🧭Neo Angband: Squire v0.2.0

Added

• Visible Squire fights with what works and keeps its way out. When one blow can kill, it takes the finishing attack; otherwise it compares melee, arrows, oil, wands and spells by damage per action. It won’t spend the mana, oil or wand charge its next escape depends on, and a young character leaves the level once three breeders are awake around it. Swapping gear never costs the Free Action, See Invisible or resistance the next depth requires.

• Visible Six more family touches. A family motto passes down and an heir repeats it at a level-up or a narrow escape, or drops it for its own when its persona differs a lot. An heir favours the weapon kind its most successful ancestor used. The depth where an ancestor died unsettles a cautious heir and draws a proud one. Level-ups and first unique kills get a line in the persona’s voice, a proud character sometimes boasts of a first kill, and an ancestor’s artifact is recognised when it turns up again in a shop or on the floor.

• VisibleBalance Each Squire character chases the goals its persona cares about. Winning the game (Sauron on dungeon level 99, then Morgoth on 100) is a goal for every character, weighted mostly by Ambition, beside goals the persona picks: riches, fine gear, seeing the dungeon, uniques, a family grudge, an ancestor’s deepest level, depth for its own sake, and keeping the family line alive. A miser can care more about gold than about winning, and a tourist more about seeing each level.

• VisibleBalance Town trips and shopping follow the persona. While supplies are still above the level that forces a trip, a character with a high Town trips slider turns back sooner, and a driven one carries fewer spare potions and stays down. In town, once it holds two healing potions and two Phase Door scrolls, a character with high Savings keeps the rest of its gold and a treasure hunter spends it on gear. Patience sets how often it waits for Word of Recall instead of exploring. Each character’s goal weights also drift a little from its persona’s, so siblings with the same persona still play differently.

• VisibleBalance Squire buys gear upgrades and sells what it no longer needs. In town it buys a weapon or armour piece it can afford when it is clearly better than what the character wears, unless the persona chose to save its gold this visit. It sells spare wands, rods, rings, amulets and supplies beyond what it carries, each at a shop that buys that kind of item, and keeps one of each kind of device, three rods of Curing or Healing, and its best attack wand. The Selling and Pack weight sliders decide how much goes. It never sells or stores what the character is wearing, its last light, its escapes and Word of Recall, or the two healing potions and two Phase Door scrolls it always carries.

• VisibleBalanceSave-Compat Squire keeps a stockpile in the home. It leaves spare potions, scrolls, flasks, torches and food there, and takes from the home before buying in a shop. It learns what the home holds by going in, and remembers it with the character, so the stockpile is still known after a reload.

• VisibleBalance Squire steps to a defensible square before a hard fight. When a summoner, a breather or two or more awake creatures are in sight, it can walk up to four steps to a corridor, doorway or dead end where fewer of them can reach it at once, along a route that costs no more than standing still, and wait there one turn for them to come. Cautious, patient and self-preserving personas take the spot more readily than bold or impulsive ones, and it never walks past a dangerous creature to get there.

• VisibleUI Squire shows why a fixed errand ended. The reason appears in the autoplayer status, such as “Stopped: cave spider came into view.”

• VisibleUI The retreat line and the length of a short errand are settings. The retreat line runs from 10% to 90% of maximum hit points and a short errand from 50 to 500 decisions; the defaults stay at 50% and 200.

• Visible Heirs remember who killed the family. An heir hates or fears the creature that killed its ancestors, depending on its persona, and more strongly with each death. Hatred pulls it toward the fight and can make a hated unique an aim; fear makes the creature look more dangerous and offers a way off the level, and neither overrides the safety floor. Killing a hated unique settles the grudge, and feelings about an ordinary monster fade over the generations unless it has killed three of the family.

• Visible Squire checks the danger before it moves. It estimates the damage coming over its next action or two, only counts an escape that leaves it safer, checks every step of a walk to the stairs, and heals with the smallest cure that keeps ahead of the damage, or a weaker one when that is all it has near death. When a single cure or escape is all that keeps it alive, it takes that without waiting on the model.

• Visible Squire gets ready before it goes deeper. It leaves town with food, light and a healing and Phase Door reserve, checks its level, hit points and supplies against each new depth first, heads home while it still has what it needs to get there, and stays near the stairs while it is young. Once it is ready for the next depth, it searches the whole level for the way down.

• Visible Squire plays the whole game when a model is set up. Press Ctrl-Z and Squire asks Jev, Laya or another System One server what to do each time something changes, and plays on until you take the keyboard back. It fights, shoots, throws oil, aims wands, casts attack and healing spells, drinks healing potions, reads Phase Door and Teleportation, backs away, rests, eats, picks things up, learns new spells, wears better gear, maps a new level with a scroll, rod or spell, explores, takes the stairs, and leaves a level once worm masses or other breeders fill it. In town it buys healing, escapes, food, light and oil, and it reads Word of Recall to restock and go back down. Squire uses items only by the names you can see and reads a shop’s stock only while standing in it.

