Are autoexplore and autofight (ala DCSS) worth it in V to reduce early game tedium?

[emar]

As a lark, I decided to add DCSS-style autoexplore and autofight into V to see how they'd handle. My implementation for autoexplore is definitely hacky but works in 90% of cases. Autofight does what it says on the bottle, for better or for worse.

I've been testing them out and, like DCSS, it makes the early game go by *much* faster. A warrior can just hold auto-explore down until a monster appears, then autofight, and repeat. I've done this a couple of times with warriors, intentionally trying to kill them by overreliance, and I was surprised to see them make it to around '750 without any major struggles. At that point group fights in open rooms using autofight start to be plainly suicidal (also like DCSS).

Equally, a mage with a decent sling (or even a stack of flasks of oil) can just hammer the auto-explore button, tab-plink when a monster blocks autoexplore, and repeat until magic bootstrapped.

With all the above in mind, philosophically speaking, what exactly is going on in the early game? Is it *intended* to be threatless drudgery that ramps into interesting situations and desirable loot? Should the early dungeon be made deadlier? Should players start deeper in the dungeon and have a higher starting level? Should early levels be smaller to get through them more rapidly? Should quality of life enhancements like autofight and autoexplore be embraced? Should novice rogues drop ?Deep Descent as frequently as ?Phase Door in the dungeon to let players bypass the boring bits? Or is the status quo a-okay in everyone else's books? Inquiring minds want to know.