Give Draconians elemental vulnerabilities

[duvessa]

There are a couple problems with Dr at the moment:
1. The colours aren't very different from each other
2. They lack meaningful disadvantages compared to humans

I believe it would take Draconians in the direction of solving these problems if, upon getting a colour, they got a corresponding defensive weakness to go with their colour.
Black: Reduced EV or reduced dodging aptitude (because your wings are extra big or whatever)
Green: Greatly reduced stealth? (because you smell really bad idk)
Grey: MR-
Pale: rC-
Purple: Reduced scales AC
Red: rC-
White: rF-
Yellow: dunno, sorry

[Elitist]

2. They lack meaningful disadvantages compared to humans

Draconians can't wear armour, and gain experience much slower than a Human does.

[Shard1697]

They have good innate AC, which for a caster(what people play Dr for) is basically strictly better than AC which comes with encumbrance. That said I'm not sure they need to be worse when the current state of the game(in actual practice) is that heavy armor melee is the easiest way to get wins.

That said wrt the op yellow could have rPois-, wouldn't be super crippling since you'd be getting your color after early adders are super scary.

[Elitist]

They have good innate AC, which for a caster(what people play Dr for) is basically strictly better than AC which comes with encumbrance. That said I'm not sure they need to be worse when the current state of the game(in actual practice) is that heavy armor melee is the easiest way to get wins.

That said wrt the op yellow could have rPois-, wouldn't be super crippling since you'd be getting your color after early adders are super scary.

I really don't think giving incentive to not getting to level 7 should be encouraged, in any way, shape or form. We've been shown before that giving players the option to do ridiculous things (see: mummy scumming, avoiding traps) because they have some form of tactical advantage means that they will eventually.

[duvessa]

I didn't suggest rPois- because it's really uninteresting and annoying.

Draconians can't wear armour, and gain experience much slower than a Human does.

Except the lack of armour is directly negated by their innate AC, and the lower xp apt is directly negated by their +10% HP. But yes, an alternative would be to get rid of their innate AC and reduce their HP modifier to 0.

[nago]

While the first point is reasonable, what's the reasons behind the second?

Races' design in dcss contemplates differences in power level.
Why now draconians should be worse humans?
I am not saying they shouldn't ever, but that there should be a good reasons to change them

[Shtopit]

Generally speaking, I am against elemental weaknesses in races, because I think that they invite tedious aspects in the game. If everything in Crawl were nicely clear-cut and monster ice mages used ice and fire mages used fire, it could more or less function: you know what to expect from whom, and, while you still are pretty much forced or at least invited to do some tedious ring-swapping, it can be played.
Crawl mages aren't like that: you don't know what the wizard is about to hit you with until it's too late. So you must take unfunny risks or unfunny precautions, and attempt to avoid getting blasted by monsters that may or may not use the element you are weak against. In the end, this becomes boring, because elements are opaque but omnipresent in this game, and you have no choice but to keep constantly in mind that particular aspect of your race in the event that it unexpectedly bites your ass.
Because of this, a race weak against all elements would likely be "easier" (as, less contrived) to handle. At least, you would always know what to expect.
It's true that draconians are strong. They also might enjoy some larger differentiation between colours. I don't think they are too strong, however. They are like magic minotaurs, but fun to play, and magic is more difficult than melee.

[Rast]

1. The colours aren't very different from each other

This is true.

If it needs to change, adding a different negative resistance to each one is not the way to go. Elemental damage is spiky enough already.

[Airwolf]

... But yes, an alternative would be to get rid of their innate AC ...

Getting rid of their innate AC would make Draconians terrible: 11 AC with fully enchanted boots, gloves, cloak, & hat. Surely reducing their innate AC is a more viable change.

What about making the apt differences more dramatic?

And DrBe is currently strong and fun. Not everyone plays Draconians as beefy casters, and Gargoyles overlap that a bit (except bad HP).

[TeshiAlair]

I like this idea in principle, but I think elemental weakness are a bit bland and don't affect play much other than increasing the frequency you swap rings.

