#3065 deep dwarves: remove starting wand of healing (species)
After watching deep dwarves throughout the 0.5 release, it really seems like they are on the overpowered side - they have an overall win ratio of 2.3%, compared to an average of 0.4% (with the next highest being at 1.0%), and a win ratio among talented players (the goodplayers group in Henzell) of 10.3%, compared to an average of 3.1% (there are a couple other races that have very slightly higher ratios, but this is still very much near the top).
The key issue here is the interaction between the damage shaving (which is quite powerful) and the lack of natural regeneration. The problem seems to be that healing is cheap enough even without regeneration to make the drawback not really meaningful enough to offset the benefit that damage shaving gives. It's possible that this will become less of an issue when AC gets rebalanced, since everyone will likely start taking more damage, but I figured I'd see how many other people feel this way just from the context of 0.5.
Possible solutions for rebalancing:
- Reduce damage shaving or possibly remove it entirely (dpeg)
- Disallow healing from any non-consumable source (basically limiting healing to potions and wands) (Eronarn)
- Make damage shaving also shave healing, reducing the effectiveness of healing items (me)
- Along with the previous idea, possibly also remove the "cannot heal" mutation, and replace it with applying shaving to normal hp regeneration - this may be scummable though, with enough rings of regen/troll leather/etc
Anyone else have any thoughts?
How about not giving them that initial wand of healing, and/or removing the recharge ability?
Lemuel
If you want to nerf DD, there are three canonical choices:
(a) No (or less) damage shaving.
(b) No starting wand of healing.
(c) No innate recharging.
doy also mentions
(d) Restrict healing to wands and potions.
(e) Reduce amount of healing (all sources).
I find the latter two to be a bit contrived. Let me explain why: comparing DD and MD, we see that DD is worse off in one crucial aspect (no innate healing) and got (a), (b), (c) in return. Whatever means DD is using for healing purposes, MD could do the same. Except for the damage shaving!
In my opinion, the issues with DD are partly of a psychological nature. The species was intended and announced as a challenge, but turned out to be rather easy. This also explains the very good statistics on the server, in my opinion: most players would be scared off by the reputation and the good players would play them carefully and win.
I believe that a no-healing species is fun and can be balanced. However, the ideas about the "challenge" are very different: yes, we could force players to rely on items (by not allowing them to use healing gods) but I don't see the purpose of that. I don't have a problem with DDHe or DDCK[Makhleb] being as easy as MDFi.
That said, the species seems to be strong enough to survive a nerf. Our plan was to have them be easy at game start and challenging later (like trolls, unlike ghouls or mummies). Damage shaving goes a long way to do that: it is strongest on D:1 and helps again poison. I suggest to keep damage shaving but reduce it. For example, it need not increase with level ups -- just have it be constant.
Between wand and recharging, I'd like to keep the recharging. I found it to be an interesting tool and players are reluctant to blow those maxMP. You can acquire wands now, which is another reason to take away that wand.
Another option:
keep damage shaving + add makhleb-like healing for kill.
On first glance it could force DD into killing, disallowing stealth etc, but stealthy characters aren't supposed to take much damage anyway so it shouldn't hurt.
I know copying Makhleb and demonspawn mutation may not be nice. But it should make DD more balanced, while still making healing items valuable and disallowing healing via resting. Currently DD's seem to be tied too much to a single source of healing. What's the win ratio among DD not using any obvious way to heal like TSO or Makhleb ?
Alternatively, make this a trait of vampires (healing by damage). I think there's not enough to distinguish vampires from ghouls, so I don't play Vp.
I wouldn't want to lose damage shaving, wand recharging or being able to heal by godly powers. The first two are unique to DD, and I like that sort of thing, and the last would basically make the healing gods a pointless choice.
Maybe they could stand to be nerfed, but I'm not sure if this is the way to go. Just removing the wand or something could go a long way, not to mention aptitude tweaks.
Going by player discussions on Something Awful, the problem with Deep Dwarves is that they *are* a challenge species as long as you avoid Elyvilon, Makhleb and vampiric weapons, but if you don't they become too easy. Nerfing damage shaving or removing the easy availability to innate healing means they become even harder for any playing style not using any of the above three techniques.
I don't know how to solve this dilemma, either, especially as I agree that blocking non-consumable healing sources seems technical and arbitrary. Maybe Ely and Makhleb could cost more piety for DD, and vampiric weapons (plus the spell, I guess) more food?
I recommend the following aptitude changes:
Long blades 100 -> 130
Staves 110 -> 140
Stealth 70 -> 120
Ench 120 -> 150
Summoning 110 -> 150
Tloc 85 -> 150
Besides balance, these changes will bring DDs closer to MDs -- I've always been bothered by the fact that the two Dwarf races have so little in common. Reducing DD stealth seems especially important -- there are half a dozen other races that have stealth as a central characteristic (Elves, Ha, Ko, Na, Sp, Vp) and there really isn't enough space in the game for so many stealthy races. DDs are interesting enough in other ways that they don't need to share this territory as well.
Lemuel
Those changes seem pretty rough. A couple of those skills are great fits for DDs, both backstory and gameplay-wise, like Stealth and especially Translocations. Besides, considering how different the species are I'd expect aptitude differences as well. But how about something like...
