The Hardfought server supports a lot of roguelike variants of Nethack.
Can anyone suggest a variant that supports more generated dungeon
types (ideally: randomly generated, not static ones) than Vanilla or
Slashem, while ideally still preserve the commands (so that there's
less need to relearn everything anew and re-condition muscle memory
from scratch)?

Janis

Em 14/10/2022 08:59, Janis Papanagnou escreveu:
> The Hardfought server supports a lot of roguelike variants of Nethack.
> Can anyone suggest a variant that supports more generated dungeon
> types (ideally: randomly generated, not static ones) than Vanilla or
> Slashem, while ideally still preserve the commands (so that there's
> less need to relearn everything anew and re-condition muscle memory
> from scratch)?
>
> Janis

You might want to look at EvilHack and dNetHack.

nabru

--
nabru | This PIZZA symbolizes
| MY COMPLETE EMOTIONAL RECOVERY!!
--------- -----------------------------------

On 24.10.2022 20:27, nabru wrote:
> Em 14/10/2022 08:59, Janis Papanagnou escreveu:
>> The Hardfought server supports a lot of roguelike variants of Nethack.
>> Can anyone suggest a variant that supports more generated dungeon
>> types (ideally: randomly generated, not static ones) than Vanilla or
>> Slashem, while ideally still preserve the commands (so that there's
>> less need to relearn everything anew and re-condition muscle memory
>> from scratch)?
>
> You might want to look at EvilHack and dNetHack.

I've had a look at EvilHack and it looked quite interesting in various
respects.

There's some design decisions I don't like that much; e.g. Elbereth
must be "learned", so that early game (where it's most useful, often
necessary) you don't have it. Also a "locked access to minetown" is
something I think is - while a nice idea from a style point of view -
not that appealing since it linearizes the game. (In Slashem with
the the new branches allow to travel forth and back as necessary, I
consider that a more appealing design gameplay wise. But I haven't
yet seen much of the deeper levels of EvilHack, but any early game
restrictions I consider a bad idea.)

I have some other issues; I cannot seem to be able to configure the
user interface (e.g. menu handling and key-behavior) as I'm used to it;
this will probably be what repels me since it needs specific attention
and detracts me from the game.

Funny that on one of the first games (one where I didn't die quickly,
and where I could open minetown) I stumbled into a minetown bones. It
was quite foreseeable that I'll die there.

Currently the RNG had chosen a turtle as my player race and I cannot
find information about the specifics and how to handle that race; for
example wearing armor like body armor or cloaks seems not possible.

Continuing exploration...

Janis

On 20.02.2023 13:22, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 24.10.2022 20:27, nabru wrote:
>>
>> You might want to look at EvilHack and dNetHack.
>
> Funny that on one of the first games (one where I didn't die quickly,
> and where I could open minetown) I stumbled into a minetown bones. It
> was quite foreseeable that I'll die there.

Second time I was able to unlock mine town. Yet again a bones level;
actually a double bones level! - I survived it but there was nothing
interesting in those bones heaps. Sacrifices on the converted early
altar and also on the co-aligned mine town altar didn't provide much
but the guaranteed Mjollnir (I'm playing a centaurian Valkyrie). It
is quite an annoyance that you get lots of ordinary armor and weapons
in EvilHack instead of artifacts. I've got a nice +5 large shield but
then I found that +0 silver shield in the bones heap; I've chosen the
higher AC instead of reflection. No bag of holding yet; a pain when
carrying 1900 units of loot (despite two base camps with more loot).
I was happy to recognize the bag of holding Sokoban level, but then
got aware of the different implementation; the possible prizes are
randomized, so again no bag of holding. I've seen that there's a
guaranteed enhanced bag in a branch close to Medusa's level, but it
appears to be difficult, and there's yet a long way to reach there.
(Still struggling with EvilHack's user interface, commands/menus.)

Janis

On Sunday, February 26, 2023 at 8:04:38 AM UTC+1, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 20.02.2023 13:22, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> > On 24.10.2022 20:27, nabru wrote:
> >>
> >> You might want to look at EvilHack and dNetHack.
> >
> > Funny that on one of the first games (one where I didn't die quickly,
> > and where I could open minetown) I stumbled into a minetown bones. It
> > was quite foreseeable that I'll die there.
> Second time I was able to unlock mine town. Yet again a bones level;
> actually a double bones level! - I survived it but there was nothing
> interesting in those bones heaps. Sacrifices on the converted early
> altar and also on the co-aligned mine town altar didn't provide much
> but the guaranteed Mjollnir (I'm playing a centaurian Valkyrie). It
> is quite an annoyance that you get lots of ordinary armor and weapons
> in EvilHack instead of artifacts. I've got a nice +5 large shield but
> then I found that +0 silver shield in the bones heap; I've chosen the
> higher AC instead of reflection. No bag of holding yet; a pain when
> carrying 1900 units of loot (despite two base camps with more loot).
> I was happy to recognize the bag of holding Sokoban level, but then
> got aware of the different implementation; the possible prizes are
> randomized, so again no bag of holding. I've seen that there's a
> guaranteed enhanced bag in a branch close to Medusa's level, but it
> appears to be difficult, and there's yet a long way to reach there.
> (Still struggling with EvilHack's user interface, commands/menus.)
>
> Janis

