This fork of DCSS is a playground for some ideas I wanted to try. Many of my changes center around increasing the richness of the different species in DCSS. I would repeatedly take the species that I considered most boring to play, and alter that species until it was a compelling choice for me to play. I know quite well that I am not nearly as experienced in playing this game as many others are, and likely some of these changes may break important things that I don't yet understand because of that lack of experience, but I figured since I am having so much fun with this fork, it doesn't take much effort to share it with others, and maybe some of my crazy ideas may be merged into the main DCSS repo. And of course you are welcome to submit changes to this fork or even make another fork if you don't like the direction I'm taking this one. This fork is in sync with the original DCSS repo as of Apr 2016. I intend to keep merging in non-conflicting changes from the main DCSS project.Check out the FUTURE.md file in the same directory as the README.md for details about what features I'm considering on implementing.There are two known servers running this fork at this time: http://crawl.homedns.org/ (always has the latest code) https://crawl.project357.org/ (probably more stable)Feel free to create issues on github for either problems with the crawl.homedns.org server, or bugs in the game itself, or ideas you have that you think are in line with my goals here, or with concerns you have about my future plans.Objectives(Not necessarily all that different form mainstream crawl, just different in exactly how I interpret these...) No boring species, gods, monsters, items, branches, etc. I never play humans in the mainstream crawl. It's just never interesting for me to do so, since they don't have any real benefit over any other species. So in this version, I amplified the differences between species, especially the "boring" ones I never play, to make each species more appealing in it's own way. My philosophy is to first try and make a problem area more interesting. If that seems utterly impossible, then it should be removed. For example, Djinni was removed from mainstream crawl because of serious problems with it's design. I brought it back, changed the design dramatically, and now I believe it is a fun and interesting species to play without the major issues it was removed for in the first place. A more fun experience for new players and intermediate players. Current mainstream crawl seems to heavily favor making the game fun for extreme veterans and experts. New players have a very hard time finding enough fun in the game to justify investing the time needed to really get good at it. Everything is balanced around understanding how to effectively use every item in the game, a situation most players don't achieve until they've played the game for a very long time. There should be a way for people who don't know how to properly use a blink scroll, or to effectively identify their inventory, for example, to still have fun. A wiki shouldn't be required to have fun with the game. I'm hardly a newbie with many hundreds of hours of crawl gametime experience, yet I still feel like I have to lean on the wiki from time to time because of the way mainstream crawl is designed. Example: Mainstream crawl's refusal to show how much damage a given attack is doing makes it very difficult for new players to figure out which attacking strategies / weapons / buffs are most effective. Just adding a simple damage number makes it so much easier to see if the flame tongue spell is really accomplishing more than just trying to bash them with a morningstar. This is somewhat ironic because I think the reason to avoid numbers is to make it easier for new players... but in my experience it seems to be doing the opposite.
Major modifications from the original DCSSv1.2 (currently deployed) Experience overhaul Monsters don't give experience One potion of experience is generated on the floor of each level except for safe floors: temple, trove, bazaar The player gains experience by: drinking a potion of experience entering a floor for the first time destroying altars (coming soon) A potion of experience is dropped by all uniques and player ghosts Since mummies can't drink potions, they get much more experience for entering a new floor The amount of experience gained by drinking a potion of experience is based on what level the potion was drunk on. Players are incentivized to go as deep as possible before drinking the experience potion, greatly increasing the danger. Monster super spawning is no longer needed for players who spend too much time in a level. Since experience scumming is no longer possible, we don't need it.v1.1 (currently deployed) Better low health warnings, especially for new players A new option, called danger_mode_threshold was made which defaults to 30. If damage is done to the player exceeding danger_mode_threadhold percent of the player's current hp, danger mode is switched to on, and a special warning message is given, the screen flashes, and the player is given a "more" message. This message appears only if danger mode is off. Danger mode stays on until no "danger" events have happened for 10 turns. Example: A player has 20 health left, the danger_mode_threshold is set to 20, the player isn't currently in danger mode, and he gets hit for 5 damage. 