Award for killing Unique Hell/Pan lords

[Sandman25]

I suggest to give some award for killing 4 hell lords and 4 pan lords. I know we can loot weapons but I believe these are not useful mostly. How about training some skill by 1 (the highest one)? It would encourage fighting the monsters if possible.

[Galefury]

I like to fight them even without a reward.

[Sandman25]

I like to fight them even without a reward.

I enjoy killing them too but it makes me feel stupid for spending precious consumables just to have fun. Greater award would make them feel special. Random Panlords can have the same spells as far as I know.

[varsovie]

How about training some skill by 1 (the highest one)?

They already gives XP, and anyway by the time you get to them XP isn't all that important.

[njvack]

I enjoy killing them too but it makes me feel stupid for spending precious consumables just to have fun. Greater award would make them feel special. Random Panlords can have the same spells as far as I know.

If you're not going to spend your consumables killing some of the nastiest dudes in the game, what are you going to spend them on?

That said, I do wish they all had an item that would actually be useful to at least some players. But this has come up in other threads before...

[Sandman25]

If you're not going to spend your consumables killing some of the nastiest dudes in the game, what are you going to spend them on?

I am going to spend them on surviving fights where I cannot just run away.
Maybe it is wrong approach though, I feel I am too greedy with consumables indeed, I spend most on item destruction

[evilmike]

You get their names in your kill list and bragging rights if you kill all of them.

I wouldn't mind a more tangible reward for some, but I'd stick to the system we already use. 3 of the unique demon lords drop unique artifacts (and the staff of dispater isn't bad). I'm not including the horn of geryon here btw, since it's special.

This is the example to follow, imo, if you want to come up with new rewards. Although, if every one of the demon lords had a unique artifact, I'd make it so they only have a chance spawning with one, rather than a guarantee like it is now.

[rchandra]

some of them could have chances at existing unrands. I'm aware that most of these are really good and could even be a pain for the player, so chances could be quite low:

Mnoleg - Plutonium sword
Lom Lobon - Crown of Dyrovepreva
Gloorx Vloq - Sceptre of Torment
Ereshkigal - Scythe of Curses
Antaeus - Gauntlets of War or Skullcrusher

[ebarrett]

For some characters killing them is simpler than not killing them. Maybe not safer or even easier, but simpler, and simplifying things as much as possible is the best strategy you can really have. Their runes are the reward for killing them if that's how your character deals with big scary dudes and that's it.

[tasonir]

I'd probably just increase their exp to much higher amounts. The thing that bugs me is I feel like I'm lowering my score if I have to spend a few hundred turns on a retreat and rest and that the exp they give probably won't balance that out. Of course if you're giving exp to offset the score loss of increased turns, it would probably end up being far too much exp in terms of raising skills. Ah well

[tasonir]

And the maximum experience value can't be changed why? There are no higher numbers than 15,000?

Assuming a character who kills all of the pan lords will reach the 3m exp cutoff, that 15,000 becomes 1500 modified exp, which won't offset the losses in turns. I feel like players should be offered a reward (higher score) if they take the higher risk of killing the unique pan lords. Given that they can't be killed more than once, it can't be scummed. You wouldn't want players to be able to indefinitely zig for more score through experience faster than the turns will lower their score, but that is already impossible since exp suffers such diminishing returns to score (only 10% is applied after 3 million) and it completely cuts off at 9 million. Granted I don't know exactly what values are typical for a 3/15 rune game since this information isn't shown anywhere since I started playing around .9.

I don't expect this to ever happen, but it's what I'd do. You could add a score bonus directly if you didn't want to raise the score through exp, which would probably be better, but I don't know if they want to change the score formula.

[galehar]

How about a score bonus?

[WalkerBoh]

The way it's set now, I personally have no motivation to ever kill one of the pan/hell lords other than during the tournies for my 40 pts. This is precisely because the turns spent killing them lowers my score significantly more than killing them raises it, and the only reason I bother doing extended is for a combo high score.

