Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 14

Thread: Let's talk about monsters' ability to track

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Location
    Moscow, Russia
    Posts
    1,729

    Default Let's talk about monsters' ability to track

    My thoughts concerning tracking in ADOM were suddenly reawakened by an RFE to upgrade GCBs to crash doors. This is a painful topic for me since the debuff for invisibility which crippled its usefulness in an incredible fashion.

    Basically, I have always thought that the degree of tracking for monsters in ADOM is insane. Aside from rats, orcs and goblins, there is practically no way to run from a hostile monster "permanently". Even if you exit its visual range, it will track your steps with a good level of precision and will eventually find you. My question is - does it have to be this precise for 90% of monsters?

    I will list several situations which may or may not be relevant for the topic.

    1) You see a hostile tough monster, quaff a potion of invis and run away only to find it matching you exactly step by step. I am sure many of you have noticed this effect.

    2) You will lock a monster in a distant room, go to the other half of the level to continue herb farming, reading books and so. Eventually some other monster opens the room and your opponent will find you again (locking at you cats).

    3) You enter a room, close the doors and start smithing/reading a complex book. Unless you have also locked a door, there is a 90% chance of someone barging in. This starts to get absurd when you lock the door, commence a long session of smithing and open the door to see a corridor absolutely packed with all monsters who have no reason to go into your room because they don't even know you are on the level (for example, spawned during smithing). For some reason, everyone gravitates towards you. If you quickly kill all of them and run around the level, you will find it devoid of any life. Which can only mean that no hostile monster stays in its place if the PC is somewhere.

    However, simple observation will show you:

    4) Neutral and friendly monsters can easily stay in one big room for long periods of time without any compulsion to find the PC. Of course they don't care about, so this is reasonable.

    Basically, my main qualm is the following:
    Why hostile monsters that have no knowledge of the PC existence try to find him/her nevertheless?

    The related questions are:
    How fair are tracking abilities of most monsters? Why are non-visual senses (hearing, smell, magical powers) so strong that everyone gravitates towards the PC even before any visual contact?
    How would you feel about an RFE about cutting all these non-visual senses outright for the majority of monsters? A change to implement such functionality is to make all monsters "don't care about the PC" till the very moment they are able to identify them visually.
    How non-visual senses are able to provide a legitimate target for a monster? A dungeon is populated by a whole bunch of critters. However, (assuming a monster can hear a target from far away), how do most monsters know that this is actually a PC who they are hostile to as opposed to something else?
    How would you feel about an RFE to decrease these powers of tracking for most monsters?
    I like my women like my ADOM loot - hunted as treasure and in extra quantity.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Posts
    2,828

    Default

    That's a good point. It's a little weird, yeah. Not sure how hard it would be to change this. Maybe invisibiliy and darkness should be rebuffed a bit?
    You steal a scroll labelled HITME. The orc hits you.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Location
    Poland
    Posts
    1,757

    Default

    I would definitely support both of Ln's potential RFEs.
    There is no more annoying thing than finally getting that cloak of invis or a ring, put it on and see almost no difference in how monsters behave.
    The only difference I have really noticed was when I had maxed stealth AND invisibility. At that point several randomly spawned monsters that have been hostile to the PC, did not instantly gravitate towards him/her.
    But this really only pertains to a small fraction of monsters and most importantly - there is very little difference between monsters able to see through invisibility and those that can't but are good at tracking.
    This is especially true for vortices and their virtually unerring ability to find the invisible PC and explode without any provocative actions.
    Why not just give them all see invis and be done with it, since it makes no difference in the first place?

    Another funny thing is a teleporting monster that will inevitably teleport around the PC, no matter if they are hostile or indifferent.
    As L+ character I've had numerous situations where both friendly blink dogs and hostile greater demons or pixies teleported to my vicinity within the first 10 turns of entering a new level.
    What, did they use a wand of monster detection at the same time as I showed up? Come on.

    As a side note, I think monsters that don't see an invisible player, yet manage to get to melee range and randomly swing at the PC, should have a permanent penalty of -50% to-hit, as long as the PC remains invisible.
    It just makes no sense how some creatures with multiple attacks accidentally bump into an invisible PC they don't see and immediately proceed to hit him with a full barrage of crits, PV-ignoring hits and special paralyzing/poisoning/corrupting or whatever attacks without the slightest clue of how well the PC is armored, if there is a shield present or most importantly - without knowing exactly where the PC is at the moment.
    Makes me wanna dump, burn or sell all invisibility granting items because they are that useless.
    Last edited by Blasphemous; 11-12-2014 at 04:11 PM.
    "Hell is empty and all the devils are here."

