YAVP - VSFi^Oka - I thought short blades were good with VS?

[Vajrapani]

  Code:

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.19.1 (webtiles) character file.

1675081 Vajrapani the Slayer (level 27, 161/161 HPs)
             Began as a Vine Stalker Fighter on Dec 21, 2016.
             Was the Champion of Okawaru.
             Escaped with the Orb
             ... and 3 runes!
             
             The game lasted 06:45:03 (75427 turns).

Vajrapani the Slayer (Vine Stalker Fighter)        Turns: 75427, Time: 06:45:03

Health: 161/161    AC: 43    Str: 27    XL:     27
Magic:  47/47      EV: 26    Int:  8    God:    Okawaru [******]
Gold:   4473       SH: 20    Dex: 22    Spells: 2 memorised, 59 levels left

rFire  + + .      SeeInvis +    a - +8 demon blade "Globulus" {drain, *Contam rF+ rC+, The Saviour}
rCold  + . .      Gourm    .    O - +5 shadow dragon scales
rNeg   + . .      Faith    +    Q - +2 shield {AC+3}
rPois  .          Spirit   +    g - +2 hat {MR+}
rElec  .          Reflect  .    X - +5 cloak of the Red Skies {+Inv +Fly MR+}
rCorr  .          Harm     .    D - +2 pair of gloves {Dex+3}
MR     +++++                    H - +2 pair of boots {Fly}
Stlth  +++.......               p - amulet of faith
                                o - ring of see invisible
                                U - ring of Faeshuotirch {rF+ rN+}

@: heroism, finesse, flying, very slightly contaminated, repel missiles
A: fangs 3, regeneration 2, magic shield, antimagic bite, no device heal 3, rot
immunity
a: Heroism, Finesse, Renounce Religion, Evoke Invisibility, Stop Flying
0: Orb of Zot
}: 3/15 runes: serpentine, barnacled, silver


You escaped.
You worshipped Okawaru.
Okawaru was exalted by your worship.
You were not hungry.

You visited 10 branches of the dungeon, and saw 54 of its levels.
You visited 1 bazaar.
You also visited: Labyrinth, Trove and Bailey.

You collected 8250 gold pieces.
You spent 3777 gold pieces at shops.

Inventory:

Hand Weapons
 a - the +8 demon blade "Globulus" (weapon) {drain, *Contam rF+ rC+, The Saviour}
   (You took it off a yaktaur on level 3 of the Depths)   
   
   A truly terrible weapon, it drains the life of those it strikes.
   
   It protects you from fire.
   It protects you from cold.
   It causes magical contamination when unequipped.
Armour
 g - a +2 hat of magic resistance (worn)
 D - a +2 pair of gloves of dexterity (worn)
 H - a +2 pair of boots of flying (worn)
 O - +5 shadow dragon scales (worn)
 Q - a +2 shield of protection (worn)
 X - the +5 cloak of the Red Skies (worn) {+Inv +Fly MR+}
   (Okawaru gifted it to you on level 4 of the Snake Pit)   
   
   It affects your resistance to hostile enchantments.
   It lets you turn invisible.
   It lets you fly.
Jewellery
 c - an uncursed ring of protection from cold
 i - a +4 ring of slaying {=f}
 k - a +3 amulet of reflection
 m - the ring "Futz" {rCorr Int+3 Stlth+}
   (You bought it in a shop on level 4 of the Vaults)   
   
   [ring of resist corrosion]
   
   It affects your intelligence (+3).
   It makes you more stealthy.
 o - a ring of see invisible (right hand)
 p - an amulet of faith (around neck)
 w - an uncursed ring of wizardry
 F - an uncursed ring of protection from fire
 R - an uncursed ring of protection from cold
 U - the ring of Faeshuotirch (left hand) {rF+ rN+}
   (You took it off a tengu warrior on level 4 of the Depths)   
   
   [ring of protection from fire]
   
   It protects you from fire.
   It protects you from negative energy.
Wands
 f - a wand of hasting (3/9)
 q - a wand of disintegration (6/24)
 t - a wand of digging (8/24)
Scrolls
 j - 12 scrolls of remove curse
 n - a scroll of magic mapping
 s - 4 scrolls of enchant weapon
 u - 12 scrolls of teleportation
 y - a scroll of immolation
 A - 15 scrolls of identify
 G - 5 scrolls of fog
 J - 4 scrolls of blinking
 K - 3 scrolls of recharging
 P - 5 scrolls of fear
Potions
 b - 2 potions of berserk rage
 d - 5 potions of might
 e - 8 potions of curing
 x - 2 potions of flight
 z - a potion of magic
 B - 3 potions of brilliance
 E - 5 potions of agility (quivered)
 I - 7 potions of resistance
 S - 4 potions of cure mutation
 T - 2 potions of haste
 Y - 6 potions of ambrosia
Books
 r - the Guide on Earthen Weightlessness
   (You found it on level 5 of the Vaults)   
   
