f13.net

1.0 came out in the last month. WEBTILES!  :drill:

 https://tiles.crawl.develz.org/#play-dcss-0.10  (https://tiles.crawl.develz.org/#play-dcss-0.10)

Here is a link to the wiki

 http://crawl.chaosforge.org/index.php?title=CrawlWiki  (http://crawl.chaosforge.org/index.php?title=CrawlWiki)


*edit* XOMMMMMMMMMMM!

RIP Mountain dwarfs

The new races have been interesting.

I still enjoy this game a lot.

I've been playing this a fair bit since the latest patch and the tiled version is definitely better than ever.  Removing species and classes seems odd to me, however.  It's not like they needed to save space or anything; if someone wants to be a dwarf paladin, why stop them?  It's not like it hurts anybody else.

http://crawl.develz.org/wordpress/whisper-farewell-when-you-leave-gimli (http://crawl.develz.org/wordpress/whisper-farewell-when-you-leave-gimli)
Less is more. Removing generic races is the way to go.

A generic race that happened to be one of the most-played (if not the most-played) races. I never really played MDs aside from that MDFi that every newbie ends up playing at some point, but I don't see the reasons for their removal outweighing the reasons for them to stay.

But then again I cannot pretend to fathom the thought processes that occur inside the heads of Roguelike developers.

Love this game to death, even if I've never beaten it.  So many different ways to play it.

It seems kind of dumb at this point to have "deep dwarf" be a race when it is the only kind of dwarf. Just call it a dwarf?

I've never been able to get into this one for some reason.   Love Nethack, play Angband every couple of years, spent a fair amount of time in ADOM, but for some reason Crawl never really got its hooks into me, and I'm not really sure why.  I should give it another shot.

DCSS pretty much killed ADoM (and by extension, other roguelikes) for me. Partially for the interface, and partially for the ability to be a maniac chucking bombs rendered form the corpses of my foes. Also still haven't beaten it.

That said, 0.10 != 1.0.

Cruel game. I'm a draconian fighter who has chugged 3 mutation potions found on the first 2 levels, and ended up with a not horrible set of mutations. ( + 1 str, better eyesight, poisonous barb on tail) on the 4th level of the dungeon, I come across brightly glowing platemail. Because Im a masochist, I blow an ID scroll on it. Its Platemail of the glowing stars (+7 ac, +1 str, RF+) For those non-crawlers, this is kinda like finding a world drop epic in wow that would be perfect for leveling your character... but then not being able to equip it do to racial restrictions.  :awesome_for_real:

I find myself making some off the wall character/god combos that are fun as hell, but never really have what it takes to beat it. Came close once, I'll get it one of these days.

Pretty cool version of this genre.

Rolled a minotaur berserker to learn the ropes and promptly cursed my chest armor, weapon and ring by level 3. No bless in sight!  :oh_i_see:

Finally the lack of upgrades did me in:

4728 Komoto the Cleaver (level 10, -3/85 HPs)
Began as a Minotaur Berserker on Mar 21, 2012.
Was a High Priest of Trog.
Slain by a troll (11 damage)
... on Level 2 of the Orcish Mines on Mar 22, 2012.
The game lasted 02:52:05 (11882 turns).

Of course, I was on level 4 or 5 of the mines when I got jumped by 3 trolls, 2 rock trolls and an ogre. Even with an iron ogre and going berserk, and fighting a retrograde action...just couldn't take the hits or dish out any damage by that point.

Even though you can usually access the Orcish Mines first, it's generally a better idea to clear some or all of the Lair before doing so.  Especially if you have poison resistance... but bring something to deal with the hydras.

If you haven't checked it out, the wiki is really comprehensive, although not all the articles are updated to .10.

Problem wasn't the mines themselves, though that would've been a tough fight without much in the way of choke points, no heal pots, etc. It was that I was basically totally screwed with an almost complete set of cursed gear from level 2 :) There was some deep elf place with a knight that gave me some great gear I couldn't equip. I probably had a dozen glowing and runed weapons and a half dozen pieces of armor on me when I died.

I'm going to stay away from the wiki for as long as possible. More fun to blunder through and discover stuff imo. Actually, I had whittled down 2 trolls and an ogre moving up stairs and using Trog's buddies - when I died there was only one troll on me...so close.

I second the Orc Mines thing as something to go back to after about dungeon level 15. When you get to Orc 4 you'll know why.

Basic advice for scrolls, I always wait until I find either a cursed item or a weapon with a brand before I start trying them out. That way I don't waste weapon enchant scrolls and remove curse scroll won't just fizzle (Nothing appears to happen). I try on rings and amulets without id scrolls because many ID themselves, and have a low prob of being cursed.

In battle, when shit goes south sometimes it's best to just run for the stairs!

I like trying out wands on myself, out of combat.

Since it was my first game, I was just trying everything on everything! :)

Stairs were definitely key in a couple tough spots.

Fun game, I haven't played one of these in ages.

If you made it that far on your first run, good on ya (though zerkers are great, but a rage at the wrong time will get you dead). Say hi to Sigmund for me! ;)

Made it that far in non-magic cursed ring mail, a non-magic cursed axe (my other cursed items were at least magic!). Mino zerker is way OP early on, tons of hp and horn retaliation probably killed as much as my axe, especially down around level 8 when my axe was almost useless. Had a high piety rating and didn't rage too much so I could summon companions, which were really tactically useful.

On a non-thiefy type character, should I even bother looking for secret doors except in the most obvious spots? I wonder how much I passed in that run-through because I was only looking in really obvious spots (and did find a few). Seems like rations would've been an issue with all the time compression (sacrificing corpses rather than chopping them).

Just got the latest version and fired it up again. Anyone remember the trick to making this run windowed?

I only search obvious spots, and never really felt like I've missed much by not training Traps and Doors (even after using magic mapping scrolls, the secrets I do find are never great). Retaliation is new to this patch I think, and pretty cool! Trog's Hand, the Regen/MR ability, is great as well. Later on he will gift you weapons, which is nice but not awesome like Okawaru's. I only sac corpses if I can't eat them, piety be damned!

Personally, I find the game more fun with fighter types , or hybrids. I can't get into pure casters. Pace is too slow for me.

C:\Documents and Settings\YOUR NAME HERE \Local Settings\Application Data\Crawl\settings

tiles_options.txt

# tile_full_screen     = false



I think anyway.

I'm just using the webtiles. Is there a reason to play the other version? I like having progress saved online for me, it's nice to have a turn-based thing for when I'm waiting for stuff to install and having it online means I can go home and pick up where I left off.

Try #2 started so promising, found splint mail and a magic hammer on level 1...but then wasn't paying attention and got creamed by the third monster on level 2, a named.

111 Komoto the Skirmisher (level 3, 0/33 HPs)
             Began as a Minotaur Berserker on Mar 22, 2012.
             Was a Believer of Trog.
             Killed by nerve-wracking pain
             ... invoked by Jessica
              (5 damage)
             ... on Level 2 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:14:39 (1200 turns).

Woops, forgot to ID her before she went invis.

Make sure you get trog's hand running for those pesky casters! Congrats, you were killed by the worst unique in the game! (been there!)

On a weird note, I showed this game to a friend of the family who is about 13 and he actually got into it. He was killed in a room with Jessica and Terrence (the names of his parents IRL). He thought I fucked with the game....

