Make rivers somewhat rarer
issueid=2876 04-24-2014 06:33 AM
The Creator
Number of reported issues by adom-admin: 499
Make rivers somewhat rarer

Rivers on low levels can be pretty frustrating. So they should be rarer.
Issue Details
Issue Number 2876
Issue Type Feature
Project ADOM (Ancient Domains Of Mystery)
Category All
Status Implemented
Priority 5 - Medium
Suggested Version ADOM 1.2.0 pre 22
Implemented Version ADOM 1.2.0 pre 22
Milestone (none)
Votes for this feature 3
Votes against this feature 7
Assigned Users adom-admin
Tags (none)




04-24-2014 08:29 AM
Ancient Member
agree x1000, especially in the DD.

04-24-2014 09:13 AM
Senior Member
Id say definitely in the VD, you go there because your don't have healing. Even characters with the swimming aren't gunna have it at a high enough level to avoid losing most of their health crossing even the narrower rivers. What happens if your have to cross a river to get Yrrigs to Jharod?

I like Rivera though. They're a pain in the arse but not really that common and they're an incentive to play something that isn't an elf.

04-24-2014 11:31 AM
Ancient Member
Yes, yes, YES :D

I hate the damn rivers, going occasionally as far as rerolling caster chars until I get a starting frost bolt book. Love this change.

04-24-2014 11:32 AM
Ancient Member
Although it's extremely rare for me to have a problem with early rivers, I think this is a very nice change :D

04-24-2014 12:09 PM
Ancient Member
I hope this change only affects low levels though, rivers in general (when you have access to means of crossing them) are cool!

04-24-2014 04:27 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by YourMum
Id say definitely in the VD, you go there because your don't have healing. Even characters with the swimming aren't gunna have it at a high enough level to avoid losing most of their health crossing even the narrower rivers. What happens if your have to cross a river to get Yrrigs to Jharod?
Rivers are never generated in VD according to my experience.

I don't know how necessary this is after the narrowing of rivers in a past prerelease. I agree with Al-Khwarizmi that only early rivers should be rarer.

04-24-2014 04:43 PM
Qui Qui is offline
Senior Member
Yes, no rivers in VD/DD according to my experience. I'd say it should be kept that way. Probably no rivers or very rare above DT, anything below is fair game. On the flip side, now about a (semi)guaranteed river on the Water Temple level? Not enough water there, really.

04-24-2014 04:53 PM
Ancient Member
I've definitely seen rivers in the DD. Don't recall seeing them in the VD.

I kind of agree with Laukku though... early rivers are already pretty easy to cross now.

04-24-2014 06:03 PM
Ancient Member
I like rivers, especially early when they are a challenge. And no - in my experience, a river can always be dealt with in creative ways, possibly dying :)

04-24-2014 06:44 PM
Ancient Member
It seems the Creator forgot why he put guaranteed Bridge building/Frost bolt in the early game.

04-24-2014 07:15 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Stingray1
It seems the Creator forgot why he put guaranteed Bridge building/Frost bolt in the early game.
I would agree with this if Bridge Building gets easier to use.

04-24-2014 10:18 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Stingray1
It seems the Creator forgot why he put guaranteed Bridge building/Frost bolt in the early game.
Haha, yes, bridge building. Maybe if that skill is ever fixed it'd be worth something, but it is less than useless at this point.

04-28-2014 05:27 AM
Senior Member
To be honest, I think rivers are fun and occasionally result in interestingly different early game playthroughs, or at the least present good challenges - I don't think this change was needed at all.

04-28-2014 09:10 AM
Senior Member
Quote Originally Posted by aerol
To be honest, I think rivers are fun and occasionally result in interestingly different early game playthroughs, or at the least present good challenges - I don't think this change was needed at all.
I'm in total agreement with this.
In fact, I've not seen a single river so far in p21 or p22. About 4 characters have made it to dwarftown, and not a single river. It would be a shame to see them gone... :(

04-28-2014 12:33 PM
Ancient Member
I have no problems with rivers per se, they are nice additions and diversify gameplay. The problem is when they are on your way in the early dungeons.
I often had to abandon DD quest because of a horizontal river that had to be crossed in 6 different places to reach the down staircase. I had to skip discovery of HMV because of similar obstruction in UD.
Bridge building is infeasible in usage as it consumes such a tremendous amount of time.

What guaranteed frost bolt is there in the early game, Stingray?
Perhaps the one from druid whose quest you'd not be able to complete because of a river blocking your way?

The only thing achieved by early rivers in either of the starting caves is forcing the player to return later if they can't cross it now. I call it a design flaw.

04-28-2014 12:59 PM
Senior Member
Quote Originally Posted by Blasphemous
The only thing achieved by early rivers in either of the starting caves is forcing the player to return later if they can't cross it now. I call it a design flaw.
I think a cool flavour for the "starting caves" (UD, PC, VD, and DD) would be to have all of them contain at least one river, but with guaranteed bridges pre-built on them (with a small chance of one missing square in the bridge). The reasoning would be that the Villagers would have been into those dungeons, and would have built such bridges, prior to the incursions of chaos that resulted in them being filled with monsters.

It's worth noting that rivers with bridges have two notable effects. First, it restricts most PCs from moving other than along the path, but doesn't do this for some monsters (such as bats, which can be a nuisance at low levels), and second, it allows the PC to see further (and possible move further, if they want to swim) than the regular paths expect. And if there are some other tweaks to river levels (like adding trees to the river levels), it would improve the overall feel of those dungeons, in my opinion.

04-28-2014 01:50 PM
Ancient Member
Also, stunning + bridges is an interesting combination.

I would like to see those bridges in some dungeons even if there are also rivers without bridges in others.

04-28-2014 04:23 PM
Senior Member
Quote Originally Posted by Al-Khwarizmi
I would like to see those bridges in some dungeons even if there are also rivers without bridges in others.
In fact, there's no particular reason why all of the corridors that would have been there need to be bridges for any given river. A neat way to make it work would be to have the game roll each time a corridor is intersected by a river, with the result of the roll deciding on whether the game produces a bridge, a broken bridge, or no bridge at all. Perhaps it could be tied to DL. Something like, say...

Roll BridgeState=1d(DL+4). If BridgeState<4, put a full bridge. If 3<BridgeState<7, put a broken bridge. If BridgeState>6, no bridge is put in at all.

So basically, at high DL, most of the time there won't be a bridge at all, while at lowest DL, there will be full bridges the majority of the time. I'm unsure of what to suggest for situations in which rooms are intersected by the river...

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