The Tavern

First I'd like to explain my reasoning. Personally I like unrandarts which do the following:
1) are very powerful but with significant drawback (Maxwell's patent armour, arbalest damnation)
2) make players train something they didn't intend to (armour of the dragon king on caster, plutonium sword)
3) make players change the way they play tactically (plutonium sword discourages weapon swapping, macabre finger necklace discourages amulet swapping)
4) are not no-brainers so ignoring them is still a good idea for some characters.

So here is my suggestion, 3 unrandart amulets:
1) Amulet of lightning hands. Doubles EV, disables both ring slots, fragile, stealth+++, air spells enhancer.
2) Amulet of freezing hands. Doubles AC, disables both ring slots, fragile, ice spells enhancer.
3) Amulet of burning hands. Multiplies AC/EV/SH by 1.5, disables both ring slots, fragile, stealth---, fire spells enhancer.

Fragile is to prevent swapping the amulets when resistance from a ring is needed (and basically it is interesting to have an item which prevents non-weapon swapping in fight), enhancers are for flavor and to make the amulets more interesting to casters, stealth+++ for flavor and to make stabbers more attractive with extra EV, stealth--- for flavor and to somewhat nerf characters in mottled/steam dragon scales.

The amulets cannot be used by octopodes, as that would make them too powerful unless the amulet removes all 8 ring slots, then it would be worse than useless.

I like the suggestion of (good) fragile unrandarts.
I'd instead of the amulet of freezing hands, I'd prefer:
amulet of petrifying hands. Doubles AC, disables both ring slots, fragile, earth spells enhancer.
Just because earth enhancers are too rare.

If you have lightning hands, do you get lightning branded UC attacks?

VeryAngryFelid wrote:The amulets cannot be used by octopodes, as that would make them too powerful unless the amulet removes all 8 ring slots, then it would be worse than useless.

Minor remark but I think you need to find quite good rings to beat something like double EV, even if you can wear 8 rings. Not impossible, but also not likely for a while.

petercordia wrote:I like the suggestion of (good) fragile unrandarts.
I'd instead of the amulet of freezing hands, I'd prefer:
amulet of petrifying hands. Doubles AC, disables both ring slots, fragile, earth spells enhancer.
Just because earth enhancers are too rare.

Sounds good IMHO

If you have lightning hands, do you get lightning branded UC attacks?

Well, I thought about it but I am almost sure it cannot be accepted by devs so I didn't suggest it to keep the suggestion small and focused.

sanka wrote:
VeryAngryFelid wrote:The amulets cannot be used by octopodes, as that would make them too powerful unless the amulet removes all 8 ring slots, then it would be worse than useless.

Minor remark but I think you need to find quite good rings to beat something like double EV, even if you can wear 8 rings. Not impossible, but also not likely for a while.

Probably. It is still octopode with HP penalty and no AC/resists which is not a big deal early game so doubled EV can be good. Later the character can learn statue/dragon/ice form for resists or just take the amulet off.

What if it changed all of your melee and missile damage to be purely elemental?

Probably bad, actually.

Multiplying defense stats is way too good. Just make it a flat +10 AC or whatever. I like the core idea though.

duvessa wrote:Multiplying defense stats is way too good. Just make it a flat +10 AC or whatever. I like the core idea though.

+10 AC can be often not good enough to give up both rings, especially late game. The amulets are scaling naturally: early game they don't give much defence because your defenses are still not that high (but you are unlikely to have great rings either) while late game they can give lots of defence (but you are likely to have some amazing rings too).
If doubled defense is too much, it can be 170-190% though 200% would be easier to communicate to player and to calculate by human.

njvack wrote:What if it changed all of your melee and missile damage to be purely elemental?

Probably bad, actually.

It would be bad IMHO, crimpson imp at least stops being annoying after early game currently.

I really like the concept, and giving up both ring slots can be really crippling (consider you're giving up one or two RANDART rings sooner or later) but getting characters with 60~80 AC or EV (and still potentially good scores in the other defenses) sounds like... uh, a thing. Hmm.

At 1.5x (and some lower amount for burning hands) they'd still be godlike before you had GOOD rings, for sure, even if you probably wouldn't wear any of them into Zot or postgame. Taking my 20 ac to 30 ac in exchange for not wearing some ring of +4 dex and ring of cold resist? Uh YES. Depending on luck with ring randarts, you could potentially wear them for quite a long while.

Also, would be neat to explore other things. After all, these amulets occupy the entirety of your jewellry slots, which is a pretty big deal. Imagine an amulet that (at the cost of both ring slots) removed or heavily reduced your armor encumbrance! Casters going from robes to heavy armor, fighters putting on Gold Dragon Scales or Crystal Plate whilst still enjoying high EV and potentially opening up magic...

Tumalu wrote:I really like the concept, and giving up both ring slots can be really crippling (consider you're giving up one or two RANDART rings sooner or later) but getting characters with 60~80 AC or EV (and still potentially good scores in the other defenses) sounds like... uh, a thing. Hmm.