956 DoWork the Archer (level 7, 0/45 HPs)
             Began as a High Elf Hunter on Mar 22, 2012.
             Was a Follower of Okawaru.
             Slain by an iguana (8 damage)
             ... on Level 5 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:18:48 (5469 turns).


Well, I died to an Iguana if it makes you feel any better....I should probably get back to work....


My best run on my work machine, 70 point bolt of fire (guess I shoulda worked on the rF !)


183741 DrWan the Unseen (level 19, -10/112 (116) HPs)
             Began as a Kobold Artificer on Feb 6, 2012.
             Was a High Priest of Nemelex Xobeh.
             Killed from afar by Margery (70 damage)
             ... with a bolt of fire

The non-webtile version has nice things like mouseover info on tiles.  Not a big deal at all if you're a vet, pretty nice if you're newb.

My internet is sporadic when I'm using it for anything serious (uploading to YT for example) so I like having the downloaded version.

Also thanks Slayerik. My file wasn't in that folder but knowing the name made finding it possible.

I've got a Naga Assassin going that is pretty slick. I have beasted like 5 uniques in their sleep. So rewarding. I also have an army of undead.

Wish me luck getting anything done today at work :)

Good luck sir. Also, webtiles has killed my productivity at work this week.

This.

Actually, it hasn't been bad because I'm in the middle of receiving a ton of new machines and just running updates and whatnot, so turn-based rocks.

Picked up my web game at home and got rocking with some nice upgrades, especially my great mace (Poundy) that just socks things left and right. Then I equip a cursed orc flail. Dammit! What is with me getting curses, darnit. So I guess now I should run through my scrolls to see if I have something to uncursify?

Tried the local version at home, the mouse stuff is pretty nice for quick looks at things, but I don't use most of the functions because I got used to the keystrokes of the webtiles. I was getting tired of the occasional lag of webtiles, though.

Oh, look. A scroll of curse armor  :oh_i_see:

Luckily, just my +0 elf gloves.

Yay, 8 scrolls later I got an enchant weapon I. Back to pounding with Poundy!

It was still missing graphical inventory a month ago when I tried again which is pretty big to me. YMMV.

Up to level 23...I feel unstoppable. I slither around and scewer things with my +6, +6 Dagger of Electrocution (There is a sudden explosion of sparks!), I took a large shield off some named guy and between that and my decent evasion and armour, things can't fuck with me. I am the slowest thing you have ever seen, being exalted with Cheirboros or whatever, but he hooks up crazy stats. I just wade through shit killing, then raising the corpses for an unstoppable wave of slow death. Regeneration and repel missiles are my favorite utility spells. I have the swamp, vaults, and snake runes. I am headed for the realm of Zot!

(famous last words)

Ugh. Work. To be continued.....

Yep, still doesn't. I think the minimap is a bit bigger, though.

Other than the latency, my main issue at work is the wonkiness of running it in chrome on osx 10.7 (some of the screens don't work and lock up occasionally) and the wireless keyboard doesn't have a number pad.

I really dont see the point of removing Mountain Dwarves, or some of the other races they've mentioned.  Whats the point?  What do you gain?  Why not leave in all of them to give players more options?

The cabal of programmers who run this want every choice especially the race to be interesting.  MD wasn't interesting.  It was safe and familiar.  If you were going to making a meat head fighter it was a no brainer.  Really I fault them was not finding a way to spicy MD up rather than removing it.  They are the doing the work so I am not going to get upset. Hopefully MD can back when they can be made interesting.

So, I fucked up. I had a million outs. Instead of using them I thought one more heal wounds would save me. It didn't. FACK

Lost my KoSt at level 17 after getting slowly worn down over 1200 turns in the Abyss. It's so frustrating; potions deal with swarms of things and it's easy to pick up necromancy for poison-resistant living and undead targets but I never have any tricks to deal with damn demons and my trusty daggers just don't quite do the job.

Abyss is a total bitch. One time, though, I had a guy tough enough to just farm the place. Never did find a rune, though!

Trying a Vampire Stalker, they're pretty cool. So far I've been leaning on throwing a lot, is leather armor too heavy to sneak or am I just too low? Only gotten a couple backstabs in. Should I work more magic or just stick to thief type skills?

In true fashion I ended up with a hobbling cursed item, -3 ring of evasion...and then 50 turns later found my very first scroll of remove curse evar! Yay!

Then on the next level is my badass MiBe ghost, who can just about two-shot me. Yay bat form, but exploring that level has become rough, barely escaped twice.

A big part of Crawl is learning when to run the hell away and come back a few levels later (or occasionally never).  Just look for the stairs down.

Yeah, I got that :) Worked the level around him, then the level below is a giant open area chock full of dudes. Judicious use of bat form to run away, finally got the ability to bottle blood. Took forever to work down the open level to the point where I got most of the items...then the named gets close to me and ports me to the Abyss. Dead. Kind of a rude thing for something on level 4.

Never found any good gear, a couple decent darts and a net to toss, but by level 4 I was in nonmagic leather and the newbie dagger, with a nonmagic cloak and books and a ring of magic.

Dammit, had a halfway decent run and decided to try the Bastion. Hey, it said the door might close soon!


Stalker is kind of an odd character. I've been playing it hard into stealth with a bit of short blades and a lot of throwing (blowgun with poison needles), and lobbing potions for crowd fights. The first two steps of the Bastion was pretty easy: a few confusion potions, the orcs all start killing each other and I just toss steam and poison clouds into the melee. Then I open the big door, no choke point and I'm low on potions so I back off to a choke point, but that thins out the group and I end up in melee and the orc knights just hit too hard for my low hps and crap armor...and there's no exit.

Forgot I had a tp scroll on me, doubt it would've done much good unless that was the last fight of the level and I got lucky.

My main gripe about Stalker is that it seems to be based on Evaporate, throwing potions, and potions weigh 4.0 each, so having a stack of harvested potions weighs me way down, especially in bat form. Seems like potions should weigh a lot less or that classes that use them heavily as part of the class combat idea should have some mechanics to reduce their weight.

Vampires are odd to play but fun.

In general I find stealth and stabbing to be not worth the investment. Fighting/weapon/armor/dodging take care of most things that potions won't (except for the aforementioned demons).

Definitely agree about the weight issue. I always find myself having to leave behind wands, food, and other things that no other class would do without.

Free experience allocation (new since 0.8 or whatever it was since I last spent much time playing) makes things like Invocation much more viable though, so I've been experimenting more heavily with different gods and seeing what I can come up with to make this class feel right. Chei solves the weight issue handily but not being able to run away from anything ever is a harsh penalty.

I dunno, it seems any time anything over a stock mob got in range, it was pretty much time for bat form and running away. If I hadn't found that +4 AC/EV ring, I wouldn't have lasted that long.

And as I said, the potions kinda screwed me. Couldn't carry a lot of them, and stuck in the bailey with orcs that only drop confusion, which is nice but really limits my ability to deal aoe damage. And if you take away the potions, it seems like you could do better either as a mage or a fighter. Again, I guess I don't see how the class should work in a pure form.

I used to think that stealth and stabbing weren't great until my naga assassin of Chei. Half the dungeon I killed while sleeping, and enough very tough uniques that it felt quite worth the points.

I got quite a few stealth kills in, and given the mechanic for vamps healing back up (drinking blood, which removes the bloodless state, thus making me less stealthy) I liked it enough to focus it.