    Spells                             Type                      Level
    a - Repel Missiles               Charms/Air                    2
    b - Summon Lightning Spire       Summoning/Air                 4
    c - Bolt of Magma                Conjuration/Fire/Earth        5
    d - Tornado                      Air                           9
Miscellaneous
 h - a phial of floods
 W - a phial of floods
Comestibles
 l - 26 bread rations
 C - 7 meat rations


   Skills:
 + Level 22.1(27) Fighting
   Level 14.9(21.1) Short Blades
 - Level 11.1(19.3) Long Blades
 - Level 15.1(20.1) Armour
 - Level 16.2(21.2) Dodging
 - Level 15.0(20.0) Stealth
 - Level 16.2(21.2) Shields
 + Level 19.1 Spellcasting
 - Level 12.4 Charms
 - Level 10.0 Necromancy
 - Level 13.0 Invocations


You had 59 spell levels left.
You knew the following spells:

 Your Spells              Type           Power        Failure   Level  Hunger
a - Regeneration          Chrm/Necr      ####......   1%          3    None
b - Repel Missiles        Chrm/Air       ###...       1%          2    None


Dungeon Overview and Level Annotations

Branches:
Dungeon (15/15)            Temple (0/1) D:7            Lair (6/6) D:9
 Shoals (4/4) Lair:3        Snake (4/4) Lair:3        Slime (5/5) Lair:6
    Orc (2/2) D:9             Elf (3/3) Orc:2        Vaults (5/5) D:14
  Crypt (0/3) Vaults:2     Depths (5/5) D:15            Zot (5/5) Depths:5



Innate Abilities, Weirdness & Mutations

You have razor-sharp teeth.
You heal very quickly.
When hurt, damage is shared between your health and your magic reserves.
Your bite disrupts and absorbs the magic of your enemies.
Potions and wands cannot restore your health.
You are immune to rotting.


Message History

Okawaru accepts your kill.
E - 5 potions of agility (gained 1)
Your extra speed is starting to run out.
Your skin stops crawling.
You enter the shallow water.
Moving in this stuff is going to be slow.
You fail to use your ability.
Why would you want to do that?
Why would you want to do that?
Why would you want to do that?
Why would you want to do that?
Why would you want to do that?
You fail to use your ability.
You feel yourself slow down.
Why would you want to do that?
You fly up into the air. You feel somewhat more hungry.
You now have 46/47 mp.
MP restored: 47
There is a staircase leading out of the dungeon here.
You have escaped!

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###    #####  ###




Skill      XL: |  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 |
---------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----
Short Blades   |  2  3     4  5  6  8 10 11 12 13 14                                              | 14.9
Fighting       |                       3  6  8 10 12 13 16 18                                  22 | 22.1
Dodging        |                                      6  9 10          13       14          16    | 16.2
Armour         |                                            4  7 10          12 13          14 15 | 15.1
Invocations    |                                            5  7                   10       13    | 13.0
Shields        |                                               7 10       14 16                   | 16.2
Spellcasting   |                                                  4 11 12                      19 | 19.1
Stealth        |                                                  2  5           9 15             | 15.0
Long Blades    |                                                                    4 11          | 11.1
Necromancy     |                                                                       7 10       | 10.0
Charms         |                                                                         11 12    | 12.4



I started this guy up using short blades, mostly because I won an an unarmed user before and doing it again would be boring, and because people said it was good at triggering the bite attack. It was mostly okay up until vaults 1-4 and depths where I kept getting my ass destroyed. Luckily, an artifact demon blade dropped so I went to elf and trained up LB to 14(with crosstraining), which gave me pretty good damage output and made me much more stronger, but I've seen people ascend with a short blade-using VS which made me confused as to how they did it without contemplating suicide.

[Dioneo]

Short blades do tend to fall off in the later stages of the game unless you find a really good branded one.

[nago]

The right definition is that VS aux bite is so strong that it makes a viable choice even short blade in late game as primary form of offence.
This doesn't mean you can use a +0 dagger and hope to be fine, or that any other slower weapon isn't good.