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jan 2009
    Posts
    5,739

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by _Ln_ View Post
    Basically, I have always thought that the degree of tracking for monsters in ADOM is insane. Aside from rats, orcs and goblins, there is practically no way to run from a hostile monster "permanently". Even if you exit its visual range, it will track your steps with a good level of precision and will eventually find you. My question is - does it have to be this precise for 90% of monsters?

    I will list several situations which may or may not be relevant for the topic.

    1) You see a hostile tough monster, quaff a potion of invis and run away only to find it matching you exactly step by step. I am sure many of you have noticed this effect.
    If the PC has stealth, you can lose the monster pretty easily. If the PC doesn't have stealth, presumably the monster can hear the PC stumbling around in their heavy metal armor, breathing, or grunting under the weight of a 500 pound backpack.

    2) You will lock a monster in a distant room, go to the other half of the level to continue herb farming, reading books and so. Eventually some other monster opens the room and your opponent will find you again (locking at you cats).
    What's the problem with this? Why would they give up hunting you? (Cats, by the way, have excellent hearing and a comparable sense of smell to dogs, and are excellent hunters. They should have no problem tracking you to the other side of the level).

    3) You enter a room, close the doors and start smithing/reading a complex book. Unless you have also locked a door, there is a 90% chance of someone barging in. This starts to get absurd when you lock the door, commence a long session of smithing and open the door to see a corridor absolutely packed with all monsters who have no reason to go into your room because they don't even know you are on the level (for example, spawned during smithing). For some reason, everyone gravitates towards you. If you quickly kill all of them and run around the level, you will find it devoid of any life. Which can only mean that no hostile monster stays in its place if the PC is somewhere.
    In the specific case of smithing... it's pretty loud. There is really no reason that monsters looking for easy prey shouldn't come looking for you. In general, I think this behaviour has two advantages. First, it helps keep the player moving. If you could just close a door and w5 indefinitely, it means that you can basically always find a place to heal yourself without any risk or farm herbs, reading books, etc. without risk. If the player always has to worry that monsters will come after them, it increases the tension and makes the game more exciting. The second reason is that without this behaviour, using altars for live sac would be basically impossible.

    Why hostile monsters that have no knowledge of the PC existence try to find him/her nevertheless?
    It makes the game more interesting.

    The related questions are:
    How fair are tracking abilities of most monsters? Why are non-visual senses (hearing, smell, magical powers) so strong that everyone gravitates towards the PC even before any visual contact?
    How would you feel about an RFE about cutting all these non-visual senses outright for the majority of monsters? A change to implement such functionality is to make all monsters "don't care about the PC" till the very moment they are able to identify them visually.
    How non-visual senses are able to provide a legitimate target for a monster? A dungeon is populated by a whole bunch of critters. However, (assuming a monster can hear a target from far away), how do most monsters know that this is actually a PC who they are hostile to as opposed to something else?
    How would you feel about an RFE to decrease these powers of tracking for most monsters?
    Generally, I don't feel these changes are warranted. Given the power of stealth and invisibility already, I think that significant changes to this effect would basically mean you could ignore combat almost entirely. If monster generation on typical levels were significantly higher, this might be worth considering, but given that an average level has <8 monsters on it at any given time, it hardly seems problematic for these few monsters to be actively looking for the PC.
    Hoping to win with every class, doomed. Archer, Barbarian, Bard, Beastfighter, Druid, Elementalist, Farmer, Fighter, Monk, and ULE Priest down.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Location
    Moscow, Russia
    Posts
    1,729

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by JellySlayer View Post
    If the PC has stealth, you can lose the monster pretty easily. If the PC doesn't have stealth, presumably the monster can hear the PC stumbling around in their heavy metal armor, breathing, or grunting under the weight of a 500 pound backpack.
    Fair enough, but this doesn't apply to a whole range of creatures with such notable examples as vortices, which are one of the best trackers out there.

    What's the problem with this? Why would they give up hunting you? (Cats, by the way, have excellent hearing and a comparable sense of smell to dogs, and are excellent hunters. They should have no problem tracking you to the other side of the level).
    This might be of course related to the general "why are creatures attacking the PC in the first place", but the level of dedication is too extreme in my opinion.