I was about 100 coins from a piece of jewelry that granted a stealth bonus and invis  :oh_i_see:

My character of choice at the moment is a hill orc abyssal knight, I take the fail early and fail often approach and try for a few lucky abyss kills to quick start my character at level 3 or 4.  Of course the Abyss isn't that bad when you can leave whenever you want.

My current crawl is a Demonspawn Monk of Makhleb. He's a beast. My mutations were spines (full), powerful demonic guardian, +3 EV, and finally some fingernails! Have the swamp rune so far, almost done with vault...then I have to decide where to go for number three.

Never tried this game until just now. I died in the tutorial when I failed to kill a goblin using a pair of boots I was accidentally wielding as a weapon.

(http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll177/edog420420/IWIN.jpg)

Morgue:

other part of morgue file:

In search of a amulet of resist mutation I decided to head back and clear the Elven Halls, where I stumbled upon an Adamantium blade. Turned out to be a +13, +13  sword of Pain that prevents casting. Who needs casting with a +13 FUCKIN SWORD WOOOOO. Cleared slime to level up long sword for the Zot run. GG fuckers.

Yay!  :rock:

I'm running a high elf wizard at home, first one died trying to convert to Vehumet, burned up on the altar. Second version hits level 3 and Jessica shows up, so I run for the downstairs to clear the next level. Leaning on summons I clear the next level so I hit a distant stair and clean out level 3 without running into her again, nabbing two spellbooks.

I have found call imp to be an awesome spell, makes most early encounters trivial. Great for my poor casting hybrids (as it is lvl 2) - My personal god run down

Some SPOILERS incoming if you want to learn by yourself!



My run down Makhleb... He is a bad ass god. At 1 star you can spam decent random low level magic attacks, at 2 you can summon minor demons (which are strong and still used later on) - and you gain life back from killing shit, at 3 you can hurl major spells at the cost of health and piety, at 4 you can summon fuckin demons. As soon as I decided to go with him, I focused all training on invocations until i was at like level 7. Makes the spell damage and accuracy solid, and better chance of friendly demons. Being a monk, I was instantly at 2 stars which was cool.

Cheibriados is pretty sweet. +15 to all stats at max piety means you are a machine. Even species that don't cast well do once they get 30+ int. Great for making hybrids, just make sure you get blink and have some teleports available. He also has an awesome AOE ability with 'slouch' and get outta jail free card. Very cool god.

Kikubaaqudgha is strong. As long as you want necromancy in your portfolio, he really makes it happen. Necromancy is now my favorite spell school. Utility in regeneration at only level 3, lvl 4 animate dead is awesome. Nothing like a horde of minions. He lacks utility, though.

Okawaru is my god of choice if I want to make a one-man army, or anything that uses a lot of ammo. He showers you with ammo gifts and artifact level armor/weapons. One time he gave me a +8, +8 speed xbow with resistances and shit. I still died due to a fuckup. His hero and finesse skills allow you to take down shit you normally wouldn't have a shot at. He lacks utility but provides it in god gifts (evokable items and such)

Trog - what's not to like? Well, besides spellcasting...Rage (extended) on demand, an awesome regen/MR ability, and raged ogre/trolls? Don't forget his pretty crappy weapon god gifts! Rarely are they ever an upgrade from my experience, but YMMV.

Vehumet/Sif Muna - Guess you'd have to play casters to really appreciate these guys. Vehumet would be my choice for a pure bomb dropping caster.

Yredelemnul is one of my favorites. At one star you start raising the dead at the cost of hunger. Injury mirror is excellent at 3 stars, and drain life will save your ass AND aoe shit. He once gifted me a bone dragon I had for like 20 levels. That thing was ridiculously good. Never used his Enslave Soul ability, but sounds pretty sweet :)

Xom can suck it. Dude is always fuckin' with ya. Gave me bolts once. I had a bow.

The good gods, and plants/slime gods? No idea. Evil will always triumph because good is dumb.

Great game, this. I'm terrible at it (never had a character higher than level 10) but I'm not letting that stop me.

I've had a lot of fun with Demonspawn Chaos Knight, Naga Assassin, Ogre Mage, High Elf Hunter, Halfling Hunter, Human Fighter, Draconian Monk ...

Stealth and Face stabbing can be exceptionally powerful.  I play lots of spriggans and find them useful even on the casters to get you in range or finish off confused monsters.  

My current play is a Spriggan Wizard.  At level 9 now with my slowly back away killing everything tactics.  The game is starting to pick up!

As a heavy caster Sif Muna is awesome.  You will get nice spellbooks as gifts.  Once you have the setup you like I suppose you could change out to something else.

Played the shit out of 0.8 and 0.9.  Just started a few 0.10 games this week and the changes look good.  Not sure why they keep adding stupid comedy races but whatever.  Naga has been my go-to race for some time.  The new constrict seems overpowered but nice for killing imps and other annoying shits early game.

Almost always run with casters of some sort as I can't seem to get melee past the mid game.  I've taken Deep Dwarf Necro and Naga Wiz into Zot 5 but haven't beaten the game.  Orbs of fire and electric golems suck!

Mostly agree with Slayerik on the gods but I find with Trog you have to be super careful with Rage.  Fighting once it wears off is NOT recommended.  Haven't played with the new Chei but I never liked him on non-Nagas.  I also vastly prefer Vehumet to Sif Muna.  Sif seems to give you more spells early but by the time you hit end game you've probably found most of them from other sources.  Vehumet's passives make him stronger late game and he guarantees access to the rarer spell books.

I also can't fathom how you kill Slime branch with Unarmed/Fighting/Blades/Dodge.  That place scares the shit out of me.  Never go in there!

The cloak of preservation gives resist acid and conservation it seems. I never lost any AC in the place, plus I had some artifact armor. I also had a ring that gave me +6 damage and other good shit, and a +4 +3 ring of slaying. So I think my spines were doing an extra 9 damage (not sure), things just impaled themselves on me, and I would beat the fuck out of them. If it looked remotely hairy, I had demons coming to my aid or I would summon them via Makhleb. Then I got a +13 sword LOL. I seriously made The Royal Jelly look like my bitch, and I remember the other time I fought him (on a diff crawl) I ran and never came back.

Normally I avoid Slime Pits like the Plague, but this guy was so beastly I probably coulda tried for an all rune run, mighta ran outta food though.



Oh I forgot the best thing about Makhleb, his Gain Power from killing. Near the end I would wade through Draconians, killing them and gaining like 20 health a kill.

Naga's are bad ass. That constrict is evil. Feels OP to me as well.

EDIT: Man, I'm still pretty pumped to have beat this! I have made a TON of crawls - with Demonspawn Monk being probably my most attempted. Feels good to win one. In this game, even with OP hookups it just takes one mistake to end it all.

Mostly playing at home now, so this is an older webtiles game that's been slowly moving. I was in really good shape with a couple nice finds - full plate and a nice axe; I had survived finding most potions and scrolls, too. Then I got cocky and tried to slip past a pool that had a couple electric goddamned eels in it. Dumb, really. Was probably my most promising run yet, I was tearing through stuff.

2232 Komoto the Covered (level 9, -2/75 HPs)
             Began as a Minotaur Berserker on Mar 23, 2012.
             Was an Elder of Trog.
             Slain by a giant goldfish (4 damage)
             ... on Level 6 of the Dungeon on Mar 27, 2012.
             The game lasted 01:24:11 (6119 turns).

