Climb Code

[solera]

Is there not? Some descriptions are more threatening than others, I feel.

[sleepyhead]

Yeah, I don't know if there is or not because I don't usually get very far with outdoorsy types before dying horribly (not that only outdoorsy types climb, but my sneaky types die horribly too.) I just assumed it wasn't that way because MH said so and he seemed to know what he was talking about.

[Molten Heart]

.

[Patuk]

If you're the one who climbs or backstabs on your weekends off because it's a fun hobby, maybe leave the serious situations to the folks who devote the majority of their time to perfecting those sorts of skills.

And if you're a player who wants to be able to come on the scene and be the go-to guy for climbing that cliff or backstabbing that enemy (or doing whatever), maybe don't leave it to your subguild?

Come on. There's much more valuable input to be had than the MUD equivalent of 'git gud, scrub.'

Nobody climbs well that's not a ranger. Absolutely nobody. It doesn't matter if you're a 'rinthi elf who's lived three stories up in a half-ruined tenement building, you're never going to be as good as the thirty thousandth generic dorf who rides inix all day. You're a pickpocket, assassin, burglar? Sucks to be you, because your skillset is never going to be as good at traversing rooftops as that one Arabeti sandblood who's never even entered a place with walls.

And y'know what? Fine. Let pickpockets have low advanced climb at the very best, and let rangers have master everything, from archery to direction sense to ride to skin to weapon skills to dual wield to god knows what else. Let city subguilds be kinda sucky at their own environment for god knows what reason, and just kinda get haughty when people suggest maybe it shouldn't be that way. But arguing that some alley-dwelling fuck doesn't spend more time devoting themselves to getting their Assassin's Creed on than a guy out in the salt flats is ludicrous.

Please, buff the climb that city sneakies get a little, nerf that of rangers a bit, or make rooftops more easily traversed. As it stands, it's one more example of anything criminal-related being a suicide mission because of the code being intensely punitive on people attempting such a lifestyle.

[manipura]

I actually didn't say 'git gud, scrub' but if that's how you want to read it, whatever.

What I said was, if a situation requires the best person for the job and you aren't the best person, stay home.

And there is plenty of climbing a non-ranger can successfully do.  The two or three people that immediately come to mind that I regularly and personally interacted with recently certainly weren't rangers. 

Again, I didn't say anything about buffing or nerfing anything, I said if you picked a guild/subguild that doesn't let you reach the top/upper levels of a skill, don't show up to a serious situation and bitch about not being good enough to succeed.

This might all be helped if climbs had difficulty levels like crafting does.  But then would there be threads here saying "My subguild gives me journeyman climb and I got to the situation and it was an advanced climb.  This was a waste of my time please change this."

[Patuk]

I actually didn't say 'git gud, scrub' but if that's how you want to read it, whatever.

What I said was, if a situation requires the best person for the job and you aren't the best person, stay home.

Uh huh. Okay.

And there is plenty of climbing a non-ranger can successfully do.

Nope.

I've seen people straight-up get KO'd attempting rooftop climb. Celf agility city-subguilded sorts that had climbing ropes - thunk, you are now out of stun, nice going, chump. There might be some ledges and the like off in bumfuck nowhere that jman climb will reliable scale both up and down, but that's not the point of contention. If your assassin needs to get up and down those, he's fucked anyhow.

But then would there be threads here saying "My subguild gives me journeyman climb and I got to the situation and it was an advanced climb.  This was a waste of my time please change this."

If you don't like the gdb's periodic bad idea threads, play the game without going there. 'tis a silly place, etc, etc. I think it's perfectly reasonable to expect certain main guilds to climb better without also arguing that subguilds should be able to do it as well.

[Miradus]

As it stands, it's one more example of anything criminal-related being a suicide mission because of the code being intensely punitive on people attempting such a lifestyle.

Pretty much, yeah.

The criminal life is pretty smooth if you're in the Guild because you just collect the protection payments that they pay because ... well ... because they always have and nobody knows if they can break them.

But if you have to actually go out and earn a criminal living in the city you face a whole host of problems, one of which is the climb you need to SURVIVE the RNG of crimcode is extremely arbitrary on the classes which need it the most.

There are TWO sets of rooftops you can reach without climb, but the problem is so can His Arm if they decide to come get your ass. And if you get caught up there then you risk the climb RNG moving to another roof or PK if you try to run back to the one entrance that allows you to safely climb down. Or if you want to move to a different rooftop to watch the entrance to say, Red's, then you need climb.