• VisibleUI The Squire panel. A dockable panel with six tabs. Setup picks the model and any backup Laya servers to try when the first is busy, stores its key, tests the connection and sets spend limits. The others are Persona, Lessons, Dashboard (a depth chart and the latest decisions), Orders and Report. Its text grows with the window, and the A- and A+ buttons change its size.

• Visible Personas. Sliders, favourite and hated lists, quirks and a backstory shape how Squire plays, starting from Default, a random persona or an archetype such as coward, berserker or miser. Squire asks for the best move and the in-character move and blends them, and a safety floor keeps it out of fights it would certainly lose unless the persona has a death wish or an order it follows closely says otherwise. Personas can be exported and imported.

• Visible Knight’s Lessons. While you play, Squire forms its own choice at each moment that matters, notes where yours differed and learns your style. It issues no commands. It offers “Why, sir?” reasons and “Watch this” demonstrations, rises through three ranks, infers a persona from your play that you can save, gives exams, and can show a hint when it disagrees.

• Visible Run reports. When a character Squire played dies, wins or retires, the Report tab shows the outcome, depth, top kills, uniques, lessons, the apprenticeship and tokens used, and saves the report as Markdown or JSON, a share card image, or the decision log, which keeps the latest 20,000 decisions.

• Visible Each decision in the log shows what came of it. When a plan stops, its entry notes whether it ran to the end, got interrupted or gave you back the keyboard. It also counts the commands sent and any the game ignored, and gives the hit points gained or lost. You’ll find this in the saved log, and it goes out with telemetry if you send every decision.

• Visible Fewer model calls. Squire no longer asks the model about moves with only one sensible answer. With no awake creature in sight it lights a torch, wears a known upgrade, learns a spell, reads a detection scroll on a new level, or waits for a recall to fire. If only one safe move is left, it takes it, and while nothing changes it repeats the model’s last choice for a few turns. The decision log lists these as reflexes, and they use no tokens.

• Visible Lessons now say what went wrong. When a battle-scarred veteran hits a level 1 mage for 8 as it walks up, the lesson reads “prefer range or avoid it below 16 HP” instead of “Nearly died after choosing to fight”. Squire learns this way from heavy blows, paralysis and other disabling attacks, breath and spells it sees, attacks a creature shrugs off, breeders and escapes that fail. It never blames resting, and killing a unique no longer adds a lesson.

• Visible Another look at the exits. If the model turns down every option while the character is in trouble, Squire adds the escapes it had held back, such as the nearest stairs, and asks once more.

• Visible Squire sizes up a creature by what it knows of it. Once the character has seen a creature’s blows, spells or breeding, those set its rating, so a level 1 mage treats a battle-scarred veteran that can hit for 12 a round as dangerous before the first blow lands. Low hit points, a crowd close by and a faster foe raise the rating further. Squire also casts the attack spell that does the most damage for its mana, holds its fire when a wall or another creature is in the way, and aims ball spells where they catch the most creatures.

• Visible Refused moves aren’t offered again right away. If the game won’t carry out a move, Squire leaves it out until the character steps elsewhere, its health or status changes, or a creature moves. When it can tell why, such as confusion, it says so to the model.

• Visible Roll-on. After a death, Setup can have Squire start the next character, like the last one or with a random race and class, and keep playing. The new character inherits some of what its ancestors learned.

• VisibleSecurity Telemetry, off by default. Setup lists what each level sends to squire.rpgm.tools, from a run summary up to every decision, and a backstory is sent only with its own consent. “Delete what I have sent” asks the service to delete this install’s records.

• Visible Train Laya while Jev plays. When switched on in Setup, Squire also sends each of Jev’s questions to Laya as its own request, skips one while Laya is still answering the last, and never acts on Laya’s answer. Every Jev decision is saved as a training row, and a Knight’s Lessons row carries your own choice as its label. “Save Laya training rows” downloads them.

• Visible Squire keeps shooting at the creature it picked. Arrows, flasks of oil, wands and bolt spells go on at one target until it dies, leaves sight, the line of fire closes or the ammunition or mana runs out, with no new model call per shot. A ball spell is still aimed afresh each cast, so the blast stays off the character. With nothing in view, Squire now walks to stairs and unexplored ground with the game’s own travel and run commands, and when it flees it heads for a known staircase before it just backs away.

