Re: CF: promotion ramps (Was: RE: CF: Long term experimental ideas)

["Doug wilder" <doug_wilder@hotmail.com>]

how about we just forget the mindless races altogether. they shouldn't be 
pc's anyway. I can't see a shopkeeper dealing with a blob or a bird or a 
cobra. Just because we would like to have a few monster races added doesn't 
mean we have to go the whole spectrum and turn them all into pc's. If we did 
who would we have to fight HEHEHEH.


>From: Hwei Sheng TEOH <hsteoh@cs.toronto.edu>
>To: crossfire@ifi.uio.no
>Subject: CF: promotion ramps (Was: RE: CF: Long term experimental ideas)
>Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 22:18:03 -0400
>
>
>Attached after this mail is a tentative list I've come up with so far, of
>possible "promotion ramps" or promotion sequences for monsterous players. 
>Note
>that I haven't actually met many monsters in the game yet, so I can't 
>really
>tell right off what sequence would befit them. I haven't figured out most 
>of
>lake country yet (only got to ebony thief guild and wizard tower, haven't
>solved any of the guild quests yet and got stuck on the other puzzles in
>lake country), and with the recent problems with the pupland maps, I pretty
>much can't go any further than I have. So I haven't encountered quite a few
>monsters yet.
>
>But with the monsters I know, now that I examined them in more detail, I'm 
>not
>so sure that *any* monster should be playable by the player.
>
>Some, like acid blobs, are currently meaningless to play (can only last one
>attack), unless we make some really innovative modifications to how acid 
>blobs
>work. We could have acid blob hit a monster, and leave a temporary acid 
>pool
>that becomes an acid blob again after a while. The temporary acid pool will 
>be
>defenseless against attacks; but as the level of the acid blob goes up, it
>does more damage and thus can take out tougher monsters with one hit, and 
>so a
>player might be able to survive this way. This will be a totally radical 
>way
>to play, which I like, actually. But overdoing this will just make the code
>too messy (one could argue, is all this complication really necessary?)
>
>Some, like many under the animals category, doesn't seem to have a wide 
>enough
>scope to be interesting. Eg. how many quests could a cobra solve, and even 
>if
>you managed it, the artifacts would probably be totally useless anyway. And
>this disadvantage doesn't come with any offsetting advantage, like the
>beholder series has with magic. Arguably, we could make the poison attack 
>much
>more pronounced as the level increases, and perhaps add a `strangle' attack 
>to
>anacondas (when you achieve that promotion). But again, a lot of 
>special-case
>programming which may not add that much to the game.
>
>The insect races might be interesting, but again, rather limited in their
>scope. Unless, of course, we start a whole bunch of insect maps/quests for
>insect players, but that sounds a little too far. (Might as well go play 
>Sim
>Ant or something!!)
>
>With the monsters that seem interesting enough to be player-controlled, the
>three humanoid series I came up with are an interesting way to enhance the
>interest of the existing player classes. I particularly like the notion of
>starting out as an apprentice, and eventually becoming an independent 
>wizard.
>(Note that I'm not really differentiating between race/class here, since 
>the
>existing monsters aren't structured that way).
>
>Anyway, feedback, comments/suggestions/criticisms/(flame?) are welcome...
>
>
>T
>
>-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>CF promotion ramps...
>
>New monsters are written in parentheses.
>
>
>angels:
>
>angel --> light angel --> archangel	(are the last two actually
>different??)
>OR
>(messenger) --> angel --> archangel
>
>
>animals:
>
>bat --> giant bat --> (vampire bat?)
>snake --> cobra --> (anaconda?)
>OR: snake --> serpent --> fire serpent
>(puppy) --> dog --> big dog			(ala NetHack :-)
>(hamster) --> mouse --> rat
>scorpion --> (red scorpion) --> (giant scorpion)
>shadowpup --> (adolescent shadow tiger?) --> shadow tiger
>
>
>dragons:
>
>(baby wyvern) --> wyvern --> chaos wyvern	(is this even sensible??)
>dragon hatchling --> baby dragon --> dragon	(baby dragon is pretty
>powerful:
>						 should make them bigger)
>OR: dragon hatchling --> young dragon --> dragon
>elec dragon hatchling --> young elec dragon --> elec dragon
>cold dragon hatchling --> young cold dragon --> cold dragon
>
>
>faerie:
>
>deathtree --> ent			(not sure how to make three stages)
>
>
>giants:
>
>ogre --> hill giant --> cyclops?	(don't see how you lose an eye! :-)
>titan --> DK --> EDK			(does this make sense??)
>
>
>imps:
>
>imp --> big demon --> greater demon?	(this one looks a bit too drastic)
>OR: imp --> big demon --> balrog?	(still kinda drastic)
>demon --> raas --> big demon		(this one's iffy)
>
>
>insects:
>
>xan --> (???) --> byakie		(does this even make sense??)
>ant --> warrior ant --> spitting ant	(not sure of the order--which is more
>					 powerful??)
>OR: ant --> work ant --> warrior ant
>OR: ant larvae --> ant --> flying ant	(three degrees of liberation...)
>
>
>humanoids:
>
>(apprentice) --> conjurer --> wizard
>(mental patient) --> madman --> wild pyromaniac
>(pickpocket) --> thief --> (mastermind)		(ala Holmes' archenemy)
>
>
>orc-races:
>
>kobold --> orc --> goblin		(not sure if this is sensible)
>OR: orc --> goblin --> gnoll
>small troll --> (troll) --> big troll	(rename current troll to big troll)
>OR: small troll --> troll -->gaelotroll
>
>
>undead:
>
>skeleton --> (elite skeleton) --> skeleton captain	(ala pirate myths)
>ghost --> ghast --> nightmare
>* --> lich --> demilich			(for whoever wants to sell their soul)
>
>
>unnaturals:
>
>unnaturals/slime:
>slime --> green slime --> ???
>(muddy pudding) --> brown pudding --> black pudding
>
>unnaturals/beholder:
>(floating eye) --> beholder --> dread
>OR: beholder --> dread --> (chaos eye)	(some nasty beefed up Dread mutant 
>--
>					 maybe call it Cacodemon ala Doom)
>
>
>
>-
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