YA2VP - 2-streak, VpVm^Veh (4 w Tomb), GhHu^Usk (Tomb 3/15)

[damerell]

http://crawl.montres.org.uk/morgue/dame ... 003717.txt

http://crawl.montres.org.uk/morgue/dame ... 151148.txt

Another twofer - but it was a two-streak, they both did Tomb excessively early, and I don't have much to write about the VpVM.

The VpVM was a distinctly scrappy win, nearly dying several times. This was partly because I leaned heavily on OTR early on, which worked very well but left me short of options for unpoisonable targets. I'd later rely on Yara's, Iron Shot, Isk's Battlesphere+Magic Dart, Orb of Destruction, and - thanks to a manual of Earth Magic - Shatter. It helped tremendously that I found a ring with {Wiz rPois rF+++ rC+ MR+} early on (D:9) and a +10 ring mail on Elf:3 - with these, I could cast high-level spells with relatively good defences.

The breakthrough on Tomb was the realisation, after Shattering my way into the corridor of bastards on Tomb:1 by accident, that I might as well stay Bloodless and spam Shatter. At first I'd tried fighting with less high-level spells and ended up salvaging the situation with Shatter - but then I was Bloodless anyway owing to the huge food cost of Shatter but also low on HP. Much better to start torment-immune - sure, I'd take a few smites, but nothing could live for very long in LOS and Veh would keep topping up my MP. By the time I hit Tomb:3 I was just standing at the point I came in and bouncing on Shatter; it took a while to chew up bennu, and I had to use up a few potion of magic (and teleport eventually) but it was all pretty routine stuff.

I had much more trouble with a draconian pack on Z:4 than anything in Tomb:3 - partly, yes, owing to our old friend overconfidence.

And there's a 15-rune Ghoul Hunter. Some day I may 15-rune something that's not Punch Ghoul, but not today; where the last one relied on Makhleb for HP topups in combat, this one used Usk to win fights faster. This didn't always work out (but with Usk you have plenty of consumables because you won most fights faster), but (partly because of wearing faith almost all game) I managed to Grand Finale most of the named panlords and hell lords, the Serpent of Hell, etc.

The game really took off when I found the scales of the Dragon King in an Orc:2 shop; I had a little while to go before I could buy them but then had very solid defences - in particular the extra MR was invaluable. Maddeningly, I did then find a silent bazaar on Shoals:3 and a second bazaar on Shoals:4 and, of course, could buy almost nothing.

After Dungeon/Lair/Orc/S-branches/Elf I went straight from Vaults:2 to the Crypt and the Tomb. The Tomb wasn't completely harmless, but it didn't pose too much trouble. Then Slime (which got very hairy when I fought TRJ), Depths, Abyss (got the rune in almost no time), the Vestibule, Pan (getting Holy Pan, which was not as bad as I expected, but still pretty harsh), Tar, Coc, Geh, Dis.

Finally I bought a manual of Poison Magic to get OTR online in Zot (where it gave some good service) and went for the Orb. Not much to say about that except I had a nasty moment where I impulsively Grand Finaled a curse toe on the Orb to find an OOF and an alich behind it, but I drowned them in box beasts.

Saw one panlord on the orb run, but it couldn't catch me. I then asked the RNG for my next combo - FoNe - and immediately splatted one, so I'm back in my normal situation, a no-streak.

[Queen Cassie]

Grats on the 2 streak. Especially re some of what you said re Usk... I still haven't tried Usk in any playthroughs and need to give them a proper go.

[damerell]

Grats on the 2 streak. Especially re some of what you said re Usk... I still haven't tried Usk in any playthroughs and need to give them a proper go.

One thing about Usk is that (while this win was melee+slings) they're not oriented around melee in the way, say, WJC is. They don't care how you do the damage. My first Usk win was a DEFE who blew things up with spells until they were paralysed then stabbed them with a rapier; Usk works well there because they make your MP go further (both directly with the pain bond and indirectly because you can stab a lot of things you'd otherwise want to use spells on) even though you'll almost never use a Grand Finale because of its MP cost.

[Queen Cassie]

One thing about Usk is that (while this win was melee+slings) they're not oriented around melee in the way, say, WJC is. They don't care how you do the damage. My first Usk win was a DEFE who blew things up with spells until they were paralysed then stabbed them with a rapier; Usk works well there because they make your MP go further (both directly with the pain bond and indirectly because you can stab a lot of things you'd otherwise want to use spells on) even though you'll almost never use a Grand Finale because of its MP cost.

Understood. I'll probably give them a go with melee first, since my last character was super spellcasty and I feel like being a bit beefier this time around, but definitely I'll keep them in mind as a spellcaster friendly god too.