In less ranty queries - I accidentally a +5 short sword...

[omegonthesane]

Current run is a SpAK. As the thread title implies, scroll IDing brought my first short sword of the game to a +5/+5, and with Short Blades 10 I'm hot on the heels of min delay for it.

Should I still switch to a sabre/quick blade given the chance, or given the chance plus certain conditions?

[1010011010]

Using some enchantment scrolls early/mid game is good as oppose to hoarding them for your end game weapon.
Keep using your sword for now, don't enchant it further, keep track of your EW scrolls (ctrl+f "enchant w") then when you find a sabre or quick blade you like use it.

[daggaz]

Pretty much what shoals said, but I'd add in the caveat that you shouldnt enchant a sabre at this point. Generally if I am running shortblades, I will try to find a decently branded shortsword or sabre, and toss a few enchants on that to serve me the midgame. If I dont find a good brand, or if I find/get a strongly enchanted vanilla shortsword/sabre, I will settle for that.

Then you save your enchant scrolls for a quickblade, branded or not (eventually you will brand it with a scroll if need be). Using acquire on weapons is a strong bet if you have seen a sabre. Oka and Trog are also *cough cough* fairly reliable.

There's just no point in going for high base damage in shortblades. Its all about how quickly you can lay it on, and qblades are unmatched in this respect. They also stab just fine, and have the added bonus of not chopping off hydra heads.

[pratamawirya]

Pray that you find/acquire the Captain Cutlass.

[Lasty]

A +5/+5 short sword will last you a fair distance, especially if you can combine it with temporary branding spells. Since EW scrolls are less likely to work on weapons that are already highly enchanted (+5 or higher), and because short swords aren't a great base type, and because this isn't branded yet, there's no point in enchanting this one further. If you can find any short blade with electrocution or distortion (or poison or draining), that would be a big step up for you, and eventually (acquirement, hall of blades, forest branch) you should be able to get your hands on a quick blade.

Quick blades are only really worth switching to from a decent branded short blade if they either have an additive damage brand or you can get them reasonably enchanted and then also some slaying for rings or artifacts. Somewhere around +13 total slaying bonus and vorpal brand is good enough to take on Zot:5, if you also have decent defenses.

Edit: added a few more brands.

[nago]

With around 13 total slaying even a butter knife would be good enough to take zot:5
A well enchanted quick blade, even with a mediocre brand like vorpal, is perfectly good to take anything in normal game (and most of things in extended too)

[ackack]

With around 13 total slaying even a butter knife would be good enough to take zot:5

I don't really agree, at least not by itself (you'd have a decent shot at killing orbs with a couple might potions on top of this.) Short blades will do quite well until then, though, so you can work with them. IMO the typical short blade user has three natural Zot:5 options: Long Blades (demon blades are much more common these days and with the crosstraining will not take a lot of xp to get good); distortion (I'd say there's a short blade of distortion somewhere in my game probably about 75% of the time); and ninjaing the orb (Short Blade users are often races well suited for this tactic.)

[Lasty]

With around 13 total slaying even a butter knife would be good enough to take zot:5
A well enchanted quick blade, even with a mediocre brand like vorpal, is perfectly good to take anything in normal game (and most of things in extended too)

When I say total 13 slaying I mean distributed among rings and the weapon itself (e.g. +7 quick blade and +0/+6 ring). Is that really that much more than you think is necessary? I know that with that much I didn't have too much trouble, but I've had characters who had the quick blade and no slaying otherwise who had a lot of trouble with some of the Zot monsters.

[Senban]

Current run is a SpAK. As the thread title implies, scroll IDing brought my first short sword of the game to a +5/+5, and with Short Blades 10 I'm hot on the heels of min delay for it.

Should I still switch to a sabre/quick blade given the chance, or given the chance plus certain conditions?

May be well worth your while raiding the Elven Halls if you get the chance, be cautious about it - I caught a Sorcerer on Elf: 1 today. Elves have pretty similar taste in weaponry to Spriggans, I found a +4,+2 elven sabre of speed, which would have been mint if I hadn't gone down in a hail of arrows a few minutes later.

[Lasty]

A sabre of speed is basically an unbrandable quick blade. It beats a sabre of flaming/freezing against many targets, but would lose out to pretty much any short blade of elec/distortion and probably draining too. It's particularly bad against high AC targets, since the speed brand decreases damage before AC is applied.

[Senban]

A sabre of speed is basically an unbrandable quick blade. It beats a sabre of flaming/freezing against many targets, but would lose out to pretty much any short blade of elec/distortion and probably draining too. It's particularly bad against high AC targets, since the speed brand decreases damage before AC is applied.

Aye, but I'd say you'd be considering your self pretty lucky to have a quick blade - branded or otherwise, for that stage of the game and distortion is a pretty big commitment, I'm never happy binding my weapon hand as an Ash worshipping Spriggan (an AK might do the sums differently to my usual assassin as far as making any given weapon their hetro-life-partner goes). I don't know what the chances of different brands popping up are on halls, but in my experience any blade, bow or casting + armour user who hasn't lucked in to serious gear by that stage should have a look, although racking up a bit of XP between Orc: 4 and Elf: 1 might be in order.

[Lasty]

Ah, I assumed that this character had gone into Elf:1 at a more common time in the game -- e.g. around the time they're considering Vaults or later -- and by then it's pretty rare not to already have a better short blade. Even just clearing Orc often gets you a short blade of elec or distortion.

Edit: Entering Elf straight from Orc is often fairly suicidal.

[Senban]

Ah, I assumed that this character had gone into Elf:1 at a more common time in the game -- e.g. around the time they're considering Vaults or later -- and by then it's pretty rare not to already have a better short blade. Even just clearing Orc often gets you a short blade of elec or distortion.

Edit: Entering Elf straight from Orc is often fairly suicidal.

Wow, I hadn't realised the Elf stuff was generally considered that far ahead of Orc. I've found the difficulty there pretty varied to say the least, and it's kind of hard to tell how much of that is variation in map generation and how much is about the characters I've taken in there. I get why a lot of people skip it completely.