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Quality of life improvements for pet classes

01-02-2013 10:45 PM

tootboot

Member

Number of reported issues by tootboot: 5

Quality of life improvements for pet classes

Pets aren't as useful as they could be because of mechanics issues

Issue #1: If you have higher than average speed, most pets will tend to lag way behind the player. If they're not in sight they can't be commanded.
Potential solution: Make pets move at the same speed as their master so they won't lag as far behind.
Potential solution: Implement a low-level item that summons pets to their master.

Issue #2: It's difficult to play with pets because a minimum of 3 keypresses are required to make them attack anything. If you fail a couple of times in a row you could be looking at 9 keypresses to get them to attack one monster.
Potential solution: Reduce the number of keypresses required to command a pet to attack. This could be done by making a pet attack key that works the way archery works. Hitting the key once targets the nearest monster, tapping it again commands the pet to attack it.
Potential solution: Implement a 'guard me' command where the pet will automatically attack monsters that are hostile to the player.

Issue Details

Issue Number 1617

Issue Type Feature

Project ADOM (Ancient Domains Of Mystery)

Category All

Status Suggested

Priority 7

Suggested Version ADOM 1.2.0 pre 8

Implemented Version (none)

Milestone (none)

Votes for this feature 22

Votes against this feature 1

Attachments 0

Assigned Users (none)

Tags (none)

01-03-2013 12:44 AM

Carter

Ancient Member

good idea, exactly why I don't play bards, they are too damn tedious.

01-03-2013 02:42 AM

Fullmoon

Junior Member

Quick targeting seems very nice indeed.

01-03-2013 03:51 AM

SirTheta

Ancient Member

Matching slave speed to yours is a bad idea and limits the usefulness of resurrecting things like quicklings (nb: I've never played a necro) and destroys a core differentiator of monsters. Other potential solution is much better.

01-03-2013 03:54 AM

Aielyn

Senior Member

Originally Posted by SirTheta

What if it matches their speed, but only when they're following you, not when they're moving to attack something?

01-03-2013 04:28 AM

Carter

Ancient Member

Originally Posted by SirTheta

they still get more attacks which is plenty.

plus the thing about quickening slaves is they are the only feasible slave for a high level necro who has SLB. everythign else gets left behind which is very annoying.

01-03-2013 04:34 AM

tootboot

Member

I don't have too much experience playing pet classes so feel free to suggest better solutions or bring up additional ideas. Those are just the things that immediately jumped into mind.

If a summoning item is chosen, it might as well be a whistle, since whistles are already in the game and have no known use according to the wiki. It would also be consistent with other games in the genre. Maybe a blessed whistle summons your pet from anywhere, an uncursed whistle summons them from the current dungeon level, and a cursed whistle has a chance of behaving like an alarm trap?

01-03-2013 05:38 AM

SirTheta

Ancient Member

Carter: if their speed was matched to yours....then they wouldn't get more attacks per turn (at least, wrt base monster. obviously there are monsters that get more than one attack per turn [like ghul] and others that you can get through SoFS). The only reason quicklings and such do is that they have a lot of speed.

01-03-2013 05:47 AM

tootboot

Member

I guess it depends on whether monster movement is like player movement. Players can get certainly get a faster movespeed independent from gaining additional attacks.

01-03-2013 08:25 AM

Stingray1

Ancient Member

I don't agree with this suggestion, because using pets to do your dirty work should have some 'cost' involved and I think the extra turns is a good way to punish the player.

01-03-2013 08:35 AM

Al-Khwarizmi Al-Khwarizmi is offline

Ancient Member

Originally Posted by tootboot

Maybe a blessed whistle summons your pet from anywhere, an uncursed whistle summons them from the current dungeon level, and a cursed whistle has a chance of behaving like an alarm trap?

I think this is a neat idea. To prevent it from being OP,

Make the whistle summon only one pet, even if you have several,
Give it a "cooldown" (you can use it every, say, 100 turns).

I think with those nuances (for the second, probably it'd need to be a magic whistle), using pets would be much more fun, and at the same time it wouldn't be especially unbalanced.

I voted yes thinking about this idea. As others before, I also find the speed adjusting more problematic.

01-03-2013 08:39 AM

SirTheta

Ancient Member

also, now that I think about it, speed adjustment won't work if you have energy movement bonuses (whether from class power, 7LBs, or what-have-you), so it is not an ideal solution in that regard, either. (sorry to keep picking on this one, tootboot, I really like your suggestion and the other potential solutions!)

01-03-2013 08:48 AM

Grey

Ancient Member

Maybe give them equal movement cost to the player rather than equal speed. There will still be problems, but reduced slightly for players with SLBs or other fast movement abilities.

01-03-2013 09:05 AM

tootboot

Member

Originally Posted by Grey

Maybe give them equal movement cost to the player rather than equal speed. There will still be problems, but reduced slightly for players with SLBs or other fast movement abilities.

That's what I was attempting to get at in the original suggestion.

01-03-2013 02:13 PM

plllizzz9

Senior Member

Originally Posted by Stingray1

I don't agree with this suggestion, because using pets to do your dirty work should have some 'cost' involved and I think the extra turns is a good way to punish the player.

Isn't losing xp already punishing enough?

01-03-2013 02:54 PM

Stingray1

Ancient Member

Nope. Besides you're not losing xp. If you wanted more xp slay the monsters yourself. Otherwise use a companion. It's a trade-off. Did you know you can 'push' companions, even Earth Elementals, along a corridor with 'w#'?

At the very most, I would say have a companion 'mode' toggle keybinding, where the movement speed/cost matches either a target companion or the speed of the slowest companion on the level.
But obviously not faster than the PC's normal speed.

01-04-2013 12:30 AM

aerol

Senior Member

I'm absolutely in favor of the new pet attack key idea.

01-04-2013 12:49 AM

quik

Senior Member

In other games (which I can't recall right now, WoW perhaps?) pets are automatically teleported back to you when they are left a certain distance behind. What about teleporting the pets back to you when you are leaving a level? Although this causes issues with leaving pets behind... Perhaps a simple 'do you want to take the pets with you?' question may solve it.

01-05-2013 06:49 AM

cyrilverba cyrilverba is offline

Junior Member

Having a wild imagination, I very much like the idea of using a whistle to summon your familiar Cuddles, the emperor lich..

01-06-2013 12:30 AM

ixi

Junior Member

I'd prefer to improve pets such way:
1) Team commands like "follow me", "cover me", "wait", "attack", "go there" e.t.c... They may require high Charisma and part of monsters still can ignore you.
2) Necromancer ability to really control the slave movement and attack almost like controlling itself :). (I know, this is very unlikely to be implemented)
3) Intelligent companions should be able to accept given items and wear them or even use items (potions of healing is the example).
4) Ability to command companions that you can't see. The game should have the screen with companions so you can choose and say something to him. If companion is far away - he will ignore you cause he just didn't hear you.
5) Potions of quickling blood should work on companions, at least temporary. I don't know weather they working now, usually I just drink them :).

I'd love the idea with whistle to be implemented). And this will add a reason to learn music skill)

01-06-2013 02:06 PM

Pim

Member

Also, I wish I did not have to select which companion / slave I wish to give the order to, when I only have one companion.

Also, when I give that companion the order to attack, the targeting reticle by default is still located on that companion, causing even more extra key presses. It should automatically move to the nearest enemy in line of sight.

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