Why are some of the artifacts clearly superior to others?

[Guest]

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

Obviously not every artifact can be equally useful in all situations,
but it seems that some artifacts were designed to be much more powerful
than others. For example, there are a variety of artifact weapons that
do double damage to certain varieties of monster, but there are also
artifacts that do double damage to almost anything. Frostbrand and
Firebrand'll do double damage to anything that isn't cold- or
fire-resistant, respectively, and since most of the endgame monsters
aren't cold-resistant, Frostbrand is extremely useful.

There are some drawbacks to those two weapons, particularly that they
can damage valuable items held by monsters, but given that they also
grant resistance to their own damage types, it seems clear that their
benefits outweigh their liabilities.

>From a design perspective, why was this done?

 

[Guest]

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

Caledonian wrote:
> Obviously not every artifact can be equally useful in all situations,
> but it seems that some artifacts were designed to be much more
powerful
> than others.

Miscellaneous thoughts:

It is by no means essential that you ever get an artifact to win the
game. Looked at this way, all artifacts are gravy.

It could also be argued that Sting and Orcrist (which can be created by
anyone with know-how) shouldn't be equivilent to Frost Brand. And a
special purpose weapon should always be worse against Joe Monster than
one of the big boys.

By having greatly differing levels of power for artifacts, it sets up a
system by which artifacts actually differ from each other in gameplay
terms, and thus are more desirable.

I would say, however, that the various Bane weapons are underpowered,
even against their target enemies, which are, after all, only tiny
portions of Nethack's bestiary -- if you're wielding Giantslayer, you'd
think that giants would be almost instantly falling before you, but no.

- John H.

 

[Guest]

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

Sting and Orcrist I'll grant -- they're easy enough to create that I
wouldn't say they need anything else. But even Sting has the ability
to instantly liberate a character from a spider's web.

What do you think about the following suggestions?

1) Reduce the elemental damage bonus from Frost/Firebrand to d6 +
enchantment.

2) Let the monster-type-specific artifacts grant awareness of the
relevant monster types, in the same way that Sting grants awareness of
orcs.

 

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

Boudewijn Waijers wrote:
> I don't think the brands grant resistance to their own damage types.

You are incorrect. Frostbrand grants cold resistance, and Firebrand
grants fire resistance.

***

Although I don't think it would be desirable to make all of the
artifacts "balanced", I don't think the current difference in their
utility leads to diversity. Quite the opposite. As things currently
stand, everyone uses only a few of the most powerful artifact weapons.

 

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

Caledonian wrote:

> 2) Let the monster-type-specific artifacts grant awareness of the
> relevant monster types, in the same way that Sting grants awareness of
> orcs.
>

I like this idea. This, plus maybe a moderate (15%?) chance of
insta-kill, might make Werebane occasionally worth carrying around.

--
Jon
Sum Quod Eris, Fui Quod Sis

 

[Guest]

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

Caledonian wrote:
> Obviously not every artifact can be equally useful in all situations,
> but it seems that some artifacts were designed to be much more powerful
> than others. For example, there are a variety of artifact weapons that
> do double damage to certain varieties of monster, but there are also
> artifacts that do double damage to almost anything. Frostbrand and
> Firebrand'll do double damage to anything that isn't cold- or
> fire-resistant, respectively, and since most of the endgame monsters
> aren't cold-resistant, Frostbrand is extremely useful.
>
> There are some drawbacks to those two weapons, particularly that they
> can damage valuable items held by monsters, but given that they also
> grant resistance to their own damage types, it seems clear that their
> benefits outweigh their liabilities.

I don't think that the resistances granted by the artifacts are that
necessary; usually you obtain quite early cold and fire resistance.
Magicbanes MR, OTOH, is more valuable, IMO (also its ability to drain
curses). Likewise Excaliburs and Stormbringers level drain resistance.
And there are other specific abilities which are worth mentioning,
permanent light, searching, decapitating, etc. I would not value the
artifacts by their damage only.

>>From a design perspective, why was this done?

[ Was this a quote? ]

Diversity is the key for an interesting game.

Janis

 

[Guest]

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

I acknowledge that whether a weapon is useless or not is often in the
eye of the beholder (and rustproofed weapons are something to be
grateful for when you get them!), but let's face it: Trollbane just
isn't as good as Grayswandir in any sense, and there's a reason the
Ascension kits people put together have the same artifacts over and
over again.

I just don't see why some artifacts should do double damage against
fairly uncommon monster types while others do double damage against
nearly *everything*.

That's a good point about adding uncertainty to sacrifices. I just
don't think the "placeholder" artifacts should be quite so limited.