• VisibleUI Squire works toward aims. On each new level, after a town trip, on gaining a level and every 2,000 game turns, Squire lists what it wants next (its next spellbook, a lantern, armour for empty slots, a magic weapon, free action, see invisible and a target depth) and has the model rank them. Moves that serve an aim say so and count for a little more with an ambitious persona, and a recall to town comes up once an aim is affordable. The list shows under Aims in the Squire panel.

• VisibleUI Give Squire orders. Write an order (“reach 500 ft before level 15”) or a standing instruction (“always run from uniques”) in the new Orders tab, or press Ctrl+Shift+O while the panel is open. Squire weighs each one in every decision, and how readily it obeys depends on its Devotion, Resentment and persona: a devoted squire may follow an order past its usual risk limit, and a proud one follows grudgingly. Instructions fade over time, faster for a Forgetful squire. Creed files save and load a set of standing instructions, a family creed passes to heirs, and “Instructions kept” in Setup caps how many it holds.

• Visible Squire uses more of what it finds. It judges floor items before walking to them, drops junk when the pack is full, and on a town trip buys the item of an aim it can now afford. Before a hard fight it drinks Heroism, Berserk or Speed or reads Blessing, it drinks a resist potion before a known breather, and it uses curing devices and activations. It disarms traps, tunnels through rubble that blocks its way, and leaves a level whose feeling is bad.

• Visible Heirs carry on the family’s aims, and orders have their own key. An heir inherits its predecessor’s depth target and a weapon the line was hunting, as strongly as the Inheritance slider allows, and an unambitious heir can drop a deep depth target; aims tied to the old character’s kit start fresh. Squire’s order key (O, or N when O is taken; none if both are) opens the order prompt during play whether or not the panel is open. An order Squire liked, or one it followed and was thanked for, now builds its Gratitude.

• Visible Viewers can give Squire orders. With a “Viewer orders address” from Squire Link in Setup, Squire collects orders from Twitch or Discord chat every few seconds while it plays and weighs each as a viewer’s request, which counts for less than your own orders unless the squire is very devoted. The Orders tab and journal name the viewer who gave each one.

• Visible Epitaphs. The log names the killer, depth and last choice when a character dies. Family memory keeps recent epitaphs for heirs.

• Visible Family milestones. The family records depth records, first unique kills and its first artifact; heirs recall shared depths and uniques in the log.

• Visible Namesakes. Heirs can take numbered ancestor names, favouring ancestors who reached deeper or lived longer.

• Visible Inherited superstitions. Heirs avoid the scroll, potion or wand used just before an ancestor died; identifying its kind ends the fear.

• Visible Lessons of the dark. A squire whose ancestor died without light can buy an extra Wooden Torch or Flask of Oil before leaving town.

• Visible Trophies. Proud characters keep one item from each slain unique while the pack has room.

• Visible Favoured grounds. Heirs favour exploring at the depth of an ancestor’s most valuable find once their gear and supplies let them reach it.

• Visible Squire reacts when something it can’t see is hurting it. After a hit with no creature in view, it counts the squares around that spot as dangerous for the next 50 game turns and considers reading Detect Invisible, quaffing True Seeing, lighting the room, swinging at the squares around it, casting an area spell, using a staff, wand or rod, backing into the light or taking the stairs. A bold character keeps exploring through small hits; a craven one leaves sooner.

• Visible Squire learns what a shop sells by walking in. It plans purchases from what it saw there, which can be out of date when it returns: a wand it saved for may have been sold, and it says so in its log. A Forgetful persona lets those memories fade. On a town trip it looks into shops it hasn’t visited yet.

• Visible Start a Squire character from the title screen, in a profile of its own. The New Squire character row (S) asks whether to use a separate profile, then whether to start it fresh, copy another profile’s options and mods, or reuse one Squire made before. Your own characters and settings stay apart from Squire’s.

• Visible Squire knows floor items only as you would. It sees an item by name while it is in sight, remembers it once it is out of sight, and never learns of one that fell where nobody saw. An unknown flavour close by is a reason to walk over and look.

Changed

• Visible Squire plays on until you take the keyboard back or the character dies. When the model can’t be reached or a spend limit is reached, it keeps choosing from its own options and returns to the model when it can. A floor with nothing left to do, a plan the game refuses or a loop that gets nowhere makes it look further afield instead of stopping.
• VisibleBalance Ambition sets how fast Squire heads deeper. An heir’s ambition now shortens an inherited depth target instead of dropping it.
• VisibleBalance A bold character roams further from the stairs on a trip to earn gold, and a cautious one stays close.
• Visible Squire spends fewer commands in a shop. It buys all the units it wants from a shelf at once, walks out when its last trade changed nothing, and no longer leaves the same shop twice.
• VisibleCompatibility Squire now needs Neo Angband 1.21.1 or later. It is the first version with everything Squire reads from the game: the title-screen row, profiles, and floor items as the player knows them.
• Visible Squire is now licensed under the GNU General Public License, version 3. Releases up to 0.1.1 carried Neo Angband’s GPL v2 or Angband licence. Squire contains no Angband code, so it now takes the same licence as Squire Link.

