My first YASD


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Snake Sneak

Posts: 123

Joined: Wednesday, 1st May 2019, 19:31

Post Friday, 10th May 2019, 07:24

My first YASD

I'm very new, of course my first three chars died quite quickly, but my fourth seemed to be really lucky, I tried something simple (Minotaur Berserker), not really my cup of tea but breezed through pretty much everything until D:12, L:6, I got very lucky finding an artefact +12 axe (with + resists), lots of resist gear, and a shop selling a +10 artefact plate mail with more resists I saved up for and soon could afford. I had poison and fire nicely covered, one rank of corrosive resistance, and C+++ (also got a nice shield of cold resistance), was in good standing with Trog, and since I got lucky with gear I had almost no scary problems, so I figured I would try the swamp, also found a backup +5 flail of protection for hydras. Everything just fine until I bump into this mad scientist guy who apparently experiments with electricity, I didn't see him coming and was a bit winded, and electricity resists was the only thing I didnt have. When I realized what he could do I started running, but too late. I don't think I'll ever get that lucky again. Never been outside of the dungeon, lair or swamp yet.
Kind of worried that this game involves a bit more luck than I am used to.
I hate myself for doing it, but after dying this time I read the "walkthrough" spoiler (I normally dont like these things), but was feeling quite frustrated, and now even after reading that am not sure if I am understanding the order right. I just want to try a "3-rune win" as you people say, so does that mean that once I get to say D:11, I should fully clear the Lair, or just L to L:5, then try Swamp until but not including the rune area, then do the other Lair subbranch but not the last level, then go do D:12-14, then do Orc:1, and THEN go do the last levels to avoid YASD?
Any other general advice?
thanks much
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Slime Squisher

Posts: 405

Joined: Sunday, 27th January 2019, 13:50

Post Friday, 10th May 2019, 08:27

Re: My first YASD

That branch order is more of a rough draft that you shouldn't strictly follow. My ordering tends to be D until I get MR+ (basilisks and such), L:1-6, then D down to 15, then O:1-2, and then a full Lair branch 1-4, then the other one. Once all that is done, E:1-3 and V:1-4. While the last level of a branch is significantly more difficult, it doesn't mean you should actively avoid it just because you read somewhere that you should. What I typed out here is also something you shouldn't follow blindly, it's my own ordering from personal experience and playstyle. After you've played more, you can always adopt something different if it suits your plays better.

Also, running into Nikola at low HP and no rElec: Ouch. That was really unlucky.
There is always something new to learn.

Snake Sneak

Posts: 123

Joined: Wednesday, 1st May 2019, 19:31

Post Friday, 10th May 2019, 08:46

Re: My first YASD

Thanks so much!
My next char seems a bit unlucky in finding stuff, for the life of me I haven't been able to find any item with poison resistance, so I am loathe to enter Lair. Just finished D11 where I have found Orc entrance. So far only one shop (Armour), all with 60ish gold mundane useless stuff. Is there a good way of obtaining poison resistance (aside from going to kill those drakes or dragons and make armour of their hide, which would first require me to have some poison resistance to survive etc.). I am not a magic user (worship Trog) so I cannot cast any transmutations....

Abyss Ambulator

Posts: 1131

Joined: Tuesday, 4th January 2011, 15:03

Post Friday, 10th May 2019, 09:53

Re: My first YASD

You are way too worried about resistances. You not only do not need to cover everything, but having a lot of resistances won't make winning so much easier as you think. If you can win, you can win with just rF+ easily, and you only need rF+ in Zot, at the end of the game, as swappable ring. I mean this is not a feat of a very experienced player who can win despite not having resistances. Instead, I think most of the time you should choose more damage/AC/EV instead of resistances, to have an easier game as a beginner.

In particular, poison resistance is not important. Poison does not kill you immediately, if you get poisoned lethally you can still kill the monster and quaff a potion of curing, use ambrosia, put on regeneration (Trog's hand for example saves you: use it instead of worrying of poison resistance). The "poison branches" are misleading: the most dangerous monsters do not deal poison damage there. If you can kill those, then you can kill the poisonous ones without poison resistance. If you worship Trog with a minotaur, then most likely you do NOT want swamp dragon armour: they do not give enough AC. You want a well enchanted plate, or some heavier dragon armour if you are lucky.

Multiple levels of the same resistance are also not important. The first level of fire/ice resistance gives the most protection, you should not worry about having more than one level.

