[Announce] Poschengband 3.4.0 Released

[mewmew]

oh, i remember i wrote a big paste about poschengband gameplay using my own experience and advice which i read here (macros, basic mechanics, races, classes, list of quests, useful links, even a short walkthrough to the serpent) for one forum... it's a bit spoily, may be sometimes questionable, i'm not a great player after all, killed oberon twice and one of those characters actually is alive somewhere on my hdd and should be tried i think..., actually i would like to change some parts of it, it doesn't emphasize the importance of the device skill enough and also it could use a part about caring for monster breaths, that they depend on their health etc, on top of that i completely forgot to add the link to the official site, lol...

http://pastebin.com/CAQmLVg1

[chris]

Thank you for writing and posting this!

[youtoo]

Originally Posted by chris

Press '_' to initialize the auto-destroyer. Unfortunately, you still need to perform this step manually for each character. The default pickup preferences has lines to pick up wanted corpses for you:

wanted corpses#Wanted!k!k!k   
wanted skeletons#Wanted!k!k!k

Everything after the # character gets automatically inscribed on the object, in this case to tell you the corpse is wanted and to prevent accidental destruction with the k command (unless you really, really, really want to, that is!).

This isn't clear. How do i edit these lines to make sure I never destroy a corpose listed as 'wanted' by the hunters office? there are corpses wanted daily and then there are uniques. I dont understand what I change. I have the autopickup doc open, but i don't get it.

Also, how do i edit this to auto-destroy all 'average' items ? and then auto destroy all 'good' items for later in the game? even if they are ID'd? plus id want to auto-destroy all spellbooks my current character can't use. been usng alot of vampire-ninjas so all of them. they have '?' and I dont want to check if its a scroll.


I have some other questions I am having trouble googling. When I google for docs I usually do a search for 'hengband' or chengband'.

1. ok if i kill a guardian I get a stat bonus. I have seen some posts around that tell me where some guardians are. is there a list of all or most of them?

2. I got killed yesterday. I was fighting a guardian in camelot. I teleported and used phase door to get away, but he teleported with me. and i couldnt get away from him. how do i get away?

3. chris made stuff get destroyed alot easier. i found a staff of speed which is invaluable and rare early... it got destroyed. does high resistance reduce chance of stuff getting destroyed? i think fire/acid is the most important? can you add stuff to an item so its resistant to getting destroyed? I know some items come with this already. 'cannot be harmed by elements'.

4. Are there links to popular macros for different classes? I get how to make them, but Im sure othres have some good ones.

5. Is there a cap on how high attributes can go? Do they go above 18/<stuff> I have gotten to 18/150 on strength. not sure if there is a 19, etc...

6. I googled this. is there a damage formula for adding more str? I know I can look at 'weapon effectiveness', but not sure if that includes my strength.

7. what determines how many bonuses I can add to a weapon/armor in a shop? This seems to go up with level. but not sure if its fame ?

8. Been following this guide. post by clouded.
http://angband.oook.cz/forum/showthread.php?t=6606

I tend to get in trouble whne i get to the part about going to lower levels of the icky cave and die. Last time i tried going down into camelot and died to a guardian. See #2 for my last death. been mainly playing vampire/ninja.

9. for vampire/ninja been raising str almost exclusively up to about level 30 (tend to die after that). i dual wield. i go up from daggers to the best lighter weapons i can find

10. at heavier armors ninjas lose their speed bonus. does anyone know the calculation on this? It seems to go up as my str goes up, but not sure...

11. what is the best way to grind up attributes? I know kill guardians and level gets them, but things get harder. any specific dungeons more likely to drop attribute potions?

[chris]

Originally Posted by youtoo

This isn't clear. How do i edit these lines to make sure I never destroy a corpose listed as 'wanted' by the hunters office? there are corpses wanted daily and then there are uniques.

You don't need to change a thing! Once you enable the auotdestroyer the default pickup preferences will take care of this and a lot of other common things for you. Like:

Also, how do i edit this to auto-destroy all 'average' items ?

