Show Posts

1

0.9.9 / E|94%|YASD The only mistake I made was being noticed.

« on: January 25, 2010, 23:46 »

--------------------------------------------------------------
 DoomRL (v.0.9.9) roguelike post-mortem character dump
--------------------------------------------------------------

 BDR, level 10 Cacodemon Corporal, killed by a revenant
 on level 23 of the Phobos base. 
 He survived 172299 turns and scored 33141 points. 
 He played for 8 hours, 41 minutes and 53 seconds. 
 He was too young to die!

 He killed 328 out of 347 hellspawn. (94%)
 He held his right to remain violent.


-- Awards ----------------------------------------------------

  UAC Star (bronze cluster)
  Hell Champion Medal

-- Graveyard -------------------------------------------------

  ###########################################################
  ..........;...................===...=......................
  .................#####.......==.###====#######.............
  .......#####..0..#...#.....==..=#.===.==.....#.............
  .......#...#...../...#......=......=.........#.......".....
  ...0...#...#.....#...#..##/###........0......#.......######
  .#####.#...#.....#####..#....#X.....+#########.#####.#.....
  .#.../.#...#............#....#.................#...#.#.####
  .#...#.#.../............#....#.......^R..}.[...#...#.#.#.|.
  0#...#.#...#............#....#.....RV..........#...#.#.#+..
  .#...#.#####..#########.#....#.....[.V.........#...#.#.#OO.
  .#...#........#.......#.#....#.....R...........+...#.#.#...
  .#####........#.......#.#....#.\.....#####.O..^#####.#.####
  ..............#......>#.######..^....#O..#R..........#.|...
  .........^....#.......#..............#...O........+..######
  ............0.#.....>.#..............#...#...........0.....
  ............0.#.......#.............[#####...............;.
  ..............#####+###.......0............................
  ..............0....................^..............0........
  ###########################################################

-- Statistics ------------------------------------------------

  Health -4/50   Experience 40340/10
  ToHit Ranged +0  ToHit Melee +0  ToDmg Ranged +2  ToDmg Melee +2

-- Traits ----------------------------------------------------

    Finesse          (Level 2)
    Hellrunner       (Level 1)
    Son of a bitch   (Level 2)
    Whizkid          (Level 2)
    Triggerhappy     (Level 2)
    Ammochain        (Level 1)

  Fin->Fin->SoB->SoB->WK->TH->MAc->WK->TH->HR->

-- Equipment -------------------------------------------------

    [a] [ Armor      ]   Onyx Armor [2]
    [b] [ Weapon     ]   modified plasma rifle (1d7)x6 [0/40] (T3)
    [c] [ Boots      ]   protective boots [2/2] (90%)
    [d] [ Prepared   ]   modified Missile Launcher (7d6) [5/5] (B1)

-- Inventory -------------------------------------------------

    [a] plasma rifle (1d7)x6 [0/40]
    [b] plasma rifle (1d7)x6 [0/40]
    [c] plasma rifle (1d7)x6 [0/40]
    [d] red armor [1/4] (25%)
    [e] modified red armor [6/6] (200%) (ABP)
    [f] rocket (x14)
    [g] rocket (x14)
    [h] rocket (x14)
    [i] rocket (x14)
    [j] rocket (x13)
    [k] small med-pack
    [l] small med-pack
    [m] large med-pack
    [n] large med-pack
    [o] large med-pack
    [p] large med-pack
    [q] large med-pack
    [r] envirosuit pack
    [s] thermonuclear bomb
    [t] bulk mod pack

-- Kills -----------------------------------------------------

    69 former humans
    32 former sergeants
    5 former captains
    30 imps
    47 demons
    55 lost souls
    30 cacodemons
    8 barons of hell
    16 hell knights
    14 arachnotrons
    2 former commandos
    3 pain elementals
    4 arch-viles
    3 mancubi
    10 revenants

-- History ---------------------------------------------------

  He started his journey on the surface of Phobos.
  On level 2 he entered Hell's Arena.
  He left the Arena as a champion!
  On level 6 he stormed the Chained Court.
  On level 11 he witnessed the Wall.
  He massacred the evil behind the Wall!
  On level 13 he found the Missile Launcher!
  On level 13 he ventured into the Halls of Carnage.
  On level 18 he found the Onyx Armor!
  On level 21 he entered the Vaults.
  He came, he saw, but he left.
  On level 23 he finally was killed by a revenant.

