Drakk The Dwarven Warrior

[sethos]

Here Goes my first vanilla game in a while!

Drakk seems to be off to a respectable start, but he's had his strength reduced and lost perma dex to a brawn potion. ah well. on my first drop into the depths, I've taken him down to 500' and clvl 13. so far, he's only whipped up on grip and fang, but he dd pick up his first ego - a shovel of digging (+5,+3) nice with that acid brand and 3.3 blows for now.
got fire and lightning resist after that first trip as well, and that's blazing fast for me! will try to push down again here this time as well.
so far, nothing he's met was too much to handle - with a corridor handy anyway.

[Timo Pietilä]

Note that slays and brands in melee-weapons affect only dice of the weapon, not the entire damage, so your shovel is not any better than enchanted rapier against creatures that don't resist acid. (In missile weapons it does affect entire damage, but slay multiplier is added to launcher multiplier, not multiplied by it before multiplying the damage bonuses and dice)

[sethos]

OK - That's good to know.
As I've dived even further, Things have become a bit more dangerous.
Currently Drakk is level 25, on DL 26. he only has lightning and fire resistace so far as well. His only ego's so far have been weapons - but he did snag a long sword of westernesse (+9, +13!) back on lv 21 (which was as far as I was gonna go till I got see invis and Free action.)

with my westerness blade, I think I'll delve (more cautiosly) till I hit 1500', unless I pick up the basic 4+ pois, or some better detection, then I'll try for 2000'.

[sethos]

http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=11889
okay - Now that I've attached A link I think it's time for me to ask for some help!

I already know my main problem: It's sooo hard to NOT fight those big bad monsters. I beat up kavlax and the laernan Hydra, and got cocky and thought I'd try Gabriel. Luckily I was at +30 speed and disappeared as he summoned. I'll leave him alone for a while.

anyways, I've been hanging around lv 60 for a while (still haven't gotten resist acid into my regular kit, but I'm carrying a scythe that gives me Immunity for a switch. A tiny bit more speed and I'll probably make that switch permanent.)

I'm also rather set in my ideas, as I seem to do well - But I really want to take down "M"... or was it P? oh well. so here's the helpless cry - NOW WHAT? HELP!

[UglySquirrell]

Watch out for the Angels, been killed a few times with these guys, usually they'll summon the other 2 and even with nether resistance, the Angel of death hits hard. Be careful of the C wolf bosses too they hit really hard and are fast. And of course The Tarrasque. I usually save him for last before fighting Sauron.

[Nomad]

The usual advice is that once you get past level 60, it's best to just keep heading down until you reach about level 90, rather than hang around. A lot of really nasty monsters - like Gabriel - start showing up in the 60s, so it's almost as dangerous as the deeper levels, but you'll find much better items down at level 90.

Just be very careful when you spot any monster that you haven't fought before, especially uniques. If you can find a Rod of Probing, zapping that will fill in the monster memory for any monsters within line of sight, plus tell you how many HP they have, which should help you decide whether they're safe to take on.

Also, remember that monsters with breath attacks like the dragons and the Lernaean Hydra do less damage as their HP goes down, but spell-casting monsters will continue to do full damage with their spells no matter how much you hurt them.

I always die because I try to battle everything, too. It's hard, but you've got to try and train yourself to run away as soon as you realise it's a dangerous battle instead of slogging it out until the last second. The worst thing to do - which I do all the time - is battle something nasty till you both have really low HP, and then use teleport instead of teleport level because you want to stay on the level to come back and finish it off. There is always something nasty waiting to insta-kill you in the room that you teleport into.

[sethos]

For that very reason, I've found TeleO to be the better choice most of the time. If I see a big battle coming, I tend to dig into an AS corridor and smash stuff mano-A-mano. I'll Immediatly TeleO anything I'm not prepared to squash.

My worry is that I will overestimate myself one of these times and after teleO-ing lots of nasties everywhere, I'll try to port and get squished. almost happened with a dracolich for Drakk once. I had to quaff a LIFE to ensure my survival. O course, I HAD to squish it after that.

oh, and Graveyards are BAD I was level drained from 42 to 37 while I tried to slog it out. Note to self - need nether resist and hold life.

on the plus side, drakk just got some BOS +7,a bow that grants COLD IMM, and a helm of Might. now he's got +21 speed and chaos covered. With a few tweaks I might get over 400 dpr soon.

[Derakon]

Originally Posted by sethos

oh, and Graveyards are BAD I was level drained from 42 to 37 while I tried to slog it out. Note to self - need nether resist and hold life.

Nether resist will reduce the average damage you take from nether attacks, but it won't reduce the maximum damage by much, so you still need to be careful around nether breathers. Hold life is not really all that useful. The main lesson you should be learning from graveyards is to not mess with graveyards. They're not worth it. Not unless you can tell e.g. that there's a suit of power dragon scale mail in there that the monsters can't pick up.

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by Derakon

Nether resist will reduce the average damage you take from nether attacks, but it won't reduce the maximum damage by much, so you still need to be careful around nether breathers. Hold life is not really all that useful. The main lesson you should be learning from graveyards is to not mess with graveyards. They're not worth it. Not unless you can tell e.g. that there's a suit of power dragon scale mail in there that the monsters can't pick up.

That depends of how you measure "worth it". I find clearing those fun, and that makes it worth it to me. It is a challenge. Early graveyards are usually impossibly difficult to clear, but later when your char has developed high enough taking one is fun.

I remember one time when saw something I needed badly in graveyard (DSM, RoS, potion of life, *acquirement*, something) that was not there after I had cleared it out. That lead to hunting down a fleeing poltergeist. Ever hunted down a monster that is fleeing and can teleport, phase door and pass_wall? I found that also fun.

Zoos I mainly avoid. They just are not fun.

[UglySquirrell]

Its best to leave graveyards till later, when I play Ironman games once I get enough speed and sustains I look at graveyards like general stores,it helps to try and have resist confusion/blindness, and use scrolls, rods, and spells late game instead of staffs/wands. If you play this way you don't have to worry about monsters draining charges. Be very careful of the s druj even at level 50, in my current game I entered the level next to a graveyard on a level 50 warrior with maxed con and health, failed using rod of detection on first turn and a vampire opened the door next to me, all of the sudden I was at 80 hp, I looked at the messages and seven eye/skull/hand druj had attacked me the only reason I lived was I made my saving throw against one.