For some reason, goldfish are one of the tougher water species.

I love Demonspawn (usually melee) and Draconian casters in this game - unpredictable is fun.  Of course, I tend to start over if the RNG gives me something horrible like hollow bones or grey draconians. 

I was finally going to give up playing, now you go and toss this out there  :mob:

My biggest problem is the 1st 8 lor so levels lull you into a sense of security where you just spam the crap out of attack and just when it lulls you into not paying attention wham it changes gears on you.  My most successful runs have been when I spam through a bunch of redos until I get a promising character to level 9/10 then force myself to step away from the game for a day, then come back to it with a slow methodical approach.  Otherwise I just get stuck in spam mode and end up dead by level 11.

Last night I had a sweet run that I made the mistake of not putting down, pretty much started at level 5 with 1 lucky abyss kill + snagged a ton of scrolls in the abyss.  Landed +4 and +6 rings of evasion pretty quick, followed up with +2 chain mail, +1 cloak, +2 wizards hat, found some gloves and boots right off, luck into a +2 shield.  Went on a wand binge and had 7 or so different ones in inventory (teleport/fire/flame/confusion/etc...), found 2 books and some weird ass staff of elements that kept up a pretty hilarious dialog.  So here I am level 9 with 23ac, 12 evasion and a decent amount of block, whupping everything in sight...

Then I die some stupid death because I have conditioned myself into high gear where I don't take the time to do a quick scan of my vitals on every single turn.

Congrats on the win, Slay.

I think I have the opposite problem. I play characters that are weak at first and end up dying because I try to run away from everything threatening, and it's only a matter of time until I run away from a trio of Orc Knights straight into a Twelve-Headed Hydra or something.

I just let the unlucky ones die fast in the abyss, I pretty much wont leave the abyss until I have a few levels or some decent armor.  Funny you should mention the orcs vs. hydra, the run I described ended by me whupping a steam dragon then wiping on a few orcs (priest+wiz+warrior and a peon or 2).

Orc priests can be goddamn deadly with their irresistable BS. If I see 2 or more, even high level, I slow my shit down and start thinking of outs. Trying to run like normal is bad, as they smite the piss out of you. Block LOS, and live. Of course, they are priority in a orc clusterfuck.

Hm, trying this for the first time tonight at work.  :oh_i_see:

Should I download it or play it through the https://tiles.crawl.develz.org/ link?  I started a tutorial game on the site but I don't think I actually got a tutorial....

*edit* ah, never mind, got the tutorial now.  Didn't work the first time because I had already started a normal game

Also Slay caught me elsewhere and got me started, so disregard my entire post.

I really wish you could just pick a god at start for all classes, instead of having to find the alter. Last playthrough I did (Demonspawn Fighter) the stairs to the temple were behind a wall of glass, and I died before finding any means through said glass. In fact, it's pretty rare that my characters survive long enough to pick a religion.

To answer what was already answered...I started on the webtiles and I'm glad I did. You learn much more of the keyboard stuff, the local version has a lot of QoL features but it's nice to know what they're covering up and it makes for easier hybrid play.

Webtiles hates my mac and magic mouse at work and I don't have a numpad on that machine, either. It's...primitive interaction, with advanced devices!

3898 Azhala III the Thaumaturge (level 9, -3/40 HPs)
             Began as a Deep Elf Venom Mage on Mar 25, 2012.
             Slain by a troll (4 damage)
             ... on Level 8 of the Dungeon on Mar 28, 2012.
             The game lasted 01:17:43 (14849 turns).

I was clearing out level 8 before trying one of the sub-branches (Lair was the only thing I'd found so far) and didn't have much answer for a troll. I had found a book of power and was slowly working up Fire and Earth so I could use Magma Bolt but it failed one time too many and I was out of escapes.

Some random thoughts after putting a few hours into some melee based Naga runs.

• Constrict is freaking amazing.  Even putting aside the damage, not having to chase down most runners is nice as hell.
• Looks like all polearms have reach now.  Orc mines requires some thought when you have to eat like 3 attacks to close into melee range with some orc warrior or knight.  That shit can get out of hand.
• For any race on a food clock Amulet of the Gourmand is the best damn item in the game.
• Looks like they axed the Hive which removes a nice stash spot and food repository.  It was usually boring and easy (just have poison resist) but I hope they added more food somehow.
• Fuck Boggarts.

Current best and still in progress is NaMo of Chei.  Level 19 with Orc/Lair/Vaults cleared.  Haven't touched a weapon or cast any spells aside from Repel Missiles and Mephitic Cloud.  Would use more spells but haven't found the shit I'll need yet.  I really want Blade Hands. The damage with ~35 Str/Dex and 20 Unarmed must be through the roof.

bleh had a good run going and took a chance putting on an un id'd cloak w/o a remove curse scroll, cloak was a unique cursed, can't take it off and it starts attracting wights and shit.

When you see the temple stairs surrounded by glass, just hit 5 to search and you will find a secret door from my experience.

Oh man.  My Demonspawn Berserker just found

N - the cursed +12,+15 obsidian axe (weapon) {chop, +Lev Str+3 SInv Curse}
   (You found it on level 3 of the Lair of Beasts)   
   
   It inflicts extra damage upon your enemies.
   
   It affects your strength (+3).
   It enhances your eyesight.
   It lets you levitate.
   It may recurse itself.
   
   This axe has had a curse placed on it by one of the lords of Pandemonium so
   that unsuspecting adventurers like you would unleash demons into this world.
   Beware, for this axe has ways of taking its wielder under its command...
   It has a curse placed upon it.

Lets see how long I live with being forced to fight and crazy demons popping in all over the place (they have been friendly!)

Cripes this game is rough, 2/4 of my games so far the first item I picked up was cursed.  My last one I was only on my 3rd level when I ran into a pack of 5-6 orcs and half of them were mages, I teleported away only to get almost instantly gibbed by 2 adventurers.  :uhrr:

I once found a +13, +13 scythe of draining that made reapers spawn after it killed stuff (only lasted like 5 turns). Only drawback was it cursed EVERY ITEM ABLE TO BE CURSED in your inventory. By that point, however, the gear was solid enough to roll with...and I just died in some dumb way I'm sure.

Ah, but it's so rewarding when that first ring you find on D1 is a +6 to evasion or protection or a stat....Without the sour, the sweet just ain't as sweet! :)

My first two rings I had my second game were a cursed ring of hunger and a ring of sustenance.  :oh_i_see:  Enjoying it so far though, but I will probably lose interest if it's too luck based.

Too luck based? The entire game is set up on the RNG!

My dragon necro just found a +4 str ring  :oh_i_see: Ah, well. He also found a book with the stalker spells, so I can at least carry the potions to esplode.

Raising the dead is pretty awesome. And I'm carrying a scythe I found (first I've ever seen), just because. Actually, I figure polearms would be good in conjunction with minions.

Thats not what I meant and you know it.  :oh_i_see:

Polearms are now great for reaching over your minions and hacking things...good call. That STR will help lope heads!

Few questions:

1.)  How should I level up my stats?   For instance, doing a Mino fighter right now.  Should I always take strength, or will I die later on if I keep ignoring dex?  Same for if I build a mage.  All int, or do I need to invest in others?

