I had a parallel conversation with Siegurt by PM – fortunately, since it allowed a focus that would have been lost had other people contributed. If anything, this delineates two perspectives on the matter. In retrospect, Siegurt has been saying it all along: the gap in power between luring and not-luring, and the number of times the game has you make a “do I lure or not” decision, do not matter, because luring is tedious by definition. I argued against it, and I don't have anything to add at this point. Siegurt's messages are in blue.
Siegurt wrote:Similarly there is also "breaking apart arbitrary groups of critters who happened to be closer to each other" this is actually fairly similar to pack breaking, but it is slightly easier since the critters aren't actively trying to stay together. They are just all chasing you.
a third thing that happens is "drawing critters into cleared areas so as to minimize noise and risk of attracting things that aren't in the immediate area"
I can't tell the difference between thing 2 and thing 3
it's like you're paraphrasing the same thing
or rather, thing 3 is what follows thing 2
since, if you've done thing 2, what else are you gonna do, other than thing 3?
this may be the source of our misunderstanding
(you can quote this in thread if you feel necessary)
Thing 2 is "breaking apart things that are close together so you only have v to fight them one c at a time"
Thing 3 is "drawing any creature away from undiscovered areas into already cleared areas *regardless of the presence of other creatures* because the combat might potentially attract unwanted attention from things you don't know about and have never seen"
The actual actions are similar, but the situation and reasons for the actions are different. In thoery, it is optimal to lure every creature in the game into cleared areas to fight it whether or not there is anything else nearby, just on the off chance the noise attracts something else, or something wanders by while you are injured.Again, I fail to see what differentiates the two scenarios. What is the variable that changes across the two scenarios?
Is it the distance – far enough, or not far enough, for anything else to hear the combat? Suppose I ensure I get noticed by an orc warrior and lure it out of a room full of enemies into an adjacent hallway. I’ve taken it out of LOS of unaware monsters. I’ve already done 80% of the work needed to take it out their earshot. I might as well lure it far enough for nothing to hear.
Is it the player’s awareness of monsters? Suppose I open a door straight-on and see the whole room, and catch the attention of 1 orc warrior among other monsters, and lure it – that’s non-degenerate. But suppose I open the door from the side, diagonally, and see only half the room, and only 1 orc warrior, and catch its attention, and lure it, just in case there are other monsters – that’s degenerate. Correct?
These distinctions seem really arbitrary to me, I mean coin-flip level of arbitrary.
Actually, this got me thinking. Maybe many people are making this distinction? They want to keep one scenario, but not the other? This could be why we see very odd mechanics getting brought up, like “the chasing monster starts doing X voodoo stuff after getting lured for Y number of turns”. It’s a tension – a desire to keep some lurings and eliminate others – that I don’t understand.
If you dedicate to fighting (AKA making noise)
within earshot or
until more threats appear, you enforce that which would happen without your consent if monsters continuously alerted other monsters, and you might as well give up the pretention that you’re luring, because all you’re doing is fleeing or repositioning.
I can guess “c” is “creature”. What is “v”?
(I suggest we continue this conversation privately, and then I’ll put it all on Tavern, if you don’t mind.)
It has nothing to do with distance, it's all about whether it's optimal for *every creature in the game* or not.
If I stumble across a lone quokka, with nothing else in LOS, it's presently *still optimal* to not merely draw it to your current position (or a nearby one) but back into an area far away from any possible source of danger.
It's all about motivation, with the orc warrior situation you outlined, it's about mitigating a known threat through positioning (in particular with orc warriors, they're almost never alone), with the quokka situation, it's about mitigating possible unknown threats, which are unlikely to even exist.It's hard for me to extract the main idea from what you're saying. I try to lay everything clean and bare. You're saying "motivation" and "every" (as opposed to "all but one" AKA "not every"??) like everything's supposed to click into place for me. Eh, maybe it's just me. So:
good: mitigating a known threat
bad: mitigating an unknown (and unlikely?) threat
pfff, I think I'm too tired to seriously ponder that at the moment.
