Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to


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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 00:27

Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Str 10, Int 5, Dex 1, (before the +2 is applied)



Arm+3, Ddg-2, Sth-3, Stb-2, Shd+4, T&D-2, Inv 0, Evo+1, HP+2, MP-2, Exp 130,



Fgt+3, SBl-3, LBl-4, M&F+1, Axs 0, Pla-4, Stv-2, UC-3, Thr-2, Slg-3, Bws-4, Crb+1,



Spc-1, Coj-3, Hex-4, Cha-3, Sum-4, Nec-4, Trl-4, Trm-3 Fir+2, Ice-4, Air-3, Ear+3, Poi-4,




Different enough from Minotaurs?
In all seriousness, it's ridiculous that Crawl represents dwarfkind with the "Deep Dwarf", a funky artificer who doesn't regenerate naturally. That would be like...if the only elf were Sludge Elf. Even if Mountain Dwarves were a redundant species, they should probably exist anyway just so Crawl doesn't look racist against dwarves (lol), considering there are three very "well-done" elf races.

EDIT: aptitudes weren't showing up so good so I tried to make it more readable.
Last edited by some12fat2move on Sunday, 8th July 2012, 02:18, edited 2 times in total.
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Vaults Vanquisher

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 01:30

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

another dwarf fetishist :roll:
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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 01:33

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

minmay: What's wrong with Deep Dwarf gameplay-wise? (I don't care about the name and backstory here, only why you think it is a superflous species.)

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 01:46

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

some12fat2move wrote:Different enough from Minotaurs?


depends, is the playstyle of your new MD significantly different from "grab the heaviest armor and biggest axe you can and beat the shit out of everything that moves"

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 02:53

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

nicolae wrote:
some12fat2move wrote:Different enough from Minotaurs?


depends, is the playstyle of your new MD significantly different from "grab the heaviest armor and biggest axe you can and beat the shit out of everything that moves"


The prior aptitude for Axes with MD was +2, this proposal has 0. Also, the Shield aptitude is beefed from +3 to +4. So 2h axing probably isn't a good idea. I realize that beating the crap out of stuff with a one-handed weapon and a shield isn't a whole lot different from doing the same thing with a battleaxe - but the defensiveness of the dwarf has some interesting differences like better positioning (getting hit while moving isn't as big of a deal), dragging a pack of war dogs through a teleport trap, maybe waiting out an enemy's berserk by running away then engaging, and other tactics that have to do with drawing out a fight and taking more hits than anyone else in town. As a tradeoff, the Mountain Dwarf loses the advantages of being able to pump out damage quickly - ending the fight before your berserk runs out, taking out liches before they summon nasty demons, overcoming the regeneration of crimson imps, etc.

Additionally, Mountain Dwarves have a not-as-horrible aptitude for Spellcasting here, though they are not nearly as flexible in weapon apts as Minotaurs.
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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 02:54

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

crawl isn't trying to respect "dwarfkind" or represent it via deep dwarves. They could be called deep minotaurs for all anyone cares.
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Shoals Surfer

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 03:04

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

I miss Mountain Dwarves a lot too, so most of my MiHu are named "Gimli".

Seriously tho why would anyone lose retaliation attacks to choose this MD?
(p.s. this is stupid some dev please make it not stupid) - minmay
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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 03:08

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

sardonica wrote:I miss Mountain Dwarves a lot too, so most of my MiHu are named "Gimli".

Seriously tho why would anyone lose retaliation attacks to choose this MD?


Awesome beards.

Make them a small race too for EV bonus as well.
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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 04:14

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Needs innate dig spell.

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 05:26

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

why would anyone RP as someone short...being short doesn't even make sense to someone like me

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 05:28

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

RPing dwarves is for times when your mommy tells you not to drink alcohol and you want to show her who's boss

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 14:07

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

n1000 wrote:why would anyone RP as someone short...being short doesn't even make sense to someone like me


Personally I'm confused why anybody would make RP considerations the number one factor in species decision

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 16:14

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

No one has actually given a proper answer to the original post yet, so I'll try to.

AFAIK, the position of the developers is that distinguishing species by aptitudes & stats is not enough, any species needs some kind of gimmick to make it different from the other species.

This is why people have tried to come up with ideas like the ability to reforge armour (see the Forge Dwarves thread) and is also the reason why the elven species (and halflings) are regarded with deep suspicion in some quarters and it would not surprise anyone much if one or more of these was removed some time in the future.

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 16:23

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Jeremiah: this is not quite right. A species does not have to have a gimmick. For example, new ogres are defined on aptitudes alone -- I suggested that a species with bad magical aptitudes but really good Spellcasting might be interesting.

However, I think it's not so easy to find interesting aptitude holes (i.e. combinations that might be interesting to try out). This is why quite some time ago the aptitude scale was made coarser, from percentage-based to the -5...+5 scale we have now. If you think your proposal has hit some sweet spot, please say so! This is why I am quite reserved about the OP: giving a list of numbers is much less appealing (to me) than describing what it's about in words. (Not to mention the unnatural despise of minotaurs in favour of those facially challenged.)

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Post Sunday, 8th July 2012, 17:00

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Fair enough, though I had assumed that being big enough to use a GSC was their gimmick (without having all the other attributes of a troll.)

I'm not saying it's necessarily a bad thing - I like Octopodes who are probably the most gimmicky species of all, and I think that when choosing between MD, Mi and HO, the devs made the right decision in removing MD. I'm still not entirely convinced the decision needed to be made at all, but I can see why (from a numbers/stats point of view) why it was done.

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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 07:57

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

The Ogre example does not feel quite right - they are one of the two large races, and large races are different not only by attributes. In my experience that matters a lot. (And of course they are different from Trolls not only by attributes as well).

