Display monster AC as range

[VeryAngryFelid]

I met a player ghost on Vaults 1 and it had "AC ********"
What does it mean?
Please display it as "AC 40-45" so I can compare it to my own AC and monsters with AC 10-15 which I was fighting before.

[Hurkyl]

I met a player ghost on Vaults 1 and it had "AC ********"
What does it mean?
Please display it as "AC 40-45" so I can compare it to my own AC and monsters with AC 10-15 which I was fighting before.

Comparison to your own AC is not helpful, because the mechanics of PC hitting monster and monster hitting PC are different.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Comparison to your own AC is not helpful, because the mechanics of PC hitting monster and monster hitting PC are different.

Yes, I know. But at least I can get basic idea (and use fsim if I am not lazy). I was really surprised that the ghost survived my attack (I was berserking Troll with UC 20+ and had some allies also, all attacking the ghost only).

[CanOfWorms]

it means it has no more than 8 times as much AC as the highest AC an enemy with AC: +.... can have

(at least that's how I hope it's implemented)

[duvessa]

I met a player ghost on Vaults 1 and it had "AC ********"
What does it mean?
Please display it as "AC 40-45" so I can compare it to my own AC and monsters with AC 10-15 which I was fighting before.

Comparison to your own AC is not helpful, because the mechanics of PC hitting monster and monster hitting PC are different.

Uh, no. Monster AC and player AC have the same effect. If you were talking about EV or SH, sure, that would be a good argument.

[Hurkyl]

Uh, no. Monster AC and player AC have the same effect. If you were talking about EV or SH, sure, that would be a good argument.

But the qualitative features of the player damage roll are different than the monster damage roll.

(also, do monsters get GDR? I don't know)

[Shard1697]

it means it has no more than 8 times as much AC as the highest AC an enemy with AC: +.... can have

(at least that's how I hope it's implemented)

But the monster AC displayed in monster descriptions is often inaccurate in the case of things like orcs and other monsters wearing armor-it guesses an "average" for that monster, which may be totally wrong based on whether it's wearing leather or chainmail. But when x'ing over it you can see that it's wearing chainmail, and go "oh, so that's 8 AC"... and now we're right back at a number again.

So the player ends up knowing and using direct numbers for estimating monster armor for some monsters, but not for others. I'd say it's hardly unusual that players are going to want to be shown actual numbers instead of pips which sometimes lie to them, and are inprecise in the first place... and also basically all good players use knowledge bots/beem to get monster info if they don't know it. I know dev intention is to not have players fret about exact numbers, and instead compare 'imperfect' AC pips, but it's not realistic to expect players to compare confusing, misleading AC pips which are a pain to count when they actually do have numbers in their head for some monsters(and thus will translate the pips into numbers on their own), or when there are utilities they can access ingame which already give them the numbers. There is now a player-made tool which hangs out in your game and will tell you the exact AC and damage numbers of any monster you want to know. Don't you think it's time to let players have access to this information in-game, instead of removing it by one layer so only the experienced players who know knowledge bots/beem exist have direct access to it as they're playing?

[Rast]

[duvessa]

the simpsons did it first

[dowan]

Hey there's something severely wrong with your tileset rast!

[CanOfWorms]

But the monster AC displayed in monster descriptions is often inaccurate in the case of things like orcs and other monsters wearing armor-it guesses an "average" for that monster, which may be totally wrong based on whether it's wearing leather or chainmail. But when x'ing over it you can see that it's wearing chainmail, and go "oh, so that's 8 AC"... and now we're right back at a number again. [...] I know dev intention is to not have players fret about exact numbers, and instead compare 'imperfect' AC pips, but it's not realistic to expect players to compare confusing, misleading AC pips which are a pain to count when they actually do have numbers in their head for some monsters(and thus will translate the pips into numbers on their own), or when there are utilities they can access ingame which already give them the numbers.

the problems you are outlining here are "the game gives inaccurate values for certain stats" and "the players have to do a trivial calculation that the game does not (but in theory could) do for them". these are not solved by revealing AC as a number

[dowan]

True, but it's also even less solved by having AC as pips.

