CIP: DECj skills question

[Konebred]

Ok, I found a ton of books pretty early so I went Kiku for the end game stuff (hopefully) Just curious how much I should put in to shields now that I have a shield of resistance and what spells should I forget or remember. Thanks in advance!

  Code:

 Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.10.0 character file.

Bingbong the Eclecticist (Deep Elf Conjurer)       Turns: 67605, Time: 06:42:09

HP  88/88        AC  9     Str  5      XL: 17   Next: 20%
MP  42/42        EV 30     Int 28      God: Kikubaaqudgha [******]
Gold 1611        SH 27     Dex 19      Spells: 18 memorised,  0 levels left

Res.Fire  : + + .   See Invis. : +    M - staff of cold
Res.Cold  : + + .   Warding    : + .  b - +0 robe {MR}
Life Prot.: + . .   Conserve   : .    j - +5 shield of Resistance {rF+ rC+ MR}
Res.Acid. : . . .   Res.Corr.  : .    F - +1 spiked helmet {SInv}
Res.Poison: +       Clarity    : .    o - +0 cloak {MR}
Res.Elec. : .       Spirit.Shd : .    O - +2 pair of fencer's gloves {EV+3 Dex+3 Acc
Sust.Abil.: . .     Stasis     : .    w - +0 pair of boots
Res.Mut.  : .       Ctrl.Telep.: .    s - amulet of warding
Res.Rott. : .       Levitation : +    a - ring of poison resistance
Saprovore : . . .   Ctrl.Flight: +    B - ring of Fytrets {rF+ Stlth+}

@: flying, extraordinarily resistant to hostile enchantments, very stealthy
A: Dex +1
a: Receive Corpses, Torment, Renounce Religion


You are on level 1 of the Lair of Beasts.
You worship Kikubaaqudgha.
Kikubaaqudgha is exalted by your worship.
You are not hungry.

You have visited 5 branches of the dungeon, and seen 36 of its levels.

You have collected 2898 gold pieces.
You have spent 1307 gold pieces at shops.

Inventory:

Hand weapons
 u - an uncursed runed blowgun
Missiles
 D - 11 curare-tipped needles
Armour
 b - a +0 robe of magic resistance (worn)
 j - the +5 shield of Resistance (worn) {rF+ rC+ MR}
   (You acquired it on level 4 of the Snake Pit)   
   
   It protects you from fire.
   It protects you from cold.
   It increases your resistance to enchantments.
 o - a +0 cloak of magic resistance (worn)
 w - a +0 pair of boots (worn)
 F - a +1 spiked helmet of see invisible (worn)
 O - the +2 pair of fencer's gloves (worn) {EV+3 Dex+3 Acc+8}
   (You acquired it on level 2 of the Lair of Beasts)   
   
   It affects your evasion (+3).
   It affects your dexterity (+3).
   It affects your accuracy (+8).
Magical devices
 d - a wand of heal wounds (5)
 i - a wand of fire (3)
 x - a wand of digging
 y - a wand of cold {zapped: 4}
Comestibles
 g - 3 meat rations
Scrolls
 k - 3 scrolls of blinking
 l - 5 scrolls of identify
 n - 4 scrolls of remove curse
 p - 3 scrolls of fear
 E - 3 scrolls of fog
Jewellery
 a - a ring of poison resistance (right hand)
 e - an uncursed ring of invisibility
 s - an amulet of warding (around neck)
 v - a +2 ring of strength
 z - an uncursed ring of protection from magic
 B - the ring of Fytrets (left hand) {rF+ Stlth+}
   (You bought it in a shop on level 11 of the Dungeon)   
   
   [ring of protection from fire]
   
   It makes you more stealthy.
 J - an uncursed ring of regeneration
Potions
 f - a potion of speed
 r - 6 potions of curing
 G - 2 potions of heal wounds
Magical staves
 M - a staff of cold (weapon)