So the holy grail solution would be to make it so:
optimal: not-luring quokka and luring orc warriors
sub-optimal: luring quokkas and not-luring orc warriors
Huh, I guess I'm starting to see where those odd proposals, doom clock etc are trying to wedge themselves.
I'm merely pointing out that they are two different things, I'm not trying to posit a holy grail of solution, only point out that two different reasons for luring require two different discussions about whether it's: tedious, optimal, and degenerate, and possibly two different solutions (If, indeed, both types of luring are considered bad for the game by that metric)
Even if the actions are the same, the reasons for taking those actions are different.
I am not *certain* it's bad for the game that it's good tactics to use luring to break apart groups of critters (it might be, but I'm really not convinced that it's so.) I *am* sure that it's bad for the game that you can marginally reduce your risk at no cost by luring every single critter in the game without regards to whether or not that creature specifically poses more risk in one position vs another.
I actually think that luring being a powerful positive tactic is a good thing, but presently it has no drawback or counter balance (I suspect originally the intention was for the food clock and OOD timers to provide such a drawback, but they fail at that task) and without such it becomes the optimal action for all encounters everywhere in the game, with a drawback that discouraged too-frequent use, you'd only want to use it where it had a definitive and measurable impact, as opposed to when it the benefit was marginal.Making "lurable" the default, and attaching a cost to the luring of popcorn only, sounds like a difficult goal. And it's difficult to communicate. But that's how many people seem to be thinking.
You just striked upon the reverse of that. That is, so that the default is "not lurable", and the drawback to luring is related to frequency of use. In other words, luring is possible, but has an in-game cost attached every time you elect to use it. What comes immediately to mind: 1)XP-gated timers like on evokers, 2)long-term cost via consumable depletion or something like draining, 3)reward for completing a "quest", like killing a certain monster or getting to a certain place on time. The thing that enables luring can be increased sound attenuation, or increased ambient noise, or something that restricts monsters' ability to shout.
Why aren't proposals based around this, then? "Rampant luring is bad but some forms of luring should be granted" is a position that people can legitimately take. Imagine if Crawl's evocables, for example, didn't have XP-gated or long-term penalties, and were boring due to lack of drawback. And to prevent them from being spammable, people proposed that the solution is to make
overusing the evoker "wake up monsters all over the level" or "give swiftness to monsters" or "make you incapable of moving away from a monster". That sounds ridiculous if you're viewing luring as just another tool along with potions and evocables, but that's the spirit of much the discussion in the thread.
But the player should be the one deciding whether an encounter is worth luring, and tanking that cost. You're gonna have problems if you think the game is going to do it well by itself.
In any case, this is much more easily done if Degenerate Luring is impossible by default, and even then, it might turn out to be unnecessary.
Well, i and dpeg both made suggestions along those lines, mine wasn't a very *interesting* suggestion, nevertheless my suggestion is generally speaking "attach an accumulative penalty for using luring, which is small enough that you could still use it in important situations, thereby attaching a real decision about overusing luring" I never suggested that the game should decide if the encounter was worth using luring or not.
As a *bad* suggestion, lets say we attached a significant food cost to moving with creatures in LOS, this would effecitvely not be a penalty if you only lured occasionally, or only used non-degenerate luring tactics, and it would become a progressively larger penalty the more you used it.
The reason that happens to be bad is that it's both hard do to communicate, and food is a terrible mechanic to attach more things to, it does however address the problem by attaching a cost to overusing luring while still making 'normal' use acceptable.