[Shard1697]

But the monster AC displayed in monster descriptions is often inaccurate in the case of things like orcs and other monsters wearing armor-it guesses an "average" for that monster, which may be totally wrong based on whether it's wearing leather or chainmail. But when x'ing over it you can see that it's wearing chainmail, and go "oh, so that's 8 AC"... and now we're right back at a number again. [...] I know dev intention is to not have players fret about exact numbers, and instead compare 'imperfect' AC pips, but it's not realistic to expect players to compare confusing, misleading AC pips which are a pain to count when they actually do have numbers in their head for some monsters(and thus will translate the pips into numbers on their own), or when there are utilities they can access ingame which already give them the numbers.

the problems you are outlining here are "the game gives inaccurate values for certain stats" and "the players have to do a trivial calculation that the game does not (but in theory could) do for them". these are not solved by revealing AC as a number

How about the part where beem(and knowledge bots in the first place) exists, and helps out players who use it a lot-but only those players who know it exists, and not newer players who are unaware?

Seems awfully weird to relegate a quality of life feature to a chat bot you have to subscribe to instead of just having it in the game for everyone!

Whether you show AC as pips or not at all, I am going to seek out the actual AC(and damage) numbers, and I am far from alone in this. DCSS is a known game with an established community, and I think it has been shown repeatedly that people want the actual direct information and will do what it takes to get it-and currently can get it quite easily. It doesn't make sense to design as if it's a new, unreleased game, and the only info people will have is what they see in game-they've had access to the real stats for quite a while now, and people use them.

[Siegurt]

But the monster AC displayed in monster descriptions is often inaccurate in the case of things like orcs and other monsters wearing armor-it guesses an "average" for that monster, which may be totally wrong based on whether it's wearing leather or chainmail. But when x'ing over it you can see that it's wearing chainmail, and go "oh, so that's 8 AC"... and now we're right back at a number again. [...] I know dev intention is to not have players fret about exact numbers, and instead compare 'imperfect' AC pips, but it's not realistic to expect players to compare confusing, misleading AC pips which are a pain to count when they actually do have numbers in their head for some monsters(and thus will translate the pips into numbers on their own), or when there are utilities they can access ingame which already give them the numbers.

the problems you are outlining here are "the game gives inaccurate values for certain stats" and "the players have to do a trivial calculation that the game does not (but in theory could) do for them". these are not solved by revealing AC as a number

How about the part where beem(and knowledge bots in the first place) exists, and helps out players who use it a lot-but only those players who know it exists, and not newer players who are unaware?

Seems awfully weird to relegate a quality of life feature to a chat bot you have to subscribe to instead of just having it in the game for everyone!

Whether you show AC as pips or not at all, I am going to seek out the actual AC(and damage) numbers, and I am far from alone in this. DCSS is a known game with an established community, and I think it has been shown repeatedly that people want the actual direct information and will do what it takes to get it-and currently can get it quite easily. It doesn't make sense to design as if it's a new, unreleased game, and the only info people will have is what they see in game-they've had access to the real stats for quite a while now, and people use them.

The philosophy, as far as i understand it, is pretty much "try to avoid giving the player feedback that they don't need to play the game" I don't know that it is always perfectly successful, but i think that is the point.

While it is true that having that information is something that people seek out, the thinking is that having that information doesn't make the game itself better, nor does it give you a real advantage while playing it.

In an open sourced game, it is literally impossible to prevent people from finding out hidden information, but if the game is better with that information hidden, then you still shouldn't provide it in game, because there is a segment of your audience who prefers their game unspoiled, and people who want all the spoilers, even the unimportant ones, ultimately have the power to seek them out, even if that isn't how the designers intended the game to be played.

