The Cathedral of Attnam ()
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chaostrom

 Feb 15, 2008, 6:45 am
I'm making this a general ideas thread. But to start, here's two I thought of.

1. Zombie corpses should turn into a pile of bones in less time they take to rot away completely. In other words, instead of taking all that time to rot away, they should turn into a pile of bones in less time. I hate having to kill zombie torsos over and over.

2. Following on from the previous idea, wands of necromancy should work on piles of bones.

3. A weapon that makes the enemy stagger backwards! Or maybe a shield.

Norrock

 Feb 15, 2008, 8:55 pm
A level editor.I'm just too damn lazy to make one the hard way.

Neonivek

 Mar 13, 2008, 9:32 pm
I thought for a while after my last three posts were deleted

Warning: Despite having played the game enough to be a Vet... I don't know the knowledge of one... So I appologise to anyone annoyed by suggestions that are either overdone or that are already in the game.

1) Magic Colar: When held by someone you will always be aware of their location (Done so by the fact that their square will always be visable)

2) Class of Food or Living Materials: A Class of edible weapon materials would be interesting to me (Heh Gingerbread)... however most specifically a Living Material that would be fragile but that would repair itself very slowly interests myself. Mostly interested by the fact that there are food gods in this game.

3) Magic Lantern (Non-Genie kind): Compared that lanterns are so prominant during the game a magical kind would be interesting.

4) Knuckle, Spiked Knuckle, Iron Ball: OLD but still up for grabs and its non-inclusion yes is a mystery.

5) Undead Animals: For the fact that it makes no sense to as why they don't exist

6) Lock picks, Flute of Opening, Skeleton Key: A universal openers... pointless... but I think it would add flavor. (should break after use or something)

7) Spices: Low satience foods that don't go bad (or just slowly)... but are worth more to sell.

Force Material: Materials made of pure energy/magic... They are effective but they either blow up, entirely disapear, or some other magical effect when broken.

9) Liquid/Gas Elementals: Elementals (or golems I guess) made out of Liquids and gases in the game would be interesting... perhaps when destroyed they sprey their material everywhere... So destroying a water Elemental would rust all your gear and destroying a Mustard Gas Elemental would burn your insides. I know how a template for it would be impossible as Gases and Liquids don't have stats.
-This is what happens when I read that tutorial too much...

10) Ice Magic: Ice should affect Infravision possible targets by slowing them, damage, as well as perhaps creating water. Does little to nothing vs non-infravision possible targets (such as Zombies and Golems) beyond a weak slow that can be resisted.

11) ESP Blast (change the name): This should harm ESP capable targets in various ways
-I guess I kinda want more kinds of magic in the game

My Unrealistic Suggestion of wanting IS

Suggestion) IVANT and LIVAN combine to make LIVANT!!!
-and on that... remove the "Test" zombies and skeletons.

Suggestion 2) Weapons that transform things into stone or Gold... problem is sorta the unbalance... hense why it is unrealistic.

All for now... Tell me what you think. Thank you for listening

Planplan

 Mar 13, 2008, 10:25 pm
Mmh... The level editor is a good idea... My computer being dead, I can't compile things and such, but I could maybe adapt a PHP script I have for IVAN user defined map ^^
Thanks, I was searching something to keep me busy while I'm searching a job

Neonivek

 Mar 13, 2008, 10:34 pm
I do agree that a Map editor would be an excellent addition depending on how you make it

JimmyJ

 Mar 13, 2008, 11:47 pm
It would certainly make it easier for people to make mods.

lampshade

 Mar 14, 2008, 12:07 am
Map editors are CRAZY useful considering how frustrating it is to make unique levels in LIVAN that would shed about 80% of my work time

Neonivek

 Mar 14, 2008, 1:14 am
Only 80%?

Holy cow Lampshade is the fastest scriptwriter on EARTH!!!

chaostrom

 Mar 14, 2008, 6:22 am

Planplan wrote


Mmh... The level editor is a good idea... My computer being dead, I can't compile things and such, but I could maybe adapt a PHP script I have for IVAN user defined map ^^
Thanks, I was searching something to keep me busy while I'm searching a job



Hey Planplan, how's that alien dungeon mod that you and Blob were working on?

Planplan

 Mar 14, 2008, 4:10 pm
My computer is dead, and I have to wait for one week before I can retrieve the data on my hard disk (it's a laptop). I'll see with blob if we could release it in the state it is. It could maybe boost me a bit to finish the most uninteresting part (because the graphic part is already done by blob ^^')
I'll post the modified source anyway, or something if it could give some people ideas and help in modification.

Apple

 Mar 14, 2008, 4:43 pm
I came up with the ideas:
1. Scroll of Convert Material - Works pretty much like golem creations, destroys the item that you convert the material from, but instead of creating golem it alters the material of the chosen item.

2. Spell Orbs: Since you can't really cast spells in IVAN, with spell orbs you could cast a spell once (more powerful than wands, such as Mass Teleport or a wave of lightning to all directions)

3. Enchantment orbs: Orbs that can be used once to give a weapon a special power (such as Unholy Weapon - like Mjolak, Lifestealing - like Neerc, Venomous - like daggers of venom)

Dumb Shit

 Mar 14, 2008, 8:34 pm

Neonivek wrote


1) Magic Colar: When held by someone you will always be aware of their location (Done so by the fact that their square will always be visable)

2) Class of Food or Living Materials: A Class of edible weapon materials would be interesting to me (Heh Gingerbread)... however most specifically a Living Material that would be fragile but that would repair itself very slowly interests myself. Mostly interested by the fact that there are food gods in this game.

3) Magic Lantern (Non-Genie kind): Compared that lanterns are so prominant during the game a magical kind would be interesting.

4) Knuckle, Spiked Knuckle, Iron Ball: OLD but still up for grabs and its non-inclusion yes is a mystery.

5) Undead Animals: For the fact that it makes no sense to as why they don't exist

6) Lock picks, Flute of Opening, Skeleton Key: A universal openers... pointless... but I think it would add flavor. (should break after use or something)

7) Spices: Low satience foods that don't go bad (or just slowly)... but are worth more to sell.

Force Material: Materials made of pure energy/magic... They are effective but they either blow up, entirely disapear, or some other magical effect when broken.

9) Liquid/Gas Elementals: Elementals (or golems I guess) made out of Liquids and gases in the game would be interesting... perhaps when destroyed they sprey their material everywhere... So destroying a water Elemental would rust all your gear and destroying a Mustard Gas Elemental would burn your insides. I know how a template for it would be impossible as Gases and Liquids don't have stats.
-This is what happens when I read that tutorial too much...

10) Ice Magic: Ice should affect Infravision possible targets by slowing them, damage, as well as perhaps creating water. Does little to nothing vs non-infravision possible targets (such as Zombies and Golems) beyond a weak slow that can be resisted.

11) ESP Blast (change the name): This should harm ESP capable targets in various ways
-I guess I kinda want more kinds of magic in the game

My Unrealistic Suggestion of wanting IS

Suggestion) IVANT and LIVAN combine to make LIVANT!!!
-and on that... remove the "Test" zombies and skeletons.

Suggestion 2) Weapons that transform things into stone or Gold... problem is sorta the unbalance... hense why it is unrealistic.

All for now... Tell me what you think. Thank you for listening



1) Very likely possible and fairly easy.

2) Already exists in the form of various foods. Add a new material with the flags of edible and healing.

3) You are not giving any information on what it'd actually DO.

4) Knuckle and Spiked Knuckle would be easy enough, too. Just add in a new weapon that uses the unarmed skill. Add graphics, add item entries. Easy enough.

5) Undead animals don't exist possibly due to not enough animals wandering into the mazes as compared to huge swarms of banana picking messengers. There's a constant supply of new corpses for zombies but not for animals.

6) Skeleton key is easy. Flute of opening would have to check a ?*? radius for locked objects and unlock them. Not hard. Lock Pick would be a Skeleton Key that requires 8-15 turns to use.

7) See 2, but instead increase the value. Actually, you could already do this. "a lump of salt" etc

See gunpowder.

9) Make a new material that is identical to the other material you want the golem made of. Give it a specific set of stats and make it explode on death with gas, using the gas grenade as a template.

10) Magic. No. Eww. Go away.

11) Scroll of EMP Blast: Scan for all things on the level with the EMP flag. Do X to them. Tada.

Unrealistic:

1) Needs to be done, but just name it IVAN. Jesus. IVAN's devs are gone and the GPL allows you to take over projects.

2) Ohhh, I don't see that as so unbalanced. Enjoy your gold golem enemy that was a zombie a second ago.


Apple wrote



1. Scroll of Convert Material - Works pretty much like golem creations, destroys the item that you convert the material from, but instead of creating golem it alters the material of the chosen item.

2. Spell Orbs: Since you can't really cast spells in IVAN, with spell orbs you could cast a spell once (more powerful than wands, such as Mass Teleport or a wave of lightning to all directions)

3. Enchantment orbs: Orbs that can be used once to give a weapon a special power (such as Unholy Weapon - like Mjolak, Lifestealing - like Neerc, Venomous - like daggers of venom)




1) Has been discussed in the past. I don't recall what's been said but I do know that'd be a massive pain.

2) Scroll templaaaaate.

3) see 2)

The biggest problem is the people who want to release little goofy patches that are not compatible with other patches. .diff patches are not going to work when there are 9 things to apply to and you've already got 5 different ones applied so none of the reference points work.

Neonivek

 Mar 15, 2008, 1:01 am
"3) You are not giving any information on what it'd actually DO"

Mostly because it doesn't matter entirely... there just needs to be one... that does anything... even if it radiates a light that harms everyone near it.

