Increase Difficulty of Air and Earth Temples
issueid=1118 07-05-2012 07:40 PM
Ancient Member
Number of reported issues by JellySlayer: 114
Increase Difficulty of Air and Earth Temples

In the theme of making the endgame a little more interesting, I thought I'd propose a few modifications to the Air and Earth temples. The idea here is that, for the most part, these two temples are sort of trivial. It's very rare that you hear of people dying in these places--it's the ToEF and the Mana Temple that most people worry about. Some small changes to these temples, I think, would make them of a more comparable difficulty.

-Air Temple: Enlarge the inner room where the Summoner lives. What makes the Summoner dangerous is the monsters he can summon. Unfortunately, he's stuck in a tiny room crammed full of grues and elementals, so he generally can't actually do all that much summoning. Increasing the available space for him to fill with more summoned monsters would, I think be an easy fix that would make the Air Temple more interesting. I'd suggest maybe just adding one extra row to the edge of the room.

-Earth Temple: This one lacks a special feature. How about, on that entire level, "The floor is covered in thick mud", which increases base energy cost to 1250 or 1500.
Issue Details
Issue Number 1118
Issue Type Feature
Project ADOM (Ancient Domains Of Mystery)
Category Unknown
Status Implemented
Priority Unknown
Suggested Version Unknown
Implemented Version ADOM 1.2.0 pre 7
Milestone (none)
Votes for this feature 7
Votes against this feature 2
Assigned Users (none)
Tags (none)




11-12-2012 05:18 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by SirTheta
Again, blocking the stairs for the Earth Temple solves nothing. The ASB is the real problem, not the mobs within (and if it came to it, you'd just have players dig out a nice escape route to a level corner, so they only have to fight 3 at a time).

P.S. That is also a bad idea for other reasons--what if I get the stiff muscles corruption but I've left my corruption removal on D1 so it doesn't get destroyed? I have to complete the Earth Temple first? It would also piss me off pretty bad if I was forced to finish the Earth Temple by merely generating the level [though this could be solved by making condition for blocking stairs that ASB moves off altar, don't know if that is possible though]. No other area in the game forces you to complete it before you can do anything else [this sentence is somewhat poorly phrased as you can't go past fire wall without fire orb, for example. what I'm trying to say is: all other places you can always leave, train up & come back if you find you aren't prepared].
This only came to me as I recently were in the Earth Temple. As it stands now players can still use the stairs/corner to fight 1-3 monsters at a time. I have the odd feeling that the Creator wanted the pc surrounded. But ppl have learned to use stairs.

Maybe make the inhabitants not follow the pc up/down stairs and place undiggable walls strategically so that digging into a corner is not possible.

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At least 4 is slightly more challenging than 3. And if creatures that ignore walls are made to pass through undiggable, even more.

11-13-2012 10:20 AM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Stingray1
Maybe make the inhabitants not follow the pc up/down stairs and place undiggable walls
The first part sounds really good to me. It eliminates the stairs nonsense much more elegantly than blocking them. Undiggable walls aren't needed imo. Digging out a corner is much more hassle than going up/down the stairs a few times and it uses up recources, at least.

12-08-2012 07:26 PM
The Creator
I have done several things that hopefully will make these levels more exciting:
- There is a little more room for summoning.
- The MS and the ASB are both slightly more powerful (and they hit better).
- The ASB now also is missile capable.
- Uniques now can teleport even on levels where this usually is forbidden.
- Monsters no longer willingly leave the temple levels.

Have fun testing!

12-08-2012 07:34 PM
Senior Member
I've posted some not previously discussed ideas regarding specifically the air temple at this RFE: http://www.adom.de/forums/project.php?issueid=1398

12-08-2012 07:37 PM
Senior Member
> Monsters no longer willingly leave the temple levels.

I think this will make the earth temple much more difficult, possibly too difficult.

12-08-2012 07:44 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Alucard
> Monsters no longer willingly leave the temple levels.

I think this will make the earth temple much more difficult, possibly too difficult.
If you aren't strong enough, you aren't. These game finishing artifacts can't just be given away.

But we'll see maybe you are right. Remember your PC can still willingly leave.

Edit - I wonder what TB means by willingly? Maybe some will? If they are lusting for your blood.

12-08-2012 07:47 PM
Senior Member
I have to say the idea of the ancient stone beast throwing missiles does take away some of the flavor of it being a huge lumbering beast that's more tough and determined than cunning.

12-08-2012 07:53 PM
Ancient Member
- Uniques now can teleport even on levels where this usually is forbidden.
This will be a very interesting change... Both the Archmage and the Summoner are teleport capable.

