Xindaris
Level: Smitemaster

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I don't know why exactly, but I thought it might be fun to come up with, and describe, some intentionally dumb DROD elements--I guess as a weird thought exercise. The hope is to come up with something that might sound reasonable at first, but if you think about actually trying to play with it in a hold you realize how unpleasant it could really be. Or else, to go way over the top and come up with something as ridiculous and stupid as possible.

Anyway, behold the list, and feel free to add to it!

Inconsistent Timeclone: Like a regular timeclone, except it fails to record on any turn where the threat clock displays 10, 20, or 30. When playing back, it skips those moves and goes straight to what came after, so 30 turns of recording become 27 turns of playback. I'd put this in the realm of "theoretically scriptable, maybe, with a lot of difficulty".

Indecisive Roach: These include a Psuedo Random Number Generator in their programming, which is reasonably even in distribution of values but not very complicated--having a cycle of length around 100-200. On every turn, in move-order order, each inconsistent roach reads and progresses this PRNG, using its result to decide whether it should move toward or away from its current Natural Target. So--these technically behave in a predictable and consistent way, but there's no easy and quick way to know what a bunch of them will do on any given turn. Very scriptable, but you definitely shouldn't.

Chadder: Name was selected to be as unpleasant-sounding as possible from alternatives like Chaindder, Gentriyadder, etc. Like an adder, it can eat things and grow longer; its head is its weak point and stabbing it makes it shorter; but unlike an adder, it can't shrink if it's stuck. Like a gentryii, its "tail" is a length of chain instead, and it can and does (try to) move like a roach in all circumstances. Definitely not scriptable...I think. Not without chain-granting/shortening commands being added to DROD script anyway.

H-Bomb: If it is attacked, bumped into, or otherwise disturbed in any way whatsoever, it explodes and blows up the entire room. Its explosions are much more powerful than any normal explosion, destroying even walls, doors, and "invincible" monsters, and it doesn't care about force arrows. It leaves the room (and the entire hold it's in!) a smoldering crater.

Zeeky: Says "the Zeeky words" on turn 30, causing the same explosion effect as the H-bomb. Cannot be killed, but instead must be pushed into a pit or water before it's too late.
...Okay I admit, these last two are actually just references to the Demented Cartoon Movie.

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109th Skywatcher

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 04-29-2024 11:44 PM]

Kalin
Level: Master Delver

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I thought of all sorts of bad ideas for the Zeldrod contest.

Potion Pack:
A complete set of potions. Special command opens a question/answer dialog to choose which of the remaining potions to drink.

Potion Pouch:
Holds up to 3 potions. Pick up a potion by waving your weapon over it. Special command drinks the most recent potion picked up. Allows carrying potions between rooms, but remembers where each came from to prevent duplication.

Sheathe:
Allows you to carry two weapons at a time between rooms, swap with special command. I actually put work into this one, only to discover disarm tokens do not play well with script commands.

Cloak of Displacement:
Monsters behave as if Beethro was five tiles in front of his actual position. Thought I might be able to do this with teleporting before and after monster movement, but what if a monster moves into the actual position? Or if the player faces the room edge?

Fast Oremites:
Instantly eat the metal of any weapons that enter their tile. Spear, Pickaxe, and Caber become Staff; Sword and Dagger are destroyed.

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NoahT
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Not my idea, but we shouldn't forget about the "invulnerable goblin queen that teleports and shoots lasers" concept from this post.

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averagemoe
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Blocks. Just regular Sokoban blocks that can be pushed around like mirrors and powder kegs, but don't have any special features like exploding or reflecting evil eye and aumtlich gazes. They also don't break when stabbed.

I've been told that my concept for bringing back the giant ants mentioned in TSS's Post Mastery commentary wasn't especially inspired.

Those swinging gates from JTRH's concept art look decently cursed, but they actually seemed to work pretty good in the Godkiller, so probably not.

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Xindaris
Level: Smitemaster

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I would say the potion pack ideas sound like decent elements to me. The only problem in terms of "how DROD puzzles are canonically said to supposed to be designed" with the sheath is that it makes rooms interdependent with each other; the scripting really isn't an issue, I think; making it function alongside disarm tokens would require some extra work but sounds quite doable.

As for blocks...well...*Cough*. Although, I introduced "basic" blocks only as a prelude to everything else in that hold, and I guess dropping trapdoors as they pass atop them does count as a special feature.

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109th Skywatcher

Here are some links to Things!

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 04-30-2024 05:40 PM]

Nuntar
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NoahT wrote:
Not my idea, but we shouldn't forget about the "invulnerable goblin queen that teleports and shoots lasers" concept from this post.

That topic is a goldmine of excellent ideas. My favourites are the double-sworded banana, and the boss Infernus, who can "trow a mortal pudge".

averagemoe wrote:
Blocks. Just regular Sokoban blocks that can be pushed around like mirrors and powder kegs, but don't have any special features like exploding or reflecting evil eye and aumtlich gazes. They also don't break when stabbed.

The opals from Avos' Dungeon were pretty well-received.

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Red-XIII
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Inverse brain
The opposite of a regular brain. They send the monsters to the furthest location from Beethro, making it harder/impossible to catch them.

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Someone Else
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Deosil/tuathal snail
A deosil snail moves toward you as much as it can - but it can't turn counter-clockwise (and can only turn up to 45 degrees clockwise). It's "smart" enough to stand in place and spin around if you're slightly counter-clockwise of it, but because of its limitations it's painfully easy to avoid. A tuathal snail is, of course, the opposite.

Dischorran
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conways

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disoriented
Level: Smitemaster

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Red-XIII wrote:
Inverse brain
The opposite of a regular brain. They send the monsters to the furthest location from Beethro, making it harder/impossible to catch them.

Except roach queens.

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azb
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LOL! Brained roach queens as they are act like this already then, so they're technically not impossible to catch because they get stuck on an impassable obstacle or the edge of the room around the center almost all the time.

Red-XIII
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azb wrote:
LOL! Brained roach queens as they are act like this already then, so they're technically not impossible to catch because they get stuck on an impassable obstacle or the edge of the room around the center almost all the time.

True, but what if they were even smarter and avoid being trapped in such ways? Like, when they realize that they are going toward a corner (hence being trapped) they move away to another corner. You could build the room such that you cannot reach her unless you do something specific.

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There's not some other world out there where everything's gonna be okay.
There's just this one, just this rock.
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Rabscuttle
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Calculate furthest square in the room from Beethro. Brained move towards that.

This would no doubt lead them directly past (or through!) Beethro in a lot of cases.

Someone Else
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A variant of the power token which gives mimics tank movement - they move in a way that's relative to their facing (so, if they're not facing the same way as the player, they won't move in the same direction). Thus if you're facing North and move North, each mimic would move in the direction it's facing.

Alternately, a monster mimic. You first choose a monster and then choose a space, and a mimic appears in the space and does whatever the monster you chose does (the mimic doesn't follow you, and the monster is unaffected).