Id do some of this programming myself... but I don't know how.

I guess Ill make a post later asking for programming help so I can start writing script (The Tutorial is limited and I need help understanding it)

"10) Magic. No. Eww. Go away."

What do you mean? There is already tons of magic in the game... Obviously I meant it in wands and scrolls... unless you meant it as a joke... or as a insiders joke.

In conclusion

I like that you responded to me, though I kinda meant more on the basis of what do you think about it in a non-"Can it be added" sort of way

Dumb Shit

 Mar 15, 2008, 1:22 am

Neonivek wrote


"3) You are not giving any information on what it'd actually DO"

Mostly because it doesn't matter entirely... there just needs to be one... that does anything... even if it radiates a light that harms everyone near it.



So there should be one but it doesn't have to actually do anything. Okay, one line of code to rename the lantern.


Neonivek wrote



"10) Magic. No. Eww. Go away."

What do you mean? There is already tons of magic in the game... Obviously I meant it in wands and scrolls... unless you meant it as a joke... or as a insiders joke.




Usable items for magic, yes. That works fine. But magic is generally referred to like Nethack magic and would take massive work.

chaostrom

 Mar 15, 2008, 3:40 pm
Baguette de pain

An artifact you get when you become Seges' champion. A long loaf of bread to hit enemies with! Rots very slowly. Maybe it could confer a little resistance to elements.

Horn of Abundance

When you blow it, you get edibles! Perhaps a loaf a day.


Thanks to Planplan for these ideas!

Ischaldirh

 Mar 15, 2008, 3:48 pm
We need a "stale bread" material.

Apple

 Mar 15, 2008, 4:19 pm
1. Lantern of Infravision

2. Boots of Avoidance (10% change per one enchantment bonus to avoid a trap/mine/web, or something like that)

3. Helmet of Water Breathing/Boots of Swimming

4. Ring of Stealth (can't be detected with ESP or Infravision when invisible)

5. Rings of Material Detection (something like Ring of Gold Detection, but only with most common materials)

6. Bottomless bag/chest

lampshade

 Mar 15, 2008, 4:29 pm

Apple wrote


How about Lantern of Infravision?

I'll consider making a lantern artifact in LIVAN.

Unknown_Entity

 Mar 15, 2008, 5:02 pm
I like the lantern idea. It could show invisible enemies/mines in its glow. Could be cool.

And I 100% agree with no magic. We debated this, along with the inclusion of ranged weapons, a long time ago and the consensus was that they don't fit in well with IVAN gameplay.

Neonivek

 Mar 15, 2008, 5:49 pm
Yes but Unknown Entity I meant in Scroll, Wand, or some other item form. *cries*

*Happy face*

"5. Rings of Material Detection"

While I like the idea I don't think it should be a ring... it should be a divining rod or a metal detector

mistifilio

 Mar 15, 2008, 6:57 pm
On the prayer screen, display the time stamp for the last time you prayed to that god(dess) and his/her attitude.

When saving give the player a chance to write a short note into the message log to allow them to leave reminders to themselves or others between play times.

lampshade

 Mar 15, 2008, 8:35 pm

mistifilio wrote


On the prayer screen, display the time stamp for the last time you prayed to that god(dess) and his/her attitude.




That's implemented in both CVS and LIVAN

Neonivek

 Mar 16, 2008, 4:33 am
Cloak of the Rainbow/Dreams (The name isn't important)

The cloak will without warning you transform into a different object of the same name randomly... except each one is a different color... and give you different bonuses and resistances depending on what color it is (though each color is in fact a entirely different object)

So Red, Orange, Yellow, Blue, Purple (or more)

slob

 Mar 16, 2008, 6:30 am
Scroll of disenchantment (or wand): rare like SOCM or wand of mirroring/cloing. When you read/use it, it takes an enchanted item (armour/weapon) and removes its enchantment but gives you a enchant armour/weapons scrolls. Eg. find meteoric steel mace +6 but you are a sword guy, poof you now have a regular old meteoric steel mace and 6 enchant weapon scrolls. For those who might say this is unbalanced, its no worse than a wand of cloning/mirroring.

Wand of transfer enchantment: takes a pile of 5 items with different enchantments and combines the enchantment into one item (at the top of the pile). The regular enchantment buffer above 5 would apply (eg 5 +5 items would not give you a + 25 item, probably more like a +8 to +10)

Scroll of Midas/ wand of midas turns item/monster to gold (good for training arm strength!) Champion of Mellis prize

Ommel Bile, fluid that allows you to transfer 3 stats points, eg from wis to int or End to Int

Champion of loricatus prize: Loricatus reforges your weapon into a flaming weapon eg Flaming Vermis

Ommel Spit, fluid that drops your End by 3 linked to scabies.

Laxative potion: converts you from overfed to hungry in one turn, or bloated to starving. if you are satiated or less you get the message XXXX shit himself to death in XXX. linked to Scabies

Aphrodesiac: potion that causes creature capable or reproducing to make reproducing their top priority. Gift from nefas when you are her champion


Wand of fertilization: causes tame Genetrix versana to sprout and thus all her offspring ar you pets. unless you hit her. gift from silva when champion

Carnivorous plants (CP) should eat any animals that come close to them and grow bigger. eg CP eats magpie becomes greater CP, geater CP eats adult bunny/kobold becomes giant CP, giant CP eats cave bear becomes Gentetrix versana (but with better stats - she is not as tough ans a giant CP) if plants eat mutant animals (bunnies/asses) they polymorph.

Berzerker potion: heals completely and adds +10 AS/LS/Dex/Agi for x amount of time but drops End by 2/3 when it wears off. Monsters can drink too so watch out for Berzerker Golgor Dhan. Spawns rarely but cruentus gives it too you if you become his champion.

Legifer Champion gift should be turox

Pockets in Cloaks holds up to 5 rings giving you up to +5 fire resist/ electricity resist or however you want to arrange it. Mirvo the tailor can sew them in exchange for a side quest item (eg Enchanted Needle which is also a dagger that give you a dex/agi bonus)

Chain mail only, Irkos the smith should be able to forge 5 rings into the mail in exchange for side quest item, eg Adamantine Thunder hammer and become champ of cruentus and Loricatus (if you pray to loricatus he can convert meteoric steel to adamant) Alternatively he can forge them into metal weapon but not artifact weapons. Eg adamantine scimitar with +2 electricity resistance, acid resistance, invisibility and polycontrol.

Dumb Shit

 Mar 16, 2008, 6:44 am

slob wrote


Scroll of disenchantment (or wand): rare like SOCM or wand of mirroring/cloing. When you read/use it, it takes an enchanted item (armour/weapon) and removes its enchantment but gives you a enchant armour/weapons scrolls. Eg. find meteoric steel mace +6 but you are a sword guy, poof you now have a regular old meteoric steel mace and 6 enchant weapon scrolls. For those who might say this is unbalanced, its no worse than a wand of cloning/mirroring.



I don't much like cloning-mirroring so I'd honestly say that's just as bad.


slob wrote


Wand of transfer enchantment: takes a pile of 5 items with different enchantments and combines the enchantment into one item (at the top of the pile). The regular enchantment buffer above 5 would apply (eg 5 +5 items would not give you a + 25 item, probably more like a +8 to +10)



I have a better idea that combines the two previous: A wand that essentially eats items, draining their enchantment and reducing them to lumps, and gives you, oh, a third of their enchantment (minimum 1 unless 0) as spheres that, when invoked, charge objects.


slob wrote


Scroll of Midas/ wand of midas turns item/monster to gold (good for training arm strength!) Champion of Mellis prize



I don't even see a point to this. Scroll of change material.


slob wrote


Ommel Bile, fluid that allows you to transfer 3 stats points, eg from wis to int or End to Int



Complicated and pointless. Training for 30 seconds often gets you 3 points.


slob wrote


Champion of loricatus prize: Loricatus reforges your
weapon into a flaming weapon eg Flaming Vermis



Overly complicated with the current means of making an object flame. Interesting idea, but a lot more suited to something he does if he really likes you.


slob wrote


Ommel Spit, fluid that drops your End by 3 linked to scabies.



Why?


slob wrote


Laxative potion: converts you from overfed to hungry in one turn, or bloated to starving. if you are satiated or less you get the message XXXX shit himself to death in XXX. linked to Scabies



That's just kind of gross o_o


slob wrote


Aphrodesiac: potion that causes creature capable or reproducing to make reproducing their top priority. Gift from nefas when you are her champion



Do monsters even have priorities at the moment?


slob wrote


Wand of fertilization: causes tame Genetrix versana to sprout and thus all her offspring ar you pets. unless you hit her. gift from silva when champion



Too... powerful.


slob wrote


Carnivorous plants (CP) should eat any animals that come close to them and grow bigger. eg CP eats magpie becomes greater CP, geater CP eats adult bunny/kobold becomes giant CP, giant CP eats cave bear becomes Gentetrix versana (but with better stats - she is not as tough ans a giant CP) if plants eat mutant animals (bunnies/asses) they polymorph.



Ooohh you're going to love my mod's levelling system.


slob wrote


Berzerker potion: heals completely and adds +10 AS/LS/Dex/Agi for x amount of time but drops End by 2/3 when it wears off. Monsters can drink too so watch out for Berzerker Golgor Dhan. Spawns rarely but cruentus gives it too you if you become his champion.



