Starting with Unarmed

[tasonir]

Seriously, there's a lot of choices. If you think a specific playstyle is missing, better to design a new background and submit it. If it's good, it gets polished and everyone can use it. To experiment, just start in wizmode and give yourself skills and items.

I've noted several times how difficult it is to start a character with unarmed. I proposed that unarmed be allowed as a weapon choice on classes that get weapon choices, ie, fighter, gladiator, skald. Currently you need to have a claws mutation to do so, I would happily play unarmed on races that do not have claws. It is currently impossible to start an unarmed character who begins the game with a shield, unless you have claws.

[Amnesiac]

Here is how to start an unarmed character with a shield, without having claws:
1. start Fi
2. press d, then a, then enter

Even if it's a troll?face.jpg

But you know what? I've always thought how cool it would be to be able to do it like in some other RPGs - a DE with 3str, 35int and 3dex, or a Ha with 3str, 3int and 30Dex.

[Galefury]

Well, in that case you cant get rid of the claws. Obviously.

[rebthor]

Here is how to start an unarmed character with a shield, without having claws:
1. start Fi
2. press d, then a, then enter

Even if it's a troll?face.jpg

But you know what? I've always thought how cool it would be to be able to do it like in some other RPGs - a DE with 3str, 35int and 3dex, or a Ha with 3str, 3int and 30Dex.

Worship Nemelex or Jiyva and you can have your wish.

[tasonir]

The biggest problem with your idea is that there is no issue that needs solving. The existing backgrounds are so many and so diverse

GLADIATORS CANNOT PICK UNARMED. Sheesh, I'm really tired of saying this There are builds that I love that cannot be started without wasted skills, or having to miss equipment that I would like to have. The rest of your post is probably correct, however.

[tasonir]

Here is how to start an unarmed character with a shield, without having claws:
1. start Fi
2. press d, then a, then enter

Character started with 0 unarmed skill. Instructions unclear. I am now stuck in the middle of a traffic intersection with no pants. Please send help.

[XuaXua]

Why are only Monks and Transmuters restricted to starting with Unarmed?

Shouldn't fighters, Berserkers, and gladiators, be able to opt for unarmed as their go-to combat skill?

At least gladiators, for the whole wrestling thing?

[Kate]

Merged the million other posts from other threads on this topic into here.

[XuaXua]

Merged the million other posts from other threads on this topic into here.

Thanks for noticing!

[galehar]

Play a monk or a transmuter.
But you want a shield. So play a fighter with claws.
But you want to play unarmed without claws. So drop your weapon.
But it's suboptimal you have no skill. Well yeah, I think you'll have to deal with it. We're not adding a weapon choice to the non-clawed fighter just to satisfy your weird niche playstyle.

[and into]

I want to play as a shield, wielding a Transmuter (clawed or not, I'm flexible there) with 5 skill levels in Traps and Doors (yes I know it was removed but I want to be really good at trappin' and doorsin' right off the bat). Can we make that happen?

[Klown]

Thought I saw this on the wiki or something. Armour messes up Unarmed Combat big time but not weapon users? Is that true?

[5ubbak]

I want to play as a shield, wielding a Transmuter (clawed or not, I'm flexible there) with 5 skill levels in Traps and Doors (yes I know it was removed but I want to be really good at trappin' and doorsin' right off the bat). Can we make that happen?

But what kind of Transmuter would make the best starting weapon? The one with Evaporate or the one with Beastly Appendage?

[ackack]

Thought I saw this on the wiki or something. Armour messes up Unarmed Combat big time but not weapon users? Is that true?

Yes, it's true. EVP affects accuracy for everybody, but for UC users it also has a chance to affect delay. The base speed of a UC attack is the larger of 10 and 1d10 + 2dAEVP. This means in very heavy armour you will be attacking much slower than usual.

I think it's a little silly (and definitely pretty spoilery) that UC is handled this way. I would think the lack of slaying, brands, and damage multipliers from the skill constitute sufficient balancing of UC. I'd be fine with either all weapons moving toward this model or getting rid of it altogether.

[Lasty]

Since it's AEVP that goes into that formula, you can reduce the penalty w/ Armour skill and more strength.

[Amnesiac]

So you want unarmed fighters in heavy armour and with a shield, so their attacks would take 3 turns? Yeah, that's ok.