Janis, hello I'm Erik (hackemslashem), I've actually read a bunch of your posts over the years. I have developed a variant called Hack'EM, which I originally based on EvilHack, but my main intention was to port SLASH'EM to the 3.6.x codebase. I have also ported a lot of stuff from other variants (Splice, Un, xnh, THEM, dnh, etc, and of course Evil) so it's not SLASH'EM exclusive. Anyway, you might enjoy it, check out the wiki page for info on the changes: https://nethackwiki.com/wiki/Hack%27EM. It's also live on hardfought and has a windows binary available if you need it (https://github.com/elunna/hackem/releases/tag/v1.1.0).

If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very much in development. I'm not sure if replies here will show up in my email, but I'll try to check back. Otherwise I'm usually in the #hackem and #evilhack IRC channels on libera, or on the roguelikes discord.

On 18.03.2023 07:25, Erik L wrote:
>
> Janis, hello I'm Erik (hackemslashem), I've actually read a bunch of
> your posts over the years. I have developed a variant called Hack'EM,
> which I originally based on EvilHack, but my main intention was to
> port SLASH'EM to the 3.6.x codebase. I have also ported a lot of
> stuff from other variants (Splice, Un, xnh, THEM, dnh, etc, and of
> course Evil) so it's not SLASH'EM exclusive. Anyway, you might enjoy
> it, check out the wiki page for info on the changes:
> https://nethackwiki.com/wiki/Hack%27EM. It's also live on hardfought
> and has a windows binary available if you need it
> (https://github.com/elunna/hackem/releases/tag/v1.1.0).
>
> If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very
> much in development. I'm not sure if replies here will show up in my
> email, but I'll try to check back. Otherwise I'm usually in the
> #hackem and #evilhack IRC channels on libera, or on the roguelikes
> discord.

Thanks for the pointer! - I'm definitely interested in a "perfect
variant" - yet, I haven't found it -, so I'll certainly try out
some more.

But bear with me and don't expect my feedback too soon; it needs
quite some time to play to get a sensible feeling about any variant.

For example, after some years of playing, I like most of Slashem's
design decisions. There's only few things I dislike (mostly that
unstylish military stuff, or "the Guild"). And there's some things
I am missing; the levels should have more randomness and diversity.

For EvilHack it's far too soon to give a fair feedback; as you may
have read, quite some basic concepts I haven't yet, erm, understood.
And I am far, very very far from an ascension.[*] So I still want
to spend some more time here to get at least a better overview of
that difficult (and yet obscure [to me]) variant.

I'll keep Hack'EM in mind, though, and will follow some games on
Hardfought; maybe it fascinates me so much that I quickly switch. ;-)

But, being old-school, I'm rarely #chat'ing, to be honest. So any
questions, exchange of experiences, and feedback I'll most likely
post here in Usenet.

Janis

[*] For comparison (and bragging): 600+ NH-343 NAO ascensions, and
150+ Slashem ascensions. This appears to be sufficient to judge :-)

PS: WRT the "Windows binary" you mention; on any computer under my
control where I spot Windows (or other malware) I practice exorcism.
All my systems (and the ones I get my hands on) run Linux.