   Skills:
 - Level 5.0 Fighting
 + Level 0.1 Maces & Flails
 - Level 18.0 Dodging
 - Level 8.0 Stealth
 - Level 1.3 Stabbing
 - Level 9.4 Shields
 - Level 20.2 Spellcasting
 - Level 11.0 Conjurations
 - Level 1.6 Charms
 + Level 10.8 Necromancy
 - Level 1.0 Translocations
 - Level 2.3 Fire Magic
 - Level 11.0 Ice Magic
 - Level 11.8 Air Magic
 - Level 4.0 Poison Magic


You cannot memorise any spells.
You know the following spells:

 Your Spells              Type           Power        Failure   Level  Hunger
a - Magic Dart            Conj           #####        1%          1    None
b - Throw Frost           Ice/Conj       #######      1%          2    None
c - Mephitic Cloud        Pois/Air/Conj  #######..    1%          3    None
d - Apportation           Tloc           #####.....   1%          1    None
e - Insulation            Air/Chrm       #######...   1%          4    None
f - Freezing Cloud        Ice/Air/Conj   ########..   3%          6    None
g - Lightning Bolt        Air/Conj       #######...   1%          5    None
h - Swiftness             Air/Chrm       #######...   1%          2    None
i - Repel Missiles        Air/Chrm       #######...   1%          2    None
j - Flight                Air/Chrm       #######...   1%          3    None
k - Sublimation of Blood  Necr           #######...   1%          2    None
l - Dispel Undead         Necr           #######..    1%          5    None
m - Iskenderun's Mystic   Conj           #######..    1%          4    None
n - Airstrike             Air            #######...   1%          4    None
o - Blink                 Tloc           N/A          1%          2    None
p - Summon Butterflies    Summ           #####....    1%          1    None
q - Agony                 Necr           #######..    1%          5    None
r - Control Teleport      Chrm/Tloc      ######....   14%         4    None


Dungeon Overview and Level Annotations

Branches:
Dungeon (15/27)            Temple (0/1) D:7             Orc (4/4) D:10
    Elf (0/5) Orc:4          Lair (8/8) D:9          Shoals (4/5) Lair:6
  Slime (0/6) Lair:8        Snake (5/5) Lair:3        Vault (0/8) D:14

Altars:
Cheibriados
Fedhas
Kikubaaqudgha
Makhleb
Okawaru
The Shining One
Vehumet
Xom
Yredelemnul
Jiyva

Shops:
D:5: [  D:8: %  D:11: =  Orc:3: [  Orc:4: (/(+  Snake:1: [  Snake:4: !

Portals:
Trove: D:12 (give +6,+4 demon whip)

Annotations
D:5 exclusion: oklob plant
D:15 exclusions: ice statue and orange crystal statue


                    Innate Abilities, Weirdness & Mutations

You are agile (Dex +1).

[Jabberwocky]

It takes 15 shield skill to eliminate the spellcasting penalty from a regular shield. You can probably forget magic dart, you have throw frost and IMB.

[rchandra]

I actually really like Magic Dart for quietly grabbing one monster at time from max range, while throw frost gets replaced by IMB/FooBolt/Freezing Cloud.
Is Insulation really worthwhile?
I haven't found Agony to be effective on general spellcasters (assuming because I didn't have enough Necro) but I haven't tried it that often.

[KoboldLord]

To the OP: 15 shield skill, and never take that shield off ever. If you have Haste somewhere, grind charms, otherwise you don't really urgently need anything for a while so you can pick up support or defense skills or try rushing to Ice Storm. Drop Insulation and Air Strike; the first is not very useful and the second can't keep up in damage unless you're trying to rush for Tornado. Which you shouldn't, because deep elf hit points. If you have Bolt of Cold somewhere, it's safer than Lightning Bolt. Less noise.

Why do you have maces & flails training?

Is Insulation really worthwhile?

