Beogh


Although the central place for design discussion is ##crawl-dev on freenode, some may find it helpful to discuss requests and suggestions here first.

User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 153

Joined: Sunday, 23rd January 2011, 20:04

Post Sunday, 30th January 2011, 23:52

Beogh

I've been whining about this for awhile but I guess this is the right place to put it.

Beogh kindof Stinks endgame, and that is due to the fact that he helps you build up a group, but he does nothing to help you keep them alive.
When assaulting Zot it is HIGHLY recommended to have these resistances
rF+++
rN+++
rE+

It is nearly impossible to get enough resistances for a band of 5-7 Orcs even if you settle for just one of each.
I think that Beogh's abilities NEED to be refined to help support the gameplay style that he helps the player build.
I would not miss the Walking on water joke if it meant that at least half my troops would be able to at least make it to the Orb Vault.

Ziggurat Zagger

Posts: 3037

Joined: Sunday, 2nd January 2011, 02:06

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 00:54

Re: Beogh

I suspect that Beogh was designed with the idea of taking an "Orc Jesus" concept from real-life joking around and running with it. Since then, the rest of the game has been refined but Orc Jesus is too much of a sacred cow to touch. With good reason, too; Orc Jesus is one of Crawl's distinctive hooks that sets it apart from other Roguelikes. There are lots of Roguelikes that just have good gameplay out there, but only one where you can be Orc Jesus.

I think it's worth a complete re-write. Other than the orcish recruitment, NONE of Beogh's granted abilities synergize with the main concept, which is being the Orcish Messiah and leading an army.

If I were designing it, I'd probably give the player a selection of Orcish War Chants that expand as piety goes up, much like the higher-level enemy orcs give each other in-game. Earlier ones would give allied orcs (and not you) a mild slaying bonus or a single pip of some resistance. Top-level ones would have a chance to send allied orcs berserk or shake off some status effect. Putting down a new war cry would supercede the old one, and some would have associated drawbacks to go with them.

Getting rF+++, rN+++, rElec, rPois for everybody at all times is probably overkill. A single pip of rF+ will reduce damage to a monster more than it will for the player, and they don't really need to be completely invulnerable.

Spider Stomper

Posts: 197

Joined: Sunday, 2nd January 2011, 11:13

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 08:33

Re: Beogh

Id' keep Water Walking for the reasons KoboldLord pointed out - You are Orc Jesus, you have to play the part. However one ability I'd gladly part with is Smiting. It might be just me, but has anyone actually used it? I've gotten to the midgame with Beogh and honestly I never need it. Early on you can't waste piety because you want your army as soon as possible, and later when you do get your army it becomes pointless to smite things when you can instead just point at something and say "Kill!" and let your orcs do the work.

Dungeon Master

Posts: 3618

Joined: Thursday, 23rd December 2010, 12:43

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 13:05

Re: Beogh

For what it's worth, I have designed Beogh.

Smiting is in because that the signature ability of monster orc priests.

As I see it, the problem is with herding. Just as we have abolished zombie herding, we should do the same with orcs. Since I'd like to keep the aspect of countless (and useless) orcs converting to you, my proposal is to have a very limited number of standard bearers around you. That's the concept of "apostles" on the wiki page: https://crawl.develz.org/wiki/doku.php?id=dcss:brainstorm:god:beogh

For this message the author dpeg has received thanks: 2
Stormfox, szanth
User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 153

Joined: Sunday, 23rd January 2011, 20:04

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 17:37

Re: Beogh

HaHa, sorry about that Dpeg but Beogh isn't very good endgame.
And he is the ONLY race exclusive god, but he isn't very competitive with the other gods.
All I'm asking for really is to add an ability to Beogh that lets you temporarily buff all Orcish allies in your LOS.

