Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying


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Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 8th March 2012, 16:30

Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

I am sure a bunch of people will come on and post "well, Lantern of Shadows is CRAP so you shouldn't be using it", but to them I answer "it got me out of a situation with Death Yaks, Spiny Frogs and low MP so keep that opinion to yourself".

The downside to Lantern of Shadows is the reduced sight area, which is fine, but the way it is implemented in Tiles is actually a terrible thing. A poor INTERFACE SCREW.

You see, when you turn it on, the entire screen goes dark. I can sort of make things out, and I know my character can, but it makes it tough to actually PLAY the game. I understand the intent is to reduce the range of sight, but in addition to that, the regular view dims. Having experienced it, I am of the opinion that this is a BAD thing, completely unnecessary flavoring that makes the game less fun to play. It makes you take more time to examine the screen and see what's going on, which is not the intent of the item.

There is enough with the reduced stealth (which makes no sense since you are creating darkness in a dark place - stealth should be ENHANCED) and the reduced basic LOS that this screw to the playing user is not needed.

Is this how it works in the console version?
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Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 8th March 2012, 16:39

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

I feel similarly about the Umbra effect of Yred's servitor gifts. It makes it very difficult to see things.

Dungeon Master

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Post Thursday, 8th March 2012, 16:45

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

It sounds like a bug, Lantern of Shadows should basically be the same as Demon Spawn attunement mutation, it should just decrease your LOS so only the tiles outside of LOS should be darkened.

BTW, reduced line-of-sight is one of the most powerful effects in the game, my first ever win was a Demon Spawn with exactly that mutation ;) It massively disables all ranged threats ...
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Shoals Surfer

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Post Thursday, 8th March 2012, 22:26

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

There is enough with the reduced stealth (which makes no sense since you are creating darkness in a dark place - stealth should be ENHANCED)


Kobold 1: "Hey dude, is it just me or did the entire world just get darker for no reason?"

Kobold 2: "Oh yah, you're right, every light in the area seems to be dimmer. Maybe its brightness is being sucked into the eternal void of darkness."

Kobold 1: "Probably nothing then, let's go back to sleep."

I think the idea is if a monster sees something like the entire world turn dark, he will wake up and be alert.
(p.s. this is stupid some dev please make it not stupid) - minmay
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Crypt Cleanser

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Post Thursday, 8th March 2012, 22:31

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Maybe do we only need intensity and gamma correction as an option.

Snake Sneak

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Post Friday, 9th March 2012, 03:31

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

It doesn't become anywhere near unplayably dark when I'm holding the lantern :/
adjust brightness?

Swamp Slogger

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Post Friday, 9th March 2012, 05:03

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Lantern is still the ultimate runaway tool in my eyes so it gets pretty heavy usage from me. That said i've never really had an issue with the dimming, but i wouldn't cry much if it went away.

However the whole "I can't see them so they can't see me effect" probably needs to be explained somewhere. Either that or a towel item.
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Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Friday, 9th March 2012, 15:12

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Well, this is coupled with my current medical condition of DOUBLE PINKEYE, so...
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Crypt Cleanser

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Post Friday, 9th March 2012, 16:21

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Conjunctiva inflammation isn't normally related to diminution of visual acuity.
Or if so, you should run at the hospital because eye abrasion can be PERMANENT.

But still you undercovered an important point, should Crawl have (easy access) options to help people with medical conditions?
Like a default big font/gui option for myopics or color enhanced for colorblind and brightness/gamma correction.

Dungeon Master

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Post Friday, 9th March 2012, 17:55

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

varsovie wrote:But still you undercovered an important point, should Crawl have (easy access) options to help people with medical conditions?
Like a default big font/gui option for myopics or color enhanced for colorblind and brightness/gamma correction.

For cases of bad vision, your monitor and operating system already have features that can help you (increase brightness, zoom in, etc). You could also play in console, and use an extremely large font. So this isn't a big deal, really.

Colourblindness is a good thing to support though (not that I have any idea how well it's supported). At least console is friendly, since you have complete freedom to redefine colours.
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Dungeon Master

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Post Friday, 9th March 2012, 18:37

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

evilmike wrote:Colourblindness is a good thing to support though (not that I have any idea how well it's supported). At least console is friendly, since you have complete freedom to redefine colours.

FWIW, one survey participant mentioned being red/green-colourblind as a way of explaining why he prefers Tiles over console - which I found a bit surprising. *checks* Okay, his argument was that having to customize the ASCII glyphs so the monsters were still easy to differentiate seemed like more trouble than he was willing to take. I also remember someone commenting years back that allowing customization of the mini-map colours (an option that was new at the time) was good for people who were colourblind, like himself.
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Snake Sneak

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Post Saturday, 10th March 2012, 15:56

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Dunno about tiles, but in console there is no problem with visibility, at least for me, so maybe people who have a problem (like minmay earlier) need to adjust their settings (for example, I needed to fiddle with the brightness of grays when I've recently changed systems, because they lacked necessary contrast with terminal background), because it would be a shame if world turning to greyscale went away - when I first discovered it, I've been like "coolest thing ever in a roguelike", and things like that make DCSS a game that stands out.
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Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Saturday, 10th March 2012, 17:13

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Vision is just a bit blurry, but I've been to the opthamologist and am on tobradex, just a bit light sensitive. I found it tough to make out the screen when it was unnecessarily artificially dimmed by the lantern. I think doing away with the dark visual umbra graphic on use would add much more than it takes away since it is only a graphical screw and does nothing to actual gameplay but make the game less usable.
"Be aware that a lot of people on this forum, such as mageykun and XuaXua, have a habit of making things up." - minmay a.k.a. duvessa
Did I make a lame complaint? Check for Bingo!
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Dungeon Master

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Post Saturday, 10th March 2012, 17:53

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

since some like it and others don't, it would make sense to have an option to disable the visual effect.
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MyOtheHedgeFox

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Post Saturday, 10th March 2012, 22:40

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Berzerk used to turn all enemies red, but then the color change was removed so they could be easily distinguished.

I don't think there is an option for the visual effect on Berzerk.

Dungeon Master

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Post Saturday, 10th March 2012, 22:48

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

Doing it the same way as berserk sounds like a sensible enough middle ground, yeah. Or adding an option that handles both, or whatever.

Snake Sneak

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Post Monday, 12th March 2012, 13:04

Re: Tiles Lantern of Shadows is annoying

minmay wrote:Unlike berserk, the lantern of shadows colour is the same as the out of LOS colour by default, so that should be changed too in some way.


That's true, though was it always like this? I have a vague recollection of being able to distinguish LOS from out of LOS in 0.6 or 0.7 (though maybe I didn't care).

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