5 is less than 30% of 20, so no warning message is given. Then the player is hit for 5 points of damage again, and since 5 damage is more than 30% of 15, the danger message is given, and danger mode is turned on. No more warnings will be given until things quiet down. This is disabled by setting danger_mode_threshold to 0. Eliminate pillar dancing and extended kiting (don't knock it until you've given it a fair chance, it really works) The first time a player moves, it takes 2.0 aut, independent of other factors. If the player moves again in the same general direction (within 45 degress or less of the original movement), then they move 10% faster than their normal speed. As long as they don't stop (by doing something other than moving in a similar direction), they keep moving at the 10% faster than normal rate. If they stop to attack, then next time they move it will take exactly 2.0 aut. It might take longer if their normal movement speed would take longer. If they change directions by 90 degrees or more, they will pay again the 2.0 aut movement penalty. Monsters move just like before, no change there. Pillar dancing no longer will work because most monsters will easily be able to catch up. Players can still escape from monsters like before, with speed boosts (haste, species speed, swiftness, etc) making it easier. Extended kiting is impractical even for the fastest species with haste. Try it and you'll see what I mean. The 2.0 aut penalty mentioned is actually the greater of 2.0 or the normal speed of the player, so if you are playing Naga of Chei, your normal speed might exceed 2.0, in which case your change-movement penalty is your normal speed. In effect, that means there is no penalty for creatures that are already slower than 2.0, since they can't kite anyway. Curse enhancement Curses now have a curse level. The curse on equipped items decay as a player gains experience (unless the player worships Ash of course). Typical early game curses are at curse level 100. Reading a remove curse scroll reduces the curse level by a minimum of 100, scaling up with invocations. Once the curse level drops to 0, the item is no longer cursed. Later game curses may be much higher than 100, and require multiple scrolls or a lot of waiting before they go away. Mummy death curses curse an equipment slot, not an item. Equipment slot curses pass on to an item as soon as it is equipped. The same item can be cursed multiple times, increasing the curse level. Curse level > 1000 will cause the bonuses of that item to be neutralized. A +5 long sword of poison becomes a +0 long sword, while the curse is above 1000.v1.0 Inventory expansion The inventory has been divided into two groups: consumables (potions, scrolls, and food), and everything else. The 'i' command shows the weapons, armour, evokables, etc. The 'I' command shows the consumables. Each can have 52 items. The drop command has been split into two also: 'd' to drop inventory items, control-D to drop consumable items. The adjust command '=' can now also be applied to the (c)onsumables. The spell list command has been moved from 'I' to 's'. Wands automatically stack in inventory, possibly exceeding max capacity. Stair changes Monsters can't use stairs, but if they hurt you while going up or down stairs, you are interrupted. Eliminates ability of player to pull apart groups of monsters into bite size pieces. Eliminates easy escapes on stairs when monsters can still inflict damage (even ranged ones). If you take the stairs, but then immediately go back through the stairs again, you can't be interrupted. Avoids the situation where a player goes onto a level surrounded by dangerous monsters, but can't escape back to the previous level. Damage numbers are shown yeah I know it adds some details that the original designers want to avoid. But really, how many crawl players aren't seriously hard core RPGers anyway? I personally find it a bit less tedious to try out different attack strategies when I can see the numbers, instead of trying to guess from vague descriptions whether or not a change is actually improving my attacking effectiveness. Summoning no summon caps. Instead, summoned creatures continuously drain mana from the summoner, until there is no longer mana to support them, and then they disappear. More powerful summoned creatures drain a greater amount of mana. This opens up new strategies, enabling a player to summon one powerful creature for a longer period of time, or many of them for a very short time. For now, this only applies to the player summons. Monster summons work as before. how much magic a summon drains is reduced by higher spell power added a "release summons" ability, so you can free up your mana pool if you no longer need those summons. summoners start with a +1 dagger to make getting off the ground a little more possible. It's still tough though. Don't summon more than one at once, and focus on boosting your spell power until you can sustain more powerful creatures. Transmutation It costs 3x more to cast a self-transforming spell transformations don't time out power of the transformation is based on spell power Game difficulty levels At game start, or in the init file, you can specify that the game is easy, normal, or hard. Normal is the standard, unmodified parameters. Easy: reduces the chances of out of depth monsters spawning starts the player with 10 more hp player has 50% more mp increases the amount of gold spawned by 33% starts player with a healing potion faster level advancement (exp apt + 2) 1/4 normal score healing potions heal 100% of health ghosts don't spawn above level 10 of dungeon Normal: ghosts don't spawn above level 5 of dungeon healing potions heal 50% of health, minimum of 20 points Hard: increases the chances of out of depth monsters spawning slower level advancement (exp apt - 2) 33% less gold spawned 25% less health 4x normal score healing potions heal 25% of health, minimum of 20 points This is just the beginning. I'm sure with more testing and experience, we can find ways to make these difficulty levels a lot more interesting. Unequipping shields When trying to equip a weapon that is incompatible with a shield, the game will ask if you want to unequip the shield first, saving some hassel. Traps Shafting doesn't happen in the first 2 floors of dungeon Flying metabolism is multiplied by 4 while flying, unless you are a Djinni. So flying around all day as a tengu will now cost something. Djinni brought back from the dead and greatly enhanced. Unusual contamination mechanism that they originally had has been removed. They also consume food like normal species, so excessive spell casting has the normal consequence. Djinni can no longer read scrolls of any kind, even though they can use spell books. Since they can't read remove curse scrolls, cursed items are a much bigger deal for them. To mitigate this a little, they have a remove curse ability that costs one permanent MP. Since they can't read identify scrolls, they can either identify items by using them (very dangerous for potentially cursed items), or wait and use the new insight mutation that they start with which, over time, randomly identifies