Maybe a Beogh's hand ability that gives all orcs 1-2 random Resistances, and +1-3Ac/Ev

Dungeon Master

Posts: 3618

Joined: Thursday, 23rd December 2010, 12:43

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 17:40

Re: Beogh

Haha sorry Omndra, this is why players and developers don't mix. Gods were never meant to be of universal strength. And I am not the fairy godmother.
User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 153

Joined: Sunday, 23rd January 2011, 20:04

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 17:56

Re: Beogh

Ok you win dpeg. XD

Dungeon Master

Posts: 1613

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 21:54

Post Monday, 31st January 2011, 18:21

Re: Beogh

Herding is definitely a problem (and I like dpeg's proposals to fix it) but I'm not at all convinced that Beogh is lacking power in the endgame. I won with a band of 6 orc warlords and a high priest killing everything on the way to the orb - it requires careful play (recall your orcs to get them out of danger!) and obviously you can't take on the whole vault at once but I only lost 2 warlords (to an orb of fire) in the entire Zot run. They waltzed through V:8 and the Lair branches, too. I also trained invocations throughout the game just for fun (and to have an invoc title), and by Zot I could do quite significant damage with smiting, allowing me to take out problematic targets a lot faster.

Ziggurat Zagger

Posts: 3037

Joined: Sunday, 2nd January 2011, 02:06

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 01:12

Re: Beogh

dpeg wrote:For what it's worth, I have designed Beogh.


Obviously pretty successfully, since your work comes up as one of the defining features of Crawl in every forum thread I've ever seen where somebody tries to introduce Crawl to players who haven't tried it yet.

I'm not convinced Beogh is worth the risk of messing with, in light of that fact.

dpeg wrote:Smiting is in because that the signature ability of monster orc priests.


Smiting is also the signature ability of elf priests, and draconian priests, and mummy priests, and some demons and angels. Plus a half dozen uniques.

dpeg wrote:As I see it, the problem is with herding.


Yeah, I can definitely agree with that.

I'm curious, though. What exactly is the point of water walking? It doesn't have any particular gameplay merit, because the ability can be trivially duplicated by any number of common items and spells, and it doesn't come in handy very often anyway. Human Jesus used this ability something like once in thirty years, so why did this get placed as the capstone ability for Orc Jesus? I'd love to hear any story behind it, if one exists.

Dungeon Master

Posts: 3618

Joined: Thursday, 23rd December 2010, 12:43

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 01:24

Re: Beogh

KoboldLord wrote:
dpeg wrote:For what it's worth, I have designed Beogh.

Obviously pretty successfully, since your work comes up as one of the defining features of Crawl in every forum thread I've ever seen where somebody tries to introduce Crawl to players who haven't tried it yet.

I'm not convinced Beogh is worth the risk of messing with, in light of that fact.

Not sure how to interpret that, so I'll let it slide by... If you read the wiki page on Beogh, you'd know that I am aware that the god is not perfect.
However, I do think that the Beogh appeal really needs converting masses. (Sometimes it is proposed that you'd only take so many followers etc.) You don't want all of those happy orclets around you, no question about that, and there are ways to achieve that in a thematic way.

KoboldLord wrote:
dpeg wrote:Smiting is in because that the signature ability of monster orc priests.

Smiting is also the signature ability of elf priests, and draconian priests, and mummy priests, and some demons and angels. Plus a half dozen uniques.

This is missing the point: orc priests are one of the most threatening monsters. They kill characters left and right. So an aspiring orc priest players should surely be able to turn the tables around. Look at it the other way: if smiting was missing, new players would propose it every time they die to monster orc priest smiting.

KoboldLord wrote:I'm curious, though. What exactly is the point of water walking? It doesn't have any particular gameplay merit, because the ability can be trivially duplicated by any number of common items and spells, and it doesn't come in handy very often anyway. Human Jesus used this ability something like once in thirty years, so why did this get placed as the capstone ability for Orc Jesus? I'd love to hear any story behind it, if one exists.

