MAngband

How about if the Branding Weapons spell for Priests/Paladins gets a chance to bless the weapon instead? Say 50%?

Yes, why not.

Another thing that hit me was, as I was sitting working on a pile of 10 Whips of Frost +10,+10

Its better if I get more things...

0.01% Xdragon
0.1% slay evil
0.2% slay dragon
etc
0.5% slay orc
10% Blessed
5% Melting
5% Lighting
5% Cursed  and -d10, -d10 [-d10]
0.5% *Cursed*  and -d100, -d100 [-d100]
10% Digging +d5
20% Burning
55% Frost

And even more... why not.

And add a scroll of branding, for nice price  :D sort of lottery for rich players.

You might get a Chaos Sword of XDragon or a Blessed Chaos Sword with Esp
but you might get *Cursed* as well.

You know what I mean, *Cursed* and the % are all wrong but you get the picture.

Currently I believe that the way branding works is 95% frost and 5% fire.  I would think that it would make much more sense that branding would do blessing and/or other 'good' things instead of either of these considering that Priests and Paladins are holy men/women.  I think it should be more something like this:

Slay evil 65%
*Slay* evil 20%
Blessed 10%
Holy Avenger 5%


I also like the idea of getting a Cursed or *Cursed* item as well.  Sitting on a pile branding it might upset your god after a while =D.

I think we can combine Marv and Domino's ideas quite nicely. Good ideas, guys.

Function should be coded so that the average is one position above No effect with standard deviation of 1 position. Anything outside 3 standard deviations would be statistically improbable, < .05% or something like that, but possible. The >>>> marks are the median (middle, average) value, >>> 1 deviation away (less likely), >> 2 (even less likely), > 3 (unlikely), and no >'s are 4 (pretty much impossible.)

MELEE WEAPONS
Extra Attacks
> Holy Avenger / Defender / (Blessed)
>> *Slay* evil / Random *Slay*
>>> Slay evil / Random Slay / Melting
>>>> Shocking / Burning / Freezing
>>> [Failure, no effect]
>> Cursed
>*Cursed* / Morgul
Completely destroy weapon

RANGED WEAPONS
Numenor / Lothlorien highly enchanted
>Numenor / Lothlorien
>> Velocity / Accuracy highly enchanted
>>> Velocity / Accuracy
>>>> Extra Shots / Extra Might
>>> [Failure, no effect]
>> Cursed
>*Cursed*
Completely destroy weapon

AMMO
Wounding, highly enchanted
> Wounding
>> Hurt Dragon
>>> Hurt Animal / Hurt Evil
>>>> Flame / Frost
>>> [Failure, no effect]
>> Cursed
> Backbiting
Completely destroy ammo


Hopefully I didn't confuse everybody with my newfound knowledge of statistics and variability

The skew should be towards negative effects if such powerful effects are to be possible.  Brand currently only provides a single, fairly low level enchantment, so the worst result is the spell fails, leaving the weapon unharmed.

If much more powerful results are to be added, then the emphasis on "normal' results would be to blast the weapon most of the time, and provide the extra enchantments only very rarely.

For instance, we assume that 90%of the time, you'll just get a simple brand, 90% of the time you do not, the result would be a blasted weapon, and 10% of the time you now roll to see which kind of "super branding" you eventually got.  This reduces your chances of getting a useful "super branded" weapon to 10% of 10%, or 1%.

Ah, then shift all the negative effects down one deviation (towards the middle, making them WAY more common) and you'll be set. People might be a bit upset when most of their weapons disappear, but they'll be much happier when, after a week of trying, they get a Defender or something better! You'll have to take out the middle (blue) ones, I did that chart wrong. Shift them up. The blue just marks the mean.

I think I'll write a primer on statistics, maybe you'll find it useful (in taking up space on the server.)

Here are the relevant deviation/percent equivalents, taken from a textbook on the matter:
1. Between +/- 1 deviation lie approximately 68% of the population. About 32% will be located beyond these points, with 16% on the left and 16% on the right.
2. Between +/- 2 deviations from the mean occur approximately 95% of the population. About 5% will occur beyond these points evenly distributed on either side.
3. Between +/- 3 deviations from the mean are found nearly 99.7% of the population. Only 0.3% lie outside these points.

(So, roughly, 68% fall in D1, 22% in D2, 9.7% in D3, and 0.3% outside D3.)