Anyway from my various experience a well enchanted quickblade with a VS is very good against anything in a 3 runes game, even broken shit like orb of fires or aliches, if you weapon was anything similar I don't understand which problems could you have.

[Vajrapani]

The right definition is that VS aux bite is so strong that it makes a viable choice even short blade in late game as primary form of offence.
This doesn't mean you can use a +0 dagger and hope to be fine, or that any other slower weapon isn't good.

Anyway from my various experience a well enchanted quickblade with a VS is very good against anything in a 3 runes game, even broken shit like orb of fires or aliches, if you weapon was anything similar I don't understand which problems could you have.

I had some excellent quickblade and rapiers in the game but they simply could not kill stuff as good as the demon blade. In depths alone my suplly of teleport scrolls went from 11 to 4, simply because I kept getting into bad situations against popcorn enemies as I couldn't kill them fast enough. Even switching to shadow dragon armour and getting good stealth didn't matter so I decided to just go LB, and once I did, I didn't even have to teleport once in V:5. I was using a rapier of electrocution and there were quickblades like

  Code:

Entered a treasure trove
 43179 | Trove    | Got a crystal quick blade
 43180 | Trove    | Identified the +8 quick blade of Leabb {pierce, +Rage Dex+4} (You found it in a treasure trove)
 43193 | Trove    | Got a polished quick blade
 43194 | Trove    | Identified the +7 quick blade of Ruination {pierce, rC+ rN+ Int-4 SInv} (You found it in a treasure trove)
 43207 | Trove    | Got a warped quick blade
 43208 | Trove    | Identified the +3 quick blade "Iribuh" {distort, Dex+2} (You found it in a treasure trove)
 43252 | Trove    | Gained mutation: Your magical capacity is low. (-10% MP) [mutagenic glow]
 43508 | Trove    | Got a sapphire quick blade
 43509 | Trove    | Identified the +8 quick blade "Ykis Tour" {holy, rC++} (You found it in a treasure trov

Unless you're with Uskayaw, I don't think VS with short blades is viable at all lategame.

[Dioneo]

Those brands aren't really that good on a Quick Blade. As far as I remember, piercing and holy add a percentage of your base damage to the attack, meaning that they are better on heavy weapons. Elec is probably best on short blades; pain is also good if you train necromancy, though only for living enemies. The distortion one could probably be a decent pick if you can live with the annoyance of having enemies teleported away all the time.

[Siegurt]

Those brands aren't really that good on a Quick Blade. As far as I remember, piercing and holy add a percentage of your base damage to the attack, meaning that they are better on heavy weapons. Elec is probably best on short blades; pain is also good if you train necromancy, though only for living enemies. The distortion one could probably be a decent pick if you can live with the annoyance of having enemies teleported away all the time.

Technically distortion is better than elec, although for many people it's annoyance factor outweighs its benefits.

Quick blades need both high enchantment and a decent brand, preferably along with some slaying to tackle problem end game critters (although popping might usually does the trick for me, provided i have enough for OoFs even without the slaying, might with a quick blade on a vine stalker wrecks stuff)

Demon blades otoh are a healthy offence pretty much unilaterally, and don't require any special circumstance to be good.

One thing to recognize about the end game, is that you are *at the end of the game*, if you don't use your consumables now, what are you saving them for?

[VeryAngryFelid]

One thing to recognize about the end game, is that you are *at the end of the game*, if you don't use your consumables now, what are you saving them for?

Orb run?

[MainiacJoe]

Quick question, did you add "The Saviour" to the inscription manually, or did it come it that? If the latter, what does it mean?

Second, it occurs to me as I read this that for VS could do well training LBl for higher average damage, and also having a good short blade that can live off the crosstraining for biting when you need am anti-magic effect. The bite, being an aux attack, only processes on (Str+Dex)/50 of attacks anyway. Your mature character here, that's pretty much every time. For early and mid characters, it's less often--and they encounter enemies where anti-magic is important less often, too. So LBl with passive SBl crosstraining sounds pretty good for VS.

I'm sure a more experienced played will come on soon enough and tell me how I'm wrong.

[VeryAngryFelid]

If you got an early dagger of electro and a long sword, you should still train short blades first because it will help you immediately much more than training long blades. There is nothing wrong with "wasting" 10 levels in short blades, especially when you use long blades later.

[Vajrapani]

Quick question, did you add "The Saviour" to the inscription manually, or did it come it that? If the latter, what does it mean?

I inscribed it 'The Saviour', mostly because it made my run alot less tedious. I was nearly dying against popcorn with short blades and once I got swinging at min-delay I was killing everything no problem.

