R67 Point-based Character Creation
issueid=4381 08-13-2016 11:58 AM
Junior Member
Number of reported issues by Halon: 1
R67 Point-based Character Creation
The actual stats having created a new character don't reflect the point-based system selection

I'm hesitant to post in case I've misunderstood how the new point-based character creation works so forgive me if I have...

Having added and taken away point for various character types (tried HE Elf, Dwarf Barbarian, Orc Choas Knight, Mist Elf Wizard) the attributes each character actual had when starting the game had no apparent connection to the way I had chosen. I've created a few characters without changing the base stats for a Dwarven Barbarian as an example:
St:18 Le:9 Wi:13 Dx:10 To:16 Ch:8 Ap:8 Ma:6 Pe:12. The results for 3 actual characters are as follows:

St:19 Le:13 Wi:14 Dx:10 To:21 Ch:4 Ap:8 Ma:6 Pe:12
St:23 Le:10 Wi:13 Dx:11 To:22 Ch:6 Ap:9 Ma:6 Pe:14
St:18 Le:10 Wi:15 Dx:11 To:18 Ch:4 Ap:8 Ma:3 Pe:14

Playing on Windows 10. What other information would be helpful?
Issue Details
Issue Number 4381
Project ADOM (Ancient Domains Of Mystery)
Category Windows 10 (Steam)
Status Fixed
Priority Unknown
Affected Version ADOM r67 (v2.2.1)
Fixed Version (none)
Milestone "Resurrect ADOM" Indiegogo Fulfillment
Users able to reproduce bug 3
Users unable to reproduce bug 0
Assigned Users (none)
Tags (none)




08-17-2016 04:49 PM
Senior Member
Personally, I choose my characters based on number of starting talents and the stats themselves are irrelevant. When I read that points based generation was going to become available, I believed that my days of roll scumming were finally over as i could fine tune my stats to that magical number of sum/7 to get that extra talent.

I like reading the background story and wouldn't want it to be removed but i concur with Harwin in the following post:
So if I start with 10 toughness (Race/class) and my background adds 3, then the Point-buy system should show my "base" toughness at 13. And I can spend points from there.

And I think it should treat that as "base" toughness. That is, it should be exactly as expensive to change my toughness (in this case) from 13->15 as it would be to change my toughness from 10->12 if I had no background.
Personally I would also like to see the number of starting talents shown before final acceptance of stats in order to save time and self-inflicted frustration.

08-17-2016 05:36 PM
Ancient Member
Perhaps there could be a compromise between suggestions, where most random background modifiers are put in before generation, but changes of +/- 1 are not shown.

08-17-2016 08:02 PM
Ancient Member
Personally, I don't get the whole fixation on background (which looks like quick fix for strap-on feature).

In my opinion main stuff, which needs fixing:
a) fixed stats like elf toughness, orc learning, etc. - saying no, you can't change that is opposite to what people expect from point based system,
b) class modifiers being neither shown nor affected. So wizard, thief and barbarian has same shown stats (which are based on the race, presumably due to "too much work") and have same modifiers. (well, i guess race changes get multiplied by class coefficient, but does average player is expected to know that?)

08-17-2016 10:07 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Soirana
Personally, I don't get the whole fixation on background (which looks like quick fix for strap-on feature).

In my opinion main stuff, which needs fixing:
a) fixed stats like elf toughness, orc learning, etc. - saying no, you can't change that is opposite to what people expect from point based system,
b) class modifiers being neither shown nor affected. So wizard, thief and barbarian has same shown stats (which are based on the race, presumably due to "too much work") and have same modifiers. (well, i guess race changes get multiplied by class coefficient, but does average player is expected to know that?)

If you look to the right hand side during character creation, you will see 2 columns that show the modifiers for star sign, and class.

08-18-2016 03:11 AM
Junior Member
Quote Originally Posted by Soirana
Personally, I don't get the whole fixation on background (which looks like quick fix for strap-on feature).

In my opinion main stuff, which needs fixing:
a) fixed stats like elf toughness, orc learning, etc. - saying no, you can't change that is opposite to what people expect from point based system,
b) class modifiers being neither shown nor affected. So wizard, thief and barbarian has same shown stats (which are based on the race, presumably due to "too much work") and have same modifiers. (well, i guess race changes get multiplied by class coefficient, but does average player is expected to know that?)
I don't think its a strap-on feature as much as it is two incompatible ways of character creation. Point based creation means you customize your character the way you want it, and having random stats affect it can be really annoying.