2.)  When you view the stats on an item, it doesn’t reflect the modifiers in the stats, correct?  So if I found a Splint Mail +5, and it says AC 5 under item stats, its really AC 10, correct?  But if I put the item on, under my character stats, it should be reflecting the bonuses under AC?  Sorry, couldn’t really find a straight explanation for fully understanding item modifiers last night.  I think the last time I was playing this game heavily was version .02 or .03, heh.

3.)  Is it important to level up that traps skill, or can I still win while ignoring it?

Starting out pretty well on my first run in years, as a mino fighter.  I’ve found two artifacts in 5 levels, both of which are perfect for me.  One is a +6/+5 long sword which lets me see invisible and interferes with all magic casting around me, and other is a piece of +5 Splint mail which gives plus strength (but -1 dex and -2 int.  But who needs int anyways!).

Was cruising along without any difficulty when I ran into a large group of orcs in front of orc mines.  I dove head long into them killing, but then remembered what slay was saying earlier about the priest, of which there were two.  I promptly got smited down to 5 hp in short order.  I read a scroll of teleportation and randomly blinked to safety.  Healed up and drew them into a corridor for slaughter.  Definitely going to level up more before touching those damn mines.

It's not. I have played this game a long time now and you really do get better. I find myself able to escape some really shitty encounters that would have easily gibbed me previous, and how to not get in those situations entirely. I can pretty much use the skills I have learned in the game, and knowledge of monsters, to get about any character to decent level...most the time I have a feel if it will be a good crawl or not but it only takes one item to change that drastically. Tip : If you have 4+ of an un-IDed scroll its going to be identify, or rarely remove curse. If you have 4+ of an unID'ed potion, it will be curing (or rarely heal wounds).

New challenge for Slay! Pick a race/class (and god if you really want to). I'm bored at work...

1. I used to build PURE STR warrior types. Now I have found dex to be useful in getting a bit of evasion/ranged attacks. I kinda build around the items I find (after holding out for my 'planned stuff'). If I get an amazing whip, I'll start working up DEX and focusing more on dodging/unarmed (dex based). You can find items to bolster stats, gloves of dex/str, rings and such. Not sure if this helps, but I like my characters at least a little well rounded. But never INT on non-casters.

Since you are using a long sword, it is actually weighted more to DEX. If you feel you will stick with swords (I would with a +6 +5 antimagic long sword), start putting points into dex. So, actually a perfect item for you would have been a mace or axe like that, but beggars can't be choosers!


2. My understanding is yes, it would be +10 - and then your armour skill takes effect for even more bonus.

3. I've never leveled up traps.


Yes, I always ignore the mines until I either  A. Need some money   B. Feel the regular dungeon is getting too hard.

I have leveled up traps on a few of my assassin types before.  On one of my runs there was a 5x9 corridor leading to the orc mines.  EVERY square was trapped.  Disarming them can get you thrown weapon stuff, some of it can be poisoned too.  For most builds it is a skip though.

Ogre assassin!

Thrawn, I've only been playing a week or so and already I've been getting better at the game. There's a lot to learn, while still being a very basic game at its core, which is pretty awesome. The RNG just provides the peaks and valleys. Mostly valleys...but that might just be because the valleys usually end in a swift death.

But as someone said earlier, most deaths are caused by mistakes, not RNG rolls.

Thanks Sky! Here goes nothing!

First ring is cursed! Dun dun duuunnnn

Oh, and this was my first try (I died cause I was too proud to poison with needles!)

62 KillEmAll the Cudgeler (level 1, -1/19 HPs)
             Began as an Ogre Assassin on Mar 28, 2012.
             Slain by a hobgoblin
             ... wielding a +0,+0 club
              (6 damage)
             ... on Level 1 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:01:17 (170 turns).


2nd attempt is going alright! Dead! Noob mistake, forgot I left an Ogre hovering at a staircase!

293 KillEmAll the Cudgeler (level 5, -11/50 HPs)
             Began as an Ogre Assassin on Mar 28, 2012.
             Mangled by an ogre
             ... wielding a +0,+0 giant club
              (24 damage)
             ... on Level 4 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:16:29 (3543 turns).

I was starting to get stealth up enough where I would sneak up and bash things with my +2, +2 club! Overall, kind of a fun character!

3rd, and final, started! Grinder put it in my ass. Maybe I'm not as good at this as I thought ! Thought my berserk rage would finish him! :)


351 MeBashShit the Skirmisher (level 5, -1/75 HPs)
             Began as an Ogre Assassin on Mar 28, 2012.
             Was an Initiate of Nemelex Xobeh.
             Slain by Grinder (6 damage)
             ... on Level 4 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:15:54 (4099 turns).

Deep Elf berserker.   :awesome_for_real:

Actually you should test out one of the screwball characters, like Mummy or that new Octopode race.  You can wear up to 8 cursed rings!

Deep Elf Zerker run began, with +2 chain mail right at the start! .....   Grinder down! Payback is a mofo, mofo!

And I am put out of my misery by one of my ghosts! It was painful every INT level up, every skill was -2 aptitude! No more of those runs!


1821 IWillDaintilySliceYou the Cutter (level 8, -3/48 HPs)
             Began as a Deep Elf Berserker on Mar 28, 2012.
             Was a Priest of Trog.
             Slain by EndofBoris' ghost (8 damage)
             ... on Level 6 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:22:12 (6266 turns).

This senseless ogre-on-ogre violence needs to stop!

Sorry, I LOLed at that. Damn, now people know I'm here. Guess I better do some work! Hopefully someone leaves a race/class for me to try tonight :)

Most classes have a weapon or spell that will get you through D1-D3 without a problem (excusing the random ogre or unique).  I don't usually try on anything magical I pick up until I have a good number of unidentified scrolls, so I have a good chance of having remove curse (very common early on) or one of the +armor or +weapon scrolls (less common).   

A few exceptions:
Axes and swords - I don't typically care if I get a cursed one of these early on, as I can still cut baddies into food and they're rarely so terrible as to screw me over.  Maces and other things are the ones to be careful about.
Amulets are worth trying on, they're almost never cursed.  However, if they don't self-identify, don't leave it on - amulet of inaccuracy is common enough and bad enough to kill lots of classes.
Rings are dangerous - most aren't that bad, but if you get a cursed hunger or teleportation, you're in trouble.  If I'm on the first floor or close to it, though, I sometimes try them on anyway because it takes so little time to go through the first few levels.  And finally finding that remove curse scroll after dealing with a teleporting ring for 5 levels feels amazing.
Better armor is usually worth trying on - even if it's cursed you wouldn't want to take it off anyway, and a -1 or -2 isn't too big a deal for AC.
Potions I generally chug like there's no tomorrow, but almost always out of combat.  Scrolls I like to have a weak critter near me - but that's probably left over from when the scroll of fear needed an enemy nearby to identify itself. 
For both potions and scrolls, I find it's best to identify them in groups - if you accidentally chug poison, having a chance of a curing or heal wounds can save your life.  For scrolls, it's good to have something to use a scroll of identify on. 

I highly recommend using 'o' to auto-explore.  It doesn't always choose the most efficient route, but it's so much faster and makes sure you never forget to check a tunnel.

And it stops when that bastard Boris shows up on screen and is about to put an Orb of Destruction up your ass.

So as an Abyssal Knight who (worships Logonu) is there any reason to enter the Ecumenical Temple?

Nope, besides checking the temple just to know what's there in case you want to change later....