attributes of items in their inventory. This mutation can also randomly be gained by other species as they drink mutation potions, etc. Fire damage heals them. Standing in a flame cloud is a way to heal, but the flame cloud is absorbed by the Djinni and disappears more quickly than normal. Be careful though, increasing their fire resistance (through an item, ring, etc), will reduce their healing. Maybe you can find a source of lowering their fire resistance? They have very low magic resistance. They have the glow mutation, which increases with experience, which reduces their stealth. Cold and water damage does triple the resistable amount of damage, in addition to the penalties of having one level of cold vulnerability. A ring of ice would be very valuable here, reducing the cold damage done, as well as increasing the healing from fire damage. Unfortunately, there is no water resistance buff... muahahaha.... Unarmed combat gets a fire brand. They start with ephemeral 3 mutation, and slowly lose it as they gain experience (as they become more corporeal). The ephemeral mutation give a chance that attacks (both melee and ranged) will completely pass through the Djinni. Dithmenos rejects Dj of course Mummy initial attributes improved greatly, making early game much easier, but long term they are weaker, gaining levels more slowly than before immunity to curses, so trying out cursed armour or weapons isn't a problem can worship Ash, but their curse immunity leaves Felid can wear 4 rings. Why not? They have four identical "hands"... I find that this helps to balance their severe limitations a bit better and make the early game a bit more doable. move faster as they advance in levels. have exactly 9 lives right at the beginning, which never increases. How many lives can you end up with at the end of the game? no loss of experience when death happens Ghouls start with a permanent empowered by death mutation, making them regenerate much faster after going on a killing spree. Halfling added wild magic mutation at the level 6, 12, and 18, making it much more difficult for them to cast spells, but they are quite powerful when they do. added an extraordinary level of magic resistance improved conjuration apt from -2 to +2 Kobold added permanent evolution mutation. Although this sounds similar to how demonspawns work, it actually plays quite differently, because the player will occasionally get random bad mutations, and sometimes have to adjust their play style to compensate. There is also a greater than normal chance that evolve will replace a bad mutation with a good, making drinking mutation potions a safer strategy for kobolds. Unlike demonspawn which get permanent mutations, the mutations a kobold gets through evolve are temporary, making cure mutation potions often a very bad thing. And of course they only get ordinary mutations, not the cool demonspawn specific ones. as a result of their highly mutable nature, they cannot worship Zin. Sludge Elf brought back because I needed a species to experiment with. added subdued magic 3 mutation at the beginning, making it very easy for them to cast spells, but they are quite weak as a result. This enables them to cast high level, low power requirement spells early or even in heavy armour, that would be impossible for others. their starting attributes are unusually low. they have a very low magic capacity. Naga poison spitting advances to level 2 at xp level 6, and to level 3 at xp level 12. made them even slower, but the slowness comes more steadily, gaining slow mutation at 1, 4, and 8. Ogre has permanent powered by pain mutation at level 12. This gives them occasional boosts as they are damaged. powered by pain was modified so that it only works 2/3 of the time on normal, and 1/3 of the time on hard. significantly increased health aptitude, making them have by far the greatest health pool of all species. added poor fitting armour mutation. That mutation was changed slightly, so that level 1 gives 2/3 of normal AC, level 2 gives 1/3 of normal AC. They get level 1 at exp level 10, and level 2 of this mutation at exp level 15. Octopode has permanent augmentation mutation 1 after level 6. This boosts their fighting and magic usage when they have a high amount of health, making them significantly easier early on. Then their gelatinous body advances to level 3 by exp level 8.
Tengu while flying, their speed and dodging increases based on their experience level. start with shock resistance start with thin skeletal structure can't wear rings at all have a new mutation called enchantment absorbtion which gives a chance that enchantments used against the player will instead be absorbed into their magic pool at xp 6 they get enchantment absorb 1, which means 10% of the time the enchantment is absorbed at xp 12 they get ench absorb 2 = 40% of the time it is absorbed at xp 18 they get ench absorb 3 = 90% of the time it is absorbed, making them almost immune to magic enchantments. Troll split into two subspecies Cave Troll like old troll, except with a couple more shaggy fur mutations that come in later Moon Troll gain several different elemental resistances as they gain levels start with higher hp than normal, but never gain hp with level increases. They can increase hp by training fighting or through items, but late game they will have much lower hp than normal. better magic aptitudes, but spellcasting skill is still bad apt 0 defensive skills (to help make up for their very low health later in the game). Deep Dwarf recharge ability has been split in two: lesser recharge (costs 1 PMP), and greater recharge (costs 3 PMP). Greater recharge is required to recharge wands of healing, haste, and teleport Deep Elf increased spell casting aptitude increased magic capacity Demigod even higher increase of stats over time lower exp aptitude Lava Orcs brought back but not modified much yet. can't worship Dith. probably still quite broken until I have the time to attempt to smooth out their problematic areas (if it is even possible). Vine Stalkers added a lignify ability, allowing them to lignify or unlignify at will, costing some time and food, but possibly adding some interesting strategic choices. can't wear body armour at all Spells because the new consumables inventory took the 'I' command, the