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[baconman]

Well, shit. Was this about 1-2 hours ago? I was backing up some stuff on my box.net too, and for some reason it never finished processing, even though right now they're < 500 kb.

[st33d]

Rackspace and Parallels have royally fucked up.

The reseller I work with is getting bullshitted by both of them whilst they're trying to patch an exploit in their site management software.

My site's up, but I still can't FTP.

Pressing ahead with the Confusion spell at the moment. Only 3 spells left!

[st33d]

Update 325

Fixed some general bugs and...

Fear Rune

Any character targeted by this spell is subject to be tracked down a new monster called a Horror.

Horror's pass through all other creatures, moving at %75 of their victim's speed. On contact they drain the victim's entire health within 3 seconds.

You will know them as the player by their black shape and the particles that drip off them, sliding across the floor. You will also hear snatches of the title theme from the click-thru screen. I've had a chat to Nathan tonight about sounds for the Horrors based on his track Slid, I feel it's apt that the title music is the theme tune of Fear.

Horror's targeting monsters are red. They will make monster's run away until attacked and will also deliver the same damage.

I've also started work on the confusion spell. It's in the list but only the player effect is in so far.

By the way: There will be Fear and Confusion traps. I will make you afraid of the Horrors.

[JobLeonard]

This sounds very, very brutal. This game is getting more and more roguelike with every iteration.

[st33d]

Update 326

Confusion Rune

Any character targeted by this spell becomes confused.

For characters this means random behaviour. They don't know who to attack, or where to go. Sometimes they fight back, the next second they run away.

For the player - you get your screen flipped randomly.

Werewolves now suffer from periodic confusion.

Don't forget that the umber hulks can confuse you now, and banshees can hit you with fear...

Working on graphics for a while now as I prepare for the final 2 runes: Holy and Chaos.

[JMickle]

Where do horrors generate? off the screen, or from the thing that cast fear on you?

[st33d]

A random floor location is selected that's not too close and not too far from the victim. They rise out of the floor, then they chase down their victim.

[st33d]

Quick bug fix 328

Entering Underworld was broken - fixed. And implemented some advice Nate suggested about damping the volume of voices vertically displaced. Technically what I've done is multiply the vertical distance, so there should be a bit more lateral range to your hearing now.

EDIT: Someone on another forum reported a bug with the quests - I had a typo where it updated the completion status of the level. Fixed now. All praise playtesters.

[baconman]

Reminds me of the spooks from Spelunker. Scary stuff indeed, especially if they're coming from below you! >.> I'm guessing there's a way to ward off the Horrors, or maybe they'll go away after a certain amount of time?

They already sound like the nastiest thing since the Hot Dog movie...

[st33d]

They currently exist for 1 second per level of the spell.

They can be destroyed by eating a null rune, you can teleport away, or simply leave the level.

Edit: Hrmm. I haven't tested what happens with indifference armour and Horrors. I think the collision is still active, I'll have to turn that off.

[mokesmoe]

Is it possible to get a cursed indifference normally? I noticed it was possible to make one in debug, even though other broken combinations like a leech enchanted with leech wasn't possible.

[st33d]

No. The debug menu forces a curse state, other curse activations go through a method that checks the type of item.

I've just realised though that you could technically polymorph a cursed item into indifference. I will put in a fix for that.

[Rumrusher]

No. The debug menu forces a curse state, other curse activations go through a method that checks the type of item.

I've just realised though that you could technically polymorph a cursed item into indifference. I will put in a fix for that.

Is this a random chance of cursed armor turning into indifference and you don't want the idea of someone rolling lucky?

[st33d]

You'd effectively be locked out of the game unless you had spells to remove the armour or make you undead.

The trouble I had with the level generator many builds ago underlines how much I can't simply assume that some events are so rare they won't matter.

[Rumrusher]

You'd effectively be locked out of the game unless you had spells to remove the armour or make you undead.

The trouble I had with the level generator many builds ago underlines how much I can't simply assume that some events are so rare they won't matter.

hmm if someone ends up like that won't the entire game turn into pocket minion/@?

[st33d]

Small Update 329

Quick update before I get stuck into all the art required for the Holy rune:

Fixed the cursed indifference polymorph issue.

Added Fear and Confusion traps (down in Caves and Chaos). Swapped the order of Fear and Confusion runes (Fear is obviously a lot more dangerous now than I originally planned it to be).

[st33d]

Note to self: Werewolves spamming the console with their confusion status needs to stop, the underworld portal is causing a bug when the minion returns and there seems to be a multiple equip bug (also the minion-auto-equip doesn't seem to be working either).

[st33d]

Small Update 330

Updated graphics for the traps and secret areas - more visible and they animate now.

Removed the confusion status print out.

The background in chaos is now animated with automata that crawl over its surface, constantly changing it.

Still more bugs to fix, and all of the graphics for Holy are in now so that spell should be in fairly soon.

[st33d]

Update 332

Changes

Fixed auto-equip logic.

Random enchantments from Identify have been reduced.

Rakshasas now have chaos as their racial attack.

Racial attacks are now guaranteed to be cast when a critical hit is landed.

Spell effects on items will be listed as "?" until the rune associated is identified. This also affects traps. Identify will only reveal names if you have the runes in your inventory.

Holy Rune

Eating a holy rune will either cause an instant heal or a random beneficial spell effect. Throwing a holy rune obliterates the monster it hits.

Enchanting an item with a holy rune will bestow a number of favourable random enchantments upon the item as well as giving it the "blessed" status. Blessed items cannot become cursed.

Blessed weapons have an additional ability to smite. If a critical hit is scored or a roll to smite succeeds (based on the weapon's level), the target will fly through the air and suffer bonus damage when they hit any obstacle.

Holy can bestow effects that may normally be limited to levels far ahead of where the player is in the dungeon. Those effects will always be beneficial. It is the only rune that will not deliberately screw over the player.

Chaos Rune

The chaos rune is basically a random spell. It is unidentifiable.

This is the beginning of the end.

All spells, items and races are now in the game. The special abilities of some races and items are yet to be coded. I will be finishing those off soon as well as overhauling other areas.

[st33d]

Small Update 333

Blessed armour now blocks smite attacks. Because smiting splits the damage between the initial hit and flying into something, this means that smite attacks will do half damage against blessed armour.

THE EXIT KEY IS NOW THE DOWN KEY

When over a portal or stairway, a clean press of the down key will open a dialog asking you to confirm leaving the level.

I've been playing Cave Story recently and I think the model they have for interaction with a clean down press (it doesn't work if you're busy mashing other keys) works well and is intuitive. I presumed that I would need a solid surface for using portals on ledges, but so far it seems fine.

I've resisted putting this in so far because I didn't see a clean way of doing it, but I think the confirmation pop-up and the Cave Story style clean key press is the way forward.

Let us know how you get on with this new system.