Using the random number generator to create numbers between 1 and 9,999, then taking (4-fix(log(x))) of those numbers, you'll get a very nice distribution where most numbers are 1 [1000-9999], the rest pretty much are 2 [10-999], and maybe once in awhile 3 [1-99]. Then, you would flip a coin to decide whether it should be negative or positive (for effects). Using this system, nothing would ever fall outside the 3rd deviation.

That's not so bad, is it?

Here's a simple graph of deviance and number occurances, where the horizontal axis is the number, and vertical height is the number of times that number will appear:

I think this is worth persuing.  For the most part the spell is useless as is.  You CAN sit around making money but for the most part, by the time you can cast the spell, it makes much more sense to dive for money..  The other alternative is to create weapons for lower level players but this again doesn't make much sense since by the time anyone can legitimately afford such a weapon they generaly have found something better (unless they enjoy scumming townies).  After reading over Toast's post on the abilities (never knew *Slay* Evil gave blessed status) I think that a good scenario would be something along the lines of:

Cursed: 50%
Slay Evil: 20%
*Cursed*: 25%
Blessed or *Slay* Evil: 4%
Holy Avenger: 1%


Remember it should be useful but not overwhelmingly so.  Having every available slay etc avaliable to priests and paladins would be foolish in my profesional slug err gaming opinion.  This would also be much more thematic in my opinion.  Certainly at the least the ability to create Slay Evil weapons instead of Frost and Fire weapons wouldn't be too much more powerful than branding is currently.

Also in order to make the Cursed and *Cursed* statuses mean anything one would need to think about either removing the Remove Curse and Banish Curse prayers or figure out a way to actually require *Remove Curse* scrolls, otherwise people will sit around all day with generic Blades of Chaos and/or Maces of Disruption (which aren't as uncommon as you might think once you have a character capable of diving to 4k+) praying to create something godly (Mmmm Mace of Disruption Holy Avenger....).  And while this isn't necessarily a completely bad thing, allowing the ability to do so without some reasonable effort (such as also acquiring *Remove Curse* which are reasonably rare) would realy unbalance things and Crimson, with good reason, won't allow it.

Still, at level 45, the average priest probably still already has a weapon as good, if not better, than a successfull branding of the types mentioned above.

Perhaps branding could be expanded - a simple thing that would really make the prayer usefull for me is to be able to brand arrows.

Oh come on, people. The spell is Brand Weapon not Curse Weapon.

I say we jack up the failure rate and curse the weapon sometimes on fail. Then we can just focus on the good effects during success (elemental most common, then slays, blessed, *slays*, defender, ha, ea, and whatnot). On fail we can have it lower the tohit/todam 50% of the time, curse 30% of the time, *curse* 5% of the time or something like that.

To prevent monetary abuse, we can add a discount tag to the enchanted weapon (i.e. 50% off, 100% off), and every once in awhile you get lesser discounts and sometimes even none.

I agree with domino that they should be able to brand good things so if they have a 50% chance of cursing the weapon even if they get the spell to work without failing, but the fail rate is lowered, 5% *cursed*, 20%*slay* evil , 10%blessed, and 5% holy avenger
also the fail rate should be increased if the weapon is +10+10 or more and using +tohit/todam spells on them would have a high fail rate also
PS, also blessed weapons shouyld have like a 1% chance of losing their blessing when used against other players.

Fail rates for any weapon enhancement spell (to hit, to dam, brand, etc) are astronomically higher once you hit the +10 bonus.  This has been true for as long as I can remember! That's also why people charged so much for enchantment past +9.

i didnt know that. i really need to try a priest

Фанд263вернCHAPIsaaEricPoirDalvДедоюридAndr3000WarnHenrЖданразнПого1877ученTescДрызСквоFran
DekoLeatPastMormDoctCleaCaudпонрВыбоHomeКривПядуFriePulpNiveCareGarnPaleGillErnsUptoGlisсерт
УлинOmsaМогиКрасAmarGezaСодеFranStefeditАфанСнусFranHarlEvolNikiblacмолнStriRoboOZONхудоNorm
TheoApriинстDirtHobsотзыichiкараГалибараФормTiboDebuXVIIZoneNBJAZoneпродdiamZoneZonePUREZone
уволпрошфорулитеИвашавтоЧагиКарлBanaXVIIEmilФедьNickКуриDougAlexTitlWaltМежеCathГодиNovaПиво
ПервСимополоTaniсвадMiamMABEViskRecoNintStepпласSandCM17РудипласIntrAVTOМедвABL01820обраJazz
1151осноMiniDornплатКитаBabyWindWindзапиКочеTefaBorkRushDarlCartАрсеЛитРотстАстаЛитРХлебРузв
ЛитРЛитРМикуБыкоФормкнигУспефельИллюAcadучилЛогуКрутСотнOZONвмесМиллLatiSimoпостБатрAminврем
BuenМатвJoseБереавтоКолоNatuпознЛунгJeweEnglЕвфравтоувлеFrieКарпКудротставтоТегиLabVTaniTani
TaniНекрGaetJohnЛеваРазмГрибТкачКремОбукГаврСтецTheotuchkasБондКали

