Comments on: Crawl 0.15 beta

By: Indy

Indy — Tue, 02 Sep 2014 02:39:56 +0000

Don’t like the direction crawl has been taking. Removing content is not the right direction. It violates the idea of stone soup. Removing others’ flavourful contributions to the soup is NOT acceptable. Stone soup is a group work. Completely agree with comment 28 by Matt, soup has less flavour. Going back to earlier and tastier version 11.

By: Gail

Gail — Wed, 27 Aug 2014 22:25:01 +0000

RIP nemelex, oversimplification and cutting continues

By: Abras

Abras — Tue, 26 Aug 2014 11:15:43 +0000

Stone Soup 0.76
===================
* Walls removed.
* Backtracking removed.
* “Dungeon” replaced with a hub menu leading to branches.
* Branch ends now contain a portal leading to the revamped Dungeon hub.
* Combat streamlined.
– Statistics and combat randomization have been removed in favor of static “health” and “damage” statistics.
– Enemies in sight are displayed in staggered rows on the main screen.
– Players now enjoy several menu options which adequately cover the existing range of combat choices: “Fight,” “Magic,” “Item,” and “Run.”
* Inventory simplified.
– Equipment now either boosts health or damage, plus certain modifiers, such as “bladed” or “flaming.”
– Potions either restore health or temporarily augment health or damage stats.
* Character generation revamped.
– Existing races replaced with “Small,” “Medium,” and “Large.”
– Existing backgrounds replaced with “Melee” or “Magic.”
– Unfortunately, this necessarily scuttles plans to add “gerbil,” “toadstool,” and “Lernaean hydra” to the list of playable species.

By: Dynast

Dynast — Tue, 26 Aug 2014 04:09:25 +0000

I was expecting to see Nemelex give more types of decks and now he gives even less.

By: NilsBloodaxe

NilsBloodaxe — Thu, 21 Aug 2014 19:27:40 +0000

I have a feeling that all those people who are complaining that removing item weight and destruction have made the game significantly easier barely, if ever, win. The only thing that these two things ever did was encourage stashing. These stashes were essentially weightless, destruction-free, backpacks, as it was easy to return. I would also point out that more enemy types have been added vs the few flawed ones that have been removed. Functionally similar food items with different names is stupid. As far as flavor goes, flavor is all well and good, but the design philosophy of the game precludes mechanics solely for flavor’s sake.

By: Matt

Matt — Tue, 19 Aug 2014 09:56:11 +0000

The main problem I have with this build is the removal of so many enemy types and food types. The team should be adding more variety, not less, the more monster types there are the more new things to experience in subsequent runs, and the same goes for different consumables to a lesser extent. Even if they are mechanically similar to existing monsters and consumables, they still add a lot of flavor to the game.

By: warren

warren — Mon, 18 Aug 2014 19:45:23 +0000

The game is unquestionably easier now. This is due primarily to two things:
1) Removal of item destruction which makes it safe to carry huge stacks of potions and scrolls
2) Elimination of inventory weight which makes it possible to carry huge stacks of everything

Since item destruction was un-fun the best way to add balance back into the game is to bring back inventory weight.

Potions and scrolls are often considered to have inventory weight in excess of their physical weight because of their fragility. A potion may only weigh 0.1 kilograms but if you throw 100 potions in a sack with no padding then many of them will get broken. So the inventory weight assigned to carrying each potion is considered to be far higher.

Since inventory weight is measured in AUM (arbitrary units of mass) no one can really say exactly how much items should weigh and the devs just need to make potions and scrolls weigh an amount that forces SOME amount of trade-off in choosing to carry 40 potions of curing.

By: Gene

Gene — Mon, 11 Aug 2014 17:12:01 +0000

It’s far more likely that by .30 there will be many alternate possibilities for branches, each with its own unique challenges and dangers, than it is that we’ll ever get “press o to win.”

I understand that some of these things made the game harder, but I would say that it was either marginal and tedious (weight,) completely luck-based and tedious (item destruction with intermittent dropping thereof,) or just plain unfun, along with adding more RNG influence re: dropped items (permanent corrosion.)

In exchange, we got beefed up poison, stacking corrosion that’s far more dangerous, isn’t obsoleted by artifacts, and is only resisted half the time, less loot, and less XP.

How is the game now easier on the whole? Sure, the odd run or two would be ruined by, again, completely luck based item destruction, but now more people die to poison, or corrosion, and there’s a smaller chance for good loot with the removal of floors from the dungeon, crypt, and vaults.