On Saturday, March 18, 2023 at 9:16:49 AM UTC+1, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 18.03.2023 07:25, Erik L wrote:
> >
> > Janis, hello I'm Erik (hackemslashem), I've actually read a bunch of
> > your posts over the years. I have developed a variant called Hack'EM,
> > which I originally based on EvilHack, but my main intention was to
> > port SLASH'EM to the 3.6.x codebase. I have also ported a lot of
> > stuff from other variants (Splice, Un, xnh, THEM, dnh, etc, and of
> > course Evil) so it's not SLASH'EM exclusive. Anyway, you might enjoy
> > it, check out the wiki page for info on the changes:
> > https://nethackwiki.com/wiki/Hack%27EM. It's also live on hardfought
> > and has a windows binary available if you need it
> > (https://github.com/elunna/hackem/releases/tag/v1.1.0).
> >
> > If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very
> > much in development. I'm not sure if replies here will show up in my
> > email, but I'll try to check back. Otherwise I'm usually in the
> > #hackem and #evilhack IRC channels on libera, or on the roguelikes
> > discord.
> Thanks for the pointer! - I'm definitely interested in a "perfect
> variant" - yet, I haven't found it -, so I'll certainly try out
> some more.
>
> But bear with me and don't expect my feedback too soon; it needs
> quite some time to play to get a sensible feeling about any variant.
>
> For example, after some years of playing, I like most of Slashem's
> design decisions. There's only few things I dislike (mostly that
> unstylish military stuff, or "the Guild"). And there's some things
> I am missing; the levels should have more randomness and diversity.
>
> For EvilHack it's far too soon to give a fair feedback; as you may
> have read, quite some basic concepts I haven't yet, erm, understood.
> And I am far, very very far from an ascension.[*] So I still want
> to spend some more time here to get at least a better overview of
> that difficult (and yet obscure [to me]) variant.
>
> I'll keep Hack'EM in mind, though, and will follow some games on
> Hardfought; maybe it fascinates me so much that I quickly switch. ;-)
>
> But, being old-school, I'm rarely #chat'ing, to be honest. So any
> questions, exchange of experiences, and feedback I'll most likely
> post here in Usenet.
>
> Janis
>
Oh cool, this does just reply direct to my email so very easy to keep up to date.

I hear you on exploring new variants. In the case of Evil and Hackem, you might find it useful to switch between the two. If you are having a bad day in Evil, switch to hackem for a bit! :D

Mechanically they are very similar but content-wise pretty different. I have toned down the difficulty of Evil a lot, and have replaced a lot of content in evil. The end-game will be pretty similar right now. The nice thing is that bugs found in either variant are co-adopted. This has been an amazing experience in working on this fork. We've traded a ton of bug fixes back and forth, and both variants have grown because of that. I also try to keep up to date on most changes Evil brings in. There are some things I haven't ported yet (forging artifacts, Lucifer endgame, etc) - we'll see on those things long term. I've been working to make Hack'EM it's own thing and trying to leave a lot of "evil" things to EvilHack, but keeping what I like - it's a tough line to walk!

On 18.03.2023 10:00, Erik L wrote:
>>
> Oh cool, this does just reply direct to my email so very easy to keep
> up to date.

(I haven't done anything else than as usual posting to this newsgroup.)

>
> I hear you on exploring new variants. In the case of Evil and Hackem,
> you might find it useful to switch between the two. If you are having
> a bad day in Evil, switch to hackem for a bit! :D

Are there any non-bad days in EvilHack possible? :-)

Or options to choose evilness-level from, like...

OPTIONS=evil_level:evil
# # select 'evil_level' from:
# sick, nauseous, disgusting, noxious, vicious, queasy, severe, smelly,
# evil, nasty, ill, bad, rank, unpleasant, ugly, gross, wicked, festy,
# dangerous, disreputably

OPTION=evil_modifier:definite
# # select 'evil_modifier' (more than one can be specified) from:
# absolutely, definite, extraordinary, extremely, unforgiven, merciless

Janis

On Saturday, March 18, 2023 at 2:04:24 PM UTC-4, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 18.03.2023 10:00, Erik L wrote:
> >>
> > Oh cool, this does just reply direct to my email so very easy to keep
> > up to date.
> (I haven't done anything else than as usual posting to this newsgroup.)
> >
If you use Google Groups it emails you replies and you can reply right
within the email website.
>
> OPTIONS=evil_level:evil
> #
> # select 'evil_level' from:
> # sick, nauseous, disgusting, noxious, vicious, queasy, severe, smelly,
> # evil, nasty, ill, bad, rank, unpleasant, ugly, gross, wicked, festy,
> # dangerous, disreputably
>
> OPTION=evil_modifier:definite
> #
> # select 'evil_modifier' (more than one can be specified) from:
> # absolutely, definite, extraordinary, extremely, unforgiven, merciless
>

Yeah! I want to comment out the firearms in Slash'EM! Military or guild
does not bother me so much.

--

On 19.03.2023 02:55, RecRanger wrote:
>
> Yeah! I want to comment out the firearms in Slash'EM!

The only interesting thing from a game-play point of view I
consider the grenades with it's interesting effects. I would
change the object type, though, to become a bomb, the thing
we often see depicted as an iron ball with a burning fuse...

*
_\/_
/ \
\____/

> Military or guild does not bother me so much.

The Guild is so extremely large that players either die (if
unaware) or you have to use some safe means to handle them,
like a cockatrice corpse while standing around a tight corner.
Neither is adding anything interesting to the game! - As a
first step one could reduce the number of player characters;
currently there's two from every existing role. I'd at least
reduce it to one per role or even choose only a random subset
of the existing role (to provide some diversity in what one
can expect there).