Some other suggestions in the thread along those lines are removing loot if you take too long (Just generally attaching a cost to taking too long to go through the level) and mine of increasing the OOD timer when moving when creatures are in LOS (thereby increasing risk) I don't consider that a very good solution, because I don't think the OOD timer mechanic works overly well, Also Lasty's suggestion for a 'doom clock' which increases risk generally on a level the longer you've been there.Suppose I find simulacra and decide to go get some stashed rC+ items, and retreat with them in tow. Or, I'm fighting normal-speed monsters in a place where I'm not afraid of anything hearing our combat, but not near stairs, and my HP gets uncomfortably low, so I track back to stairs and the monsters follow. Or, autotravel stops upon a quokka and I just decide to manually move to where I want instead of tabbing the quokka. Or, I'm trying to round up a bunch of monsters to get the most use out of a long-lasting buff or a mass bomb (immo/torment/slouch/etc). There is no luring there, but if the game qualifies that as luring, the player accumulates a penalty. That's not fair. If you want the game to discriminate between genuine luring and not-really-luring (and where does pillar dancing belong?), that's a super-hard task, hard to program, would likely be broken and breakable anyway, like Nemelex's Genuine Card Use conduct back in the day.
I don't think it's just a food cost that would be difficult to communicate. So would waking distant monsters, destroying loot, increased out-of-depth spawns, etc. It would be a weird, strange, obnoxious mechanic, which does not need to be there, and exists to nerf some obscure player behavior, but interferes with normal gameplay.
That's why I'm not saying the solution is to provide incentives for non-luring, or disincentives for luring. If you want to curtail the behavior of luring, just... make it not a behavior. Walking away from a monster has a
side-effect of luring it away from other monsters, due to how noise and AI work. Just get rid of the side-effect. Then you could still retreat, but retreat won't be hopelessly intertwined with luring.
Actually I still don't even get why unlimited luring of dangerous enemies like single orc warriors, which is usually equivalent to insta-gibbing them, is a great feature to have in the game.
I can't see why people are attached to their precious luring. Could be Mountain Dwarf Syndrome.
It sounds like your proposed solution is 1. If a monster has seen you ever, it will track you indefinitely, and 2. Combat noise does wake up or attract the attention of other critters.
1. Is problematic, it moves the pack breaking aspect of letting back to staircases, making it more tedious, not less. If your proposal includes making creatures follow up stairs that is problematic from both a coding and logistical problem, coding wise because once you move of the level all critters aren't in memory any longer to track, and logistic wise because one end of the stairs may have more room than the other, and there isn't any where to put all the following critters, if the solution is don't bring critters upstairs if they don't fit, the you re introduce pack breaking, but move it back to an appropriate stair set, which makes it significantly more tedious than it is now, but no less powerful.
2. Wouldn't be significantly problematic from a coding or logistical standpoint, but again, it means if you can see one b pay off a group of critters, but not the rest, you can pick them of one at a time by luring, and it makes the process safer and more predictable, making luring more powerful, while less tedious, not what you were going for.
You might mean something else, I am interpreting vs going of what you said directly. But eliminating the behavior is actually worse in any implementation I have seen proposed than just leaving it alone.Your response is full of non-sequiturs. Why do you bother interpreting? I do in fact say it directly. And I proposed neither 1 nor 2. But I even disagree with you about why 1 and 2 are problematic. Actually I can't understand half the things you say, so I suspect you're drunk or something. "b pay off a group of critters, but not the rest" - ??
Siegurt wrote:It sounds like your proposed solution is 1. If a monster has seen you ever, it will track you indefinitely, and 2. Combat noise does wake up or attract the attention of other critters.
1 is already part of Ash wrath, and is not problematic logistically or coding-wise. Letting monsters forget you is not a crucial element of luring, so 1 does not impact luring in any obvious way.
2 would actually be like current Crawl, but less spoilery. If combat noise were zero, then you could lure an orc warrior around a corner and safely kill it. But a newbie sees it summon friends from just out of LOS. Presumably, the orc warrior is shouting for help. But actually, no - that's just the noise of you hitting it, attracting attention. The newbie is confusing combat noise for group AI. That is what I meant by calling "group-clustering AI" an illusion in my first post on the thread.
If monsters shouted continuously, combat noise would be almost redundant most of the time. And you can't reasonably claim it's problematic from a coding or logistical standpoint. Like, even berserk monsters already make noise continuously when they see you. You just copy-paste those lines of code for all hostile monsters that see and seek you.
