Shouldn't "Ironman" be the default (and is it even playable atm) ?
 

Hi,
To make my question/suggestion a bit more clear :

By "ironman", I only mean no recall/upstairs
I didn't play any *band for some years, essentially because I realize I'm tired of the scumming mechanic.

In games like FTL, B.o.Isaac, DoomRL, Slay The Spire, Monster Train, Hades... one doesn't have the choice, and MUST play "ironman" every game.
Of course, the difficulty of the game is calibrated on this, and most games can be won if one plays the right way, but good difficulty setting, like StS's ascension, or the excellent pact system of Hades keep things challenging. (I don't like Hades much, but Hell... this pact system is so neat !)

I realize the game feels much more interesting to me with finite resources (and feels dull without it, tbh), so I'd want to play *band the same way, but I'm afraid it's not designed for that at all atm.
I think I'd find too few stuff, no shops at all, and be extremely dependent on the RNG.
As an average player, I'm not sure beating a Vanilla game with no upstairs or recall would be even remotely possible.
Am I wrong ?


If this hasn't already been suggested, I'd love to read some thoughts about it.
A quick search didn't give me much result, except that I should give a glance to "Coffee break".
... but is it the only version focused on that way of playing ? I'd want that spirit in Vanilla !


Thoughts, or links to existing threads debating about this would be welcome.
Maybe I should have made it a poll about scumming's relevancy :) ?

These are my personal observations over the past 3-4 years:

Winning ironman is most certainly possible, but it has become much more difficult after the release of 4.2.1 version. Early huorns and newly buffed hydrae are not only tough and fast, they are also very common. The new endgame has also several common monsters, that pass or dig through a wall. These two factors alone have made ironman much harder for me.

One way of easing things up, is to choose random artifact set. You can find artifact rings much, much earlier than you will find em with standard set. Also random artifacts can give immunities, attack speed bonuses, ridiculous damage dice for weapon etc. Immunities are especially valuable in ironman because you need those fragile consumables in the endgame. You're gonna have to think twice before dropping an immunty-granting artifact behind. People complaining about inventory management know next to nothing, if they haven't tried ironman. :D

I've won lots of ironman games using randarts.. before 4.2.1. Today I mainly use standard set and I have serious trouble even winning with just forced descent on.

PS: Ironman DEFINITELY should not be a default.

EDIT: Just remembered that most of my pre-4.2.1 ironman wins had Know-all-flavors birth option turned on. That doesn't make much difference to the late game, but I can imagine early game being a bit easier this way. The most powerful buffs are immediately identified by wielding anyway.

Normally when we talk about game play/play-ability of Angband we are talking about non-ironman play. We don't typically talk about ironman play because it is not the norm and those setting are considered challenge settings. So taking the non-normal settings and making them default does not make sense, regardless of how other roguelike games are structured.

Personally, I think everyone should play ironman once in awhile - it will make you a better player because it forces you to think about all your decisions in ways that will help when you are playing normally.

When I first started playing Angband a few years ago I predictably died, a lot. One day, frustrated yet again, I decided to try something crazy - an ironman game. If Morgoth had not double moved me with two mana storms (I didn't quite have enough speed, obviously :)) I think I would have won.

Try it, you might be surprised.

One thing that helps is to have already won the game with a given class, so that you have a pretty good idea what you need at the end, which helps you make all the crucial decisions on the way.

I have won three ironman games - I think the Druid class is especially suited to iron man games - never go hungry, lots of super useful utility spells and the last spell book gives you inexhaustible endgame fighting ability (assuming you fine a bazillion restore mana potions - which you will)

I prefer Ironman settings for vanilla. Partially because a challenge option made previous versions more interesting but also because I prefer on-the-spot inventory management vs. filling houses of kit and constant reshuffling for optimal setup.

Ironman has a different pace and other sweet spots than normal game play. Warriors, for instance, normally easy to play in the early game suffer from lack of free ?phase door and ?teleport which makes a big difference. Then you learn to hunt the now more common blue p's and that is ok, etc.

Burden and speed is often an issue. Imagine finding a strong dragon scale mail on level 1, clearly you will use that PDSM (or whatever DSM) so you start learning to cope with crap (negative) speed.

In previous versions I'd say Priest is easy even in Ironman mode. Now I'd probably go for a Ranger.

In short: *NO* it shouldn't. It should be default for Rogue, a different but related game. Rogue is intrinsically ironman.

Default? NO.
Doable? Certainly. My first attempt in the latest release is not done yet, but what's there not to like? Can't see that infinite shopping in the town had helped much except made the game a bit faster.

http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=24674

Thanks to this thread, I've started running ironman games again on angband.live. Randarts on! Gimme some +3 movement speed now!

Randart drops have been very, very rare so far, even though I've played at least 10 games already and easily gotten past L20 most of the time. The worst case was finding a great Torch artifact, but not finding a single weapon on the way that could beat my starting weapon. I died somewhere before L30 wielding +0+0 dagger.

The best one I've managed so far, was a character that bought 5 iron shots of flame with most of the starting money. Throwing those killed everything and did even better, after I found an enchanted sling.

Randarts are pretty rare indeed on levels 1-20 and many are very crappy when they do appear. You'll be far more likely to find them on levels 30-50.

I only ever play randarts and the hardest thing is not getting early access to the thancs.

Like you I prioritise branded shots or pebbles. The fact they're now indestructible is massive, you'll eventually find a sling of power and the combination can easily take you to clvl40.

At some point you'll find a randart bow/crossbow with such incredible buffs you'll have to make a switch. But I do think slings are currently the greatest launchers in the game, solely on account of indestructible ammo

@egavactip
Yeah. It seemed like dlvl 1-20 are less likely to create an artifact.
I thought artifact generation is 'based' on standard artifacts and their depth. So for example the early ones; the Phial, the three thancs, Elvagil and Forasgil would be represented by some crappy, even harmful artifacts. But no. Pre 4.2.1 gave some massively strong artifacts, frequently. It generated harmful ones too. Even one that had no branded intrinsic of any kind :D
Got my first good one today, with the cost of almost all my cure wounds potions and having deliberately stepped on a skull druj's sight to be able to TO it away. It was 9-8 suicide-or-prize vault.

@selkie
The game I just saved has had typical 'this-can-only-happen-to-me' whining scenario. Game has produced Light Crossbow of Accuracy but not a single bolt from start to this moment. It also produced 10 pebbles of slay evil early but not a single Sling yet. And finally some unique dropped 37 arrows of wounding +17dam, but the game hasn't generated a single bow after that :D

Those missing pieces will drop eventually, but as far as launchers go, I've been going smh all the way so far. Character just cannot carry a +0 longbow in ironman game just for the fact that some great arrows MIGHT drop.