[BlackSheep]

How about unarmed gladiators with leather, a helmet and some nets? Or an unarmed skald with a free book? I've not yet heard a compelling reason why unarmed can't be presented as a weapon choice for all species regardless of claws.

[Volteccer_Jack]

monk is a class you can pick

some people in this thread seemed unaware, is all

[BlackSheep]

So if you want to start out with some unarmed skill your choices are a robe and ** of piety or some arrows the book of Changes *unless* you pick a species with claws. What if I want to play an unarmed warper?

Other backgrounds starting unarmed is not an argument against allowing unarmed as a weapon choice to all species.

[Volteccer_Jack]

What if I want to play an unarmed warper?

The same thing you do if you want to play an unarmed wizard?

[BlackSheep]

Wizards don't get to pick a weapon.

I really don't understand why people are being so obnoxious about this. Some backgrounds get to pick a melee weapon. Some species get to pick unarmed combat as their melee weapon. Unarmed combat is valid melee option in the game for all species. Why can't all species choose unarmed at the beginning of the game?

[DracheReborn]

To me it's an issue of consistency more than anything else. If warpers get weapon choice, then why not UC as well. If no weapon choice is desired, then just give warpers a shortsword to start with. I mean, they can just pick up an axe or spear from the floor and train that right?

[Galefury]

I think it's because early unarmed is really bad? I'm not really sure though, it might be better than I think.

[BlackSheep]

So make the choice darker as with short blades for most species.

[Mankeli]

I think it's because early unarmed is really bad? I'm not really sure though, it might be better than I think.

Unarmed 0 is worse than a lousy +0 hand axe at corresponding skill level. I believe unarmed at level 4 is already marginally better than that +0 hand axe at 4 axes but you can't brand your fists with poison or draining or a better base type/enchantment if you happen to find/enchant a nicer weapon early on. So I think it's safe to say that unarmed at very low levels is bad.

[BlackSheep]

Changing this is pretty trivial. It took longer to make the display show claws for trolls/ghouls and unarmed for other species than it did to add the option to the menu.

Anyway, if you want to change your local game, here's a patch. If you think this should be added to the game as a whole, keep trying to persuade someone with commit rights.

[and into]

I don't have a very strong feeling one way or the other, though I am on the side of not allowing it, and since the rationale for that hasn't been very well expressed so far, I'll put my two cents in.

Outside of transmuters (a very interesting and unique hybrid starting point), or Monks (who have a unique piety bonus), is it good *design* to give UC as an option for gladiators, etc.? I can see why people want to just say, "Give the player as many choices as possible, so long as it doesn't become OP or mess with other balance issues or clog up the starting screen too much." That's not an unreasonable position. But, from what I take to be the design perspective of crawl, there are problems with that.

Beginning classes in Crawl are meant to be starting points, not "kits" (in the D&D sense), and the whole structure and core mechanics of Crawl reflect this fact.

EVERY character begins the game with appendages (of some form), and the ability to train unarmed combat. It is actually one of the very few things ALL species have in common. However common it may be to run across one in the first few dungeon floors, your character does not START with a hand axe, unless you choose a particular background, and is not GUARANTEED to come across one immediately. The design intent behind class choice is to give you some starting materials, although yeah in some cases those materials are better or at least much more exotic and unique than others, and then after the fact (so to speak) you get some skills appropriate to them. (Except with Wanderers, which are a bit different.) Races with claws, on the other hand, already have something unique about them, and their option to choose UC reflects that.

So there's nothing unique introduced by having a few skill points in UC as an "option." In fact, it (however slightly) actually eliminates options, as someone starting with a spear can *immediately* train UC *or* spear. You can even train one while using the other to kill things, now that victory dancing is dead. (And I'll never stop dancing on its grave, by the way.) In this case it may be trivial and fine to add the UC option to gladiator, as I said I don't feel *that* strongly about it, but I do think it diminishes the differences between starting classes, and let's face it, the non-God straight-up melee starting classes already have a problem standing out from each other, as it is.

In fact, Monks only got that unique piety bonus because it was (rightly) felt that they otherwise lacked differentiation from fighters, gladiators, hunters, etc.

A more minor point, but one that still deserves to made, is that providing for more and more options can also (falsely) give the player the sense that all those differences in options are meaningful, and sometimes they are not. As it stands people overvalue things like aptitudes and starting skills far too much already, worrying about "wasted" skill levels, and it leads to all sorts of skewed notions regarding game play. The design of crawl itself is (mostly) not responsible for these notions, though, so much as entrenched different habits from other games with a very different design philosophy from crawl. This is a mark of crawl's success at being distinct and shouldn't be taken too lightly, even in apparently trivial matters like offering a UC option to a few class backgrounds.