spell list can now be seen with the 's' command. There is now a unified spell list which removes the need to toggle between two views. All spells have the same spell cap... now even basic spells can continue to grow in power late in the game. the effect of spell casting skill on spell success and power has been increased. Throw Flame has been removed from spell books. Monsters still cast it, but the player can't. Instead, Flame Tongue has been slightly enhanced to fill that void. Not much of a void, since I hardly used it anyway. Magma Bolt has been put in the Flames Book as a level 5 spell alongside Fireball. Potions of heal wounds easy mode: heals 100% of max hp normal mode: heals 50% of max hp (minimum of 20 points) hard mode: heals 25% of max hp (minimum of 20 points) Wands of heal wounds heal based on evocations skill always take 2 turns, uninterruptable Recharge scrolls less common, but fully recharge the wand. each time a wand is recharged, it's max charge capacity is cut in half. Potions of magic easy mode: gives 100% magic normal mode: gives 50% magic hard mode: give 25% magic restores a minimum of 10 points Potions of lignification (and lignify ability of vinestalkers) lower initial AC (20 -> 15) higher AC scaling with experience (0.5 -> 1.5 AC per level) higher health boost (1.5x -> 2x) no hp regen while lignified intention is to make it useful even in late game. It's a rare consumable, it won't break the game by being a little more powerful later in the game. Mutation tweaks powered by pain works as often as before on easy, only 2/3 of the time on normal, and 1/3 of the time on hard. Gozag only half of corpses dropped change to gold, opening up gozag to many more species. There is a higher amount of gold dropped per corpse to make the total gold benefit the same as before. Minor item tweaks ring of magical power now gives you 50% more mp, or 9 mp (like before), whichever is higher, making this ring still have some late game value.
v1.3 Implement stamina points, alongside magic points and health points three exertion levels normal mode (press 'e' again when in exertion mode, or 'E' again when in careful mode) no stamina cost for most actions movement speed is 1.1 for all species, except naga, which is 1.4 power mode (change to this by pressing 'e') actions cost stamina stamina is slowly depleted while in power mode movement speed is 0.9 for most species 0.5 for spriggan 0.7 for centaur 1.4 for naga, since they can't run, so they don't have a stamina cost for moving in power mode melee and ranged damage is higher spellpower is greater accuracy is reduced chance of spell failure is increased careful mode (change to this by pressing 'E') actions cost stamina stealth is amplified accuracy is increased spell failure chance is reduced damage is reduced spell power is reduced movement speed is slower (1.5 for all species) when stamina is depleted, game switches back to normal exertion mode automatically berserking automatically switches to power mode species differences: centaurs and nagas have a larger than normal stamina pool spriggans consume half as much stamina when running trolls and players wearing regen items consume stamina more quickly when their health isn't at maximum vampiric weapons consume stamina as they heal the player, and stop healing the player when stamina runs out added endurance potions make all stamina costs drop to 0 for a limited time Remove food no more chopping or eating fruits and royal jelly can still be consumed with the quaff command fruit is used by fedhas still or may be consumed for stamina consuming royal jelly reduces stamina costs to 0 temporarily vampire still drink blood to change their satiation level ghouls automatically eat some of the corpses they kill to heal and cure rot Enchanted Forest and Dwarven Halls brought back I haven't done anything to them yet, but I intend to make them interesting and fun enough to want to keep around. If you don't want to play in a likely broken or boring area, avoid these branches for now. If you want to help test and refine them, go ahead and explore, and tell me what you think will make them better.v1.2.3 Experience modes You can now configure the experience settings through predefined modes. The old settings have been removed. You select a mode by using "experience_mode = ..." in your rc file. Current modes: experience_mode = classic this is the basic vanilla crawl way experience is gained by killing monsters experience_mode = simple_xl experience is only gained by reaching new floors. every 3 floors gives a new experience level, assuming a species exp apt of 0, and difficulty mode is normal experience_mode = simple_depth experience is only gained by reaching new floors. depending on how difficult your current level is determines how much experience you get for reaching it. experience_mode = balance 1 experience potion spawns on each floor experience potions are dropped by each unique and player ghost experience is evenly divided between reaching new floors, killing monsters, and drinking potions at the lowest possible level experience_mode = serenity like balance, but calmer with serenity, as opposed to balance, drinking a potion advances your experience based on your current xl, not based on the floor, so you can drink them immediately, or save a few for when you need to clear out some draining fast. 1 experience potion spawns on each floor experience potions are dropped by each unique and player ghost experience is evenly divided between reaching new floors, killing monsters, and drinking potions strategy: you want to delay drinking potions or going down floors for as long as possible, and kill everything possible, since the amount of experience you get from floors and potions is based on your current xl. But don't wait too long or you will be too underpowered to survive. experience_mode = intensity like balance, but more intense 1 experience potion spawns on each floor experience potions are dropped by each unique and player ghost no experience gained for killing monsters a little experience is gained for reaching a new floor but most of the experience is gained from drinking potions at the lowest dungeon level possible experience_mode = pacifist 1 experience potion spawns on each floor experience is gained by drinking