The Tavern

Summary: Remove the haste spell from the game. Other forms of haste remain as they are.

Details: Other forms of haste will still remain in the game, primarily potions of speed and wands of hasting. Any character can expect to find 5-10 potions, and will have a supply of haste for emergencies. A character with a wand of hasting will likely have around 20-50 uses of it, depending on how much they recharge the wand, and it's also non-destructible. This should be enough haste for anyone. So while it's a nerf of players and will make the game harder, I don't think it's going to be as hard as you'd expect, since haste is still around, just not spammable.

The early game won't be any harder, while making the late game more difficult, which will help to even out the difficulty curve.

Haste causes the problem of being obvious for 90% of characters, even melee characters who wear heavy armor still tunnel exp into charms in order to cast haste, and get a few low level charms for free along the way (repel missiles, swiftness, regen). Haste also overshadows nearly all other escape options, with exceptions when you're up close to monsters with ranged attacks.

Removing haste will encourage more use of less versatile consumables such as wands of paralysis, confusion, scrolls of fog/fear, etc.

This will have a negative side effect of making high level charms pointless - it would be best if there was another high level charm to replace haste's position, and this could be delayed until one is added if that's best.

This will have a positive side effect of making Chei less bad indirectly, and I believe it will also open up more design space for new gods/god abilities. I'd love to see a god which had haste like effects, although I don't think that simply giving a god the old haste spell is a good idea. I'd probably model an ability after Finesse, but instead make it a 100% haste for movement actions only - a great escape option which would cost fairly high piety. As it stands, it wouldn't be as useful since you could just learn haste and not pay piety for it.

Please try to keep the thread somewhat serious, I'm aware I have a reputation for playing Chei. I assure you, I have used haste plenty of times and it's as ridiculously powerful as everyone says it is.

tasonir wrote:I'd probably model an ability after Finesse, but instead make it a 100% haste for movement actions only - a great escape option which would cost fairly high piety. As it stands, it wouldn't be as useful since you could just learn haste and not pay piety for it.

So like swiftness, but a larger speed bump?

This is very unlikely to happen, based on my conversations with devs (particularly elliptic) in the past. I know I have posted about this on tavern before but I do not wish to find my post in my history nor write it again.

crate wrote:This is very unlikely to happen, based on my conversations with devs (particularly elliptic) in the past. I know I have posted about this on tavern before but I do not wish to find my post in my history nor write it again.

This is the one thing that made me hesitate to post this - if it's considered a settled issue by the devs then by all means we can abandon the thread. I generally test ideas here rather than try to bother the devs over in serious dev wiki land, since most stuff dies a horrible death here. I know there's a lot of general problems with haste, but if not having haste is agreed to be worse than dealing with haste's problems, no need to repeat it endlessly.

I agree haste makes a gameplay way too easy.

OK, if removing this spell from the game is not possible, there are still other options to solve it! It might be just a lot harder to cast:

=> the haste spell could be much harder to remember,
=> the haste spell could be much harder to cast,
=> the haste spell could cause much more magic contamination than it does now,
=> the haste spell could last shorter than it is now,
=> the spell itself could be less likely to find this spell in the spellbooks (ex.: it might be found just in one or two books in the whole game),
=> sometimes (like 5% of times or so), casting the haste spell could generate the opposite effect (slowing instead of hasting),
=> sometimes (like 5% of times or so), casting the haste spell could generate side effects, like hasting some monsters in LOS.

We already have a haste wands, which could be always recharged, and it seems to be sufficient for usual needs.

I have no objections to your arguments but would be sad if haste is removed because it would be harder to win.

btw wand of hasting is actually a significantly more problematic thing for balance than the spell imo
(and personally I find swiftness as a spell even more problematic than haste)

Extended would need to be rewritten almost entirely.

Extended does need to be rewritten almost entirely, but not for reasons that have to do with haste.

I've done extended 3 times with chei, so I don't think it's too tough without haste. This is more a factor of how the late game gets easier rather than anything else, though.

Some of ideas I gave above might be implemented (like the one, where the spell lasts less longer and/or it gives more contamination when casted), so that the haste spell would not ease the game so much. I think that`s a reasonable compromise between leaving the spell as it is now and removing it.

Idea that might make it a biiit more balanced: Have it make EVERYTHING faster- hunger faster, potion debuffs run out faster, charms run out faster, the 3 duration based level 9 spells run out faster. It will balance out the OP Necromutation+Haste combo at least.

TeshiAlair wrote:Idea that might make it a biiit more balanced: Have it make EVERYTHING faster- hunger faster, potion debuffs run out faster, charms run out faster, the 3 duration based level 9 spells run out faster. It will balance out the OP Necromutation+Haste combo at least.

Well, uh -
I think that uh -
Nevermind.

Powerful is not bad. Having haste is not a guaranteed win. I think the game is hard enough as it is, and there have been many changes that make it harder (e.g., being caught unaware by the recent accursed curse toe buff).

crate wrote:btw wand of hasting is actually a significantly more problematic thing for balance than the spell imo
(and personally I find swiftness as a spell even more problematic than haste)

I'm curious about that -- could you elaborate on why wands of hasting are more of a balance problem than the Haste spell?

