New Unrand: Sigmunds Baby Blanket

[Tiktacy]

A blanket bestowed upon the mighty caster Sigmund The Dreaded on the day of his birth. Its completely shredded and has pictures of deep elves all over it, but still just barely functions as a cape. You get the strange feeling that wearing it over your head will protect you from monsters as well, just as long as it covers your toes.

+0 Sigmunds Baby Blanket [Fragile, +inv, +3 slaying]

If possible, I would like it to instead say "pictures of [YOUR SPECIES]" so it would list whatever you are currently playing as.

[infinitevox]

Get rid of *Fragile and I'm down.

[Tiktacy]

Get rid of *Fragile and I'm down.

Fragile is the whole point of it. Its suppose to be a joke about how Sigmund destroyed his baby blanket when he was younger using his scythe.

[Quazifuji]

While the flavor's amusing, in general there seems to be a preference for unrands that add something interesting gameplay-wise. This both has no qualities that couldn't appear on a regular randart, and no interesting synergies or other combinations of effects that interact in cool ways and are unlikely to appear together on an unrand. I'd rather see something more flavorful be added.

One thought offhand: go with the "you're safe while covered with a childhood blanket idea" and make it give invisibility while waiting. I have no idea where this would fall balance-wise (I could see it being anywhere from useless to overpowered, honestly), but I feel like it would be a more unique way to match the childhood blanket theme than just +inv.

[Shard1697]

Well, what counts as waiting? How many turns do you have to not move to count as waiting? How do monsters react to this-normally monsters will still try to attack an invisible player, so it's still possible for you to die. So letting the player hit 5 with monsters around could instakill them.

[Tiktacy]

While the flavor's amusing, in general there seems to be a preference for unrands that add something interesting gameplay-wise. This both has no qualities that couldn't appear on a regular randart, and no interesting synergies or other combinations of effects that interact in cool ways and are unlikely to appear together on an unrand. I'd rather see something more flavorful be added.

One thought offhand: go with the "you're safe while covered with a childhood blanket idea" and make it give invisibility while waiting. I have no idea where this would fall balance-wise (I could see it being anywhere from useless to overpowered, honestly), but I feel like it would be a more unique way to match the childhood blanket theme than just +inv.

Ring of the mage, Vamp tooth, spriggins knife, morg, bloodbane, sword of jihad,arga, trogs wrath, Octopus trident, octopus rings, glaive of prune, finisher, eos, Punk, Robe of augmentation, robe of night, salamander hide, armor of the dragon king, shield of resistence, ratskin cloak, shield of ignorance, and Dyrovepreva.

All of those unrands exist purely for flavor reasons, most of them can be spawned with nearly identical stats on a randart. None of them add anything unique to the game, and while I do think some of them should be removed, I do think some of the fixarts with particularly interesting flavor and reasonable usefulness deserve to stay(Eos, sword of jihad, trogs wrath, just to name a few).

I had considered complicating this slightly, I originally had the idea of giving your weapon reach like a scythe, but I decided that making it simple but funny with good flavor and a little something unique would make it fit much better into crawls armory. The unique part was the slayer bonus and the fragile status, since no unrands currently have the fragile ego.

[sanka]

Vamp tooth, trogs wrath, Octopus trident, robe of night, salamander hide (...)

All of those unrands exist purely for flavor reasons, most of them can be spawned with nearly identical stats on a randart.

According to learnDB:

Vampire's tooth: heals more on hits than normal vampire weapons (heal for full hit instead of 3/5).
Wrath of Trog: forces berserk on 50% of attacks
Trident of the octopus king : Gains +1 for every {ring of the octopus king} worn.
Robe of night: reduces LOS by 2
Salamander hide: I do not think that evocable berserk can spawn on randart armours

Only the robe of the night seems to be a really bad example for your case tough.

[andreas]

I don't understand why arguments from precedence seem to have such a grip on the Tavern. Maybe those other things should be removed or improved? Why would it be a good idea to be consistent in favor of some poor principle? Maybe those other things are fine, but we have enough of them already. It seems like almost always it would be much better if people gave direct arguments in favor of their proposal: not, ''my idea is no worse than what we've already got,'' but ''my idea improves things in these ways.''

Anyway, in this case: artifacts that are basically strong existing item types with good flavor are fine with me, if not ideal. But an artifact whose main feature is a one-off joke seems less like a good idea; you see it once and it's amusing (if you get it; I didn't), but from then on it's just a slightly tweaked cloak of invisibility.

[Quazifuji]

Well, what counts as waiting? How many turns do you have to not move to count as waiting? How do monsters react to this-normally monsters will still try to attack an invisible player, so it's still possible for you to die. So letting the player hit 5 with monsters around could instakill them.

The number of turns to make it count could be decided based on what got the best results balance-wise. Monsters would react like if you went invisible through any other means. Of course it's still possible to die - a cloak that made you invincible while waiting would be absurdly overpowered.

That said, upon some consideration, I don't think the mechanic would work. At first, I figured it would make resting safer, since you'd be less likely to be detected by monsters that wandered by while resting. I think that could work fine, and also fits amazingly well with the theme of a baby blanket. However, after thinking about it, is also has the risk of opening up a very tedious strategy: if you're a melee character and, say, a centaur wanders into sight while you're hiding under your blanket, the optimal strategy is to hit s until it wanders into melee range, which is obviously tedious and not the kind of behavior we want. I don't think the mechanic could work unless that's addressed.

Ring of the mage, Vamp tooth, spriggins knife, morg, bloodbane, sword of jihad,arga, trogs wrath, Octopus trident, octopus rings, glaive of prune, finisher, eos, Punk, Robe of augmentation, robe of night, salamander hide, armor of the dragon king, shield of resistence, ratskin cloak, shield of ignorance, and Dyrovepreva.

