[Crawl] Two (stupid?) questions for weekend

Archived from groups: rec.games.roguelike.misc (More info?)

What's the difference between
Fly <-> Levitation
and
Haste <-> Swiftness?

I'm interested in the differences of the actual ingame effects (not the
conditions to cast them).

Thanks in advance,
Rubinstein

Archived from groups: rec.games.roguelike.misc (More info?)

In article <ctg3ve$ds6$02$1@news.t-online.com>,
Rubinstein <picommander@t-online.de> wrote:
// What's the difference between
// Fly <-> Levitation

As stated, flying is levitation without disadvantages (that's what the
amulet of controlled flight does)... for the player. For the monsters,
the difference is that if they get paralysed flying monsters will fall
to the ground... levitating monsters remain hovering.

// Haste <-> Swiftness?

Swiftness: "imbues its caster with the ability to achieve great movement
speeds. Flying spellcasters can move even faster."

Haste: "speeds the actions of a creature."

Note the operative words: "movement" vs "actions".

Swiftness is also just a small bonus... Haste, being a higher level spell,
is double time. The difference can be easily tested via getting an air
mage to level 2 and (later) drinking a potion of speed.

Oh, and you don't need to be flying to get the bonus on swiftness...
levitation is exactly the same here.

Brent Ross

Archived from groups: rec.games.roguelike.misc (More info?)

bork bork bork Lauri Vallo bork 5:43:57 PM bork 1/30/2005 bork bork:

> Haste contaminates you with magic.

A bit more on this: you certainly shouldn't be afraid to cast Haste, but you
should avoid casting it if you've cast it in the recent past (say, while
clearing the same dungeon level), and you should only wear an amulet of
resist slowing (which lengthens Haste's effects) when hasted if it's an
emergency. If you stick to these principles, and stick an amulet of resist
mutation on top of that, the mutating effect will be minimal, and IIUC will
be random rather than weighted strongly towards (or guaranteed?) bad
mutations. (That is: even small amounts of contamination may cause a
mutation, but only large amounts cause the routine that's weighted towards
bad mutations to run.)

I actually looked at the contaminations-to-mutations code last week, but I
was in a hurry, so I didn't get much from it.

Erik

Archived from groups: rec.games.roguelike.misc (More info?)

bork bork bork Rubinstein bork 11:48:26 PM bork 1/31/2005 bork bork:

> Erik Piper wrote:
> > bork bork bork Lauri Vallo bork 5:43:57 PM bork 1/30/2005 bork bork:
> >
> >> Haste contaminates you with magic.
> >
> > [recommended intervals of Haste]
> > ...and you should only wear an amulet of resist slowing (which
> > lengthens Haste's effects) when hasted if it's an emergency.
>
> Because in this special case you accept the almost(?) sure(?) resulting
> contamination -> (bad) mutation? Do I get this right?
>
> Rubinstein

Time for me to fess up. I'm not sure if I've ever gone the whole
(approximately) double length hasting with an AoRS on, actually -- I always
take it off as soon as my crisis ends, which doesn't tend to be the full
double length. With the crusaders I've been running recently, Haste-with-AoRS
tends to be more the result of having it already on my neck anyway (because
of how it affects berserking) than intending to be hasted a really long time.

But yes, the thinking is, "better irradiated than dead."

Erik