I agree that this is not something easy to believe when you are new to the game, especially since you have already died to Nicola! What I suggest instead of lamenting too much on resistances is:

1. When you meet a new monster/unique, check her abilities. Nikola can deal extremely high damage: big danger!
2. When you face danger do not tap buttons widely, running away. Instead, open your inventory first, checking what you have. Blink out of his line of sight (he can't damage you if he can't see you), quaff potion of resistance, quaff haste, etc.
3. You do not need to kill everything. If you successfully escaped from Nikola, do not get back to that part of the dungeon until you have items to deal with him (potions of resistance, for example), or, more likely, ever. You can simply leave him alone in his level.

Remember: most resistable attacks are not more dangerous than non-resistable ones. So if you have a strong character then having resistances is just icing on the cake: you turned some normal monsters into weak monsters. AC/EV/damage helps against much more things. Potions/scrolls/evocables/god abilities should cover the few cases where you need something more.

It really helps if you actually know which monsters can deal dangerous damage. I think Nikola has the chance to deal the highest damage in one turn in a three rune game - so he is the primary example where resistances actually help a lot. But he is only one monster: surely you should be able to win without permanent electricity resistance. I usually carry a staff of air just to switch to it while running away from him, if I do not have potions of resistance. Potions of resistance are in the game for Nikola.

An other monster which is very dangerous without resistance is orb of fire. There are more then one in Zot, so you would like to have rF+ there - arguably the most important time you need a (permanent/switchable by ring) resistance in a normal game.

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 182

Joined: Monday, 2nd July 2018, 16:47

Location: United States

Post Friday, 10th May 2019, 16:13

Re: My first YASD

The lair is considered the easiest part of the game, and I recommend fully clearing it as soon as you see it (unless Rupert or some other very scary enemy appears in the lair, in which case it may make sense to skip that floor of the lair).

As you found out, the swamp is a lot harder than the lair and dungeon. I advise clearing lair first, then dungeon, then orcish mines, and only then going into lair rune branches (snake, swamp, spider, shoals).

You mention resistances a lot, but they are useful against a very small percentage of enemies (most of which are not even especially dangerous). You should generally prioritize AC, EV, and offense (slaying and STR for attacks, or INT for spells) over resistances.

You do not need much luck to win this game. Some tips to improve your play that would have helped you survive:

1. Do as much as possible to prevent unseen enemies from walking into your fights. Attacks, shouts from enemies, and most spells will make noise. If you are fighting on the edge of unexplored territory, there is a high chance that this noise will attract monsters from the unexplored territory. You want to fight in a bubble of safe territory - ideally upstairs on a cleared floor - so that monsters don't hear the fight and walk in while you're damaged. Basically when you see a monster, you want to get its attention (if it hasn't already spotted you) by throwing something at it, then running away, luring it to a better location.
2. If you see an enemy that could kill you, run away. You can go upstairs and take a different staircase down.
3. If you see an enemy that could kill you and you can't run away (early centaurs and killer bees are an example of this, but so is Nikola), be proactive. Open your inventory, see what tools you have to improve your situation. Examples: Scrolls of teleport, fear, and blink will usually get you out of bad situations, while potions of haste, or might or brilliance, will usually make you powerful enough to kill whatever looks like a threat, and potion of resistance is effective against certain resistible enemies such as Nikola. Most of these solutions are only useful while you still have the HP to leverage them, so it's important to be proactive instead of reactive. And don't be stingy - the game generates a lot of consumables. Most characters die with items that could have saved them!

For this message the author stormdragon has received thanks:
duvessa

Snake Sneak

Posts: 123

Joined: Wednesday, 1st May 2019, 19:31

Post Saturday, 11th May 2019, 08:31

Re: My first YASD

Thanks much.
Yes I suppose I'm reading resists wrong, probably because I can't think of another hack-n-slash that's not exactly the opposite (remember diablo2?)) - I think so far almost all of my yasds have been from being surprised by some bosslike thing (that nikola for example), but of course just being surprised in general, which your advice covers perfectly, thank you!! I usually like playing mages or ranged in other arpgs, almost never melee fighter types, and it's ironic for me that I get so much farther here with melee and struggle with mages while my archer was laughable

Abyss Ambulator

Posts: 1131

Joined: Tuesday, 4th January 2011, 15:03

Post Saturday, 11th May 2019, 10:44

Re: My first YASD

I think it is an important observation, because it is a cause of many deaths in crawl: there are a huge number of relatively easy enemies, and then suddenly an unexpectedly hard one turns up and kills you.

Snake Sneak

Posts: 123

Joined: Wednesday, 1st May 2019, 19:31

Post Monday, 13th May 2019, 14:36

Re: My first YASD

Funny, the only time I seem to die is to things for which my resistances are too low

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