It's a joke. I thought it'd be too snarky, but everyone seemed to love it, so it stayed.
Your interpretation is quite negative, I would rephrase it like this: water walking allows to use an in-game mechanic to build flavour easily.

Ziggurat Zagger

Posts: 3037

Joined: Sunday, 2nd January 2011, 02:06

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 01:34

Re: Beogh

dpeg wrote:Not sure how to interpret that, so I'll let it slide by...


I mean that completely literally. If you tune in to a Let's Play thread involving Crawl, or a What Roguelike Should I Play Next? thread that gets Crawl as a suggestion, Orc Jesus will always come up, and the general reaction from non-Crawl players will be "THAT IS SO AWESOME!!!" Yes, in all capital letters.

Dungeon Master

Posts: 3618

Joined: Thursday, 23rd December 2010, 12:43

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 01:49

Re: Beogh

minmay wrote:Replace water walking with an invocation that turns nearby water to wine. Monsters swimming in wine become confused. Fire conjurations that pass over wine create permanent flame clouds.

edit: also make the player come back from the dead

All of these are somehow things attributed to Jesus. And now tell me which one is best translated to the game. And stirs players' memory most vividly? That's why I suggested water walking.

Vaults Vanquisher

Posts: 476

Joined: Friday, 31st December 2010, 06:38

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 03:15

Re: Beogh

A joke that'd be pretty cool. Like if he had a one-time-only Felid-ish extra life. Maybe comes back with a halo over the character icon.
User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 153

Joined: Sunday, 23rd January 2011, 20:04

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 07:13

Re: Beogh

Nah I after reading some of Dpegs notes i begrudgingly realize that he is right.
No other ability would be able to trigger the Recognition that water walking has.
I also just remembered one of the things i read one i first started playing.

"We don't really want to focus on balence, some things will always be better than others"
(I probably Misquoted, but that was the basic idea i got from it.)

That said, I am still a little bit sad that Beoghs Last ability is just a joke, as i had suspected.
User avatar

Dungeon Master

Posts: 4031

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:37

Location: France

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 10:48

Re: Beogh

dpeg wrote:water walking allows to use an in-game mechanic to build flavour easily.

I love the water walking flavour :D . I'm sad that it feels so fragile. You never know when your piety is going to decay and drowning this way is a very stupid death. We should definitely fix it so the player has 10-20 turns to go back on firm ground (or cast levitation) when he loses the ability.
<+Grunt> You dereference an invalid pointer! Ouch! That really hurt! The game dies...
User avatar

Dungeon Master

Posts: 182

Joined: Saturday, 18th December 2010, 10:26

Location: Germany

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 11:19

Re: Beogh

galehar wrote:
dpeg wrote:water walking allows to use an in-game mechanic to build flavour easily.

I love the water walking flavour :D . I'm sad that it feels so fragile. You never know when your piety is going to decay and drowning this way is a very stupid death. We should definitely fix it so the player has 10-20 turns to go back on firm ground (or cast levitation) when he loses the ability.

When I coded it, I suggested that the player should be warned if they're actively spending piety while water walking. The suggestion was shot down. Prompts are annoying, sure, but drowning is arguably worse. That said, I've no idea what percentage of drowning accidents is due to the interface (the player forgetting he's standing on water) and what to overconfidence (wrong estimation of the current piety level).

Water walking is basically a gimmick, but a very flavourful one. Though I was originally against it, I've come to appreciate it. Of course, there's no reason we couldn't add a high-level invocation, like orc warlords' battle cry. (Saint Roka is, in fact, actually an orc warlord getting priestly abilities via Beogh, rather than an actual priest.)
Please report bugs to Crawl's bug tracker, and leave feedback on the development wiki. Thank you!

Abyss Ambulator

Posts: 1196

Joined: Friday, 17th December 2010, 13:59

Location: Maryland, USA

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 14:23

Re: Beogh

As someone who has drowned by burning piety while walking on water, I found it absolutely hilarious. It was a completely avoidable death in the making anyhow (engaging an OOD ice statue on D:4 without a wand of fire), so I didn't feel bad about it at all.