[Lasty]

I think this should be added for the following reason: why not?

Is the objection that it's underpowered? That it's overpowered? That it's bad flavor? I haven't heard any arguments that it's overpowered, and if it's underpowered, who cares? We allow MuCKs. I haven't yet heard any good arguments against it from a flavor perspective yet, so I assume it's not that either.

The closest thing to a good argument I've heard so far is that it overlaps with monks, but monks already have a unique quality that sets them apart. Lots of backgrounds overlap in other weapon choices, so why not allow them to also overlap with monk unarmed combat choice? Hell, maybe we should allow monks to do something other than unarmed combat; -1 quarterstaff, perhaps.

[and into]

I think this should be added for the following reason: why not?

Is the objection that it's underpowered? That it's overpowered? That it's bad flavor? I haven't heard any arguments that it's overpowered, and if it's underpowered, who cares? We allow MuCKs. I haven't yet heard any good arguments against it from a flavor perspective yet, so I assume it's not that either.

The closest thing to a good argument I've heard so far is that it overlaps with monks, but monks already have a unique quality that sets them apart. Lots of backgrounds overlap in other weapon choices, so why not allow them to also overlap with monk unarmed combat choice? Hell, maybe we should allow monks to do something other than unarmed combat; -1 quarterstaff, perhaps.

The "why not?" argument with regard to UC on gladiators is majorly undercut by what you say later: Why not allow monks to start with a -1 quarterstaff? At the point where you are saying something like that, I'd say, just create a design-your-own-class option for people who want absolute complete control over character creation. (Which is a bad idea, IMO, but a lot better than offering a bunch of strange pseudo-options like -1 quarterstaff, which does not offer anything meaningfully different or new, when rolling monks.)

Allowing more options is not always better, if it does not introduce *meaningful* choices or decisions. Obviously what counts as meaningful is up for discussion, but an attitude of "why not?" is a very bad design approach. In fact, introducing so many options can unwittingly make previously meaningful decisions *less* meaningful, thus making design worse.

EDIT: Upon reflection, apparently I feel more strongly about this than I had originally thought....

[Lasty]

The "why not?" argument with regard to UC on gladiators is majorly undercut by what you say later: Why not allow monks to start with a -1 quarterstaff?

Okay, yeah, I shouldn't have said the quarterstaff thing. That's a whole different conversation, and it has no bearing on UC. However, it doesn't undercut what I said about unarmed combat. You're right that "why not" isn't a reason by itself, but others have already given baseline reasons: all characters can train and use that skill immediately anyway; some people would appreciate being able to make this choice; it's trivially easy to implement.

So, we have some reason to consider making this UC change. It's at this point that my "why not?" comment is meant to fit: we have some small reason to do this, there are no appreciable barriers, and no good reasons not to.

More options isn't always better, and "why not?" isn't necessarily a good design philosophy. However, in the context of this specific debate, "why not?" is a valid question, given that others have already stated that this would give them meaningful options.

[tasonir]

I'd be fine with letting all weapon classes start with unarmed iff you also remove monk.

Honestly this wouldn't bother me that much. I think the reason monk should stay is simply the piety bonus, but let's ignore the piety bonus for now. what is a monk? Basically just a fighter without any starting gear or shield. You get a robe, go have fun. There's really no point to the background, unarmed fighter would do everything they do better. The scale mail might be slightly too heavy and slow down their attacks for a while, but some armor skill would cure that. Fighters have slightly more strength where monks have more balanced stats, but it's not a big deal.

Since the piety bonus is in, that unique flavor/mechanic would be lost, and so I'd keep monks for that reason. But if they were removed and all weapon choice backgrounds could pick unarmed, I'd still be happy. Unarmed skald is more interesting to me than a monk.

[Wahaha]

An unarmed fighter would do everything worse than a monk actually. Much worse.

[tasonir]

It would be fine if your intention was to go for a pure melee heavy(ish) armor and shield unarmed character.

If you wanted to not use shields and cast, unarmed skald. if you wanted to not cast, but use light armor, unarmed gladiator.