 

[Guest]

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

Janis Papanagnou wrote:

[ "From " at the beginning of a line being prefixed
by a quoting ">", as if a new article were email]

> I'd rather guess it's a bug.

Yes, it's a bug, it originates in the Google Groups
Beta postings, I've reported it to the Google
Support group, and so far they haven't fixed it.
Keep that address in mind, (and take out the
backslash that avoids another glaring design
misfeature of theirs, address munging)

groups-support\@google.com

and rant loud and long via it about all their
misfeatures.

They seem to do nothing unless a stink is raised [as
in the case of the current spamming Jesus freak,
also reported, but to their abuse site, with the
response roughly "we hardly ever do anything about
people abusing our site to spam Usenet"; grrrr].

The issue in general seems to be that GGB is used
both to email responses to article posters, since
GGB mangles addresses so readers cannot handle that
emailing out of band, and also to post articles, and
the protections appropriate for email are applied
_before_ the fork that decides which way the typing
gets sent.

> (There's really an awful lot of broken software
> out there...) :-(

Yes there is, and quite lot of it is Google Groups
Beta.

FYI

xanthian.

 

[Guest]

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

Caledonian wrote:

> There are some drawbacks to those two weapons, particularly that they
> can damage valuable items held by monsters, but given that they also
> grant resistance to their own damage types, it seems clear that their
> benefits outweigh their liabilities.

I don't think the brands grant resistance to their own damage types.

NINDND.

--
Boudewijn Waijers (kroisos at home.nl).

The garden of happiness is surrounded by a wall so low only children
can look over it. - "the Orphanage of Hits", former Dutch radio show.

 

[Guest]

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

Caledonian wrote:

> Obviously not every artifact can be equally useful in all situations,
> but it seems that some artifacts were designed to be much more
> powerful than others. For example, [...]

From a design perspective, why was this done?

[ Removed incorrect quotation level ]

I think this was on purpose.

I think useless artifacts like these are meant to make sacrificing less
effective. After all, getting *no* result at all is better for you than
getting these artifacts, since every artifact you get makes it more
difficult to get another (useful) one.

--
Boudewijn Waijers (kroisos at home.nl).

The garden of happiness is surrounded by a wall so low only children
can look over it. - "the Orphanage of Hits", former Dutch radio show.

 

[Guest]

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

On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 22:41:24 +0200,
"Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:

> Caledonian wrote:

> From a design perspective, why was this done?

> [ Removed incorrect quotation level ]

That's the second comment about that in this thread.

Some email and related software is confused by lines beginning with
'From' (because it looks like a From: header), so some software always
adds a '>' to the beginning of a content line that just happens to begin
with 'From.'

I'm sure that some RFC or other (RFC 822, perhaps, he guesses without
checking) describes this behavior.

HTH,
Dan

--
Dan Sommers
<http://www.tombstonezero.net/dan/>
μâ‚€ × εâ‚€ × c² = 1

 

[Guest]

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

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 03:02:07 +0200,
Janis Papanagnou <Janis_Papanagnou@hotmail.com> wrote:

> Dan Sommers wrote:
>> On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 22:41:24 +0200,
>> "Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:
>>> Caledonian wrote:
>>
>>> From a design perspective, why was this done?
>>
>>> [ Removed incorrect quotation level ]
>> That's the second comment about that in this thread.
>> Some email and related software is confused by lines beginning with
>> 'From' (because it looks like a From: header),

> That's an interesting observation.

>> so some software always
>> adds a '>' to the beginning of a content line that just happens to begin
>> with 'From.'

> Why should it believe that? A header is clearly separated from the
> body by the first empty line. (And since when is "From " the same as
> "From:"?)

Consider mailboxes, where multiple messages are contained in a single
text file. In this case, the beginning of the next message must be
differentiated from a 'From' in the middle of the current message. A
lot of usenet software is based on email software, so a lot of usenet
software escapes leading 'From' in the body of a message.

>> I'm sure that some RFC or other (RFC 822, perhaps, he guesses without
>> checking) describes this behavior.

> I'd rather guess it's a bug.
> (There's really an awful lot of broken software out there...) :-(

I can't find this (quickly) in the RFC's, but I'm not making it up, and
it's not a bug. See the "mbox" entry in wikipedia:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mbox>

Regards,
Dan

--
Dan Sommers
<http://www.tombstonezero.net/dan/>
μâ‚€ × εâ‚€ × c² = 1

 

[Guest]

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

"Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:

> Caledonian wrote:
>
> > There are some drawbacks to those two weapons, particularly that they
> > can damage valuable items held by monsters, but given that they also
> > grant resistance to their own damage types, it seems clear that their
> > benefits outweigh their liabilities.
>
> I don't think the brands grant resistance to their own damage types.