At 1.5x (and some lower amount for burning hands) they'd still be godlike before you had GOOD rings, for sure, even if you probably wouldn't wear any of them into Zot or postgame. Taking my 20 ac to 30 ac in exchange for not wearing some ring of +4 dex and ring of cold resist? Uh YES. Depending on luck with ring randarts, you could potentially wear them for quite a long while.

Also, would be neat to explore other things. After all, these amulets occupy the entirety of your jewellry slots, which is a pretty big deal. Imagine an amulet that (at the cost of both ring slots) removed or heavily reduced your armor encumbrance! Casters going from robes to heavy armor, fighters putting on Gold Dragon Scales or Crystal Plate whilst still enjoying high EV and potentially opening up magic...

When character has AC 40, it does not need AC 80, it needs slaying and resistances.
The whole idea of the amulets is to instantly use them if player wants to do so, reducing EV penalty is not a big deal, even heaviest armour reduce EV by a small amount and casters are still better in light armour because they don't have high enough Armour skill to make it a good idea to give up both rings just for a few AC.

I'm not gonna take slaying and resistances over +40 AC wtf

Doubling is probably too much, but conceptually it could work if the multiplier is at a point where the choice is hard to make/contingent on ring drop luck.

Full on doubling would still be insane. Felids, tengu, gargoyles... Just think of what their innate bonuses and aptitudes would do. Having >50 in a defensive stat before entering Lair!? Hell, doubled AC could be coupled with a low # Ozocubu and grant chain or plate armour AC on demand. Mutations would also be empowered to a huge level.
I can dig the unrand proposal from a lore perspective, but a multiplicative bonus rather than additive would take so many builds into lolstomp territory. Specialists would go up from "fair enough" to "game-busting b&!!$#/t" in a hurry.

With the numbers toned down, maybe. +100% is way too much. I'd love more enhancer options in play.

duvessa wrote:I'm not gonna take slaying and resistances over +40 AC wtf

I forgot that GDS exists

Sorcerous wrote:Full on doubling would still be insane. Felids, tengu, gargoyles... Just think of what their innate bonuses and aptitudes would do. Having >50 in a defensive stat before entering Lair!? Hell, doubled AC could be coupled with a low # Ozocubu and grant chain or plate armour AC on demand. Mutations would also be empowered to a huge level.
I can dig the unrand proposal from a lore perspective, but a multiplicative bonus rather than additive would take so many builds into lolstomp territory. Specialists would go up from "fair enough" to "game-busting b&!!$#/t" in a hurry.

With the numbers toned down, maybe. +100% is way too much. I'd love more enhancer options in play.

Unfortunately I think it won't work with additive bonus. Nobody is going to swap from plate armour just because they found an amulet with EV 20 or whatever. Casters will keep using robes while enjoying AC 20 too. It will be boring IMHO.

Both a +N and a +N% would work, that I won't dispute. It is just the amount that's scary.
On a build with low numbers, a very welcome change of pace. Then you put lightning hands on a spriggan or felid. Nothing short of area spells could touch the little sneak, and half the floors would be !!!!-stab fodder anyway.
Again, love your idea. Just apprehensive about the balance when mixed together with the existing stuff, item swapping be damned.

Maybe doubled AC but not more than +25?

VeryAngryFelid wrote:Maybe doubled AC but not more than +25?

A hard cap seems workable.
Diminishing returns are an option, too. A function which checks against defensive factors, with log-scaling?

While on topic, do you have ideas for an earth-themed enhancer?

Double or even triple melee damage? Increased melee damage is a distinct design space from the other amulets, and fits into the theme established by staves of earth and statue form. Name could be something like "Amulet of crushing hands".

The only other option would seem to be a massive boost to SH, and that doesn't really sound all that interesting (pretty similar to massively boosted EV) or thematic.

Err... do you not realize that triple melee damage would be the most hilariously broken amulet ever? XD Anyway, we already have Amulet of Increased Damage, it's called Amulet of Harm. You take more in exchange because a damage increase is -incredibly- strong both offensively and defensively. Dead things don't fight back.

I think doubling with a soft cap and drop off similar to how dex starts to have less and less impact on your EV once you get too much is the best solution. That being said, no one's mentioned how this will (or won't) work for octopodes. If I can double my AC/EV and still have 6 rings, that's something I'd throw on every single time. Especially if (and it sounds like it would) it doubles statue form AC. ~70ac statue with 6 rings? You'd have to put in serious effort to die.

tasonir wrote: AC. ~70ac statue with 6 rings? You'd have to put in serious effort to die.

Like open up a shatter-ghost vault? :)

Also you can see in OP that the amulets are supposed to not be usable by octopodes.

The Tavern

Unrandart amulets which disable ring slots

Unrandart amulets which disable ring slots

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Re: Unrandart amulets which disable ring slots

Re: Unrandart amulets which disable ring slots

Re: Unrandart amulets which disable ring slots

Re: Unrandart amulets which disable ring slots

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