[Crawl] YASD - Conan, Gnome "Bevoker"

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No character dump available, it was on another computer, but I have to
share my pain.

- Conan the Talismancer, Level 27 Gnome Trog-worshipping Thief with
lev27 in long blades, dodging, and evocations; secondary skills were
fighting, unarmed, and stealth
- Shocked to death in 2 rounds by an electric golem, simply due to
underestimating the risk (I was under full health before the first
round, and over half before the second, so I thought I had a round to
spare) and experimenting (a.k.a. "fooling around") when I should have
been in live-or-die mode. "Nope, can't be drained. Nope, scrolls of
fear don't affect them. [The EG hits you! shocks you! hits you! etc.!]
Buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh..." Over 90 damage, possibly a
full 100 damage in one round.
- Had cleared the Hells and (just before Zot) the Pits, had decided to
skip Pan this time, because mutational overconfidence in the midgame
had left me saddled with double teleportitis after the Pits (as well as
a lot of other nastiness at one time or another). This meant my
spending rather more time than necessary in Zot, so perhaps you could
say it contributed to my doom, but all in all, this character was so
insanely buff that he could shrug off the implications of teleportitis
in any place short of Pandemonium. Heck, I even did the *Pits* with
single teleportitis.
- Darshan was right: rods are overpowered. *Twinkily* overpowered, in
fact. I mean yeah, OK, so Gnomes are rod specialists, and my whole
strategy was centered around the fact (my first six acquirements were
rods), but STILL. It was like being a mid-level fire elementalist, ice
elementalist, earth elementalist, summoner, and diviner, all in one
skill that went up so fast that I maxed it out mid-Vault without even
WANTING to.

This is now my THIRD character to die within the Hall of Zot. :-/

Bad man that I am, I am still steadfastly refusing to work on the Bow
Patch until I squeeze a WIN out of this eeeeevil GAME. Jeez, just 5
little HP out of that 90-100+ and I would be writing in with a YAVP
instead. (What do you mean "it was my fault for not taking the EG
seriously"? Take your truthful commentary somewhere where it will be
appreciated, please...)

Grumble grumble.

Now on to a KeNe...

Erik

 

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"Erik Piper" <erik@sky.cz> wrote in message news:<1112604598.177579.162840@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>...

> - Conan the Talismancer, Level 27 Gnome Trog-worshipping Thief with
> lev27 in long blades, dodging, and evocations; secondary skills were
> fighting, unarmed, and stealth

As usual an unusual characters for you.

> - Shocked to death in 2 rounds by an electric golem, simply due to
> underestimating the risk (I was under full health before the first
> round, and over half before the second, so I thought I had a round to
> spare) and experimenting (a.k.a. "fooling around") when I should have
> been in live-or-die mode. "Nope, can't be drained. Nope, scrolls of
> fear don't affect them. [The EG hits you! shocks you! hits you! etc.!]
> Buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh..." Over 90 damage, possibly a
> full 100 damage in one round.

<insert standard rant about Crawl killing you when becoming too
confident>

I think you have to learn by dying in Crawl. The first few games you
get whacked by hobgoblins until you learn proper respect for them,
then you have to do the same with ogres, giants, yaktaurs, and so on,
up until the creatures in Zot. That said, if you're getting your
lessons from EGs then the Orb is quite close.

> - Darshan was right: rods are overpowered. *Twinkily* overpowered, in
> fact. I mean yeah, OK, so Gnomes are rod specialists, and my whole
> strategy was centered around the fact (my first six acquirements were
> rods), but STILL. It was like being a mid-level fire elementalist, ice
> elementalist, earth elementalist, summoner, and diviner, all in one
> skill that went up so fast that I maxed it out mid-Vault without even
> WANTING to.

Overpowered, yes, but only if you can find them and you can get those
acquirement scrolls to do as you want. The last evoker-type I played
got two early acquirements and got two staffs as the result. (And then
he died.)

> Now on to a KeNe...

Why not something easier, such as a OMCr?