Here are my thoughts:

Black: Reduced EV or reduced dodging aptitude (agreed)
Green: Greatly reduced stealth (a bit kitchy but I kinda like having a poisoner style not directly tied to stealth)
Grey: MR- (agreed)
Pale: Instead of a defensive weakness, flatten their apts. It's weird that their three bonus apts are already used by other dracs. Maybe boost invo by one to compensate.
Purple: Reduced scales AC (agreed)
Red: Cold blooded always triggers, rC does not protect against it.
White: Fire attacks have a chance to daze or blind for one turn.
Yellow: swapping equipment corrodes it briefly until you can fix it- makes in combat swapping less valuable

[Shard1697]

Why should Dr be nerfed, though? They're strong but not dominant. If there's any aspect of their design that ought to be changed IMO(besides Dr ghosts), it's some of their breath attacks.

[duvessa]

Even if you want species to be unbalanced, each species should still have some sort of advantage over others. When one species is just better than another in every way, that's a problem. Currently Dr can do everything Hu does except better, and that feels pretty bad. If Dr didn't get the benefit of heavy armour for free (hence the suggestion to reduce their innate AC to 1), or Dr had another actual disadvantage added (such as elemental weaknesses), it would remain better than Hu but there would be some things Hu is better at.
Obviously Dr > Hu is not the only instance of this problem but I'm trying to address them one at a time.

[watertreatmentRL]

It is certainly true that many species are too humanlike, frequently human-but-better. Hill orc, merfolk, and gargoyle come immediately to mind but there are plenty of other offenders here. Draconians are actually less human-but-better than other human-adjacent species. In any case, there's something to be said for removing species, e.g. human, in response to this issue rather than fiddling with individual species.

If there's a problem with color introducing insufficient variation, the resistance component is a big part of that and continuing in that direction is likely a dead end. After all, resistances don't do anything... amirite? Negative resistance is more consequential than positive resistance, but it's still just a matter of shuffling rings etc. The breath is really the main difference between most colors. It's unclear that it's actually necessary for different variants of the same species to be significantly more distinct than the breath weapons.

[Siegurt]

Even if you want species to be unbalanced, each species should still have some sort of advantage over others. When one species is just better than another in every way, that's a problem. Currently Dr can do everything Hu does except better, and that feels pretty bad. If Dr didn't get the benefit of heavy armour for free (hence the suggestion to reduce their innate AC to 1), or Dr had another actual disadvantage added (such as elemental weaknesses), it would remain better than Hu but there would be some things Hu is better at.
Obviously Dr > Hu is not the only instance of this problem but I'm trying to address them one at a time.

Draconian AC isn't as good as real body armour, you're trying to claim that "similar but not the same" things are the same, they aren't. Maybe your experience of them is the same, but a Early Hu who stumbles across plate mail (Or even scale or chain) is in a very different place than an Early Dr. Trying to collapse them into the "same thing" is a false equivalence.

XP vs Hp bonus for Hu vs Dr is also different, on an early spellcaster, you'll have access to memorizing your 2nd and 3rd level spells earlier with a Hu, and have more MP to cast spells with.

Those are some advantages, claiming they aren't enough, or that they aren't significant is reasonable, claiming they don't exist at all is hyperbole.

FWIW I'd rather draconians just lost a ring slot, rather than got an elemental weakness, it'd result in a similar net effect, but it'd be less annoying. (Actually having a race with less jewelry is something we don't have right now, so that might be a unique thing generally.)

[nago]

Or they could lose some other aux armor slot.
I thought this could kinda be an april fool post, but as it seems not, I wonder why you're suggesting as solution for a non-existant problem one of the most annoying and bad features ever - aka inbuild elemental weakness.

[tabstorm]

Draconians are better with book backgrounds since they get an AC bonus and a resist without needing body armor.
Humans are better in non-book/melee backgrounds, because they can use body armor. A good body armor drop is a big swing in your favor that Draconians can't leverage, whereas a human can reasonably get ~20 more AC than a draconian if he has a good body armor, in the long term (10 from base AC, 10 from ~20 armor). A melee draconian, to me, feels obviously weaker than a human with a decent body armor. I guess you can allocate that XP into Dodging or spells but:
1. Draconians have poor dex and dodging anyway so it's not like you're going to get Spriggan EV
2. Most of Crawl's support spells have been gutted except spectral weapon and it probably isn't long for this world
3. High-evasion characters are overrated since there are quite a few EV-ignoring attacks.
Seems ok to me...

[PowerOfKaishin]

Still not sure why Dr needs a nerf. Draconians are the best race that isn't broken. I think they're in the right spot.