Aww hell, I just realized you're letting auto-suggest give me crap. *sigh*
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:Your response is full of non-sequiturs. Why do you bother interpreting? I do in fact say it directly.
I have re-read your initial post and don't see a specific proposal at all, you say
"Walking away from a monster has a side-effect of luring it away from other monsters, due to how noise and AI work. Just get rid of the side-effect. Then you could still retreat, but retreat won't be hopelessly intertwined with luring."
But you don't specify what *should* happen instead.
There's a few problems with this:
1. What does "separated" mean, If I encounter an orc warrior, and haven't seen some nearby orcs who are part of his pack, and start walking away, does he follow me, or his pack that I haven't seen yet, how about the hobgoblin who is also near the pack but not part of it, what about the ogre who happens to be near-ish to both myself and the orc warrior, but not in LOS of either one of us? You need to define what you mean by "other monsters" so that we can define what you mean by "separated from"
2. Even if we presume that we have a definition of "other creatures" that shouldn't be separated from the one (or group of) creatures you can see, and we have no "other creatures" per that definition, it's presently *still optimal to lure that singular creature* because while you're fighting one creature another creature could wander nearby and *become* part of that definition, so even if we eliminate the 'breaking creatures apart from each-other' aspect, *it doesn't fix the problem at all, because luring is still tedious and optimal* You've mis-identified the problem, which is why your solution doesn't work.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:And I proposed neither 1 nor 2. But I even disagree with you about why 1 and 2 are problematic. Actually I can't understand half the things you say, so I suspect you're drunk or something. "b pay off a group of critters, but not the rest" - ??
As it happened I wasn't drunk, I just typed that response on my cell phone, and my auto correct sometimes does things without me noticing when I'm going quickly.
Here's the paragraph corrected for readability:
Siegurt wrote:2. Wouldn't be significantly problematic from a coding or logistical standpoint, but again, it means if you can see only one out of a group of critters, but not the rest, you can pick them of one at a time by luring, and it makes the process safer and more predictable, making luring more powerful, while less tedious, not what you were going for.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:Siegurt wrote:It sounds like your proposed solution is 1. If a monster has seen you ever, it will track you indefinitely, and 2. Combat noise does wake up or attract the attention of other critters.
1 is already part of Ash wrath, and is not problematic logistically or coding-wise. Letting monsters forget you is not a crucial element of luring, so 1 does not impact luring in any obvious way.
2 would actually be like current Crawl, but less spoilery. If combat noise were zero, then you could lure an orc warrior around a corner and safely kill it. But a newbie sees it summon friends from just out of LOS. Presumably, the orc warrior is shouting for help. But actually, no - that's just the noise of you hitting it, attracting attention. The newbie is confusing combat noise for group AI. That is what I meant by calling "group-clustering AI" an illusion in my first post on the thread.
If monsters shouted continuously, combat noise would be almost redundant most of the time. And you can't reasonably claim it's problematic from a coding or logistical standpoint. Like, even berserk monsters already make noise continuously when they see you. You just copy-paste those lines of code for all hostile monsters that see and seek you.
Aww hell, I just realized you're letting auto-suggest give me crap. *sigh*
Hehe, yes, sorry about that I shouldn't type long replies on my cell, it gets me into trouble, and I miss things it doesn't do properly.
If monsters shouted all the time, it'd be even more optimal than it is now to draw every fight back into cleared areas, because shouting is generally louder than combat, also when you initially encounter a critter, it shouts (typically) and monsters are attracted *to that spot* which is yet another reason to fight the thing you want to fight elsewhere.
Monsters not losing track of you isn't problematic on it's own, it's just not a solution for luring (Which I think now reading your current message that we both agree on) If anything it makes luring more predictable. When I said "track you indefinitely" when I thought you were proposing that as a solution for luring (which it appears you are not) I also thought you meant "across levels" which *would* be a problem coding wise (not impossible, but really really annoying)
Again, I feel like the point has been missed, the problem with luring isn't *specifically* that it breaks apart packs or groups of monsters, it's that it's both tedious and optimal, and having it not break apart groups of monsters doesn't make it not-optimal, only slightly less powerful than it is now.
