(Forge) Dwarfs again

[sanka]

I was not a big fun of MD, and I do think that the removal was a good and well tought design deceison. But I also think that a community game cannot ignore such a big part of the community who was upset by the decision. So the conclusion is to put a little bit more work to create a new (and hopefully interesting) dwarf species. This thread is for brainstorming a little bit. Naturally the starting point is the already existing forge dwarf proposal.

- I'd like to ask the developers to consider enabling the forge dwarf in trunk for a while, to get more feedback. I would like to playtest them, but most of the times I can play I do not have access to development environment to compile my own version. It's a little troublesome to be "up to date", which is important for playtesting.
- I'd like to ask players who playtested the species of their opinion.

And finally I'd like to propose some (maybe wild) ideas (just for brainstorming):

- we already have a "no AC (or low AC)" species (octopode). Maybe make the dwarf a "NO EV" or "low EV" species. If the species has a drwaback that it never evades anything, thats a pretty big drawback in the early game, and opens up some opportunities to give interesting bonuses.
- we may give the dwarf a uniqe style of spellcasting. Give them bonuses (like good aptitudes in some school), and reduce the heavy armour and shield penalty for spellcasting. But also make it more limited: only one, or only a couple of spell schools are allowed. I proposed such a species a long time ago, and maybe some of the ideas in that thread can be used for a dwarf.

I hope that those who thinks that implementing a new, interesting dwarf species should be priority in the next release, will help to playtest and design it.

(Just to make this clear: I myself would much more like the "settable autopickup options" or changed buff mechanics implemented, but I still do think that the forge or whatever dwarfs should have priority over these features.)

[sardonica]

There are already Dwarves, and we can't use up one of 27 slots to make another one. Have to leave room for another playable animal like a Crocodile Man or a sentient Mushroom...

[absolutego]

i played one locally until the midgame and then forgot about it. i went for heavy armour and nemelex, and in practice it felt like a mountain dwarf with slightly different aptitudes (worse weapon skills, some better magic skills if you are so inclined) and the power to enchant items, which i used once or twice and found quite irrelevant (this may not be true if you abuse it). i thought it was neat on paper, but it didn't quite translate. regarding heavy-armour casters, i wouldn't mind seeing a race that can actually do it without being funneled to a particular skill (fire for hill orcs, earth or fire for forge dwarves).

i'm aware it's a poor argument, but i can't do better right now.

[sanka]

I haven't tried the proposal, but on paper the "enchant armour/weapon" abilities does not sound very relevant. They may be nice flavor, but enchantments or racial modifiers simply does not matter that much.
About "funneling into paricular skills" - my idea was not to pre-determine the spellschool they can use. Rather, if they learn a spell from a school, they cannot learn spells from other schools - so the player decides, but the race has much more limited spellcasting than others.

Heavy armour spellcasting is simply not special enough alone to justify a race. It is possible to cast in heavy armour, just usually only by the later game. So if we want to keep this idea, we need a proposal that makes "heavy" armour casting viable in the early game, but wich does not makes it overpowered in the late game (where it is already viable). Reduced spellcasting penalty with limited school spellcasting can achieve this: the limitation is not that strong in the early game, but the bonus is. In the end game, we can make the reduction not so strong, while the limited schools will be a real drawback.

[sanka]

Restricting a species to one choice is usually not a good thing, I agree, and the current forge dwarf is not very good in this regard. However, I feel my brainstormed ideas are not that kind, and I hope someone can come up with better ones.

To came up with a more concrete idea: (just an example)

Defense is restricted:
- dodging skill is not allowed. Any starting dodging skill automatically transfers to armour skill, any starting body armour is automatically upgraded to ring mail (or by two "categories"). Initial EV is 0. (but items can give them).

Spellcasting is restricted:
- only one spellschool is allowed up to level 15 (player's choice). Armor penalties are not applied. Aptitudes for spellschools are roughly based on how "universal" the school is - for example, air would be low.
- after level 15, other schools are also allowed, but with restrictions (armor penalties are applied, and every other spellschool only counts as half of that school).

Or maybe your proposal (if I remember correctly) is more intresting for the restriction:
- player choose one of (conj, sum, nec, hex), one of (charms, transmut, transloc) and one element. Only spells from these schools are allowed. Armour penalties are not applied. Spellcasting is average, schools are roughly based on the attempt to even the choices (like conj and sum would be lower than hex, charms and transloc would be lower then transloc, and air and ice would be lower).

[jejorda2]

Deep Dwarves don't heal naturally, but they have damage shaving, free healing wand, and recharging abilities.
Perhaps Forge Dwarves (Or Dire Dwarves, or whatever) don't regenerate MP, but have X.

X might be:
"Armour fits naturally on your body" mutation that reduces armour penalties to spellcasting
Reduced MP cost per cast that stacks with Vehumet
Eat scrolls to regenerate MP


The whole thing is probably a bad idea because Sublimate Blood and Channeling are in the game, but then again Regen doesn't work on DDs.