By: kamil

kamil — Mon, 11 Aug 2014 10:56:33 +0000

the inventory space got devalued by reducing the item variety(food stuff, darts), and removing the weight system led to the removal of the corps/skeleton carrying feature… meh dont like that

By: Joe

Joe — Sun, 10 Aug 2014 14:32:37 +0000

While I’m sympathetic some of the general concerns about simplifying away too many of the gameplay features. I’m not sure there’s any grounds to say the game has gotten “easier.”

Particularly, I’m confused why people seem to think short dungeons make the game easier. Longer dungeons yield more experience, which yields a bigger char to conquer other dungeons. The days of 27 D levels and 8 vault levels meant you could always find a branch you were overprepared for. Now you are almost always pushed into dangerous territory for exp necessary to survive. And most of those branches have dangerous new enemies with a variety of attack types that require different tactical response. The old days of kiting nagas in snake are gone with blink allies encircling. Retreating to hallways is nullified by deep troll earth mages, and so on.

By: DaStockMan

DaStockMan — Sat, 09 Aug 2014 16:48:43 +0000

There are also other missing features that much deeper roguelikes have. The lack of light sources in DCSS for instance has always been a disappointment to me. Light is something that should be a factor in any dungeon crawler…

By: Stefan

Stefan — Sat, 09 Aug 2014 10:52:10 +0000

Playing a bit with 0.11 I found some more slightly disappointing simplifications in later versions: There are no elven or dwarfen branded items anymore. I was always hunting for elven or dwarven things. Then once you are poisoned you dont know how many life points will be eaten up by the poisoning. With 0.14 you have a prediction which makes it quite a lot more boring. Now you know if it would be a good idea to take a potion or not…
Cheers Stefan

By: Stefan

Stefan — Sat, 09 Aug 2014 10:14:23 +0000

Summing up some changes (likely incomplete list) leading to simplification executed with the last versions: no secret doors, no stabbing skill,
shorter main dungeon, shorter and reworked branches, and ultimately with 0.15 no item destruction, no corrosion effects, no weight limits anymore. Whoa, thats a lot! I actually compiled version 0.11 because from my point of view its the last one really challenging.
Also the removal of the funny little things as listed in comment 15 is really disappointing.
I would rather add much more things like that.
As comment 15 stated, crawl becomes much more bland. I dont want to say Crawl is bad, Crawl is still a good game, also many changes have been good, like introducing several sprint maps or new unique characters, but from my point of view the general direction should be reconsidered. Cheers Stefan

By: DaStockMan

DaStockMan — Sat, 09 Aug 2014 07:46:08 +0000

Yes I agree as well, the game is too simplistic now. It was death by a hundred simplifications. Food will be the next thing to go, and soon after that the monsters. I mean, endless eating and fighting easy mobs around every corner isn’t fun either right?

By version 0.30 you just have to hit autoexplore and the game wins for you…

By: Stefan

Stefan — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 19:58:31 +0000

Hello, concerning the item destruction and the
dropping of items I would suggest making dropping items unnecessary instead of making items indestructible. For example if you are surrounded by a freezing cloud, your potions should freeze whether you drop them or not. Same with flame clouds and scrolls. I agree very much with the people complaining about the ongoing simplification of the game.
Cheers, Stefan

By: Gail

Gail — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 16:06:59 +0000

Every patch seems to make the dungeon shorter and easier

An amazing game to be sure but is persitently heading in a lets be casual experience.

Item destruction and weights forced players to make stashes and think about what to bring or leave behind or risk losing escapes. This update removes alot of risk/reward that makes crawl unique. Making games shorter and shorter is not a plus, we can dungeon sprint if we want 15 minute games. Fast forward 5 patches and every branch is 2 levels and the dungeon is 6 floors. Please stop the hacksawing!

By: onono

onono — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 13:51:54 +0000

Cocytus should prevent quaffing
Gehenna should prevent reading scrolls

Rationale for temp debuffs:
Cold attacks freeze potions -> Player can’t drink
Flaming attacks cause smoke -> Can’t read scrolls

By: TheLastMoonTroll

TheLastMoonTroll — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 11:08:18 +0000

Please, release first 0.16 build ASAP. I’m an addict.

By: nosrepemos

nosrepemos — Fri, 08 Aug 2014 09:21:59 +0000

Why remove all the funny little things like cheese, sausages, big fish, giant goldfish, etc? Now Crawl is like a bland, flavorless shell of its former self

By: aruca

aruca — Thu, 07 Aug 2014 16:21:39 +0000

> Perhaps they should look into making a side branches where you cannot use potions and another for scrolls.

This reminds me of the recent change: “Casting Ozocubu’s Refrigeration now prevents the player from using potions
for several turns instead of destroying potions.”

Perhaps cold attacks can have a chance of a temp debuff that prevents potion quaffing.

