brainer for spellcasting characters to go Sif?

I don't think it would, you're still paying a high opportunity cost.

[Quazifuji]

How hard would it be to get a no-spell-hunger experimental branch up somewhere? This thread seems to be full of abstract theorizing about whether or not removing spellhunger would have any significant effect on spell casters or not, and whether it spells would need some other nerf to be kept in check if it were removed. Maybe we should just set up a branch, try playing the game with no spell hunger, and see how things work in practice, instead of all these untested theories?

[duvessa]

I mean you can already try playing crawl with no spell hunger, just play any undead race.

[acvar]

As long as you can eat chunks the food clock is an outdated kludge that serves no real purpose spell hunger or not. Don't get rid of spell hunger just get rid of hunger! Make all wandering monster durable summons and actually solve the problem of scumming once and for all. Why does anybody defend the retention of a poorly designed, ineffective kludge?

[Sandman25]

I mean you can already try playing crawl with no spell hunger, just play any undead race.

It's not as fun as blasting everything as DE. Mu has bad aptitudes, Gh has the lowest Int, Vp is extremely annoying wrt healing.

[johlstei]

As long as you can eat chunks the food clock is an outdated kludge that serves no real purpose spell hunger or not. Don't get rid of spell hunger just get rid of hunger! Make all wandering monster durable summons and actually solve the problem of scumming once and for all. Why does anybody defend the retention of a poorly designed, ineffective kludge?

Isn't it still optimal to wait in a corner for stuff to enter your LOS?

[archaeo]

Isn't it still optimal to wait in a corner for stuff to enter your LOS?

One thought I posted upthread was that you'd replace the normal OOD timer with a resting timer, such that every time you spend too long in one spot, the game spawns an ambush, or summons monsters on top of you, or some other nasty effect. Or, another example, what if the game had a resting timer that would slowly increase the ability for monsters to find you, such that a regular rest might only slightly increase the likelihood of being seen by a monster, but just 5'ing in a corner will let every creature on the level know where you're at. A few of those ideas together, and I think you'd have it beat.

[reaver]

This logic would also apply to rod spell hunger, correct?

I don't see any reason why not but I understand its slightly different than normal spell hunger (can't be entirely eliminated with enough Evo skill, for example).

I agree with Lasty this is worth trying.

[Tenaya]

What if we removed spell hunger, and replaced it with nothing at all.

If we did that then the only limitation to currently high-hunger cost spells would be MP. This would be tactically very different than the current condition where over-reliance on high-hunger spells requires strategic consumable trade-offs.

Well, they're basically unlimited consumables, and as Sandman pointed out, there's a relatively common item that totally removes that cost anyway (Surprisingly, it's not considered an OP item). Also you're forgetting the main strategic cost of casting high hunger cost spells, which is the XP you spent to get that spell castable.

YMMV, but I often enter lair without having seen a staff of energy (I assume that is what you mean by "a relatively common item"). As such, even in a high-chunk location such as lair, the level 6 bolt spells use up enough nutrition that despite having sufficient MP, I can not eliminate an entire yak pack (for example). Either I stair dance to eat chunks or eat on the battlefield (which is a tactical accommodation), or I use up perma-food (which has a strategic cost). If casting had no hunger cost then once a spell was reliably castable one could just blast away with only consideration of MP and kiting needs. IMO, that is what would happen if we removed spell hunger, and replaced it with nothing at all.

I did not forget about the skill investment cost. The nutrition cost and skill investment cost are distinct. Getting level 6 spells to castable comes sooner than getting level 6 spells to have negligible hunger costs.