evasion overpowered?!

[nessi]

So, the following build got me to Remgard (without save-reload):
Level 20, IF(1), Evasion (4), 9 of the level-ups into AD , 10 into AC;
Equipped with QSD (ap=3, AC+20), Jewel (attack ap -1), Villain's Leather armour (move ap -1), 2x Villain's ring (AC +50, AD +6-12, HP+8), Gloves of Swift Attack (AC +15), Coward's boots (move ap -1) gives
AC 191%, AD 16-22, 5 attacks or 3 attacks+flee.
Since the fleeing always works with evasion 4 and mobs only attack if they would otherwise move into you, reasonably careful play allows you to take on even the toughest monsters. It just takes some time (to kill the HP 300+ mobs with high DR you have to do the attack-flee-dance about 11 times, similarly for the high BC and high DR mobs on the way).

I haven't completed everything in 0.6.11 (getting to Remgard with that careful play took a good 2 hours and having to take care even against seemingly easy monsters [mountain wolf] makes quests painful), but I think this shows what is possible with 4 points in Evasion (you really won't get hit if you don't want to).

The only sticky situation occurred when fighting a brute (I think) and having one generated right behind me. If that had been a tougher monster or before the attacked monster was down to its last few hitpoints, that would have been it. Also, switching weapons/equipment on the way would have made sense (e.g. when fighting high DR mobs, a more hard-hitting weapon may have been better), but I was too lazy. Also note that this made no use of Legendary or Extraordinary items and only 13 bonemeal potions were used on the way.

Finally, on the way I of course could have levelled up, but chose not to do so (and dying sufficiently often would, I believe, get me down into the proper level 20 range).

Anyway, I'll wait what 0.7 brings to tone down evasion (quickfix: allow only 3 points in evasion so that their is still some risk - alternatively make evasion reduce the risk exponentially, every skillpoint reduces the risk by 3/4 of the current risk giving Evasion 1 = 15%, Evasion 2 = 11.25% (current 10%), Evasion 3 = 8.43% (current 5%), Evasion 4 = 6.33% (current 0%) ...

[Mad P]

This is all very true, but two things have to be taken into consideration:

1) there is an even more powerful "dance" that doesn't require any skillpoints at all: save-attack-reload. Everyone can use that almost anytime, giving not only the benefits of first strike but also retries if the loot wasn't what you expected. So toning down evasion will not help much as long as saving-reloading is this easy.

2) with smarter movement of monsters, the future benefit of evasion remains to be a mystery anyway (see this topic)

[fiernaq]

Mmmmmmm... evasion /drool

Gotta love the ninja/quickstrike build

[nether]

Why run when you can kill? Regret my two levels in evasion.

RIP skillpoints.

[Pyrizzle]

Why run when you can kill? Regret my two levels in evasion.

RIP skillpoints.

On some builds evasion is more useful than others

Crit builds = Evasion is amazing

Defensive builds = who cares I'm a freaking tank.

[nessi]

MadP: yes, I know, but I consider the save-reload dance 'cheating' (in some weak sense). Having grown up on Nethack (if you die - you're dead [except of course if you wear a non-cursed amulet of live saving in which case it 'dies' instead of you]), I wouldn't mind the 'save' taken out of the game (with auto-save whenever you leave). I mean, this game is open source: no one is stopping you to modify the source so that all monsters give a few billion experience and level up to invincible in about 10 minutes. But clearly this is not 'intended'. I also don't think the 'save-reload-dance' is intended, but of course I don't know.
Regarding your second point: conceded. We'll just have to wait and see.

Generally I'm all in favour at making things 'exponential': For every event there is a 'base chance' and spending skills/levels moves the fail chance closer to 0 by a fixed ratio: this is kind of already implemented with AC and BC, but maybe should be generalized and uniformized: so against each monster the hero has a base, naked miss chance, call it p. Spending a level-up on AC would then multiply this base chance by say 95% (i.e. decrease it by 5% of its original value). Spending two level-ups on AC would correspond to multiplying this base chance by 95%*95%=90.25% and so on. Similarly, equipment wouldn't have a +AC value but a 'miss chance multiplier value'. Computation can be reasonably quick if everything is written in terms of exponents and summed (just a sum and then an application of an exponential) or of course cached.
It would lead to more 'balanced' builds as each skill-point spent is slightly less effective. Again, I don't know whether that is desired...

[buddyCasino]

Maybe it is really powerful, but do you really want to play that way? Hours and hours of fleeing, regenerating and attacking again? That's not fun to me.
By the way: upcoming changes will introduce intelligent monster movement. That will make fleeing within one map much less effective.

[nyktos]

in the past there was talk about implementing a slide bar that adjusted your aggression level.
(how often you would attack the adjacent mob)
from "Never" to "Always"

I even think Samuel wrote a script for it (unused?!)
i don't know if it will be a skill or what,
but this Evasion issue must / will be discussed.
and this seems like the perfect time to address both.

because you guys are right.
Evasion makes no sense when mobs start moving with purpose.

This also shows how easy it is to "forget" great ideas...
and why the idea of an "Organizer" is so enticing.



I will try to remember to dig up the old thread in a bit...

[Mad P]

but this Evasion issue must / will be discussed.
and this seems like the perfect time to address both.

because you guys are right.
Evasion makes no sense when mobs start moving with purpose.

Nyktos, has this evasion/monster movement been discussed already? (didn't see it in the meeting log)
Fiernaq mentioned a good way of dealing with it here: http://andorstrail.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2009#p22182

[nyktos]

nope, it hasn't been discussed yet...
but it would be interesting to hear an initial reaction from Oskar.

there are a few way to remedy this, (i've had a few ideas recently...)
so im not as worried about keeping the functionality of evasion as we update.