Deep Elf is a better example - they only different by aptitudes, stats and HP/MP from humans, yet because of the extreme bias towards magic they plays differently. Of course if Deep Elf is good from a design perspective that's another story, but I do not think the devs will remove it in the near future.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 15:09

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Just throwing an idea out:

Give new dwarves a permanent stasis and rPois effect because dwarves are sturdy and used to heavy drinking.

For an escape option, allow them to shaft - they get dropped down a few levels instantly.

And finally, allow them to cast dig, passwall, and leda's liquefaction without armour/shield penalties.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 15:14

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Wouldn't permastasis be a huge problem? I'd never, ever play them if they had stasis built-in.

Maybe if they had a different form of stasis that only prevented monsters from blinking/teleporting them. That would be nice. I think rPois is a little overdone as a racial trait. Shafting would be a little too powerful, and there'd be way too many special-casings on levels where you absolutely cannot go down more.

Mountain dwarves can definitely be done in a great way, though. Their original implementation was just shoddy.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 15:23

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

A player race with intrinsic stasis might be interesting. It'd be awfully hard to offset the penalty -- though maybe not harder than unhealing DD or undrinking mummies.

Also: clarity might be a more interesting intrinsic than rPois -- lots of people have rPois, and it's not a particularly important resistance. Unless you're undrinking, though, clarity isn't terribly important... hm.

Agreed that intrinsic shafting is way too powerful.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 15:35

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Wouldn't permastasis be a huge problem? I'd never, ever play them if they had stasis built-in.


I think it would be very interesting to play a heavy melee character that can't rely on haste/finesse/beserk/tloc to survive. There are many other of escape & buff options available and it would be a breath of fresh air to actually use them.

Also: clarity might be a more interesting intrinsic than rPois -- lots of people have rPois, and it's not a particularly important resistance. Unless you're undrinking, though, clarity isn't terribly important... hm.


Yeah, clarity would probably be better.

Agreed that intrinsic shafting is way too powerful.

Why is that? It's more dangerous than a teleport, although instant. It also doesn't work on branch ends, which is where escape options are needed the most.

If it's an issue of preventing people from diving too easily then it can have a limit depending on XL - if you're XL 5 then you can't use it paste D8, XL 15 then you can't go past D18, etc.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 15:43

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

That would be extremely silly.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 15:45

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Interesting ideas.

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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 16:01

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Why is that? It's more dangerous than a teleport, although instant. It also doesn't work on branch ends, which is where escape options are needed the most.


Well, you only need to map Zot:4 and Zot:5, find the right spot, and shaft yourself... someone has done this with Nemelex before. Same for some hard runes.

Also, "although instant" is a lot more important than you imply. On early levels, it's a guaranteed distortion unwield escape equivalent that puts you into a space very likely to be safer than the Abyss. On late levels, it's a guaranteed distortion unwield escape equivalent that puts you into a space likely to be more dangerous than the Abyss, but that doesn't mean it isn't a guaranteed escape from your current situation.

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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 16:10

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

cerebovssquire wrote:Well, you only need to map Zot:4 and Zot:5, find the right spot, and shaft yourself... someone has done this with Nemelex before. Same for some hard runes.

!lm MarvinPA type=orb char=DrTm 1 -tv

It's since been fixed, shafts and hatches just drop you onto a random square. But yeah, instant escapes are still absurdly powerful (see also the old Portal card in that TV).

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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 16:12

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

MarvinPA wrote:
cerebovssquire wrote:Well, you only need to map Zot:4 and Zot:5, find the right spot, and shaft yourself... someone has done this with Nemelex before. Same for some hard runes.

!lm MarvinPA type=orb char=DrTm 1 -tv

It's since been fixed, shafts and hatches just drop you onto a random square. But yeah, instant escapes are still absurdly powerful (see also the old Portal card in that TV).


that's so like a dev, abuse some ridiculous feature and then fix it

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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 16:13

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

You can just shaft yourself again (instantly) if the new situation is not safe. Of course this may kill you in the long run, but it will at least solve your current problem.
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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 16:39

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Galefury wrote:You can just shaft yourself again (instantly) if the new situation is not safe. Of course this may kill you in the long run, but it will at least solve your current problem.


Having you get exhausted after shafting would be a solution to this, although perhaps not the best.

Also, "although instant" is a lot more important than you imply. On early levels, it's a guaranteed distortion unwield escape equivalent that puts you into a space very likely to be safer than the Abyss. On late levels, it's a guaranteed distortion unwield escape equivalent that puts you into a space likely to be more dangerous than the Abyss, but that doesn't mean it isn't a guaranteed escape from your current situation.


That's a great comparison. There of course could be turns taken while you dig your escape hole which would remove the instant aspect. Do you have any ideas?
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Shoals Surfer

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Post Wednesday, 11th July 2012, 17:53

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

Make mountain dwarves lithovores.

They eat rocks and stones instead of people food.

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Post Wednesday, 25th July 2012, 09:27

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

I think the real issue are DDs. Any new race is gonna be severely gimped compared to DDs, like this new version of an MD/Shield Dwarf. I don´t believe DDs needs to be shafted, just nerfed. The suggestion was made but never replied too; reduce DDs dmg absorb by unmodified EV penalty.
Last edited by graffen69 on Tuesday, 16th April 2013, 04:19, edited 1 time in total.
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Barkeep

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Post Wednesday, 25th July 2012, 13:26

Re: Mountain Dwarf proposal...sorry, I just have to

graffen69 wrote:The suggestion was made but never replied too; reduce DDs dmg absorb by unmodified EV penalty.


Deep Dwarves in robes with high Dodging are also extremely powerful. You can even get some nice AC in Statue Form.
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