The Brands do grant the appropriate resistance; it's Mjollnir that does
shock damage but doesn't grant shock resistance (which is one of the
reasons why only gamblers throw their Mojo around).

Richard

 

[Guest]

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

Caledonian wrote:
>
> Although I don't think it would be desirable to make all of the
> artifacts "balanced", I don't think the current difference in their
> utility leads to diversity. Quite the opposite. As things currently
> stand, everyone uses only a few of the most powerful artifact weapons.

And what do those "everyone's" use if they haven't got any of the
"most powerful artifact weapons"?

As I've already written elsethread, I would not value the artifacts
by their damage only, but people who value damage solely will surely
gain less from the existing diversity.

Making a good choice between Sting and Grayswandir is easy, between
Magicbane and Frostbrand more difficult, depending on the situation.

And, not to forget, your weapon proficiency plays a role.

In my games - and I don't wish for artifacts - I often have no simple
choice what to use. I once even didn't use the Frostbrand (considered
to be one of the best!) because it was inappropriate at the time.

I still have problems with these (Ogre-)Smashers and (Giant-)Slayers,
though. But all in all, out of the existing 20 (non-quest) artifact
weapons, I would be grateful for at least 12 of these, just ignore 3
(by ignore I mean to continue offering for another one in any case).

Janis

 

[Guest]

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

Dan Sommers wrote:
> On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 03:02:07 +0200,
> Janis Papanagnou <Janis_Papanagnou@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Consider mailboxes, where multiple messages are contained in a single
> text file. In this case, the beginning of the next message must be
> differentiated from a 'From' in the middle of the current message. A
> lot of usenet software is based on email software, so a lot of usenet
> software escapes leading 'From' in the body of a message.
>
>
>>>I'm sure that some RFC or other (RFC 822, perhaps, he guesses without
>>>checking) describes this behavior.
>
>
>>I'd rather guess it's a bug.
>>(There's really an awful lot of broken software out there...) :-(
>
>
> I can't find this (quickly) in the RFC's, but I'm not making it up, and
> it's not a bug. See the "mbox" entry in wikipedia:
>
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mbox>

That extra > is supposed to be used when STORING the message in the mbox
file, not when reading, quoting, forwarding, etc. Any reader that
doesn't strip a storage convention back out when retrieving a message
back from the storage file is buggy.


Atillo

 

[Guest]

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

Dan Sommers wrote:
> On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 22:41:24 +0200,
> "Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:
>>Caledonian wrote:
>
>>From a design perspective, why was this done?
>
>>[ Removed incorrect quotation level ]
>
> That's the second comment about that in this thread.
>
> Some email and related software is confused by lines beginning with
> 'From' (because it looks like a From: header),

That's an interesting observation.

> so some software always
> adds a '>' to the beginning of a content line that just happens to begin
> with 'From.'

Why should it believe that? A header is clearly separated from the body
by the first empty line. (And since when is "From " the same as "From:"?)

> I'm sure that some RFC or other (RFC 822, perhaps, he guesses without
> checking) describes this behavior.

I'd rather guess it's a bug.
(There's really an awful lot of broken software out there...) :-(

> HTH,
> Dan

Janis

 

[Guest]

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

David Tillotson wrote:

> That extra > is supposed to be used when STORING the message in the
> mbox file, not when reading, quoting, forwarding, etc. Any reader that
> doesn't strip a storage convention back out when retrieving a message
> back from the storage file is buggy.

Certainly, but how would that software know whether the > sign was
inserted when storing or whether it had been there all the time, even
before reception?

--
Boudewijn Waijers (kroisos at home.nl).

The garden of happiness is surrounded by a wall so low only children
can look over it. - "the Orphanage of Hits", former Dutch radio show.

 

[Guest]

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

Richard Bos wrote:

> The Brands do grant the appropriate resistance; it's Mjollnir that does
> shock damage but doesn't grant shock resistance (which is one of the
> reasons why only gamblers

and people who are shock resistant from a ring or eating the right food

> throw their Mojo around).

Raisse, killed by an electric shock
(not a gambler)

--
irina@valdyas.org LegoHack: http://www.valdyas.org/irina/nethack/
Status of Raisse (piously neutral): Level 8 HP 63(67) AC -3, fast.

 

[Guest]

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

rlb@hoekstra-uitgeverij.nl (Richard Bos) writes:

> "Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:
>
> > Caledonian wrote:
> >
> > > There are some drawbacks to those two weapons, particularly that they
> > > can damage valuable items held by monsters, but given that they also
> > > grant resistance to their own damage types, it seems clear that their
> > > benefits outweigh their liabilities.
> >
> > I don't think the brands grant resistance to their own damage types.
>
> The Brands do grant the appropriate resistance; it's Mjollnir that does
> shock damage but doesn't grant shock resistance (which is one of the
> reasons why only gamblers throw their Mojo around).