Of course you should design a game with hidden information as if that information is and should remain hidden, if the game is better with that information hidden, then you shouldn't provide it, even if it is possible that your player base has access to it.

Of course none of that really speaks to the specific case at hand (whether specific monster ac should be hidden or not) since there seems to be a division on whether it is information that improves game play

I dont think so, but i recognize that that is just a personal preferance, not based on any conclusive reasoning, i certainly don't need or want ac numbers, and would hate to feel like i had to xv every creature to know exactly how much of my damage they could reduce, that sounds awful to me.

[dowan]

But right now you have to xv every creature to see how many pips it has, and count them. Then you have to consult whatever it is that tells you how many AC points a * is worth. Then you have to figure out exactly how much damage they could reduce.

That's even awfuller, at least showing the number lets you skip some steps.

[Midn8]

I think that this is probably better as a setting in the rc file than as a default. That way you can let the people who like spoilers get them and the people who don't like spoilers can ignore them. You still have to xv over them, but then people can have their number and be unspoiled too!

[Shard1697]

I don't believe the game is made any better by not letting new players know how much damage an ogre or hobgoblin can do, or how much AC an enemy has, just like it wasn't any better when the chances of hexes working on you was hidden. It's information that in dangerous situations is legitimately important for making decisions(worst case scenario, how fast can this monster kill me? how fast can I kill it?).

[Siegurt]

The counter argument is, of course, that monster AC is almost irrelevant for making actual combat decisions doubly so for the "does this creature have 7 or 9 points of AC" sorts of questions.

There is sufficient variance in crawl combat that a pretty wide swath of AC values' actual impact is completely lost in the noise across a single combat, the amount of AC a critter has is an incredibly poor predictor for how long it will take to kill it. The variability from random rolls has way more impact on any given fight than monster AC does.

If you are looking up AC values for every critter in the hopes of having a good idea of whether you are likely to kill it in X turns, you are just fooling yourself, there is just too much randomness.

As such, drawing attention to such a value just gives it weight in the decision making process that it just plain shouldn't have.

[VeryAngryFelid]

i's not 7 AC or 9 AC, it's 5 or 9 or even 0 or 4. Difference can be quite large provided AC is rolled thrice vs LRD/sandblast

[Siegurt]

i's not 7 AC or 9 AC, it's 5 or 9 or even 0 or 4. Difference can be quite large provided AC is rolled thrice vs LRD/sandblast

Within a single pip?

[VeryAngryFelid]

i's not 7 AC or 9 AC, it's 5 or 9 or even 0 or 4. Difference can be quite large provided AC is rolled thrice vs LRD/sandblast

Within a single pip?

yes. as far as I understand 0 and four are in the same pip, 5 and 9 are in the same pip too.

[Siegurt]

i's not 7 AC or 9 AC, it's 5 or 9 or even 0 or 4. Difference can be quite large provided AC is rolled thrice vs LRD/sandblast

Within a single pip?

yes. as far as I understand 0 and four are in the same pip, 5 and 9 are in the same pip too.

Right, but is the difference (in the worst case) between "Roll 4 3 times" and 0 going to be significant when compared to the range of damage that LRD can do?

[Shard1697]

An earlygame character isn't casting LRD

The counter argument is, of course, that monster AC is almost irrelevant for making actual combat decisions doubly so for the "does this creature have 7 or 9 points of AC" sorts of questions.

There is sufficient variance in crawl combat that a pretty wide swath of AC values' actual impact is completely lost in the noise across a single combat, the amount of AC a critter has is an incredibly poor predictor for how long it will take to kill it. The variability from random rolls has way more impact on any given fight than monster AC does.

If you are looking up AC values for every critter in the hopes of having a good idea of whether you are likely to kill it in X turns, you are just fooling yourself, there is just too much randomness.

As such, drawing attention to such a value just gives it weight in the decision making process that it just plain shouldn't have.

Right, but I'm not just looking up AC-I'm also looking up monster HP, which is very important(and also poorly communicated via pips). (AC is less important, but still not irrelevant.)