/Johan

 

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Johan Strandell wrote:
> "Erik Piper" <erik@sky.cz> wrote in message
news:<1112864115.613324.156310@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>...
> > Johan Strandell wrote:
>
> > And once in a while, it really pays off. This was the *easiest*
game of
> > Crawl I've played in a very long while.
>
> There is such a thing as an easy game of Crawl?

I was surprised, too. It was only hard in the parts where I was
doing my best not to abuse rods. :0)

[...]

> In my winning game I didn't find even one scroll of acquirement (or
> perhaps I did - I did find an unidentified scroll pretty late, but it
> was promptly burned by a deep elf who popped out of nowhere when
> heading back to the stash). He also found just one rod (|ofDemonology
> + Elyvilion = bad), so it's nothing you can count on.

Weird! Of course, item distribution in Crawl is random, but I find I
can count on a scroll of acquirement or two during the Lair as much as
I can count on anything (which, as your example shows...).

[...]

> (Rods are one thing I would tone down a bit in Crawl v4 if I had a
say
> in that.

I think any reasonable person would, which is why I am rushing to play
lots of games with rods while it's still possible.

> Right now they're only compensated by being rare, but if you
> manage to find one of the decent ones then you'll have a very easy
> game. Compensating by making the {:s usable for someone without
magic
> skills would be one way. A summoner without Spellcasting might be
> interesting for example - you have the rods, but also the stones,
> lamps and such.)

Nice idea, although not one I would play with (I find summoning
boring).

> > Rod/staff acquirement respects the highest skill in the right-hand
> > column. Your evocations has to be higher than any of your spell
schools
> > and spellcasting itself, or else you get a staff instead of a rod.
> > (Barring a freak chance, I suppose. My fifth or sixth rod/staff
> > acquirement granted me a staff of summoning even though I,
obviously,
> > had huge Evocations and zero magic skills.)
>
> But there's also a quite big random factor. The character I mentioned
> had zero Spellcasting, and level 2 Evocations. Perhaps too little,
but
> not having any Spellcasting skill at all should have been a huge hint
> to those acquirement scrolls. (grumble)

Huh. In that particular game, it was striking, smiting, destruction,
destruction, discovery, summoning, striking, and only then a staff. So
I think you got a bit unlucky. (And I think that yes, you can point out
to me that anyone who gets THAT many ?ofAcq, even during quite a long
game, should be shot.)

> > > Why not something easier, such as a OMCr?
> >
> > Actually, if I was forced to bet on which out of two players of
equal
> > skill, one with a KeNe and one with an OMCr, would be first to the
Orb,
> > I'd bet on the KeNe. I've played both pretty intensively, and IME
the
> > OMCrs really start suffering from their lack of armor options (lack
of
> > sources of cool randart-granted traits) by the midgame, even when
> > compared to Kenku. Plus "having lots of hitpoints" is a... nice...
> > advantage, but being able to zip over all terrains and getting your
> > carrying capacity considerably increased when you get permaflight
at
> > level 15 is really, really nice. It saves you all the usual "oops
I'm
> > dead" deaths in the Swamp, just to name one example. I know it
doesn't
> > sound like much, but... well, it has to be seen to be believed.
>
> I've never gotten any far with Crusaders - they tend to be quite weak
> in all areas, compared to pure fighters/spellcasters.

Not at all, not at all. I've gotten one Crusader to Zot and several to
the endgame. Their alloting experience to magic doesn't reduce their
effectiveness compared to a straight fighter. The small reduction in
fighting effectiveness is made up for by their very useful array of
enchantments, even in just their starting book, and when you add in the
things they find later, you get some very effective fighters indeed. To
simplify, they're like berserkers with 80% of the combat effectiveness,
but with no spell restrictions (except how much XP they are willing to
spend).

> But hey, if it's
> possible to win with ghouls, then OMCr:s should be possible winners
> too.

Like I say, it's the OM that's the problem, not the Cr.

> > The nice thing about running Ke's as Ne's, incidentally, is that
you
> > basically end up with really, really competent Death Knights. You
start
> > out with a "conjuration-like" spell that holds you over until you
find
> > a decent weapon, so you only spend your XP on weapons AFTER you
know
> > which ones you want, but unlike conjurers who become reavers,
> > necromancers who become death knights aren't left burdened with
largely
> > overlapping skills once they learn to fight.
>
> Sounds interesting, like a Ne with a bit of added hitpoints to get
> through the early game.

