Do 'out of depth' monsters occur outside of vaults?

[berenbelagund]

As title.

For instance, as a level 14 dwarven berserker, I encountered a 30th-level demon in level 2 of The Old Forest, with almost 800hp. Is that within the bell curve in this situation?

[GlassGo]

Yeah.
These goldy chests can easy roll something that can easily kill your char.

[berenbelagund]

Yeah.
These goldy chests can easy roll something that can easily kill your char.

But it wasn't a gold chest. This was just me wandering around on the second level of The Forest, and stumbling upon this creature, with a whole nest of snakes. I'm used to the nests. I'm not used to 30th-level demons being there. That's why I asked.

[HousePet]

What happened in this case is that it rolled a creature with a minimum level of 30. The zone wasn't a actually trying to generate an out of depth monster, but it got itself into a corner.

[twas Brillig]

That's more common if you go around examining the spooky demonic statues, but you'd probably remember doing that and snakes are illiterate (?). Doesn't spawning work by picking enemies on spawn lists (in this case demon) and only picking ones that fight in the right level range? So it shouldn't be stuck spawning obnoxiously high-level demons. Heck, unless something changed recently it's max level is only 16.

[HousePet]

It tries to pick one in the level range, but if it ends up on the Greater Demon table, there aren't any lower than level 30.

[grayswandir]

There's no actual greater demon "table". Everything just gets mashed into the same big list.
Most enemies have a minimum level. If their minimum level is higher than the zone's maximum level ("out of depth"), then their chance to appear is divided by (3 * (their minimum level - zone's maximum level)). (See engine/Zone.lua:computeRarities)
In addition, some zones have a maximum out-of-depth level cap, but old forest doesn't.

[berenbelagund]

There's no actual greater demon "table". Everything just gets mashed into the same big list.
Most enemies have a minimum level. If their minimum level is higher than the zone's maximum level ("out of depth"), then their chance to appear is divided by (3 * (their minimum level - zone's maximum level)). (See engine/Zone.lua:computeRarities)
In addition, some zones have a maximum out-of-depth level cap, but old forest doesn't.

As the OP, I think I'm following this discussion, although I'm not sure a consensus has emerged! grayswandir's summary seems to be that it's possible for a 30-level demon to appear on the second level of the Old Forest, even though the wiki says the max level of the Old Forest is 16. And that's because "the zone's maximum level" doesn't preclude a chance of even higher level creatures from appearing. Indeed, if there's a nonzero chance of an out-of-depth baddie of appearing, then anything can happen in the Old Forest, because it has no "maximum out-of-depth level cap."

Is that basically right?

[Danton]

More or less.

[Herode_]

Well, that question only asks for yes or no
If the probability is non zero that lvl 16+ things happen to spawn in the Old Forest, then it is possible.
If the probability is 0 because rules and code do not allow it, then it's either a bug or something else than a spawn.
In such a case what is it ?

[berenbelagund]

Well, that question only asks for yes or no
If the probability is non zero that lvl 16+ things happen to spawn in the Old Forest, then it is possible.
If the probability is 0 because rules and code do not allow it, then it's either a bug or something else than a spawn.
In such a case what is it ?

I don't know! I guess that's what I was wondering: is it just bad luck, or a bug? (Although, of course, even bugs can be filed under 'bad luck' )

No matter, though. I killed it earlier today so it's gone now.

[Herode_]

Well, if you killed it, it's not a bug : it's an achievement

[berenbelagund]

Well, if you killed it, it's not a bug : it's an achievement

I agree! Although it looks like it was lacking a lot of talents, despite being high level. Maybe the code does this to compensate in these high level cases. In any event, Wrathroot was far more challenging, because of (predictably) the freezing talent.

[Dracos]

There's also the Castle vault which can show up in Old Forest and spawns high level (30-50) monsters outside of it.

But that's sort of a design problem with that specific vault.

[Herode_]

Yep, although it may spawn lower levels : my lvl 11 dwarf berserker has just headed into this castle in Old Forest 4, facing half a dozen (at least) of lvl 24-25 golems and minotaurs. Enough to say that he fled, leaving alone the escort he had to help...
Glad he could escape alive and kill 2-3 bulls anyway.
I guess I will try to level him up a bit before coming back to this vault.

And yes, Wrathroot is a hard guy. Took several lives on my poor noob adventurers. Fairly easy to beat it with and Archmage anyway (or maybe I've been lucky !)

Speeking of OOD monsters, my Dwarf Berserker went to explore the caves beneath the Iron Council Chamber and at lvl 3 or so, met the Mouth. This thing is rated lvl 7 (my dwarf was lvl 5-6 at this time) but has 10000+ HP, tremendous attacks, resistances everywhere and spawns unfriendly critters at will.
I hope there are not a lot of such "lvl 7" monsters wandering in the wilderness