Janis

On Saturday, March 18, 2023 at 11:00:02 PM UTC-4, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 19.03.2023 02:55, RecRanger wrote:
> >
> > Yeah! I want to comment out the firearms in Slash'EM!
> The only interesting thing from a game-play point of view I
> consider the grenades with it's interesting effects. I would
> change the object type, though, to become a bomb, the thing
> we often see depicted as an iron ball with a burning fuse...
>
> *
> _\/_
> / \
> \____/

Yes, black powder, gun powder, has been used since, what, the 12th century?
So, it is not completely out of place. But machine guns? Sniper rifles?!

> > Military or guild does not bother me so much.
> The Guild is so extremely large that players either die (if
> unaware) or you have to use some safe means to handle them,
> like a cockatrice corpse while standing around a tight corner.
> Neither is adding anything interesting to the game! - As a
> first step one could reduce the number of player characters;
> currently there's two from every existing role. I'd at least
> reduce it to one per role or even choose only a random subset
> of the existing role (to provide some diversity in what one
> can expect there).
>

Yes, The Guild has either made or broken a lot of characters for me.
If you can survive it, without them _using_ everything, you can get a very
nice potion, scroll and wand haul. Not to mention all of the armor and
polyfodder. I try to sleep them as much as I can.

However, one of the last games I played, I had character get hit hard with
player characters with wands of draining. Went from mid-20's to level
one! So, I had really buff character, armor and equipment-wise, at level 1.
I tried to go back to the earlier levels to re-up my levels, but ultimately
just parked the character out of utter frustration.

--

On Sunday, March 19, 2023 at 4:00:02 AM UTC+1, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 19.03.2023 02:55, RecRanger wrote:
> >
> > Yeah! I want to comment out the firearms in Slash'EM!
> The only interesting thing from a game-play point of view I
> consider the grenades with it's interesting effects. I would
> change the object type, though, to become a bomb, the thing
> we often see depicted as an iron ball with a burning fuse...
>
> *
> _\/_
> / \
> \____/
> > Military or guild does not bother me so much.
> The Guild is so extremely large that players either die (if
> unaware) or you have to use some safe means to handle them,
> like a cockatrice corpse while standing around a tight corner.
> Neither is adding anything interesting to the game! - As a
> first step one could reduce the number of player characters;
> currently there's two from every existing role. I'd at least
> reduce it to one per role or even choose only a random subset
> of the existing role (to provide some diversity in what one
> can expect there).
>
> Janis

Interesting, I pretty much did these exact two thing: grenades were converted to bombs (they work slightly differently, but mostly the same. In SLASH'EM, a group of bombs would simultaneously explode so that any bomb would contribute to the explosion. When I looked at the code for this, my brain partially melted so I imported the version from SpliceHack. I modified it so that a bomb's fuse can be light if exposed to fire, and also when players throw bombs they will explode on contact (mirroring how it works for monsters). I still admire the explosion code from SLASH'EM, but it is multiple levels of recursion and almost impossible to follow how it works.

I also don't really like the guild level from SLASH'EM - it's pretty unbalanced because if you are ready for it, it's a huge item dump and if you aren't ready for it it's certain death. In either case it's tedious to clear and the player monsters tend to escape with wands of digging (or scrolls of teleport) so you usually have to chase lots of them through the rest of the dungeon. I elected to completely remove that level and replace it with much smaller "mini guild" special rooms, that have a mix of player monsters and their pets. The player monsters from EvilHack are definitely tougher and smarter than vanilla style, so a full level of them would be a nightmare. The mini guilds only start showing up after level 15.

On 19.03.2023 05:11, RecRanger wrote:
>
> Yes, black powder, gun powder, has been used since, what, the 12th century?
> So, it is not completely out of place.

Yep.

> But machine guns? Sniper rifles?!

Only interesting for fans of the (US) NRA, I suppose.

>
> Yes, The Guild has either made or broken a lot of characters for me.
> If you can survive it, without them _using_ everything, you can get a very
> nice potion, scroll and wand haul. Not to mention all of the armor and
> polyfodder. I try to sleep them as much as I can.
>
> However, one of the last games I played, I had character get hit hard with
> player characters with wands of draining. Went from mid-20's to level
> one! So, I had really buff character, armor and equipment-wise, at level 1.
> I tried to go back to the earlier levels to re-up my levels, but ultimately
> just parked the character out of utter frustration.

Well, that wand is generally a problem you'd constantly should have
on your awareness list. At the Guild with all its offensive wands
it's standard equipment. Unless I happen to miss the level drains -
not so much at the Guild where I expect that - but else. That's the
reason why I try to instant-stone these Guild player monsters. With
drain resistance one can of course play more careless here.