I wouldn't mind some of these vulnerabilities, but a few things:
1. It's hard to adapt to this each Draconian weakness is not only distinct (except for Pale and Red) but also something that doesn't affect any other race but Mu and I guess Ce. The player needs to be periodically reminded of these weaknesses when they move to a new, unexplored floor. Nothing that does a force-more, however.
2. Dr should receive buffs in return. Specifically the ones that aren't Grey, Red, and Pale. Adding unique and fun strengths is going to be more interesting than adding weaknesses.
3. lol, stealth penalties. I don't think penalizing something like stealth to be a good idea unless it's done from the getgo. Unfortunately, I too, do not have an alternative suggestion.

[prozacelf]

1. Draconians have poor dex and dodging anyway so it's not like you're going to get Spriggan EV
3. High-evasion characters are overrated since there are quite a few EV-ignoring attacks.
Seems ok to me...

Huge EV seems great until about the 3rd stone giant you run into and then you realize that one failed roll basically got you killed....

Also, someone else mentioned it above, but Draconians are really the one place in the game where you notice that you have 0 GDR no matter what your AC number reads as.

[papilio]

1. Draconians don't need nerfs

2. Penalties without advantages are never interesting discriminations, they're just irritating

[Elitist]

Currently Dr can do everything Hu does except better, and that feels pretty bad. If Dr didn't get the benefit of heavy armour for free (hence the suggestion to reduce their innate AC to 1), or Dr had another actual disadvantage added (such as elemental weaknesses), it would remain better than Hu but there would be some things Hu is better at.
Obviously Dr > Hu is not the only instance of this problem but I'm trying to address them one at a time.

Draconians do not get the GDR that comes with heavy armour, and gain experience much more slowly than Human does. If it means anything, they also can't wear helmets.

[PowerOfKaishin]

Draconians do not get the GDR that comes with heavy armour, and gain experience much more slowly than Human does. If it means anything, they also can't wear helmets.

The lack of GDR kinda sucks, but it's not important. Shitty rolls on Draconians don't tend to be an issue. If they are, then GDR should actually be added so that Dr AC is doing its job.

Not wearing helmets doesn't mean much, as helmets aren't relevant during the hardest part of the game: the beginning. Dr mages come with twice the normal mage AC right off the bat and tend to breeze through the first few floors. Draconians are good because they're a tanky race that can use magical extremely well thanks to not having to worry about physical defense and perfectly serviceable INT and magic apts.

Your experience point is valid, but IMO it doesn't make up for the difference. I wish there were a way to make that xp apt difference more pronounced.

[Shard1697]

I mean, you could increase it. Again, I don't think they need a nerf(honestly I think it's really good for hardy spellcaster species to exist), but if you want the xp apt difference to be more pronounced... it could always be made more pronounced, straight up.

[sanka]

I really think that this is only an April 1st joke - sorry for ruining it.

I think duvessa like to point out that vulnerability is a really really bad drawback (design wise, not power wise), so maybe it could be removed from mummies. Maybe not tough, sorry if I am wrong, but that would be my interpretation.

[Speleothing]

Or they could lose some other aux armor slot.
I thought this could kinda be an april fool post, but as it seems not, I wonder why you're suggesting as solution for a non-existant problem one of the most annoying and bad features ever - aka inbuild elemental weakness.

Duvessa's gimmick is posting solutions to non-existent problems. Unfortunately lots of people take the bait, the devs see a thread with 20 posts, and we end up with unnecessary reforms.

[nago]

You know that gdd on DCSS' development weighs light 0,1% and number of posts on an argument like 0,0000000000000000000000000000001%, right?

[tasonir]

You know that gdd on DCSS' development weighs light 0,1% and number of posts on an argument like 0,0000000000000000000000000000001%, right?

Once upon a time I suggested they remove the dragonslaying ego from weapons other than wyrmbane, and they actually did. I've been here 5 years. It's my crowning achievement on these forums. I'll answer any questions you have. Signatures are $5.

[Sprucery]

You know that gdd on DCSS' development weighs light 0,1%

Once upon a time I suggested they remove the dragonslaying ego from weapons other than wyrmbane, and they actually did.

Search says you have 805 posts in GDD and 1/805 is 0,12%. QED