The Tavern

How many acronyms can we incorporate into one subject? Whee!

Anyway, this is my very first win after years of playing. Yes, it was with a gargoyle, so let's go ahead and get the "Gr is broken, doesn't count", "Gr are for newbs", "Come back when you win with a real race" posts out of the way early.

So, yeah! Gargoyle Fighter of the Shining One, 3 runes (Snake, Shoals, Vaults). Mastered shields, didn't learn or cast a single spell. Found a nice eveningstar and branded it with electrocution, so that was fun. Enchanted up some gold dragon armour to +8. Only had a few "oh crap" moments, angels helped me through most tough spots, and I got to nuke a few crowds with Cleansing Flame spam which was a joy to see work. Used tomahawks and javelins for ranged attacks - with only 10 throwing, they did really well. Sack of Spiders now and then to get out of a bind/deal with crowds of tough critters. By far my favorite magic item.

I was terrified to enter Zot, and was surprised to see it wasn't difficult at all. When I saw my first Orb of Fire I got real nervous, after all the talk you hear about them, but they didnt seem too dangerous and I took them out without difficulty. I'm guessing this is all because people may want to get a 3-rune and having Zot harder than all the "extra" branches would be silly. Still, kind of disappointed in the wimpiness of Orb Guardians.

I decided to enter the Vestibule for the first time and had to resist the temptation to venture into the various branches of Hell. The desire to finally get a win under my belt overcame my curiosity (as well as the compulsion being a Shining Oneite gave me to go destroy all those unholy abominations).

Yay! Character file dump attached.

Congratulations!

Yes, Orbs of Fire are not that bad when you have rMut, AC 63 and rF++.
It's nice to see a character for whom using +15 large shield "Bullseye" {EV-5} is a good idea.

Oh yeah, I loved that shield! Combined with Divine Shield my SH was around 93, I think. It was love.

I don't think using Bullseye on that Gr was a good idea (compared to a branded shield or something). Congrats, though.

What's included in that "or something?" My only other option was a +1 regular shield of reflection, but you know how those high numbers can tempt you (or maybe you don't!). I swapped to the reflector when I saw an upcoming yaktaur pack or occasional conjurers, with enjoyable results, but I still preferred not getting hit over the chance to reflect. From what I understand, reflection doesn't work against fireballs, so as I approached the Orbs of Fire of such fearsome reputation, I opted for as much SH chance as possible over reflection. Would a reflected firebolt or fireball back at an Orb of Fire even hurt it anyway? Same with all the dragons in Zot - I assumed a reflection of their innate element wouldn't hurt them much.

What would you, the kids at home, have chosen? Was choosing a Large shield with the obscene +15 on top of the "Large" shield rating worse than choosing a Regular shield with a mild +1 and Reflection? I admittedly don't have a head for minmaxing odds and diminishing returns and all that jazz, to say nothing of my lack of understanding regarding the minute details of Crawl combat calculations. All I knew was that nothing was getting past my shieldiest of shieldy shieldosity!

Shield does not block Fireball/Bolt of Fire.
See http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Shields for details

Edit. Main disadvantage of Large Shield is necessity to train Shields skill to 25. But I think it was ok for the character though probably it could be better to train some fighting before training Shields really high.

Well, I would probably raise Dex and get unhorrible EV. Even if I went one-handers for some reason. So my AC/EV/SH would be something like 50-ish/20-30-ish/40-ish (no TSO buff). Depending on items, of course. I think really low EV can be pretty bad, though I did win some characters with really low EV.

Thanks for all the useful info, everyone! I knew some spells weren't blockable, but I wouldn't have guessed all the bolts weren't. That's really weird - anyone know why? Game balance? I just figured if you could evade it, you could block it, with the exception of explosive stuff (if it hits your shield I can see how you'd get hit by the blast anyway) and a few more less-direct attacks (airstrike).

Well, thankfully I had so much armor and resistance (and hitpoints) that getting hit by the occasional unblockable spell wasn't overly noticeable. Anyway, I'm a geek for thematic play over optimized play, so I still say "Heck yes" to a completley shield-and-armor-based character who doesn't bother with pirhouetting around and dodging attacks. I got the orb and my first win with it, and without any significant trouble (easier than I expected), so here's to saying you can do it effectively without worrying about EV, even if it isn't the Ultimate Ideally Optimized Build.

Next goal: Hybridized Merfolk Ice Elementalist of Sif Muna.

P.S. Forgot to mention, I totally went to Tomb and wiped out that sphnix pack that smote my last character to dust (started a thread about it elsewhere). That felt good!

All bolt spells pierce multiple enemies in a row, would make little sense for them to be blockable.

Aha! Shows how much I pay attention to magic. I didn't realize "bolt" was the Crawl version of Angband's "Beam". Good to know!

(They should still totally be blockable though, and stop the beam at the point they're blocked!)

What is the lowest ever EV on a winning character? Is this close?

Oh, and gratz on the first win! And with TSO, wow. A rare combination.

Numerous characters have won with 0 EV after the bots started tracking it, and I'm sure there are older wins with less.
This should help you see how easy it is to get low EV.