VOTE: targets of ID scrolls

[Sandman25]

How do you usually spend your scrolls of identify?

[Tedronai]

I guess: Jewelry, potion, scroll

But I only read it on jewelry when it doesn't equip-identify and I never read it to id scrolls.

[Sandman25]

But I only read it on jewelry when it doesn't equip-identify and I never read it to id scrolls.

Yes, I assumed jewelry is equipped first to see if it auto-ID. I think almost everyone does it (with remove scroll in inventory hopefully).

[tedric]

Agreed with Tedronai (must be in the name ) -- never use ID on scrolls except in rare cases like when I have a bunch of unknown scrolls in inventory and need to know if one of them is blinking/tele in a hurry.

[rchandra]

Usually potion, jewellery, scroll, especially now that read-IDing scrolls doesn't risk wasting enchant armour on a wand etc. The last few scrolls might be IDed to try to sift brand/silence/vuln/holy if they haven't been found and I want them.

[braveplatypus]

Potion first, but it's situational, it really revolves around the potion of mutation. Read testing scrolls is mostly safe, and you can remove curse out of dangerous jewelry, but mutations can kill you before you can get rid of them. Once you get mutation (or cure mutation) identified you can quaff test in relative safety and that's really what you want to be doing with your identify scrolls early on.

If you are for example a ghoul or you are really low on remove curse scrolls then you'll want to do things differently.

[Sandman25]

Usually potion, jewellery, scroll, especially now that read-IDing scrolls doesn't risk wasting enchant armour on a wand etc. The last few scrolls might be IDed to try to sift brand/silence/vuln/holy if they haven't been found and I want them.

Exactly my approach.
Curing and Healing is more important than knowledge about negative slaying or rF+ so I always id potions first.
Teleportation scroll is not rare so I don't mind losing one. Blinking scrolls are rare but unfortunately it happens often that I have 5+ different scrolls so it's unlikely to be ID-ed unless I waste many ID scrolls on scrolls which could be read-ID. Jewelry items are rare and can be very useful/bad (MR, rF+, rC+, clarity, stasis etc.).

[WalkerBoh]

I read-ID all scrolls as soon as I find them; at the worst I'll waste a scroll of recharging early on. So I never use ID scrolls on scrolls.

Between potions/jewelry, I usually ID jewelry first. Although I often like to wear un-ID'd uncursed rings around for a while to try to wear-ID them.

[and into]

Depends, but I actually went with potion, scroll, jewelry.

Top priority to potion probably doesn't need explanation. For scroll I will readily read ID if I have a lot of one unidentified type (at least two, but ideally three or four) and I either have remove curse or will not be hurt by any worn items being cursed. Single scrolls I will try to use ?identify on if possible, because burning up your only ?blinking is bad. Whereas using one ?blinking to discover that you have three more is a much more reasonable course of action. If I am very low on ?ID I will be more willing to read-ID the scrolls. I used to read-ID all scrolls but became convinced this was needlessly wasteful and adjusted play accordingly; so far I've been pleased with the results.

[HenryFlower]

I would generally use ID on a wand (particularly the big three and major attack wands) before a scroll. But perhaps I'm doing it wrong.

[and into]

I would generally use ID on a wand (particularly the big three and major attack wands) before a scroll. But perhaps I'm doing it wrong.

I might too, but that wasn't an option in the polls...

[XuaXua]

Artefact jewelry, unidentified tried jewelry, wand of healing/hasting, potions, scrolls

[KoboldLord]

Potion, scroll, jewelry. I don't think major deviation from that rule of thumb is reasonable, so long as you bow to common sense.

Dangerous potions are very dangerous, and some of the really good potions are incredibly good. Keeping an extra potion of speed often means you get to simply not die once. The only time potions fall below absolute top priority targets for identify scrolls is when you look at the remaining list of unidentified potions and you realize you don't care about any of those potions.

Scrolls are like potions, but less so. You don't want to waste blinking, obviously, or stuff like magic mapping or teleportation when you have a short supply. There are several nice strategic scrolls that you want used on the right thing, too. Scrolls are less unsafe to read-identify than potions are to quaff-identify, but you still don't particularly want to waste the ones that are good if you can help it.

