Friday, 30th October 2015, 22:20 by BobIsDead
I tend to agree that a less fancy race suggestion for fiery dudes would be a bad idea. Sure, the idea of a new race that's similar to any number of pre-existing races appeals to me from the perspective of novelty. But it's really only the novelty of it that appeals to me.
On the subject of novelty, I had an idea for a race about a year back for a Mayfly Race. The idea was a very quick and stealthy race that was loaded with advantages that would allow it to blitz through the early game and, arguably, be at an advantage come the mid-game. The downside would be that the race aged rapidly. As time passed, the race would slowly suffer permanent stat decay until it finally reached stat zero. The idea was that, in order to succeed with this race, one had to be quick about getting to the Orb and out, before their character became unplayably sucky. I never formally suggested it as an idea because, honestly, even I can tell when an idea of mine is that bad.
Anyway, I bring this up because I think it could be reworked into a fiery dude that has a trick to it without being as hideously convoluted as other races. The lore would be that the race (let's call them Salamanders) have a flame within them that gives them power. This power takes the form of strength, speed, proficiency with fire magic, being able to spit fire. However, as time passes, their internal flame dwindles. Their snazzy powers would begin to lose their edge and eventually cease altogether.
The general pitch behind it is that it's easy in the early game, hard in the late game, perfect for newbies to explore the early game with, whilst also allowing for interesting challenge runs for more veteran players. Of course, the counter-pitch is that such a race wouldn't exactly be novel for crawl and, anyway, causing players to become weaker as the game goes on seems counterintuitive. So this isn't really a sincere proposal. It's more just general brainstorming for how a hypothetical fire-based race that could bring more to crawl than just another fiery dude.