I'd give this a shot with 1.3x stats but a chance of tearing limbs and muscles. When it wears off, you take all the damage you took while berserked again. Also, not good enough for a champion gift.


slob wrote


Legifer Champion gift should be turox



Not good enough!


slob wrote


Pockets in Cloaks holds up to 5 rings giving you up to +5 fire resist/ electricity resist or however you want to arrange it. Mirvo the tailor can sew them in exchange for a side quest item (eg Enchanted Needle which is also a dagger that give you a dex/agi bonus)



Massively overpowered I believe


slob wrote


Chain mail only, Irkos the smith should be able to forge 5 rings into the mail in exchange for side quest item, eg Adamantine Thunder hammer and become champ of cruentus and Loricatus (if you pray to loricatus he can convert meteoric steel to adamant) Alternatively he can forge them into metal weapon but not artifact weapons. Eg adamantine scimitar with +2 electricity resistance, acid resistance, invisibility and polycontrol.



see previous

Apple

 Mar 16, 2008, 1:17 pm
Champion gifts:

Legifer: Scroll of Magic Mapping (only usable once but shows the WHOLE level you are in)
Atavus: Already Scroll of Wishing?
Dulcis: Lyre of Charm.
Seges: A bread that has veery high nutrition value, and doesn't spoil.
Sophos: Amulet of Charging (charges a wand every 24 hours) - Idea by my brother

Silva: Polymorphs you into a huge wolf.
Loricatus: Grants you limitless Scroll of Repair as a repair hammer.
Mellis: Raises your relations with all gods.

Cleptia: Gives you a permanent haste.
Nefas: Gives a Hula-Hula Doll that you can sell for 3000.
Scabies: Gives you a weapon with small damage, but it contracts leprosy to enemies it hits.
Infuscor: Gives you Staff of Striking (a limitless wand of striking)
Cruentus: Increases your ASTR and LSTR by 5.

Neonivek

 Mar 16, 2008, 5:26 pm
Maybe Mellis should give a Pick that never breaks instead Apple

So you can become the ultimate Gold Miner

Apple

 Mar 16, 2008, 5:35 pm
I don't know, since pick-axes are linked to Loricatus...

Neonivek

 Mar 16, 2008, 5:56 pm
Good point... What about a Metal Detector?

slob

 Mar 16, 2008, 6:09 pm

Arcane wrote





slob wrote


Ommel Bile, fluid that allows you to transfer 3 stats points, eg from wis to int or End to Int



Complicated and pointless. Training for 30 seconds often gets you 3 points.



Often you reach a plateau that is hard to get over, especially with wis/int and you need just a few more points to get to 40


Arcane wrote



slob wrote


Champion of loricatus prize: Loricatus reforges your
weapon into a flaming weapon eg Flaming Vermis



Overly complicated with the current means of making an object flame. Interesting idea, but a lot more suited to something he does if he really likes you.



so avoid the fancy flames and make it a red hot weapon. make a new material class of red hot XXXX that has red colors and give weapon burning ability


Quote



slob wrote


Ommel Spit, fluid that drops your End by 3 linked to scabies.



Why?



Because it is funny and will fool people into drinking it, but there are a few ways that a smart IVAN player would use this to his advantage.




Arcane wrote



slob wrote


Wand of fertilization: causes tame Genetrix versana to sprout and thus all her offspring ar you pets. unless you hit her. gift from silva when champion



Too... powerful.



Nah, an Orc would eat Genetrix for lunch. She may be strong when you have 12 AS and shitty armour but she's a pansy (pun intended - get plant-pansy huh huh, c'mon its not that bad) even a goblin could do her in.

you didn't like my ring idea, what about making rings enchantable then.

slob

 Mar 16, 2008, 6:18 pm

Apple wrote


Champion gifts:

Legifer: Scroll of Magic Mapping (only usable once but shows the WHOLE level you are in)
Atavus: Already Scroll of Wishing?
Dulcis: Lyre of Charm.
Seges: A bread that has veery high nutrition value, and doesn't spoil.
Sophos: Amulet of Charging (charges a wand every 24 hours) - Idea by my brother

Silva: Polymorphs you into a huge wolf.
Loricatus: Grants you limitless Scroll of Repair as a repair hammer.
Mellis: Raises your relations with all gods.

Cleptia: Gives you a permanent haste.
Nefas: Gives a Hula-Hula Doll that you can sell for 3000.
Scabies: Gives you a weapon with small damage, but it contracts leprosy to enemies it hits.
Infuscor: Gives you Staff of Striking (a limitless wand of striking)
Cruentus: Increases your ASTR and LSTR by 5.



Legifer: SODM already does this. I think its a crappy gift
Seges: Bread? Crappy gift. who needs bread if you know seges
Sophos: amulet of charging - too powerful
Silva: I don;t want to be a wolf
Loricatus: praying to him already is a limitless scroll of repair (except for artificial limbs) 9 times a day he can repair items
Nefas: Money is useless, its easy enough to make already (UT4 or praying to silva)
Infuscor: too powerfull

Dumb Shit

 Mar 17, 2008, 12:22 am

slob wrote


Often you reach a plateau that is hard to get over, especially with wis/int and you need just a few more points to get to 40



Not really.


slob wrote


so avoid the fancy flames and make it a red hot weapon. make a new material class of red hot XXXX that has red colors and give weapon burning ability



Why would Loricatus do this? I can see things likea weapon splashing hot iron on people but.. just hot and burning?


slob wrote


Because it is funny and will fool people into drinking it, but there are a few ways that a smart IVAN player would use this to his advantage.



It's.. not funny. It's pretty cheesy and what I'm trying to avoid in my own patches.


slob wrote


Nah, an Orc would eat Genetrix for lunch. She may be strong when you have 12 AS and shitty armour but she's a pansy (pun intended - get plant-pansy huh huh, c'mon its not that bad) even a goblin could do her in.



Unless you count in her constantly summoning greater carnivorous plants, so she'd essentially be like a Aliens queen.

Goblins don't get cargo loaders.


slob wrote


you didn't like my ring idea, what about making rings enchantable then.



That's probably overpowered but I could see about a guy in town who does it for a ridiculous amount and some strange items.


Apple wrote



Champion gifts:
Legifer: Scroll of Magic Mapping (only usable once but shows the WHOLE level you are in)
Atavus: Already Scroll of Wishing?
Dulcis: Lyre of Charm.
Seges: A bread that has veery high nutrition value, and doesn't spoil.
Sophos: Amulet of Charging (charges a wand every 24 hours) - Idea by my brother




Legifer: That's silly and not worth the time. It also doesn't make sense for the god of law and order. A new scroll that does massive damage to nearby chaotic enemies, maybe or any other number of ideas.
Atavus: That's actually remotely worth it.
Dulcis: Easy enough to find in most games.
Seges: WOO BREAD THAT WAS TOTALLY WORTH IT EVEN THOUGH SEGES FILLS YOU USUALLY WHEN YOU PRAY
Sophos: The god of knowledge shouldn't have that! That's not his territory D:


Apple wrote



Silva: Polymorphs you into a huge wolf.
Loricatus: Grants you limitless Scroll of Repair as a repair hammer.
Mellis: Raises your relations with all gods.




Silva: woohoo there goes my chances of living
Loricatus: He's already a limitless scroll of repair and also my best buddy.
Mellis: But he already does this each prayer, partially!


Apple wrote



Cleptia: Gives you a permanent haste.
Nefas: Gives a Hula-Hula Doll that you can sell for 3000.
Scabies: Gives you a weapon with small damage, but it contracts leprosy to enemies it hits.
Infuscor: Gives you Staff of Striking (a limitless wand of striking)
Cruentus: Increases your ASTR and LSTR by 5.




Cleptia: RAPE RAPE RAPE RAPE RAPE GAME IS OVER
Nefas: ??? That is not useful
Scabies: Why not stick with a venom blade?
Infuscor: Overpowered.
Cruentus: Massively, massively underpowered.

chaostrom

 Mar 17, 2008, 6:52 am
About Silva turning you into a wolf, what if she turns you into a werewolf that can equip? I've got werewolves that can equip in a dungeon I've been thinking of.

Ernomouse

 Mar 17, 2008, 4:10 pm

slob wrote


Because it is funny and will fool people into drinking it, but there are a few ways that a smart IVAN player would use this to his advantage.



Have you tried my ommel vomit? A liquid that works as all the ommel fluids combined, but is extremely acidious... >=)

Neonivek

 Mar 21, 2008, 1:41 am
Ive heard that it isn't possible to simply expand the "Graphics" files as they are... (as in it isn't as easy as simply making them larger PSX files)

So I guess Ill add

Expand the PSX files or find a way to make the game look in alternate files for graphics. (especially needed for Humanoid and Items that are really stuffed)

Cerumen

 Mar 21, 2008, 11:01 am
I love the idea of champion gifts - the gods always seemed to me to be a bit lame without such ultimate rewards - though not the gifts as proposed by apple as such...

I guess most useful gifts would just be weapons or armor. Seges could have a ring that would reduce energy loss (or protect items from spoiling), and maybe an unrechargeable wand of wishing for Atavus?

chaostrom

 Mar 21, 2008, 1:38 pm
A monster that steals your name. When he gets on your high-score list, you don't know who he is.

mistifilio

 Mar 21, 2008, 4:39 pm
I don't like the Champion items idea if they are implemented like the current ones.

Currently if you get Valupurus's shield or sword, or Mortifer's mace, you can't pray to that god again for 3 days. Atavus's Armor is better...but you still can't pray to him for 6 hours.


The champion artifacts would need to be pretty damn spectacular to justify losing the god(ess)'s normal prayer effect for 3 days. It is only worth it for Val and Mort because they have no normal prayer effects.

