Silly species idea: Skeleton.

[Steel Neuron]

tl;dr: Skeleton race with good melee + elemental magic aptitudes. No hunger clock, can't eat or drink, and no natural regen. Regains HP by salvaging other skeletons. Can self-haste and lose their head because of it.

So... Don't take this suggestion too seriously. It started as a joke between me and a friend, but I thought it might be fun to share regardless. Who knows, maybe something can be salvaged from it (pun may be intended).

The Skeleton

Animated skeletons, generally built for protection of some long lost arcane artifact. Since combat is their sole purpose, they have decent aptitudes for melee and ranged combat, as well as conjurations and elemental magic, but lack the finesse to use any of the more subtle magic schools, utilize evocables or communicate their devotion to the gods. Their fragile bodies can be improved with horns, hooves, tails, extra ribs and other goods that they find around the dungeon; but they must be careful not to lose control and start breaking those precious body parts, or even worse, lose their head.

Aptitudes

• High: Axes, Long Blades, Polearms, Armour, Shields, Fighting, Conjurations, Fire Magic, Ice Magic.
• Low: Invocations, Evocations, All other schools of magic.
• Average: Everything else.

Innates

• Undead (similar benefits/drawback to Mummy)
• No natural HP regeneration. Instead, the Skeleton recovers HP by salvaging bones from dead enemies. When butchering a corpse the bones will be consumed, returning missing HP, and the chunks will be left behind. In addition, they can gain physical mutations from the salvaged skeleton (such as horns from a dead Yak, robust from the ribs of an ogre, etc).
• At level 5 they gain Dance of Death (active, toggle): The Skeleton lets go and enters a frenzied dance. This ability allows you to enter a hasted state at will and at no cost, but it poses a risk: All of the temporary mutations obtained from salvaging other skeletons may break, and there is an increased chance per turn that thinking too fast will cause your head to fall off.

Headless
A Skeleton that abuses Dance of Death may lose its head from mental exhaustion (it falls and is rendered completely unusable). This causes some dramatic changes and can only be reverted by salvaging bodies until a suitable head is found (chance when salvaging any boned corpse, increased if it's humanoid).

• Intelligence drops to 1. You can't cast spells or read scrolls.
• Helmet slot is unavailable (duh).
• LOS is significantly reduced.
• You become unable to use Dance of Death (too uncoordinated). When you lose your head, you'll still have a few Dance of Death turns left.
• Move speed and EV boost thanks to the reduced weight. (Enough to make running away easier)

[dowan]

While for some reason I really like the idea of a skeleton species, I don't think this is it.

Eating corpses for HP is like a weird cross between deep dwarf and ghoul, and I don't like it.
Getting mutations from corpses is even worse. (I mean from the design perspective of DCSS it doesn't fit, I'm sure it would be fun for some people)

The dance of death thing is OKish, I guess... I mean, it's powerful, but I think it relies on the whole corpse salvaging mechanic. But I'll propose a fixed version:

Dance of death works as listed above, but instead of a chance at headlessness:
Applies attribute damage (The normal kind, goes away with XP)
Applies temp mutations, like those... abyss star things. (I realize giving mutations to undead is problematic, but oh well. Ideally this would be a subset of mutations that are thematically appropriate for a skeleton that has jumbled itself up. Maybe some ru sacrifices would also fit, like temporary hand or eye loss? When the skeleton gets enough XP they repair themselves or something)

I'd give them low int, medium-low strength, and medium-high dex. Fairly flat spell apts, all -2 maybe except necro for flavor reasons? +1 physical apts,

Now, it would be very flavorful and thematic for them to have a built in version of repel missiles (The missiles go through the gaps in their bones sometimes). But free haste and free repel missiles is getting kinda silly, so there needs to be a pretty big drawback to make that reasonable I think. Maybe no potions is a fair drawback for that, but mummies don't get much in return for it.

At that point its role seems to be a... better mummy.

I suppose you could also have it get the random muts and stat loss just from getting hit, but that sounds unfun to play, and leads to some of the same problems with deep dwarves (Being extra careful not to get hit, even against popcorn and such)

[Steel Neuron]

While for some reason I really like the idea of a skeleton species, I don't think this is it.

Yeah, I think it's a fantasy trope with a lot of potential in Crawl, even if this isn't the right iteration.

Eating corpses for HP is like a weird cross between deep dwarf and ghoul, and I don't like it.

Any particular reason why, or just personal preference? I can't see any obvious way it could lead to tedium, since the HP is obtained immediately.

Getting mutations from corpses is even worse. (I mean from the design perspective of DCSS it doesn't fit, I'm sure it would be fun for some people)

I've been thinking about this one a bit more. I think it could be nicer if, rarely, "eating" a corpse would offer you a chance to replace a full body part. "Do you want to replace your head with an elephant head? (ac +3 int +2 dex -2)". "Do you want to replace your legs with ogre legs? (...)" and so on. This isn't necessarily too unlike other races with permanent modifications, except you get chances to reroll as the game progresses.