Igxfl wrote:
crate wrote:btw wand of hasting is actually a significantly more problematic thing for balance than the spell imo
(and personally I find swiftness as a spell even more problematic than haste)

I'm curious about that -- could you elaborate on why wands of hasting are more of a balance problem than the Haste spell?

IMHO because haste takes a bunch of XP to train to use, and a bunch MORE to make work in heavy armour. Wands require little to no investment.

Siegurt wrote:IMHO because haste takes a bunch of XP to train to use, and a bunch MORE to make work in heavy armour. Wands require little to no investment.

Wands are rarer than a book with haste, normally appear later, and use up ?recharge to use as often as the spell. Personally don't know which is worse but wands do take investment to use to the same extent as the spell.

1010011010 wrote:
Siegurt wrote:IMHO because haste takes a bunch of XP to train to use, and a bunch MORE to make work in heavy armour. Wands require little to no investment.

Wands are rarer than a book with haste, normally appear later, and use up ?recharge to use as often as the spell. Personally don't know which is worse but wands do take investment to use to the same extent as the spell.

I guess I don't use the spell that often, and while it does take longer to get the wand, you don't have to detract from your other skills in the meantime, I didn't mean "you can just use a haste wand whenever you want to" I meant "If you want to use a haste wand, it doesn't take any special training, all your XP can go into your primary offense and defense skills" so someone who hasn't used any XP casting haste will be slightly more powerful than someone who has. (And of course the *haste* is the same, regardless of how little or much XP you've invested.)

Perhaps rather than remove haste, we could make the amount it speeds you up dependant on spell power, with the top end being where haste is now.

Should the wand depend on Evocations then? It seems like Evocations is gradually becoming more and more important.

Igxfl wrote:Should the wand depend on Evocations then? It seems like Evocations is gradually becoming more and more important.

I would assume if they made the spell depend on spell power then the wands would depend on evocations (Evocations being the thing which gives wand spells their spell power)

By inference we could assume the wand would probably not be as good as the spell in that case, since wand spellpower from evocation caps at 80 and most level 6 spells have a higher cap than that.

Ok so potion of speed is the single most powerful potion in the game. And potions are pretty powerful.

Now imagine that you can find a single item that gives you five times as many potions of speed in a game as you normally get.

Gosh that item sounds pretty crazy.

It's called wand of hasting.

I very rarely actually learn haste spell if I find a wand because there's no point; you have the wand so you have more haste than you need already.

I'd prefer to see the wand of hasting changed to a wand of swiftness. Swiftness is always useful, but having haste as a non-perishable, massively reusable AND it not taking up any MP is just too good. Potions can be destroyed and the spell takes up MP/spell levels and a lot of xp - the wand is just purely awesome (in a bad way).

I know people have said that 'hasting isn't an automatic win' but for most characters it really, really is.

Bim wrote:I'd prefer to see the wand of hasting changed to a wand of swiftness. Swiftness is always useful, but having haste as a non-perishable, massively reusable AND it not taking up any MP is just too good. Potions can be destroyed and the spell takes up MP/spell levels and a lot of xp - the wand is just purely awesome (in a bad way).

I know people have said that 'hasting isn't an automatic win' but for most characters it really, really is.

wands are consistent that they are all beam spells, would you want swiftness to become a beam? I personally don't think that it should be.

1010011010 wrote:wands are consistent that they are all beam spells, would you want swiftness to become a beam? I personally don't think that it should be.

Except invisibility. And heal wounds and paralyze, which aren't spells at all.

Wait, flame and frost are beams? Also I don't think hasting is either.

crate wrote:Gosh that item sounds pretty crazy.

Golly, what a good item that would be.

1010011010 wrote:wands are consistent that they are all beam spells, would you want swiftness to become a beam? I personally don't think that it should be.

As above, plus confusion. I don't think it really matters that swiftness becomes targeted, if that's what you're getting at.

Lasty wrote:Except invisibility. And heal wounds and paralyze, which aren't spells at all.

njvack wrote:Wait, flame and frost are beams? Also I don't think hasting is either.

Beam is the wrong word, but you know what I mean, targetable. Healing and paralyze are monster spells (clutching straws).

Bim wrote:As above, plus confusion. I don't think it really matters that swiftness becomes targeted, if that's what you're getting at.

I actually think that no charm should be targetable, that seems more hex territory. but there's no major reason why swiftness shouldn't be targetable.

I have trouble believing that haste makes the game trivial. Winning 1/100 games seems hard enough as it is. I can't believe that it jumps to 100/100 as soon as you get haste. It doesn't for me, that's for sure. I find all sorts of haste-resistant ways to get squashed.

Another way to approach the issue is to add dimensional anchor as a translocational spell, basically allowing some monsters to inflict stasis on players. On top of giving it to some monsters, you can put it in spellbooks for warpers to transcribe, giving that branch of magic more tools to work with.

Sure haste would still be quite powerful and useful, but there would at least be some situations where haste wasn't part of the solution to a problem.

adamo901 wrote:I agree haste makes a gameplay way too easy.