I shouldn't say unarmed fighter is better than monk, I should say the set of backgrounds with weapon choices as a whole is better than monk. Sorry for being unclear.

[and into]

So, we have some reason to consider making this UC change. It's at this point that my "why not?" comment is meant to fit: we have some small reason to do this, there are no appreciable barriers, and no good reasons not to.

More options isn't always better, and "why not?" isn't necessarily a good design philosophy. However, in the context of this specific debate, "why not?" is a valid question, given that others have already stated that this would give them meaningful options.

Well, except for the reasons not to that I pointed out above (perhaps not directly enough). It is not clear to me that this IS a meaningfully different option, even if a few people apparently want it, or that there is really a gap that needs to be filled here. Especially considering that monks had to be specifically given that piety bonus in order to avoid getting the ax (or being changed in some other way), because in the past they really weren't any different from other melee classes. Some players want to be able to customize everything, crawl doesn't allow this (for good reason IMO), the question to my mind is, would doing this offer a meaningful (however small) difference in game play? I don't think so.

With these sorts of design questions I think it is sometimes helpful to pose the question in reverse: If gladiators didn't exist, but monks did, would it make sense to take away monks' piety, give them a few throwing nets, leather armor, and a buckler? I didn't seize on your comment about the -1 quarterstaff to strawman you, I kind of feel that giving monks the "option" to have some staves skill and a -1 quarterstaff makes about as much as sense as monks with no religion bonus, throwing nets, leather armor, and a buckler.

But then again I'm also of the opinion that gladiators and fighters need to be differentiated, and that M&F and long blade weapon types are too similar, for instance, so what do I know.

[dpeg]

I don't think there has ever been a really thorough discussion on this matter in the devteam: claws were added as an option for the cases were the weapon choices are clearly subpar. Apart from this, the trend has always been "less options" (I took part in starting this, and I still think it's the way to go). The reasoning of and_into [that's a pretty awkward name to cite, by the way :] is thorough and to the point, in my opinion.

and_into: Your comments about under-differentiated features (like Gl vs Fi, or maces vs long blades) hit the spot, but differentation has been increased (for example, Gl used to have no nets). It's never finished, of course.

[Klown]

Thought I saw this on the wiki or something. Armour messes up Unarmed Combat big time but not weapon users? Is that true?

Yes, it's true. EVP affects accuracy for everybody, but for UC users it also has a chance to affect delay. The base speed of a UC attack is the larger of 10 and 1d10 + 2dAEVP. This means in very heavy armour you will be attacking much slower than usual.

I think it's a little silly (and definitely pretty spoilery) that UC is handled this way. I would think the lack of slaying, brands, and damage multipliers from the skill constitute sufficient balancing of UC. I'd be fine with either all weapons moving toward this model or getting rid of it altogether.

This is pretty weird. Can swing a 200 pound battleaxe like Alex Rodriguez on steroids, but throw punches slower? That should probably be looked at.

[BlackSheep]

If the classes that let you pick a weapon had really tight lists that were well thought out and quite restrictive for the purpose of background differentiation, appealing to the "less is more" philosophy might make sense. However, gladiators can choose a weapon of every class, and fighters from all but staves (which don't jive with their shields). Adding the last melee class isn't going to overwhelm people with options, and singling out UC just looks arbitrary. (subpar choices already remain on the weapon choice list in dark grey--I'm looking at you short sword--and there's a whole function devoted to deciding what's a good weapon choice and what's bad)

If you really think restricting UC is good game design, take a good look at the rest of the weapon choices available. There is surely room for improvement.

[XuaXua]

Do any builds start with touch-based spells (confusing touch)? I would opt to allow that build to start with points in Unarmed.

[Siegurt]

There aren't any such backgrounds, but I always thought it would be cool to start a character based around starting with confusing touch (Particularly I think a felid stabber-type starting with confusing touch would be fun to play) I would personally would be in favor of replacing corona with confusing touch in the enchanter's starting spell book, although I can understand why it's not in there.

[Abominae]

The only feasible argument I can see from this thread is that allowing UC as a choice restricts the Monk background. As minmay said: just remove the background. I'd be very surprised (and probably disappointed) if players made a Mo solely upon the extra ** piety. It has always been a nice perk for starting unarmed, but so is anything that the other weapon choice backgrounds offer.

