Dungeon levels in ToME: revamping desired ?

[Lord Satri]

Ok, I care more about the discussion than the poll itself.

I feel something is wrong. Wanted to see if I'm alone thinking this or if other players agree. Thanks

Personnally, I really dislike levels in integer from 0 to 100. Doesn't give me a sense of deepness. Also, I feel it should change depending whether your above the ground (Dol Guldur, Mount Doom, etc) or under the ground (Caves, Angband, Barrow Downs).

[darkgod]

Die feet die !

[boucman]

I'll second that, DG

it should use the metric system anyway

[Lord Satri]

Die feet die !

Oopps. If DG himself says this, I guess I'll be stucked in a vault soon!

Ok, but then, using integers for level up and down ? Why not just change "feet" to "meters". Meeting Sauron at "level 50" makes less sense (to me) than to meet him at 2500 meters down. ?

[Wolfe]

How would that work with dungeons where you don't really go up or down? I always imagined that in the cases of Mirkwood and the Old Forest, going 'deeper' would simply be a case of 'closer to the heart of'. Similar for the barrow downs, as weren't they just a bunch of ancient burial mounds in the books? Artificial hillsides, in other words? Those things tended to go along more than down into the bowels of the earth.

I get that impression from the exits nearly always being on the edge of the map in such areas, rather than how they're randomly scattered in 'underground' dungeons like Orc Caves or Moria, too.

Anyhow, as to the numbers... I go through moods as to which I have switched on. I kinda like feet, but level numbers means I don't have that momentary pause in mental math to work out roughly how far down I am

Either works for me, though.

[Hunter]

Die feet die !

Now that's not nice. I lamented that I had no feet until I saw the man who had no shoes...no, wait. Doesn't sound exactly right. Hmmmm... Oh well. Let me cast my vote for levels. It makes more sense anyway -- you know you've gone down/up some stairs, thus descending/ascending a level, but I can't really picture my hobbit taking along a tape measure and a plumb line and trying to figure out exactly how far down/up he went. Plus toting around the stepladder so he can measure from the ceiling seems unwieldy. And then there's the thickness of the actual floors, which must be factored in.

Nah, too much trouble. I've always played with the levels measurement.

[Maylith]

Why all the fuss? I like level numbers myself, but if you want them in feet you can toggle the setting to show it that way.

[Lord Satri]

How would that work with dungeons where you don't really go up or down? I always imagined that in the cases of Mirkwood and the Old Forest, going 'deeper' would simply be a case of 'closer to the heart of'. Similar for the barrow downs, as weren't they just a bunch of ancient burial mounds in the books?

I like this. I like the idea of "going deeper into Mirkwood". Instead of stairs, we could have "a path that lead farther in Mirkwood". Same for other "dungeons" where it does not make sense to go "down".

In towers, Dol Guldur, 'soon' Isengard, Cirith Ungol, stairs could be inversed. Downward would make you closer to the exit.

Unlike others, this is not trivial to me. It's all about "being in the game" feeling, instead of just crunching numbers and bashing ASCII colored letters

[Varil]

I don't think levels OR feet really sum up some levels. Maybe we could start naming areas of appropriate dungeons. IE you're on the 70th floor of Angband, but somewhere near the center of Old Forest. Maybe put the appropriate level number in parenthesis. 'Somewhere near the center of Old Forest(11), for example. But hey, I'm all for complicated and completely unnecessary effort, so you probably don't want to listen to me.

[Neil]

Arda will use only feet.

[Lord Satri]

Arda will use only feet.

This is strange. DG says «Die feet die», and you, feet-only. Mushrooms of Hallucination anybody ?

[Maylith]

Last I looked, they are entitled to disagree. (Though I admit to curiosity, myself.)

[Nerdanel]

Why remove options from people who prefer them? I hate feet. I would have to divide them by three point whatever to find out the real metric depth and by fifty to find out the relevant monster level/real dungeon level.

Archaic measurements such as feet may fit with the tone of Middle-earth, but I think they are simply too much bother in a game in which they are more than occasional bits of flavor.

How about using tens of yards instead if you really must have that antique feel?

[Ravenred]

For mine, non-underground dungeons should have a different layout to wilderness dungeons.

They should have their own randomly generated overhead-map representing the dungeon. You can't move anywhere you haven't been on the map (i.e. you get there by going to a purple staircase and...), but you can move through previously explored "squares". You can only get to the "next" square by going down a staircase on that side of the Level. "Depth" could be measured by the distance the "level" is from the dungeon exit tile (which would have to be a staircase on the overhead map mode).

This could me made exponential rather than linear (the deeper you go, the HIGHLY more dangerous it is!)...

Obviously, this would only be suitable for certain dungeon types (Erebor and Land of Rhun come to mind), but would provide both a different game "feel" and a different type of level generation pattern...

2c worth and counting...

[Arioch_Arioch]

when it comes to any discussion for or against imperial measurements, I believe grandpa Simpson said it best when he said " My car still gets thirty rods to the hogshead, dangnabbit!"