Cerumen

 Mar 21, 2008, 9:11 pm
True, but the mechanics could be changed. By getting the Champion reward from one of the gods, you wouldn't be able to get another one from any of the other gods - and perhaps other gods' happiness would drop. Nothing as severe as the once-proposed "crowning by one god only" idea, but a small penalty nonetheless. Oh, and of course, you could only get the Champion gift once.

And if we talk about an increased prayer timeout, the gift should be something really nice to justify it. Certainly not 3 days, though.


Quote


Atavus's Armor is better...but you still can't pray to him for 6 hours.



He doesn't do much else, now does he?

(if my calculations are correct, it takes roughly 3 hours for prayer to be safe, so 6 hours aren't THAT bad either)

Ps. Another idea: Make sacrifices decrease the time until your next possible prayer (I can't really tell if anything like that exists now).

Shard

 Mar 22, 2008, 4:47 am
How about when you get crowned, it gives you a special artifact that you can't get anywhere else? And also, what about a monster that does no damage but changes your limbs? It would really suck if a Limber changed your head into air and then a kobold stabs it and you die. But if you eat it's corpse you can choose what limb to change, but you could only choose what kind of material if you had like a ring of limb control or something.

Unknown_Entity

 Mar 22, 2008, 5:00 pm
Meh, a limb-changing monster just sounds like it would be frustrating as hell. IVAN doesn't need random WTF deaths, it needs deaths where you say "Damn I should have played that better."

Cerumen

 Mar 23, 2008, 6:12 pm

Quote


a ring of limb control or something.



Haha. Thinking about it, it might be nice to have something like a "ring of sticking together" that would prevent, or at least protect, against limb loss (you would still get them damaged and wouldn't be able to use them, but your limbs wouldn't have got severed, or the chance of that would be lower).

Also, I think IVAN would look nice with some more weapons and equipment from various island cultures to play more on the "New Attnam" theme - something like eskrimas, krises, katars, parangs, machetes, etc.

Dumb Shit

 Mar 24, 2008, 4:32 am
I'm not sure India is an island.

Zayre

 Mar 24, 2008, 6:50 am
1 - A Giant Slime enemy that vomits smaller slimes. Name it Blob, and make it speak french!

2 - The Dullham. Comes in Male and Female Varieties. A armored humanoid that has armor that can't be removed from itself unless its broken off. The best part however, is it's head. It can survive, even if it's head is sliced off. The head feels what the body feels, and vice versa. Destroy the head, the Dunham will die. Destroy the body, and the Dunham is nothing but a severed head, that talks. They will attach it's head back to it's body, if they can, and will protect it.

3 - The Attnamatons in IVAN.

These ideas were brought to you by Sophia. ^^

Cerumen

 Mar 24, 2008, 11:31 am

Quote


I'm not sure India is an island.



I was thinking Sri Lanka, but fine. Scratch that katar.

Shard

 Mar 24, 2008, 3:54 pm
@Zayre. All good ideas. Sophia is thanked. And I think it's 'Dullahan'.

@Everyone. What if you could bottle up or can up things like dark frog blood that was on the floor? Then you would throw it at enemies and watch their limbs melt >

Ernomouse

 Mar 24, 2008, 4:43 pm
What's the point of putting a potion mixed in dirt to a bottle? It's probably ruined anyway. If the floor is metal, I think you could lick it...

Shard

 Mar 24, 2008, 6:35 pm
It would still work, it would just be weakened. The degradation of the potion would be equivalent to the time spent on the ground, but as you said, if the floor was metal, the liquid wouldn't dilute. Also, maybe there could be a scroll of blood changing, where you could choose what you bled, or choose not bleed at all, for a limited time. Maybe there could also be trolls, that would bleed(Of course) troll blood, and their arms and legs would constantly regenerate.

chaostrom

 Mar 25, 2008, 7:31 am
I have long thought of having the creatures of whom materials are made in IVAN, ever since I had the idea to introduce a troll in the original Co-Op Fiction

Cerumen

 Mar 25, 2008, 9:47 pm

Quote


What if you could bottle up or can up things like dark frog blood that was on the floor?



But then it would only be fair if you needed some gloves protection or yours hands would get hurt... and the game would become a second NetHack


Quote


I have long thought of having the creatures of whom materials are made in IVAN, ever since I had the idea to introduce a troll in the original Co-Op Fiction



Guessing from the amount of troll hide items, trolls could be pretty much extinct in the Ivan world by now, heh.

(I still would like to meet an ommel, though!)

Neonivek

 Mar 27, 2008, 4:02 am
I know this is kinda stupid...

But there should be Uranium and Plutonium and other "Radioactive" Materials in this game...

Mostly to somewhat explain off the "Mutants"

Apple

 Mar 27, 2008, 6:23 am
Or perhaps we could add a named baddy, mad scientist that contaminates passing animals. Anyway, both would take a huge amount of work.

Neonivek

 Mar 28, 2008, 3:08 am
I guess I just REALLY REALLY like the idea of Uranium and Plutonium (though I don't think you can mine Plutonium). So I think I am biased (Afterall it could be Scabies tampering)

Actually a Mad Scientist wouldn't be bad.

Id actually would like to help programming but I can barely do script work (as you can tell by my topic)

Let me think of more stuff
-Merchant Chains: So Store Credit is more useful
-More noticable Money on baddies/ground: I THINK you can get random cash from killing enemies (could be wrong) but Id like it to be a tad more noticable like "Sack of 55 coins" or something.
-Flint Rocks: They do extra damage when thrown

Hmm not feeling too much into making a large list today... Ohh well.

Unknown_Entity

 Mar 28, 2008, 3:21 am
I bring a new bill to the Senate floor today, for all IVANers to hear and vote upon.

Section I-
IVAN is not, and never will be, Nethack, ADOM, or Dwarf Fortress.

Section 2-
IVAN will not copy elements from any of the aformentioned games unless it is of critical importance, such as the ability to move your character with the keyboard.

AYE or NAY- cast your vote.

Neonivek

 Mar 28, 2008, 3:33 am
I hope your not accusing me Unknown Entity... Nothing I suggested is intentionally a copy.

-Flint Rocks: actually I didn't remember it was in ADOM
-Noticable cash: WAY doesn't count

(I HIGHLY HIGHLY doubt Merchant chains were done in any of those games so I am safe there)

Alright let me see...

Section 1:
-Of course not... Nay (Or Aye... whatever means it won't become those games)

Section 2:
-Ill abstain... It seems like a can-o-worms to me. I mean if I was to vote Aye technically there would need to be removed content or greatly limit new content... and Nay for obvious reasons is a bad answer.
--Though I understand what you mean in Section 2... "Ivan shouldn't rip content from other games unless it is otherwise needed and within the cliche". I am just overcautious.


EDIT ADDITION AFTER THIS LINE!!!---------------------------------

I am very sorry... Not changing what I said as that is somewhat dishonest... but I am a bit on the defensive today as Ive been attacked in the Attnam Boards and IRC all day... So don't read too much into what I have said.

Though what I find interesting about Section 2 is what dirrection is IVAN going to go in now to set itself appart? That is what I am most interested in currently (I mean afterall a lot of what IVAN can become is taken... So what is left would be entirely unexplored)

Ischaldirh

 Mar 28, 2008, 4:00 am
Aye aye. Though on the second one I'd add a little flexability.

Z

 Mar 29, 2008, 2:36 pm
IVAN sometimes aims to be a parody of ADOM, NetHack etc. For example, NetHack has something like "cheap copy of the Amulet of Yendor", which IVAN parodizes as "cheap copy of left nut of Petrus", which is parodized even more as "expensive copy of left nut of Petrus".

But if something is done well in these games, and there is a logical reason to have it in IVAN too, then it should be in IVAN. (For example, you should be able to find gold in dungeons.) And AFAIK the reason why IVAN has no PC spellcasters, bows, identification, trolls (which are supposed to bleed with troll blood) etc. is that the devs have not implemented them yet.

Unknown_Entity

 Mar 29, 2008, 5:16 pm
Well I was mostly making my bill as a twist on just saying "Stop making suggestions that are completely unoriginal" because I figured saying that would be too asshole-ish. I wasn't actually being 100% serious with it.

But yes, I agree 100% with you Z. There are multiple references to both ADOM and NetHack in IVAN, and there's nothing wrong with it as long as IVAN doesn't because some poor bastard child of the two.

Shard

 Mar 29, 2008, 6:34 pm
Honestly, there are some things in ADOM and Nethack that would be great in Ivan(Sinks, corruption, etc) while it still keeping its original humor. Ivan should be the king of all roguelikes, so how can it be king if some of its subjects have powers it doesn't?

Z

 Mar 29, 2008, 11:50 pm
I think that a sink is an example of thing which should not be added. There is no sense to copy NetHack's joke. IVAN has its own jokes.

Unless you mean some kind of a parody of NetHack's kitchen sink. But I have no ideas how this could be done.

Corruption, mutation, etc. is probably OK. (I am not sure who invented corruptions, maybe ADOM, but it's an interesting feature - its "power" as you say - and also Crawl and some Angband variants have it.)

Neonivek

 Mar 30, 2008, 12:33 am
I kinda agree with Z a sink is a bit unneeded... It would be a joke of a joke.
-Though exception would be if "Bathrooms" were added...

Ischaldirh

 Mar 30, 2008, 1:43 am
We need a pirate king who sits on a throne made of porcelain.