Actually, I don't start training fighting with Ne's until late in the
early game, and Ke's are quite fragile. They are fairly good at
necromancythough, and they tend to get more fighting-related skill
levels out of their initial allotment than, say, a deep elf.

> > To spice things up a bit, though, I've started with STAFF-wielding
> > Kenkus.
> >
> > Named Dispater.
>
> Isn't that just inviting a YASD in Hell?

Staff-wielders tend to YASD long, long before then. ;-)

Erik

 

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Twisted One wrote:
> Erik Piper wrote:
> > I think any reasonable person would, which is why I am rushing to
play
> > lots of games with rods while it's still possible.
>
> Why not just avoid upgrading? (Or keep a parallel install of a
version
> from Before Rods Were Nerfed and have the best of both worlds, even?)
>
> --
> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
> Palladium? Trusted Computing? DRM? Microsoft? Sauron.
> "One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
> One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

Actually, the whole release thing is a bit screwy with Crawl, as the
maintainer is nearly as hard to spur onward than the NetHack devteam,
and no-one has spoken up to replace him so far. So I think rods may not
really be nerfed a while yet; I just wrote what I wrote for humor's
sake.

If I ever get around to writing Erik's Vaporware Crawl Patch, *I* may
be the one to nerf rods, in which case I will get a lot of stern looks
if I do so just after getting my first YAVP with the help of rods, but
c'est la vie.

Erik

 

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Erik Piper wrote:
> I think any reasonable person would, which is why I am rushing to play
> lots of games with rods while it's still possible.

Why not just avoid upgrading? (Or keep a parallel install of a version
from Before Rods Were Nerfed and have the best of both worlds, even?)

--
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Palladium? Trusted Computing? DRM? Microsoft? Sauron.
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

 

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"Erik Piper" <erik@sky.cz> wrote in message news:<1112948471.660622.181040@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com>...
> Johan Strandell wrote:

> > In my winning game I didn't find even one scroll of acquirement (or
> > perhaps I did - I did find an unidentified scroll pretty late, but it
> > was promptly burned by a deep elf who popped out of nowhere when
> > heading back to the stash). He also found just one rod (|ofDemonology
> > + Elyvilion = bad), so it's nothing you can count on.
>
> Weird! Of course, item distribution in Crawl is random, but I find I
> can count on a scroll of acquirement or two during the Lair as much as
> I can count on anything (which, as your example shows...).

The item distribution doesn't seem to be very "well-behaved" in that
it doesn't have a predictable outcome: you can't really count on
finding specific items by a certain depth. This goes especially for
the rare items - sometimes you find 2 !CM on the first level, and in
other games none until quite late.

> > Right now they're only compensated by being rare, but if you
> > manage to find one of the decent ones then you'll have a very easy
> > game. Compensating by making the {:s usable for someone without
> magic
> > skills would be one way. A summoner without Spellcasting might be
> > interesting for example - you have the rods, but also the stones,
> > lamps and such.)
>
> Nice idea, although not one I would play with (I find summoning
> boring).

I can understand not liking pure summoners, but what's not to like
about a bunch of elementals or 1:s taking out the welcome committee on
the last level of the Vaults?

> Huh. In that particular game, it was striking, smiting, destruction,
> destruction, discovery, summoning, striking, and only then a staff. So
> I think you got a bit unlucky.

The probability for that happening is probably not very large, but not
negligable.

> (And I think that yes, you can point out
> to me that anyone who gets THAT many ?ofAcq, even during quite a long
> game, should be shot.)

No, rather that someone that gets that many ?Acq:s and then YASDs
should be shot.

> > I've never gotten any far with Crusaders - they tend to be quite weak
> > in all areas, compared to pure fighters/spellcasters.
>
> Not at all, not at all. I've gotten one Crusader to Zot and several to
> the endgame. Their alloting experience to magic doesn't reduce their
> effectiveness compared to a straight fighter. The small reduction in
> fighting effectiveness is made up for by their very useful array of
> enchantments, even in just their starting book, and when you add in the
> things they find later, you get some very effective fighters indeed. To
> simplify, they're like berserkers with 80% of the combat effectiveness,
> but with no spell restrictions (except how much XP they are willing to
> spend).