About Dance of Death, I think it's probably the least important mechanic, although if it were to stay, I like your idea of stat decay.

I'd give them low int, medium-low strength, and medium-high dex. Fairly flat spell apts, all -2 maybe except necro for flavor reasons? +1 physical apts,

I think having undeads be good at necromancy is a bit stale, it makes sense for mummies and ghouls but skeletons aren't typically that great at raising other skeletons. The "skeleton mage" trope with fire and ice spells is in many fantasy games and I thought it could be fun to have an undead race focus on conjurations for once.

Now, it would be very flavorful and thematic for them to have a built in version of repel missiles (The missiles go through the gaps in their bones sometimes). But free haste and free repel missiles is getting kinda silly, so there needs to be a pretty big drawback to make that reasonable I think. Maybe no potions is a fair drawback for that, but mummies don't get much in return for it.

I don't know, it seems like a faint flavour connection to me. Why would it apply to projectiles and not, say, polearms? I can be convinced otherwise though .

[infinitevox]

I'd play the shit out of this if it were a species. Specifics could def use some working out, but as for the basis, especially:

I've been thinking about this one a bit more. I think it could be nicer if, rarely, "eating" a corpse would offer you a chance to replace a full body part. "Do you want to replace your head with an elephant head? (ac +3 int +2 dex -2)". "Do you want to replace your legs with ogre legs? (...)" and so on. This isn't necessarily too unlike other races with permanent modifications, except you get chances to reroll as the game progresses.

This sounds AWESOME.
Maybe instead of wearing armor, like other species, this is how they fill out their armor slots?

[dowan]

I mean, if we ignore the fact that a lot of coding has to go into each corpse type to determine what it can give to a skeleton, and then the equipment or mutation system also has to expand to allow it, that does sound fun. I just feel like it's one of those things the devs will not do.

Any special interaction with ranged/piercing attacks is probably also right out, especially since monster skeletons don't get anything special like that.

I don't like the no regen except eating corpses because I don't like no regen. The corpse eating part has the same issues as vampires I suppose, where you might be tempted to keep some weak enemies around somewhere to heal from later. But my biggest issue with it is just that no regen means I have to be extra careful not to take damage at all times, for example, when automoving to a shop on a cleared level or something.


Still, despite all my complaints and problems with it, I want this to work. I want to be able to play a skeleton damn it, and I don't care if it makes any sense or if it's just a mummy with some extra stuff tacked on.

[Lasty]

Gaining permanent bonuses from corpses sounds like it would strongly incentivize scumming for corpses, and I am definitely against that.

[Steel Neuron]

Gaining permanent bonuses from corpses sounds like it would strongly incentivize scumming for corpses, and I am definitely against that.

Hmm... It depends on how it's implemented though. It doesn't have to be a chance per corpse.

The body parts you'll be offered could be secretly determined at character creation, along with their minimum level (i.e. you will be offered a horned skull past level 5) and then it becomes a matter of stumbling into the right body type skeleton.

[duvessa]

mutagenic chunks have that problem btw

[Steel Neuron]

After gauging the initial reactions, let me make an attempt at a more serious version of the Skeleton. In particular, I hope this solves the issue that Lasty pointed out:


Aptitudes

• High: Axes, Long Blades, Polearms, Armour, Shields, Fighting, Conjurations, Fire Magic, Ice Magic.
• Low: Invocations, Evocations, All other schools of magic.
• Average: Everything else.

Innates

• Undead (similar benefits/drawback to Mummy)
• No natural HP regeneration. Instead, the Skeleton recovers HP by salvaging bones from dead enemies. When butchering a corpse the bones will be consumed, returning missing HP, and the chunks will be left behind.
• Bone upgrades: On character creation, a hidden list of upgrades you'll receive during the game will be randomly selected. Through the progress of the game, these upgrades will silently unlock at their respective levels and will be offered to you when you salvage a skeleton of the appropriate type. These upgrades come with benefits and drawbacks and take a specific slot. For example you may be offered a horned skull from a yak (Horns 2, +2 Str -1 dex -1 int) or the ribs of an ogre (Robust 3, move speed -1). If you already had an upgrade on that slot, you would have to lose the previous one. Through 27 character levels, you would be offered an average of 4-5 slots per body part, including legs, arms, chest and head.
• At level 5 they gain Dance of The Dead (active, toggle): The Skeleton lets go and enters a frenzied dance. This ability allows you to enter a hasted state at will and at no cost. However, it causes constant drain and stat loss as you damage your bones, and it has a chance to permanently break any of the bone upgrades. The slot that gets broken will depend on your current activity (arms if you were attacking, legs if moving, chest while being hit and head when casting spells or using abilities). Stat loss can be recovered normally via XP but permanent upgrades are lost forever.