The other safer rooftops need climb, and if you fail, you're suddenly at ground level, with 30 hp and 17 stun (if you're lucky) with teleporting half giants wielding greatswords who can see hidden.

Maybe the guild revamp will take care of this, but I have my doubts.

[manipura]

And there is plenty of climbing a non-ranger can successfully do.

Nope.

I've seen people straight-up get KO'd attempting rooftop climb. Celf agility city-subguilded sorts that had climbing ropes - thunk, you are now out of stun, nice going, chump. There might be some ledges and the like off in bumfuck nowhere that jman climb will reliable scale both up and down, but that's not the point of contention. If your assassin needs to get up and down those, he's fucked anyhow.

Yep.
I've seen people straight up scale up and down walls and rooftops like it was nothing.  Not rangers either.
Not sure what else there is to say here.  You're going to say "Nuh-uh it's broken because I've seen all the times it hasn't worked" and I'm going to say "It's not easy and it's probably not supposed to be but I've seen it work well plenty of times so I don't believe it's as broken as some people think." 
But I have my opinion and you have yours.
Tomato-tomahto, I guess? *shrug*

The criminal life is pretty smooth if you're in the Guild because you just collect the protection payments that they pay because ... well ... because they always have and nobody knows if they can break them.

But if you have to actually go out and earn a criminal living in the city you face a whole host of problems, one of which is the climb you need to SURVIVE the RNG of crimcode is extremely arbitrary on the classes which need it the most.

Interestingly, some of the best criminals I've crossed paths with in the not-too-distant past have not been in the Guild.  They did well for themselves.

[Miradus]

I think those non Guild criminals do well BECAUSE they have a whole host of problems to overcome. Weeds out almost all the competition and they become very good at navigating the other issues.

The social side of being a criminal is what always runs me down. When that melon breasted fem you sapped in an alley at night turns out to be the mudsex partner of half the playerbase and suddenly every Bynner, noble, and Arm recruit is white knighting across the city looking to murder you. Mmmm. Good times, good times.

But back to climb, it's not that it fails EVERY TIME. It's that it will always fail and the consequences are ridiculous.

Imagine if a ranger fell off his mount while learning to ride and stunned himself unconscious in the scrub plains for 20 minutes. The playerbase would be up in arms demanding a change, even if it only happened once every week to someone.

[Patuk]

I've seen people straight up scale up and down walls and rooftops like it was nothing.  Not rangers either.

Well, yeah. I also once succesfully got a backstab off at apprentice, and even somehow prepared some food at apprentice cook.

None of that changes the fact that climb is lethal as fuck for the non-ranger using it, and that you're still risking falling to your death each and every time. It's not even as with steal, where partial failures are a thing; if you're climbing in any direction that's not up, a failure means you get to roll up a new character.

[palomar]

Ranger isn't the only main guild to be good at climbing. Also, remember that gear, encumbrance and stats matter.

[nauta]

re: city climb vs. wilderness climb)

It does make sense to me to distinguish city climb from wilderness climb, for one reason mentioned: there's quite a difference between the skill in picking a switchback route down a cliff vs. parkour up a building.

There's another thing too: a fall from the Shield Wall, which strikes me as /huge/ is more or less the same as a fall from some of the buildings in Allanak.  So one idea here would be to:

o Double the distance on all outdoor climbing spots.

But this would make them all death drops, you might say!  Well, once you've doubled the distance on outdoor climbing spots, the second step would be to:

o Half the damage done per drop everywhere.

[Patuk]

I mean, a fall of a roof should kill you, just as a drop off the shield wall kinda should. For all the faults the climb code has, the actual damage dealt doesn't really seem to be one.

[Riev]

I mean, a fall of a roof should kill you, just as a drop off the shield wall kinda should. For all the faults the climb code has, the actual damage dealt doesn't really seem to be one.

I agree here. Even in Zalanthas, dropping off a 50ft roof may not kill you, but by description it seems like a lot of the buildings in Allanak are much higher than 50ft.

I think the skill involved needs a bit more "oomph" but it would require extra coding. Each "climb check" room should have a difficulty modifier added to it, and then the climbing gear in game can actually have its "quality" be useful.

Then you can succeed a climb check if your climb + gear quality is higher than the difficulty of the climb itself. I don't know the numbers, but it'd be nice if "Decent" climbing gloves gave you a +6 to your roll, and terrible quality gloves gave you a +1. Intermittently while climbing, your gloves would be "used" and degrade in quality. The more gear you wear, the more likely SOMETHING degrades in quality, but also the safer your climb.