potions and reaching new branch floors experience is lost for each monster killed experience_mode = destroyer experience is gained for killing monsters experience potions are dropped by each unique and player ghost experience is lost for each new floor reached experience potions give experience based on player xl a good approach here is to clear all monsters from each floor, but delay drinking exp potions for a long as possible, since the amount of xp they give will be higher if the player is at a higher xl.v1.2.2 Human exp apt +2 fighting and spellcasting apt +2 can crosstrain many more skills fire, ice, earth, air invo, evo, spellcasting god wrath lasts half as long, since the gods understand how fickle humans can be. Draconian Pale Draconian inv apt 1 -> 0 evo apt 1 -> 2 Mottled Draconian now has rF+ and rC+ sticky flame can go 2 spaces instead of 1 +1 apt for elemental magics and poison Options for experimenting with experience model changes (each option is shown with it's current default) level_27_cap = false when false, the level and skill cap is 99, and a smooth scale is used to determine how much exp is required for each level when true, the old experience cap and scale is in place
Summoning simplification Summoning now simply reduces the players magic capacity until the summons are released. Summons cost 2x the normal price of the spell. Summons may be maintained as long as the player wants to continue with the reduced magic capacity. Spell power may affect various attributes of the summoned creature, but it does not affect duration or cost. Added a "release summons" ability, so you can free up your magic pool if you no longer need those summons. If a summon is released, all of the magic used to summon it is returned to the player The number of summons a player can have is only limited by their magic pool, with a maximum cap of 20 total summons. When a summon dies, they player gets 1/2 of the mp used on that creature When going up or down stairs, if there are no monsters in sight, summons automatically follow the player.v1.4.1 Transmutation transformations don't time out power of the transformation is based on spell power when the player takes any offensive action (attacks, casts, evokes), the spell failure of the form is tested. Once the spell "fails" 5 times, the form unravells and the player returns to normal. each failure chance is squared towards failure, so 50% failure becomes 75% failure, 20% failure becomes 36% failure. so if you can't get the failure below about 20%, you won't be able to maintain the form for long. undead can transmute in living forms, undead can also mutatev1.3 Wand recharging Wands gain half of the normal capacity for that wand type. So a healing wand gives 5 each recharge. Wands lose 1/2 of what they gain from their capacity But they will never end up with less than 2 charges Hill Orcs Gave them Summoning +3, because we needed another good summoner. Gave them Bad Dna 1, because they were too awesome overall, and need a nerf. Doors can be closed even if there are items on the floor All races can wear cloaks. (including Fe and Op) Mummy curses a little more threatening 50% chance that they will curse weapon or ring slots otherwise they just pick a random slot to curse 1/10 chance of triple cursing Mutations added a bunch more super rare mutations that could really throw a curveball at the player. created the good dna, bad dna, and clean dna mutations good dna: increases chances that mutators will add a good mutation bad dna: increases chances that mutators will add a bad mutation clean dna: increases chances that mutators will remove a bad mutation Sif Muna get book gifts at 2* piety instead of 5* channeling ability has been dramatically changed. Instead there is a 50 piety cost to make spells cost 0 mp for 20-40 turns, based on invocations. passive ability added: conserve MP: with higher invocations levels, spells cost less MP to cast. Starts at 1*.
Removed temple. Makes choosing from a spawned altar much more significant. There are no guarantees that a guardian will ever spawn in a game, so holding out too long for one can be a bad decision. Added rune curses Fiery rune (for cerebov): occasionally your fire resistance is ignored. Magical rune (for lom lobon): occasionally your spells fizzle. Dark rune (for gloorx vloq): see invisible takes a few turns to kick in. Iron rune (for Dis): armour becomes less effective. Obisidian rune (for Gehenna): fire damage against enemies is reduced. Added species specific stamina aptitudes, alongside health and magic aptitudes that already existed. Yred's animate undead and remains ability are converted to passive abilities. When monsters are killed and leave a corpse, they occasionally come back to life as an undead servant with a temporary lifespan. Demonspawn mutations are spread over 40 levels now instead of 27. They are also given more to compensate. Brilliance potion also boost magic resistance, to give it some value for fighters. Stop portal timers when you are not on the same floor. Abyss is now 7 floors Zot no longer requires any runes to get in. You can beat the game with 0 runes. Branches rearranged a bit: Dungeon:7 Temple Lair:7 Snake Swamp Shoals Orc:7 Spider Elf Dwarf Forest:7 Crypt Slime Vaults Depths:7 Hells Pan Abyss Zig Tomb Zot:7v1.5.6 Vine Stalker nerf Took health regen mutation from 3 to 1, so they regen health more slowly than a cave troll. Changing weapons no longer takes any time. Made carnivore and herbivore mutations more meaningful. Carnivore increases stamina gained from stamina potions, but reduces magic from magic potions. Herbivore does the opposite. Limit the number of uniques that can be generated on one floor Easy / Standard mode can only have 1 unique per floor. Challenge can have 2. Nightmare doesn't have a limit. Added quick casting mutation Increases spellcasting speed. Added amulet of quick casting Doubles casting speed. Implemented more rune curses: You can see the list of curses in effect with the ["] key. glowing rune: experience gains are cut in half. demonic rune: shop prices are multiplied by 3. elven rune: monster spellpower increased by 33%. slimy rune: you no longer can lose mutations by getting mutated, even if heavily mutated. Cure mutation potions fail 1/3 of the time. abyssal rune: 