Barkeep
Posts: 4435
Joined: Tuesday, 11th January 2011, 12:28
HD and polymorph
This isn't a terrible thing if it's intentional, but it doesn't feel intentional to me ("haha enjoy your shrike in Lair" doesn't seem like a crawl joke) -- and additionally, it relies on knowing HD which isn't even hinted at as a mechanic anywhere I know about. You just need to polymorph monsters and see what turns into something really appalling.
It might make more sense if Crawl picked something nearby in XP value instead, as those values (IIRC) can be tweaked by hand and are at least a little closer to meaning "this about how dangerous someone thinks this monster is."
Thoughts?