There has yet to been presented a logical reason why UC should not be an option for weapon choice backgrounds, and I really don't see why Monk needs to exist as a background. I love UC, but I don't see the point in having a specific background when adding UC to the weapon option list will provide much more options than ** piety.

[savageorange]

^ Unarmed fighters starting with robes instead of scale mail would be optimal (avoid UC penalty), but confusing ("why does every other choice of weapon get scale?")
OTOH, If unarmed fighters start with scale, that is both suboptimal and confusing ("why do I need to take off my armor and switch to robes to get non-crap attacks?").

In short, as long as there is a special UC penalty for heavy armor, the Monk background is needed to make things non-confusing. If there is no special-casing for UC, Monk is free to go away.

[ontoclasm]

I'd be very surprised (and probably disappointed) if players made a Mo solely upon the extra ** piety

** piety for free is pretty nice.

I really love playing characters that use the Book of Flames. Why can't my Assassin choose the Book of Flames as his weapon? I know people tell me there's another background that starts with it but I really want to have a cloak too.

[BlackSheep]

Seriously? Now we're equating books and fists?

All characters start with the ability to fight unarmed. People are just asking for the ability to put their starting weapon skill points into UC instead of some other weapon they don't want to use.

[and into]

The only feasible argument I can see from this thread is that allowing UC as a choice restricts the Monk background. As minmay said: just remove the background. I'd be very surprised (and probably disappointed) if players made a Mo solely upon the extra ** piety. It has always been a nice perk for starting unarmed, but so is anything that the other weapon choice backgrounds offer.

There has yet to been presented a logical reason why UC should not be an option for weapon choice backgrounds, and I really don't see why Monk needs to exist as a background. I love UC, but I don't see the point in having a specific background when adding UC to the weapon option list will provide much more options than ** piety.

Did you read the thread before posting this?

Regardless of why people choose the backgrounds they do, the ** piety that monks start with is way more interesting (in fact it is a unique mechanic amongst backgrounds) than gladiators, whether gladiators get to choose unarmed or not. With the exception of throwing nets, any character can approximate the gladiator start just by wearing stuff you find on the floor in the first two levels of the dungeon, nine out of ten times. (From a design perspective, Fighter is actually more interesting/unique in this regard.) Even better, the ** piety presents interesting options. I don't play monks a lot, but when I have played them, that mechanic has pushed my play into unexpected directions when, for instance, an early Fedhas altar spawns. For people who play monk more often, I imagine it also presents an interesting choice when a Jivya vault or the corrupted temple show up. This is the case even if "optimal play" is probably just to grab Okawaru and get immediate Heroism. It would be a shame to lose that and, in fact, if a choice *has* to be made, dropping gladiators would be better than dropping monks, now that the latter have their unique piety mechanic.

Seriously? Now we're equating books and fists?

All characters start with the ability to fight unarmed. People are just asking for the ability to put their starting weapon skill points into UC instead of some other weapon they don't want to use.

I think we have a difference in perspective, here. I see starting classes primarily in terms of the *things* you start with, and then you get some starting skills that are appropriate to those things. I feel like the main reason to allow UC for gladiator is out of a misplaced concern for "wasted" skill points or whatever, which is silly. You can just choose monk, train a bit of throwing (or not), and pick up some leather armor on D2, then enjoy the extra piety boost, or if you **really** want those throwing nets for some bizarre reason, choose gladiator and train UC, which literally every character can do. I think it is fine that the game "makes" you do one of these things, just like (as ontoclasm somewhat sardonically pointed out) the game "forces" you to *start* as either assassin or a blaster mage (but then, of course, either one can branch out into the other play style later on, without too much difficulty, if you want.)

[dpeg]

I am quite surprised how lightheartedly some of you willing to dispense with the Gladiator or Monk backgrounds. In my opinion, both the nets and the piety are meaningful, interesting starting kits.

[Siegurt]

My problem, actually, with gladiator is that I don't start with *enough* nets for them to be useful for very long. I feel like the nets given by the gladiator background last me much less long than say, the arrows or bolts from the hunter background do. This feeling may be exacerbated by the fact that nets are much rarer overall.

[dpeg]

Siegurt: Now, that a much more meaningful complaint (to me) than the one about UC backgrounds! I am not sure what to think about yet. Yes, nets don't last long -- but they are emergency tool, which you can hardly say about arrows I have made good use of nets, both for fleeing and also for killing early nasties. Hm, guess I wouldn't mind giving gladiators some more.