Removed

• Internal Removed this repo’s own Discord release announcer. Its workflow, script and test are gone. The releases site at releases.rpgm.tools now posts each new release to the Neo Angband announcements forum.

Fixed

• VisibleSecurity Deleting your telemetry also clears uploads still waiting to be sent. A queued run could otherwise upload after the deletion. New uploads follow your consent setting as before.

• VisibleBalance A spellcaster learns new spells in a swarm of weak creatures and stops meleeing with no mana left. It studies when the creatures that can reach it this turn would cost little of its hit points and none can paralyse, confuse or slow it. With no mana for its attack spells, it backs away from creatures that hurt on touch or that it cannot kill quickly.

• Visible Squire no longer reads Word of Recall on dungeon level 1 when it doesn’t know where the up staircase is. It looks for the way up on foot.

• Visible Waiting for Word of Recall to take effect is one plan instead of a decision every game turn.

• VisibleUI The Squire panel opens at its intended minimum size. It passed its size under names the game does not read, so the dock could squeeze it smaller.

• Visible With Inheritance at nothing, or Blood grudges off for the parent or the heir, no grudge passes down. The family still remembers what killed its characters.

• VisibleBalance Squire can go deeper than 2,300 ft. Past that depth it descends once the character has the speed, protections and healing each depth calls for, where before it never went further.

• VisibleBalance Squire keeps earning experience when it isn’t ready to go deeper. On a cleared floor it takes an up staircase to a fresh level instead of stopping, and it never takes a down staircase to a depth it isn’t prepared for.

• Visible Squire no longer waits in town for light it already has. By day the town reports no light radius, so Squire now checks the light it wields and the fuel that light can use: flasks of oil for a lantern, spare torches for a torch.

• Visible Squire no longer freezes in town. It keeps exploring until it can actually reach the staircase down, rests instead of opening the shop when it means to wait on a shop entrance.

• Visible Squire stops dying while it backs away. It no longer tries to step away from an adjacent creature as fast as it is, offers healing, teleports and recall near death, and picks an escape or a fight itself when the model turns every option down. It buys Phase Door and healing before anything else in town, and leaves the level when a fast unique like Grip shows up early on.

• Visible Squire finds the town staircase at night, and buys once per aim on a shopping trip. In the dark it explores the streets until it has seen the staircase, instead of deciding there is nothing to do. An empty armour slot no longer gets several cloaks in a row.

• Visible Squire no longer stalls on a purchase it can’t afford or on a plan that stops moving. It checks a ware’s price before buying it for an aim, and it drops a plan that goes 30 seconds without a game turn passing, or runs for 60 seconds, and then decides again.

• Visible Squire goes deeper and no longer loops. Retreat below town takes a down staircase unless the danger is pressing, and in town it steps away instead of taking the stairs into the dungeon. Leaving a level prefers the way down when the character is ready for the next depth. Townspeople are no longer rated dangerous before they have hit, a known worm mass no longer stops each walk, and exploring no longer paces beside a creature that drops in and out of sight. A choice that makes no game time pass is dropped after three tries on one turn, and Squire rests instead of waiting for a recall.

• Visible Squire no longer stops for creatures that cannot hurt it. Farmer Maggot or another harmless creature coming into view no longer ends what Squire is doing or makes it back away, and a creature it has already seen on the level is not news when it steps back into sight. A creature that has hurt the character is never treated as harmless again.

• VisibleBalance Squire stays on the first two dungeon levels without potions or Phase Door. Before, reading one scroll on level 1 sent it back to town every trip, and the character never stayed long enough to gain a level.

• VisibleBalance A trip to earn gold starts its clock on level 1 and lasts twice as long. A character that runs out of rations goes home once it is hungry rather than at once, and a character with almost no gold no longer climbs straight back up the stairs it just came down.

• Visible The fighting errand stops when the character is afraid. The game refuses every blow from an afraid character without using a turn, so the errand swung at the same creature hundreds of times while nothing else moved. An errand whose commands pass no game time now ends as well.

• Visible Exploring goes through closed doors. A room whose only ways out were closed doors counted as fully explored, so the errand stopped with most of the level unseen.

• Visible Exploring keeps a step away from creatures in view. The route no longer walks past a mushroom patch or a sleeping creature when there is another way, and it treats a creature the character cannot see as not there, as the player would.