galehar wrote:About flight, the idea was that it has minor bonuses (stealth, immunity to mechanical traps and carrying capacity), but they are all relevant for exploring. So we need to either remove those bonuses or make it possible to permacast it. But permanent flight is Tengu's things and we don't really want to give it to anyone. So it needs a relevant penalty, and ponderousness is one. You would be able to permacast it, but you'll rarely do without the amulet, except maybe for shoals and swamps. Another idea that came up was a spellcasting penalty like for blade hands and spider form (double ponderousness was also suggested).
Tengu get awesome super-flight, everybody else gets stripped-down basic flight that allows safe travel through relevant problem tiles and does nothing else. Saving the amulet of controlled flight is not worth the trouble. Flight is not an effect worth sacrificing an amulet slot, so it will never be worth an amulet slot to very slightly improve flight.
galehar wrote:Regarding the minimum hunger for spellcasting elliptic pointed out that if there is one, you'd always have to worry about whether casting IMB twice or throw flame five times is better against monsters for which either will do. Hungerless spells is a good thing because it means less minmaxing.
That consideration already exists in that you want to conserve mp. A single 2-mp Throw Flame that kills a target will result in less piety decay than a 4-mp IMB that does the same thing when you rest your mp bar back up, so it will always be worth minmaxing your spell tactics. Hunger is typically much less a concern because either way you're going to eat chunks from the thing you just killed anyway.
Hungerless spells cause minmaxing by introducing a clear maximum to shoot for. Worse, this maximum often works at odds with actual good gameplay (it is often preferable in practice to use your high-hunger spells and then eat the chunks you make than it is to use your hungerless spells), which misleads unspoiled players by giving them an obvious goal to reach and then punishing them for trying.
galehar wrote:I like the idea of giving an AC bonus to RMsl. If it works by slowing down projectiles, should it also work on bolt spells and penetrating bolts? Probably yes, at least for simplicity.
I'd say yes, but poorly. +8AC against ranged attacks gives the same average of 4 damage reduction whether the incoming projectile is a kobold's dart or a 100hp Crystal Spear.
nvjack wrote:No flying mummies, then?
They can always use a ring of levitation or a +lev artifact. Or semi-controlled Blinks. They're common enough, and the only vaults that actively require levitation and flight don't occur until post-endgame.