Neonivek

 Mar 30, 2008, 2:28 am
It would be nice if the Pirate King had a Pirate ship

Apple

 Mar 30, 2008, 8:26 am
And you'd have to levitate to the pirate isle.

Ischaldirh

 Mar 30, 2008, 5:36 pm
No, no levitation. You just have to be drunk as hell to find the king.

Shard

 Mar 30, 2008, 9:13 pm
Booze could be useful! Also an artifact: Jar of Dirt.

Cerumen

 Mar 30, 2008, 10:13 pm

Quote


Unless you mean some kind of a parody of NetHack's kitchen sink. But I have no ideas how this could be done.



Sinks? Nooo. But I think that toilets (introduced in Slash'EM, a variant of NetHack) may fit IVAN a bit more... you could vomit into them to cure confusion

Ischaldirh

 Mar 30, 2008, 11:27 pm
Yes. Toilets. AKA the Porcelain Throne.

Zayre

 Apr 3, 2008, 3:23 pm
What about the introduction of a special new island, in which you can only access by levitating, or a boat? Like there are special exotic characters, enemies, and weapons. For example... The area in which Banshees, and the like exist. Genies, think of it as an Arabian area.

Neonivek

 Apr 4, 2008, 4:10 pm
More Wishes that go beyond items... I shouldn't have to explain this Ill assume that someone else made a huge list long ago.

slob

 Apr 4, 2008, 5:31 pm
How about a level filled with enner beasts.... reproducing enner beasts. Hmm that gives me an idea I wonder what would happen if I cloned Enner a bunch of times and then got Ischaldirh to spawn.

Cerumen

 Apr 4, 2008, 6:02 pm
Some ideas for how traps could work:

First of all, traps more connected with items. For example, valuable stuff could have powerful traps underneath - "Hey look, a belt of... snap! My leg! Where's my leg?" Rooms that have a lot of items could have a larger possibility of traps, with less random corridor ones.

Second of all, different mine mechanics that damage and sever your legs more. So if you step on one, your chance of surviving is bigger, but you'll almost certainly lose both legs. A lot of real-life accidents end up like that

And third of all, more kinds of traps... not to suggest a copy NetHack or ADOM ones, but splashing acid on your face or dissolving your equipment with rust would be nice.


Quote


Hmm that gives me an idea I wonder what would happen if I cloned Enner a bunch of times and then got Ischaldirh to spawn.



I believe there's a word for it.

Somagu

 Apr 4, 2008, 6:22 pm
I believe there's a better word for it.

chaostrom

 Apr 5, 2008, 6:33 am
Having multiple enners don't work. They kill each other until there's only 1 weakened enner.

Ernomouse

 Apr 5, 2008, 2:51 pm
Traps gave me an idea. Where is the wand of fetching?

You zap the wand of fetching.
What do you want to fetch? (type the name of item(s): Belt of levitation
The belt of levitation hurtles towards you and lands at your feet.

Basically, similar to Harry Potters accio-spell. If several swords are around, they all come. The effect is the same as if thrown, so instead of gently landing at you feet, you could get:

The Vermis hurtles towards you and hits you in the groin! Your groin bleeds very badly! You panic! You are teleported away!

Of cource, the bigger the distance to the item, the better intelligence you need to have.

Bored One

 Apr 5, 2008, 4:32 pm
Would the wand of fetching work on monsters?

You zap the wand of fetching.
Ur-Khan the orc marshall flies towards you!
You panic!

chaostrom

 Apr 6, 2008, 6:45 am


Haha, that's the best idea I've heard in a while. Nice on Erno

Have a kiwi

Ernomouse

 Apr 6, 2008, 12:42 pm
I started thinking about the use for such an item... Should the items fly straight towards you, or do they turn in corners? That'd make them actually useful in other ways as another means of setting off traps. Here's something that might happen:


Code

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

X..@...k....m..

X.XXXXXXXXXXXXX



X: Wall

.: empty space

@: player

k: kobolt

m: BIG mine, armed and dangerous



You summon the activated big mine!
The kobolt is hit by the big mine! The mine explodes! The kobolt is hit by the explosion! The kobolt panics! The kobolts left arm is severed! The kobolts right arm is severed! The kobolts left leg is severed! The kobolts groin is severed! The kobolt is severed! The kobolt dies with the sound 'BLLAAARGHFNARF'!
You are hit by the explosion! Nothing happens!

chaostrom

 Apr 6, 2008, 4:44 pm
Ahaha, very nice. Should be kinda rare though, if it's that useful and powerful.

slob

 Apr 7, 2008, 4:46 am
If you get to choose what you fetch then it should be a scroll. if you zap it at what you want to fetch then it should be a wand. As a scroll it could be a way to steal things from shops or cathedral : you fetch the amulet of esp (there are always some in the treasury)

Neonivek

 Apr 10, 2008, 1:46 am
Alright I have a very lame idea but I think it would be a rather funny joke

There could be an item called "Chicken Soup" that heals you and cures poison. (but has no chance to regrow bodyparts)

Apple

 Apr 10, 2008, 5:12 am
Maybe, maybe not. For the soup you could add a possibility that the chicken is raw, contracting salmonella.

Neonivek

 Apr 15, 2008, 4:54 am
Here is something...

I found that when you equip humanoid allies with Shields they tend to replace it with ANYTHING such as daggers.

Can you set it so that they only replace Shields you give them with only better shields?

Ernomouse

 Apr 15, 2008, 4:58 am
No, but you can tell them not to change their equipment.

Neonivek

 Apr 15, 2008, 5:00 am
I got another one... for future Ivan games

Can the amulet of life saving also be wished for by typing amulet of lifesaving?

Note this isn't asking if it is possible... it is asking if it should be

Z

 Apr 15, 2008, 7:31 pm
Why not? I suppose you can add the line
Alias = { 2, "AoLS", "amulet of lifesaving"; }
and you wil get it if you wish for "AoLS" or "amulet of lifesaving".

Neonivek

 Apr 15, 2008, 7:45 pm
Well it just makes it easier on players who could be pulling their hair out trying to make the amulet appear (With many barriers such as case-sensativity)

BDR

 Apr 15, 2008, 11:25 pm
A magic-null unique. This entity is completely resistant to all types of magical enchantment and/or harm, which is to say that neither god powers (like Scabies' leprosy or Dulcis' charm effects), taming (or harden/change material scrolls for the corpse), musical instruments, artifact weapon powers, rings, resistance/stat boosting equipment, nor even simple power enchantments apply when figuring out how badly he is hurt by a weapon or how well his equipment protects him from harm. In other words, your Vermis will not teleport him, your Ne'erc will not drain him, and your +7 whip of thievery will only be as effective as an unenchanted whip of the same material is. You *can* befriend him, but only on first meeting him and you must not have any enchanted equipment, wands, magical instruments (lamps included), or scrolls of any kind on your person (picking up and using anything in the list after that will be seen as a hostile action and he will attack you for it). This goes both ways, as a leather armor of great health +1 will not, for example, grant him a boost to his endurance nor even protect him any better than a normal suit of leather armor (not that he'd ever willingly pick such an object up), and he will also not benefit from a friendly mystic light frog as much as you will.

EDIT: Far as the dwarven grenades are concerned... the one with concentrated magic (and any clouds that magic mushies make) won't do anything to him, but he will take the full hit from skunk smell and mustard gas. Also, if it's not clear, SoCM/HM'ed items will act as if they always were the material they were changed to (for the purposes of figuring out how much damage he takes).

Also, gonna repost an older idea that got eaten by the server scramble a month or two ago: the doom siren. Her song induces all who hear it to suicidal acts, which translates to drinking acid, poison, breaking/zapping wands at yourself, and other such things which eventually degrades to beating yourself up with your current weapon (only once, but it will still likely hurt).

Neonivek

 Apr 16, 2008, 1:52 am
It would be interesting if he had the ability to destroy indestructable objects as well

BDR

 May 17, 2009, 8:45 am
This was an idea that I had a long time ago, back before attnam.com got the awesomely spiffy facelift (not before attnam.com, though), and one which was unfortunately lost in a semi-crash that resulted in a need to rollback to a time before the one where I\'d posted it. However I now have been reminded of it due to thinking of monsters I\'d like to see in IVAN, so I present... the doom siren!

Doom sirens sing songs of such intense despair that anyone or anything hearing them is immediately compelled to commit suicide. Otherwise (more) intelligent monsters will quaff sulphuric acid, kamikaze dwarves will set their packs alight, and those without a faster means of killing themselves (asploding wands, traps, etc.) will make do with the most lethal object they have on hand (usually their weapons), until of course the song\'s effects wear off (which is fortunately only one turn, though for many that will still have been too long). The player, not being immune to this, will have to either acquire some means of stopping up their ears, or will have to find a way to kill the sirens without committing suicide in the process.

Serefan

 May 18, 2009, 10:28 am
Reading the Wand Of Fetching post, you should be able to throw armed mines, detonating them with a chance roll if they hit something on the correct angle. Also, monsters could be able to throw stuff around, should cause some funny encounters.

capristo

 May 18, 2009, 4:07 pm
Haha, yeah, monsters should definitely be able to throw stuff at you.

4zb4

 May 19, 2009, 6:32 am
I\'ve always thought kobolds should throw spears.
And there could be dwarven grenadiers.
Oh, and POLTERGEISTS!

Serefan

 May 19, 2009, 4:53 pm
A poltergeist room disturbing the poltergeist when you are in the middle of the room would be awesome. You guys are giving me my spirits back for restarting my project.

4zb4

 May 20, 2009, 4:39 am
Yes... a room full of dwarven grenades, heavy chests and whips

Eagle V

 May 20, 2009, 8:26 am
Would it be possible to fetch creatures? And combinations? And items in someone\'s inventory?