12-08-2012 08:18 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by aerol
I have to say the idea of the ancient stone beast throwing missiles does take away some of the flavor of it being a huge lumbering beast that's more tough and determined than cunning.
Perhaps it throws Huge Stone, 1000s each, 10d6 damage. Would that satisfy you?

12-08-2012 08:29 PM
Ancient Member
If the ChAoS archmage can now teleport, that might just need to be reverted. Guess we'll see :)

12-08-2012 09:09 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Alucard
> Monsters no longer willingly leave the temple levels.

I think this will make the earth temple much more difficult, possibly too difficult.
For some reason I never used to do the stairs trick in the Earth temple in my first wins. It didn't occur to me. What I usually did was letting myself be surrounded and then zapping wands of fireballs. Works quite well, although not as easy as with stair hopping.

12-08-2012 10:09 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by grobblewobble
For some reason I never used to do the stairs trick in the Earth temple in my first wins. It didn't occur to me. What I usually did was letting myself be surrounded and then zapping wands of fireballs. Works quite well, although not as easy as with stair hopping.
Those grues hit pretty often and if you're surrounded even more. The elementals have quite a punch and regenate. I must admit even I'm scared.

12-08-2012 10:35 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by Stingray1
Those grues hit pretty often and if you're surrounded even more. The elementals have quite a punch and regenate. I must admit even I'm scared.
Good! Scared is how one should feel :) Mana Temple will be even more epic now!

12-08-2012 11:10 PM
Ancient Member
Mana Temple might actually be easier, if anything. You just need to get the Archmage's attention and he'll come out to fight out. OTOH, if you try to blind or stun him, he'll probably teleport away.

12-08-2012 11:26 PM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by JellySlayer
Mana Temple might actually be easier, if anything. You just need to get the Archmage's attention and he'll come out to fight out. OTOH, if you try to blind or stun him, he'll probably teleport away.
Yes, like unicorns and greater daemons. I hate it when they do that. Might have to devise some new tactic?

I would already like to suggest, if it is not too difficult to code, that he doesn't teleport to outside of the inner temple.

12-09-2012 01:55 AM
Senior Member
Quote Originally Posted by Stingray1
Edit - I wonder what TB means by willingly? Maybe some will? If they are lusting for your blood.
Probably that monsters that are pets or companions will still follow you. Otherwise, it would be frustrating having to obtain a new pet every time you pass through each of the CoC temples.

12-09-2012 09:16 AM
Ancient Member
To be honest I'm absolutely in favor of 95% of the balance changes, but I think the earth temple buff is going to be too much. I never supported it because I think people saying it's too easy with melee chars must be either really top notch players, or massive stat scummers. My last melee char actually had as tough a time fighting the ASB in melee as fighting the D:50 balors, and that was with the stairs technique.

On the other hand, the earth temple was quite easy with wizards, essentially because you could spam ball spells, resorting to HP-casting when needed. Now that HP-casting has been nerfed (which is good), I foresee lots of corruptions for wizards that will have to leave the level to regenerate PP.

My prediction is that these buffs will make the earth temple such a scary place that it may need to be toned down again so that players can actually, well, get the damned orb. But anyway it will be fun to try and see what happens :)

12-09-2012 10:04 AM
Ancient Member
To be fair, your last character was a monk who was burdened (so didn't get the monk DV bonus) and wielding a two handed weapon. Resulting in very low DV overall. If you compare that to a wizard on coward with a shield, the comparison isn't fair. Don't forget that melee characters can also wield a shield, press F7 and spam ball spells with a wand.

12-09-2012 07:52 PM
Ancient Member
I'm neither a top notch player (far from it), nor a massive stat scummer (don't tend to scum much, overall), and I've never really had the slightest problem in the Earth Temple. I will note, I've always been against any change to the monsters in the ET (....I think?). It does make it significantly harder if you can't stairhop Elementals/Grues, which can already be really brutal (although I usually am not forced to stairhop). Guess we'll see. Not sure if ASB changes are going to beef him up enough. Guess we'll see again.

12-10-2012 02:29 AM
Ancient Member
Quote Originally Posted by SirTheta
I'm neither a top notch player (far from it), nor a massive stat scummer (don't tend to scum much, overall), and I've never really had the slightest problem in the Earth Temple. I will note, I've always been against any change to the monsters in the ET (....I think?). It does make it significantly harder if you can't stairhop Elementals/Grues, which can already be really brutal (although I usually am not forced to stairhop). Guess we'll see. Not sure if ASB changes are going to beef him up enough. Guess we'll see again.
The earth temple beasties only tend to move at you if you rush right into the middle. I would expect an approach similiar to the ToEF where you activate a set of monsters, then walk back will be just as effective as stair hopping.

i'm old enough to remember when you could TP in the elemental temples... good times.

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