Rogue - let's beat it

[Squeeealer]

Whoa, I missed all this action from a month ago...  welcome guys!

The BIGGEST gameplay difference to me is the speed.  With v5 you can knock out a game SUPER FAST using the Ctrl+directionals.  I find versions that don't offer this to be mind-numbing.  Although some might say the biggest difference is the item specific scrolls of identify as opposed to v3 which I think has generic scrolls of identify.

[mouser]

So far, the most noticeable diference is that +4 bonus to hit. It really hurts the chances of the player, but also makes some fights more interesting...

Having specific scrolls of identify does not hurt nearly as much as that bonus.

[Squeeealer]

So far, the most noticeable diference is that +4 bonus to hit. It really hurts the chances of the player, but also makes some fights more interesting...

Having specific scrolls of identify does not hurt nearly as much as that bonus.

So what is the +4 bonus?  Is that the bonus you get for hitting a sleeping enemy (in v3)?

[Squeeealer]

More bugs...

This one is really funny and quite unfortunate, present in v5, v4, and also Epyx 1.48:

    /*
     * If the creature being attacked is not running (alseep or held)
     * then the attacker gets a plus four bonus to hit.
     */
    if (!on(*thdef, ISRUN))
   hplus += 4;

File "fight.c", function roll_em(). This is supposed to give the player bonus chance to hit sleeping (held) monsters, and monsters to get this bonus when player is faint or frozen/paralyzed. The funny part is that it actually gives monsters this bonus all the time, while player never gets it. Ha-ha! As if the game was not intended to be hard enough these bugs make it still much harder and super-very unfair. And that Squeeealer managed to beat it with all these bugs and against all odds, I have to say again it's some kind of miracle.

Anyhow, there are two problems. First, ISRUN flag for the player is not handled properly somewhere else in the code so effectively the player is always "fainted" and thus the monsters always get this to-hit bonus. Second, in function fight(), there is a call to function runto(), which wakes up monsters, before the dice roll, so by the time it is decided whether to give the player to-hit bonus for sleeping/held monsters they are already up and running and thus the player never gets it.

Okay, here it is.  And originally reported here by Xerxes way back there...

[mouser]

Some IRC developer has commented me that there is a patch for it, which was submitted to the person running rlgallery, but I don't know whether it has been made available anywhere.

[Squeeealer]

Some IRC developer has commented me that there is a patch for it, which was submitted to the person running rlgallery, but I don't know whether it has been made available anywhere.

The question is do you want it patched?  I guess you could have it as a separate option. Now that we have a winner or two it's hard to go back and change the challenge.

Speaking of the other winner, I noticed it's fames who also commented on this thread way back at the beginning that he resets the game if he doesn't get a two-handed sword in the first room. elwin mentioned that he can't do that on rlgallery, but it would be interesting to go into fames' ttyrec files and see if he somehow manipped this.

But I get it. A two-handed sword is essentially what you must have to win. Winning may not have been the point in 1980, but it's pretty much been the point ever since then for any game.

On that note, I just had a fascinating run with base mace and no potions of strength.  First, I found a +3 chain mail. Then came a tidal wave of enchants for both armor and weapon plus waterproofing for the armor.  I was at +13 armor most of the run. My mace was +3, +3 by the end, I believe.  I had some poly, three monster hold scrolls, stealth, and regen.

But you could feel that I needed to find the stairs and FAST as soon as I hit 17.  For the most part I had that luck. But all it took was one floor where I had to search the entire floor before finding the stairs and all my toys were used up.  After a bit more luck I was on 24 (pretty sure) and again had trouble finding the stairs. I was trying to go toe-to-toe with a Jabberwock with some light kiting, when the next thing I knew I was surrounded by THREE of them.  I had an unidentified scroll and I researched what it could be. AHA!  TELEPORTATION!  So I read it and was wrong. It was identify ring/staff/wand. I assumed I had already found that, but apparently I had use ID'd everything to that point. I was dead and nowhere near the gold count for the leaderboard.

The part that really stumped me was when I had a +3, +2 mace and found a long sword. Assuming the long sword was +0, +0, and knowing I had one weapons enchant, what should I have gone with?  I went with the mace.

[mouser]

Some IRC developer has commented me that there is a patch for it, which was submitted to the person running rlgallery, but I don't know whether it has been made available anywhere.

The question is do you want it patched?  I guess you could have it as a separate option. Now that we have a winner or two it's hard to go back and change the challenge.

I wanted it patched in my local copy. And it would make sense to have a patched version available somewhere. Not necessarily at rlgallery as I understand it is a public game with some competitive component. Hard to undo the changes.

But really, some deaths in V5 feel very cheap and I think the 20% bogus bonus monsters get to hit you is at fault at many of those.

I miss useful potions, scrolls and wands more than a 2-handed sword most of the times. I think you only need the big steel when you are halfway there... I think resetting the game because you don't find one on level 1 is too hardcore. You have about 10 levels to find one IMO.

[Celes]

Hello, I want to say that it's a great topic and I'm in the process of reading, whilst trying to avoid spoilers simultaneously, as I haven't yet been beyond lvl17. It's the spirit of discovery, gotta see those monsters myself first! I don't know what got into me, but I got addicted to Rogue and really want to beat it one day.

And I have a question:

It's embarrassing, but I don't get how to use wands on my own self. Once I had a wand of teleport away. But all wands asks for a direction, and I think I pointed it to a monster that was attacking me?.. I don't quite remember, but I died twice because I couldn't figure out how to use wands on myself and did something that the game considered stupid.