50% more monsters spawn. Bands are 33% bigger too. gossamer rune: bad effects last 33% longer. serpentine rune: magic and stamina costs are 33% higher. decaying rune: higher chance of rotting when you over exert yourself. barnacled rune: monsters have 33% more energy. dwarven rune: enemy ac is 33% more effective. creeping rune: when monsters are killed, they occasionally come back to haunt the player. Only if they drop a corpse though, so strategies that reduce the number of corpses will also reduce this effect. silver rune: less items are spawned, but monsters are more likely to be equipped with better items. golden rune: slower normal movement speed, quick mode is unaffected. Some rune branches will require one or more runes before you can get in. Randomly chosen at beginnng of game.v1.5.4 Shield equipping / removal takes 0.5 turn instead of 5, like weapon swaps. Crosstraining removed Now that the fighting skill takes care of a lot of "crosstraining" concepts, there is no need for another crosstraining path. This helps to make the weapon skill investment choice more meaningful. Humans can still crosstrain. Spell school effects are no longer based on an average of spell skills, but instead on the maximum. This decouples spell difficulty from school accessibility. If we want a spell to be harder to train, we just move it up a level. If we want a spell to be usable to more spell schools, we add a school to it, which can be done without making it twice as hard to train. This makes spellcasting a little more like fighting, where you can easily get away with training one weapon skill, and if you want a little more flexibility you can train another, instead of forcing a player to train multiple skills just to utilize one "weapon". Now a spell having more than one school makes it easier = more accessible to mages of different backgrounds. High powered spells should be more specialized, so just training one school doesn't allow easy access to all highest level spells. Mid level spells should have the highest diversity, so a conjurer, for example, can have easy access to a wide selection of powerful mid level spells. Low level spells should also be specialized, giving specialists something to work with early on. Added more schools to more spells to take advantage of this new mechanic. Made all spellcasting a little bit harder to compensate. Added Light and Darkness spell schools to better fit a variety of spells. Guardian Spirit changes Renamed to Magic Shield. Stamina Shield added also, both mutation and amulet. Three levels instead of one, and it can be seen in the [%] resistance screen. Amulet gives 1 level of the ability. Level 1 gives 25% damage shaving, 2 gives 50%, 3 gives 75%, and the value is randomized. Based on the MP / SP you currently have, instead of max, so it protects you better and consumes more MP / SP when you are full, and when you are low, the shield does very little (making it less likely to force you into tired mode). You can stack them, for example if you have a vine stalker which has spirit shield 2, with a stamina shield amulet. But the amount shaved for the amulet is only a percentage of the damage that remains. So a 50% + 50% savings doesn't give 100% savings, it gives 75% (50% of the remaining 50% damage). Yred changes His animated undead timeout after a while, but will follow the player between floors. Exhaustion separated from "tired" mode Exhaustion works as it did in vanilla, preventing you from executing an exhausting action again until it's gone. When you drop below 5 sp or mp, you are tired. In tired mode, your basic attributes are a little worse than normal mode. You are no longer tired once you have at least 5 mp and 5 sp. There is a chance to rot player hp based on amount of sp or mp spent while exhausted. It should be easy enough to manage SP / MP to avoid being tired. If you are having a very hard time not playing in "tired" mode, tell me, that means something is out of balance. Tired mode won't apply if you have exertion modes disabled (if you have exertion_disabled=true in your rc file). Minions will not follow you down stairs if you [t]ell them to [w]ait. Then telling them to [f]ollow will enable them to follow you down the stairs again. Vampire changes Blood potions spawn when corpses are dropped for vampires. Vampires rot instead of mutating if their hunger is below Full. They don't become less hungry when attacking anymore, forcing occasional uses of blood potions. Enchantments can pass through friendlies now. Particularly, pain can go through undead minions to hit your foes. Mummies gain stamina and magic regen at XL 1, 6, and 12. Since they can't use potions, and they don't have the main benefit that they get in vanilla crawl to compensate, this will somewhat make up for it. Added a strategies.md file to explain basic strategies to help people unfamiliar with the many different rules that apply to this fork. It's highly recommended that you read this file and keep up with changes that are made to it, even if you have been playing on this fork for a while, since things change so quickly here. Macros always save when the game is saved. No more extra prompts at random times when trying to save. Undead minions will reduce max mp and follow player down stairs like summons. But if you descend the stairs and hostiles are present, then the undead will collapse back into corpses which may be reanimated later. Can't gain experience in abyss anymore. You can still gain piety, lose drain, etc, though. Added "light" weapon brand, making weapons weigh half as much, allowing them to be swung for half of the SP cost. Moving around in focus mode no longer consumes stamina. Moving around in heavy armour with a large shield increases stamina costs. Only in quick mode, when flying, or in focus mode while sneaking. Examples: With no heavy armour or shield penalties, you use 2 SP per movement in quick mode. With crystal plate armour and a large shield, 8 str, 0 armour skill, 0 shield skill, you use 10 SP per move. With chain mail, shield, 20 str, 10 armour skill, 10 shield skill, you use 8 SP per move. With chain mail, 10 str, 0 armour, you use 6 SP per move. With chain mail, 20 str, 20 armour, you use 4 SP per move. With ring mail, 20 str, 10 armour, you use 2 SP per move. Min attack