Crossfire Archive
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Re: CF: hello


> oh, I dunno about having to invent new puzzles, but there WOULD have to be
> a lot of extra code. As I see it, you'd want things like:
>
>   "randomize the walls in THIS area, but only use THIS type, and only in
>     THESE following formations"
>
>   "chose from THESE set of monsters to randomize"

 Actually, for individual monsters, this could probably already be done (make
up a treasurelist of monsters, and put in a 'random monster' type of space.
 Unfortunately, that would not have any consistency in the map (if you had
random_dragon, you could get a oriental, fire, and electric dragon next to each
other, and they end up killing eadch other.

>
>   "only have THIS powerful an item, if you have at least THIS powerful
>     a monster(s)"

 Determining how powerful an item is can be difficult.

 For example, a weapon that gives speed+1 is not as useful as say gloves that
do the same thing - such a weapon would not be good enough to use, but given
the other gloves out there, such gloves could be.  Also, some
protiections/immunities are better than others.  Protection from drain is nice,
but probably not as good as protection from magic.

 While that idea is good, I could certainly see some very good items pop up -
better than they should be.

 I would have a feeling that even for random maps, you might still need some
form of map outline (ie, the map is this big, exit here leading so and so,
treasure here, etc.)  It probably wouldn't be too hard to have a program
generate passage ways and rooms (however, I will not one big difference between
crossfire and say nethack is in crosssfire, most levels try to fully utilize
most every space, while nethack has a lot of open areas).

>
> As far as challenge:
>
> Let's say you walked into a map, and you fought a fairly tough dragon. You
> make it with about 30% of your HP left, and you win the prize.
>
> Now you want it again, so you go back in. you walk round the corner...
>
> and face THREE dragons :-)

 Then you run away.  However, you then get a problem - if the random maps
change radically in difficulty time to time, would people play them much?  If
always the same difficulty, then all they really end up being are hack fests
(although, this could still be useful for some things).  IF they change
radically, players may not choose to fight them for fear of being killed too
often.

 But the question is - would the random maps be good enough/balanced
enough/rewarding enough for people to play them?  Right now, if looking for
items/exp, there are already some pretty well known maps which the player can
pretty safely know they can handle.

 The main thing I could see with random maps is increase the number of maps
with under represented monsters.  This is only really important for priest
experience where you need to slay opposing races.

 While I think more quest maps would be useful, I can also see adding more maps
that will just add color.  For example, an underground dwarf city, maybe so
casts of lords ala ultima, better temples/holy places for the gods, etc.  While
maybe these won't increase the adventuring much, it would add some
realism/flavor to the world which I sort of think it is missing right now.


>
>-- End of excerpt from Philip Brown



-- 

-- Mark Wedel
mark@pyramid.com
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