No. There are only a handful of monsters with electrical attacks at all. Electric eels are already popcorn by the time you are likely to have Insulation, and they respect EV and Repel Missiles. Storm dragons respect EV and Repel/Deflect Missiles, too. Lightning Bolt off normal spellcasters also respects EV and Repel Missiles. Lom Lobon and Nikolai are the only two uniques that are likely to have electrical attacks that don't respect EV and Repel Missiles, and electric golems with their melee electrical attack are possible in Zot, but you should invariably be able to have a potion of resistance on-hand for every single one of these that you encounter for an entire game. Insulation should almost never be worth the spell slots it takes up.

I haven't found Agony to be effective on general spellcasters (assuming because I didn't have enough Necro) but I haven't tried it that often.

It's not great on conjurors, since they have so many other good ranged damage options, but it works pretty well on enormous meat walls like orc warlords. It doesn't work very well against high-MR opponents, but being able to cut Berserk Rupert or Saint Roka's hit points in half for 5mp is kind of nice if you're worried about having enough mp to finish them off.

[phonix]

Yeah only time I'm worried about rElec is Nikola and Lom Lobon. I always just quaff a potion of resistance for those guys. Oh and electric golems can be pretty nasty too but by the time you meet them you can probably blow them up almost instantly.

[Blade]

Oh and electric golems can be pretty nasty too but by the time you meet them you can probably blow them up almost instantly.

what.

if your strategy for egolems is "I can probably blow them up almost instantly" then enjoy your loss. By the time you meet them they're manageable if you quaff a resistance potion beforehand. Fighting one without any form of rElec is asking for a swift and brutal death.

[phonix]

Oh and electric golems can be pretty nasty too but by the time you meet them you can probably blow them up almost instantly.

what.

if your strategy for egolems is "I can probably blow them up almost instantly" then enjoy your loss. By the time you meet them they're manageable if you quaff a resistance potion beforehand. Fighting one without any form of rElec is asking for a swift and brutal death.

I have killed tons of E golems w/o rElec or potion of resistance (and never ever died or came close to dying to one) even with pure melee characters. dunno what you're doing. I suggest not fighting the whole orb chamber at the same time or fighting them in the open if you're having so much trouble.

[cerebovssquire]

"even with pure melee characters" meaning "oh yeah and I had over 200 HP", right

Blade's statement absolutely makes sense. If you are willing to take a gamble of taking 50-100 damage each turn depending on your position, go ahead, but don't pretend it's a good tactical decision if you have any form of rElec available.
Also, note the "probably" in "you can probably blow them up instantly", then rethink what the word "probably" means in a permadeath context.

[phonix]

"even with pure melee characters" meaning "oh yeah and I had over 200 HP", right

Blade's statement absolutely makes sense. If you are willing to take a gamble of taking 50-100 damage each turn depending on your position, go ahead, but don't pretend it's a good tactical decision if you have any form of rElec available.
Also, note the "probably" in "you can probably blow them up instantly", then rethink what the word "probably" means in a permadeath context.

How much hp should melee characters have in Zot:5 Of course it's smart to use potions of resistance IF you can spare them. If I have to choose between saving my last 2 potions for orbs of fire or electric golems the choice is pretty easy.

[cerebovssquire]

How much hp should melee characters have in Zot:5 Of course it's smart to use potions of resistance IF you can spare them. If I have to choose between saving my last 2 potions for orbs of fire or electric golems the choice is pretty easy.

I'm not accusing you of having too many HP Of course it's good to have 200+ HP on a MiFi or whatever.
I'm saying that what your pure melee characters can do is not something every DECj can do. They won't be capable of taking more than ~3-5 lightning bolts without rElec.
And yes, the choice of reducing a dangerous enemy's attack from 100% elec damage to 33% elec damage and, assuming you have at least rF+, a dangerous enemy's attack from 50% fire damage to 33% fire damage does seem pretty obvious, even more so if you only want to take yourself from rF++ to rF+++. If you don't have rF at all it's a different matter, of course. But the first pip of resistance is the most important one.

(optimally one would be standing in a chokepoint with !might and !haste and making as much noise as possible, of course, on a strong character)