Abilities for monsters that affect missile and/or magic users

[SirTheta]

A long time ago, I posted this RFE: http://www.adom.de/forums/project.php?issueid=1536.

I don't want to continue discussion on said RFE, however - I want to have a community discussion of powers that can be applied to discourage people from using missiles and/or magic against a monster. The idea would be to have a range of creatures that are debilitating or what-have-you to fight with missiles and/or magic, but not melee. For example, (quoting from my RFE): "There's a fair number of creatures you really shouldn't, or plain can't in certain circumstances, fight in melee--karmics, of course, come to mind, as well many monsters with corruption attacks, [x] kings, things that paralyze you [if you don't have -Para], stat drainers [and not just wights, which can be fended off with PV, but lich kings, minotaur mages, greater daemons]...the list is quite extensive."

No such disincentives exist for missiles and/or magic. I would appreciate some ideas so I can post a fleshed-out RFE. Note that "powerful ranged attacks" (a la titans/greater titans) and "cannot use missiles against them" (a la doppleganger [x]) are not what I'm looking for: rather, I would like to see some sort of cost-benefit analysis involved (heavily weighted towards cost), such as is typically involved in deciding whether to go mano a mano with stat drainers or paralyzing creatures. Also, this would ideally generate a lot of ideas wrt spells as I've come to the conclusion that missiles are less important.

As a framework, consider an half-idea I had: summoning a ball spell could trigger an effect while a bolt spell would not.

[JellySlayer]

Maybe something like a mindcraft blowback (eg. vs undead) for magic attacks? Or something that acts like a wall to bolts and bounces/fizzles them (living walls would be a prime candidate)?

[Harwin]

An easy one might be a monster that got more powerful (damage, speed, abilities?) for having spells cast against. Notably NOT HP. So you can burn it down with spells - but it gets more and more dangerous.

Going with Jellyslayer's idea for mindcraft blowback. Rather than damage-style blowback - what if using spells against this monster drained extra PP? (It uses the conduit from the spell to pull out PP from you). You could use a spell and it would work, but it might trigger HP casting (in which case it *is* like mindcraft blowback), or at least drain extra PP, which can be significant in its own right.

[Blasphemous]

I'd like to point your attention to the fact that both melee and missile attacks are in principle single type of attack - physical.
With magic, we're talking about a wide range of possible medium used to carry out an attack.
It can be fire, frost, lightning, acid. It can be death ray, magic missile, whatever it is that destroys undead, and we have stuff like webs and stun bolts.
I agree that perhaps some monsters should present a backlash-kind of threat caused by attacking them with specific type of offensive magic.
Some powerful monsters should perhaps cause such a backlash in response to two different kinds of magic.
But I would very much like to avoid situation where ALL magic is ineffective.

I had a mindcrafter char recently that was at lvl 50, had some of the best artifacts in the game and was ready to close the gate.
*Something* summoned great karmic wyrms in UL, 5 of them. At that point using thrown trident would have taken too long and I had no dragon slayers available.
So, considering the abundance of altars around that level, I just meleed them with twin daggers, fully aware of the consequences.
It worked, I sacced some gold and removed dooming and cursing. So, it's possible given the right situation.
Mimics, dorn beasts and gray oozes should usually be dealt with from a safe distance, but with para resistance, you can just go face-to-face with them without worry of being disabled.
For PV ignoring monsters that experienced players advice to tackle from a distance as well, you can also just melee them, given that you have a decent amount of HP and ~70 DV, which isn't a big deal to achieve with some shield and spear combinations, other items, talents etc. Mentioned character took down balors, greater molochs, greater earth elementals and deep CoC mimic tension rooms all in melee.

So you see, there really are no monsters that cannot be dealt with in melee.
Similarly, there should be no monsters that cannot be put down with magic.

I'd like some more consequential approach to magic.
If fiery monsters are immune to great heat but vulnerable to ice, reflect that in the game more strongly.
They should not be able to shrug frost bolts as often as they do, but at the same time, all fire spells should heal them/make them faster/increase their DV/PV or whatever.
This would address two situations: first you encounter a mixed vault and you need to switch between different elements to use against monsters.
If red and white dragons are standing next to each other, a fire bolt should strengthen the first and damage the second one. It would be up to the player to align him/herself cleverly and try to align monsters to avoid consequences of bolting everything with a single bolt type.
Second situation: Imagine a greater fire vault, with drakes, lizards, dragons and of course wyrms.
Great wyrms and ancient dragons see invisible and will typically follow the PC and breathe fire at him/her, without any respect for monsters standing between you and them.
What it could mean is that they would power each other up enormously by treating each other with fire, their most favorite element.
This again forces the player to consider the strategy and how to best lure them out one by one because the alternative is having to deal with super-wyrms and super-dragons with the conditions favoring them rather strongly.

Maybe I'm looking the wrong way and this isn't such a good idea but it would be a start.

[RedBamboo]

An easy one might be a monster that got more powerful (damage, speed, abilities?) for having spells cast against. Notably NOT HP. So you can burn it down with spells - but it gets more and more dangerous.

I like this idea. Like if you shot someone with an arrow, they'd probably get pissed off and sprint at you. Speed would be increased aswell as hits/turn.

[Lasher]

Hi!

So, you probably don't want to hear this, but I don't want this to happen! If that's not want you want to hear you can ignore the rest of what I'm saying.

So, it sounds like you want to make the ranged people run into the monsters like Karma Lizards and other scary things that sometimes Melee people get. But the thing is those monsters usually aren't fun! I know when I run tino a doppleganger with my archer I don't think "Oh Boy!" I mean, maybe it's balanced, but I don't care.