I forgot to mention that I meant in the early game, where not having
strong skills tend to kill you. That said, I might be playing them
wrongly.

> > Sounds interesting, like a Ne with a bit of added hitpoints to get
> > through the early game.
>
> Actually, I don't start training fighting with Ne's until late in the
> early game, and Ke's are quite fragile. They are fairly good at
> necromancythough, and they tend to get more fighting-related skill
> levels out of their initial allotment than, say, a deep elf.

That was what I was thinking about - I've mostly been playing MuNe:s
(and a few MuDK) when doing Necromancers, and they are not known for
their fighting skills.

/Johan

 

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Johan Strandell wrote:

[Discussion: Is the likelihood of finding enough ?oAcq quickly enough
high enough to support a rod-based strategy?]

> The item distribution doesn't seem to be very "well-behaved" in that
> it doesn't have a predictable outcome: you can't really count on
> finding specific items by a certain depth. This goes especially for
> the rare items - sometimes you find 2 !CM on the first level, and in
> other games none until quite late.

True, but scrolls of acquisition are a bit more common than !oCM, and
there's also the second possibility of finding a rod directly (only
about 1 in 10 midgames, but every bit helps).

I can't recall any late midgames I've entered without any scrolls of
acquirement behind me, unlike the many I've entered without an "oRS,
!oCM, =oPR, "otG, or non-acquired \oConjuration. However, I may just
not be noticing it due to the rarity of games where I really care if
I've found one or not -- until I started bevoking, a lack of
acquirement was only really frustrating enough to notice if I was a
conjurer with no enhancer staff by the midgame.

> > > Right now they're only compensated by being rare, but if you
> > > manage to find one of the decent ones then you'll have a very
easy
> > > game. Compensating by making the {:s usable for someone without
> > magic
> > > skills would be one way. A summoner without Spellcasting might be
> > > interesting for example - you have the rods, but also the stones,
> > > lamps and such.)
> >
> > Nice idea, although not one I would play with (I find summoning
> > boring).
>
> I can understand not liking pure summoners, but what's not to like
> about a bunch of elementals or 1:s taking out the welcome committee
on
> the last level of the Vaults?

The waiting. The cheapness. The not doing my own thing. The wasted XP.
The uncoolness.

The variety of rods is cool; it would be a shame if it disappeared. The
only real problem is the excessive ratio of advantages to
disadvantages, for those who model their games around rods and who have
a bit of luck.

> > > I've never gotten any far with Crusaders - they tend to be quite
weak
> > > in all areas, compared to pure fighters/spellcasters.
> >
> > Not at all, not at all. [etc. etc.]

> I forgot to mention that I meant in the early game, where not having
> strong skills tend to kill you. That said, I might be playing them
> wrongly.

In the very very early game, I just let them die. There's more where
those came from. Once they can reliably cast the flaming weapon spell,
repel missiles, and berserk rage, they are on very good standing, so I
tend to scum all of my XP into spells until that point is reached. I
tend to do it with everything but spellcasting turned off, since it's a
bit hard to raise spellcasting with a crusader otherwise. Either at 4
or 8 levels of spellcasting, I turn it off, start training weapons, and
head out to kick butt.

[Kenku necromancers]
> > > Sounds interesting, like a Ne with a bit of added hitpoints to
get
> > > through the early game.
> >
> > Actually, I don't start training fighting with Ne's until late in
the
> > early game, and Ke's are quite fragile. They are fairly good at
> > necromancythough, and they tend to get more fighting-related skill
> > levels out of their initial allotment than, say, a deep elf.
>
> That was what I was thinking about - I've mostly been playing MuNe:s
> (and a few MuDK) when doing Necromancers, and they are not known for
> their fighting skills.

I've hardly played mummies, but I have the impression they are good for
roleplaying and for scumming, but not much else.

Erik