    In the specific case of smithing... it's pretty loud. There is really no reason that monsters looking for easy prey shouldn't come looking for you. In general, I think this behaviour has two advantages. First, it helps keep the player moving. If you could just close a door and w5 indefinitely, it means that you can basically always find a place to heal yourself without any risk or farm herbs, reading books, etc. without risk. If the player always has to worry that monsters will come after them, it increases the tension and makes the game more exciting. The second reason is that without this behaviour, using altars for live sac would be basically impossible.
    Ok, forget smithing - what about reading books that have absolutely the same effect?
    What's wrong with spending a lot of time healing? As a matter of fact, I never ever w5 for healing in any given game (except in extreme cases with level 1-10 PCs to cross an early-game river). If it helps someone to survive, well why not.
    Also, I've never said all monsters - I mentioned the majority of monsters. Does a simple orc has some sixth sense to tell them where the PC is or something like a doppleganger king. Do mindless jellies (no offense ) have some organs to detect the PC who is not in their vicinity?
    Well a lot of people are already bashing on precrowns. I love them and do them every time, but I wouldn't mind restricting live precrowns ot the cases where I find an altar in a cavernous level where natural wandering provides you with enough material. If anything, this will be a proactive medicine for my addiction.

    It makes the game more interesting.
    It's true in lower parts of the game dungeons. Can I have some breathing room close to the surface, where your usual inhabitants are measly humanoids without any super-powers. Animals can smell/hear me? Fine, let them come, at least they won't be able to open the door.
    It would be more like in real life - you evolved to an intelligent being? Please sacrifice some of your senses precision for brain power.

    Generally, I don't feel these changes are warranted. Given the power of stealth and invisibility already, I think that significant changes to this effect would basically mean you could ignore combat almost entirely. If monster generation on typical levels were significantly higher, this might be worth considering, but given that an average level has <8 monsters on it at any given time, it hardly seems problematic for these few monsters to be actively looking for the PC.
    I don't bash on Stealth, on level 100 it's pretty awesome. However, invisibility right now is no longer a source of evading danger in an intelligent way and/or a backup plan against early-game nasties, but simply a way to reduce the amount of bashing through weak monsters you have to do in the late game. You can no longer use it to take a stealth approaches, because anything worthwhile will cling to you and enter "I swear there is something right next to me, I'd better land 3 critical hits on it" mode.

    I mind the changes to invis both in game balance and logic reasons. A gibbering mouther cannot accidentally bump into the PC and do 6 attacks, this makes zero sense at all.
    Actually, this is a reasonable RFE idea - restrict accidental bumps to 1 hit per round regardless of what the monster does normally.
    I like my women like my ADOM loot - hunted as treasure and in extra quantity.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jan 2009
    Posts
    5,739

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by _Ln_ View Post
    This might be of course related to the general "why are creatures attacking the PC in the first place", but the level of dedication is too extreme in my opinion.
    I've actually found that, if anything, cats are much easier to deal with in pre compared to 1.1.1. They're much more likely to just get bored, stop chasing you, and wander around neutral until you get close to them again. Yes, there are some monsters that are annoyingly persistent, but there's lots of others that give up rather easily.

    What's wrong with spending a lot of time healing? As a matter of fact, I never ever w5 for healing in any given game (except in extreme cases with level 1-10 PCs to cross an early-game river). If it helps someone to survive, well why not.
    I rarely do either, but I normally play Candle-borns or use spenseweed or something for healing later in the game. Again, my point is that I think it makes the game more intense to have a sense of danger--that monsters aren't going to give you a break and ignore you unless you work pretty actively to pacify the level. If you're spending a couple hundred or couple thousands turns reading or smithing or farming herbs, I don't think it's unreasonable that now and then a monster will wander in. Frankly, doors are already pretty favourable to the PC. There's no reason that any humanoid shouldn't be able to kick them down (as any PC can).

    Well a lot of people are already bashing on precrowns. I love them and do them every time, but I wouldn't mind restricting live precrowns ot the cases where I find an altar in a cavernous level where natural wandering provides you with enough material. If anything, this will be a proactive medicine for my addiction.
    I wasn't talking about precrowns specifically. If you get doomed early on, say, chances are the only way to clear it is to livesac up to close. If I find an early altar of a favourable alignment, I normally at least get +Luck from it.