What do you want to fetch?
- Backpack full of gunpowder
You see a backpack full of gunpowder with a veteran kamikaze dwarf of valpurus fly towards you.
You see a backpack full of gunpowder with a veteran kamikaze dwarf of valpurus fly towards you.
You see a backpack full of gunpowder with a veteran kamikaze dwarf of valpurus fly towards you.

Or

What do you want to fetch?
- Bear trap
You see a bear trap with a goblin in it fly towards you.
The bear trap hits you in the groin.
The goblin critically hits you in the groin.
You die.

Or


What do you want to fetch?
- Mithril longsword
You see a mithril longsword with an angel of Valpurus holding on to it fly towards you.
The angel of Valpurus seems hostile.

Serefan

 May 20, 2009, 9:11 am
Items in inventory should be fetchable without them noticing it (as they\'re in their backpack), with a chance roll they notice it and become pissed at you for stealing.

BDR

 Jan 25, 2010, 12:13 am
*resurrects the thread*

Here\'s an item idea: the Minus sword - not nearly as damaging as the other artifact weapons, but it has a rather good chance of weakening one of the physical stats (AStr, LStr, Dex, Agi) of the monster fought by 1d3 points.

4zb4

 Jan 25, 2010, 3:37 am
Perhaps with a more flashy name?
Like... uh... Blade of Woe? Sapping blade?

Also I think we need more items referencing other things. And LIVAN\'s \"tip sword of penetration\" should be called Estoc IMO.
More artifact armor? If not more types of armor. Like footwear being boots, sandals, shin guards etc. And body armor being robes, plate, chain, fabric.

BDR

 Jan 25, 2010, 3:42 am
Minus sword references Star Ocean: The Second Story.

Somagu

 Jan 25, 2010, 3:44 am
Just because it\'s a reference doesn\'t make it a good name.

BDR

 Jan 25, 2010, 3:55 am
Eh, I was responding to Azba\'s desire for more references. As far as what makes an objectively good name, I guess something else could work but I\'m not sure what precisely (though the two suggested alternatives don\'t thrill me a whole lot). The main thing I cared about is getting the idea of a sword that knocks down physical stats on the table.

Eagle V

 Jan 25, 2010, 6:11 am
The sword of chaos. A decent artifact weapon, but with a chance to explode/burn/acid/generally screw your oponent, and a chance it backfires and screws yourself. And chances of random effects, like the monster becomes friendly, or you get a random state, or you autopray to a random (known or unknown) god. I remember there being a curseblessed sword in a d&d campaign, and hell it was fun. \"Shit! I\'m backed into a corner by three greater demons! In a desperate attempt to save myself, I attack!\" *rolls d100 = 50* \"The demons sit down and invite you to debate the conflict. You convince them that you have done nothing wrong, and they depart\"

4zb4

 Jan 25, 2010, 6:17 am
Voodoo doll.
\'Nuff said.

(e.g. alternative to BDR\'s Minus sword)

Also, a completely horrible addition - Midas\' touch. Either a status effect or something permanent upon consuming or equipping a certain item. Turns everything you touch into gold. All your inventory, enemy body parts that are struck, walls being dug - the floor under your feet? etc.
Should probably be temporary to stop it being a nuisance.

Serefan

 Jan 25, 2010, 10:33 am
- The voodoo doll would be different from the Minus sword in that it would be a ranged attack instead of melee. (Actually, what would happen if you smack the head of a voodoo doll in the groin of the victim? ) Another fun thing to do would be gathering small items to apply to the doll. (i.e. on one hand, pieces of victims so the doll actually works on them, on the other hand: needles, matches, razor blades, ...)

- I love the Midas\'s touch idea. If it\'s worked out some more it\'s very reasonable. In your example of digging out a wall, the wall would not change into gold (except if you touch it by accident, and then maybe you\'d just get a gold brick or something), on the other hand, one of the first things turning into gold would be your pickaxe - Problem is, you\'d have to be very creative to get certain things done like eating, handling items, and... pushing your FINGERS down your throat to vomit.

*You push your fingers down your throat and vomit.*
*Your throat turns into gold!*
*Your tongue turns into gold!*
*You vomit gold nuggets!*
*You panick!*

BDR

 Jan 25, 2010, 2:45 pm
[quote=\"Serefan\";14826] Another fun thing to do would be gathering small items to apply to the doll. (i.e. on one hand, pieces of victims so the doll actually works on them, on the other hand: needles, matches, razor blades, ...)



We could definitely use fire and a burning status ailment in this game. Drowning too, but then there\'d have to be more water.

4zb4

 Jan 25, 2010, 6:34 pm
Drowning exists. Vaguely. Perhaps the ability to learn to swim? Also to prevent abuse, maybe you should get tired quickly and \"fainting\" leads to drowning. Maybe a giant sea monster on the world map to prevent swimming between New Attnam and the outside world. Areas previously only accessable through teleportation or levitation (Like Genefourx\'s lair in LIVAN) could have the water replaced with lava or acid or radioactive sludge.
I second the \"more water\" idea.

chaostrom

 Jan 26, 2010, 2:15 am
Swimming and drowning exists. Dolphins and frogs can swim, and I think rats can too. Anything that can\'t swim, if it happens to fall into water, drowns.

BDR

 Jan 26, 2010, 2:42 am
However, players cannot currently swim or learn to swim (nor does water generally enter into the equation of living and dying). I think a water-themed area would be a nice addition.

Serefan

 Jan 26, 2010, 7:28 am
In general, and I think most of you are familiar with it, I think IVAN would eventually turn out much like Dwarf Fortress (Adventure Mode), especially concerning skills and stuff. Not that that\'s not normal. I think DF pretty much has every skill you could imagine.

Batman?

 Jan 26, 2010, 8:32 pm
Has random encounters on the overworld been suggested? It would make it interesting.

capristo

 Jan 27, 2010, 3:40 am
I don\'t like the idea of random encounters. But it would be cool to be able to \"enter\" every single space on the map, so you could enter a forest or mountain area (I guess a mountain would just be a forest covered in snow) which is basically a small map with randomly placed trees and some natural wildlife. That would also make starvation less common among noobs.

4zb4

 Jan 27, 2010, 3:58 am
Night/day actually having an effect would be nice (like making undead and nocturnal creatures appear at night, and general wildlife during the day). Also night/day on the world map. And Attnam if it hasn\'t got that already (it hasn\'t changed from snowy day in my experience).

Somagu

 Jan 27, 2010, 4:58 am
What a horrible night to have a curse!

Battleguy

 Jan 27, 2010, 7:15 am
Battleguy waits for somagu to slowly say that last line.

Serefan

 Jan 27, 2010, 12:52 pm
I\'m not really for random encounters either. But in my childhood I\'ve played many oldschool rpg\'s, and one of them had a (imho) nice solution for that. There were random encounters, but you could see them walking over the map, that way you could estimate what creatures the random encounter contained, and eventually engage or evade them.

The battles themselves are, a bit like Capristo said, resolved in an extra pseudo-randomly generated piece of ground.

Alveradok

 Jan 27, 2010, 1:00 pm
Serefan played Exile?

Serefan

 Jan 27, 2010, 1:18 pm
Yeah, loved those games. That was the one I was talking about.

4zb4

 Jan 27, 2010, 2:11 pm
Baldur\'s gate had a similar \"random encounters\" system which I wasn\'t too fond of. You had a chance of being \"waylaid\" between areas, which consisted of a fight in a generated zone.
IMO as previously suggested you should be able to \">\" anywhere in the wilderness, and have a chance of critters appearing (and maybe unique encounters too...)

Batman?

 Jan 27, 2010, 4:44 pm
Maybe random encounters are kind of hokey, but I like the idea of the overworld having a challenge. Because really other than starving the occasional Knuub to death,and making you go into the UT early on it serves no purpose. Also Random encounters (or some form of overworld conflict be it random of monsters you can see) would give the game a new way to kill you.

Maybe have the overworld contain random low depth dungeons with treasure/higher chance of an an artifact or valuable item? so that early on you have a chance to do a quick 1-3 level out of depth monster run to get good items, but once you leave it dissapears?

4zb4

 Jan 27, 2010, 9:42 pm
Also, some lovely music to provide ambience. Use MIDI for that authentic \"old game\" feel!

BDR

 Jan 28, 2010, 12:30 am
I think the biggest deal-breaker IMO as far as random encounters are concerned is that in tandem with permadeath life becomes even harder for newer characters and players. The jRPGs with random encounters all have some kind of save system (not necessarily in the dungeon, but it\'s there all the same) so that you don\'t get *completely* screwed over if an encounter proves too much to handle. However, I like the idea of > providing randomly generated wilderness that may contain items, as then it becomes up to the player whether they want to risk going in or not.

Eagle V

 Jan 28, 2010, 6:42 am
If there is a random wilderness generated by > I think some tiles should be marked as \'containing a temple/dungeon\', in the same way the other levels are marked. That way, you don\'t end up searching several levels of jungle before you find a dungeon.

Batman?

 Jan 28, 2010, 5:30 pm
[quote=\"BDR\";14867]I think the biggest deal-breaker IMO as far as random encounters are concerned is that in tandem with permadeath life becomes even harder for newer characters and players. The jRPGs with random encounters all have some kind of save system (not necessarily in the dungeon, but it\'s there all the same) so that you don\'t get *completely* screwed over if an encounter proves too much to handle.