Anything that preserves monsters being attracted to whatever you're fighting now, and doesn't attach any cost to taking the turns needed to lure things away from possible trouble, doesn't fix the 'optimal' part of the problem, and there's nothing to be done to make luring any less tedious (Well, maybe allow auto-travel while monsters are in LOS, but I don't think a UI tweak is really the way to fix the problems here.)
So that reduces us to either: 1. We make it so there's no cost to fighting monsters you discover in place (it's equivalent to moving the fight elsewhere) which means pretty much the whole noise system needs to be thrown out in it's entiretly. Or 2. We attach some kind of real cost to relocating combats, whether that's a general low-level cost for spending extra turns, or a specific cost for certain circumstances certainly does bear discussion. Also worth discussing whether to make it an opportunity cost (give a reward for fighting in place that you don't get if you relocate the combat) or a simple direct cost.You define "other creatures" well enough in your own words:
Siegurt wrote:when you initially encounter a critter, it shouts (typically) and [other] monsters are attracted *to that spot*
so pretty much whatever you'd end up fighting if you stood and fought instead of drawing some monsters back; or somewhat less than that.
Siegurt wrote:If monsters shouted all the time, it'd be even more optimal than it is now to draw every fight back into cleared areas
OK, but you wouldn't be drawing back just whatever monsters *noticed you*. If you *just* draw back monsters that *notice you*, that's degenerate luring. But if you draw *them*, *and all their friends*, then that's tactical repositioning.
Siegurt wrote:because shouting is generally louder than combat
I'm not qualified to tell what the perfect loudness for continuous shouting should be, but anything between zero and normal shouts would be an improvement over the current situation.
Siegurt wrote:the problem with luring isn't *specifically* that it breaks apart packs or groups of monsters, it's that it's both tedious and optimal
ugh, how do you keep these apart in your mind? Luring breaks apart monsters. Breaking monsters apart is the property that makes luring tedious+optimal. Because breaking apart monsters is tedious+optimal. Luring inherits "tedious+optimal" from the breaking apart of monsters. Basic logic, no?
Siegurt wrote:having it not break apart groups of monsters doesn't make it not-optimal, only slightly less powerful than it is now.
only
slightly less powerful? ummm... I'd be happy enough with "slightly" nerfed luring, which just doesn't break apart groups anymore
Siegurt wrote:So that reduces us to either: 1. We make it so there's no cost to fighting monsters you discover in place (it's equivalent to moving the fight elsewhere)
Yes, precisely...
Siegurt wrote:which means pretty much the whole noise system needs to be thrown out in it's entiretly
WUT
I gave an example, which you understood, of how to do this with existing sound mechanics (continuous shouting). Granted, it's just an example. I'm sure you can contrive another system, for example: monsters get an 'alert' flag when they notice you, and awake monsters are visually attracted to 'alert'-flagged monsters or their last-seen location, which get priority over noise. But, I just think continuous shouting is simpler and easier to implement and debug, as well as discuss, making it better as a proposal.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:WUT
I gave an example, which you understood, of how to do this with existing sound mechanics (continuous shouting). Granted, it's just an example. I'm sure you can contrive another system, for example: monsters get an 'alert' flag when they notice you, and awake monsters track these 'alert'-flagged monsters (like they'd track a player), which get priority over noise if they're more than ~2 tiles away from the awake monster. But, I just think continuous shouting is simpler and easier to implement and debug, as well as discuss, making it better as a proposal.
FIXED, what was I even thinking...
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:HardboiledGargoyle wrote:WUT
I gave an example, which you understood, of how to do this with existing sound mechanics (continuous shouting). Granted, it's just an example. I'm sure you can contrive another system, for example: monsters get an 'alert' flag when they notice you, and awake monsters track these 'alert'-flagged monsters (like they'd track a player), which get priority over noise if they're more than ~2 tiles away from the awake monster. But, I just think continuous shouting is simpler and easier to implement and debug, as well as discuss, making it better as a proposal.
