-cTele, Controlled Blink, and ?Blink

[njvack]

Hi all,

There's one (admittedly minor) thing that's bugged me for a while: Scrolls of Blinking are uncommon shots of Controlled Blink, except that in -cTele areas, Controlled Blink gives you a semicontrolled blink, and the scroll gives you an uncontrolled blink. Every once in a while, I forget this difference and it bites me. I freely admit that this is because I'm being forgetful in a game that does not reward forgetfulness.

Is there a reason they don't behave the same? I could be convinced that either behavior is OK, but kinda feel like the scroll's current behavior is preferable -- you can't control translocations in -cTele zones.

[XuaXua]

This killed me in ELF 4 just 2 days ago.

[dpeg]

Good point.

Also, if for some reason there should be a discrepancy, it has to be in favour of the consumable (scroll) and against the unlimited power tool (spell). So I suggest to either swap the spell vs slot behaviour or make them equal. If equal, I'd suggest the current scroll behaviour (no semi-controlled blinks in -cTele areas).

[Galefury]

Nerfing semicontrolled blink sounds like a good idea.

[mageykun]

Yeah, I'm familiar with this particular mistake.

  Code:

# This is mostly to make me pause before panicking and wasting ?blink on ctele levels
autoinscribe = blinking:!r

I like dpeg's idea. The consumable should be more useful than the renewable spell. On the other hand, it's kind of rough to drop a level 7 spell all the way to level 2. Could we have some kind of roll for it? So cblink randomly degrades to blink or semi-c blink (possibly with better odds depending on spell power?).

[smock]

Taking a step back: cblink is way strong anyway. Does anyone think cblink is not OP? I think cblink's degree of control should based on spell power so that at low spell power there's a low chance of landing in the target square and at high spell power there is a high but not 100% chance.

[XuaXua]

I would also appreciate more higher level spells with long tail scaling.

[KoboldLord]

While it is true that Controlled Blink is too strong for its cost, it is currently the only reason to pick up more than about 2 levels in translocations. Level 2 Blink is reliable at that point, and Control Teleport will be usable at roughly the same time you get Haste usable, which you will be doing anyway. Everything else in the skill is cool but not clearly superior to the alternatives.

I would think it would be better to do a more comprehensive translocations reform, rather than to slap down whatever solution looks like it would require the least effort possible. And since this topic has come up before, I'll just go ahead and repost my translocations reform wish list:

Controlled Blink raised to level 9. It is translocation's super-spell, and by Trog you're going to pay for the privilege if you want that level of defense. Two consecutive casts should definitely put you into yellow glow, but otherwise level 9 spells can be allowed to be good.

Blink raised to level 3, possibly to level 4 if that doesn't do the job. Maybe evokable sources will even be desirable for non-heavy armor characters.

Ring of Blinking. Works just like +Blink on an artifact, but as a vanilla ring ego.

Ring of Teleport Control is now evokable, much like the rings of invisibility and levitation. The required evocations skill to get it reliable is around 12-15 or so, and it has an appropriate cost in nutrition every time.

Teleport Control spell raised to level 6, and if that doesn't work it gets removed.

Teleport Control mutation is moved to become an additional effect of Teleportitis 3, and you activate it off the a-menu like other mutation abilities.

Activating any source of teleport control causes heavy glow along the lines of Haste, such that it is prohibitive to keep it on all the time. Teleporting or blinking with teleport control active does not cause additional glow, but it does immediately end any active CTele status.

Monster spell Teleport Anchor added, applied liberally.

Holy monster, perhaps an 'inevitable' associated with Zin gets an aura that blocks translocations in a large area, perhaps the size of a silent spectre's aura.

Some monster line, perhaps gargoyles, gets a 'Sentinel' or 'Hunter' ability that allows them to scry a player that has awoken them and inform other monsters of the player's location. All monsters in a radius, and all monsters that have become aware of the player, beeline directly to the player's location. Repeatedly, if necessary.

Some high-end monsters, preferably glass cannons, get Controlled Teleport as a monster spell. Functionally inescapable unless you can hex them somehow.

[XuaXua]

Of note, I really love Portal Projectile. Thanks to all who recommended it; it works quite well with a launcher-based character. SMITE SMITE SMITE.

[crate]

I don't think controlled blink is too strong; if it were uncontrolled with -ctele I would probably never learn it again since the main reason I currently do learn it is for -ctele areas. Changing ?blink to be semicontrolled is also a very big buff to a lot of characters in Zot:5, since it means that basically anyone not worshipping chei can go ninja the orb unless you have had uncommonly bad luck with ?blink.

I don't like this proposal at all, in short.

[KoboldLord]

I don't think Controlled Blink is completely unworkable, although it is currently too strong. It's an incredible defense, but ultimately offense counts for a whole lot more. The trouble is that it's simply too cheap once you're late enough in the game. 15 skill levels simply isn't much of an entry barrier to an ability when you're clearing Zot or soaking up Hell Effects; that xp comes in fast and the lower levels are as cheap as ever.