I realize that unrandarts that don't have unique mechanics exist. That doesn't mean we need more of them. I've seen proposals to remove or rework some of the items you've listed. Also, I think some of those items are interesting enough when you find them due to the combination of mechanics on them to make up for the lack of any unique mechanics. I don't think Sigmund's Baby blanket would really provide anything particularly interesting that's unlikely to appear on a randart. It's good enough that many characters would be happy to wear it for a long time, possibly the whole game, and I don't think it would create any particularly interesting decisions about when to take it off - you either find something you think is better, or you don't.

I had considered complicating this slightly, I originally had the idea of giving your weapon reach like a scythe, but I decided that making it simple but funny with good flavor and a little something unique would make it fit much better into crawls armory. The unique part was the slayer bonus and the fragile status, since no unrands currently have the fragile ego.

I don't think an unrand with an ego that can already appear on randarts is very interesting on its own. I do think it would be possible to create an interesting unrand with the fragile ego without it necessarily needing to have a unique mechanic - I just think it would need an interesting mix of other egos that makes deciding whether it's worth wearing an interesting decision. Something situational or with drawbacks, or a ring or amulet that you might otherwise want to be able to swap, could be interesting. But I don't think the fragile ego on a cloak with slaying and +inv really creates any interesting decisions.

[ion_frigate]

I don't think it would create any particularly interesting decisions about when to take it off - you either find something you think is better, or you don't.

Isn't this pretty much the general problem with Fragile? In theory it could also be used to add a decision to tactical swapping, but the for most-frequently tactically swapped items - rings - it doesn't prevent that at all unless you get two desirable rings with the property.

EDIT: Fixed malformed misquote.

[andreas]

I don't think it would create any particularly interesting decisions about when to take it off - you either find something you think is better, or you don't.

Isn't this pretty much the general problem with Fragile? In theory it could also be used to add a decision to tactical swapping, but the for most-frequently tactically swapped items - rings - it doesn't prevent that at all unless you get two desirable rings with the property.

I didn't say that, Quazifuji did. It seems to me that ''you ask yourself whether you have found something better or not'' characterizes a very large portion of equipment choices, not just those where at least one object has *fragile, and the choices are not necessarily less interesting for it.

[dpeg]

I like the item proposed in the OP.

[Tiktacy]

I like the item proposed in the OP.

I knew dpeg would like this. <3

Dpeg is like the Guy Fieri of the tavern, he's all about that flavor, just like my proposal.

[duvessa]

Dpeg is like the Guy Fieri of the tavern, he's all about that flavor, just like my proposal.

what is it with you and comparing Tavern posters to people with goofy hair

[Tiktacy]

I don't understand why arguments from precedence seem to have such a grip on the Tavern. Maybe those other things should be removed or improved? Why would it be a good idea to be consistent in favor of some poor principle? Maybe those other things are fine, but we have enough of them already. It seems like almost always it would be much better if people gave direct arguments in favor of their proposal: not, ''my idea is no worse than what we've already got,'' but ''my idea improves things in these ways.''

Anyway, in this case: artifacts that are basically strong existing item types with good flavor are fine with me, if not ideal. But an artifact whose main feature is a one-off joke seems less like a good idea; you see it once and it's amusing (if you get it; I didn't), but from then on it's just a slightly tweaked cloak of invisibility.

Its playing on how younger kids feel safe from "monsters" when they are completely covered in a blanket.

Also, the fragility is supposed to add flavor the the character of sigmund, implying he has been trying to kill characters like 'you' since he was a baby, which is why its shredded by his scythe(much like how many players end up who cross his path).

Its also a very very good cloak. randart cloaks are very rare in my experience, and also generally not very good. The other unrand cloaks are pretty good too, but none of them offer invisibility or give a slaying bonus, also there exists no unrand with fragility right now, and I like the thought of representing all of crawls effects in unrands.

Adding items with character into the game adds a level of charm to the game, and the charm of a game plays a large part in game design.

[Sar]

it makes me imagine a little babby sigmund with a little babby scythe

I don't like it at all

[andreas]

[snip]

Its also a very very good cloak. randart cloaks are very rare in my experience, and also generally not very good. The other unrand cloaks are pretty good too, but none of them offer invisibility or give a slaying bonus, also there exists no unrand with fragility right now, and I like the thought of representing all of crawls effects in unrands.

Adding items with character into the game adds a level of charm to the game, and the charm of a game plays a large part in game design.

I don't (and didn't) contest the strength of the item or the value of flavor.

[Rast]

randart cloaks are very rare in my experience, and also generally not very good.

The roulette wizlab has a bunch. Usually one of them is pretty solid.

[Quazifuji]

I don't think it would create any particularly interesting decisions about when to take it off - you either find something you think is better, or you don't.

Isn't this pretty much the general problem with Fragile? In theory it could also be used to add a decision to tactical swapping, but the for most-frequently tactically swapped items - rings - it doesn't prevent that at all unless you get two desirable rings with the property.

Yes, it is. That was kind of my point. If the goal is to create a fixedart with fragile, I feel like the best approach would to be find a way to make an item where fragile really creates a more compelling decision than it usually does. I don't think this item does that. It just behaves like any other fragile item.

While I realize I'm being negative in this thread, I don't really have any reason to oppose the item. It's not like it would make the game worse, I'd certainly be happy to find a cloak with some slaying occasionally, and the flavor's fun. I just don't think the item would really add anything meaningful to the game gameplay-wise, and I think there are much more interesting things that can be done with both the "baby blanket" flavor and the "fixedart with fragile" gameplay concept, personally.