FIXED, what was I even thinking...
It still doesn't make luring go away (which was your stated goal)
Continuous shouting doesn't make luring go away either, in both cases, it is optimal to get the creature(s) who are awake and have noticed you as far from any who haven't (and might not be in your los yet) as possible as quickly as you can.Siegurt wrote:It still doesn't make luring go away (which was your stated goal)
How does it not? I'll assume you're referring to the part in bold font: An orc warrior sees you, gets an 'alert' flag, shouts, and now everything in ITS line of sight is following IT as IT follows YOU, so you got a LOS-ful of monsters on your tail. You can't lure away the single orc warrior anymore, which is my main intention. It is the great Luring Nerf.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:You define "other creatures" well enough in your own words:
Siegurt wrote:when you initially encounter a critter, it shouts (typically) and [other] monsters are attracted *to that spot*
Ok, so i see at least part of the ccommunication problem here, the creatures which are attracted to any given noise (say a shout) aren't a pre defined set of creatures, each critter has a chance of being attracted to a noise, depending on how far away it is, what kinds of walls are in the way, whether it is asleep or wandering etc. And it may or may not actually find its way onto your los, it may give up and start wandering. The "set of things which would come find you if you just had the combat on the spot" is unknown and unknowable in the current system, and changes drastically if move even slightly, or change how much noise you make in combat.
We could go with the greatest extent (say, all things that could in the current system be attracted to your current position) but what noise do we use to determine it? The loudest one you could make? A specific one (say, a shout?) What if I stab something silently, does that also cause the tracking behavior? What about when I encounter one of the things I attracted, does it re trigger for the things that are in range of that creature? What about the things that are in range of the things that are attracted, does it chain? If not, how do we decide who the center point is?
So a couple points here: if the number of creatures attracted are based off the noise level of your current action, rather than an arbitrary one, it is optimal to lure, because you can always take a quiet action move away, and take a louder action (that is the current situation, you just remove randomness, which just makes luring more defined and predictable), if it is based on an arbitrary noise level then we need to move on to the secondary creatures, if secondary creatures might attract more creatures, then it is still optimal to lure so that they won't.
Then there is the interaction with stealth, if I don't wake up a critter and haven't made any noise yet, I assume we don't have anything awake and tracking us, but if I do, what if I move to a place where just that monster is in range of shouting and start shooting myself, or flinging fire storms, who comes running? Anyone? no one?
Defining "nearby creatures" in a consistent and specific way is not as simple as you have made it out to be, and noise is a pretty complex and subtle thing presently, you might have a specific set of rules in mind for how all that should work (it might even be a very good one), but I haven't heard it yet.Whoa, this isn't about defining the outcome of an encounter, only the laws that dictate how it unfolds. You can't suppose that a solution to luring must involve some preordained selection of creatures that shall follow the player. You wouldn't need to set "the number of creatures attracted" nor consider the player's future or past actions. It is dynamically generated. On the fly.
That's how the current system does it too. It runs off a number of rules that monsters must follow. And with the current set of rules, you get such behaviour as "lured monsters leave their pack behind and wandering aimlessly". Does the game specifically order monsters to run away from their pack? No, but that's what happens.
Very simple example: you have 0 stealth, a monster wanders into your LOS, and you can't move or blink out of its LOS. Only one outcome is possible next turn: if it's still alive by then, the monster
will notice you. Now, at this point, the game hasn't figured out that the monster will notice you. But it doesn't need to. It doesn't matter that the game doesn't know. So as a developer, you don't need to make the game know that. Thus the questions you ask do not need to be answered, yet the game will work properly.
Indeed, with constantly shouting monsters, you don't know how many will end up following you. Hell, maybe just one monster notices you, but before it gets any friends to notice you, you blow it up with a wand of disintegration, and walk away scot-free.