[VeryAngryFelid]

Right, but is the difference (in the worst case) between "Roll 4 3 times" and 0 going to be significant when compared to the range of damage that LRD can do?

why did you ignore sandblast? that ac is typical for early game and spell power is quite low early game so four ac difference is extremely important.

[Siegurt]

Right, but is the difference (in the worst case) between "Roll 4 3 times" and 0 going to be significant when compared to the range of damage that LRD can do?

why did you ignore sandblast? that ac is typical for early game and spell power is quite low early game so four ac difference is extremely important.

What are you fighting in the early game with low spellpower that has 4 ac?

[Shard1697]

any enemy that can equip items could randomly show up wearing leather or ring mail, gnolls and orc priests have 2 ac so with hide/leather they'll have 4/5 ac, robin usually has a similar number, so does sigmund...

[Lasty]

I think lots of players want to be able to see AC, but I would be amazed if it turned out that knowing AC improved player decision making by a non-trivial margin.

Gamers tend to assume that knowing precise numbers will help them because that's often true in games. In crawl, it is mostly not true. The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

Adding in unimportant numbers puts an emphasis on those numbers. Uncertainty changes your experience of the game, and, for some at least, can make it more exciting or frightening. Crawl doesn't work very well as a counting exercise or mathematical model to manipulate, but I find it to be a pretty fun experience.

[HardboiledGargoyle]

As such, drawing attention to such a value just gives it weight in the decision making process that it just plain shouldn't have.

Slapping a number onto a thing does not magically "draw attention" to that thing. Example, "20" versus "huge".

The game should not determine what is relevant, on behalf of the player, because the player is supposed to do that - part of what you do as a player is to determine what is relevant, that's why we play. Suppose AC is irrelevant - you could learn this if it were shown, but it's not shown, so you can't learn it.

By the same token, it doesn't matter so much whether knowing AC "improves player decision making" so much as it reduces staring at plus signs with befuddlement and irritation.

AC doesn't matter? then what matters? damage, HP, MR? because those are not given either, should I treat giant gecko and orb guardian the same?

The variability from random rolls has way more impact on any given fight than monster AC does.

the random rolls themselves are derived from the stats of the combatants. Damage is rolled, AC is rolled, etc. I can't recall any stat-independent random rolls.

The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

Not from level-to-level or char-to-char. For a long time I thought that giant frogs are tougher than spiny frogs! And, this quote contradicts the idea that randomness from random rolls overwhelms whatever statistic-based prognostication the player may make. If the result of a fight is too random to be predictable, and feedback comes from the result of a fight, then feedback is too random to be useful.

Uncertainty changes your experience of the game

We have uncertainty from random rolls - is it insufficient? What, we want uncertainty from ignorance too? If so, shouldn't we deprive the player of the feedback/information rhat we so generously bequeath? Hide resists, hide pips, let them figure it out.

[Rast]

I think lots of players want to be able to see AC, but I would be amazed if it turned out that knowing AC improved player decision making by a non-trivial margin.

Yes, but it would make the game more fun for players, which should be the goal. Because it makes them feel more like they are in control of what happens to their character.

Also, showing monster damage absolutely would make a difference in player survival.

[Hurkyl]

The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

How much science is behind this? While I recognize the noble intent, my impression of the actual execution is that obfuscation is done for the sake of having obfuscation rather than being tuned for usefulness -- and the quality of the result judged by people who don't really care about having the information presented to them.

[VeryAngryFelid]

What are you fighting in the early game with low spellpower that has 4 ac?

I am unspoiled player in this regard, I have no idea what monsters have four ac.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Gamers tend to assume that knowing precise numbers will help them because that's often true in games. In crawl, it is mostly not true. The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

please remove knowledge bots and close source on monster data. otherwise how do we know that if many good players check ac, ev and damage out of game?