[lostinspace]

Ranger isn't the only main guild to be good at climbing. Also, remember that gear, encumbrance and stats matter.

^

[Synthesis]

Assassins can barely climb.  Pickpockets are a little better.  Burglars and rangers are about the same, and are as good as you can get without magick.

[Qzzrbl]

I've always felt that the risk vs. reward of the climb skill has been way off.

Succeed? Congrats. You've moved a room.

Fail? Mantis head, probably.

I'm sure there have been plenty of harrowing situations where a master climber was able to masterfully evade a gith warband with their masterful use of the skill, but in my experience the climb skill exists only to crush the falsest of hopes it provides when I accidentally fall into a hole or whatever.

[Dar]

How many people here had a character, or knew a character who was totally awesome, plot creating, engaging, vibrant, interesting persona. Someone who was around for the longest of times, created a lot of content and fun in the game and all that ended due to a crit fail in climb this one weird time on a room that he usually traversed with ease?

[nauta]

Part of my suggestion of halving the damage from falls was to make it a little less black and white, do or die.  When my PC falls off a three story or four story building (and survives), I can't really imagine in my head that they just dropped off the edge; rather they are constantly working their way down, window to window to awning, but this time they slipped somewhere in the fall.

I still think climbing is pretty ok, overall, once you learn the counterintuitive trick about scramble.

[Dar]

Part of my suggestion of halving the damage from falls was to make it a little less black and white, do or die.  When my PC falls off a three story or four story building (and survives), I can't really imagine in my head that they just dropped off the edge; rather they are constantly working their way down, window to window to awning, but this time they slipped somewhere in the fall.

I still think climbing is pretty ok, overall, once you learn the counterintuitive trick about scramble.

counterintuitive trick about scramble. Unless your climb is at master. Dont Do it.

[Armaddict]

Molehill mountain.  (Saying this because 'useless' seems to have become synonymous with 'it has risks')

Agility helps climbing.  Thus, stumpy dwarf assassin makes tradeoffs for the boons they get with stumpy assassin skillset.

There are two main classes with master climb.  One is better than ranger, or at least equivalent (but I believe it's better).

Two other main classes gain climb with limited proficiency where they are utterly capable, but will look at a long fall like it's inviting death (because it is).

Other classes can use subguilds to gain it to varying degrees of proficiency.

I see no reason to make it -easier- for anyone, but the mechanic of 'falling' could use improved physics.  That is not to say that a journeyman climber should be able to thumb his nose at a three room fall.  Cuz that shit is scary, and should be.

[Dar]

Molehill mountain.  (Saying this because 'useless' seems to have become synonymous with 'it has risks')

Agility helps climbing.  Thus, stumpy dwarf assassin makes tradeoffs for the boons they get with stumpy assassin skillset.

There are two main classes with master climb.  One is better than ranger, or at least equivalent (but I believe it's better).

Two other main classes gain climb with limited proficiency where they are utterly capable, but will look at a long fall like it's inviting death (because it is).

Other classes can use subguilds to gain it to varying degrees of proficiency.

I see no reason to make it -easier- for anyone, but the mechanic of 'falling' could use improved physics.  That is not to say that a journeyman climber should be able to thumb his nose at a three room fall.  Cuz that shit is scary, and should be.

Imagine a rl year old elven character who crit fails on climbing 1 room climb, gets knocked out, and gets killed by a creature that normally dies in 3 rounds from a 0 day warrior.

Something like that happens. Something like that 'shouldnt' happen.

[Armaddict]

...why not?

[evilcabbage]

last i checked, life wasn't fair.

armageddon is even less fair.

maybe your palms were sweaty. the gear was used up and broke.

a rock fell out of place.

bad stuff happens even to the best.

[Riev]

maybe your palms were sweaty. the gear was used up and broke.

This is the part I think needs more attention. Climb Gear, so far as I know, doesn't have Tool Quality Functionality, so it doesn't really break. It just adds a flat modifier to your skill.

Climbing is not fair. If you're going to climb a mountain or scale a building, you probably should be decked out in the proper gear, and not a soft pair of footpads or full scale armor. Also, an assassin probably shouldn't be climbing to the top of four story drops.

I do think there needs to be either more granularity, or more intuitive tool use. "with a staff in your hand, you climb east" doesn't tell me if its a detriment, rather than using a grappling hook. Is that how you're SUPPOSED to use the grappling hook? If I hold sticky string, does that help, or hinder because I have something in my hands?