And you say a thing (what thing?) needs to be based on a noise level you must set, as a dev? Are you sure you didn't misunderstand what I mean by continuously shouting monsters? They just shout continuously - that's pretty much it - and it's this shouting that attracts other monsters, because shouting is noise, and noise attracts monsters.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:Whoa, this isn't about defining the outcome of an encounter, only the laws that dictate how it unfolds. You can't suppose that a solution to luring must involve some preordained selection of creatures that shall follow the player. You wouldn't need to set "the number of creatures attracted" nor consider the player's future or past actions. It is dynamically generated. On the fly.
But that is my question, if it is dynamically generated, *what system do we use to dynamically generate it*
By definition it is either determined by player actions, or by some other pre set algorithm, those being the only two categories of things that exist.Siegurt wrote:HardboiledGargoyle wrote:Whoa, this isn't about defining the outcome of an encounter, only the laws that dictate how it unfolds. You can't suppose that a solution to luring must involve some preordained selection of creatures that shall follow the player. You wouldn't need to set "the number of creatures attracted" nor consider the player's future or past actions. It is dynamically generated. On the fly.
But that is my question, if it is dynamically generated, *what system do we use to dynamically generate it*
By definition it is either determined by player actions, or by some other pre set algorithm, those being the only two categories of things that exist.
We use the existing system, the system of noise. You understand noise. So what's the problem? What part of this is ambiguous? I don't see your question.
When you cast LRD on a wall, and monsters come to you, what system is used to dynamically generate the movement of monsters from their original position to you? The system of LRD making noise, and monsters being attracted to noise. Or, when you're following Qazlal, how do monsters keep finding you? Qazlal makes noise at your location, which is constantly changing (or not), and that noise draws monsters. It's perfectly analogous.
Player actions and pre set algorithms interact, you know? So I don't agree that dynamic generation is, by definition, determined by only one of those things.
BTW yet more evidence that luring is not an obvious tactic (this is from an old advice thread; newbies have to be told this, i.e. spoiled): "Many enemies make noise upon seeing you, but that only draws other enemies to the spot where they made the noise. (They don't shout continuously or anything.)"
What is ambiguous is what change you are proposing to noise (or that uses the existing noise system?) to prevent luring from occurring
I don't recall ever saying it was obvious, only that it was tedious and optimal.
Having monsters shout all the time doesn't make it not optimal, it just changes the optimal location for luring from "the nearest cleared area" to "upstairs" If you propose a secondary change to remove the ability to go upstairs (although I don't know how you do that while preserving retreating as an option, the mechanism is irrelevant to luring ) then you luring to the nearest cleared area is still optimal, just slightly less glaringly so than it was when critters didn't shout.
Also, yes some things are player actions, some things are programming, and sometimes it is a combination of the two, I didn't mention the "combination" alternative because it seemed obvious to me and that it didn't need explicitly stated, however the pedantry doesn't help your case at all.
It seems like you are trying to solve the "luring is too powerful when used in this one way" problem, when the actual problem isnt that it is particularly powerful it is that it is always the best choice, if you reduce its power, *but it is still the best choice* then you have accomplished nothing in terms of making the game more fun (you might have made it "more balanced" but that is unimportant)Siegurt wrote:What is ambiguous is what change you are proposing to noise
I'm not proposing any change to noise. Noise will work like noise works now. That's why I literally call it noise and not X-that-works-somewhat-like-noise.
Siegurt wrote:Having monsters shout all the time doesn't make it not optimal, it just changes the optimal location for luring from "the nearest cleared area" to "upstairs"
How on earth are the two related?! They're independent! At least have the decency to explain your thought process or rescind. (I'm for the “
monsters can't use stairs” option.)