Spoiler: show

I am serious. I believe it will help devs realize how important those numbers are. I believe we will get much more asks to show the numbers also

[adozu]

i usually determine monster ac by hitting them a few times. then i classify them as "dead" or "not dead". repeat.

i also die a lot.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Pip system is not bad for 1-3 pips but it does not work with 5+ pips. Just take a look at Roman digits, there is a human-nature-related reason why four is IV there and not IIII. Our brain cannot easily differentiate ******** from ********** and that is what we currently have for AC. Even changing it to "AC-factor:9" would be an improvement. This 9 is still as contextless as *********

[dowan]

Once upon a time players did double damage to enemies, and it went a surprisingly long time before anyone noticed (As in, the first player to start up the game wasn't like "WTF my long sword is hitting for 22 damage sometimes").
In a game with numbers, this would be noticed instantly.

I know this gets hammered a lot, but it's because it's really good evidence that the feedback the game gives is clearly not enough, and humans are really not good at collecting lots of noisy and random data and figuring out averages, especially when they're just trying to play a game.

I know this thread is about AC, not damage, but it's the same idea. It's * instead of !, but it's hiding a lot of information that is still quite available, even from memory for some of us. If I see that orc with ring mail has 4 ac I'll get a feel for how effective my magic missile is against it, then the next time I see a monster with 4 AC I already have an idea of the effectiveness of my spells. Occasionally a monster with 4 ac will die quickly to some lucky magic missiles, but with a specific number at least I've lowered the number of variables I'm worried about. On the other hand, one monster with * ac might be a lot easier to kill with my magic missile than the next monster with * ac, so that information is less useful to me. Still better than no information, of course.

If you're worried about what people think is important to win, well people generally already have some really weird ideas in that department, even though numbers are hidden. GDR isn't shown, or even mentioned in game, and yet some people are obsessed with it! I get the resistance to lots and lots of numbers, we don't want something like Tome's billion little resistance numbers that nobody can keep in their head, but players get lots and lots of experience with AC and EV numbers already with their own characters.

NINJAD: Good point there too, it's hard to quickly count little pips when there's more than a few of them.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Gamers tend to assume that knowing precise numbers will help them because that's often true in games. In crawl, it is mostly not true. The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

You are correct provided most fights are vs popcorn in crawl. However those numbers start making a difference vs dangerous monsters. One of my recent deaths was a death to Snorg, I didn't expect to lose 72 HP in a single attack. If it's not enough, we can find threads where one of the most experienced players mentioned dying to Anaconda Simulacra in ice cave with words like "I forgot how much damage it can do" or that thread where we calculated that adjacent Azure Jelly can do 200+ damage in a single turn. This is very important info and I believe making good decisions in most cases is irrelevant because you can kill 100 monsters this way and then die in the same game due to lack of that info.

[Siegurt]

Gamers tend to assume that knowing precise numbers will help them because that's often true in games. In crawl, it is mostly not true. The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

You are correct provided most fights are vs popcorn in crawl. However those numbers start making a difference vs dangerous monsters. One of my recent deaths was a death to Snorg, I didn't expect to lose 72 HP in a single attack. If it's not enough, we can find threads where one of the most experienced players mentioned dying to Anaconda Simulacra in ice cave with words like "I forgot how much damage it can do" or that thread where we calculated that adjacent Azure Jelly can do 200+ damage in a single turn. This is very important info and I believe making good decisions in most cases is irrelevant because you can kill 100 monsters this way and then die in the same game due to lack of that info.

But how is the amount of damage a critter can do related to showing their ac? I mean you might or might not have a point, but it seems only tangentially related to this thread.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Gamers tend to assume that knowing precise numbers will help them because that's often true in games. In crawl, it is mostly not true. The ballpark feedback the game gives you is enough to make good decisions in most cases.

