Remove direct damage from the list of necromancy miscasts


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Swamp Slogger

Posts: 169

Joined: Tuesday, 25th October 2011, 00:06

Post Sunday, 30th September 2018, 18:16

Remove direct damage from the list of necromancy miscasts

#TombIsTooHard

Today I learnt in a hard way that damage caused by a necromancy miscast ("You convulse helplessly as pain tears through your body!") is not resisted by rN!* So, if the proposal from the topic doesn't go through, please consider at least making this damage check rN, because the current situation is wrong even from the standpoint of flavour.
*just by rN, not by torment immunity: undead players aren't affected

LearnDB:
  Code:
??death curse
mummy[1/8]: When destroyed, all mummies cast a death curse. For normal mummies (i.e. 'a mummy'), this could curse items. For other mummies (e.g. 'guardian mummy'), it will be a random {necromancy miscast} effect. [...]
??necromancy miscast
necromancy miscast[1/1]: By severity: 1: Slowing, (living) 5-19 dmg, rotting. 2: 1-3 shadows, (living) draining, 15-37 damage. 3: Reaper, soul eater, 1-7 statloss, draining, (living) severe rot, or torment.


I believe Tomb doesn't (and shouldn't) require lichform or being undead. I also believe that teleporting-blinking around and apporting the rune (read: ninjaing) shouldn't be the only way for living characters to do Tomb. That said, let's consider our living character doing Tomb in a 'normal' way ('kill everything' way).

Now, with the removal of stairs (I like the change, btw: it made Tomb spicy), it's very hard to fight Tomb monsters small group by small group (not even saying 'one by one'). So, with all the torment around, our character is bound to flounder at low hp. There are plenty ways to finish off low-hp character: phisycal damage (summoned monsters help a lot here), smiting, poison from miasma clouds, ancient liches and ancient champions, and, last but not least, direct damage from death curses. Of all of these ways only the last one seems unfair to Me: chances to avoid physical damage or spells from liches and champions can be improved by defences and/or spells (Aura of Abjuration, RMsl and DMsl), miasma can be avoided by stepping out of it asap or by using fog or other clouds, smiting can be semi-avoided by using smart tactics of breaking los and using fog (and its damage is fairly low, tbh: 7-17), and only death curses have fixed chance to deal irresistable 15-37 damage. Have you heard of those instant deaths caused by using Apocalypse, Disaster Area or aoe spell like Shatter? They are all because of this single type of death curse. I think it would be better if death curses never killed character directly; leaving it debuffed and surrounded by summons and other not-dead-yet enemies is quite enough.

As a separate argument on the proposal in topic: Regeneration spell is usually casted when low on hp. If you miscast it, getting your hp rotted is fine, getting killed - isn't.

I propose to remove the direct damage death curse.

Now, when you know my opinion on the most dangerous death curse out there, have you noticed how it was tier 2, not tier 3? As a necromancy miscast it indeed seems milder than being tormented or getting reapered. But as a death curse in Tomb - no. And since it's only tier 2, the most often causers of this curse are guardian mummies; mummy priests inflict it very rarely, greater mummies - almost never. So, in some way, guardian mummies are scarier than greater mummies!
If you spot a grammar mistake in my post I will appreciate if you PM it.

For this message the author Yermak has received thanks: 12
duvessa, Ge0ff, mdonais, nago, Rast, Shard1697, Stairdancer, svendre, Vajrapani, VeryAngryFelid and 2 more users

Blades Runner

Posts: 616

Joined: Thursday, 25th October 2012, 03:19

Post Sunday, 30th September 2018, 20:08

Re: Remove direct damage from the list of necromancy miscast

Yermak nailed it. I would just add that this curse also almost single-handedly pigeon holes the builds capable of running Zigs for the case that you get a mummy level.

For this message the author svendre has received thanks: 2
duvessa, nago

Tartarus Sorceror

Posts: 1739

Joined: Tuesday, 13th March 2012, 02:48

Post Sunday, 30th September 2018, 20:48

Re: Remove direct damage from the list of necromancy miscast

Yermak wrote:*just by rN, not by torment immunity: undead players aren't affected


It checks torment but not RN? How is that anything but a bug?

Slime Squisher

Posts: 377

Joined: Thursday, 12th June 2014, 06:56

Post Monday, 1st October 2018, 15:05

Re: Remove direct damage from the list of necromancy miscast

Rast wrote:
Yermak wrote:*just by rN, not by torment immunity: undead players aren't affected


It checks torment but not RN? How is that anything but a bug?


Because the damaging miscast effects predate rN+ giving torment resistance. And more generally, because (non-plain) mummy death curses haven't changed in like a decade.

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