Author Topic: help choosing a game  (Read 51508 times)

Xecutor

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #30 on: September 24, 2010, 01:05:34 PM »
One more example.
Player is Ice Elementalist wielding crossbow.
His Ice Magic and Crossbow skills are both level 10 filled to 99% exp till next level.
Exp pool is empty.
There are Saint Rjoka and ordinary orc in front of player.
Player throws icicle at Saint Rjoka and kills him. Nothing happens to his Ice Magic skill.
Than player fires bolt (with crossbow) at head of almost helpless orc and blows his head into pieces.
Nearly effortless action. That somehow levels Crossbow skill up. Why?
Where is logic in this?

IMO: Properties of good skills/exp system:
1) Сonsistency. It shouldn't defy laws of common logic.
2) Fluent? It shouldn't force player to do unnatural things to progress.
3) Balanced.

In order to achieve (really?) 3, Crawl somewhat fails at 1 and 2.


jim

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #31 on: September 24, 2010, 04:16:36 PM »
One more example.
Player is Ice Elementalist wielding crossbow.
His Ice Magic and Crossbow skills are both level 10 filled to 99% exp till next level.

In this example, Crawl is right and just in punishing this foolish player because Crossbows are a waste of skill points if you have destructive, direct damage at your willworking fingertips.

Seriously though, what are you saying? The XP -> skill system is straightforward once you learn it, and the devs have gone to reasonable lengths in order to tweak it. I understand that it's not your preferred method of character advancement, but it seems like you're splitting hairs with these examples. Is it supposed to be self evident that one should advance in skill when shooting at Saint Roka but not at the weak Orc? I don't see it that way.

Let me give YOU an example of XP gain versus XP allocation.

We're all nerds here. We all remember how terrifying the prospect of eternal virginity was, right? (All due respect to the remaining virgins; it happens, put yourself out there, etc etc.)

So you were a virgin. The prospect of ever losing your virginity seemed incredibly daunting - and much of this had to do with the fact that you had NO IDEA how to have sex. You had no skill levels in lovemaking. You were so worthless at sex that even low-level harlots scoffed at you. But eventually you found a special someone who, after an epic battle, consented to make love with you anyhow.

Chances are high that you were terrible in bed regardless of how much you cared for this person. You simply had no idea what you were doing. But you still had sex! A major accomplishment, one giving you 1000XP.

But it wasn't just like you suddenly knew how to have sex after that one experience. It was more like a door had been opened for you and now you were able to practice fruitfully. It was a slow process, fueled by optimism and the inertia of being genuinely cared for by someone... but hopefully... after many attempts... some of them with subsequent low-level harlots... you gained a few skill levels in sex by SPENDING that inertia you'd gained from that one special experience with that special someone.

Crossbows shmossbows. Crawl Represent!

Quote
I know I sound boring but I personally really like the Adom system: every time you perform an action, there is a little chanche your related skill can improve, regardless of things like Crawl exp pool. This is after all enough realistic and doesn't force the player to behave innaturaly.

Skeletor, you don't need to convince me that ADOM is incredibly engaging. I literally threw my computer away because I'd been spending too much time playing that goddamn game... stupid Kelevaster.... that was like 9 years ago though
« Last Edit: September 24, 2010, 04:21:39 PM by jim »

gruff

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #32 on: September 24, 2010, 04:22:42 PM »
Nice analogy...I'd modify it by saying that before achieving that first strike, you had to kill a bunch of kobolds first to build up the XP pool, then spent the XP practicing approaches, dates, etc.. Actually bedding down for the first time represents going from Sex Skill 0 -> Sex Skill 1.