But that being said I do agree that it would be nice to have more leniency in terms of points and races. However, there should still be a limit for certain races in terms of those stats (but not to the extent it is currently).

08-18-2016 04:36 AM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Blank4u47
If you look to the right hand side during character creation, you will see 2 columns that show the modifiers for star sign, and class.
Do you mean Pr column?

I always thought race modifier was multiplier not add on.
Well, i've rolled few trolls and they seem to be consistently higher on they strong stats (st and to) and weaker on mental parts (charisma and learning). The same conclusion was what people on wiki arrived at some point.

if class modifier is really a modifier of 1.2 instead of giving +2... that is seriously misrepresenting info.

Overall, if someone says point buy system... well, roguelikes had a few of these (nethack for example), so people have certain expectations, which they build up during some period(it was promised as 'deluxe' feature quite some time ago). I don't think this will generate any positive reaction, if the system gets released to public in this way.

p.s. forum discussion thread at the time the system rolled
http://www.adom.de/forums/showthread...sion-%28R65%29
p.p.s
" point-based character generation
selectable background stories "
http://www.adom.de/adom-deluxe/index.php3
Well, I would not mind other promises like selecting hair/eye color too:)

08-18-2016 05:27 AM
Ancient Member
Yes, the Pr column is the stat modifier due to profession, sn is star sign, gn is gender, all of which is applied before rolling the background. Race determines both the initial stats and the potential currently.

There is no stat multiplier of any sort involved in the point based character generation, if that's what you meant by talking about 1.2 given instead of 2?

08-18-2016 06:01 AM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Blank4u47
There is no stat multiplier of any sort involved in the point based character generation, if that's what you meant by talking about 1.2 given instead of 2?
If that was true it would be possible to land class +3/+4 stats (troll St/To) with lower than shown stats due to shitty background. That does not seem to be the case.

As far as I recall TB comments point based generation follows same rules as normal one, except very minor changes (class modifier instead being randomized (withing certain limits) is controlled by points (within exactly same limits)).

Since when Adom calls race 'Cur' and changed classes to professions?

08-18-2016 06:20 AM
Ancient Member
Background can give a huge variation to stats. I rolled ~100 human wizards using point based generation and some stats were as low as -9 or as high as +6.

Most of the variety you see in a normal random roll is due to the characters background, not the dice roll. So when TB says it follows same rules, but with minor changes, he's being very accurate.

08-18-2016 07:38 AM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Blank4u47
Background can give a huge variation to stats. I rolled ~100 human wizards using point based generation and some stats were as low as -9 or as high as +6.
I would like to believe that line, but... I am still waiting for your pickpocket bloody dagger screenshot you promissed on Steam forums and your book report (in http://www.adom.de/forums/showthread...esearch-thread).

So for now, I will assume that the stuff people believe (and have some numbers to back in, let say in http://ancardia.wikia.com/wiki/Talk:Archer) is more valuable than your imagined/presumed/dreamed up numbers. (p.s. unless it was same stat you can't claim -9 and +6 were not due to multiplier, but background anyway).

08-18-2016 07:57 AM
Ancient Member
Lol, I forgot about that. Did you know pressing f12 gets rid of a message when you press it? Anyways I'm pretty sure my screenshot of it is in my steam pictures. Anyways, your method was better for quickly finding a good dagger anyways. I only found the bloody dagger on my 4th attempt.

The numbers weren't dreamed up, I actually physically wrote them down so I could compare them and try to find out what the actual background modifiers were for each different one.

Adom does not contain multipliers for stats. There is exactly one set of numbers not shown in point based character creation. That's your character background.

The first column is always determined by race, it is exactly the same regardless of class. Then there's the point based modifiers which you manually add, followed by star sign, gender, and class. Then all the way to the right is your pre-background total. That's it. And by the way, the -9 was to str the character had the seriously ill background.

08-18-2016 08:38 AM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Blank4u47
Lol, I forgot about that. Did you know pressing f12 gets rid of a message when you press it? Anyways I'm pretty sure my screenshot of it is in my steam pictures.
I'll suggest you post it in such case. It won't be much trouble really.


The first column is always determined by race, it is exactly the same regardless of class. Then there's the point based modifiers which you manually add, followed by star sign, gender, and class. Then all the way to the right is your pre-background total. That's it. And by the way, the -9 was to str the character had the seriously ill background.
Wizzies get 0.8 multiplier, that's how you end with -9. If you want to prove me being wrong gen wizzard with -9 in learning.

