ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

So I've just had two characters in a row killed by getting trapped between Ziguranth patrols.

Ziguranth patrols:

1. Are, depending on how they spawn, a near-automatic death sentence, especially on higher difficulties. The latest one hit me for 800 damage (at level 19) before I even had a chance to act.

2. Are not hostile to Allied Kingdom patrols, meaning that, once all the adventurer parties are dead (which happens quickly because the latter ARE hostile to Allied patrols), nothing can kill the Ziguranth unless they happen to wander next to Agrimley (or the Apprentice Mage, if you haven't done that quest yet).

The result is that the map tends to fill up with Ziguranth patrols. At best, this is a pointless annoyance - it means that you need to be constantly retracing your steps because the map's many, many choke points often have a Ziguranth patrol within range. At worst, if you get unlucky with their spawn placement, you can wind up in a situation where you're trapped between two or more Ziguranth patrols and have no choice but to fight them, which is, again, a death sentence.

Fighting on the World Map is supposed to be largely optional, unless you're being chased by orc patrols. Please lower the Ziguranth spawn rate so that this stops happening.

idea: stop them from spawning if you destroyed Zigur

(Or is that already the case?)

As a work around I read in another thread that move speed items work on the world map. So if you can stack a bit of it then you can outrun patrols.

grobblewobble wrote:idea: stop them from spawning if you destroyed Zigur

(Or is that already the case?)

+1

It's pretty weird how after a while there are ARMIES of zigurites behind every corner. They are not that bad for most melee characters but there should be more variety in encounters.

To be honest, I've never understood the purpose of the world-map patrols anyway. Not only are they sometimes way too difficult but even when that's not the case, they are very annoying. They either force you to move very carefully and to take overly convoluted routes to get where you want to go, or they blindside you and interrupt whatever you were trying to do.

Am I missing something here? What design purpose do they serve that couldn't be better fulfilled in some other way?

Dopaminka wrote:

grobblewobble wrote:idea: stop them from spawning if you destroyed Zigur

(Or is that already the case?)

+1

It's pretty weird how after a while there are ARMIES of zigurites behind every corner. They are not that bad for most melee characters but there should be more variety in encounters.

To be fair, after you burn down Zigur there are a whole bunch of anti-magics out there with nowhere to go. They're basically killing you so they can steal your boots and sell them for a crust of bread.

PoetApe wrote:To be honest, I've never understood the purpose of the world-map patrols anyway. Not only are they sometimes way too difficult but even when that's not the case, they are very annoying. They either force you to move very carefully and to take overly convoluted routes to get where you want to go, or they blindside you and interrupt whatever you were trying to do.

Am I missing something here? What design purpose do they serve that couldn't be better fulfilled in some other way?

I never saw the point of `em either; they're why I created the Opt-in Adventurers Parties addon.

Zizzo wrote:

PoetApe wrote:To be honest, I've never understood the purpose of the world-map patrols anyway. Not only are they sometimes way too difficult but even when that's not the case, they are very annoying. They either force you to move very carefully and to take overly convoluted routes to get where you want to go, or they blindside you and interrupt whatever you were trying to do.

Am I missing something here? What design purpose do they serve that couldn't be better fulfilled in some other way?

I never saw the point of `em either; they're why I created the Opt-in Adventurers Parties addon.

Which should be merged into vanilla it's so essential. I've had one too many characters trapped and hopelessly screwed by adventurer parties, ziguranth or otherwise. (4 parties advancing northward when I come out of sandworm lair took the cake.) I highly recommend this addon with the 'ask' option, so you can still choose to fight if you so want, say because desperate for alchemy ingredients.

Hatome wrote:As a work around I read in another thread that move speed items work on the world map. So if you can stack a bit of it then you can outrun patrols.

yes, this works very well

Teleportation Runes are also good means to escape if you've failed at avoidance. Due to their minimum range they usually put you on the far side of the map where the exit is, hopefully no further than a movement infusion\phase door\whatever leap away from it.

PoetApe wrote:To be honest, I've never understood the purpose of the world-map patrols anyway. Not only are they sometimes way too difficult but even when that's not the case, they are very annoying. They either force you to move very carefully and to take overly convoluted routes to get where you want to go, or they blindside you and interrupt whatever you were trying to do.

Am I missing something here? What design purpose do they serve that couldn't be better fulfilled in some other way?

I enjoy the extra challenge. I have suffered a number of deaths to them, but mostly when I started playing and learning different character classes. Now that I'm more experienced I die far less often, and they need a lot of luck, great equipment and powerful class abilities to beat me.

If you're playing roguelike I could understand how they are just too much of a risk to be bothered with. On adventure mode I want to test my character against them (and often get equipment upgrades & extra money). Since they're so dangerous and random I get more excited to fight them.

Wait until you play Embers of Rage and the Anorithil patrols 1 hit KO you with a spell that does 1,700 damage

you do realise, I hope, that your topic title has two different meanings?

I usually play AM, so it's not a problem.

PoetApe wrote:Am I missing something here? What design purpose do they serve that couldn't be better fulfilled in some other way?

They were originally put in to offer an alternate means of getting alchemist ingredients, iirc. Pretty sure they actually still serve that purpose, if much more rarely insofar as I've noticed. They also serve a similar role as the farportal, a high risk means of grinding if for some reason the player wants to. Though I could have that backwards in order of implementation, heh.

Either of those probably could be fulfilled in some other way (Ziz's opt-in is a good way of making the high risk loot opportunity as voluntary as the farportal is, and the Bazaar addon does a decent job of giving an alternate route to ingredients, just as examples), but, well... it's fairly workable as is, if occasionally annoying, so I don't believe it's particularly high priority as things go. Rather imagine if someone stuffs together an addon that handles the problem in a way DG is down with, it'd get merged into the main game.

Personally, it's been a long, looooong time since I've really had trouble avoiding the patrols if I wanted to. Every once in a while one'll get the jump on me, but it's... not really something I notice as much of an issue. Honestly, I find the orc patrols much more annoying, heh -- they're nearly as prolific in the areas they inhabit, potentially nearly as dangerous, and give much, much worse loot