[bel]

Quick blade of distortion is pretty good. It's only +3, but that's fine, since distortion effects are more important. I just checked fsim: even without considering stuff like banishment, it does as much damage as a +3 battleaxe of elec (exact values would depend on race, str, dex etc. but they are comparable).

Distortion can be quite annoying though.

[MainiacJoe]

So why aren't VSAK a recommended build, if SBl of distrortion is so strong even before their bite?

[Dioneo]

So why aren't VSAK a recommended build, if SBl of distrortion is so strong even before their bite?

I'm not too familiar with Vine Stalkers, but picking Abyssal Knight just for distortion is probably not a good idea. You aren't guaranteed a distortion weapon until reaching full piety, which takes a fair while in my experience, given that Abyssal Knights are fairly piety-hungry. Lugonu also requires a fair bit of Invocations skill to be effective, and does very little to increase early survivability, so it's probably not the ideal god for a frail species like Vine Stalker.

[Siegurt]

So why aren't VSAK a recommended build, if SBl of distrortion is so strong even before their bite?

Because build recommendations are subjective and somewhat arbitrary (the intent is "these should be easier starts than non recommended builds" but i doubt anyone would claim that it is 100% perfect)

Also distortion branding stuff happens later, as does (maybe) getting a quick blade, and you can't really consider it part of your "recommended start"

[MainiacJoe]

If you got an early dagger of electro and a long sword, you should still train short blades first because it will help you immediately much more than training long blades. There is nothing wrong with "wasting" 10 levels in short blades, especially when you use long blades later.

Well in the interim I actually looked up the VS bite damage formula: 4 + XL/3 for XL 1-7, 6 + XL/3 for Xl 8+. Here is a table of average bite damage by XL vs. weapon speed, before multiplying by the (STR+DEX)/50 chance-to-bite modifier.

  Code:

XL      3      4      5      6      7      8      9     10     11     12     13     14     15     16     17     18
 1    8.9    6.7    5.3    4.4    3.8    3.3    3.0    2.7    2.4    2.2    2.1    1.9    1.8    1.7    1.6    1.5
 2    9.4    7.1    5.7    4.7    4.0    3.5    3.1    2.8    2.6    2.4    2.2    2.0    1.9    1.8    1.7    1.6
 3   10.0    7.5    6.0    5.0    4.3    3.8    3.3    3.0    2.7    2.5    2.3    2.1    2.0    1.9    1.8    1.7
 4   10.6    7.9    6.3    5.3    4.5    4.0    3.5    3.2    2.9    2.6    2.4    2.3    2.1    2.0    1.9    1.8
 5   11.1    8.3    6.7    5.6    4.8    4.2    3.7    3.3    3.0    2.8    2.6    2.4    2.2    2.1    2.0    1.9
 6   11.7    8.8    7.0    5.8    5.0    4.4    3.9    3.5    3.2    2.9    2.7    2.5    2.3    2.2    2.1    1.9
 7   12.2    9.2    7.3    6.1    5.2    4.6    4.1    3.7    3.3    3.1    2.8    2.6    2.4    2.3    2.2    2.0
 8   16.1   12.1    9.7    8.1    6.9    6.0    5.4    4.8    4.4    4.0    3.7    3.5    3.2    3.0    2.8    2.7
 9   16.7   12.5   10.0    8.3    7.1    6.3    5.6    5.0    4.5    4.2    3.8    3.6    3.3    3.1    2.9    2.8
10   17.2   12.9   10.3    8.6    7.4    6.5    5.7    5.2    4.7    4.3    4.0    3.7    3.4    3.2    3.0    2.9
11   17.8   13.3   10.7    8.9    7.6    6.7    5.9    5.3    4.8    4.4    4.1    3.8    3.6    3.3    3.1    3.0
12   18.3   13.8   11.0    9.2    7.9    6.9    6.1    5.5    5.0    4.6    4.2    3.9    3.7    3.4    3.2    3.1
13   18.9   14.2   11.3    9.4    8.1    7.1    6.3    5.7    5.2    4.7    4.4    4.0    3.8    3.5    3.3    3.1
14   19.4   14.6   11.7    9.7    8.3    7.3    6.5    5.8    5.3    4.9    4.5    4.2    3.9    3.6    3.4    3.2
15   20.0   15.0   12.0   10.0    8.6    7.5    6.7    6.0    5.5    5.0    4.6    4.3    4.0    3.8    3.5    3.3
16   20.6   15.4   12.3   10.3    8.8    7.7    6.9    6.2    5.6    5.1    4.7    4.4    4.1    3.9    3.6    3.4
17   21.1   15.8   12.7   10.6    9.0    7.9    7.0    6.3    5.8    5.3    4.9    4.5    4.2    4.0    3.7    3.5
18   21.7   16.3   13.0   10.8    9.3    8.1    7.2    6.5    5.9    5.4    5.0    4.6    4.3    4.1    3.8    3.6
19   22.2   16.7   13.3   11.1    9.5    8.3    7.4    6.7    6.1    5.6    5.1    4.8    4.4    4.2    3.9    3.7
20   22.8   17.1   13.7   11.4    9.8    8.5    7.6    6.8    6.2    5.7    5.3    4.9    4.6    4.3    4.0    3.8
21   23.3   17.5   14.0   11.7   10.0    8.8    7.8    7.0    6.4    5.8    5.4    5.0    4.7    4.4    4.1    3.9
22   23.9   17.9   14.3   11.9   10.2    9.0    8.0    7.2    6.5    6.0    5.5    5.1    4.8    4.5    4.2    4.0
23   24.4   18.3   14.7   12.2   10.5    9.2    8.1    7.3    6.7    6.1    5.6    5.2    4.9    4.6    4.3    4.1
24   25.0   18.8   15.0   12.5   10.7    9.4    8.3    7.5    6.8    6.3    5.8    5.4    5.0    4.7    4.4    4.2
25   25.6   19.2   15.3   12.8   11.0    9.6    8.5    7.7    7.0    6.4    5.9    5.5    5.1    4.8    4.5    4.3
26   26.1   19.6   15.7   13.1   11.2    9.8    8.7    7.8    7.1    6.5    6.0    5.6    5.2    4.9    4.6    4.4
27   26.7   20.0   16.0   13.3   11.4   10.0    8.9    8.0    7.3    6.7    6.2    5.7    5.3    5.0    4.7    4.4