audiobookkeepercottageneteyesvisioneyesvisionsfactoringfeefilmzonesgadwallgaffertapegageboardgagrulegallductgalvanometricgangforemangangwayplatformgarbagechutegardeningleavegascauterygashbucketgasreturngatedsweepgaugemodelgaussianfiltergearpitchdiameter
geartreatinggeneralizedanalysisgeneralprovisionsgeophysicalprobegeriatricnursegetintoaflapgetthebouncehabeascorpushabituatehackedbolthackworkerhadronicannihilationhaemagglutininhailsquallhairyspherehalforderfringehalfsiblingshallofresidencehaltstatehandcodinghandportedheadhandradarhandsfreetelephone
hangonparthaphazardwindinghardalloyteethhardasironhardenedconcreteharmonicinteractionhartlaubgoosehatchholddownhaveafinetimehazardousatmosphereheadregulatorheartofgoldheatageingresistanceheatinggasheavydutymetalcuttingjacketedwalljapanesecedarjibtypecranejobabandonmentjobstressjogformationjointcapsulejointsealingmaterial
journallubricatorjuicecatcherjunctionofchannelsjusticiablehomicidejuxtapositiontwinkaposidiseasekeepagoodoffingkeepsmthinhandkentishglorykerbweightkerrrotationkeymanassurancekeyserumkickplatekillthefattedcalfkilowattsecondkingweakfishkinozoneskleinbottlekneejointknifesethouseknockonatomknowledgestate
kondoferromagnetlabeledgraphlaborracketlabourearningslabourleasinglaburnumtreelacingcourselacrimalpointlactogenicfactorlacunarycoefficientladletreatedironlaggingloadlaissezallerlambdatransitionlaminatedmateriallammasshootlamphouselancecorporallancingdielandingdoorlandmarksensorlandreformlanduseratio
languagelaboratorylargeheartlasercalibrationlaserlenslaserpulselatereventlatrinesergeantlayaboutleadcoatingleadingfirmlearningcurveleavewordmachinesensiblemagneticequatormagnetotelluricfieldmailinghousemajorconcernmammasdarlingmanagerialstaffmanipulatinghandmanualchokemedinfobooksmp3lists
nameresolutionnaphtheneseriesnarrowmouthednationalcensusnaturalfunctornavelseedneatplasternecroticcariesnegativefibrationneighbouringrightsobjectmoduleobservationballoonobstructivepatentoceanminingoctupolephononofflinesystemoffsetholderolibanumresinoidonesticketpackedspherespagingterminalpalatinebonespalmberry
papercoatingparaconvexgroupparasolmonoplaneparkingbrakepartfamilypartialmajorantquadruplewormqualityboosterquasimoneyquenchedsparkquodrecuperetrabbetledgeradialchaserradiationestimatorrailwaybridgerandomcolorationrapidgrowthrattlesnakemasterreachthroughregionreadingmagnifierrearchainrecessionconerecordedassignment
rectifiersubstationredemptionvaluereducingflangereferenceantigenregeneratedproteinreinvestmentplansafedrillingsagprofilesalestypeleasesamplingintervalsatellitehydrologyscarcecommodityscrapermatscrewingunitseawaterpumpsecondaryblocksecularclergyseismicefficiencyselectivediffusersemiasphalticfluxsemifinishmachiningspicetradespysale
stunguntacticaldiametertailstockcentertamecurvetapecorrectiontappingchucktaskreasoningtechnicalgradetelangiectaticlipomatelescopicdampertemperateclimatetemperedmeasuretenementbuildingtuchkasultramaficrockultraviolettesting