Jewelry basically isn't worth spending scrolls on until your ID mini-game is basically over anyway. Almost all rings that are potentially bad will identify themselves, and you can just take them off. Rings that don't identify themselves are doing something useful passively, and by the time you're likely to have three of these on-hand your potion and scroll ID mini-game will probably be over and you'll have nothing better to do with your scrolls anyway. When you don't identify a scroll or potion that is good, it's gone forever. When you don't identify a ring that is good, you still have it and are probably still wearing it and getting its benefit. You just aren't aware that you are fire resistant or whatever. Amulets are a little trickier because you don't want to walk around with stasis or inaccuracy on, but it isn't like you can't equip a maybe-clarity unidentified amulet when you see a monster that has a confusion spell, so you're pretty much safe there, too.

Of course, if you get a dump truck full of unidentified artefact jewelry before you even get to the Temple, you can do what you want with your scrolls. My rule of thumb is only the one I use for plausible scenarios.

[Wahaha]

All 3 can have different priorities depending on what the character already has, or even is. At least the first few scrolls are used on potions, but after that I don't think there's a good reason to follow some kind of general guideline order.

[Sandman25]

I don't think major deviation from that rule of thumb is reasonable, so long as you bow to common sense.

It depends on what you mean as major deviation. Identified ring of protection from magic/cold/fire or clarity amulet can save life in exactly the same way as scroll of blink can. I am not sure I would equip maybe-clarity amulet if stasis or inaccuracy are unidentified.

[mikee]

I'm glad to be in the 3% that picked scroll, jewelery, potion.

[KoboldLord]

It depends on what you mean as major deviation.

Yes, that was a very important qualifier there.

Identified ring of protection from magic/cold/fire

Only if you have all three, at which point you're probably not in the early game any more and you have scrolls to burn. If you only have one of the three, it will save your life just as well sitting unidentified on your ring finger as it will if you burn a scroll on it.

or clarity amulet can save life in exactly the same way as scroll of blink can. I am not sure I would equip maybe-clarity amulet if stasis or inaccuracy are unidentified.

You can usually soft-identify the three of those without taking any risks or spending any scrolls. Arguably doing so is tedious, but if it lets you identify an extra potion you are mechanically better off.

[duvessa]

See this for why I put jewellery last. Unless you have certain mutations you can identify any non-randart jewellery without using scrolls, with the exception of slaying enchantment.

[and into]

I'm curious about why mikee went with scroll, jewelry, potion.

The only tip I would add to KoboldLord's breakdown (with which I agree) is what I said in the other thread. It is not terribly uncommon to have enough ?identify to ID your important potions, but not enough to ID scrolls. If you find yourself in that situation, out of ?identify, but with some large stacks of scrolls and some good scrolls still not IDed, then read-IDing those scrolls in a large stack in a safe place is probably a good idea. It isn't a waste of a scroll if using one of five inappropriately let's you confirm that the other four left in the stack are ?fog or ?fear or ?blinking, as you can then use any or all of the remaining appropriately.

[Magipi]

It is not terribly uncommon to have enough ?identify to ID your important potions, but not enough to ID scrolls.

I would say it differently: I usually have less ID scrolls than jewellery and potions (so some potions are always unIDd). In my current trunk game, the first time I had surplus ID scrolls was after getting my first rune, and it felt typical.

To have enough ID scrolls to ID other scrolls, that has never happened to me, and it is a surprising idea.

So for me: jewellery, potions, nothing (no such option, unfortunately).

[Sandman25]

Only if you have all three, at which point you're probably not in the early game any more and you have scrolls to burn. If you only have one of the three, it will save your life just as well sitting unidentified on your ring finger as it will if you burn a scroll on it.

You can usually soft-identify the three of those without taking any risks or spending any scrolls. Arguably doing so is tedious, but if it lets you identify an extra potion you are mechanically better off.

I am not sure why early or non-early game is important here. I know it's possible to be banished by Erolcha with unidentified ring of MR in inventory. The same with clarity and Sigmund, Ice Beast and rC+, Fire Drake and rF+. Maybe I should have created another poll first: "Do you wear unID-ed jewelry early game". I don't, negative slaying/stasis/inaccuracy can kill character.

[Sandman25]

I'm glad to be in the 3% that picked scroll, jewelery, potion.

Could you please elaborate how you deal with Adders/Working Ants without Curing or with situations when you get heavily damaged and have no HW? Do you quaff-ID?

[damiac]

artifact jewelry, potions, jewelry, wands of healing, haste, fire, ice, scrolls.

I'll never burn an ID scroll to ID scrolls(unless I have a big surplus), but if I get multiple uses out of one, and I have nothing better to id I'll do scrolls before crappy wands.

[and into]

Only if you have all three, at which point you're probably not in the early game any more and you have scrolls to burn. If you only have one of the three, it will save your life just as well sitting unidentified on your ring finger as it will if you burn a scroll on it.

You can usually soft-identify the three of those without taking any risks or spending any scrolls. Arguably doing so is tedious, but if it lets you identify an extra potion you are mechanically better off.

I am not sure why early or non-early game is important here. I know it's possible to be banished by Erolcha with unidentified ring of MR in inventory. The same with clarity and Sigmund, Ice Beast and rC+, Fire Drake and rF+. Maybe I should have created another poll first: "Do you wear unID-ed jewelry early game". I don't, negative slaying/stasis/inaccuracy can kill character.

Yes you need to be somewhat more careful about inaccuracy/stasis.

Two of the bad rings ID on their own, and negative slaying generates cursed either 100%, or very very nearly 100% of the time (unlike inaccuracy which tends not to generate cursed), so if a ring is cursed and doesn't auto-ID when you become hungry, you uncurse it and don't wear it. Beneficial rings can generate cursed but in all likelihood that once-cursed ring that was not teleportation nor hunger is a ring of negative slaying. Don't wear it, and try to ID it eventually to confirm (but not high priority to ID it).

Putting aside the question of wearing un-IDed jewelry, the chance of dying to Ice Beast with =protection of cold sitting in your inventory is a hell of a lot less likely than dying with unidentified ?blinking or ?fog or ?fear in your inventory. And frankly knowing what ?blinking, ?fog, etc. you have is a much, much better answer to early ice beasts or Erolcha than rings of MR anyway.

Compare the number of people who have died to confusion from Sigmund with clarity un-ID and unworn in inventory to the number of people who have died with un-IDed ?blinking and the like in their inventory. Its pretty clear you should prioritize IDing your consumables over some jewelry, especially since aside from a good =slaying, rings that can have a major impact, especially early on, tend to auto-ID upon wear (protection, evasion).

[Sandman25]

Well, I almost never die with un-ID blinking in inventory because I read-ID early. That's actually argument for NOT using ID scrolls on scrolls.
I usually have very few jewelry pieces and very many scrolls so reading ID scrolls for scrolls seems like a waste because I am unlikely to ID good scrolls. Ok, I identified enchant weapon I and noise by my ID scrolls and I am still wearing 2 unID-ed rings. Does not seem good to me.

[dpeg]

To me, this whole discussion is a good reason to keep the id game for consumables: not only that different players have different approaches (there could still be an optimal approach) but also that I believe (read: hope) that the actually optimal strategy depends on circumstances. I would be happy to hear suggestions how to make that dependency even stronger.

(For the record: I read-id single potions first, followed by single scrolls. I try to hold out as long as possible. This is easier with stealthy characters who can decide to retreat and use-id consumables of >1 quantity. I put on jewellery as soon as a I find, and spend ?id immediately if uncursed and still identified. If cursed, I wait for hunger, then read-id. The presence of shops can change all of this, of course.)

[mopl]

Potions first, that's sure
Then jewelery, but I try to auto-ID a lot of rings/amulets :

• wear it for a long time (sustencance)
• wand of frost/flame on myself (rC/rF)
• quaff !para or walk in tele trap on known level (stasis)
• quaff !confusion (clarity)
• quaff !degeneration if not too risky (sustab)

I always ID artefact rings/amulets
Last scrolls because I read-id a lot of them. I often ID silence/summoning/holy word/torment

[KoboldLord]

To me, this whole discussion is a good reason to keep the id game for consumables: not only that different players have different approaches (there could still be an optimal approach) but also that I believe (read: hope) that the actually optimal strategy depends on circumstances. I would be happy to hear suggestions how to make that dependency even stronger.

(For the record: I read-id single potions first, followed by single scrolls. I try to hold out as long as possible. This is easier with stealthy characters who can decide to retreat and use-id consumables of >1 quantity. I put on jewellery as soon as a I find, and spend ?id immediately if uncursed and still identified. If cursed, I wait for hunger, then read-id. The presence of shops can change all of this, of course.)

"I don't have a scroll of identify left, but I still want to identify something" seems to be the only good argument for use-identifying a consumable. The rate of identify scroll generation is mostly outside the player's control, however, so it isn't all that much of a choice. There is some element of player skill involved with judging that the identify scrolls aren't coming in fast enough and if some of these scroll stacks aren't identified it'll be too late, but I don't know that this one element of skill is really enough to justify the entire sub-system's existence.

"I could figure out what this ring or amulet does, but the process for doing so is tedious so I'd rather accept a mechanical disadvantage in order to avoid it" is definitely an argument for scroll-identifying jewelry, but I'd hesitate to call it a good argument for the game.

[dpeg]

KoboldLord: I disagree, since I think you are missing some other points but this isn't GDD, so I stop.

[some12fat2move]

Potions first, that's sure
Then jewelery, but I try to auto-ID a lot of rings/amulets :

• wear it for a long time (sustencance)
• wand of frost/flame on myself (rC/rF)
• quaff !para or walk in tele trap on known level (stasis)
• quaff !confusion (clarity)
• quaff !degeneration if not too risky (sustab)

I always ID artefact rings/amulets
Last scrolls because I read-id a lot of them. I often ID silence/summoning/holy word/torment

Also quaff !pois (poison resistance) and juggle your rings around something invisible, like a sky beast (see invisible)

[and into]

Well, I almost never die with un-ID blinking in inventory because I read-ID early. That's actually argument for NOT using ID scrolls on scrolls.

You can also die with with ?blinking identified but without any in your inventory, because you foolishly wasted one when it wasn't necessary. Once I realized I had died once or twice (I'm sure more than that, but didn't register it) with ?blinking IDed, but not in my inventory, I stopped read-IDing because I realized those were very foolish and unnecessary deaths linked directly to poor ID-game management. That's what prompted me to limit read-IDing scrolls, which I used to do much more readily. (So it isn't like I don't have experience with different approaches, here.)

I don't mean to nit-pick, but your hypothetical is actually a very good example of why jewelry should generally be low priority:

I usually have very few jewelry pieces and very many scrolls so reading ID scrolls for scrolls seems like a waste because I am unlikely to ID good scrolls. Ok, I identified enchant weapon I and noise by my ID scrolls and I am still wearing 2 unID-ed rings. Does not seem good to me.

If you only have two beneficial rings (though exact identity unknown), it is unequivocally poor play to use ?identify on them—I don't see how there can be debate about that. The ring provides whatever benefit it provides when worn even if you don't know what it is. Yes it is good to know what you have but in general your jewelry options are not going to majorly affect what is or is not a good idea in early game. E.g., if tackling Erolcha on D:8 with your character is a bad idea—and it almost certainly is—then it is still a bad idea if you know that you have a ring of MR on.

An orc wizard is dangerous early game and can hit with fire or ice or confuse or turn invis or haste self.... So knowing that you have a ring that helps with one of those things really shouldn't cause you to play much differently, as you should prepare for the worst—even if you have a ring of sinv, you should prepare for the dude to haste. A beneficial ring helps you, but I really struggle to think of realistic situations in the early game in which I would play differently based on knowing exact identity of a beneficial ring early on. The only thing that occurs to me is mummy because rF-. (But whenever you need to invoke mummies to make a counterpoint regarding some mechanic in Crawl, that usually tells you the argument you just tried to rebut is in fact correct.) It just seems extraordinarily unlikely that the knowledge of what a beneficial ring does will really help you in the early stages of the game. Meanwhile having an extra ?teleport, ?blinking, ?fog, ?fear, etc. is huge—*especially* in the early stages of the game.

All of this is just another way of saying that even if !mutation didn't exist, quaff IDing when it is not necessary to do so would still be a very bad idea—because it is needlessly wasteful.

Finally: Personally I don't intentionally use-ID jewelry by exposing myself to fire or whatever, because I play Crawl for pleasure. If someone offered me a bunch of money if I won next game then that is the sort of thing I would do for said game. (Note to self: Meet an eccentric billionaire who is really into roguelikes.)

[Sandman25]

and into

Sometimes I forget to read ID scrolls (after identify scroll is ID-ed) so I have some experience with your approach too. I end with many different scrolls and can die while having 2 scrolls of blink before I remember to read-ID, that would make more sad than wasting a scroll of blinking. It is not rare for me to have lots of unID-ed potions deep in Lair despite I spend ID scrolls on potions only, even with potion of haste unID-ed.

I don't get your point about different tactics. Do you play differently because you know you have a scroll of fear, fog or teleport? Don't you try to play pretending like they don't exist in order to save them? If a monster is dangerous, I still avoid it, even if I have an escape tool. Maybe because I died too often after reading blink scrolls on previous floors and running out of them eventually.