You get the ability early enough and it's unique enough that it makes for a refreshingly different gameplay experience. Relatively few other builds get a reliable way to cross deep water and still easily retain item pickup and the use of down stairs. (All Merfolk, levitation + controlled flight, sufficiently leveled kenku and trunk dracs, batform vampires...forgetting anything?)

The only area where it becomes problematic is leading your followers through a watery area like Swamp or Shoals, or some main branch levels (like the Lethe vault).
You fall off the wall. You have a feeling of ineptitude.

Snake Sneak

Posts: 110

Joined: Monday, 20th December 2010, 21:11

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 16:46

Re: Beogh

I have 3 suggestions which i think would pretty much solve everything with just a few minor tweaks:

(1) reconsider the costs for smite. Most people don't use it (much) for reasons already given above. Maybe we can greatly increase the food cost in exchange for a lower piety cost.

(2) Beogh can passively grant your (strongest x?) allies half of your resistances. This way you still have to work to get them resistances and it solves alot of the endgame issues. Granting it to the strongest constant number of allies is an effective way to softcap your number of allies as well.

(3) if water walking wears off, give the player exactly one turn before it does. You can even have some flavorful message show up at this time and it keeps an element of the risk since you only have one turn while no longer insta-killing people without any way to prevent it.

For this message the author ryak has received thanks:
mageykun
User avatar

Shoals Surfer

Posts: 320

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:02

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 18:12

Re: Beogh

I like Beogh and I think he's a fun god to play with. I found Smiting to be useful in the early-game for killing uniques. Beogh is very powerful in mid-game (close to overpowered actually). And kinda mediocre in the endgame. Warlords don't suck in Zot, but they die easily against the tougher enemies, like Orbs of fire and electric golems. I still managed to retrieve the Orb with a few warlords left.

How about replacing some of Beogh's passive abilities, such as blessings and reinforcements, with a Recite-like ability? At piety 75 (***) you get a battle cry, which may cause some random and temporary status effects on nearby allies depending on your invocations skill and piety level.

Effects:
- Minor slaying bonus
- MR+
- Frenzy
- Potion of Resistance type effect
- Haste
User avatar

Barkeep

Posts: 4435

Joined: Tuesday, 11th January 2011, 12:28

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 20:35

Re: Beogh

Beogh is definitely what initially sold me on Crawl. My brain definitely went HOLY CRAP I GET TO BE ORC JESUS!

And I don't think he's particularly underpowered. Followers make pretty much all of the dungeon easy, and the bonus for orc-gear combined with good combat aptitudes in general make killing stuff later quite possible. The heavy armor revamp should help in this respect, too.

Smiting, I generally use on an early Ogre or two. Maybe some early uniques. Definitely has saved my hide.

And I've also never thought water walking was so useless. It sure makes Shoals and Swamp easier -- especially as bringing your orc buddies down into Swamp pretty much turns into an Orcish Drown-A-Thon. Yes, you want to be pretty sure your piety is high before you go and do it, but piety's plentiful.
I am not a very good player. My mouth is a foul pit of LIES. KNOW THIS.
User avatar

Dungeon Master

Posts: 4031

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:37

Location: France

Post Tuesday, 1st February 2011, 22:41

Re: Beogh

The battle cry is a nice idea. For resistances, I think Beogh should just bless followers with random resistances. 1 for warriors, 2 for knights and 3 for warlords. The orc should get the blessing, not his gear. Also, adding a L4 Hexes spell "Haste other" would be awesome for Beoghites.
<+Grunt> You dereference an invalid pointer! Ouch! That really hurt! The game dies...