P.S. rlgallery is an amazing site, especially the recordings saved on it that can be analyzed! I stay away from them for now, because I want to fumble on my own for a while.

[mouser]

Hello, I want to say that it's a great topic and I'm in the process of reading, whilst trying to avoid spoilers simultaneously, as I haven't yet been beyond lvl17. It's the spirit of discovery, gotta see those monsters myself first! I don't know what got into me, but I got addicted to Rogue and really want to beat it one day.

And I have a question:

It's embarrassing, but I don't get how to use wands on my own self. Once I had a wand of teleport away. But all wands asks for a direction, and I think I pointed it to a monster that was attacking me?.. I don't quite remember, but I died twice because I couldn't figure out how to use wands on myself and did something that the game considered stupid.

P.S. rlgallery is an amazing site, especially the recordings saved on it that can be analyzed! I stay away from them for now, because I want to fumble on my own for a while.

You don't really point at yourself with the wands. A wand is either directional, in which case you aim it at the target; or it isn't, in which case you aim at any direction. It makes no difference.

[Squeeealer]

Hello, I want to say that it's a great topic and I'm in the process of reading, whilst trying to avoid spoilers simultaneously, as I haven't yet been beyond lvl17. It's the spirit of discovery, gotta see those monsters myself first! I don't know what got into me, but I got addicted to Rogue and really want to beat it one day.

And I have a question:

It's embarrassing, but I don't get how to use wands on my own self. Once I had a wand of teleport away. But all wands asks for a direction, and I think I pointed it to a monster that was attacking me?.. I don't quite remember, but I died twice because I couldn't figure out how to use wands on myself and did something that the game considered stupid.

P.S. rlgallery is an amazing site, especially the recordings saved on it that can be analyzed! I stay away from them for now, because I want to fumble on my own for a while.

Hi Celes!  I watched one of your runs today.  Keep at it!

[Celes]

I watched two of your plays live, too. And the one on YT, apparently it's the only one with commentary? The commentary made it very entertaining to watch.

And I must say that the UNIX version seems more difficult than the DOS 1.48 (by Epyx) I used to play before! At least at early levels. I've never once died from hypothermia in the DOS version, it was probably entirely removed from the game, as I've never seen it at all. There was only one scroll of identify, not separate ones. I don't know what else, but it felt easier overall, I could make it to levels 9-11 pretty reliably almost every time in the DOS version.

It's a shame that ctrl+numeric keyboard doesn't work in v5, using ctrl+hjkl\yubn is difficult as far as moving diagonally is concerned.

EDIT: There were no mazes at early levels in the DOS version, too. I think I've only seen those at levels beyond ~15-16.

[Squeeealer]

I watched two of your plays live, too. And the one on YT, apparently it's the only one with commentary? The commentary made it very entertaining to watch.

And I must say that the UNIX version seems more difficult than the DOS 1.48 (by Epyx) I used to play before! At least at early levels. I've never once died from hypothermia in the DOS version, it was probably entirely removed from the game, as I've never seen it at all. There was only one scroll of identify, not separate ones. I don't know what else, but it felt easier overall, I could make it to levels 9-11 pretty reliably almost every time in the DOS version.

It's a shame that ctrl+numeric keyboard doesn't work in v5, using ctrl+hjkl\yubn is difficult as far as moving diagonally is concerned.

EDIT: There were no mazes at early levels in the DOS version, too. I think I've only seen those at levels beyond ~15-16.

Watching you now.  You were in a lit room with an Aquator and he ruined your armor.  What you can do with Aquators is simply remove your armor.  Then they cannot damage it.

[Squeeealer]

I watched two of your plays live, too. And the one on YT, apparently it's the only one with commentary? The commentary made it very entertaining to watch.

And I must say that the UNIX version seems more difficult than the DOS 1.48 (by Epyx) I used to play before! At least at early levels. I've never once died from hypothermia in the DOS version, it was probably entirely removed from the game, as I've never seen it at all. There was only one scroll of identify, not separate ones. I don't know what else, but it felt easier overall, I could make it to levels 9-11 pretty reliably almost every time in the DOS version.

It's a shame that ctrl+numeric keyboard doesn't work in v5, using ctrl+hjkl\yubn is difficult as far as moving diagonally is concerned.

EDIT: There were no mazes at early levels in the DOS version, too. I think I've only seen those at levels beyond ~15-16.

I would also reconsider how you use arrows and pick up your arrows that missed.  When you get to a higher STR like 18 or even a full 16 (with some xp gains), arrows really pack a punch.  If you have projectiles late in the cave and you have high levels and high STR, they can work wonders even helping defeat the most difficult of monsters.  I mostly use my default arrows to defeat a few early enemies for levels, then save the rest for stationary opponents like Leprechauns and Nymphs.  Any projectiles I find along the way are bonus for knocking enemy HP down before I hit them with my weapon.

[mouser]

And I must say that the UNIX version seems more difficult than the DOS 1.48 (by Epyx) I used to play before!

Rogue V4 and V5 at rlgallery have a bug/feature that causes monsters to strike at you with a +4 bonus to hit.

If you play Rogue V3 you will notice the difference. V5 is still more fun in my opinion.

[Celes]

@Squeeealer, thank you for your suggestions!

@mouser, seriously?! Why would anyone keep such a 'feature' rather than fix it? Learning about this makes me feel like I should go back and play the DOS version. Unless you're joking...
EDIT: Did the official v4&5 versions have that feature, too, or is that a real bug?