Actually, I can easily imagine dozens of scenarios where it is
the 'marvinesque'[1] action to throw Mjollnir. Most popular
example might be the mmf while I'm at 120 HP.

Best,
Jakob

[1] 'marvinesque': Way of choosing your action, tactics or
strategy such that it, in a scientifically provable way,
maximizes the chances of short- and long-term survival.

 

[Guest]

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

Jakob Creutzig <creutzig@mathematik.tu-darmstadt.de> writes:

> Actually, I can easily imagine dozens of scenarios where it is
> the 'marvinesque'[1] action to throw Mjollnir. Most popular
> example might be the mmf while I'm at 120 HP.

Not sufficent precondition. The mmf needs to be also blind, you be out
of ways of preventing it from getting next to you, and also lack other
long-range offensive capabilities.

Throwing Mjollnir is very, very rarely the "best-bet" action.

 

[Guest]

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

Boudewijn Waijers wrote:
> David Tillotson wrote:
>
>>That extra > is supposed to be used when STORING the message in the
>>mbox file, not when reading, quoting, forwarding, etc. Any reader that
>>doesn't strip a storage convention back out when retrieving a message
>>back from the storage file is buggy.
>
> Certainly, but how would that software know whether the > sign was
> inserted when storing or whether it had been there all the time, even
> before reception?

The software (read "the software designer") is free to use an appropriate
method.

Therefore the software should use either a quoting that is reversible or
not add the "From " in the first place when the message is intended to be
re-extracted from the composite file to be sent. Missing either condition
will result in broken software.

Janis

 

[Guest]

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

On 3/28/05 7:24 PM, Dan Sommers wrote:
> On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 22:41:24 +0200,
> "Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:
>
>>Caledonian wrote:
>
>>From a design perspective, why was this done?
>
>>[ Removed incorrect quotation level ]
>
> That's the second comment about that in this thread.
>
> Some email and related software is confused by lines beginning with
> 'From' (because it looks like a From: header), so some software always
> adds a '>' to the beginning of a content line that just happens to begin
> with 'From.'
>
Interestingly enough, Thunderbird shows the added '>' but does not
recognize the line as being a quote. So it's obviously the sender's
software that's erroneously adding the '>' character, not the
recipients'. (If Thunderbird had added it in order to distinguish it as
a quote, it would have recognized it as a quote.)

--
Kevin Wayne

"I came to Casablanca for the waters."
"Waters? What waters? We're in the desert?"
"I was misinformed."

 

[Guest]

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

Tommi Syrjanen <tommi.syrjanen@enough.spam.hut.fi> wrote in
news:7jmzsm8ylq.fsf@cronotopology.tcs.hut.fi:

> Jakob Creutzig <creutzig@mathematik.tu-darmstadt.de> writes:
>
>> Actually, I can easily imagine dozens of scenarios where it is
>> the 'marvinesque'[1] action to throw Mjollnir. Most popular
>> example might be the mmf while I'm at 120 HP.
>

> Throwing Mjollnir is very, very rarely the "best-bet" action.
>

I would say that if you have a good backup then throwing Mojo is
perfectly Marvinesque in that situation, because there is no real risk
(presuming you're shock resistant.)

 

[Guest]

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

David Damerell wrote:

> Quoting Dan Sommers <me@privacy.net>:
>> "Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:
>>> Caledonian wrote:
>>> From a design perspective, why was this done?
>>> [ Removed incorrect quotation level ]
>> That's the second comment about that in this thread.
>
> As a brief interjection, a look at the raw article body confirms it
> arrived pre-mangled.
>
> We may have found _another_ bug in DejaGoogle.

Where are you finding the raw article body? It's mangled here:

http://groups.google.ca/groups?selm=1112014850.488503.109330%40o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com&output=gplain

http://tinyurl.com/4u8pk

--
Benjamin Lewis

A small, but vocal, contingent even argues that tin is superior, but they
are held by most to be the lunatic fringe of Foil Deflector Beanie science.

 

[Guest]

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

Quoting Dan Sommers <me@privacy.net>:
>"Boudewijn Waijers" <kroisos@REMOVETHISWORD.home.nl> wrote:
>>Caledonian wrote:
>>From a design perspective, why was this done?
>>[ Removed incorrect quotation level ]
>That's the second comment about that in this thread.

As a brief interjection, a look at the raw article body confirms it
arrived pre-mangled.

We may have found _another_ bug in DejaGoogle.
--
David Damerell <damerell@chiark.greenend.org.uk> Kill the tomato!
Today is First Mania, April.