ADOM (My personal favorite of the rougelikes) has permadeath and random overworld encounters that are handled very well. they have the difficutly scaled by location (how far you are into the wilderness from the stasrt of the game) and by game time, so early on in the game you get goblins/kobolds etc, but as the game clock runs the monsters get more difficult. it occaisonally causes an early charecter to get killed ,but in general adds a nice flavor to the game.

capristo

 Jan 28, 2010, 5:58 pm
[quote=\"Eagle V\";14875]If there is a random wilderness generated by > I think some tiles should be marked as \'containing a temple/dungeon\', in the same way the other levels are marked. That way, you don\'t end up searching several levels of jungle before you find a dungeon.


Why not all of them?

Eagle V

 Jan 28, 2010, 7:00 pm
[quote=\"capristo\";14883]Why not all of them?



Because you would be either dead or immortal by the time you reach attnam

BDR

 Jan 29, 2010, 3:00 am
[quote=\"Batman?\";14882]ADOM (My personal favorite of the rougelikes) has permadeath and random overworld encounters that are handled very well. they have the difficutly scaled by location (how far you are into the wilderness from the stasrt of the game) and by game time, so early on in the game you get goblins/kobolds etc, but as the game clock runs the monsters get more difficult. it occaisonally causes an early charecter to get killed ,but in general adds a nice flavor to the game.



I\'ve always felt IVAN was characterized by the dungeons with their mix of random enemies and design as well as static additions that presented new problems or possibly new solutions (though certainly not without cost). Random encounters out in the wilderness I feel would break the feel of that and since the \'real\' part of the game takes place in the dungeons anyway, I don\'t think it would be a positive change. Also worth noting is that as the game is at the moment, the previous concern is irrelevant because the longest trip anywhere in the overworld is from the underwater tunnel to Attnam, and as the second longest trip is generally much smaller, unless you make random encounters really common there probably won\'t be all that many and thus it won\'t be able to make the kind of impression they do in ADOM. Though, really for me it seems like it will be more annoying and unfun than otherwise to have random encounters.

Batman?

 Jan 29, 2010, 12:47 pm
IDK, you could try to reinvent the random encounter model, instead of just the \"you are ambushed by a bunch of random monsters\" model, give you random encounters that give you a chance to add alignemtn roleplay \"you encounter a carvan of traders, do you want ot help/pillage them\" or such. I think it could be a tool to really flesh out the IVAN world.

I dont disagree that some aspects of random encounters are pretty lame and dont really add much to a game, but as it stands the overworld has no real purpose. you could just as easily eliminate it alltogether. All it does is occasionally starve a beginner player.

Ernomouse

 Jan 29, 2010, 1:46 pm
The latest version of the game is 0.50. The plan was that there\'d be a empires and cities out there doing trade, wars, politics and other sorts of things without the player doing anything about it. This game is not finished, therefore some things that seemingly have no purpose, might simply not been finished yet.

capristo

 Jan 29, 2010, 4:46 pm
The more we talk about this the sadder I am that they stopped development at 0.50

BDR

 Jan 29, 2010, 4:50 pm
Aren\'t we all, though?

chaostrom

 Feb 1, 2010, 11:58 am
There really needs to be a warning on a locked door if it\'s Merka\'s. It was such a promising character too...

4zb4

 Feb 2, 2010, 12:44 am
A scatterbrained wand. Does the effect of a random wand when zapped. Has a chance to break itself resulting in a random effect too.

And probably an outlandish idea: The Room of Change Material. A simple non-descript room that looks no different to the others on the level, but anything inside the room occasionally changes material to something random. Upon entering the room there should be some sort of alert, like \"This room seems dangerous\", \"you get the feeling it is not safe here\", \"Your skin seems to be crawling\". The change should affect all bodyparts along with inventory items, but only has a chance to (to prevent everything changing at once) and without an announcement of having done so. The message \"Your head suddenly feels like marble!\" would definately give it away.
To make things more interesting, there should be a unique monster that spawns in there, and is slow-moving so it has time to get its limbs and such changed. A golem of some sort, perhaps?

Alkatrazz

 Mar 21, 2011, 12:23 pm
A new status effect or two might be nice. What about Reflect?

Reflect would protect you from all spells. Including beneficial ones.

chaostrom

 Mar 21, 2011, 12:58 pm
Interesting idea. However, I can\'t help but think it\'d be broken due to the fact there\'s just so many more harmful spells cast your way than beneficial ones. How about magic immunity? Magic doesn\'t affect you, period. That\'ll include spells, wands, scrolls, equipment, fountains, the works. Possibly prayer effects as well. It\'d work both ways, so it won\'t be so broken.

Alkatrazz

 Mar 21, 2011, 1:22 pm
That\'s kinda what I meant. Say goodbye to using wands of teleport to get out of jams.

Or perhaps using a wand/scroll of Reflect lets you reflect 1 spell, whereas a ring of reflection or a mirrored shield would give you perma-Reflect status?

Reflect would also be a buff that can be granted by Infuscor.

I was also thinking about a wand/scroll of healing. You can use them to heal yourself, pets, or deal damage to the undead.

Alveradok

 Mar 21, 2011, 4:02 pm
Immunity is less merciful, ergo more IVANish

One-time reflections sound great because it would take some mastery to succesfuly determine which will come first - his fireball or your need to teleport away. I like the idea very much.

A scroll of healing would be a cute gift for us players who like to hang out with buffed out pets, and sounds easier to do than a \"Drink a healing liquid!\" command for the AI.

Alkatrazz

 Mar 21, 2011, 4:21 pm
Reflecting some things like lightning, fireballs, and healing spells would be cool. Then you could use the old Final Fantasy trick of casting Reflect on a monster before it uses its own healing spell, thus causing it to heal you instead. Or casting Reflect on yourself, and then using lightning or a fireball on yourself and sending it in a random direction.

Alveradok

 Mar 21, 2011, 9:41 pm
Yeah the first thinghi thiught of was Carbuncle and the reflect tricks

Warheck

 Mar 22, 2011, 2:29 am
[quote=\"Alkatrazz\";18743]Or casting Reflect on yourself, and then using lightning or a fireball on yourself and sending it in a random direction.



Sounds like an appealing idea, particularly implemented as a state.

It gives me an idea for a scroll of fire balls, where if you read it, then you can cast a spell on a selected square (spell range proportional to your intelligence). This would be a bit like the spells of an elder dark mage, in that you could cast the spell from a distance. It would also finally make the behaviour of dark mages somewhat more explicable; it bothered me a little that I couldn\'t cast spells like they do.
The scroll could be volatile and explode like a wand of fireballs. If you are confused state, then confuse-read means the incantation goes wrong and you blow yourself up.

Wand/Scroll of healing sounds great too.

chaostrom

 Mar 22, 2011, 3:08 am
[quote=\"Warheck\";18755]It gives me an idea for a scroll of fire balls...


As far as that goes, there was some sort of magic to be added to IVAN beyond the scrolls/wands way we have right now.

13:55 < J_Kahvi> if the psi system is added we could make an explanation for why food in shops stays unspoilt
13:55 < J_Kahvi> the shopkeeper would have a remove air -spell and would remove the air around the foodstuffs
13:55 < J_Kahvi> it could also be used to suffocate slow enemies
13:56 < J_Kahvi> or well, not remove, but push aside
13:56 < J_Kahvi> since shopkeepers aren\'t much of magicians, it could be a quite simple spell

BDR

 Mar 22, 2011, 3:30 am
That\'s a pretty neat solution to the problem. Shame spells never got added in.

cowofdoom78963

 Mar 22, 2011, 4:15 am
isn\'t there already an explanation as to why their foods dont rot?

chaostrom

 Mar 22, 2011, 5:56 am
Only for the New Attnam shop\'s bananas.

cowofdoom78963

 Mar 24, 2011, 9:01 pm
[quote=\"chaostrom\";18761]Only for the New Attnam shop\'s bananas.


I thought it was implied for Attnam too.

4zb4

 Mar 25, 2011, 3:43 am
[quote=\"cowofdoom78963\";18760]isn\'t there already an explanation as to why their foods dont rot?


Maybe because it\'s damn near freezing in Attnam by the time you get there?
Perhaps the same could be said for the GC shop (not that i\'ve seen any food in there as far as I remember) because it\'s so deep underground and kept in a cold stone room.

Coding wise, I have no idea.

Bored One

 Mar 28, 2011, 8:23 pm
The shopkeepers are friends with all creatures, including microbes.

Warheck

 Apr 8, 2011, 1:40 am
How about: Named Continents

4zb4

 Apr 8, 2011, 8:27 am
[quote=\"Bored One\";18834]The shopkeepers are friends with all creatures, including microbes.



With the exception of Hulbo, who is not friends with the tax collectors.

Warheck

 Apr 9, 2011, 5:37 am
Fortune Cookies, which are \'read\', and tell your fortune using a similar method to the sci-talk algorithm.

f.ex. a particular fortune cookie might read:

\"The fortune cookie reads:\\ \"Soon, the (adjective) (creature noun) will (adverb) (verb) you!\\\"\"


Code



adjective =

{5, big, little, small, brittle, enormous;}



creature_noun =

{4, hedgehog, orc, zombie, dolphin;}



adverb =

{5, quickly, slowly, mildly, briskly, painfully;}



verb =

{5, devour, jump over, smash, stomp on, dissolve}

4zb4

 Apr 9, 2011, 6:00 am
+forum rep if you use a similar code to program the Magic 8 Ball into IVAN.

chaostrom

 Apr 10, 2011, 7:42 am
Hehehe, fortune cookies.

capristo

 Apr 10, 2011, 11:19 pm
Fortune cookies are a cool idea It would be nice to be able to hack down spiderwebs (\'a\' with a pickaxe or something)

chaostrom

 Apr 11, 2011, 4:29 am
I\'d prefer an \"A\"ttack button that lets you choose what to attack with (such as choosing to bite an opponent, with bites having a higher chance to hit the head, or just swinging your thunder hammer in the air hoping to throw a bolt at an approaching opponent, etc, which would also work with missile weapons or learned spells if such are ever added, not to mention allowing you a proper first attack on a pet to piss them off if your aim is to kill said pet instead of a kick).