-- Messages --------------------------------------------------

 Your armor is not damaged. Your boots look like new!
 There is a Supercharge Globe lying here.
 SuperCharge!
 There are stairs leading downward here.
  
 You enter Phobos Hell, level 8. There's the smell of blood in the air! You
 feel a breeze of morbid air...
 You open the door.
 There is a small med-pack lying here.
 You picked up a small med-pack.
 You open the door.
 You open the door.
 You open the door.
 Argh!!! Lava!
 You dodge! Argh!!! Lava!

-- General ---------------------------------------------------

 Before him 87 brave souls have ventured into Phobos:
 81 of those were killed.
 And 6 couldn't handle the stress and committed a stupid suicide.

--------------------------------------------------------------

I had full health and onyx armor. Still got insta-gibbed thanks to that wonderful cluster of death.

EDIT: Sorry, feels like a million years since I made a mortem thread.

2

Discussion / So I used three phases and couldn't get into the middle vault of the Vaults..

« on: January 25, 2010, 23:09 »

..and now I'm wondering why there's not an easier way in. I have nice stuff this game, but I can always use another unique and I would have really liked to get the badge for this as well as the 100% kills badge.

Edit: Thinking about it, there are three things that would make this less of a problem in my eyes. 1. Give the silver badge on defeating the two side vaults. 2. Make a series of teleporters that place you directly in each of the vaults (a difficulty increase but one which takes the buggeriness of trusting to random phasing to get you there). 3. Change homing devices so that you can pick your destination instead of them always sending you to the stairs.

3

Requests For Features / New trait - Salvage

« on: October 18, 2009, 21:12 »

Requires: Whizkid 2

Grants: The ability to take a weapon, armor, or pair of boots you've modded and salvage some of the mods. Destroys the weapon/armor/boots in the process, and can only give 1-3 mods back (33% of the mods on the item rounded down; has a chance of failing entirely if you have less than 4 mods on the weapon). You cannot choose the mods you salvage.

*hopes this is depowered enough to pass muster*

4

Requests For Features / Phase devices

« on: January 01, 2008, 00:15 »

Do people ever use them, and how useful on average are they?

I sorta came over from Crawl - a much longer and substantially harder game. Teleports there are a risk, too, but the level maps are much bigger than DoomRL's maps; big enough that the chance of being 'ported into a worse spot from a bad spot is acceptably low. Not super-low, but low enough that it's generally safer than trying to tough out the current situation. It also helps that in Crawl, good healing is not usually available in big enough quantities to allow damage soaking for any serious length of time; you *need* ways to fix your enemy woes reliably and/or quickly.

DoomRL sort of gets this reversed; full healing is carried around easy enough, armor soaks damage as well and you're generally either carrying the most reliable means of foe death available or you're already pushing up daisies. Maps are much smaller, meaning you've got a better chance of running into bad guys. Totally fits Doom, sure, but the risks of random porting tend to far outweigh the rewards as a result; it's not likely that you'll do better to use a phase device than to heal or even to reload. The problem is that because of that the phase device is left by the side of the road when something better comes along; full kits, armor, even ammo and mods, which spurs one of two questions: why is an item that is significantly less valuable than all others in this game, or is there a way to make this more worthwhile to the average player?

5

Discussion / Knew I wasn't crazy!