There's a line in there for that, but it's conditionally guarded so that it won't apply until you reach a certain character level. Scroll down to the section heading

#########################################
# Destroy Junk
#########################################

And you'll see the block:

?:[GEQ $LEVEL 20]
!average common weapons
!average common armors
?:1

In short, "!average common weapons" says to destroy, well, average common weapons. When your cursor is on this line there is even a plain English description at the bottom that explains what the line does. You can build a new line using the menu options which are pretty self explanatory. But the conditional guard may be confusing if you don't know computer programming (But if you know Scheme, then it should make perfect sense albeit with a disgusting syntax). Basically, it is saying "only apply these lines once the player's level is greater than or equal to 20). Edit that 20 to whatever you like.

and then auto destroy all 'good' items for later in the game? even if they are ID'd?

Right above the block we were just discussing is:

?:[GEQ $LEVEL 35]
!nameless common armors

?:[GEQ $LEVEL 30]
!nameless common weapons

Again, just edit the numbers after the $LEVEL variable if they are set too high for you. Good Armor is worth good money, so I like to leave those around for longer.

plus id want to auto-destroy all spellbooks my current character can't use.

Add a new line "!spellbooks" or, perhaps, "!unreadable spellbooks". The first will destroy them all, while the second will only destroy ones you cannot use. However, you probably want to keep high spellbooks since they can be sold for gold. In that case, something like

!unreadable first spellbooks
!unreadable second spellbooks

would work. Personally, I use the 'k' command to destroy objects and then press 'a' when prompted to do this stuff automatically. Much of the early game is spent auto-registering stuff for destruction once I no longer find it useful.

More to follow.

[chris]

Originally Posted by youtoo

1. ok if i kill a guardian I get a stat bonus. I have seen some posts around that tell me where some guardians are. is there a list of all or most of them?

No list at the moment. I would consider this as well as some of your other requests to fall in the category of spoilers! All the starting player should know is that there are different dungeons, each dungeon starts at a variable danger level (depth), and that many dungeons have guardians that you should try to kill. Exploring new stuff without knowing what will happen should be part of the fun!

That said, I'm sure Hengband had a list on its spoiler site and it might be mostly accurate.

2. I got killed yesterday. I was fighting a guardian in camelot. I teleported and used phase door to get away, but he teleported with me. and i couldnt get away from him. how do i get away?

Ah, well that's a gotcha. I'm not sure I like having that attribute manifest so early as it's much more fun when Nodens does it to you and you don't have a clue what to do. Well, teleporting *yourself* is not the only way to get out of danger.

3. chris made stuff get destroyed alot easier. i found a staff of speed which is invaluable and rare early... it got destroyed. does high resistance reduce chance of stuff getting destroyed? i think fire/acid is the most important? can you add stuff to an item so its resistant to getting destroyed? I know some items come with this already. 'cannot be harmed by elements'.

Actually, I think other variants have toned this down. Inventory destruction has always been a nuisance, and different elements destroy different things. In this case, fire and acid will destroy staves and the only way to protect stuff is to get enough resistance. Here, one source of each resistance is not enough, but is a very good start!

4. Are there links to popular macros for different classes? I get how to make them, but Im sure othres have some good ones.

I don't know about this one. I recommend you just pay attention to actions you take over and over again. When you find something tedious, then look into how to make a macro. You can post on the forum with a specific task to do and I'm sure people will help!

I can tell you what I macro:
Resting: "\eR&\r" and "\eR333\r". The first version rests until you are fully recovered while the second rests 333 turns and is useful for level feelings or waiting for monsters to come to you.

Destroying: "k-y\s\s"

Shooting: "\e*tf1" with ammo inscribed "@f1=g" (The @f1 part you should understand from before. The =g part means to automatically pick the object up)

That's pretty much it for universal macros for everything I play. But I macro extensively as I play, and it's different for each build.

More to follow.

[chris]

Originally Posted by youtoo

5. Is there a cap on how high attributes can go? Do they go above 18/<stuff> I have gotten to 18/150 on strength. not sure if there is a 19, etc...

19? That's crazy talk 18/220 is the max and will display as 18/***.

6. I googled this. is there a damage formula for adding more str? I know I can look at 'weapon effectiveness', but not sure if that includes my strength.