Intelligent monsters can pick up a lot of the stuff you leave on the ground, and since you'll end up with a lot of conditional equipment or extra permanent food after 10 floors or so, most people make a stash somewhere.

Since monsters can't enter the temple, it's a great place for that.  Few things worse than having your one potion of cure mutation shattered by an ice spell while you're carrying it, or having to drop half your food because you're past your weight allowance, only to have it get eaten by a jelly while you're elsewhere

Second floor of the Lair works is another good place after you clear it, since intelligent monsters never wander lower than L1.

I think int is always best for someone relying on spells. I tend to go all-in on one stat no matter what, but Slayerik's advice is probably better than mine here.
Ghoul Earth Elementalist.

Hate to leave level 6, had an ogre zombie for almost the entire level. Just sat back behind him smacking things with my scythe. Had a spectator briefly, that made me a little nervous, having someone watch me play poorly :p

Troll healer

Run 1, next one will probably be my last! That sling HURT

59 RottenMeatIsGood the Digger (level 2, -2/20 HPs)
             Began as a Ghoul Earth Elementalist on Mar 29, 2012.
             Shot with a runed sling bullet by a goblin (7 damage)
             ... on Level 2 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:03:38 (1011 turns).

2nd run, not horrible but ran into a ghost and got slowed by an orc wizard. Kinda liked Ghoul, it's different!

721 RottenMeatIsGood the Digger (level 7, -16/52 HPs)
             Began as a Ghoul Earth Elementalist on Mar 29, 2012.
             Demolished by KillEmAll's ghost (20 damage)
             ... on Level 4 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:23:24 (4495 turns).


Found this:
 B - the cursed -1,-5 flail of the Lurker {slay orc, +Lev MR}
   (You found it on level 5 of the Dungeon)  
  
   It is especially effective against all of orcish descent.
  
   It increases your resistance to enchantments.
   It lets you levitate.
   It has a curse placed upon it.

Lurking is a curse.

Zero post count users are of orcish descent? Who knew?

Hey, had a run that didn't feel like a total failure at last.

1032 Mitthrawnuruodo the Covered (level 7, 0/60 HPs)
             Began as a Minotaur Fighter on Mar 29, 2012.
             Succumbed to poison (a potion of poison)
             ... on Level 6 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:28:07 (6219 turns).

(I had some elite orc warrior or something completely kicking my ass and chugged my last few unidentified potions at like 5 hp as a last resort.)

For the first time I was able to wade through ogres and bunch of bands of orcs with casters and priests.  Was crushing stuff with a great mace and had found plate armor early.  Had a +7 ring of slaying in my inventory I hadn't identified yet it turned out too.

Oh wow. +7, +7 slaying??? That's godlike!

I could of read it wrong I dunno, maybe it was 0, +7.  (Which is 0, but +7 max right??)  I'll have to double check when I'm back at that PC now.  :awesome_for_real:

Also, if I play a monk, do you just try to use robes and unarmed or do you use whatever weapons/armor you find like a fighter still?

My usual monk I go purely unarmed unless I find a nicely branded weapon 1 handed weapon that has good aptitudes for my race. My last run, though, I just dumped all points into unarmed until I found crazy artifact sword in the last 5% of my run. I was kinda using the monk class for the quick 2 stars with Mahkleb...I rock robes, and then I seem to find a decent leather armor. I prefer it due to the damage reduction.

+0 to hit, +7 damage.

My favorite brand is electrocution. Just don't be standing in water.... :)

You can't sell items, correct?  So I should suppress my diablo urges and stop picking up anything that's glowing?  My inventory is filled with glowing daggers and robes..

Correct, but early on I sometimes try weapons i normally wouldn't use, for the chance of a brand.

Humanoid mobs pickup stuff and use it against you. So you may wish to pick some stuff up to dump it later.  Orcs seem very prone to this.  Last night I had a dagger of flame used against me by 3 different orcs.  Distortion and draining brands are especially problematic.

So I had a nice little mob of weeny zombies and got a centaur zombie...and then got overrun by a pack of yaks. Gore ftl!

1787 Komoto the Grave Robber (level 8, -3/58 HPs)
             Began as a Grey Draconian Necromancer on Mar 27, 2012.
             Slain by a yak (10 damage)
             ... on Level 7 of the Dungeon on Mar 29, 2012.
             The game lasted 02:37:23 (9811 turns).

I was able to kite them down to the last one, but ran out of tricks and he gored my centaur...then me.

Yeah, Yaks are nastier than I ever expected at first. Caught me off-guard really. Death Yaks are real whores.....

Lowercase qs are traditionally nasty in roguelikes.

Lolascii.

It wasn't so much the tough yak. That's what my minions are for, dying so I can beat a hasty retrograde action.

It was the seemingly nonstop flood* of them pouring through the door. If I hadn't just raised a centaur zombie, I'd have been down in a couple turns. And I had just gotten a book with a necro spell I didn't have, a draining bolt...yay range!





*5

This thread has me playing Nethack again.

Inspired by Slay's tales of victory I finally managed to win one.

Partial morgue
Highlights include:

• Almost losing my shit on Elf 5.  Tried to haste some nasty elf with a wand so Slouch could nuke his ass into orbit.  Apparently that puts you into Chei Penance.  Losing 15 from all stats and 2/3 of your outs mid fight is BAD.
• Not being able to replace a -5 Naga barding with a fucking sweet artifact barding due it having some skill I've never seen before that only appears on barding and speeds up your base move/delay.  Chei again!
• Killed Boris three times.  No idea he respawned.
• Having to kill my DDNe player ghost on Zot 4.  Nasty fucker but I guess DD ghosts don't regen health.  Thankfully.
• Torment and Tentacled Monstrosities forced many retreats and almost all my consumables out of me.  I was face checking Orb Guardians and Orbs of Fire though.

This reads like a fishing story, only of interest to the participant, but fuck it.  Tonnes of fun!

Edited to chop some length

THIS game was a winner.


Starting to get a little farther every time.  My best run so far.  Sad to lose the +5/+5 Flail of draining on this run.  Probably could of gotten out if I had remembered my scrolls, panicked a bit.

As of now, Gastronok is to be restricted from mexican food whilst in the dungeon.

edit: You know what sucks? Having a wicked stack of mutations built up and quaffing an unidentified cure mutation potion. It "cured" 6 mutations on my Demonspawn Abyssal Knight. Sonofa.

Coming soon ... the adventures of BiBimBop, Ogre Wizard ...

Didn't see it mentioned anywhere but something just about everyone should be doing at or near the start is hitting 'm' to go into skills and switch it from auto to manual.  Most melee dudes have much longer lifespans if you stick to just your weapon of choice until it hits 8-10.  After that you can turn back on whatever the fuck and back-fill support skills.  The first 4 skill levels come really fast at that point anyway.

Good advice, and congrats on the win!

Bah.

 Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.10.0 character file.

1576 Khorne the Ducker (level 8, -9/60 HPs)
             Began as a Demonspawn Abyssal Knight on Mar 28, 2012.
             Was a High Priest of Lugonu.
             Mangled by an orc warrior
             ... wielding a +0,+0 orcish halberd
              (11 damage)
             ... on Level 9 of the Dungeon on Mar 30, 2012.
             The game lasted 01:19:36 (7970 turns).

