Wucad Mu Monastery and Chei - Ayayayay!

[removeelyvilon]

Hello

The Wucad Mu Monastery wiz lab is atm a death trap for Chei characters - if mermory serves, there is no exit anywhere close to the entrance point, so you can't just leave.

Furthermore, because you move slowly and other methods of travel are either unavailable or chancey at best, you are beset by a constant stream of shadowy monks. You can not simply walk away so you have to fight.
They are, believe it or not, tough as nails, even for a Chei boosted character. Plus you literally cannot rest because you are haunted relentlessly.

If you aren't lucky enough to have aura of abjuration, you are pretty much dead. I know some places/enemies are meant to be more difficult for different kinds of characters, but this goes far beyond that - unless you are incredibly lucky, you are sure to join the ranks of the spectral monks.

Maybe you can tell which wiz lab you get by the entry vault, I don't know that, but if you could, you could avoid it that way, that that is very spoilery.
You could avoid evey wiz lab on the basis that you might get trapped in the monastery, but that would be anti-fun.

Suggestions:
-Place an exit close to the entrance (sounds weird)
-Make Chei slow the place down like Abyss and Orb run
-or perhaps remove the shadow monk mechanic entirely and replace them with something else instead

[Sar]

"Turns out one of drawbacks of being slow is being slow."

[VeryAngryFelid]

"Turns out one of drawbacks of being slow is being slow."

It is not about being slow. I hate that wiz lab without Chei too.

[removeelyvilon]

"Turns out one of drawbacks of being slow is being slow."

What do you reckon is the reason Chei specifically slows down the spawn rate in Abyss and Orb run?

[Sar]

Bad design, obviously.

[removeelyvilon]

Yawn.You know what, it's not getting funnier with time. I'm just going to make use of the foe function. Hard to believe a guy like you used to be a counselor.

Anyway, the real answer is of course to prevent the exact scenario in current monastery to not drop new spawns on you after every single step you take.

It's not about the drawback of being slow; you know what you signed up for. It's about undesired side effects due to the way "time" works in this game. What you call bad design, I call a minor oversight.

[Rast]

It is not about being slow. I hate that wiz lab without Chei too.

Yeah, it's pretty bad to spam the player with an unlimited supply of 0 xp summons, with no summoner to kill to end things.

Been a while since I've been there, but IIRC they come fast enough that you would need a very strong offense to avoid fighting two at once, and you need regen or great defense to avoid bleeding out... except that a normal speed player should just walk away from them all instead of fighting.

The monastery has great flavor, but the summons are bad design.

[Doesnt]

I had to deal with a Glaciate ghost in there once, and had the same problem a Chei worshipper would have because:

-glaciate kills movement speed
-the exit is far from the point you arrive at

Putting an exit at the arrival point would be sensible for all portal vaults I think? It's kind of silly to immediately be put in peril just for peeking into a portal that you probably had to rush through a Depths floor to reach in the first place.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Yeah, it's pretty bad to spam the player with an unlimited supply of 0 xp summons, with no summoner to kill to end things.

Been a while since I've been there, but IIRC they come fast enough that you would need a very strong offense to avoid fighting two at once, and you need regen or great defense to avoid bleeding out... except that a normal speed player should just walk away from them all instead of fighting.

The monastery has great flavor, but the summons are bad design.

Exactly, I remember being pure melee and still unable to kill them in time (I didn't have cleaving). That wiz lab made me obvious that 0 XP OOD summons will work great as forward pusher on rest of levels, I almost always exit the wiz lab immediately now. Despite great loot.

[duvessa]

That wizlab is abominable in a lot of ways:
- it places stone walls and trees, then uses lua to make them functionally equivalent to unnaturally hard rock walls (except that you can still cast fireball inside the trees)
- it also uses lua to make its doors invincible
- there's absolutely nothing useful to do in the wizlab except take the shortest path to the center, so you are strongly incentivized to refer to the des to minimize the turns you spend getting things summoned
- the statue is the worst attempt at a unique in the game aside from maybe Roxanne, all you have to do is walk past it.
It's the wizlab of "walk down a predetermined path and ignore the monsters". This is nearly as bad as a labyrinth.

[nago]

Well at least it got slightly better after the interaction between orange statues and disint was removed - before was just run and kill it in 1 turn if you happen to have the right item in inventory.

[njvack]

Hi all, mostly absentee mod here:

While I enjoy a good chei joke as much as anyone else, keep in mind that this is GDD and that jokes that distract from actual design discussion don't help. Yes, we all know that being slow is bad, but as others have pointed out, there's plenty of stuff to talk about in this vault even at speed 10.

[Rast]

That wizlab is abominable in a lot of ways:

Interesting thing about duvessa: You might think that X is good, or at least not a problem, but then duvessa will read the source and explain exactly how X works, and you will realize X is shit.

[NhorianScum]

Yeah wucad with Chei is straight up the worst thing in DCSS bar none.

[dynast]

Enter Wucad Mu lab
Read tele
?????
Profit

[TonberryJam]

did you have enough armour/dodge/shield?