Item Proposal: Crab and turtle-shell shields
Posted: Saturday, 4th February 2017, 08:41
Background: Shields are useful but boring, in that their appropriate use is almost completely predetermined: any character using a one-handed weapon benefits from a buckler, shields make sense for a much more restricted set of builds, and large shields (as far as I can tell) are only worthwhile for formicids. This proposal adds more differentiation to Shields and enriches the gameworld by adding another class of monster-derived items.
Proposal: Upon death, all crabs and turtles have a chance (equivalent to the chance of troll and dragon armour generation) to leave behind an intact shell which can be used as a shield. Different types have different qualities and effects. To my knowledge, this involves the creation of five new items: fire crab shell, ghost crab shell, apocalypse crab shell, snapping turtle shell, and alligator snapping turtle shell, described below.
Details:
Crab shell penalties are all overcome at SH 4.0, same as a buckler
Fire crab shell: base shield 5, rF++
Ghost crab shell: base shield 5, rN++
Apocalypse crab shell: base shield 7, some kind of chaos or Tiamat resistance, or even weirder effects (suggestions welcome!); contamination when unequipped
Snapping turtle shell: base shield 10, penalties overcome at SH 15.0, same as a shield (this should maybe have some more interesting aspect than just 'a better shield', but I haven't thought of anything. Perhaps spines? Suggestions welcome!)
Alligator snapping turtle shell: unique mechanics. This shell is worn on the back. It provides shielding even when paralyzed or otherwise incapacitated, but also encumbers like heavy armor. Base shield 13, shield penalty overcome at SH 15.0, plus ER 10 (or higher; enough to make it truly cumbersome). The idea is this would only be usable by characters with high STR and DEX (in-game explanation: specific bodily maneuvers and carriage in order to use it as a body-shield) and would substantially inhibit casting. On the plus-side, it could even be possible for a character wearing the alligator snapping turtle shield to equip another shield in their off-hand (shield dual-wielding!); this would be at the cost of insurmountable penalties, but could prove fun and useful with certain builds in certain situations.
Gameplay considerations:
For a buckler user, switching to a crab shell if found would be a no-brainer, but I want to make them good enough that a user of shields (the item) might consider 'downgrading' in order to get some useful resistances. It would be nice to have a similar calculation regarding the regular snapping turtle shield, but again I haven't thought of a good mechanic. All of these items will be quite rare, since the monsters that spawn them are almost always confined to specific branches, and in the case of ghost crab and turtles, those branches (Swamp and Shoals) are mutually exclusive. They would thus be substantially less common than troll or dragon armours, and obtaining the apocalypse crab shell would require a deliberate Abyss hunt or extreme luck (by the time you're powerful enough to stalk the apocalypse crab through the Abyss without fear of dying, you don't really need its shell anyway; it's more of a trophy. Perhaps defeating multiple apocalypse crabs (say, 3) is necessary to obtain it--rather than dying, the apocalypse crab is pulled to another region of the Abyss, so you only really 'kill' it once). Because they are such rare items, I want them to be good and useful for those who find one, hence their not for the most part presenting significant drawbacks. None of these items are so powerful as to be unbalancing.
'Flavour' considerations:
Using a magical crab or turtle shell as a shield is cool and interesting. It provides another means for players to interact with their 'environment' (in this case, the remains of dead enemies) and thus brings the world of the dungeon a bit more to life.
Proposal: Upon death, all crabs and turtles have a chance (equivalent to the chance of troll and dragon armour generation) to leave behind an intact shell which can be used as a shield. Different types have different qualities and effects. To my knowledge, this involves the creation of five new items: fire crab shell, ghost crab shell, apocalypse crab shell, snapping turtle shell, and alligator snapping turtle shell, described below.
Details:
Crab shell penalties are all overcome at SH 4.0, same as a buckler
Fire crab shell: base shield 5, rF++
Ghost crab shell: base shield 5, rN++
Apocalypse crab shell: base shield 7, some kind of chaos or Tiamat resistance, or even weirder effects (suggestions welcome!); contamination when unequipped
Snapping turtle shell: base shield 10, penalties overcome at SH 15.0, same as a shield (this should maybe have some more interesting aspect than just 'a better shield', but I haven't thought of anything. Perhaps spines? Suggestions welcome!)
Alligator snapping turtle shell: unique mechanics. This shell is worn on the back. It provides shielding even when paralyzed or otherwise incapacitated, but also encumbers like heavy armor. Base shield 13, shield penalty overcome at SH 15.0, plus ER 10 (or higher; enough to make it truly cumbersome). The idea is this would only be usable by characters with high STR and DEX (in-game explanation: specific bodily maneuvers and carriage in order to use it as a body-shield) and would substantially inhibit casting. On the plus-side, it could even be possible for a character wearing the alligator snapping turtle shield to equip another shield in their off-hand (shield dual-wielding!); this would be at the cost of insurmountable penalties, but could prove fun and useful with certain builds in certain situations.
Gameplay considerations:
For a buckler user, switching to a crab shell if found would be a no-brainer, but I want to make them good enough that a user of shields (the item) might consider 'downgrading' in order to get some useful resistances. It would be nice to have a similar calculation regarding the regular snapping turtle shield, but again I haven't thought of a good mechanic. All of these items will be quite rare, since the monsters that spawn them are almost always confined to specific branches, and in the case of ghost crab and turtles, those branches (Swamp and Shoals) are mutually exclusive. They would thus be substantially less common than troll or dragon armours, and obtaining the apocalypse crab shell would require a deliberate Abyss hunt or extreme luck (by the time you're powerful enough to stalk the apocalypse crab through the Abyss without fear of dying, you don't really need its shell anyway; it's more of a trophy. Perhaps defeating multiple apocalypse crabs (say, 3) is necessary to obtain it--rather than dying, the apocalypse crab is pulled to another region of the Abyss, so you only really 'kill' it once). Because they are such rare items, I want them to be good and useful for those who find one, hence their not for the most part presenting significant drawbacks. None of these items are so powerful as to be unbalancing.
'Flavour' considerations:
Using a magical crab or turtle shell as a shield is cool and interesting. It provides another means for players to interact with their 'environment' (in this case, the remains of dead enemies) and thus brings the world of the dungeon a bit more to life.