Relic Wraiths (Player Ghosts)

[wizzzargh]

I haven't really read the thread but I approve

[Sandman25]

To make it clear I would be happy if summoners were optional too though I realize it is not going to happen. The risk/reward ratio is not that good for them especially provided you have to kill them in a special way i.e. don't kill summoner without getting its demons to heavily wounded state first.

[Ferret]

Since it's of some interest perhaps, the first draft of the resistance tables ghosts will have. If a ghost possesses Soul Armor, it will remove a randomly selected weakness.

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                Sla  Imp  Pie  Fir  Ice  Ele  Bod  Min  Lgt  Drk
CrownGlory                               Wek  Wek  Res  Res  Res
HandDead                       Wek  Res       Res       Wek  Res
TitanFist       Res  Res  Res  Wek  Wek  Wek
OrbPower        Wek  Wek  Wek  Res  Res  Res  Imm  Imm       Wek
DragonEye                      Res  Res  Res  Wek  Wek  Wek 
FaithfulHeart                  Res  Wek  Res  Imm  Wek  Res  Res
VodunMask                           Res  Wek  Imm       Wek  Res

For the most part, the odds are of getting a weakness vs. resistance/immunity in any given element are roughly matched, with the exceptions of Body and Dark. Of course, a ghost's demons have their usual resistances, so you'll still find use for Body/Dark spells even in those cases probably.

BTW: Probably also a good time to point out that when I'm using the word "ghost", I'm referring to a mechanic more so than what these things actually are. This statement will make more sense once the art is available to show you.

[Ferret]

One other note: Ghosts will not necessarily be connected to the floor you actually died on. They will be connected to the last "new floor" you discovered. In many cases, this will be the floor you actually died on anyway... but there are some edge cases where it won't be. (Example: If you clear Anomaly, then die on the floor that you entered Anomaly from. This example also probably serves to illustrate why it works this way: a post-Anomaly ghost appearing on the floor with the Anomaly's entrance would probably be a bit broken. )

[Ferret]

I'm also not certain ghosts will use the "relic explosion" mechanic yet either, by the by. I've been thinking about it and I'm not sure I want that for ghosts. Fighting 6+ Demon-made demons is one thing, fighting 6+ player made demons at once is quite another.

[mbj]

You could leave it in on the first pass and see what people think. I mean you have to specifically go out of your way and do certain things to summon the ghost, so no one is going to get screwed over that wasn't asking for it.

[Ferret]

Yeah, that's a fair option too. "They asked for it" only works up to a point though: I don't mind ghosts being really tough due to that, just want to make sure they don't become unwinnable or exceptionally trolly in some cases.

[nikheizen]

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                Sla  Imp  Pie  Fir  Ice  Ele  Bod  Min  Lgt  Drk
OrbPower        Wek  Wek  Wek  Res  Res  Res  Imm  Imm       Wek
FaithfulHeart                  Res  Wek  Res  Imm  Wek  Res  Res


Probably one of my least favourite things about ghost bones in DCSS is that they get a swathe of resistances which don't really reflect possible player resistances. This seems better, since you haven't indiscriminately given them all body immunity and ice resistance or some such nonsense.

But it still bothers me.

I also agree with sandman25 that I would like if they were completely optional. I have never been a fan of bones files in any roguelike. More predetermined summoners would work much better at emulating PvP in my opinion.

[Ferret]

The resistance tables for the relic wraiths somewhat mirror what you find in the Tower as a whole (i.e.: Physical resistance/weakness is rare, Elemental is common, etc.), with maybe a slight favoring of Body resistance/immunity.

In the first pass, they will be optional in the sense that they will never appear if you don't specifically do something that has a chance to spawn them (searching a corpse, using Enemy Sense's active component (it will no longer be automatic upon full explore), using a Haunting Chime or Mirror Chime)

This doesn't even necessarily have to mean losing the other benefits of those: You can wait until the level is cleared to search corpses, and if you get a ghost, hoof it to the nearest portal, only losing the remaining corpses. There is still some risk involved in that, but fairly diminished: no worse than running from an enemy summoner, at least in theory. You can use Enemy Sense's active component while literally standing on a portal, which will give you a 100% escape if an unwanted ghost appears. As for Haunting Chime and Mirror Chime, you can simply not use them since neither does anything but spawn ghosts.

The only thing you'd be missing out on from that would be the XP/demons from the ghosts, and Demon's already balanced such that even missing entire branches is recoverable, so this isn't likely to have a massive impact, especially since even if you do everything possible to run into ghosts, they'll still be somewhat rare (how rare I haven't decided yet, but somewhere around the rarity level of other special encounters such as heroes and summoners is likely.)

[Ferret]

Some final little details:

There are currently 4 ways to encounter a Relic Wraith. Here is the list, including the odds of it happening, and the spawning method used.

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Source_____________Chance______Spawn Method_____Notes_________________________________
Searching Corpse   3%          By Floor         Roughly 9 Corpses per floor.
Enemy Lure         25%         By Floor         Recharges upon entering a new floor.
Haunting Chime     100%        By Level         Rare item.
Mirror Chime       100%        Clone            Rare item.


By Floor: Attempts to spawn an offline or online generated ghost that is haunting the floor the event happened on (this is, as previously discussed, NOT necessarily the same floor the player that generated the ghost actually died on, to prevent post-Anomaly suicide epidemics among the troll population.)

By Level: Attempts to spawn an offline or online generated ghost whose summoner level is *very* close to the player's current level. Prior to Level 10, *very close* means *match exactly*. From 10 on, a tiny amount of variance is allowed (+/-1 until Level 30, then +/-2 until Level 50, etc.) This is inherently more dangerous than by floor, since one player may have reached higher floors by the same level than another player did. However, it also increases the chance a relevant ghost will actually be found. Be careful using Haunting Chimes, especially at XL 10 or higher!

Clone: Creates a hostile relic wraith of the player and their party, following the normal rules for relic wraiths. I'm sure some of our more creative summoners will find ways to (ab)use this beyond just another bag of XP and demons.

Finally, one note on all ghost spawning: Each time By Floor or By Level is used, it (randomly) prefers either online or offline ghosts for that particular spawn, and will use a ghost from that source if available. However, if a ghost from the preferred source is not available, it will attempt the other method too. A ghost spawn only fails if neither offline or online data has a relevant ghost.

However! If a ghost spawn fails, there are currently no takebacksies: an Enemy Lure that tries to spawn a ghost doesn't go back and try to spawn a normal or cryptid encounter instead, and a Haunting Chime used when there are no relevant ghosts is simply lost with no effect. Extra chances for demon recruiting and XP are powerful enough where I will not grieve over this much, especially since it is a self-correcting problem. (Both of the obvious fixes: asking the server ahead of time about ghost availability, and having the ability to "redo but don't do this" on ability/item usage, have issues that aren't worth tackling for this situation.)