[CF-Devel] Revival of old paralysis proposal

[Peter Mardahl]

Repeated paralysis (even of short duration, like 2 ticks)
is still a problem if you're bathing in paralysis spells.

Long ago I proposed a scheme like this:

1)  If person gets paralyzed, when he recovers, he is
safe from paralysis spells/attacks of equal or lower level
for a certain amount of time

2)  If he saves from paralyze, he is safe from paralysis
spells/attacks of equal or lower level for a certain amount
of time

3)  Protection should *also* reduce paralyzation duration.

This won't be hard to implement.  Whenever you hit
someone with paralysis, you put a force into him 
(if not already present).  If a paralysis spell detects
this force at equal or higher strength, it won't paralyze.

Then, after you check/place the force, you check to see if the
player makes his saving throw or not.

If not, THEN you paralyze him for a few ticks.

This can work similarly for monsters, except they'd (to make
the game fun) be paralyzed for more ticks.

A similar approach is also sorely needed for deathstrike spells
such as banishment and face of death.  These spells hit many times,
and each time they have a chance of causing instadeath.  Each
spell should get ONE chance to instadeath a monster, not dozens.

I really think this approach can save the paralysis attack from its present
irrelevance, and bring a far better balance to the various deathstrikes.

PM


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      Tim Rightnour wrote:
     
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      > 
     
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      > On 22-Nov-01 Peter Mardahl wrote:
     
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      > > I think the game is too fast to allow anything more than
     
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      > > split-second paralysis, because otherwise, you may
     
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      > > as well make paralyze an instant deathstrike.
     
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      > 
     
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      > I don't have a problem with split-second paralysis, thats not so bad.  As l
     
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     ong
     
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      > as you can't get yourself into a box where you are getting paralized repeat
     
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     edly
     
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      > and can't do anything about it.  Long drawn out paralysis is harsh though.
     
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       Thats the difficult part.
     
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       IF paralysis just lasted say 5 ticks (a bit more than half a second), it is 
     
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     a
     
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      pretty big disadvantage. If you happen to get paralyzed and then some damage
     
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      spell is cast, that will hurt.
     
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       Note that protection from paralysis could effect that (eg, if you are 60%
     
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      protected, it is now 2 ticks).
     
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       The difficulty is preventing the case where you just continually get
     
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      paralyzed.  If you are just fighting one monster with the spell, chances are 
     
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     you
     
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      are OK (because the monster will probably choose some other spell to cast or 
     
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     you
     
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      may make your saving throw or whatever).  The problem is lots of maps have li
     
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     ke
     
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      20 beholders, of which a non trivial portion will cast paralyze, making it so
     
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      you may constantly get hit by it.
     
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       Making it so it prevents movement could be interesting (eg, paralyzes your l
     
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     eg
     
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      muscles only).  This means you could still drink those potions or cast those
     
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      spells (including remove paralysis) to survive it.  This would make it simila
     
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     r
     
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      to confusion right now in some sense.  However, if this option is chosen, the
     
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     n
     
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      it should still have a longer duration.  For monsters, it could still complet
     
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     ely
     
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      paralyze them.  Putting in code to do this would not be that difficult - just
     
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      need to check to see if the player is paralyzed in the movement routines.
     
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