You are correct provided most fights are vs popcorn in crawl. However those numbers start making a difference vs dangerous monsters. One of my recent deaths was a death to Snorg, I didn't expect to lose 72 HP in a single attack. If it's not enough, we can find threads where one of the most experienced players mentioned dying to Anaconda Simulacra in ice cave with words like "I forgot how much damage it can do" or that thread where we calculated that adjacent Azure Jelly can do 200+ damage in a single turn. This is very important info and I believe making good decisions in most cases is irrelevant because you can kill 100 monsters this way and then die in the same game due to lack of that info.

But how is the amount of damage a critter can do related to showing their ac? I mean you might or might not have a point, but it seems only tangentially related to this thread.

You can notice that we are talking about precise numbers now. It is not that much offtopic since it is easy to come with example where knowing precise AC can make difference between death and life. Sandblast with last few stones and you have 2 adjacent monsters, both are shown to have the same number of AC pips but one of them has AC 0 and another has AC 4 (12! vs Sandblast).

[archaeo]

Once upon a time players did double damage to enemies, and it went a surprisingly long time before anyone noticed (As in, the first player to start up the game wasn't like "WTF my long sword is hitting for 22 damage sometimes").
In a game with numbers, this would be noticed instantly.

I know this gets hammered a lot, but it's because it's really good evidence that the feedback the game gives is clearly not enough, and humans are really not good at collecting lots of noisy and random data and figuring out averages, especially when they're just trying to play a game.

Let me stop you right there, dowan, because this isn't "really good evidence" of anything except that Crawl can have some bugs that are harder to figure out given its UI. That's not really an argument for anything other than a better debug mode.

I'm of the opinion that I have played many fun games where I was asked to make choices about what attacks and weapons I would use without having access to the precise numbers undergirding the game's mechanics. Crawl is one of those games, to me at least. I don't find the arguments in favor of damage/to-hit/AC/HP numbers all that convincing, if only because I've won the game a lot and while I have a lot of beef with the oral history you have to be prepared to deal with to learn more about Crawl, I don't think I would've won more with more numbers.

But that's just like, my opinion, man. I get the feeling that maybe there's a happy medium we're missing here, somewhere.

[VeryAngryFelid]

if only because I've won the game a lot and while I have a lot of beef with the oral history you have to be prepared to deal with to learn more about Crawl, I don't think I would've won more with more numbers.

Are you sure about that, have you never died to a wounded monster who probably would be dead if you were using a better weapon? As anecdote, I found arcblade in one of my games, I tried hitting some popcorn with it but wasn't impressed so I switched back to my previous weapon. Later I was told by other players that it was a mistake and surprisingly I found that they are correct, fsim showed up to 232 (!) damage per attack and average damage per turn was about 50% higher too, I was just unlucky with my popcorn experiments.

[archaeo]

If I have, VAF, it's probably only a handful of deaths among the hundreds that were totally my fault and can't be blamed on some theoretical better weapon/armour I didn't know about.

Crawl needs better in-game documentation, and better tutorials, and better ways to help players make seamless and quick decisions. I don't know that the answer to those issues is just "tell us the numbers." I think it's both too much and too little, and it will fail to make a meaningful difference.

I think a more productive version of this thread would involve us asking what the devs might be prepared to add to the game that would let us make those better decisions. Which isn't to say that y'all are wrong, just that it's pretty clear that there's no consensus in favor of numbers on the dev team, and that maybe some other solution would garner more approval.

[VeryAngryFelid]

If I have, VAF, it's probably only a handful of deaths among the hundreds that were totally my fault and can't be blamed on some theoretical better weapon/armour I didn't know about.

Crawl needs better in-game documentation, and better tutorials, and better ways to help players make seamless and quick decisions. I don't know that the answer to those issues is just "tell us the numbers." I think it's both too much and too little, and it will fail to make a meaningful difference.

I think a more productive version of this thread would involve us asking what the devs might be prepared to add to the game that would let us make those better decisions. Which isn't to say that y'all are wrong, just that it's pretty clear that there's no consensus in favor of numbers on the dev team, and that maybe some other solution would garner more approval.

I am sure those numbers would succeed in making a meaningful difference at least for some players.

