Skills Q/A

[Brian Thomas <>]

	Hi everyone,
	
	Sorry for the slow reply -- Ive only just gotten back from my
	first vacation in 1 1/2 years :)

	I would like to address some of the skills issues brought up
	in the past few days. Before I start, I would like to reinforce
	the point that the SKILLS code is experimental still. It is 
	definitely past "development" but, it still requiring some 
	fine tuning. One important aspect is how fast/well various
	skills garner experience for the user. This definitely needs 
	tuning still.

	Now, that said....

> Klaus writes:
> Hello Brian, hello Mark
> I just installed crossfire 0.92.1 and recognized the same problem as
> with 0.92.0 and your extensions expxx.
> When we start a new player, we got the problem, that the character gets no
> experience when using a wand, or when casting a spell.

	Yeah. This is *not* a bug. Wand/rod/horn experience has been 
	removed from the game. Originally there were 2 justifications
	for this: 1) the game was very easy when you can fireball/icestorm
	your way to high level and 2) what experience category would get
	attached to wand experience? 
	  It turns out that the only non-magician (err.. "clerical") spell
	that appears in a "wand" is summon pet monsters. With the introduction
	of version 0.92.1, "summon pet monsters" is once again a magician
	spell, therefore, it seems reasonable to attach wand/horn/rod 
	experience to the "magician" category. This is quite easy to do
	(below). But I suggest that the player gain much less xp for killing
	things with a wand/horn/rod/scroll ("magical device") than with 
	spellcasting alone. To change the setup, edit the "skill_params"
	file in lib/. Change the entry:

		use magic item
		6 0   0 0.0    5 99 99

	To this:

		use magic item
		4 0   0 0.01    5 99 99
	
	("0.01" indicates 1/100th of the regular monster xp will be awarded,
	adjust as you like for more/less).

> Klaus writes:
>
> Crossfire reports severall Bad call of calc_skill_exp() by player.
> messages in his logfile (option -d). Any suggestions?

	Hmm. This is hard to "debug" w/o further info like what/which
	skills are being used at the time. Can you supply me the 
	info? 

> Akshay writes:
> 
> Has anyone seen the following error while compiling (ld error)::
> symbol Gods has different sizes:
> (libcross.a(init.o) value=0x2c; libcross.a(map.o) value=0xdc)
> I checked the files and found that Gods was referenced only from map.c and the
> linker made the correct choice. I still dont know why the error occurred or
> what it is pointing to.

	Hard to debug this too. I have never seen this error. One
	possiblity.. Have you defined MULTIPLE_GODS but not ALLOW_SKILLS?
	Any special compile time flags in use? Also, did you rebuild
	the code from the ground up? (perhaps makefiles werent rebuilt
	by xmkmf ?)

> Peterm writes:
>
> Humm, I've been the author of most of the rune code.  I tried to design
> the experience from runes to obey the following design:
> [ rules sniped]

	I may be at fault too. I hacked on the disarm code a bit to 
	fit it within the context of the skills system. Now, all xp
	should be awarded by a call to calc_skill_exp() from within
	disarm_trap(). The rules (in version 0.92.1) for xp gain 
	are essentially the same as originally. I will try to take a 
	look at this too.

> Arne writes:
> 
> Hmmm... I think, as for everything, the exp you get should be in
> correlation to the risk you take. So a spell of disarm should give no
> exp.

	I agree. I thought that the spell was fixed so it wouldnt 
	give xp. *sigh* I will take a look at this again too, and 
	make a patch for Mark if needed. 

> Mark writes:
> 
>  I know that Brian changed the fighter skill code recently so that wc and
> damage goes up as fighting skill level goes out.

	Yeah this is correct. A player (0.92.1) only gains advances in wc,
	and dam (*note* this is new) for gaining more *fighter* xp. 
	
	Also, (Mark didnt mention it) the special weapon code was tweaked
	a bit too. Now, you may only have a special weapon that has been
	improved 5 + (fighter level/5) times. This means the best special
	weapon that can now exist in the game is one which is 25 times 
	improved. Therefore a 20th level mage/10th level fighter can 
	only weild a special weapon which is improved by 7 times or less.


	Hope I didnt miss any queries concerning the skills code. If so,
	please re-submit them to the list. 

						b.t.
 
	(in the skills system)