OK, if removing this spell from the game is not possible, there are still other options to solve it! It might be just a lot harder to cast:

=> the haste spell could be much harder to remember, Spam the memorise button
=> the haste spell could be much harder to cast, Spam it moar or pump moar into Charm.
=> the haste spell could cause much more magic contamination than it does now, Rest moar between spamming it
=> the haste spell could last shorter than it is now, Spam it moar.
=> the spell itself could be less likely to find this spell in the spellbooks (ex.: it might be found just in one or two books in the whole game), Scum Abyss/Pan moar
=> sometimes (like 5% of times or so), casting the haste spell could generate the opposite effect (slowing instead of hasting), Spam it again
=> sometimes (like 5% of times or so), casting the haste spell could generate side effects, like hasting some monsters in LOS. Spam it again

We already have a haste wands, which could be always recharged, and it seems to be sufficient for usual needs.

@ MrPlank, sad but that you suck at the game doesn't mean haste isn't broken or extended game is way easier than early/mid.

Personally I would like the haste spell being active on you (or allies) only in an area becoming smaller over time (like silence, but not attached to the caster). That way at least haste may have some TACTICAL relevance other than straight up semi-strategic speed and DPS bonus.

Also there could be some monster/mechanics/spells added that would make haste dangerous to cast into some situation (e.g. a monster that steal your buffs or has the equivalent of Sloush).

varsovie wrote:
@ MrPlank, sad but that you suck at the game doesn't mean haste isn't broken or extended game is way easier than early/mid.

Regardless of how much I suck at the game (was that really necessary?), I still haven't seen evidence that it makes gameplay way too easy. How many games has it made trivial for you, varsovie?

Making clouds or bubbles of hastiness that you run to the edge of so you can fight the slowpokes outside sounds more fun than just being fast.

MrPlanck wrote:Regardless of how much I suck at the game (was that really necessary?), I still haven't seen evidence that it makes gameplay way too easy. How many games has it made trivial for you, varsovie?

Have you ever, say, had Haste, Ice Storm, and a reliable method of fast MP-recovery all online at once? Pretty much everything dies before it gets the chance to do a whole lot. Yes, huge XP investment and all that, but it's easily doable in a 3-rune game if you manage your XP. I did it in a 15-rune game where I used that combination to nuke everything in Zot for XP before going for the other 12 runes.

So long as you're not being reckless, at any rate. Anything that "trivializes" the game always has the hidden disclaimer of "so long as you don't do anything dumb."

Haste in of itself isn't really overpowered. It's all the silly combinations you can do that makes it overpowered, like Haste + Controlled Blink for zipping half-way across the map to safety before the monsters know what's going on or machine-gunning high-powered spells while channeling back the MP before reinforcements show up.

Haste is a power multiplier and perhaps the strongest one in the game. If your character isn't very powerful, Haste isn't amazing. If your character is very powerful, Haste is ridiculous.

Power is not even needed. Hasted Sp can take the orb without any fighting, 0.4 turn per move is amazing.

TwilightPhoenix wrote:Yes, huge XP investment and all that, but it's easily doable in a 3-rune game if you manage your XP.

XP has been rebalanced somewhat in trunk, so this kind of statement might not be true anymore.

Monster slouch would be hilarious.

Offensive haste!

galehar wrote:
TwilightPhoenix wrote:Yes, huge XP investment and all that, but it's easily doable in a 3-rune game if you manage your XP.

XP has been rebalanced somewhat in trunk, so this kind of statement might not be true anymore.

I assume you mean there's less experience now? Any idea if there's a ballpark "3 rune games tend to have x% less exp" that is known?

It doesn't really work that way. There's a little less exp from high-exp monsters, but also the higher levels require a bit more exp now. Also skill learning is a bit slower late in the game.

So, experience is slightly slowed down in every regard?

Like I said in another topic, making it give 25%(or less) would be much more reasonable. Why 50%? It's obvious that it's too much. It should've been nerfed years ago.

It's 50% now, but prior to 0.8 it was 100%. Knocking it from doubling your DPS down to 1.25-ing it probably would've been too abrupt a change.

tcjsavannah wrote:Monster slouch would be hilarious.

This one time I hasted a lich so I could slouch it. That was a terrible, terrible mistake.

Nothing better than being crushed by all your possessions against a hasted lich.

brendan wrote:
tcjsavannah wrote:Monster slouch would be hilarious.

This one time I hasted a lich so I could slouch it. That was a terrible, terrible mistake.

Heehee.....I can see why you wouldn't have thought of the consequences of that too. It's still pretty funny though.

brendan wrote:
tcjsavannah wrote:Monster slouch would be hilarious.

This one time I hasted a lich so I could slouch it. That was a terrible, terrible mistake.

But hilarious !

I think you can throw/drop a wand or a potion of haste for monster to pick up and use. Might be fun.

I concur about the wand of haste-- one wand of haste is easily enough for a normal run, and lets you save your XP for other stuff.

Even the spell I don't use too often. The glow was effective in deterring me personally from abusing it.

Hasting summons rocks though.

The Tavern

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