You are right, maybe there is a better way. Ok, here is a situation which is very similar to what I had in my current game:
I am a flying Tengu above lava with about 70 HP, there is a Titan who has just turned around a corner. I am not hasted but I am faster than Titan so I can run away. Unfortunately I will still be in Titan's view on next turn (due to the corner) but it is not that bad as I will be in its view only during 1 turn if it casts any spells. Here is my question: should I use a scroll of blinking?
Is information about Titan's airstrike dealing 0-75 damage irrelevant here? Can it be substituted with something else?

[jwoodward48ss]

"It can kill you in one hit with this attack/ability, with a 5% chance." Except that's awful.

[dpeg]

I think lots of players want to be able to see AC, but I would be amazed if it turned out that knowing AC improved player decision making by a non-trivial margin.

Yes, but it would make the game more fun for players, which should be the goal.

Minor nitpick: I believe the first intent is to make the game fun for the developers themselves (which is hard in its own right). The idea is that if it's fun for us, it'll be also fun for Other People.

Second minor nitpick: granted, we all want the game to be fun, for everyone. That's the goal. But "fun" is an extremely subjective concept, which you hide by saying "fun for players". For example, I never look up damage/etc. numbers, because I don't like it. I expect Crawl to be winnable without such sheenanigans. It's clear to me that number-crunchers fare better, and that's perfectly fine. On the other hand, any number that Crawl displays adds to my cognitive load, and I don't mean "abstract psychological concept", but "stuff I have to parse and understand". In other words, more numbers are not necessarily more fun to me, probably the opposite. I spend a lot of time looking at the %-screen (which I designed) and at the I and II screens (all of which I understand).

To sum it up: I think it is important to think about feedback. What do want to suppress, what to show, and if so, how? Qualitatively vs quantitively? You'll observe that more feedback has been added. For example, Hexes success chances are very important (much more important than monster AC, in my opinion) and they have the advantage that they occur within the game's focus (exactly when you're about to execute a Hex) and they need no further context, they're self-explained. That's very good feedback.

Note how simply printing a bunch of numbers is the simplest (i.e. laziest) solution from both a coding and a design point of view. We have higher standards.

Like archaeo says, this is a discussion that should be had. I don't think that monster AC is the right number to show. (Monster damage is another ballpark.)

[VeryAngryFelid]

Minor nitpick: I believe the first intent is to make the game fun for the developers themselves (which is hard in its own right). The idea is that if it's fun for us, it'll be also fun for Other People.

This is root cause of the problem IMHO. All devs have easy access to monster data, they know all those monster AC/EV/HP/damage/spell damage etc. That's why I suggested to remove that access, add some new monsters and see how you will like fighting it knowing nothing about its damage and not that much about AC/EV (in stable it would be even worse because average HP is not shown). You should try playing like you are unspoiled player, stop using beem/knowledge bots etc.

Edit. I was shocked when I tried to fight caustic shrikes, iron giant, juggernaut for the first time while being unspoiled. You cannot even try hitting them and see how it works because you will be dead in no time.

Spoiler: show

Edit2. We need caustic sharks

[Siegurt]

Minor nitpick: I believe the first intent is to make the game fun for the developers themselves (which is hard in its own right). The idea is that if it's fun for us, it'll be also fun for Other People.

This is root cause of the problem IMHO. All devs have easy access to monster data, they know all those monster AC/EV/HP/damage/spell damage etc. That's why I suggested to remove that access, add some new monsters and see how you will like fighting it knowing nothing about its damage and not that much about AC/EV (in stable it would be even worse because average HP is not shown). You should try playing like you are unspoiled player, stop using beem/knowledge bots etc.

Did you miss the part where he specifically said he didn't look up those numbers (fwiw i don't either, i have never looked up a monster's stats while playing, have never used beem, and only occasionally used knowledge bots while responding to some forum post about something.)

I think this might, if anything, lead me to play overly cautiously, rather than leading to extra deaths.