Another nuisance with that level is that these monsters with all
their wands and potions also escape to other levels; you have to
hunt them levels up (because of their cursed gain level potions) or
many levels down (with their wands of digging). Quite boring.

And all that loot is mostly just ballast, getting your 30th wand of
striking or your 40th wand of magic missile.

I've never got reduced to XL 1. That's hard! - After having played
thousands, even ten-thousands of turns to start from the beginning,
that's frustrating.

Janis

On 19.03.2023 06:57, Erik L wrote:
>
> Interesting, I pretty much did these exact two thing: grenades were
> converted to bombs (they work slightly differently, but mostly the
> same. [...]

Nice!

> [...] I still admire the
> explosion code from SLASH'EM, but it is multiple levels of recursion
> and almost impossible to follow how it works.

If you mean a recursive implementation (of chain reactions); I think
that's okay, because every single recursion is well defined; usually
functions and their behavior are clearer formulated with recursion.
(But mileages certainly vary, and it depends also on the actual code
quality.)

>
> I also don't really like the guild level from SLASH'EM - it's pretty
> unbalanced because if you are ready for it, it's a huge item dump and
> if you aren't ready for it it's certain death. [...]

Exactly.

> [...] I elected to completely remove that level

I think even completely removing the Guild wouldn't be a bad decision.

> and replace it with much smaller "mini guild" special
> rooms, that have a mix of player monsters and their pets. The player
> monsters from EvilHack are definitely tougher and smarter than
> vanilla style, so a full level of them would be a nightmare. The mini
> guilds only start showing up after level 15.

Meeting randomly one or two in the deeper dungeon levels - I suppose
that would be like in EvilHack? - I'd consider sufficient.

But a mini-club of 3-5 player monsters would also be an advance.

Janis

Hi Eric

On 18.03.2023 07:25, Erik L wrote:
>
> Janis, hello I'm Erik (hackemslashem), I've actually read a bunch of
> your posts over the years. I have developed a variant called Hack'EM,
> which I originally based on EvilHack, but my main intention was to
> port SLASH'EM to the 3.6.x codebase. I have also ported a lot of
> stuff from other variants (Splice, Un, xnh, THEM, dnh, etc, and of
> course Evil) so it's not SLASH'EM exclusive. Anyway, you might enjoy
> it, check out the wiki page for info on the changes:
> https://nethackwiki.com/wiki/Hack%27EM. It's also live on hardfought
> and has a windows binary available if you need it
> (https://github.com/elunna/hackem/releases/tag/v1.1.0).
>
> If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very
> much in development. I'm not sure if replies here will show up in my
> email, but I'll try to check back. Otherwise I'm usually in the
> #hackem and #evilhack IRC channels on libera, or on the roguelikes
> discord.

I'm coming back to your post after having switched to Hack'EM, now
playing it for about a week. I read (parts of) the Wiki page, and
occasionally I had a peek into the source files (objects, artilist,
monst, and some *.des files). Not much experience yet to provide a
qualified response. But since I'm not active any more here in RGRN -
apologies if some open replies have remained unread and unanswered -
I wanted to provide some impressions at least about your suggestion
to try out Hack'EM since you explicitly asked for my opinion.

My first characters died, and I suppose my current randomly chosen
dwarven Valkyrie is still alive at T:35k because it's as in Vanilla
one of the easier race/role combinations. I finished Sokoban and the
Mines, and I had just visited the Town branch. Early altars provided
a good melee artifact, the Gungdir (a spear), and later I also got
Mjollnir (never used it; the expert +5 artifact spear is very good).
I also got the artifact shield Pridwen, and I am currently at Expert
skill (and I'm able to enhance it to Master, but yet abstained due
to the skill slot limits and skill management tactics).

The problem with that game was that I did not find any portable bag
or sack, most vulnerable items (scrolls and potions) thus stashed at
various places and unidentified. All the spear variants I collected
for ranged attacks occupied quite some inventory slots as well, but
having an effective ranged missile attack proved to be quite good to
survive. Very late I finally found a leather bag, but I mistook it
for a medical kit, so only a lot later I tried to put things into
that bag. Two blessed smoky potions got only one vanishing djinn.
A late appearing magic lamp - the haunted orc mine town had only
oil lamps - got blessed and the djinn provided Perseus' Wallet,
thanks to the artifact wish counting implementation! The fun thing
was that the previously found bag was also a bag of holding, as a
full inventory identification showed; it didn't occur to me that
this "leather bag" could also be this sort of bag (something I'll
have to get used to, and next time I know). - Good that I haven't
tried to put that bag into the artifact bag of holding by accident.