    I don't bash on Stealth, on level 100 it's pretty awesome. However, invisibility right now is no longer a source of evading danger in an intelligent way and/or a backup plan against early-game nasties, but simply a way to reduce the amount of bashing through weak monsters you have to do in the late game. You can no longer use it to take a stealth approaches, because anything worthwhile will cling to you and enter "I swear there is something right next to me, I'd better land 3 critical hits on it" mode.
    The PC is able to track invisible monsters fairly well, even early in the game, and gets full damage critical hits on them with minimal penalties. Monsters, invisible or otherwise, aren't able to sneak up stealthily on the PC and backstab them for 2x or 4x damage.
    Hoping to win with every class, doomed. Archer, Barbarian, Bard, Beastfighter, Druid, Elementalist, Farmer, Fighter, Monk, and ULE Priest down.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jul 2013
    Posts
    128

    Default

    I would like to see this topic get more attention and maybe have some solutions brought forth.

    My main issues are:
    - with blink dogs, as mentioned. How they teleport adjacent to you when you're invis and waiting on the spot.
    - invis potions, I rarely use them because they aren't very effective and don't last that long (IMO).

    I would suggest that critters have some sort of a detection value for invisible things which helps them track the pc.

    That being said and I just watched desolation of smaug again and the Dragon can detect invisible bilbo quite easily because of smell, sight( of coins being displaced), and sound.

    So there is definitely both sides to the story, yes dragons can see invis but my point is that the monsters have many ways to detect the pc but I think the detection is too good.
    Gate Closers:
    Dwarf Monk (p17), Dwarf Paladin (p23), Gnome Duelist (r49), Dark Elf Barbarian (r50), High Elf Archer (r51)

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    Berlin
    Posts
    366

    Default

    Although it is sometimes very annoying, I prefer the extra challenge of "homing missile" enemies to the overpoweredness of darkness and invisibility of the past.

    However, I strongly agree that accidental hits on an invisible PC should be less harmful. Unless the PC has attacked that monster already.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Dec 2008
    Location
    Moscow, Russia
    Posts
    1,729

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by JellySlayer View Post
    I've actually found that, if anything, cats are much easier to deal with in pre compared to 1.1.1. They're much more likely to just get bored, stop chasing you, and wander around neutral until you get close to them again. Yes, there are some monsters that are annoyingly persistent, but there's lots of others that give up rather easily.
    We must be playing a different game then!

    I rarely do either, but I normally play Candle-borns or use spenseweed or something for healing later in the game. Again, my point is that I think it makes the game more intense to have a sense of danger--that monsters aren't going to give you a break and ignore you unless you work pretty actively to pacify the level. If you're spending a couple hundred or couple thousands turns reading or smithing or farming herbs, I don't think it's unreasonable that now and then a monster will wander in. Frankly, doors are already pretty favourable to the PC. There's no reason that any humanoid shouldn't be able to kick them down (as any PC can).
    It's not really "now and then", more like "let me read my damn book already!" There's no reason that any humanoid should seek out the PC because being a humanoid the monster is fairly normal and has its own stuff to do. *shrugs*

    I wasn't talking about precrowns specifically. If you get doomed early on, say, chances are the only way to clear it is to livesac up to close. If I find an early altar of a favourable alignment, I normally at least get +Luck from it.
    I wouldn't say that getting doom removed is hard with an altar. You can just lure monsters, what's the big deal. I don't w5 on the place when getting a precrown, I normally run around the level and get monsters quicker.


    The PC is able to track invisible monsters fairly well, even early in the game, and gets full damage critical hits on them with minimal penalties. Monsters, invisible or otherwise, aren't able to sneak up stealthily on the PC and backstab them for 2x or 4x damage.
    Cut the PC some slack, the average kill-count in my games is 3000+. Let's not compare him/her to any monster in the game.
    Is there any trick to tracking invisible monsters? If Li-Hon-Kay starts panicking in the Arena, I usually spend a crapload of time trying to chase him down or get him in the corner because I have zero idea how he moves with a different speed. We are not talking general direction of retreat here, but the very exact position.
    I like my women like my ADOM loot - hunted as treasure and in extra quantity.

  10. #10

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by _Ln_ View Post
    How would you feel about an RFE to decrease these powers of tracking for most monsters?
    I would say anything below level ~32 that can't cast a spell and isn't named shouldn't have a clue where I am if it can't see me.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •