Another newbie with questions

[Painted Lady]

Three newbie questions:

1. I started out playing a HaHu and never got past Dungeon level 8. One of my biggest problems was running out of bullets (including stones). I didn't want to put a lot of points into melee, but my sling was useless without ammo. Have others had this problem?

2. Scrolls of Teleportation. I click on one and nothing happens - I just keep getting beaten up on and can't seem to teleport. Am I doing something wrong?

3. Am now playing a SpEn - much easier! I found a named ring that says it is EV+8, Acc-1,Dam-4. What is Acc? Is this ring worth wearing?

Thanks in advance for any help.

[asdu]

1. You really can't do without melee, especially early on. You can then worship Okawaru or Trog to get ammo gifts, which will likely solve your problems once and for all. Even then, you'll keep using melee weapons since they tend to do more damage, so when your enemies catch up to you, it'll be better to switch to your sword/mace/axe/whatever rather than shoot them at point blank range. Also, the higher the enchantment of you bullets, the longer they'll last, so it may be a good idea to use some enchant weapon scrolls on you largest ammo stack (wield the ammo while reading the scroll)

2. Teleportation isn't instant (except for telport traps), it takes a couple turns to kick in. Plan accordingly

3. Acc is accuracy. I'd be more worried for that -4 to damage, especially since as a Spriggan you'll likely use short blades which already have low damage. -4 is a big penalty, your short sword will hit like a feather. Too bad because +8 EV is very good. Still worth keeping for when you need to run and can use all the extra defense available, just don't wear it while fighting.

[Painted Lady]

Thank you so much!

[DivineHammer]

1. You really can't do without melee, especially early on. You can then worship Okawaru or Trog to get ammo gifts, which will likely solve your problems once and for all. Even then, you'll keep using melee weapons since they tend to do more damage, so when your enemies catch up to you, it'll be better to switch to your sword/mace/axe/whatever rather than shoot them at point blank range. Also, the higher the enchantment of you bullets, the longer they'll last, so it may be a good idea to use some enchant weapon scrolls on you largest ammo stack (wield the ammo while reading the scroll)

This is definitely true. Another important reason to melee is that it raises your fighting skill, which is essential for any character because it increases max hit points.

[Shade]

This is definitely true. Another important reason to melee is that it raises your fighting skill, which is essential for any character because it increases max hit points.

On quick tip is use '=' and 'i' to make your melee weapon 'a' and your thrower 'b'. Then you can weapon switch using the " ' " key. Setting that up early can save you a fair bit of mashing later.

[mrbobbyg]

+ or - DAM is one of the most powerful game impacting "brands" an item can have.

+4 dam can make a small blades fighter into a monster, and -4 dam effectively shuts off melee for a character.

[Painted Lady]

Well, I'm back with more questions

1. If I play a HaHu I don't start out with any spell casting ability. Does that come later? Do you get it from a book? Are there trainers anywhere in the game?

2. The last time I played I met TWO of my old ghosts on the same level of the dungeon! Is that normal?

Thanks in advance!

[eharper256]

Well, I'm back with more questions

1. If I play a HaHu I don't start out with any spell casting ability. Does that come later? Do you get it from a book? Are there trainers anywhere in the game?

2. The last time I played I met TWO of my old ghosts on the same level of the dungeon! Is that normal?

Thanks in advance!

1. With a no-spellcast start, you have to gain it by Reading Scrolls WHILST there is XP in your Pool.

I tend to find this happens at Temple at the earliest, but you can save up by turning off your most-used combat skill. Keep in mind this is a kinda risky thing, though. Alot of people get their fave combat skill up to scratch first.

You can use Pooled XP up by using spells/attacks of a certain type with only the skill you want to develop switched on in the skills screen; this is called Victory Dancing. You can eventually get the Spellcasting skill without Dancing, but by the time you get it, you've lost alot of development time already. Even so, most melee starts will only ever be hybrids, don't expect your Hunter to ever be a full-blown destructive Wizard; they probably won't have the natural INT to cast the high level stuff, without alot of equipment to buff it.

There are no Trainers. To use a Spellbook, you need to have Spellcasting, either innately, or from the above method of victory dancing.

2. Yep, normal, if they both died on that level. Entering different character names helps you recognise your former selves later on (don't feel the need to always play yourself!). If you lose too many characters, I'd recommend going into your saves directory and deleting all the ghosts; it can get ridiculous. Don't know if there's a cap on ghost numbers per level, I tend to always delete when I get more than about 10 YASD's, but I imagine so.

[Shade]

Don't know if there's a cap on ghost numbers per level, I tend to always delete when I get more than about 10 YASD's, but I imagine so.

Gah! Deleting ghosts. Neeeeever. I just replaced a Firestorm capable High Elf with an OOD and Freezing Cloud capable Deep Elf in Elf 5. The case for not deleting ghosts is that they do provide flavour, they don't happen on D 1-2, and they are big undead piles of XP. I think the Firestorm Ghost put 4200 XP in my pool. Not to mention that ghosts are easier to deal with than a number of higher level uniques, and learning to cope with ghosts is actually good training for some of those nastier uniques. (I'd say the best training, IMHO.)

(Let's see if I keep singing that tune with the high level Transmuter I left at the bottom of Lair, and that Lv. 27 Kobold Berserker I left in Zot:5.)

[Tiber]

Don't know if there's a cap on ghost numbers per level, I tend to always delete when I get more than about 10 YASD's, but I imagine so.

Gah! Deleting ghosts. Neeeeever. I just replaced a Firestorm capable High Elf with an OOD and Freezing Cloud capable Deep Elf in Elf 5. The case for not deleting ghosts is that they do provide flavour, they don't happen on D 1-2, and they are big undead piles of XP. I think the Firestorm Ghost put 4200 XP in my pool. Not to mention that ghosts are easier to deal with than a number of higher level uniques, and learning to cope with ghosts is actually good training for some of those nastier uniques. (I'd say the best training, IMHO.)

(Let's see if I keep singing that tune with the high level Transmuter I left at the bottom of Lair, and that Lv. 27 Kobold Berserker I left in Zot:5.)

Depends on the ghosts really. Draconian ghosts will SPAM draining bolts at you, and in many cases even if you know you can beat them it's just not worth it.

[joellercoaster]

There are no Trainers.

This is not, strictly, true.

Manuals are very rare though!

[slowcar]

There are no Trainers.

This is not, strictly, true.

Manuals are very rare though!

And Manuals still need free XP in the pool. You can safely use-id them when you don't have pooled XP, possibly wasting a charge if it is something great.
Better not to use them with 10k XP in the pool, or you may find your mage with rank 12 in slings.
The only use I had of manuals was in the post game, playing a Ziggurat skyrocket the XP pool and dancing these into skills was too long for my taste.
As there were none of the really useful kind i finished my game with 450k XP in the pool, but if you have 15 runes in the pocket as well that does not matter too much.