The levels thus far were fine. I did not miss Gollum's branch.
Being able to enter mine-town - even though the orc variant isn't
that interesting - was good. I had some respect for the mines-end
level; on entry I feared it was that "Deluxe variant", but it
turned out that it was the beehive-level. I finished it without
problems but abstained from the air elementals and left the wand
where it was, didn't descend deeper. Had a luckstone, so I left.
Some new Sokoban levels were not as hard as I perceived Slashem's,
and the zoo could be cleared with some care taken. The bad news
was that I didn't get the bag but a marker. (See above about my
dire need for some bag at that stage.) I cannot say that I like
the predominant implementation in some variants that determine
the prize randomly; I think it would be okay to have the 1-in-3
choice of the prize type without an additional 50% random choice.
I would find it better if all these items could be found in some
branches (like Slashem's speed boots @spiders or magic lamp @sea).
But okay. The Town branch was also new to me and from the infos I
had I wasn't quite sure how the design actually is. In practice
it was (in my game) three levels (the dat/*.des files show more);
open land with rivers, then some detailed level with thugs, and
a final town level (resembling one of Slashem's kobold levels).
The documentation about the level design provides some more infos
(longer branches instead of single-level branches, cavernous hell,
outdoor sceneries) and the Town branch already shows that very
well. I like it.

The monsters I met were manageable; but I also had an excellent
artifact weapon and don't know how that would be with a race/role
that isn't as easy as a dwarven Valkyrie. On the Wiki page I read
that there's locusts and shambling horrors, but yet I haven't met
these in this variant. I've already written (for another variant)
what I think about these monsters in general and especially if
they appear early. I cannot tell whether I was just lucky to not
have met them, or whether they appear later in Hack'EM. I don't
think adding these as I know them from Evilhack is a good thing.

Yet I don't know how many instant-deaths are to expect; after my
recent experiences in Evilhack (and since there's a lot borrowed
from that variant) I fear that I had been just lucky in my game.
(So I cannot yet tell an opinion here about that crucial point.)

Generally it seems that variants borrow features from each other,
thus adding a lot of complexity. Personally I think that the
resulting bazillions of combinations (thinking of weapon types
and materials) add more to complexity than to game-play. Maybe
we can consider that junk pile of object variants littering the
dungeons as a realistic picture of our consumer-item-polluted
Real Life earth. ;-) Some changes I read about in the Wiki seem
quite reasonable to me, but yet I've seen and experienced only a
subset. Certainly worth further exploration.

So much for my first impression on Hack'EM. - Happy hacking! :-)

Janis

On 02.05.2023 19:45, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> On 18.03.2023 07:25, Erik L wrote:
>>
>> If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very
>> much in development. [...]

Erik, another thing I already elaborated on in a post about Evilhack
and just noticed in the current game...

After I accidentally hit a monster from an Elbereth square and I got
the message "You feel like a hypocrite." I inspected my alignment
record, and it now says: "You have seriously abused your alignment."
No idea what I did beyond that mishap to get that penalty - I assume
it is irreversible, as in origin. Needless to say that what I think
to be a bad design element in one variant...

Janis

>> On 18.03.2023 07:25, Erik L wrote:
>>>
>>> If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very
>>> much in development. [...]

Some more feedback...

Entered the Black Market. I like the layout and having specific shops.
The warning message at the beginning made me ask myself whether my
usual robbing tactics would also work in Hack'EM, but I didn't dare
to try that out. - But it also seems not necessary; some swamp ferns
turned up and some shopkeepers tried to kill them - they died, and
they left the shops unattended, and I'm free to take the items with
me, it seems. Moreover, these monsters seem to reproduce themselves
("The swamp fern releases a spore!")? - So I suppose that there's a
new simple way to rob the Black Market without getting into troubles?
Though, I'm not sure that this was intended.

Janis

On 04.05.2023 14:15, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
>>> On 18.03.2023 07:25, Erik L wrote:
>>>>
>>>> If you check it out, let me know what you think - it's still very
>>>> much in development. [...]
>
> Some more feedback...
>
> Entered the Black Market. [...]

Game over.

Some monster inflicted Fear at me. I had no control; my moves were
directed towards a shop that I managed to enter. I could even lock
the door, but that fearsome monster entered the door square and
continued his attacks. The fear attack lasted too long, I tried a
desperate teleport zap at that monster (with the shopkeeper close
and all these items around). I was sure that chances will be high
that I miss and get all the negative effects from the Black Market
but I that place isn't allowing self-teleports, I think. When the
shopkeeper got mad my HPs dropped quickly. Then the in-game Fear
vanished while my real-life fear to lose that fabulous character
emerged. A desperate zap of teleport at the shopkeeper to obtain
some time to sort myself lead to summoned humans around me. Not
even one breath later I was dead.