speed for all weapons achieved when dex + fighting = 60. Removed squaring function, so you get further faster. At dex + fighting = 30, you'd be halfway to min delay. Min spellcasting speed is achieved when dex + spellcasting = 60. In labyrinth, if you are a minotaur, map rot doesn't happen (the map doesn't fade away). To Hit Chance and Be Hit Chance now displayed in right stats panel To Hit Chance shows how likely it was for the player to hit the last monster it attempted to hit. Be Hit Chance shows how likely it was for the player to be hit from the last monster who hit the player. Fighting and Spellcasting factors changed. See cheatsheet under "Fighting" and "Spellcasting" for details.v1.5.2 Simplified spell power calculations Like spell failure, spell power now has equalized factors. Adding a point to intelligence will have the same impact on spell power as raising the average spell school level by 1 point, under all circumstances. Simplified orb run Once you enter Zot, you can't leave without the orb. Once you leave Zot with the orb, the game is over. You won! Zot is 7 floors now. Depths is 7 floors now. Simplified spell failure Now all failure factors (dex, spellcasting, spell schools) have equal effect on spell failure. So adding one point in dex always has exactly the same effect as adding one point in spellcasting or one point in average spell schools (which if there are two schools for the spell, technically requires 2 points to have the same effect as one point of dex). Many spell failure rates are different now than might be expected. Don't think it's a bad thing just because they are different. Instead, try out the difference and see how it works. If it creates a specific case that limits player options more than it produces, then tell me and we'll tweak it. When summoning more than one monster with a single spell cast, all summons after the first only cost 1/3 as much. You can now disable exertion modes Put this in your rc file: exertion_disabled = true Quick mode is still available, but focus and power modes won't be if you have this option set. Switching between exertion or quick modes costs 0 turns. Retreat simplification (instant rest) Instead of making it optimal for a player to retreat and recharge after every monster killed, the player is instantly fully recharged as soon as they have killed all nearby monsters. If the player kills the last known monster, and there is another just beyond the edge of LOS, it is brought to edge of LOS instead of player instant-resting. If instarest doesn't happen, that means there is an invisible monster nearby or you have seen a monster, but haven't actually killed it, and it has moved out of LOS. In this case you'll have to rest the old-fashioned way. Rune curse effects are now shown in rune list (show with '{'). Players can unsummon individual summoned friendlies by using the 'x' command, selecting the monster, and then pressing 'q'. Players can fire missiles through friendly summons, but when they do, their spell failure is checked for the spell that summoned the creature. If it fails, the creature is unsummoned. Friendly fire does not work through other friendlies, such as animated dead and simulacrum. Set hp rot caps based on difficulty. Easy mode can't rot to less than 80% of hp. Standard: 60% Challenge: 40% Nightmare: 20% Spells may be cast even when mp is empty. Except for spells which reduce max mp instead of consuming mp (like transmutations and summons). Focus mode now increases ac, sh, and ev slightly By paying closer attention to incoming attacks, a player can optimize their armour (making sure the enemy hits the more fortified places) or increase their chance of dodging the attacks. Power mode now doubles cost of action, whether it is MP or SP (before it only had an SP cost) Focus mode now doubles cost of action, whether it is MP or SP (before it only had an MP cost) This means that spellcasters in power mode no longer consume SP when casting a spell, but instead must pay double the spell cost. Monster HD slightly adjusted based on difficulty level Easy: -1 Standard: 0 (unchanged) Challenge: +1 Nightmare: +2v1.5.1 Exertion mode cost is based on action cost instead of a flat cost. For example, if an attack costs 8 SP in normal exertion mode, and the player is in power mode, it will instead cost 16 SP (+100%). If they are in focus mode, it would cost 8 SP + 8 MP. If a player casts a spell costing 10 MP in normal mode, if they were in power mode it would cost 10 MP + 10 SP. In focus mode, it would cost 20 MP. Maces have higher base damage, because they have the highest weight of all weapons, and cost the most stamina to use. Drinking an experience potion no longer pull up a menu to choose skills. So allocate your training before you drink it. Inner Flame is smite targetted now. Elyvilon improvements Healing targeting shows pacification chance when a monster is selected. Lesser and Greater healing may be applied to player or monster. When applied to monster, the ability will cost hp from the player. When applied to player, the ability costs piety. Each spell costs a minimum of 5 mp, and it's easier to reduce the mp cost than before. You can only have a maximum of 5 summons total between all spells. Spirit shield Since players have much more magic now, to keep spirit shield from being too powerful, it behaves as if you have half as much max mp. So if you have 50 max hp, and 100 max mp, half of your damage would come from hp, and half would come from mp (since it acts as if you had 50 mp). Unlimited ammo If you fire a ranged weapon without ammo, the unbranded ammo fires. Unbranded ammo no longer spawns. Branded ammo still spawn in higher quantities than before, but always mulches. You can switch to unbranded ammo by hitting the quiver command 'Q', and then '-', just like weilding nothing. One shot kill protection Player isn't allowed to receive more than some percentage of damage between times when the player can act. This means, even if paralyzed, there is a limit to how much damage can be done before the player gets a chance to do something about it. Nightmare mode: 80% damage per turn max. This means that they are guaranteed to have 1 turn to respond to any threat if they are at full health. Challenge mode: 40% damage per turn max. Guarantees 