Also, the thing is Archers and Wizards have ammo. Maybe that's not balanced cause they never run out but that's a different issue. I know that my last archer kept running out of arrows and it was miserable cause I could never get enough or find any at all. The other thing is Wizards, sometimes there are monsters that just shrug off bolt spells and it's like why even bother. You just have to get close anyways to use a ball spell anyways. So I don't know if that's a thing or not. I know my wizards near the end of the game they just basically fight up close the whole time cause they mostly only use ball spells.

Also Wizards have PP, and there are places and bad guys where you just can't get any PP and then you are in trouble especially now since if you cast from your life you lose stats.

Anyways, I think a type of monster that you want just wouldn't be fun. Maybe it'd be better to make the horrible melee guys just less bad or less common. Otherwise you could just make a guy who sometimes deflects or dodges arrows and who shrugs bolts a lot. Then you have to get close anyways.

[magpie]

know that my last archer kept running out of arrows and it was miserable cause I could never get enough or find any at all.

You almost have to use Coward tactics and scum archery-using monsters in the early game - kobolds, ratling archers, raiders, stuff like that. By the time you head west to the CoC, you should ideally have a stack of 50-100 arrows, and as many quarrels and rocks/sling bullets as you can find. Don't neglect thrown rocks and slings! In the mid-end game, 'sling bullets of demon slaying' are rather common, and very powerful against demons.

Dopplegangers and doppleganger lords aren't so bad - after all, they're not that tough, and can be pretty easily melee'ed or zapped with wands. But even for an end-game archer, doppleganger kings are a big problem thanks to their insane +to hit and powerful melee attacks. You don't have to fight everything, and they don't give enough XP to be worth the risk of melee'ing. Just avoid them.

TH is stronger for Archers than many other classes, because it will ensure a steady stream of slaying ammo from the midgame on. I'd say it's almost a must-take - archers level quickly, so by the midgame you can have TH and Quick/Lightning Shot as well. Then you're pretty much set - with high missile weapon skill, you'll be getting off 2-3 shots for every attack a monster gets, and that's if they get into melee range, which ideally they shouldn't be.

Crowning is also very strong for an Archer, what with Sun's Messenger, Thunderstroke, True Aim, Far Slayer and Whirlwind, you've got 5 crowning gifts which are incredibly powerful.

There's already a class of monsters which screw over magic-users - magebane and magedoom eyes with their constant shrugging, PP drain, confusion attacks and (in the case of magedooms) penetrating attacks - but they're not that common, except in the Mana Temple. I still think magic-users are the most powerful class, but I've never ended a game with one, so what do I know?

I mean, maybe it's balanced, but I don't care.

The thing is that ADOM is a single player game with no PVP, so it's never been balanced and I don't think it was supposed to be. How else to explain a game with Archers, Wizards, Duelists (et cetera) as character classes in a game which also features Thieves and Merchants? Some classes are relatively easy, and some are almost-impossible without a lot of time and care. Winning with an Archer is nothing compared to winning with a Merchant. And that's the way it's supposed to be, I think.

[SirTheta]

So you see, there really are no monsters that cannot be dealt with in melee.
Similarly, there should be no monsters that cannot be put down with magic.

Having taken down most monsters in melee....I agree! That's why I clearly state I don't want abilities akin to the doppleganger "cannot use missiles" - rather, I want to see interesting things where there are diverse effects, so you can still use magic (or some form of magic), but you have to consider the cost! I really like some of the suggestions so far as they fit this theme wonderfully. Like - look at that wonderful living wall suggestion! What a great idea - and if you make the bolt bounce, you can still have the wall take damage [since one 'square' of a bolt is absorbed by a normal wall]! Plus, ball spells / burning hands / etc. are still in play. So it really spices things up and is very inventive. The same goes for Harwin's suggestions.

So, it sounds like you want to make the ranged people run into the monsters like Karma Lizards and other scary things that sometimes Melee people get. But the thing is those monsters usually aren't fun! I know when I run tino a doppleganger with my archer I don't think "Oh Boy!" I mean, maybe it's balanced, but I don't care.

Well, I don't know about fun - they're dangerous, so of course they're a little less fun. The idea here is to add some variety to the game and points where you have to consider "do I use spells [or a certain type of spell?], do I use a different type of spells, or do I use non-magic [i.e. missiles or melee]?" I think this would make the game incredibly more interesting versus the whole "bolt everything until it stops twitching or ball everything".

[Arctic]

I think the fun part of playing a spellcaster is that you can bolt/ball everything. But this discussion reminded me of nishruu/hakeashar from Baldurs Gate 2. They were healed by magic, successful hits drained magic items of charges and lost memorized spells. Great fun.

[JellySlayer]

An easy one might be a monster that got more powerful (damage, speed, abilities?) for having spells cast against. Notably NOT HP. So you can burn it down with spells - but it gets more and more dangerous.

Going with Jellyslayer's idea for mindcraft blowback. Rather than damage-style blowback - what if using spells against this monster drained extra PP? (It uses the conduit from the spell to pull out PP from you). You could use a spell and it would work, but it might trigger HP casting (in which case it *is* like mindcraft blowback), or at least drain extra PP, which can be significant in its own right.

Shambling mounds already kind of do this with lightning. I think the effect would have to be a lot more extreme though for it to really be noticeable though--shambling mounds gain levels, but not enough for it to be really that threatening. But if it was a big enough boost, yeah, that would work nicely.