Reference for my previous post, here's a costly potion:

  6426 | D:7      | Lost mutation: Your muscles are strong (Str +1).
  6426 | D:7      | Lost mutation: Your muscles are flexible, but weak (Str -1, Dex +1).
  6426 | D:7      | Lost mutation: You passively map a small area around you.
  6426 | D:7      | Lost mutation: You have a pair of small horns on your head.
  6426 | D:7      | Lost mutation: You evolve.
  6426 | D:7      | Lost mutation: You have razor-sharp toenails.

I was absolutely wrecking stuff and opened a door on a full room of orcs. Damned priests and halberds!

Deep Elves are in for some serious death.  I have been banished to the Abyss TWICE by those bastards in this game.  Have I mentioned how much I hate the Abyss?  Fuck that place, honestly.  You know what saves me there?  STEALTH.  And when I have the right setup you are all invited to a nice elf blood shower.  I am going to kill every one of those elves or die trying.  NO ELVES.

Somebody needs to mod Bloodbowl to include Deep Elves and Sludge Elves.   :awesome_for_real:

My Mino Fighter first char still remains alive somehow.  Level 12 and going through the Lair currently. 

Identifying weapons is really god damn annoying though.  I'll grab something and bash half a level to death with it and still not get an ID on it.

I just get overconfident and die to the knights. Sigh. Level 13 and no idea what possessed me to try to do Elf before Lair.

Cursed -4 chainmail artifact that weighs 40 and lets you turn invisible. Cruel game.

Started another game as a Demonblood Abyssal Knight, as the first run was a lot of fun...and found out how much of that fun was due to having the evolution mutation. I had quite the list of mutations, most of them good or balanced (+1str balancing the -1str/+1dex for instance). Overall better mutations this run, but far fewer (powered by death and bone plates)...and I discovered cure mutation potions BEFORE I was all mutated up.

edit: I'm going to stop posting about current crawls. I always seem to die right when I go back to the game. Opened a door with a ton of gnolls armed with halberds and spears + shamans.

587 Komoto the Skirmisher (level 6, -9/47 HPs)
             Began as a Demonspawn Abyssal Knight on Mar 30, 2012.
             Was an Elder of Lugonu.
             Mangled by a gnoll
             ... wielding a +0,+0 halberd
              (11 damage)
             ... on Level 3 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:50:20 (4761 turns).

It's interesting how you can look at the turns and times and figure out who (me) rushes a bit when they play.  My 10k turn game took 44 minutes, wouldn't of died when I did if I was paying better attention too.  :uhrr:

Your Demonic mutations will never be cured by one. So no worries there!

Yeah, but it cured Evolution, which was the awesomest. I had also chugged several mutation potions.

Started playing random/random games and enjoying it.  My first one was a Troll Abyssal Knight, I had no idea how any of the classes work or what most of the deities are yet.  My shortest game to date.  :oh_i_see:

Testing out a demonspawn monk, and this is actually pretty fun!  I enjoy the mutations, and so far got some good mutations (+2 AC and SH, minor demon protector, and the ability to eat rotten meat).  Slay, what attributes should I level up?  Is dex more important than Strength for a monk?

This one hurt, seems like the demonspawn/abyssal knight can be lots of fun if you get a good start.

479 Khorne the Skirmisher (level 5, 0/40 HPs)
             Began as a Demonspawn Abyssal Knight on Mar 30, 2012.
             Was an Elder of Lugonu.
             Slain by an ogre
             ... wielding a +0,+0 giant spiked club
              (10 damage)
             ... on Level 4 of the Dungeon.
             The game lasted 00:33:10 (5109 turns).


Had good armor, a start on good weaponry, decent mutations and a nice set of boots. Got cocky thinking I could just zap an ogre with wands after pulling it off on the floor above with my confusion wand. Also had a really nice spellbook with some great spells (fireball, invis, haste, etc), intended to maybe branch into casting once I had melee skills up a bit.

Player ghosts can be mean.

146234 Arinon the Tortoise (level 17, -1/151 HPs)
             Began as a Minotaur Gladiator on Mar 30, 2012.
             Was the Champion of Okawaru.
             Killed from afar by Arinon's ghost (65 damage)
             ... with a stone arrow
             
             ... on Level 5 of the Vaults on Mar 31, 2012.
             The game lasted 02:56:26 (43017 turns).

The ghost was listed as mightly DsTM so I in no way expected a spell to punch 65 damage through 37 AC.  Ouch!


My understanding is that it depends on what else you plan on doing.  Straight Unarmed damage is mostly just affected by the skill itself, as well as Fighting, so you are better off stating based on the type of armour you want to use and how much if any spellcasting you want to do.  Light armour means mixing dex and int to manage EV and spell power/hunger, heavier armour needs a shitton of STR or it tanks your attack rate.

Various transmutation spells have really good synergies with Unarmed as well and can really jack up the damage. Sorta what I think I went for on the aforementioned ghost above.  A lot of the Demonspawn mutations still work in other forms so you can have a lot of fun with shit like Spider Form, Ice Form, and Blade Hands.  Easier if you start as Transmuter but would totally work as a Monk once you find the spells.

Ash likes it when can't I switch weapons, so surely using this chaos brand will be a pretty good idea.

Currently wrecking the Lair as a Mino Monk of Makhleb. Level 12 so far, using a +2/+2 Vampiric Scimitar, the unrand +6 Gong Shield, +5 ring of prot, +2 gloves/boots/cloak, an amulet of the gourmand, and a randart wizard hat that's 3 AC, MR, +5 int, +10 MP, and ponderous. The extra mana from the hat works well with the guardian spirit on the shield (since I'm just a melee character). I've also got rings of poison, fire, cold, and magic resist for whatever the situation requires. Chugged a mutation potion and got rPois, Regen 1, and Berserking 1.

This is the furthest I've gotten in a while; I was fucking around as felid for a little while but the game kept dropping awesome randart weapons/armor/etc. and I got frustrated so switched to something that can use gear.

I just fought a god damn staircase. 

I guess they added some new mimics.

Progress, new personal best, was dying to a dire elephant, used a teleport scroll and it landed me someplace worse.  :heartbreak:

30262 Mitthrawnuruodo the Stickfighter (level 13, -2/97 (111) HPs)
             Began as a Minotaur Gladiator on Mar 31, 2012.
             Splashed by acid (4 damage)
             ... on Level 8 of the Lair of Beasts.
             The game lasted 00:52:27 (15749 turns).

Of course it helps a bit when I find all of this before I even hit D:5
a +4,+4 quarterstaff of chaos (weapon)
a +2 orcish plate armour (worn)
a +5,+4 ring of slaying (left hand)
a +3 ring of strength (right hand)

I ran into one of those too; scared the shit out of me.

I'm guessing that quarterstaff of Chaos was from the Crazy gnoll?  He'll always drop a highly-enchanted one with that brand, sometimes an enchanted cloak as well.  If you're hurting for usable weapons it can be nice, but it's healed/hasted/turned the enemy invisible a few too many times for me to trust it.

Up to level 14 on the Mino Monk I mentioned above; just cleared the Orc Mines. Only hairy part was the bottom level which had Azazel, a named efreet and his pack of fire elementals. Had to run back to my stash and grab my fire resist gear; didn't think to drop my scrolls and ended up having a bunch incinerated. Not much of value in the shops at the bottom either; a bunch of unbranded weapons that don't compare to my +3/+4 vamp scimitar. Probably going to do the Snake Pit next.