If the screen says +2... well, it does not make code to work that way. I suggest you actually read talk:Archer page, and produce comparable data if you want to argue.

08-18-2016 10:22 AM
Ancient Member
Let's be reasonable about background effects.

If someone wants to use a point-based generation system, he's either min-maxing or roleplaying.
-- In both of these cases said person would want to know the backstory and its effects before assigning points (to reroll in case of "seriously ill"/adjust the RP respectively). Thus the backstory must be visible.
-- In both of these cases said person would want to be able to actually change the stats. Thus we should go away from no-St-and-To-for-elves thing, because it ruins all the fun whatsoever.
-- In both of these cases said person would want to be able to achieve skewed builds. Thus we should really go away from different-stats-have-different-price thing.

In my eyes, the problem is that the current system isn't any fun to use. Slap a score penalty if it's used for global leaderboards. But in its core ADOM is a singleplayer game. Why can't people play it as they like?

Arguably, options already present (no hunger etc.) have a much more serious impact on the game than creating even the most min-maxed build. That is why I don't understand the rationale about limiting point-based generation.

08-18-2016 10:22 AM
Ancient Member
[sorry for double-post]

08-18-2016 10:50 AM
Senior Member
I suppose Thomas didn't want to make points based generation have penalty to score in the end, although I doubt min-maxers and rpers would care much about score. I still think it's more likely he'll change the point-based generation to be more min-maxable without having it affect the high score at the end, mostly because people can still min max with questions.

That's another thing, rpers probably won't use the point based generation and would probably end up using the question based system. However I suppose it is still something to consider when thinking about changes.

08-18-2016 12:54 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Soirana



Wizzies get 0.8 multiplier, that's how you end with -9. If you want to prove me being wrong gen wizzard with -9 in learning.

If the screen says +2... well, it does not make code to work that way. I suggest you actually read talk:Archer page, and produce comparable data if you want to argue.
You cannot generate a wizard with -9 compared to average Le because there are no backgrounds that stack with each other that can provide that much variance. The only stats that have such large modifiers are str, Ap, Cha.

Also, that makes no sense that multiplying a stat by .8 would subtract 9 from an average score. It is a ridiculous argument. If an average human had 11 str. Plus 1 for being male, -1(? Going off memory here) due to being a wizard, then .8 would always make it 9 with no variance. This multiplier theory is silly because it fails to address the fact that there's a large variance in stats between characters with the same modifiers (as provided by point based generation)

08-18-2016 05:23 PM
Ancient Member
Maybe I'm crazy but I do not have a big problem with the way things work now. Whilst I can see how the points-based generation is seen as misleading, I was expecting to see a certain amount of randomness in the stat generation process, just like always, but with a slight nudge to a few stats (more wiggle than we had before).

That said, I think having the background generated prior to slotting in points would be fine, but I would very much dislike the background being displayed before points are allotted.

08-18-2016 05:35 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Blank4u47
This multiplier theory is silly because it fails to address the fact that there's a large variance in stats between characters with the same modifiers (as provided by point based generation)
Try to generate Troll barabarian with +5 mana or something like that. That's truly silly is arguing against numbers without any arguments.

Background effects are known, Ascaron and Co did evaluations by eliminating them(and I gave you a link to the source). Point is that your history effect gets (in theory), multiplied. So, -9, would have been -7 before multipliers. If you run race/class where both parts get bonus (or negatives) to the stat, you will see effect better. Large variance has actually nothing to do with theory.
but with a slight nudge to a few stats (more wiggle than we had before)
Grey elves can't nudge To, hurthlings can't touch St and Mana and so on... Still no problem?

08-18-2016 05:41 PM
Junior Member
I think what it's gonna come down to is how new players feel about it. I think some of the older players might be okay with the way it is, but a lot of new players might be turned off by how it works.

For simplicities sake, it might be better to not have the backgrounds alter stats (or make them selectable as Soirana pointed out was going to be a feature), so as to make it easier for new players to not feel confused.

It would be kind of cool to select backgrounds from a role playing perspective, but that's just me.

08-19-2016 12:52 PM
Senior Member
I vote for bigger pool of points too. While background is nice flavor. Removing it also gives player character more freedom to roleplay with their own background story they develope by building totally customized characters. Other option would be that you can pick your background from several options with stats shown, that sounds totally fine for me too.

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