In general I think this is a shame because I hardly ever interact with them beyond thinking "hope I don't take too much damage as I run/blink past". Just doesn't seem fitting for a high-power endgame branch guardian. The best two options I see are direct score bonus per kill, or lock the rune til its guardian lord is dead (like geryon). I know the second will never happen so...

[siprus]

Score bonus sounds perfect.

[Galefury]

Why? Crawl is a game mostly about killing dudes, but it is not optimal to kill everything. This is fine, and it is one of the things that sets crawl apart from other games.

[Sandman25]

Score bonus sounds awful to me. Turncount depends a lot on player skill, killing Hell/Pan lords does not. Not to mention that it would be a ridiculously arbitrary thing to put in the score formula.

I fail to see any problem here, really. What's the difference between fighting Antaeus being a bad idea and fighting a d:10 dragon being a bad idea?

It sounds like you suggest to give a score penalty for killing Antaeus (punishment for stupid players). I think you can create an "unkillable" monster (like Boris who is resurrected at full hp immediately after being killed) instead, it might guard demonic rune for instance.
And one more thing - not everyone here plays for score.

[Bim]

As I don't really play for score, the score bonus doesn't do a lot for me (and I've never thought score bonuses were 'fun'), but I do think there should be more of a reward involved. Gear is difficult, as not much is useful/relevant at that point.

How about if they infused the player with some of their power? For instance killing Lom would give you the (a)bility (or usuable item) to create an ice storm or heal a limited number of times? That would be useful to almost any player, and the number of times/power could be easily messed about with to give balance (it might be a good idea to have it set as just a one off). This could also work to an extent with the randpands although could be lower in power and might not be guaranteed.

Everyone likes free spells (they could have a high hunger cost as more of a nerf I suppose) at nearly any stage of the game and it would be a different mechanic to anything else in the game. The only downside I can see is people scumming pan lords for ability spells, but I would say that the risk/consumable use would offset that - as in, any char that can kill a panlord without consumable/risk is already too powerful to be bothered about a few free ice storms.

If this was seen as unsuitable/too big a change, they could either boost a stat (or two) or perhaps guarantee drop a good consumable as these are both useful and not completely trivial bonuses.

[crate]

I kill the hell/pan lords quite often when I do extended (except for antaeus). I don't really see why they need changing.

[Bim]

I feel that as they are somewhat unique in their challenge (that they pretty much force you to fight them as soon as you meet them/you can't go off and come back) and because they are generally some of the hardest things to kill in the game that they should provide something more exciting for killing them. Obviously there will be a lot of people that feel that 'the hunt is all that matters' but in the interest of adding interest and surprise it'd be nice to add a more substantial reward - especially at that stage in the game where xp doesn't matter so much.

[rchandra]

I was thinking about this a bit more. Right now, with the Pan lords, if you don't kill them they can spawn on the orb run. This isn't a huge thing, but it is something.

But with the Hell lords, there is nothing. What if killing a Hell lord turned off Hell effects for that subbranch? Right now many hell layouts have big treasure rooms that are not worth looting because of the danger of guardians + hell effects. This is similar to how taking the rune enables cTele.

[Bim]

I was thinking about this a bit more. Right now, with the Pan lords, if you don't kill them they can spawn on the orb run. This isn't a huge thing, but it is something.

But with the Hell lords, there is nothing. What if killing a Hell lord turned off Hell effects for that subbranch? Right now many hell layouts have big treasure rooms that are not worth looting because of the danger of guardians + hell effects. This is similar to how taking the rune enables cTele.

Fantastic idea. I'd take it a step further (although it may have possible balance issues) and have it that for each Hell lord you kill, the hell effects are slightly diminished for all branches, eventually (with all lords dead) having no hell effects.

This could allow for a bit of strategic thinking of which Hell branch to go to first, and possibly allow you to take on all of them even with a slightly less well suited char.