Stealth: 70 -> 90
Stabbing: 110->120
Long blades: 100->110
Not totally sure about the other ones. Tloc seems fine as is, maybe Transmutation could even get a little buff just for the Earth synergy?
I like Lemuel's proposal.
jpeg: Yes, I agree. But do we think that's problematic? As I said, I don't mind DDHe being straightforward but DD[something else] being hard.
petato-
Why is Tloc a good fit for DDs?
Lemuel
Lemuel: I'm just thinking that the idea of being able to warp out of danger would be very important for a species without any form of innate healing, and they're the only species in Crawl that has above average armour and tloc aptitudes. All other specialized translocators are either elves or spriggans.
I mostly like Lemuel's proposal for aptitudes, though I'd be fine with DD keeping either good stealth or good Tloc.
My analysis of DD is the same as the one jpeg posted from SA. They're far too hard unless you take one of the healing gods (or use vampiric draining), in which case they're far too easy. This is not a good design decision because it discourages many potentially interesting combos disproportionately.
The problem can be fixed just by making god healing more costly in piety, as jpeg notes, but that's just as arbitrary as making them unable to heal except by consumables. And it won't be as consistent due to the many sources of god healing. If DD can only heal by consumables, this is easy to understand and affects all characters equally. The only god that would become "unplayable" is Ely, and even there, you can then use all of your piety to pacify. This is much better than the current status of all non-healer gods being "unplayable". (Vamp draining/weapons need to go for similar reasons.) Assuming this happened, DD could probably actually be buffed slightly (especially given the impending AC changes) - namely I would look into the MP cost of recharging. It seems like it might be just a bit too high by the end of the game.
-Ero
I've been thinking a little more about possible aptitude changes, so here are some suggestions.
Sth: 100
Stb: 130 (like MD)
SBl: 110
LBl: 120
Coj / Enc: 130
Sum: 120
Trm: 110 (maybe even 100?)
Fir/Ice: 120
These are all kinda off the top of my head. Not completely sure about god healing... Do any other species have such a gap in difficulty just because of gods? Really, I still don't like the idea of restricting DDs to consumables.
Regarding the stealth aptitude: This is the Gnome heritage, and nerfing it would kill deep dwarves as passwall stabbers. Of course, like warping stabbers, I'm probably the only one to care about these...
I don't think removing the starting wand of healing does anything to balance deep dwarves. If they get a wand (which is likely given new wand acquirement rules), they'll be just as strong as before. I'd prefer making wand recharging more costly, say have it take 10% max mp (rounded up).
rvollmert: agreed about passwall/warping stabbers :)
And yeah, balancing something by making it rare usually isn't very balanced in the end.
Seems to me the greater sensitivity to god choice is just a natural consequence of DD design. No natural healing = greater reliance on magical healing, including from gods. Why is that a problem? Nobody plays non-casting DEs, either. It doesn't seem like making all race-job-god combos equally attractive should be a design goal in Crawl.
Personally my biggest concern about DDs is the number of special cases that already exist for them -- the last thing they need is more ad-hoc special rules.
if rvollmert is right that the starting wand doesn't matter, then it should definitely be removed -- handing such an uber item out at startup should only be done if it is absolutely necessary.
Lemuel
Would that really solve anything though, besides making survival much harder unless you get really lucky and find a wand in the dungeon?
petato-
Start a DD. Drop the /healing on turn 1. With reasonable play, you *will* get to the ET. I did it just now (as a test) with a DDPa and I am not a good player by any means. Still have 6 !healing and a !HW in inventory, too.
One thing that might help mkae up for the loss of the wand is for all races to heal on level-up (say around 2x the new HP gained). That would help DDs, especially in the early game, but would be a reasonable, intuitive general rule rather than a special bonus just for them.
More generally, my ideal for DDs would be exactly two special rules: no natural healing, and damage shaving. Same starting equipment by job as any other race, and no wand recharging. Finding healing is a challenge for the player. Set the damage shaving (including its rise over time) at a level that balances -- since with some shaving they are too weak, and with some shaving they are too strong, there must be an intermediate level where they are just right.
Lemuel
Lemuel
The original idea was to allow DD go easily Stealth, EV or AC for protection purposes. I would liike to keep that. So revisiting Lemuel's aptitude proposals, I'd now only take staves and long blades. Magic skills can be nerfed but I'd be more reluctant with that.
However, it seems to me that removing the starting wand is a much better immediate improvement. I like the mapping they inherited from gnomes (now passive thanks to sorear) and I also like the innate recharging. Changing title and priority.
Should wand acquirement be special for deep dwarves?
For whatever it's worth, I would be fine with acquirement favoring /healing for DDs.
Lemuel
Well I was thinking more about the later parts of the game, but after some thought I wouldn't really mind losing the wand, if necessary. Why nerf staffs, though? Being able to use them decently in combat fits DDs well, as I see it.
Any thought about improving their transmutation aptitude a bit? I still think it would be cool, due to the synergy with earth magic.
Regarding wands of healing and recharging, discussion on ##crawl-dev resulted in the following proposal:
1. remove starting wand of healing
2. increasing maxmp cost: 1, 2, 3, ...
rvollmert: +1
oh, and cost should be mentioned on a screen