[dpeg]

I had assumed that when I said "this discussion is a good reason to keep the id minigame for consumables" everybody understands that I am not defending the status quo wholesale. It's painful to witness the hoops through which players can jump (and then some inevitably do) in order to eke out a little more information. My basic claim is that it is possible to create frequently enough situations where your actual circumstances matter. If identification would (and should) always follow the same workflow, then the game would gain very little from it (still something, I say, but definitely not much). However, I think that's not the case, and I construe this discussion as an argument in my favour.

Like I said before, I am always interested in hearing about to get rid of the hoops, and how to increase the potential for actual decisions. (From what I've written, you can infer that "Make all items identified at game start does not contribute to the discussion, at least as far as I am concerned.)

[and into]

Sandman25:

Yes but having more escape tools is really good whereas knowing what a ring is doing to you already is much less valuable.

Yeah if you are out of ?identify but unknown consumables are piling up then read IDing (and less often, but sometimes) quaff IDing certainly becomes the lesser evil. No argument there. But the poll isn't "Do you ever read scrolls to ID them?" but rather, in what priority does one use ?identify in order to sort out what you have.

My point is that if you have a few single un-IDed scrolls and an unknown ring on your left hand, and a single ?identify, it is foolish to use it on the ring. Unless you already have all good tactical scrolls IDed already , of course.

[Sandman25]

Yes, maybe the poll is not clear enough. But I can't think of an option for players who ID one potion while having 5 different potions, then ID one scroll while having 5 different scrolls and then Id one of rings anyway.

I meant that I usually don't ID jewelry if I still have some unknown potions in inventory and some life-saving potions (curing, HW, speed) are unID-ed. Also I don't ID scrolls unless I have no unknown potions/jewelry.

Edit. Or to make it more clear: first ID item is always potion, second category of ID items is jewelry.

[rchandra]

Curse scrolls not existing might make IDing scrolls a bit better, too. I'm going to try to ID scrolls a bit more often when I have lots of ID early.

[duvessa]

Do you play differently because you know you have a scroll of fear, fog or teleport? Don't you try to play pretending like they don't exist in order to save them?

I can't speak for and into, but I certainly play differently. You should try playing chess pretending that you don't have a queen or knights. It doesn't work very well.

[Sandman25]

Do you play differently because you know you have a scroll of fear, fog or teleport? Don't you try to play pretending like they don't exist in order to save them?

I can't speak for and into, but I certainly play differently. You should try playing chess pretending that you don't have a queen or knights. It doesn't work very well.

That explains why you lose so many games.

Edit. Maybe you didn't understand my idea, then I apologize. Do you try to kill dangerous monsters because you know you can use scroll of Blink if something goes wrong?

[dck]

Uh, of course knowing what tools you have changes the way you play.
e: ahaha

[and into]

I can't speak for and into, but I certainly play differently. You should try playing chess pretending that you don't have a queen or knights. It doesn't work very well.

I get the point of your analogy, but if a small digression based on an overly literal misreading might be allowed, I actually wonder how pretending you don't have certain chess piece(s), at least for X rounds, would affect a chess game. Assuming that opponent does not know about this self-challenge ahead of time, of course. I mean I'd just lose worse than usual, I'm sure, but if someone really good at chess did that it would be interesting to observe.

EDIT: To give nontrivial example, Sandman25, if I know I have ?teleportation that gives different options from knowing I have ?teleportation and ?fog/?fear, and yeah that could affect how I play. That's not to say I would become all gung-ho and rush into danger, or anything; I wouldn't suddenly start playing poorly. But I may play differently, certainly.

Ok, concrete example: I see a vanilla orc early during my exploration of D:4 asleep at edge of LOS, carrying a morning star while I am still stuck with a flail like a chump. My only available tactical consumables at the moment are two ?teleportation and a couple of !curing. Probably best play is to avoid, on chance that priests or wizards are resting just outside LOS. Come back later. Now if I had a ?fog in addition to those two ?teleportation, however, I could definitely see myself risk throwing a stone to draw just that dude toward me, because worse case scenario I can still escape without relying on an uncontrolled teleport with the usual time delay before kicking in. (I might still explore level more before coming back or whatever depending on situation, but yeah, your options should affect your risk assessment in Crawl situations involving meaningful rewards.)

To give trivial example !resistance has a *huge*—usually 180 degree, so to speak—effect on whether I try to take out Nikola.

