Ridiculous death due, in my opinion, to flawed design.

[Vogrim]

I just lost my level 39 Dunadan paladin to the Lernaean Hydra after getting hit by a roughly 800 damage breath attack, which is almost 200 hp over my maximum life total. Is making a situation like this possible conducive to quality, enjoyable gameplay?

[Magnate]

Originally Posted by Vogrim

I just lost my level 39 Dunadan paladin to the Lernaean Hydra after getting hit by a roughly 800 damage breath attack, which is almost 200 hp over my maximum life total. Is making a situation like this possible conducive to quality, enjoyable gameplay?

Well someone might as well have a go.

IMO it depends on the extent to which you like knowing all the mechanics of games you play, as compared with finding stuff out as you go. In a game with permadeath, some people argue for the former - i.e. all the edit file contents known to the player from the start. The game is actually designed from the other viewpoint, though there is an option which gives you full monster knowledge.

You got killed by an unresisted poison breath (I assume). If you'd had resist poison, you'd have survived. Next time you'll know that to face the Learnean Hydra you'll need resist poison or over 800hp. If you don't like discovering this sort of stuff by dying, turn on the full monster memory option.

HTH.

(EDIT: There is also a "cheat_death" option, removing the permadeath from the game. You might prefer to turn that on for a while.)

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by Vogrim

I just lost my level 39 Dunadan paladin to the Lernaean Hydra after getting hit by a roughly 800 damage breath attack, which is almost 200 hp over my maximum life total. Is making a situation like this possible conducive to quality, enjoyable gameplay?

Those kind of deaths are called "Yet Another Stupid Death". YASD in short. "stupid" doesn't mean game here, it means that you, the player, did something you should not have done. Before you think I claim you stupid, that's the only type of death in this game and we all have experienced it. for example I have lost a +30+ speed nearly 1000 point damage / turn, 1000 point HP, almost every resist covered char to Dracolisk once (forgot to wear FA item).

In your case that was fighting a (unknown) monster without resists to handle it. Either mistake was the "unknown" part, or the "missing resist" part. Missing resist poison perhaps? By the time you meed Lernaean Hydra you should have already learned about danger of not having poison resist. You had seen AMHD:s, right? If you had not have fire resist and got hit by that it would have made over twice the damage you had HP.

To answer to your question, yes, it increases the enjoyment of the playing knowing that you can die. This is a tough game, not something that 5-year old kid can play through in a hour and then forget. Winning is actual achievement, though much easier now than it used to be.

[Vogrim]

Perhaps you're the stupid one for thinking it makes sense to have instant kill abilities in a game where death is permanent.

I don't understand the point of putting so much emphasis on being either resistant to EVERYTHING or getting screwed over.

[flechette]

Originally Posted by Vogrim

Perhaps you're the stupid one for thinking it makes sense to have instant kill abilities in a game where death is permanent.

I don't understand the point of putting so much emphasis on being either resistant to EVERYTHING or getting screwed over.

Wow... you aren't here to make friends, are you?

Protip: You don't have to kill everything you see the second you see it, or even at all ever. There have been plenty of times where I've left goodies on the ground because of monsters that I couldn't handle at the time.

[Vogrim]

Yeah, silly me for prancing about oblivious to the fact that I'd be one-shot 20+ hours into my game for not wearing every single resistance. Guess I should've been on my toes. What a fun learning experience!

Say, can you recommend any old Nintendo games where I can jump off a platform and fall into a pit without ever actually seeing the pit until I'm flying face-first into it? It's such a great system that I can't get enough!

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Vogrim

Yeah, silly me for prancing about oblivious to the fact that I'd be one-shot 20+ hours into my game for not wearing every single resistance. Guess I should've been on my toes. What a fun learning experience!

Now you're getting the idea

[andrewdoull]

Originally Posted by Nick

Now you're getting the idea

You're just saying that because in O's opinion he should have instead been blinded, confused and bleeding to death...

Andrew

[Adley]

You don't have to resist EVERYthing. Actually, apart from being breathed on by Tarasque, you only Need Pois & Base 4 . The rest are only to counter side effects. Chaos breathing monster are not too common.

[fizzix]

Originally Posted by Vogrim

Yeah, silly me for prancing about oblivious to the fact that I'd be one-shot 20+ hours into my game for not wearing every single resistance. Guess I should've been on my toes. What a fun learning experience!

It seems that you don't like the way Angband is structured. However, as Magnate says, there are several options for you. One is to turn on full monster memory. Then you will see how much damage and what type every monster will do. The second option is to turn on cheat death, and then death puts you back at the start of the level.

I too did not like learning by losing a powerful character to an instant death. My first 2-3 wins were with cheat death (actually save scumming). I wasn't convinced to try playing without the backups until I won a game without ever using my scummed save files.