[nagdon]

The easiest way to force spell school specialization would be to make all spell school skills of Forge Dwarwes antitrain a bit, so for example they would get no penalty on their best school, -2 aptitude on the second best, -4 aptitude on the next etc. (plus regular antitraining). Or alternatively (conj, sum, nec, hex) all pairwise antitrain (with regular -4 apt for each skill higher than the one considered); (charms, transmut, transloc) all antitrain too, and maybe the elements also get extra antitraining, but it isn't necessary if FDs get high Fire/Earth (and it is OK if they have both Fire and Earth) and bad Ice/Air/Pois apts and they only have the regular antitraining. I think antitraining is better than fully disabling skills, and it is a minor modification of an existing mechanism.

[sanka]

Antitraining may be a better solution. I just like to point out that many useful spells are low-level, and do not require any skill in his spell school at all - so antitraining does not matter too much for them. Of course for Haste and Controlled blink, antitraining would make a big difference. To make an antitraining system more relevant, we can make the race have average intelligence and bad spellcasting aptitude, but have good aptitudes in the spells chools.

[Jeremiah]

If you're looking for a way to distinguish them that does not involve aptitudes, how about: they cannot wear/wield any equipment that is not primarily made of metal.

This would mean no robes, leather or dragon armour, bows, slings, staves etc. With weapons it would be a bit complicated to decide what is allowable - ie does a spear contain enough metal to count?

It would be a shame to prevent them using crystal plate, so maybe you could say that crystal is also kind of aligned with earth and forges so could still be worn.

[File200]

I wish I had known that somebody played FD. I abandoned the project because I thought there was no interest.

I agree that the current FD aptitudes are focused and uninteresting. Trying to make the species play differently from humans and hill orcs ended up making a species with a completely pigeonholed play-style.

I have a new proposal for the species if anyone is still interested:
-Mountain dwarf HP, MP and levelling.
-Mostly average weapon aptitudes.
-High armour and shields apts.
-Low spellcasting, but with above-average aptitudes in a wide range of magic schools (fire, earth, poison, hexes etc). The fastest way to cast in heavy armour is to train one school of magic exclusively and ignore your armour skill.
-No forging gimmicks. They just aren't interesting.
-Lower stealth and spellcasting penalties for wearing metal armour. Dragon armour is not affected.

The focus is now on spell casting. You can reach high spellpower quickly and cast while wearing metal armour, but can't cast as many spells. As a pure fighter, you'll be playing a weaker but stealthier hill orc.

It still needs a gimmick to change game-play.

[Galefury]

It still needs a gimmick to change game-play.

Does it really? The idea of a so-called "reverse ogre" has come up a few times.

[evilmike]

HO already has lower penalties for metal armour (it has to be orcish but there's more orcish plate around than regular plate). I like the "reverse ogre" idea, but I doubt it's enough for a new species, and would rather give it to an existing species. Not HO because they're already biased towards heavy armour casting - SE, Ha, Mf, Vp, Sp, and perhaps Te seem like reasonable targets.

I think Ha could work for this idea. They already lean to this direction - bad spc apt, but a lot of other magic apts are good. So, it wouldn't be unreasonable to push them more in this direction. Also, if you want a reverse ogre, you might as well pick a small race

[ebarrett]

That'd be the second time Ha is sort of forgotten by players and even receiving the odd death threat only to get some crazy buff.

Of course, being a filthy powergamer (POWERGAMER), I'd support this.

[File200]

All of those species minmay mentioned except halfling are already unique and interesting enough to stand on their own. (IMO)

I'm willing to start another branch of Crawl to play-test the concept by giving it to some of the existing species. When I get around to it I'll start thread about it.

[XuaXua]

pick a small race

OFFTOPIC: where is the size-changing mutation or spell?

[File200]

pick a small race

OFFTOPIC: where is the size-changing mutation or spell?

It was buried with the last of Mini Dwarves.

[XuaXua]

Spider Form, Dragon Form.

I mean for abuse of armours and shields by races that can't wear them or for mega constriction options (Ogre-sized Octopodes, anyone?)

[Pereza0]

I like the idea of making them good armour users and good at evocations (these could be improved a little too)

Giving them mediocre weapons skills but good armour, shields and fighting apt. Good at taking damage, not that good at dealing it. A good species for skalds?

Maybe, they should be able to recognize types of armour as they level up.

Say, able to distingish cursed from enchanted since some level, then they can tell the brands without wearing them, and later on they can recognize artifact armour (and all its properties) just by looking at it.

Or maybe their equipment could gain enchantment levels with kills/use.

The forge mechanic sounds complicated
.
Also (probably a dumb idea) when using a highly enchanted shield/being pretty high level they could passively reflect a spell(conjuration] to the one who cast it, without being affected at all by it

[graffen69]

Nerf DDs damage reduction to be affected by the (unmodified) Evasion Penalty. This would make DD´s using heavier armours reduce the damage reduction to the point of actually negating it. Maybe it´s just me but I feel DD´s are superior heavy armour users to every other race in the game making new races like this Forge Dwarf kinda weak (by comparison) from scratch. Then again, maybe that was the whole point of Deep Dwarfs all along.