It's a pity; I had collected quite some items in the Market to
further develop my equipment. A lot of scrolls of enchant armor
(that were rare in the game; found just one), quite some scrolls
of identify (for all the unknown loot I collected; previously I
I got only one full-ID). The ring-shop wasn't yet raided (I was
still missing some important rings), but that shop was the source
of these spores that had killed the shopkeepers, so I intended to
get there later. There was also a potion shop, but many monsters
seem to have equipped themselves with potions so I couldn't tell
whether there were still interesting ones for me. Amongst the yet
unidentified items were +4 speed boots.

I don't recall what monster it was that inflicted Fear on me
(a bodak or banshee maybe). Anyway. - What would be the defense
against a fear-attack? Would a blindfold have already helped?
Reading annihilation would probably have been a bad idea while
being under the fear-effect?

Janis

> I don't recall what monster it was that inflicted Fear on me
> (a bodak or banshee maybe). Anyway. - What would be the defense
> against a fear-attack? Would a blindfold have already helped?
> Reading annihilation would probably have been a bad idea while
> being under the fear-effect?
>
> Janis

In the early game, easiest way to cure fear is to quaff booze.
The best way is a ring of psychic protection (cures + protects).
To defend against getting the fear: depends if it's sound or sight based.
Yes, blindfold helps against sight-based attacks. In case of sound, you need sonic protection (or some way to be deaf).
Some armor items have the sonic protection property, toque has it inherently.
There is also a ring of sonic.
Dragonbane defends against all fear attacks by dragons.
Fear affects your movements, but all other actions should still work as normal.

At the Hardfought(EU) server I got with Hack'EM this message
(with recent messages first, reverse order)...

Message History

[missing block message summary for #00305]
You kill Grund the Orc King!
Grund the Orc King's steel dented pot deflects your attack.
You strike Grund the Orc King!
Grund the Orc King's steel dented pot blocks your attack.
You are still in a pit.
...

Janis

On 19.03.2023 06:57, Erik L wrote:
>
> Interesting, I pretty much did these exact two thing: grenades were
> converted to bombs (they work slightly differently, but mostly the
> same. In SLASH'EM, a group of bombs would simultaneously explode so
> that any bomb would contribute to the explosion. When I looked at the
> code for this, my brain partially melted so I imported the version
> from SpliceHack. I modified it so that a bomb's fuse can be light if
> exposed to fire, and also when players throw bombs they will explode
> on contact (mirroring how it works for monsters). I still admire the
> explosion code from SLASH'EM, but it is multiple levels of recursion
> and almost impossible to follow how it works.

I'm currently at Grund's level. In the one treasure boxes I found (as
designed) some bombs. But one of these was an artifact: "a fire bomb
named Hand Grenade of Antioch". - And according to the Wiki it seems
to deal amazing damage (6d50). What monster would be an appropriate
target for it?

Then I sat on the altar. I got an item-identification - after having
used many scrolls of identify to only get few items identified. But
this altar-ID identified everything - yes, _everything_, including
all the items in my bag.

Janis

> I'm currently at Grund's level. In the one treasure boxes I found (as
> designed) some bombs. But one of these was an artifact: "a fire bomb
> named Hand Grenade of Antioch". - And according to the Wiki it seems
> to deal amazing damage (6d50). What monster would be an appropriate
> target for it?

Perhaps Kas in the Chaos branch - he is difficult to hit (low AC) and hits extremely hard.
But the couple of times I found the grenade I ignored it for fear of killing myself somehow.
Could quaff a potion of invulnerability first...

> Then I sat on the altar. I got an item-identification - after having
> used many scrolls of identify to only get few items identified. But
> this altar-ID identified everything - yes, _everything_, including
> all the items in my bag.

That's a really fun Hack'EM feature!

I was careful with the Lawful quest level, since I didn't know
what changes were implemented in Hack'EM.