9. for vampire/ninja been raising str almost exclusively up to about level 30 (tend to die after that). i dual wield. i go up from daggers to the best lighter weapons i can find

It's not a formula, just a table lookup and subject to change of course. The weapon info screen does spoil this information at the moment, though, and tells you exactly what is going on. It should be accurate and you should really use that while playing, at least when deciding gear to use or whether to dual wield or not. As for knowing whether or not to boost Str rather then, say, Dex, that is something you will get a feel for as you play longer. For the ninja, Dex is more important to the blows calculation then is str, but you want some str to get things started. Also, you cast spells off dex, so I'd be boosting that in preference to str.

7. what determines how many bonuses I can add to a weapon/armor in a shop? This seems to go up with level. but not sure if its fame ?

It only depends on you level, not your fame. Basically, you can go one plus higher every 5 levels. This is subject to change, though (i.e. I've tweaked the formula in the past and may do so again!).

8. Been following this guide. post by clouded.
http://angband.oook.cz/forum/showthread.php?t=6606

I tend to get in trouble whne i get to the part about going to lower levels of the icky cave and die. Last time i tried going down into camelot and died to a guardian. See #2 for my last death. been mainly playing vampire/ninja.

You can post dumps here as you play if you want advice. I didn't read all of clouded's post, but he is a good player so you should listen Personally, I tend to get to DL30 very early and park it for a long time. I know what to avoid and can play cautiously in hopes for stat potions. Eventually, once I stop running from everything in sight, I move a bit deeper, say to DL36 of The Lonely Mountain and wait longer for more stat potions. It's a long time before I risk the L40 guardians or the DL38 Angband quest, though. I usually do the Cloning Pits first. Other people play very differently. Some even go to the Dragon's Lair after the Warg's quest!

10. at heavier armors ninjas lose their speed bonus. does anyone know the calculation on this? It seems to go up as my str goes up, but not sure...

You have a level dependent weight cap. I don't recall the exact formula off hand but you max out at 30lbs at CL50. Perhaps you start with 10lbs max? I can't remember.

11. what is the best way to grind up attributes? I know kill guardians and level gets them, but things get harder. any specific dungeons more likely to drop attribute potions?

Stat potions start at DL30, though you can (rarely) get them at DL20. I recommend waiting in the stat gain level range (30 to 40) until your stats are respectable before diving deeper. Beginning with L40 are some nasty breathers (300hp a pop and more) so you'll want to have you Con and level up a bit first.

[chris]

Originally Posted by youtoo

8. Been following this guide. post by clouded.
http://angband.oook.cz/forum/showthread.php?t=6606

Did you read mewmew's guide:http://pastebin.com/CAQmLVg1? It's pretty good!

[youtoo]

im lost .why is the auto-destroyer destroying useful corpses? I have not edited the file at all. how do i edit it to get it to not destroy useful corposes. I read your post chris, but i dont get why im destroying wanted corposes?

The document is hard to read and poorly written.

It doesn't come out and say what they mean. It skips it. I think I know what some mean.

! = destroy item on ground
just name of item such as 'weapons' leave on ground

What does leading with:
?
~
?~

mean? Its confusing.


I have not edited the file. why is this auto-destroying wanted corposes.

#########################################
# Corpses
#########################################

?:[EQU $RACE Possessor]

~wanted corpses#Wanted!k!k!k
wanted skeletons#Wanted!k!k!k
~corpses more level than 0

?:[NOT [EQU $RACE Possessor]]

wanted corpses#Wanted!k!k!k
wanted skeletons#Wanted!k!k!k

[chris]

Originally Posted by youtoo

im lost .why is the auto-destroyer destroying useful corpses? I have not edited the file at all. how do i edit it to get it to not destroy useful corposes. I read your post chris, but i dont get why im destroying wanted corposes?

Your going to have to post your savefile and pickup pref for me to look at this.

[youtoo]

I had to rename to .txt to get them to upload. I have edited my pref file since I posted, but I have always auto-destroyed all corposes with any play through.

you also mentioned 'auto-register'. i did a search of the autopickup help and I don't see a reference to 'auto-register' are you referring to something under a different name?