For this message the author galehar has received thanks:
mageykun

Vaults Vanquisher

Posts: 476

Joined: Friday, 31st December 2010, 06:38

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 01:58

Re: Beogh

So why's invisible a hex -and- a charm? :P

Vaults Vanquisher

Posts: 447

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 22:10

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 02:00

Re: Beogh

hexes are about branding weapons and projecting noise

Vaults Vanquisher

Posts: 476

Joined: Friday, 31st December 2010, 06:38

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 02:14

Re: Beogh

But aren't hexes and charms opposites, like ice and fire?

Vaults Vanquisher

Posts: 447

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 22:10

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 02:39

Re: Beogh

invis is a hex because it's a playstyle spell for enchanters, the hexes class.

hexes and charms are not opposites.

Slow is already mass-hasting for ally users, and more distinct from Haste than yet another spell, and I'd say if it isn't good enough, perhaps MR-checking spells like it should be a bit more viable later on, eh? but that is already in another thread or two.

Dungeon Master

Posts: 3618

Joined: Thursday, 23rd December 2010, 12:43

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 07:45

Re: Beogh

galehar wrote:The battle cry is a nice idea. For resistances, I think Beogh should just bless followers with random resistances. 1 for warriors, 2 for knights and 3 for warlords. The orc should get the blessing, not his gear. Also, adding a L4 Hexes spell "Haste other" would be awesome for Beoghites.

Sounds good to me.
I am pretty sure that back when we finetuned Beogh, there were no orc battle cries yet. Otherwise we'd probably incorporated them into Beogh (I hope).
Regarding resistance blessings: Do we want to spell them out? (I.e. in the orc's description.)
Regarding Haste Other: I agree with the comment that Slow should be used here (and this includes making Slow useful later on).
User avatar

Dungeon Master

Posts: 4031

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:37

Location: France

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 08:49

Re: Beogh

minmay wrote:Hexes are about negative effects, not positive ones. And regular Haste is already awesome for Beoghites even if they never cast it on themselves.


But Beoghites benefits a lot from heavy armour. And casting L6 in heavy armour is no fun. Also, the difference in MP cost is quite significant if you plan on hasting 6 to 12 allies.

Here is the official Hexes (current) description. It's not the in-game description, it's in docs/develop/spells.txt. This file has been added as a guideline for which schools a spell belongs to.

  Code:
Hexes are spells that affect things and monsters (usually negatively). They
never do direct damage nor change fundamental state of anything.

If we had spells that bestow a curse on someone or something, make an item
zap anyone who touched it, enlarge a person or give him a nasty itch, they
would be all hexes. Beguiling and illusions also belong here.

This includes: slowing monsters, paralysing monsters, confusing monsters, etc.

This specifically includes: weapon branding spells.


And here is Charms description:

  Code:
Charms are things that positively affect yourself, having amulet ("charm")-like
effects. They all have a lasting effect, and never affect anyone else except
for direct contact with the warded person (RoF, RMsl, ...).

These are wards or enhancements: give you a resistance, let you move or heal
faster, let you have more control on magic affecting you, make you stronger.

This includes: hasting yourself, becoming invisible, extending current status
effects, berserk rage, etc.


So if we were to add a "haste other" spells it would be pure Hexes.

MrMisterMonkey wrote:Slow is already mass-hasting for ally users

Except that slow is resistible and affects a single target.
<+Grunt> You dereference an invalid pointer! Ouch! That really hurt! The game dies...

Vaults Vanquisher

Posts: 476

Joined: Friday, 31st December 2010, 06:38

Post Wednesday, 2nd February 2011, 13:04

Re: Beogh

MrMisterMonkey wrote:invis is a hex because it's a playstyle spell for enchanters, the hexes class.

hexes and charms are not opposites.

Slow is already mass-hasting for ally users, and more distinct from Haste than yet another spell, and I'd say if it isn't good enough, perhaps MR-checking spells like it should be a bit more viable later on, eh? but that is already in another thread or two.