[giygas]

But with the Hell lords, there is nothing. What if killing a Hell lord turned off Hell effects for that subbranch? Right now many hell layouts have big treasure rooms that are not worth looting because of the danger of guardians + hell effects. This is similar to how taking the rune enables cTele.

This makes sense. But it seems it would make more sense if this were activated when the rune is picked up.

[hxy]

How about this - any of the fixed Pan and Hell lords not killed WILL spawn on D1 on the orb run

[Tiber]

But with the Hell lords, there is nothing. What if killing a Hell lord turned off Hell effects for that subbranch? Right now many hell layouts have big treasure rooms that are not worth looting because of the danger of guardians + hell effects. This is similar to how taking the rune enables cTele.

This makes sense. But it seems it would make more sense if this were activated when the rune is picked up.

Picking up the rune already enables controlled teleport, and the point of this thread is to make the player feel meaningfully rewarded for going through the trouble of killing them. There are plenty of ways to justify it. Maybe the lord was responsible for sending out the curses. Maybe the forces of hell are in awe of you. Maybe they fear you. Maybe hell is just smart enough to realize that if their lord couldn't kill you, they should just their losses and let you leave. Maybe all of the above.

[Bim]

this however is like the worst idea ever...blahblahblah unhelpfulness

I'm not talking about making the hell effects disappear instantly after you've killed one of them - just scale down the effects with each one you kill (much like Zin's protection scales with piety), so once you've killed all of them you've 'conquered hell' and all it's effects. Maybe to counteract this the hell branches could be more difficult in general to compensate, and Zin followers could get more of a bonus.

It could be dressed up in any way though, I'd be happy with it being about runes or just that the lords themselves are emanating the effects.

[pratamawirya]

Yeah, even flavor-wise, it doesn't really make sense that the death of one hell lord reduces the power of other hells. If anything, killing Antaeus (the lord of the freezing Cocytus) should instead make Gehenna (the fiery hell) MORE dangerous, and vice versa.

Of course this is all flavor talk, so not really important.

[prozacelf]

It'd make sense on some level for one of the Lords of Hell to have total control over his own domain, but the idea starts to wear thin if it weakens the other domains.

[pratamawirya]

It'd make sense on some level for one of the Lords of Hell to have total control over his own domain, but the idea starts to wear thin if it weakens the other domains.

Try looking at it from a different angle. It's not that the presence of Antaeus weakens Asmodeus, but rather the disappearance of Antaeus strengthens Asmodeus (because the "evil power" or followers (or even both) of Antaeus fly to Asmodeus' realm after the death of the ice titan). It'd make sense that while the good gods work with each other, the big evil dudes do the contrary and are competitive with their peers.

Gameplay-wise, it'd actually be good too if the more hells you conquer, the more dangerous the rest of them would be (because, like minmay said, the Hells are a scary bunch of places but they're not really that dangerous for an extended-worthy character (especially if he already reaped a ton of xp from Pan)).

[Bim]

I actually (in the first time in the history of the internet) completely reverse my position and, as prozacelf says, now feel they should get stronger for each one killed - 'a bigger slice of the pie' as it were. I guess I just find hell effects really annoying.

However, I still feel that there should be some sort of extra reward, even if it was a retrospective one like them being guaranteed on the orb run if you didn't kill them off.

[Bim]

I guess locking the doors would be the only way of doing it, and quite an interesting mechanic as well actually.

[rebthor]

I guess locking the doors would be the only way of doing it, and quite an interesting mechanic as well actually.

Hope you don't pick the wrong one first. Like if you get the Dis castle instead of the easier layout.

[tasonir]

3 quick brainstorm ideas:

How about killing unique lords lowers the spawn rate on the orb run?

That, or it could even allow ctele with the orb?

Kill all of them and be granted a portal from d:27 back to floor x? however far up would be fair. the turns saved would equal out some of the turns you spent killing the lords, making killing them a bit more score neutral.

[Rast]

How about killing unique lords lowers the spawn rate on the orb run?

How about collecting more runes increases the danger level of orb run spawns?