Eagle V

 Apr 11, 2011, 7:37 am
That would be awesome indeed. It could also be used to hack doors open with your Iron Battleaxe +5 instead of trying to kick them, or prying chests open with a dagger, or even repeatedly kicking a weak opponent instead of attacking him directly, allowing you to keep his sweet armor intact. Or to use your left-hand thunder hammer only if there is no wall directly behind your opponent, and you don\'t want to equip and unequip it every time your enemy makes a sidestep. Or even make spears and/or whips have a range of two tiles.

Ernomouse

 Apr 11, 2011, 9:09 am
Man I love those ideas... I wish I had time to start coding, but no... =( Too many irons in the fire already, I\'ve barely got time to sleep.

chaostrom

 Oct 18, 2011, 5:07 am

Quote


dhsk232 says (3:55 PM):
oh yeah, and this is creepy
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/10/pictures/11...-albino-one-eyed-fetus/
... do you think mortifer should have sharks since valpurus has dolphins?
Macho Messiah says (3:55 PM):
Izzy says yes
dhsk232 says (3:55 PM):
lol
Macho Messiah says (3:55 PM):
I agree
dhsk232 says (4:01 PM):
should they be one-eyed sharks, as above, or normal sharks
Macho Messiah says (4:02 PM):
How about sharks with frikken laser beams coming out of their third eye
dhsk232 says (4:02 PM):
lmao
Macho Messiah says (4:02 PM):
Also they're necromancers
And they can transform into walking sharks
Credit goes to Izzy for 90% of this
dhsk232 says (4:03 PM):
hah
dhsk232 says (4:04 PM):
should be some world-devouring wyrm with a one-eyed shark's head that fires lasers on par with orbital cannons
that'd be more suitable for the destroyer of worlds
Macho Messiah says (4:05 PM):
Should be a post end-game event for non chaos wins
dhsk232 says (4:05 PM):
no, not wyrm
WORM
Macho Messiah says (4:05 PM):
DEATH WORMS
dhsk232 says (4:05 PM):

Macho Messiah says (4:05 PM):
THAT SHOOT LASERS

Warheck

 Oct 20, 2011, 8:41 pm
What about permanent polymorph into an orc, by drinking a potion or something? Then you can play the rest of the game as an orc character.

Is there any code for the Magic 8 ball, by the way?

chaostrom

 Oct 21, 2011, 5:13 am
The 8ball is on IRC. It's Bored's.

Alkatrazz

 Nov 3, 2011, 12:27 am
How about a skeleton key? Opens any locked door or chest. Would be extremely rare, OFC. Or a Bag of Holding?

4zb4

 Nov 12, 2011, 11:02 am

Alkatrazz wrote   >

How about a skeleton key? Opens any locked door or chest. Would be extremely rare, OFC. Or a Bag of Holding?



A skeleton key isn't really necessary - any locked chest can be opened with a firm kick/bottle of sulphuric acid/wand of polymorph/exploding mine.
"A wand of polymorph hath a thousand uses"

Not sure a Bag of Holding would be possible as of now. You could of course just give it a ridiculously negative weight, but that would effect your total carried weight rather than the weight of the bag's contents.
Also, would unbalance play


Also I just had an idea: An orb/scroll of scrambling. Does nothing to affect gameplay - all it does is randomly mix the tile graphics and names of all in-game entities around. Think walls having the graphic of a goblin head, and Elpuri looking like 4 tiles of pineapples, and a two-handed sword being a element coloured door. "A door is stridulating here." "You pick up the mustard gas dolphin of agility +2"
Would have to be an extremely rare random spawn, or locked away deep in some dungeon where only forumites/developers would know how to find it.

Alkatrazz

 Nov 14, 2011, 9:57 am

4zb4 wrote   >

A skeleton key isn't really necessary - any locked chest can be opened with a firm kick/bottle of sulphuric acid/wand of polymorph/exploding mine.



Many of those methods jeopardize the contents of the chest/door.

How about a key ring to hold all the keys you find?

4zb4

 Nov 14, 2011, 7:55 pm

Alkatrazz wrote   >

Many of those methods jeopardize the contents of the chest/door.



Wand of Polymorph doesn't, and explosions don't do much except break bottles occasionally. Acid is negligible if you get to the items in time.

Key ring would be nice. Like, you "a"pply the keyring to open a chest if it has the correct key rather than an individual one.

Warheck

 Nov 14, 2011, 8:20 pm
i still want to program the magic 8-ball into IVAN.

On anaother note, I'm wondering if anyone has found an easier way to build up rooms in the dungeon.dat files? i.e. a more wysiwyg way rather than manipulating a bunch of ascii? (That said, editing the script in ascii still has some charm to it).

JoKe

 Nov 14, 2011, 10:08 pm
There was the image-to-map converter by someone linked somewhere here long ago.

Fake edit: found it, Planplan's converter.

Warheck

 Nov 15, 2011, 3:52 pm
Ah I remember this, thanks for bringing it back into the daylight

Zulox

 Nov 18, 2011, 3:56 pm
I have an idea that should be easy to implement and would increase realism of the game - shop shelfes. Each shop should have specialised furnitures for item display. Armor racks, weapons racks, potions cabinets and so on, they suppose to work in the same way as bookshelfs in Attnam librairy. This way shops could be smaller, contain more items of wider array and be generally more friendly to costumers.

chaostrom

 Nov 19, 2011, 5:44 am
That... Is actually a great idea. Nice one Zulox.

Somagu

 Nov 19, 2011, 7:18 am
Kind of gives more incentive to rob the stores though. I think an increase of guards would be in order.

capristo

 Nov 22, 2011, 12:43 am

Warheck wrote   >

i still want to program the magic 8-ball into IVAN.

On anaother note, I'm wondering if anyone has found an easier way to build up rooms in the dungeon.dat files? i.e. a more wysiwyg way rather than manipulating a bunch of ascii? (That said, editing the script in ascii still has some charm to it).



I'd bet that a graphical map editor would encourage a lot more people to contribute maps! The actual maps themselves aren't bad but then assigning properties to all the different tiles and etc. can be a pain.

Alveradok

 Nov 25, 2011, 7:00 pm

capristo wrote   >

I'd bet that a graphical map editor would encourage a lot more people to contribute maps! The actual maps themselves aren't bad but then assigning properties to all the different tiles and etc. can be a pain.



Well would you look at that I found an old """map editor""" I used for my project which stores maps in plaintext and doesn't look like it needs much to be reworked. I'm on the job*!

*-may or may not finish

Warheck

 Nov 25, 2011, 10:30 pm
Yay! That is great Alvers

Eagle V

 Feb 17, 10:28 pm
Well, because Erno asked so nicely.

The dreamworld, or limbo, is a universe parallel to our own. Dreaming people are observing and subtly, but constantly manipulating that universe, and as such, it is a bizarre place, where no laws apply. As the dreamworld is not exclusive to human dreams, it contains items and entities no man can understand, in addition to warped and mutated monstrosities, objects or places that can cause insanity simply by looking at them, and so on.

Dreamcasting is the art of projecting the power of the dreamworld into reality. The caster enters a state of very lucid dreaming, in which he perceives both the dreamworld and the real one. The caster then uses his consciousness as a portal to let a select item, entity, or idea enter the real world from the dream world.

While the caster can manipulate such a dream-thing to an extent, he is still limited to what he finds once he enters limbo. In addition, thinking dream-entities might try to use the caster to escape limbo, by force, diplomacy, or other means.

Another disadvantage of dreamcasting is the use of the caster's mind and body as a carrier for dream-things. Human brains and bodies work great in this physical world, but they weren't meant for the insanity of the combined dreams of everything that ever lived.

Every dream-thing that passes trough the caster's consciousness changes the brain, causes it to question what used to be facts, and accept as reality what it saw in limbo. Depending on what knowledge erodes and what weirdness is added, several sorts of insanity are possible, ranging from almost all known phobias to megalomania, extreme sadism or masochism, severe depression or unwavering optimism, hallucinations, amnesia, ...

Similarly, as the dream-matter passes trough the body of the caster, a bit of its reality erodes. Slowly, the physical body will show more and more oddities and discontinuities. Examples of later stages are missing body parts (even missing connections between two fully functional body parts), boiling skin, more or less joints, supernatural abilities or disabilities (eg, a vampire's weakness to garlic), ...

Ultimately, either the mind or the body of the caster will give in. If the mind collapses to madness, the caster will become a monster, controlled by that same madness. (A bone file is generated, with a monster instead of a ghost.) The monstrous caster will haunt the place where it died, in a manner controlled by its madness. (eg, a megalomaniac will attack relentlessly, thinking himself invincible. An agoraphobic caster/monster will wait for prey in the smallest, most winding and cramped corridor it finds)
If the body erodes completely, the caster is cut loose from this world and sucked into limbo. From there, he has no choice but to endure, hoping another caster will one day open a portal nearby, trough which he can try to escape.

That's my idea about the whole dreams/magic thing.