First surprise was that the dragon corpse chamber that I entered
first was lacking all the dragon corpses! I planned to obtain the
gray dragon scales from the maze moat island, but I feared that a
teleport-zap might wake the arch-lich; only later I noticed that
I was lacking the necessary tool, a wand of teleport to get these
scales from distance. The monsters were not much of a threat with
my Samurai two-weaponing artifacts, the +6 Kiku-ichimonji and the
+7 Grayswandir. The rot worms were approached carefully, and the
elementals as well. The mind flayer chamber contained three of
them. My plan was to place a stinking cloud in their mid from a
safe Elbereth square. - Something went wrong; for one my lighting
tool was unlit - I think I forgot to light it again after leaving
an elemental - so I couldn't see the targets, then the Elbereth
I thought to have burnt into the ground was ineffective - maybe
I was just too tired for playing and simply forgot to engrave?
Whatever. They sucked my brain out of me - of course I missed
as well to grease my helmet in advance! - and therefore I forgot
a lot of my weapon proficiency; needed to retire to have some
more training before meeting all the nymphs and Nebuchadnezzar.
The nymphs where only a minor nuisance, stolen loot recovered.
Since the quest nemesis is a human I didn't attempt Elbereth.
A zap from cancellation seems to have been ineffective and the
charge wasted - I still have one charge to cancel the cursed
-9 dragon scales later. On my way back to the portal with the
Key of Access in my possession I met a bodak who dropped gray
dragon scales. - No wand of teleport necessary. Thanks buddy!
At least I've got quite some prizes from that quest; I also
got the long desired amulet of flying from the mind flayers'
chest (the eleventh amulet in my collection). Continuing...

Janis

On Tuesday, May 9, 2023 at 3:46:41 PM UTC-7, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
> I was careful with the Lawful quest level, since I didn't know
> what changes were implemented in Hack'EM.
>
> First surprise was that the dragon corpse chamber that I entered
> first was lacking all the dragon corpses! [...]

As I recall from playing slash'em nearly 20 years ago, that
could happen with it too. The room was random among a
set of 4 or 6 and the corpse pile with cancelled tinning kit
might be near the entrance or farther away. When not near
the entrance, it could take quite a while to wade through
a few patrolling werewolves and their summoned wolves.
The corpses in that pile had normal rot timeouts and only
lasted on the order of 250 turns.

I had a slash'em monk who had kept vegetarian conduct
for quite a while but eventually accidentally broke it. After
that, I ignored dietary issues and ate what I pleased. When
I reached that level, the corpses were right by the entrance.
I ate a black dragon corpse and got disintegration resistance.
(That character eventually choked to death on the vibrating
square level by eating something inconsequential like a
brown mold which was consumed too soon after having
eaten some other dragon corpse. At least it was memorable.)

On 10.05.2023 21:09, Pat Rankin wrote:
> On Tuesday, May 9, 2023 at 3:46:41 PM UTC-7, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
>> I was careful with the Lawful quest level, since I didn't know
>> what changes were implemented in Hack'EM.
>>
>> First surprise was that the dragon corpse chamber that I entered
>> first was lacking all the dragon corpses! [...]
>
> As I recall from playing slash'em nearly 20 years ago, that
> could happen with it too. The room was random among a
> set of 4 or 6 and the corpse pile with cancelled tinning kit
> might be near the entrance or farther away. When not near
> the entrance, it could take quite a while to wade through
> a few patrolling werewolves and their summoned wolves.
> The corpses in that pile had normal rot timeouts and only
> lasted on the order of 250 turns.

My own experience from Slashem's Lawful quest is quite consolidated
with more than 150 (maybe 180) visits. When arriving "in time" (i.e.
before the corpses had a chance to decay) I found _all_ existing
dragon corpses. A quick look into the source files confirms that
there all corpses initially there, no conditional restrictions.

WRT my current Hack'EM game the wyrm room of the Lawful quest was
adjacent to the entry room, and immediately visited. (As far as my
old memory serves.) There were some other monsters (of type 'a'
IIRC) besides the wyrms, and my instant suspicion was that these
monsters might have ate the corpses; this would be the simplest
explanation (if it applies), so I spare the time to get and inspect
the ttyrecs for the moment.

>
> I had a slash'em monk who had kept vegetarian conduct
> for quite a while but eventually accidentally broke it. After
> that, I ignored dietary issues and ate what I pleased. When
> I reached that level, the corpses were right by the entrance.
> I ate a black dragon corpse and got disintegration resistance.

Yes, that matches my usual procedures as well. (If I find - not
stepped onto - the portal I typically wait for any satiation to
wear off before entering, to avoid choking and to get the free
disintegration resistance or what other resistance appears to be
most important.)

> (That character eventually choked to death on the vibrating
> square level by eating something inconsequential like a
> brown mold which was consumed too soon after having
> eaten some other dragon corpse. At least it was memorable.)

Yeah, stupid deaths are memorable. As my current Hack'EM Samurai
who was inattentive; first he missed to switch from pick-axe back
to two-weaponing the +6 artifact longsword and the +7 Grayswandir,
and then waited too long to cure the "term-ill" from a gray fungus.
Too bad I couldn't check out this holy grenade of Antioch in my
stash, or all these pills from a nurse-populated hospital. Stupid
me. And lucky who will find these bones...

Janis