« on: October 26, 2007, 21:09 »

Arch-Viles *do* leave corpses!

sergeant is bleeding! The bleeding stops. The former sergeant loses blood. The former sergeant dies. ######################## #....#....>............# #....#.................# #....#.......0.........#. #....#.................##.####.############## #0.../...........................}............ #....#.................#........}.|}|.......... #....#.................#..........[}}}......... #....#............................}|}.|..}.%.... #....#.................#....0>...}|}}}....|..... #....#...........0...../.%........%.}%%.......... #....#.................#...............@......... #....#.................#################/####+ #....#.................+ ... ##################/##### ... .... ###+ Adam Ring Armor : none Phobos Base Lev2 Health: 58% Exp: 2/26% Weapon: pistol (2d4) [2/6] coward

:/ I know that doesn't look like much, but the only way I could really get better proof is through a video recording of some sort, and I'm not sure how to work that. Suffice it to say that my final bullet knocked and killed it out of sight, and a caco did come around too, but it got shot out of the way such that I was able to see this, which finally proves that I *wasn't* crazy that time a long while ago when I had to fight three Viles which rezzed each other. Also, no, there weren't any other enemies I killed in this area. The Vile was the first thing to poke its head through the door, and the only one I killed. Acid and lava don't do bleeding damage, so it couldn't have been either of those on a different corpse.

>_> Sorry if this inspires more fear in you all... at least they don't resurrect each other often! Oh yes, they also have a *melee* attack, which appears to be somewhere between former foo and demon strength, so there's a new weakness as well. :grin: Happy hunting!

6

Bug Reports / Bleeding stopped? Nope!

« on: October 04, 2007, 01:30 »

sergeant is bleeding! The bleeding stops. The former sergeant loses blood. The former sergeant dies. ######################## #....#....>............# #....#.................# #....#.......0.........#. #....#.................##.####.############## #0.../...........................}............ #....#.................#........}.|}|.......... #....#.................#..........[}}}......... #....#............................}|}.|..}.%.... #....#.................#....0>...}|}}}....|..... #....#...........0...../.%........%.}%%.......... #....#.................#...............@......... #....#.................#################/####+ #....#.................+ ... ##################/##### ... .... ###+ Adam Ring Armor : none Phobos Base Lev2 Health: 58% Exp: 2/26% Weapon: pistol (2d4) [2/6] coward

Obviously the message priority needs to be shifted a bit..

7

Pre-0.9.9 / [M|AoMr|100%|Win] Absence makes the mind play better, I suppose..

« on: September 04, 2007, 02:01 »

Or at least mine seems to.. >_>

--------------------------------------------------------------
 DoomRL (v.0.9.8.7 BETA 1) roguelike post-mortem character dump
--------------------------------------------------------------

 Ilya Bely, level 10 Former Human Corporal, defeated the Cyberdemon
 on level 25 of the Phobos base. 
 He survived 160999 turns and scored 94819 points. 
 He didn't like it too rough.

 He killed 468 out of 468 hellspawn. (100%)
 This ass-kicking marine killed all of them!
 He was an Angel of Marksmanship!

 He found the Phobos Arena. 
 He stormed the Chained Court. 
 He found the Hell's Armory.
 He fought on Hell's Arena.
 He was caught in the Mortuary!
 And he managed to clear it!
-- Graveyard -------------------------------------------------

  ###########################################################
  #..........................................................
  #..........................................................
  #..............................................###.......##
  #......................................###.....###.......#>
  #......................................###.....###.......##
  #..........###.........................###.................
  #..........##..........###.....###.........................
  #..........#...........##......###.........................
  #....###.......................###....................###..
  #....###..............................................###..
  #....###......#.......................................###..
  #.............#............................................
  #.............##...........|...............................
  #....................X.....||.......................###....
  #..........................}..###...................###....
  #.............................###...................###....
  #.............................###..........................
  #..........................................................
  ###########################################################

-- Statistics ------------------------------------------------

  Health 58/60   Experience 46401/10
  ToHit +0  ToDmg Ranged +0  ToDmg Melee +0

-- Traits ----------------------------------------------------

    Ironman        (Level 1)
    Finesse        (Level 2)
    Son of a gun   (Level 3)
    Reloader       (Level 3)
    Whizkid        (Level 1)

  SoG->SoG->SoG->Fin->Fin->WK->Rel->Iro->Rel->Rel->

-- Equipment -------------------------------------------------

    [a] [ Armor      ]   Angelic Armor [6/6] (70%)
    [b] [ Weapon     ]   advanced pistol (2d7) [7/8] (D3R3S1M1)
    [c] [ Boots      ]   nothing
    [d] [ Prepared   ]   extended pistol (2d4) [6/9]

-- Inventory -------------------------------------------------

    [a] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [b] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [c] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [d] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [e] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [f] red armor [1/4] (11%)
    [g] 10mm ammo (x95)
    [h] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [i] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [j] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [k] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [l] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [m] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [n] large med-pack
    [o] large med-pack
    [p] large med-pack

-- Kills -----------------------------------------------------

    72 former humans
    44 former sergeants
    35 former captains
    41 imps
    43 demons
    50 lost souls
    44 cacodemons
    11 barons of hell
    1 Cyberdemon
    24 hell knights
    29 arachnotrons
    9 former commandos
    19 pain elementals
    8 arch-viles
    13 mancubi

-- History ---------------------------------------------------

  He started his journey on the surface of Phobos.
  On level 3 he entered Hell's Arena.
  He left the Arena before it got too hot.
  On level 6 he stormed the Chained Court.
  On level 10 he found Hell's Armory.
  On level 22 he was foolish enough to enter the Mortuary!
  He managed to clear the Mortuary from evil!
  Then at last he found Phobos Arena!
  On level 25 he finally defeated the Cyberdemon.

-- Messages --------------------------------------------------

 Your weapon is empty.
 Your weapon is empty.
 You reload the pistol with 10mm ammo.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon.
 You reload the pistol with 10mm ammo.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the Cyberdemon. The Cyberdemon
 dies. Congratulations! You defeated the Cyberdemon! Press <Enter>
 Unknown command. Press "?" for help.

-- General ---------------------------------------------------

 Before him 9 brave souls have ventured into Phobos:
 9 of those were killed.

--------------------------------------------------------------

My reasons for not playing more DoomRL are mostly the seeming drop in activity after the first beta was released as well as getting into other games (Crawl, for example, which I also recently won :) ). Being spurred on to try and find two advanced pistols so I could see whether it was possible to switch to a different advanced pistol for modding purposes (which Kornel claims is possible and may well be right on *if* you need Dualgunner to do so), I ended up running through the whole game and beating it, as well as the Mortuary which has ruined my past AoMr runs.

Highlights:

1. 3 reload mods + 3 levels of reloader = the ability to reload in a single turn (moving without Hellrunner takes 10). Combine this with being able to shoot in a single turn granted by 3 levels of SoG, 2 of Finesse and one speed mod and you have a hell of a weapon. Oh yeah, and three damage mods + a mag mod really make life nice too.

2. I wasn't sure I'd reach 10th level, but having to gun down a horde of beasties before finally meeting and killing the very last Vile put me over the edge. :) It's a good thing that there's more sources of armor and health in the corners..

3. When I met the Cyberdemon, I had about 3 or 4 encounters. The first few were when he had his weapon locked and loaded, and I ended up getting asplodied back out of view (which meant I'd have to find him again). The last time, though, he knocked me *into* view through a slight miss (a pillar was behind me). Then, with my single turn shooting and reloading, I was able to fire about two or three clips into him without getting shot at myself, when he finally exploded and I won. :)

4. I was lucky enough to find an Invincibility Globe near the exit to Phobos Arena this game, but I unfortunately was not lucky enough to find a matching nuke (or it was just asplodied in one of the many great balls of item-destroying doom). :/

8

Bug Reports / Trait selection screen says you get a +4 melee damage bonus from Brute.

« on: June 28, 2007, 15:40 »

It's actually +3. As you can see from looking at the SoG topic, I just checked it and the numbers don't even match up between the end screen and the trait screen.

9

Off Topic / Any chance of Xenocide ever being worked on again?

« on: June 27, 2007, 15:21 »

I just finished the tutorial and it looks/sounds pretty nice for an unfinished game.

EDIT: Now that I've looked for more information, it seems that this actually wasn't made by Kornel (oops >_>;) but another person named Jakub Denski. Kornel, do you have any idea what happened to him?

10

Requests For Features / Fairly minor change here...

« on: May 23, 2007, 06:06 »

I don't know how often people use x, but whenever I'm walking around an open area (like the Arena) I use it so that I don't suddenly find myself dead because I ran three spaces too far. However, the default white text for both no monsters and seeing monsters requires more than a glance, so I put in an extra color message:

BLUE_2 = "There are no monsters in sight.";

What could also be worked in, to further distinguish seeing and not seeing monsters:

RED_4 = "You see*";

Having this by default would be really nice, though I can always just keep copy-pasting it in the inis....

11

Bug Reports / Grrr.. monster levers....

« on: May 14, 2007, 15:39 »

Every so often I come across a lever that seems like it should be a monster lever (it gives the "You pull the lever... There is a lever here." text) but nothing happens at all. I search the level top-to-bottom and no monsters anywhere. This frustrates me greatly. It might be that you need to break part of the room's walls for it to happen, but I can't be sure as I've not taken Int 2 and tried testing it.

12

Pre-0.9.9 / [M|AoMr|88%|22] - I WILL beat this challenge someday... :shakes fist:

« on: May 14, 2007, 13:52 »

--------------------------------------------------------------
 DoomRL (v.0.9.8.7) roguelike post-mortem character dump
--------------------------------------------------------------

 John Romero, level 8 Imp Corporal, killed by a arch-vile
 on level 22 of the Phobos base. 
 He survived 129035 turns and scored 52704 points. 
 He didn't like it too rough.

 He killed 278 out of 315 hellspawn. (88%)
 He was an Angel of Marksmanship!

 He stormed the Chained Court. 
 He ventured into the Halls of Carnage. 
 He invaded Spider's lair.
-- Graveyard -------------------------------------------------

  ###########################################################
  #....................#........#..#.................#.....#.
  #....................#........#..#;................#.....#.
  #.##############.....#.#####..#..#..##############.#.....#.
  #..#.................#.....#..#...........#..............#.
  #..#.................#.....#..#...........#..............#.
  #..#..#..##########..####..#..#######..#..#.#####.#####..#.
  #.....#}.#....................#h.#..#..#..#h.h.............
  #.....#..#....................#..#..#..#..#.c....h.........
  #.....#..#######...X.......%V.#..#iO####..#h###############
  #.....#..#...............................M....h.....h....#.
  #.....#..#..........................OhV.........#........#.
  #..#.%#.#####..#########################..#.....#..#.....#.
  #}.#..#.....#................^.V.#..#.....#.....#..#.......
  #..#..#.....#..................A.#..#.....#.....#..#.......
  #..#..#..#..#..#.....#######.....#..#>########..#..########
  #..#..#..#.....#..........O#...|.\.................#.......
  #.....#..#.....#...........#..+..............>.........+...
  ###########################################################
  ###########################################################

-- Statistics ------------------------------------------------

  Health 0/50   Experience 28064/8
  ToHit +0  ToDmg Ranged +0  ToDmg Melee +0

-- Traits ----------------------------------------------------

    Finesse        (Level 2)
    Son of a gun   (Level 3)
    Reloader       (Level 1)
    Whizkid        (Level 2)

  SoG->SoG->SoG->Fin->Fin->WK->WK->Rel->

-- Equipment -------------------------------------------------

    [a] [ Armor      ]   blue armor [2/2] (56%)
    [b] [ Weapon     ]   advanced pistol (2d6) [6/13] (D2R3S3M3)
    [c] [ Boots      ]   nothing
    [d] [ Prepared   ]   pistol (2d4) [6/6]

-- Inventory -------------------------------------------------

    [a] blue armor [2/2] (100%)
    [b] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [c] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [d] red armor [4/4] (100%)
    [e] 10mm ammo (x55)
    [f] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [g] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [h] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [i] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [j] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [k] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [l] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [m] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [n] 10mm ammo (x100)
    [o] small med-pack
    [p] small med-pack
    [q] small med-pack
    [r] small med-pack
    [s] large med-pack

-- Kills -----------------------------------------------------

    42 former humans
    50 former sergeants
    12 former captains
    16 imps
    44 demons
    7 lost souls
    22 cacodemons
    10 barons of hell
    8 hell knights
    20 arachnotrons
    7 former commandos
    9 pain elementals
    6 arch-viles
    8 mancubi

-- History ---------------------------------------------------

  He started his journey on the surface of Phobos.
  On level 5 he stormed the Chained Court.
  On level 11 he ventured into the Halls of Carnage.
  On level 18 he ventured into the Spider's Lair.
  He cleared the Lair, kickin' serious spider ass!
  On level 22 he finally was killed by a arch-vile.

-- Messages --------------------------------------------------

 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the arch-vile.
 You reload the pistol with 10mm ammo.
 The cacodemon suddenly rises from the dead! The arch-vile loses blood. The
 arch-vile raises his arms! You are engulfed in flames! The arch-vile
 loses blood.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the cacodemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the cacodemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the cacodemon. The cacodemon is
 bleeding!
 Fire -- Choose target... Boom!
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the cacodemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the cacodemon.
 Fire -- Choose target... The missile hits the cacodemon. The cacodemon
 dies. The arch-vile raises his arms! You are engulfed in flames! You
 die!...

-- General ---------------------------------------------------

 Before him 35 brave souls have ventured into Phobos:
 35 of those were killed.

--------------------------------------------------------------

YASD. I really, really, REALLY should know by now not to be walking around with only 10 HP once I end up this deep. Also, as I've said before elsewhere I still think two guns are better than one, even if that second gun is a pea-shooter compared to my primary hand cannon. But I also think now that saving DG for the deeper levels makes it so that I can save on ammunition AND get more mods on my gun and out of my inventory/off the floor where they taunt me so. Once I get enough traits to knock the penalty down to nothing, though, I'll get DG and kick some more ass. Of course, if the penalty is applied after the total energy cost is ramped back up (instead of [{1000-600-200-200}*1.4] being ramped up to 100, it's [1000-600-200-200] ramped up, then multiplied by 1.4) the total benefit's a lot smaller, but someone's going to have to try it and see what happens first. If I'd survived to clevel 9, I'd have taken DG for sure; the Reloader trait was taken to try and minimize the effects of reloading my hand cannon. Also (and I know people are going to say "Whaaaaaat..?" at this), I don't much care for magazine mods after getting 10 bullets in a mag. This is because after shooting 10 bullets, the enemy will get a turn, and if that turn involves shooting me, unless I'm on coward/cautious I'm gonna get hit, and the non-pushovers tend to hit hard. Now, I suppose I could just make it a habit to count bullets and go coward/cautious on the turn that the enemy gets a chance to do something, but it's slightly easier just to make use of an already established habit (that of reloading while in coward mode). If I had more damaging bullets/more chance for knockback, I might not mind so much, but it just tends to be more annoyance than convenience when enemies are in view (and when not in view, it really doesn't matter too much).

Oh yeah, and I also beat the Spider's Lair in this game without using the teleporters. Hard as hell and I came very, very close to dying a few times though. You can read a little more about it on the site chat (which if you've never seen or heard of before is on the very bottom of the forum index page). I probably wouldn't have been as reluctant to use up my medkits here if I hadn't used up most/all of the large ones in attempting to survive that.

13

Bug Reports / Um, I thought the teleporter blockage problem was fixed...

« on: May 06, 2007, 22:33 »

There is shotgun shell (x30) lying here. There is a shotgun (6d3) [0/1] lying here. ############################################################################## #..#...# ^ # # #..#...###########################+##################### # #..#...+.........+========= =============+ # #..#...#...}.....#========= ==============# 0 # #..#...#.........#======== ============# + 0 # #..#...#.........# ======= ===========# # #..#...#.........# ====== ==========# 0 0 # #..#...#####+##################################.#.....##############+#+###+### #..#...#..........*......@.................}|..%........>.. # #..#...##############+######+#########%..#.###.#........... # #..+...#.........0.....................................# # #..#...#.................................%.............# } # #.%#...#................................................. # #..+}..#.................................}.............#. 0 # #..#.|.#..........................^.......|....|.......# # #..#...#.................................}}}...}%......# # #..#...#...............................................# # #..#...#...................^.........................^.# 0 # ############################################################################## John Romero Armor : green armor [1/1] (69%) Phobos Base Lev3 Health: 78% Exp: 2/6% Weapon: advanced pistol (2d4) [6/6] coward

I spawned on the left side of the screen, and from there it's impossible to reach the part you see me at without either wading through a lot of acid or going into the teleporter (the teleporter placed me, thankfully, in a fairly safe area from which I could roam about).

14

Discussion / Angel of Marksmanship discussion; now with modding goodness!

« on: May 06, 2007, 20:06 »

So I was in IRC 'yesterday'/very early this morning while the forums were down, and got information about how speed (and probably reload) mods work. I then woke up much later and looked here, but was disappointed to see nobody had posted anything. So, I decided to! (information courtesy of DaEezT)

First, all discussions like this should start with the basics, so that's where I'll begin (I would have just appended this to Fingerzam's very nice post on the AoMr discussion topic, but I couldn't find it). A normal turn spent on firing costs 1000 energy, Son of a Gun subtracts 200 energy from this per level, Finesse subtracts 100 energy from this per level, speed mods subtract 100 energy per mod, and the Dualgunner multiplier applies after all of these subtractions occur, but since both guns fire at the speed of the active (moddable) gun, this malus isn't a problem for long. With that out of the way, we now have the question: what do we do with our guns?

There are two main things that affect this. First, there aren't any diminishing returns; all of the speed bonuses stack on each other, and there aren't any stepdown functions to decrease the effect of any one component, which basically means that, if you were allowed and had the luck for it, you could put 3 levels of SoG, 2 levels of Fin, and 3 speed mods together for a total energy cost of -100 energy (1000 - 600 - 200 - 300). Those who have good memories and read everything on the board that shows up will recall that any energy usage less than 0 is supposed to crash the game, but that's where the second part (which also effects good usage of such things) comes in: there's a failsafe that causes any action that, after applying the bonuses, costs less than 100 energy to cost exactly 100 energy. This means that a player who has 3 levels of SoG, 2 levels of Fin, and 3 speed mods has effectively wasted either 2 modslots, 2 levels in maxing Finesse, or 1 level in SoG 3, because that extra 200 energy gained by that combination simply doesn't apply thanks to the failsafe. You can do it, but there won't be any actual change in speed, thus there's no point in doing so.

So, you say, you still haven't told us what we should be doing with our guns. That's fair, but bear with me here, because this isn't going to be over soon. Thing is, Finesse 2 still is best to take for two reasons: Whizkid, and if you ever plan on using two pistols. Three speed mods are great for reducing your speed to the absolute minimum energy possible, but that single modslot you have left over isn't necessarily going to get you as far as having one speed mod and three damage mods (plus the opportunity to put on more damage mods thanks to the bug Blade reported) plus getting that lowest possible speed anyway and the ability to add on, say, reloader or magazine mods if you can and want to. Also, if you use two pistols, while the game will round down to a single turn, unless you get a second level of Dualgunner, with SoG 3, DG 1, and three speed mods you'll be using 140 energy, not 100. There is rounding, but from what I've read it's implied that the game keeps track of the real energy cost and not the rounded cost in terms of how many turns you spend, meaning that (not taking reloading into account) you'd be able to fire only 7 and 1/7 shots rather than the 10 you get with a single pistol and the same traits/mods in the same 1000 energy. Finesse 1 cures that, and the second level of Finesse was argued above for the purpose of Whizkid. So, in short, you only really need to take one speed mod, and the other two modslots can be applied towards damage, reload, or magazine mods.