2 turns. Standard mode: 20% damage per turn max. Guarantees 3 turns. Example: in nightmare mode, a player has full health and comes across a pack of death yaks and a basilisk. The player has 50 health. The player tries to attack the basilisk, but fails to kill it. The basilisk paralyzes the player. The death yaks get a few free rounds of damage to the player while they are paralyzed, causing 100 damage. Normally the player would be dead at this point, but since 100 damage is more than 80% of 50, only the 80% damage is allowed (40 points of damage) that round. Then the player gets a chance to read a blink scroll and maybe escape. This isn't going to make up for chronically bad habits, but it will reduces the chances of players who are playing well from dying because of a freak RNG roll. This may be disabled with: disable_instakill_protection = true Labyrinth allows auto-explore It's not super reliable, but I find that is removes some tedium without making it totally trivial. Increased Fighting and/or Spellcasting skills for all starting jobs that use them by 1, to make it a little easier for characters to get off the ground with the recent changes. Orc branch has been doubled in size, to 8 floors The "boss" level is still on floor 4. Floors 5-8 don't give experience for kills, although they will restore drain and charge evocables. Turned off monster spawning. Increased initial floor population by 20% to compensate. Monsters still spawn in Abyss and during orb run. Deactivated ghosts. I have a better solution, but for now this will help. Magic potions restore 40, 30, 20 points depending on difficulty mode. Stamina potions restore 40, 30, 20 points depending on difficulty mode. Spell factors: Spell failure: dexterity, spellcasting, spell schools Spell power: intelligence, spell schools Spell cost: intelligence, spellcasting Removed all food, and created stamina potions. You can now sacrifice stamina potions to evoke fedhas' abilities. Quick mode doesn't use stamina if monsters aren't around.
v1.5 Stamina overhaul Extremely brief summary: you won't be able to swing around a broad axe as a spriggan with 5 str just as well as an ogre with 25 str any more. Trying to swing that broad axe as a spriggan will exhaust the player almost immediately, whereas and ogre with some minimal fighting skill (say 3) can use it quite a few times before getting tired. But even for an ogre, throwing a large rock is going to be expensive stamina-wise. Normal mode fighting actions cost stamina points (SP). SP cost of attack is based on fighting skill, strength, weapon weight. Heavier weapons will cost more stamina to swing than lighter ones. Spells only cost magic points (MP), no more spell hunger. MP cost is based on spellcasting, intelligence, spell level. You can see how much spells cost in the 'S' spell list. Fixed size MP pool like SP pool. Does not go up with experience level (XL). Power and Focus mode doubles the SP or MP costs of an action. In addition to increasing damage by 33%, power mode now increases attack speed by the same. Careful mode renamed to focus mode. Escape mode was removed and in it's place a separate quick / normal mode This can operate independently of exertion mode, i.e. you can have Quick mode + Focus or Quick + Power mode. Quick mode has the benefits of the old escape mode, which are faster movement speed. But there is also an additional stamina cost. Stealth is also dramatically reduced. Normal mode doesn't have those benefits, but it doesn't have the additional stamina cost. Quick mode no longer gives an evasion boost, only a speed boost. Quick mode no longer has a stealth penalty. Quick mode no longer has a movement penalty when changing directions. If you run out of stamina in power mode, and it switches you back to normal mode, once you've recovered 50% of your SP, the game will automatically switch you back to power mode. Same applies to Focus mode. Switching any modes costs 0 turns. Summary of exertion modes: (existing info merged with changes from this update) Normal mode Melee and ranged attacks require SP based on weapon weight, player strength, and fighting skill. Weapon skill does not affect SP cost. Spell casting costs MP based on spell level, player intelligence, and spellcasting skill. Spell school skills do not affect MP cost. Damage, accuracy, stealth, spellpower, spell success, and attack speed are reduced from vanilla crawl levels, based on difficulty mode being played. Power mode (same as normal mode except for the following) +33% damage +33% spellpower increase +15% attack speed -3 SP per attack or spell cast Focus mode (same as normal mode except for the following) +33% attack accuracy +33% stealth -15% spell failure chance or 1/2 failure chance, whichever is worse -5 MP per movement or attack or spell cast Summary of Quick mode: (this can be on or off independently of the player's exertion mode) Slow mode (normal state) Movement delay is 1.1 for all species + slowing down effects, mutations, etc. So a naga still is 1.3 speed because of the slow mutation they possess Quick mode Movement delay is based on species, artifact properties, mutations, spells in effect (haste, swiftness) Standard species movement delay in quick mode is 0.9 -5 SP per movement SP does not regenerate Keyboard changes instead of 's' to open spell list, now you press 'S' 'g' will switch to quick speed mode (go) 's' will switch to normal speed mode (slow) other stamina keys that are the same as the previous version: 'e' turns on power mode. (exert) 'c' changes back to normal mode. (cancel) 'E' turns on focus mode. (E...xamine?) Spell failure Spell failure is reduced by dexterity, as well as spellcasting and spell schools. Significant simplification of failure calculations. All spells are between 1 and 99% failure. It's easier to get a level 9 spell down to 80% failure rate than in vanilla. It's harder to get a level 9 spell down to 20% failure rate than in vanilla. New branch layout Dungeon (15 floors) Orcish Mines (7) (only 4 floors provide XP, 4th floor is boss level) Lair (7) Swamp (4) Shoals (4) Spider (4) Snake (4) Forest (7) Crypt (4) Slime (4) Elven Halls (4) Dwarven Fortress (4) Vaults (4) Depths (5) Zig (27) Abyss (4) Vestibule Dis (7) Gehenna (7) Cocytus (7) Tartarus (7) Pandemonium (~25) Zot (4)