L9 Controlled Blink is clearly not a superior investment to spending that same xp towards getting Fire Storm castable, or getting evocations to 22+ for crystal ball use if you've already got Fire Storm castable. L9 Controlled Blink is also clearly not a superior investment compared to getting a +9/+9 executioner's axe of reaming to minimum delay, or maxing out your skill with a longbow of holy wrath. So there definitely seems like there should be a way to make it work.

Direct comparisons to the scroll form seem to be wandering a bit off-track, though. There's no reason for a moderately uncommon consumable that any character can pick up off the ground and use with no investment required to be compared to the capstone ability for high levels of skill investment in a skill that up until that capstone supplies mostly weaker versions of that capstone ability. We don't have scrolls of Fire Storm or scrolls of Minimum Delay, and we probably shouldn't. Scrolls of Blinking likewise have a different role in the game than the various translocation spells.

[dpeg]

You can do with blinking what you want, of course. I'll tell you the lesson I learned about it from Brogue.

Brogue has scrolls of teleportation (very rare, so strict emergency items) and *staves* of blinking. Staves in Brogue work like this: they have a number of charges (expect 2 when found). Charges can be increased with a scroll of enchanting (which is Brogue's all-purpose tool and you want to enchant all kinds of things -- expect to find about twelve in a winning game). Each use of a staff uses up a charge, naturally. Staves recharge themselves (charging from 0 to full takes the same number of turns regardless of number of charges, by the way). Brogue's food clock is way too tight to allow for deliberate recharging of staves by waiting. Also, the enchantment of a staff of blinking will determine how far you can blink.

So what do we have here: blinking in Brogue is in the middle between a consumable and a infinite effect. Really good use demands investment (of scrolls of enchanting). Positioning is really strong in roguelikes and Crawl did a good move with delayed teleports. However, I am not convinced anymore that blinking is good spell material. Casters have all sorts of flexibility already -- do they really need free positioning on top of this? And controlled blink should be an exceptional feat (think god ability, or extremely high skill).

So if I'd got to do it from scratch, I'd leave scrolls of blinking in (consumables are generally fine, they create choices). The spell should, if it was to survive, very much have a gradient, i.e. spell power should play a role. For plain blink it'd determine the distance (i.e. the squares among which the destination is rolled). For controlled blink, I'd make both distance and control a function of spell power: you'd always get to choose a direction (semi-controlled blink) and with good power, you have a chance for controlled blinks. I am aware that blinking is not just about fleeing but also an attacking tool (for stabbing and otherwise) so it is worth it to keep controlled versions in the game but they should definitely ask for more investment than Crawl currently wants.

Evokable items of blinking only serves to weaken the game, in my opinion.

[XuaXua]

Banish the Controllable Blink spell to the Astral Plane.

[KoboldLord]

Positioning is really strong in roguelikes and Crawl did a good move with delayed teleports. However, I am not convinced anymore that blinking is good spell material. Casters have all sorts of flexibility already -- do they really need free positioning on top of this? And controlled blink should be an exceptional feat (think god ability, or extremely high skill).

Removing Blink and Controlled Blink as spells would essentially be the same as removing translocations entirely. There's not enough design space left in the concept if neither teleportation nor blinking is acceptable. Maybe that's what ultimately needs to be done, but I don't know about calling for that before any other solutions are even tried.

Evokable items of blinking only serves to weaken the game, in my opinion.

It seems unfair to restrict blinking only to casters. +blink artefacts already exist in the game, so sacrificing a ring slot and substantial xp for evocations in order to get that effect on a vanilla ring seems at least as fair as the status quo, only with one fewer way casters are better off than non-casters. Maybe blinking is never acceptable under any circumstances, but the premise of my list is that it can be rehabilitated.

[dpeg]

KL: I described how blinking can work very well (scrolls in Crawl, staves in Brogue). And I proceeded to explain how the two blinking spells should be made smoother functions of spell power (currently, they're discontinuous apart from success). This would make Translocations stronger in a way.

[tasonir]

I love controlled blink, and without it you're significantly weakening Chei, who's already terribly weak by most standards. I would, however, be perfectly fine with it being possible to off by 1, if it was limited to lower spell powers. And once you raised translocations a few more levels, it functioned as it does now, with 100% accuracy. Let's say you can get it to 4% or less failure at around trans 13, but to reach 100% accuracy, you need trans 17. Something along those lines. This would make it a rather odd case of a spell which reacts to spell power in a fairly binary way, though. It wouldn't be obvious how to communicate to the player what the failure rate on perfect precision is, you'd want to have something like a spell failure chance (already exists) and a placement failure chance (does not exist). So it's not really a elegant way to nerf the spell.

[dpeg]

tasonir: Controlled blink is a spell available to everyone (bar Troggies, and assuming a little luck with the books); Cheibriados is one god. It is certainly possible to boost Cheibriados in many ways -- and perhaps good to do so regardless of the blinking affair, if the god is really too weak.

In general, the special case should never detract from the global picture.