Siegurt wrote:still optimal, just slightly less glaringly so
True. (
Probably true.) But. I don't care much, and neither should you, if “luring THAT HAULS ENTIRE PACKS TOGETHER“ remains optimal. The important thing is that luring a single creature at a time (which you
pinpointed as the problem earlier in our conversation IIRC) stops being an option. 90% of the cheese in luring is gone. Problem solved, mission accomplished! Or would you rather bathe in cheese for a few more years until some perfectionist brings that 90% up to 100% or whatever your standard is? I addressed this a few messages back; apparently you ignored it:
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:OK, but you wouldn't be drawing back just whatever monsters *noticed you*. If you *just* draw back monsters that *notice you*, that's degenerate luring. But if you draw *them*, *and all their friends*, then that's tactical repositioning.
as well as how you keep calling new, non-degenerate luring “tedious and optimal”:
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:Luring breaks apart monsters. Breaking monsters apart is the property that makes luring tedious+optimal. Because breaking apart monsters is tedious+optimal. Luring inherits "tedious+optimal" from the breaking apart of monsters.
What pedantry do you accuse me of? My proposal is simplistic to the extreme. I don't see how your sentence here has anything to do with what we've said: “By definition it is either determined by player actions, or by some other pre set algorithm, those being the only two categories of things that exist.”
Siegurt wrote:the actual problem isnt that it is particularly powerful it is that it is always the best choice
No, it's not. If the best choice is very very safe and boring and takes no decisions, then it's a big problem. If taking the best choice *leads* to such interesting situations as having to deal with entire packs at the same time, then it's not a big problem. People are tempted to lure precisely because of the huge gap in power between luring and staying to fight. If the tedium of luring stays the same, but its power is reduced dramatically, then the temptation to boringly lure is that much smaller.
Siegurt wrote:you might have made it "more balanced" but that is unimportant
Ah, balance is unimportant apparently.
So, why does all importance lie in making luring suboptimal sometimes? (which this actually does; for example, imagine a monster-filled bottle-like vault on an open level - it could be optimal to rush into bottleneck with monsters beyond it, instead of luring them out of the bottle and into the open.) Lots of things are optimal, always, like having better defenses, or killing monsters before they kill you, or winning. You conflate all the ways you can "lure", as if they would all be the same under new "luring". In many games you're crouching behind obstacles for cover all the time, and their gameplay isn't in the binary decision of whether to use cover or not, but in using/changing cover well, and the other things you do while under cover, since it's presumed that you use cover.
You shouldn't base a game around a degenerate element; basing a game around a legitimate element is... inevitable to some degree - there's no way around it. But it looks like you have never distinguished degenerate and legitimate luring.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:True. (Probably true.) But. I don't care much, and neither should you, if “luring THAT HAULS ENTIRE PACKS TOGETHER“ remains optimal. The important thing is that luring a single creature at a time (which you pinpointed as the problem earlier in our conversation IIRC)
That's quite literally the exact opposite of my opinion, the ONLY thing I think is important is if a behavior is the best choice *AND* is tedious, if a thing is always the best choice, and makes the game boring, then it's bad for the game, whether it's "cheesy" or not.
If it's less powerful *but it's still the best option* then it doesn't matter if it's less powerful, people are still encouraged to do it, and if people are encouraged to do something boring, then it's bad for the game.
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:stops being an option. 90% of the cheese in luring is gone. Problem solved, mission accomplished! Or would you rather bathe in cheese for a few more years until some perfectionist brings that 90% up to 100% or whatever your standard is? I addressed this a few messages back; apparently you ignored it:
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:OK, but you wouldn't be drawing back just whatever monsters *noticed you*. If you *just* draw back monsters that *notice you*, that's degenerate luring. But if you draw *them*, *and all their friends*, then that's tactical repositioning.
as well as how you keep calling new, non-degenerate luring “tedious and optimal”:
HardboiledGargoyle wrote:Luring breaks apart monsters. Breaking monsters apart is the property that makes luring tedious+optimal. Because breaking apart monsters is tedious+optimal. Luring inherits "tedious+optimal" from the breaking apart of monsters.
That's incorrect, it's tedious because walking halfway across the level to fight something *is inherently tedious*, It's optimal because it's more powerful than any other option with no cost. Making it not break apart packs makes it less powerful, *but still more powerful than any other option and without any cost* and hence it's still tedious and optimal.