Reasoning:

This more serious approach to the skeleton gets rid of the headless siliness and instead causes stat loss on Dance of Dead. More interestingly, I think the limited amount of bone upgrades creates a good dynamic; since you will be offered a few different parts per game, you have to balance the risk from using Dance of Dead with the knowledge that you'd lose the part anyway when a new replacement comes. Also, Dance of the Dead breakage depends on what you're doing, so if you can stay disciplined and never use spells when hasted, you won't lose your head; if you stay stationary, you won't lose your legs, etc. This way, you can preserve an upgrade of particular interest to your build while still being able to haste yourself at the cost of slight drain and stat loss.

I'd like to reiterate than scumming bodies is not helpful, since the upgrades are gated by level and will come at the same XL anyway, and they will be of a predetermined type, so focusing on killing Yaks will not make it any more likely to get a horned skull.

I mean, if we ignore the fact that a lot of coding has to go into each corpse type to determine what it can give to a skeleton, and then the equipment or mutation system also has to expand to allow it, that does sound fun. I just feel like it's one of those things the devs will not do.

Don't worry about this, I don't want to do proposals anymore Anything I discuss here I am willing to code myself. I'd just rather not make my own thing in isolation, but involve others and make sure it's a community idea by absorbing as much feedback as I can, and that people generally like it. That's what I did with Ieoh Jian and I think it has become a much better design after incorporating many changes that people were suggesting.

[duvessa]

What's the point of tying bone upgrades to corpses?

[Steel Neuron]

What's the point of tying bone upgrades to corpses?

None at all, just flavour. It's almost equivalent to handing the mutations as you level up, but it makes sense for the skeleton theme.

Method of acquirement aside, I think it's different enough from other permanent mutation races (Ds, Dr), since the mutations are more frequent and mutually exclusive, so there is some degree of decision involved (and also the possibility of losing them).

[infinitevox]

Honestly, you could lose the "dance of the dead" thing. I think swapping out body parts is an interesting enough and unique enough idea to build around without adding in any other parts.

[NhorianScum]

No regen is an actively horrible mechanic.

Dance of death can just inflict brainless for an exp gated period of time after each use. No need to get quirky with it.

Extra bonus: curse skulls attempt to seduce you.

[Psieye]

Innates

• Undead (similar benefits/drawback to Mummy)
• No natural HP regeneration. Instead, the Skeleton recovers HP by salvaging bones from dead enemies. When butchering a corpse the bones will be consumed, returning missing HP, and the chunks will be left behind.
• Bone upgrades: On character creation, a hidden list of upgrades you'll receive during the game will be randomly selected. Through the progress of the game, these upgrades will silently unlock at their respective levels and will be offered to you when you salvage a skeleton of the appropriate type. These upgrades come with benefits and drawbacks and take a specific slot. For example you may be offered a horned skull from a yak (Horns 2, +2 Str -1 dex -1 int) or the ribs of an ogre (Robust 3, move speed -1). If you already had an upgrade on that slot, you would have to lose the previous one. Through 27 character levels, you would be offered an average of 4-5 slots per body part, including legs, arms, chest and head.
• At level 5 they gain Dance of The Dead (active, toggle): The Skeleton lets go and enters a frenzied dance. This ability allows you to enter a hasted state at will and at no cost. However, it causes constant drain and stat loss as you damage your bones, and it has a chance to permanently break any of the bone upgrades. The slot that gets broken will depend on your current activity (arms if you were attacking, legs if moving, chest while being hit and head when casting spells or using abilities). Stat loss can be recovered normally via XP but permanent upgrades are lost forever.

- No HP Regen -> "in-combat, lose HP over time" with ordinary HP regen out of combat. Where 'in-combat' means 'hostile in sight'.
- Bone upgrades 'on corpse action' -> 'on marked kill'. Think Yred ultimate marking a soul for enslavement:
-- Designate some enemy (that COULD drop a corpse) at some expensive cost.
-- Kill enemy in time limit.
-- Bone part of killed enemy auto-magically flies onto your 'chassis'. 100% chance if killed in time limit.
-- Avoid specific reference to shapes (e.g. horned) and just go with HD (or maxHP) of the kill (translate "you upgrade your HD 5 head for an HD 8 head" into player-friendly language).

Whatever that 'expensive cost' is can then be shared with "Dance of Dead".

[duane]

I liked the idea of playing a skeleton so much that I coded a simple version to fool around with. I had different ideas, of course. My version is slow and clumsy, like regular skeletons. He gets undead resistances, and can only regenerate when a corpse or headstone is in sight (not animate undead -- too easy). That's pretty challenging, especially since he can't use potions and they just removed healing wands. He hastes himself randomly when he takes damage, and he can take off his head and have it fly around independently (summon a flying skull-like monster).

if anyone wants to look at (or even try) what I've got so far, it's on github:

https://github.com/duane-r/crawl/tree/skeleton-normal