Now I am getting a crazy good idea for a roguelike....hmmm...

jim

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #33 on: September 24, 2010, 04:29:26 PM »
Serial Monogamist?

gruff

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #34 on: September 24, 2010, 04:33:33 PM »
SEX DUNGEON

jim

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #35 on: September 24, 2010, 04:43:45 PM »
I'm sure there's a pornographic code page from somewhere back in the BBS days.

gruff

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #36 on: September 24, 2010, 04:48:29 PM »
Actually I was thinking about a real-life roguelike. Like Passage but a roguelike. Levels of dungeon would be years or stages of life, you'd start out in a playpen practicing basic hand-eye co-ordination, by level 20 you'd be on car driving skills and so forth...Death would be inevitable but there could be some sort of afterlife concept, perhaps one that differed depending on the religion you chose.

Eudoxus

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #37 on: September 24, 2010, 06:29:59 PM »
I definitely find the Crawl skill system to be odd, at least conceptually, but I also think that it's really fun.  It's weird to think about being able to use a skill many times without ever getting any better at it, like when you put a skill on hold.  That said, I've never cared that much about how realistic a game is, provided it has fun internal logic.  And, for what it's worth, Crawl is the first roguelike that I've ever really gotten addicted to.

Many moons ago I used to play a bunch of the tabletop RPG L5R, usually with the same DM.  The DM made a house rule that was a bit of a compromise between Z's general rules (1) and (1') that I really liked.  The rule was this: before you could spend experience points to buy a level 1 skill, you had to role play your character becoming interested and attempting to learn the skill.  In other words, introducing new skills to your character took some extra effort.  I could see something like this working in a roguelike, where you use Z's rule (1) for getting lvl 1 skills and using (1') for raising skill levels above 1.

Switching gears here, I'm curious to know how many serious attempts there have been to make a roguelike with a randomly generated storyline.  ADOM is the only one I know of.

Darren Grey

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #38 on: September 24, 2010, 07:14:05 PM »
ADOM doesn't have a randomly generated storyline - everything in it is hard-coded.

From what I've heard GearHead 2 has an extremely good random story and quest system, but I've never tried it out myself.  There are probably other examples out there...

jim

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #39 on: September 24, 2010, 08:20:10 PM »
Gearhead is a really underrated game, and the combat/customization of mecha is not to be missed. It really feels like a polished, turn-based mecha strategy game. The faction system is fun, though it seems to amount to a lot of grinding. Nonetheless, once in a while I find myself slogging through yet another search and destroy mission for the Silver Knights because I want to be promoted. There are definitely balance issues.

The randomly generated story isn't much to brag about, IMO. It can be summed up as: Stop [RANDOMNAME] from [STEALING/DESTROYING] the [ITEM/PLANET] from [FACTION]. More of a "wacky mad libs" thing than anything else. I'm not disparaging the work at all; I'm just saying it's a far cry from a real-feeling plot.

Vanguard

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #40 on: September 25, 2010, 04:38:34 AM »
If you're still looking for a good roguelike, Mage Guild is a lot of fun and easy to pick up and play.  It even has a unique leveling system that doesn't require picking fights or grinding like you guys were talking about earlier.

Xecutor

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #41 on: September 25, 2010, 04:55:51 AM »
If you're still looking for a good roguelike, Mage Guild is a lot of fun and easy to pick up and play.  It even has a unique leveling system that doesn't require picking fights or grinding like you guys were talking about earlier.
Yeah, totally forgot about this one.

And I'll definitely add Brogue to the list!

gruff

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #42 on: September 25, 2010, 11:33:28 AM »
It's weird to think about being able to use a skill many times without ever getting any better at it, like when you put a skill on hold. 

This is actually realistic...if you think about it you only really get better at something when you put your full attention on it with a clear intention to practice and improve. If you just noodled around on a violin, you'd never really learn to play well, even if you noodled for eight hours a day. True skill comes with hard practice.

Xecutor

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #43 on: September 25, 2010, 01:23:10 PM »
Quote
True skill comes with hard practice.
With interruptions for a bloody massacre. Very realistic, yeah.
Exp pool of Dexter must be constantly full.
I wonder what skills he is training with all this exp...

gruff

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Re: help choosing a game
« Reply #44 on: September 25, 2010, 01:27:04 PM »
What, you don't go on killing sprees between violin practice sessions? I thought everyone did that.