So let's look at investing 6 skill levels in a speed 13 falchion vs a speed 10 dagger, and let's leave off brands for now (you have to admit, comparing a branded SBl to an unbranded LBl was a straw man response to my suggestion). For the falchion, we go from 1.8 to 2.3 raw average bite per 10 aut, and for the dagger from 2.3 to 3.3. SBl, for the same skill investment (and remember the VS has flat weapon apts) just improves quicker, because we are dividing by smaller and smaller numbers. So I concur that I was wrong, and that SBl first and then cross-trainign to LBl if a good one comes along is preferable to LBl first and crosstraining to a SBl if a good one comes along.

[VeryAngryFelid]

My post had nothing to do with VS, sorry, if it wasn't clear. It's not about bite, it's about investing in superior weapon (electro). I don't recommend using brandless dagger no matter VS or not.

[cerebovssquire]

So why aren't VSAK a recommended build, if SBl of distrortion is so strong even before their bite?

I'm not too familiar with Vine Stalkers, but picking Abyssal Knight just for distortion is probably not a good idea. You aren't guaranteed a distortion weapon until reaching full piety, which takes a fair while in my experience, given that Abyssal Knights are fairly piety-hungry. Lugonu also requires a fair bit of Invocations skill to be effective, and does very little to increase early survivability, so it's probably not the ideal god for a frail species like Vine Stalker.

Lugonu gives you blink at ** and banish at ***. That is excellent early survivability and neither of these abilities require a lot of (or any) Invocations to be fantastic early on.

[tabstorm]

short blades are almost never good man.

[damerell]

I started this guy up using short blades, mostly because I won an an unarmed user before and doing it again would be boring, and because people said it was good at triggering the bite attack. It was mostly okay up until vaults 1-4 and depths where I kept getting my ass destroyed. Luckily, an artifact demon blade dropped so I went to elf and trained up LB to 14(with crosstraining), which gave me pretty good damage output and made me much more stronger, but I've seen people ascend with a short blade-using VS which made me confused as to how they did it without contemplating suicide.

Well, I had a recent VS of Oka win (second win ever, but I'd previously had a 6-rune death as a VS of Oka->Zin) using short blades, but it did help that my quick blade was of electrocution (and I had a +3 ring of slaying). Of course the damage output is not as high as it could be but I found it very much a compensating factor that once you get an enemy spellcaster at range 1 they are basically neutralised. Orbs of fire, ancient liches, etc, you can laugh at - with 0.3 attack delay and enough STR+DEX to make the bite trigger reliably, you can juggle several spellcasters at once if need be.

Also the damage output subjectively seems much worse than it is because you have to take twice as many actions to spend the same amount of time attacking...