Finally got a Mummy Summoner off the ground.  Really weak start but once you can use Sif Muna's channel your summons can be chained together and cast more or less at will.  Have a pack of 5-8 summons with me at all times.  Imps => Dogs => Ice Beasts.  Middle of the Lair now and I'm gonna need something beefier soon.  I just know I'm gonna die to something stupid because managing pets can get tedious.


Be very very careful in Snake Pit as most of the Nagas can constrict you now which does more damage, prevents movement, and will also prevent stair dancing.  Much harder than it has been in the past.

Tried to make an assassiny Necro, failed spectacularly. Twice. Though I did two-shot Jessica, which made me happy after an earlier wipe to her.

Tried a Draco Wizard, got lucky with imp summons, shadow imp going around raising corpses. Died horribly soon after.

It's humbling that my best two games were my first two, and playing the local version at home I get to see my vast morgue of level 1 and 2 characters. A couple 8th level are my best there.

Well, if you want a guy that feels way overpowered, try a Draconian Transmuter of Cheibro(whatever). If you can live long enough for the stats from him, Blade Hands gets CRAZY. Dragon Form. Hack the fuck outta stuff.

Staff of Energy was awesome, I just was perm blade hands / dragon form.

This run I really got NO items and no support spells. Got impatient at vault 8, and got dead. The run was a lot of fun, though.

Constrict is starting to get pretty old.

I've had a couple really good runs ended because I got constricted, it's just a random "you lose". Game is tough enough on mistakes without that kind of nonsense. Hopefully it gets nerfed in future releases.

This last time, had a good run of luck with drops and then descended a staircase into a ball python's constrict, bunch of orcs jump me and I'm too low hp to endure it.

I don't read a ton of DCSS stuff, but the little bit I do you are not alone on this complaint.  I've seen multiple upset people with the same issue that some really good run is ruined by a completely unpreventable random "Constrict, you lose.".

Yeah, it finished me off in the realm of Zot during a bad ass run. Beware of tenacled monstrousities!

Ball pythons I won't bitch about because they drop so quick and I focus them like I do orc priests...GREEN = DEAD in this game!

Apparently dumping all my points into fighting and maces and wielding a +3,2 mace on level 4 of the dungeon wasn't enough to overcome a ball python...in the time it took the orc and orc priest and rat or whatever else was in there to chop me into little pieces.

Check for an Amulet of Inaccuracy (I say it cause I've been there, not insulting your INT :)

This is another reason why I stay in the abyss until I hit level 4+ or die.  My record so far for levelling in the Abyss is level 8, but the odds of being able to achieve this make it not worth making into an objective.  Hitting level 4+ is about a 1 in 15, so basically I false start 10+ times to get a game rolling.

Tentacled monstrosities seem more dangerous in melee than pretty much anything I've come across.  The constrict thing is annoying to me from the other end as I've basically stopped playing Nagas due to the power of starting the game with constrict.  It looks like the next release moves Naga constrict to XL13 so hopefully they mellow out on the monster versions as well.  My current beef is early game paralyse.  Hello Grinder, you fuckface!

On the bright side I've tried a bunch of new stuff that's been pretty fun and/or hilarious.

Today's lesson: It doesn't matter how stealthy you think you are. Stay the hell out of Elf 5.

The equipment and mutations I've gotten early on this run almost make me want to stop playing - the artifact gold dragon armor, amulet, and flaming demon blade especially.  THEY'RE TOO GOOD THE GAME IS GOING TO KILL ME SOMEHOW.

That's a damn sweet load-out for level 13.  Basically just need to get some more STR and some mutation mitigation and you are set for Zot.  This usually means you'll die before your first rune.

Finally got to see a wee bit of the post game on a Dragonspawn Transmuter.  Had six runes and got cocky diving too deep in a Ziggurat.  First time seeing a pandemonium lord.  He proceeded to fill the screen with summons multiple times over and they aced me after I managed to dive in and kill him.

Bleh I may have to throw in the towel, DCSS is killing me, last night I thought I had a character that could go all the way,  I hit level 7 in the pregame abyss lottery and by level 9 (dungeon 6) my little hill orc had 34ac (with 7 evade still) and 20 str, I just couldn't seem to land a decent weapon and was hesitant to drop my 4 or so enchant weap scrolls on my starter +2+2 mace.  

End result is I got cocky and didn't run early enough from an orc party, I need to be patient/disciplined enough to just run from the get go on all parties larger than 2 and use the stairs to split them up.

Nice run Arinon, the Draconian Transmuter of Chei is fun eh? :)

Draconians still seem like a garbage race but for that specific build they are insane.  I don't think you gain a ton at cap but you get Dragon Form running a shitton earlier then you otherwise would.  Chei boosted Dragon Form castable at XL 14 let me one/two shot everything in the mid/late game.  Pale version worked much better than I thought as the breath weapon blocks LoS.

I was so comfortable that I started branching out into various spells willy-nilly which, as it turns out, was a bad idea.  Probably should have left Tomb alone and went hard into Summoning rather than Necromancy for Summon Dragon and Mass Abjuration.

Weaknesses near the end were Torment, lack of spammable AoE, and outs on -cTele levels.  That purple draconian breath weapon nearly killed me a few times before I realized it was dropping me out of form.  It's also tricky to get resists with only rings and amulets but it's hard to complain when you have almost 400hp.

Currently dicking around with MiMo and I have a HOFE that is in really good shape for a win.  Polearms + Conjure Flame is some fun shit.

I've been playing this for years. 

Never the easy characters, though.  No Minotaur or dwarf fighters, Spriggan Enchanters or Deep Elf casters of any kind.  I liked the harder and more random characters - Draconians (haven't tried transmuters), Demonspawn fighters, ogres, etc.  And because of that, I've never won.  Well, that and a lack of patience  :grin: 

That changed today, though: 


Didn't really get any 'great' items until near the end in the form of a few useful artifcats (Fair Winds Amulet, etc), so I was a little surprised I made it as far as I did - Demonspawn usually struggle early without a great weapon or great mutations, but I was stuck with a standard scimitar with electric branding for a good way through the mid-early late game, and only some basic +2 enchanted plate armor.   

I actually found the Abyssal rune as well after being cast in twice while clearing Elf 5 - I guess I never hit 'get' when I found it though.  Oh well!  A few tricky moments in the Lair early on, and then some VERY close moments during the final ascent - I was actually down to 10 hp and surrounded by 3 enemies on D5 or so, and somehow got out of it.  Pretty sure I would have broken my computer if I hadn't.  Otherwise, help from Makhleb made things fairly manageable, except for the orbs of fire in Zot - those almost got me a few times as well. 

I love this game, but after this I think I'm going to take a good long break.  So many dead characters!

Edit: Whoops, broke the length limit. 

Yea, dragon form is great but in the end game torment just does so much damage. Regen starts to get really slow when you have a ton of hp (it gets faster, but when compared to your max hp, it gets much slower).

Well done! I find that an electrically enchanted weapon might be the best out of all them all for non-artifacts. You see a sudden explosion of sparks!

You did it with considerably worse gear/mutations than I!

Haven't put much time into this since April but I have a Mino meleer that just needs Tomb and the Pan runes for a 15 rune win.  Tomb without Kiku, Necromutation, or Shatter will probably kill him though.

Version 0.11 should be out in a few weeks.  New Spider branch and streamlined Swamp and Elf among other things.  Oh and ammo management will no longer suck.