There are about 50 numbers involved in a melee attack situation, some derived, some rolled based on other numbers, some are shown, some aren't.

The current criteria for shown vs not shown appears to me to be "show the things the player has direct control over as a number, show the inputs from the system and the results as an abstraction, dont show any intermediate calculations or rolls"

If that criteria doesn't make sense to you, what does? Showing 50 numbers per attack is just straight up out the door, i think nobody wants to see that.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Did you miss the part where he specifically said he didn't look up those numbers (fwiw i don't either, i have never looked up a monster's stats while playing, have never used beem, and only occasionally used knowledge bots while responding to some forum post about something.)

I think this might, if anything, lead me to play overly cautiously, rather than leading to extra deaths.

There are about 50 numbers involved in a melee attack situation, some derived, some rolled based on other numbers, some are shown, some aren't.

The current criteria for shown vs not shown appears to me to be "show the things the player has direct control over as a number, show the inputs from the system and the results as an abstraction, dont show any intermediate calculations or rolls"

If that criteria doesn't make sense to you, what does? Showing 50 numbers per attack is just straight up out the door, i think nobody wants to see that.

No, I didn't miss it. As far as I understand dpeg is not trying to play optimally and does not care about deaths much (no offense, dpeg, I play this way sometimes too).

You are welcome to answer my questions about scroll of blinking and Titan's airstrike or sandblast and last few stones and prove those numbers are irrelevant.
I am also among those who don't want 50 numbers, don't get me wrong. I played ToME4 and know how bad it is.

[archaeo]

Yeah, just to add to the anecdotal evidence here, I also really haven't ever bothered looking at damage ranges, HP, or other monster stats when playing. And in years of watching people play hundreds of hours of Crawl, I really rarely see people checking this information. Even now that beem's around, I usually don't see players do this; most of the information I'd really find useful from monster stats are in the xv description.

This may not be evidence that this information isn't useful. I bet my winrate would go up if I paid more attention to this stuff. But Crawl is definitely not aimed at people playing for winrate -- if this was true, I imagine the game would be half as long as it is and mechanics that lead to unavoidable deaths would be removed. It's possible that the game shouldn't try to fool people into believing it's about a high winrate, especially when that level of optimal play is the least pleasant way to enjoy Crawl.

[VeryAngryFelid]

IMHO we have several steps here:
1) Question that those numbers are relevant. I hope my examples prove that they are very important sometimes.
2) Question that playing without those numbers is more fun. Fun is subjective so I cannot argue about it of course. Just two things:
a) Less unavoidable deaths is objectively a good thing provided it changes nothing else.
b) It is possible to use options to have everyone happy. If you don't want to see a number or want to see it as pip, fine, you have a way to do it. If I want to see important number as actual number, fine, I have a way to do it too.

[dowan]

If nothing else, lets not pretend that more information leads to worse choices. There's a very good reason you do research before you make an important decision.

The numbers inform the decision. If the decision is meaningless with numbers, it's meaningless now, the meaninglessness is just hidden. If the decision is important with numbers, it's important without them, it's just that you don't have the proper tools to make the decision.

Existing crawl realizes that players should have an idea of what sort of damage their attacks do, but only physical attacks for some reason(The whole ! !!! thing). If knowing how much damage you're doing doesn't help, and only hurts, why are we forcing players to count the !!!!! (They wouldn't be shown if they weren't important enough to make a decision by, right?). I think counting little vertical !!! then consulting the conversion chart, then realizing the ranges are so outrageously large that it's practically useless is more of a cognitive load then just showing the number. I can notice that one weapon sometimes gets up to 51 dmg while the other one only ever gets as high as 42. Now we tell players to get a local copy of crawl, fire up wizard mode, create a copy of their character and equipment, and run fsim to get that information to decide which weapon is better.

I'm terrified that dpeg is saying he'd rather have 20% of characters killed off unavoidably, but that's a whole other subject.