But it's -not- a hex. It's a hex -and- a charm. :P
User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 153

Joined: Sunday, 23rd January 2011, 20:04

Post Thursday, 3rd February 2011, 17:24

Re: Beogh

galehar wrote:But Beoghites benefits a lot from heavy armour.


THAT EXPLAINS EVERYTHING!
I suck at playing characters dependent on AC as i started playing after the great AC nerf.
Has AC been buffed a bit in trunk?
User avatar

Vestibule Violator

Posts: 1533

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:52

Post Thursday, 3rd February 2011, 18:45

Re: Beogh

Yes it has, significantly.

Temple Termagant

Posts: 11

Joined: Saturday, 22nd January 2011, 23:01

Post Saturday, 5th February 2011, 23:48

Re: Beogh

while we are still on the topic of Beogh....
i think this issue has come up somewhere before, but i forgot...

its regarding the inventory of your orc followers.

countless times, some orc has manage to pick up some good gear, WHICH I WANT! :evil:

i have absolutely no way to tell him "drop that weapon/armour" or "give me that weapon/armour"

furthermore, there seems to be situatons where i want an orc to use a particular weapon, but theres no function "use this weapon/armour ONLY" or "here take this weapon/armour and DONT SWITCH!"

its very frustrating when your orc warlord takes a randart weapon which you want to use. you either kill him just to get it back.....or cant get it back at all, unless he dies.


i wish there could be commands whee i could customize the follower's inventory to my liking....
for example, i could take the good items away from low level orcs and equip it to high level orcs, or give better armour to my orc priests and sorcerers, or give potions of healing to SPECIFIC orcs, rahter than dropping potions and hoping that orc will pick it up admit a HUGE crowd of followers who would pick it up too.


the fact that these orcs do what they want,is quite annoying, in that item management is a nightmare, they will not drop weapons unless they find a better one, and good stuff seems to be taken by your orcs and you can't take them back unless you kill them, and your army of orcs are so disorganized.

i mean, my normal orc is wearing crystal armour but my orc warlord is wearing a chain mail?! there has to be a way to organize them...

Edit: currently orc followers dont seem to bother with amulets and rings, which is good, since i dont have to worry about them taking good rings and amulets.
however, if there is a command that we can assign objects to orcs, maybe we can equip them with rings and amulets? so that they can benefit from the effects of those rings and amulets?

after all, whats the harm of giving my 8 extra rings of fire and ice resistance to my high level followers?
Last edited by barasia on Saturday, 5th February 2011, 23:56, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar

Shoals Surfer

Posts: 320

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:02

Post Sunday, 6th February 2011, 00:48

Re: Beogh

barasia wrote:...

furthermore, there seems to be situatons where i want an orc to use a particular weapon, but theres no function "use this weapon/armour ONLY" or "here take this weapon/armour and DONT SWITCH!"


Tell them (Ctrl + T) to pick up only things that you drop, swap places with them, then set it so they can't pick up anything once they have it. Yeah, it's awkward.

Edit: currently orc followers dont seem to bother with amulets and rings, which is good, since i dont have to worry about them taking good rings and amulets.
however, if there is a command that we can assign objects to orcs, maybe we can equip them with rings and amulets? so that they can benefit from the effects of those rings and amulets?

after all, whats the harm of giving my 8 extra rings of fire and ice resistance to my high level followers?


Monsters can't wear jewelry.
User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 153

Joined: Sunday, 23rd January 2011, 20:04

Post Sunday, 6th February 2011, 18:13

Re: Beogh

I like that idea, as it does sound simple enough to implement

But even if you don't do that It would be nice to have an Ally Equipment screen.
however I am gonna Try out the HOPr again, only this time imma use that Buffed up Heavy Armor.
I am glad to see that it is no longer useless.

Return to Game Design Discussion

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 37 guests

cron
Powered by phpBB © 2000, 2002, 2005, 2007 phpBB Group.
Designed by ST Software for PTF.