There's also the issue of two pistols vs. one pistol. Thanks to the fact that SoG gives no damage bonus (see here), Dualgunner seems even more necessary. It is possible that someone might use traits to make up for the lack of additional mods (eg. Reloader) with an SoG 3 build + 1D3S pistol, though, which is where I'll be examining the difference, starting with the basic question, "Which is better: SoG 3 + a 1D3S pistol, or SoG2 + DG 1 + a 1D3S pistol + a normal pistol?"

A character with SoG 3 and a 1D3S pistol is firing a 2d5 pistol for 100 energy (1000 - 600 - 300), while the character with SoG 2, DG 1, and the same sort of modded pistol plus an extra normal pistol will be firing a 2d5 and a 2d4 pistol for 420 energy ([1000 - 400 - 300] * 1.4). This is a dramatic difference in speed (it's more than 4 times faster to use a single pistol in this case), but reloading and actual damage should be examined before conclusions are drawn: the SoG 2, DG 1, 1D3S + normal pistol user gets an average damage of 11 HP for every time he shoots ([2 + 10 + 2 + 8]/2) and 66 damage on average from unloading both clips, for a total cost of 2520 energy; the SoG 3, 1D3S single pistol user, on the other hand, gets an average damage of 6 HP per shot ([2 + 10]/2), a total average damage of 36 HP for unloading one clip, and (taking reload time into account, which costs 1200 energy normally as I recall) is able to unload a full clip, reload, and unload again for a total cost of 2400 energy, and doing 72 damage in this time. Interestingly enough, the dualgunner does more damage per turn right up until the 6th pair of bullets; firing 5 pairs of bullets costs 2100 energy exactly, and at this point the dualgunner has done 55 HP of damage, while the single gun user has only had enough time to unload once, reload, and unload half of his clip, which given an average damage of 6 HP means he's only done 54 HP of damage (6*9).

So, you say, obviously the single gunner has a lot going for him. Not so fast; we need to take Finesse into account, and we haven't even seen what it's like when we take a third level of SoG. Remember that the dualgunner had the upper hand damage-wise right up until he fired the last pair of bullets. So, here we go further into the answer for whether it's smart to ditch the second pistol. When that same dualgunner takes his 3rd level of SoG, his energy usage per shot goes down from 420 to 140 energy ([1000 - 600 - 300]*1.4), which not only puts him nearly on-par with the single gunner speed-wise but also increases the effect of the extra damage he has over the single gunner, as now the DG penalty has been nearly erased while the damage is still the same. Even if the single gunner takes a level of SoB to match (and it's not even clear that SoB's damage bonus is working), the way it pans out is that the dualgunner's average DPT (damage per turn) is 7.857 (66/[840/100 {since 100 energy = one turn}]), whereas the single gunner's average DPT is only 7 ([6+1]*6/[600/100]).

This of course doesn't answer the big question of whether it ever makes sense to ditch the second gun. There's probably some math that can be done to the end of figuring out when the damage added on by the second pistol is negligible, but it's taken me long enough to write this blasted thing anyway; what's more important is that, once you max out on speed upgrades through traits and mods, the penalty is either null and void or near enough to gone that it doesn't hurt, and that there is a significant benefit to taking it over simply using a single pistol.

15

Discussion / Slightly counter-intuitive knockback issue

« on: May 05, 2007, 00:58 »

I can't believe I just noticed it now, but it seems knockback is only applied to base damage rolls. Extra traits don't seem to affect this at all, which seems odd because you'd usually think a harder-hitting weapon = more kick. Adding damage mods, on the other hand, does increase the chance of knockback. This is most easily seen in AoMr, where SoG has absolutely no effect on how far you can throw baddies (whereas damage mods will allow you to knockback spiders with ease). Any thoughts on this?

EDIT: I also want to say that something is definitely off with SoG (or the listing on the wiki for HP is incorrect). I can confirm that it took 3 shots to kill a human sergeant without any armor on, while I had 3 levels in SoG. I'd have a screenshot of my messages, but it seems pressing F10 while in the past message menu doesn't have any effect; I guess it only works for the main screen and not any of the sub-screens. In any case, either the human sergeant has at least 15 HP (1+6+1+6=14), or the damage bonus is only +1 per level (1+3+1+3=8).

News:

Profile Info