On ranged attacks

[Vanguard]

I think it would be interesting to have a few threads on gameplay and different design decisions that are made in roguelikes, so this is my first one of those.

Some roguelikes allow players to fire ranged attacks in the 8 different directions (Mage Guild, Adom), while others allow the player to target any tile in their line of sight (*Bands, Nethack).  Which of these do you think makes for better gameplay?

There's obviously more realism to the second approach, but I think it adds a little more variety and planning to playing a ranged attack based character when you have to line your shots up, so to speak.

[PaulBlay]

Some roguelikes allow players to fire ranged attacks in the 8 different directions (Mage Guild, Adom), while others allow the player to target any tile in their line of sight (*Bands, Nethack).  Which of these do you think makes for better gameplay?

The '8 directions' (or '4 directions') approach does mean that the whole business of trick shots and what's targetable doesn't apply.

[Ex]

Targeting is way better. The best ranged weapon combat I've seen in a roguelike is probably MetroidRL followed by DoomRL.

[Nahjor]

Both approaches have their upsides and downsides. Basically, free targeting makes ranged combat more powerful, while straight-line targeting makes it weaker. If you're looking to make a game where ranged combat is generally superior to melee combat (DoomRL, Angband), then free targeting is a great choice. If you're looking to make one where there's some level of parity between ranged and melee combat, then straight-line targeting is a really solid idea.