Perhaps fire attacks can have a chance of a temp debuff that prevents scroll reading.

Temp debuffs in general achieve a lot of the same goal without the tedium of dropping and picking back up items, etc.

By: Toast

Toast — Thu, 07 Aug 2014 15:25:43 +0000

> Doing volcano without scrolls, or fighting slimes with substandard weapons, are ways of providing different challenges under new constraints. The consensus seems to be that the variety did not outweighed the tedium, but there’s no question that the game offers fewer types of challenges with the change.

Perhaps they should look into making a side branches where you cannot use potions and another for scrolls.

This would give back some of the challenge, even if the area’s reward was ‘just loot’.

By: schmoe

schmoe — Thu, 07 Aug 2014 10:43:33 +0000

Doing volcano without scrolls, or fighting slimes with substandard weapons, are ways of providing different challenges under new constraints. The consensus seems to be that the variety did not outweighed the tedium, but there’s no question that the game offers fewer types of challenges with the change.

By: Gene

Gene — Thu, 07 Aug 2014 05:39:23 +0000

Item destruction was unfun, as was permanent corrosion. They really did just add a level of tedium to the game that shouldn’t need to be there. What value is there in me dropping all my scrolls, entering a volcano, and immediately picking them up again? What does making me carry one mediocre weapon along with the one I’m actually using do to either increase the challenge or /remove/ tedium?

The change of rCorr to 50% makes actual fights harder, what with the stacking non-specific corrosion, but removes the need for an entire second set of gear for melee fighters. The loss of strong rPois, while something I personally dislike (it usually just means you wait to heal the poison, since it’s not too debilitating in battle) also increased the difficulty factor, if by a little.

What these changes did was remove some luck from the game, and replaced it with tactical choices. Isn’t that a good thing?

By: Tasonir

Tasonir — Thu, 07 Aug 2014 02:03:09 +0000

125 * Statue Form no longer gives -10 EV.

Somehow, I had missed this going in. Awesome, time for more statue form…

By: MrPlanck

MrPlanck — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 23:38:01 +0000

Good stuff.

RIP, flaming corpses

By: PleasingFungus

PleasingFungus — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 22:44:13 +0000

@zardo: consumable spawn rates have indeed been adjusted.

By: Wolfechu

Wolfechu — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 22:24:10 +0000

Loving the changes from 0.14 to 0.15 so far, from the major gameplay stuff to the new gods to even the new vaults. Whether I like a particular change or not (and this time round I like 99% of stuff), it’s amazing fun to log into a game each day and have new things waiting.

I think it was one of the developers of Rogue said that a roguelike by definition should be a game that is still capable of surprising you with something after years of play. By being so actively developed, DCSS is probably one of the best paragons of this.

By: zardo

zardo — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 22:09:56 +0000

The issue is that (Abyss and Pandemonium somewhat aside but they have their own problems) item destruction could be very substantially mitigated by dropping items and picking them up again, repeated ad nauseam. Any player aspiring to maximize their resources was incentivized toward this very irritating behavior. This violates stated design goals of DCSS, which with all due respect are what actually make this particular roguelike unique and replayable – the number of tedious things one does to get an edge (or even identify items) in nethack for example being a major reason I will probably never play through it again. If the difficulty has been affected too much the obvious solution is to adjust consumable spawn rates, but on the other hand recent versions have arguably made enemies and layouts *more* difficult than they used to be so maybe its okay.

By: warren

warren — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 19:52:43 +0000

Exactly. And to the extent that it makes the game more fun, that can be good. But we are moving very quickly toward losing some of what has made Crawl unique. The complexities and intricacy of the game that can confuse newcomers are integral to the long-term replayability of the game and should not be discarded.

By: past

past — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 14:31:34 +0000

seems to me that dungeon crawl is becoming a bit like angband (no food problems, carry large stacks of consumables)

By: warren

warren — Wed, 06 Aug 2014 08:58:21 +0000

It absolutely mattered when items got destroyed in many cases. The removal of item destruction has made the game significantly easier since you can safely carry around huge stacks of potions and scrolls.

By: Jaega1

Jaega1 — Tue, 05 Aug 2014 19:36:50 +0000

Item destruction is no more… and there was much rejoicing! It really did not matter much when items got destroyed but for some reason it was always infuriating. Thanks for all the hard work, devs!

By: aruca

aruca — Tue, 05 Aug 2014 16:47:02 +0000

Thanks for all the hard work on 0.15, I’ve been closely watching the git log and compiling my own local daily builds.

I really like a lot of the usability improvements and overall push against repetitive, unnecessary and/or unfun game play.

Looking forward to the tournament announcement!