[damiac]

This is how you play? Turning tail at the sight of 1 orc, even when he's got a weapon you want? Jesus, that sounds like a terribly boring way to play crawl.

[duvessa]

This is how you play? Turning tail at the sight of 1 orc, even when he's got a weapon you want?

That is how you should normally play, yes.

[mikee]

Could you please elaborate how you deal with Adders/Working Ants without Curing or with situations when you get heavily damaged and have no HW? Do you quaff-ID?

Short answer: yes.

Early in the game, my first priority towards items is to know what I have so that I can better use them, and the item I want to identify the most is scroll of teleportation (or to a lesser extent, blinking). Once I have at least two of one scroll and at least three other scrolls, I will read the stack, and if it is identify I will target scrolls with it. If I have at least two of a potion and enough hp to survive poisoning, I will drink it, and yes, if I am otherwise about to die to poison, I will quaff ID whatever.

This goes on until I identify teleportation, the reason being that in most situations that I find actually deadly early on, teleportation is the best option (identified potions just aren't as helpful if you walk into grinder or whatever). Later, I can read-ID scrolls, and because I tend to have more identify from use-IDing items earlier, I can just use it on jewellery that doesn't wear-ID, potions, wands I might have acquired, etc.

[and into]

This is how you play? Turning tail at the sight of 1 orc, even when he's got a weapon you want? Jesus, that sounds like a terribly boring way to play crawl.

You missed the point and read what I wrote in basically the most uncharitable way possible.

As I said, it depends. I was giving an example of how the availability of my consumables might affect my willingness to wake up what is quite likely to be a dangerous pack of enemies. Even with just ?teleportation or with no scrolls at all I might try to lure that orc away—but I would not be under any delusions that (for most characters) there is a significant risk to doing this *in the early game*. Being able to recognize early signs of danger is extremely important; that doesn't mean you always avoid every risk in every situation, that's a question of judgement. However, you cannot judge what you do not recognize. I was expressing one plausible thought process while playing that is relevant to the discussion, not giving guidelines for when and how to kill orcs.

As for the rest....

"Turning tail"—well I don't find anything particularly gratifying or enjoyable in suffering needless, frustrating deaths in Crawl by bringing overly dangerous situations upon myself. Absolutely none of my enjoyment in Crawl is derived from role-playing that I'm some awesome badass who goes around beating up orcs (and rats, newts, plants—how heroic!) so it seems very bizarre to me that you consider it cowardly to not rush in to an unnecessary and risky attack.

Recognizing and weighing dangers, using your positioning to your advantage—in short, *surviving*—is what I find fun in Crawl. Which is why early game is most interesting to me usually; when my character starts to get too strong I get bored frankly. I've quit lots of viable winners with levels in the late teens and 20s out of boredom because I cease to find them fun.

So, for me surviving is fun. As opposed to stuff like min-maxing your god's benefits by leaving and incurring wrath and then doing less dangerous areas while under wrath, or training transmutations for a looong time just to get a single spell going. To me those power gamey things are terribly boring, but I understand that other people find them fun and so while I will offer my advice about the usefulness of such tactics in this or that case, I don't presume to tell people how to enjoy a game. Perhaps you should consider offering the same courtesy.

[Hopeless]

I had assumed that when I said "this discussion is a good reason to keep the id minigame for consumables" everybody understands that I am not defending the status quo wholesale. It's painful to witness the hoops through which players can jump (and then some inevitably do) in order to eke out a little more information. My basic claim is that it is possible to create frequently enough situations where your actual circumstances matter. If identification would (and should) always follow the same workflow, then the game would gain very little from it (still something, I say, but definitely not much). However, I think that's not the case, and I construe this discussion as an argument in my favour.

Like I said before, I am always interested in hearing about to get rid of the hoops, and how to increase the potential for actual decisions. (From what I've written, you can infer that "Make all items identified at game start does not contribute to the discussion, at least as far as I am concerned.)

Having played a game where we went from read/use id to auto id I have to say I don't think it matters a great deal in terms of improving your odds. (I am talking about Portralis here). The benefit was mostly in consistency (because many of the decisions in the game involved roleplaying elements) but the improvement was pretty minor. I liked it for the purpose of not having to think about that aspect but we also lost hunger and a number of other "core" roguelike features so that as a whole that game moved pretty far away from its origins (angband-pernband-tome). I think the hoops are a part of the learning process. And it is interesting to read here the different theories by expert players on what they consider the optimal strategies to be. Unnecessary hoops I totally get doing away with but I would not have the use-id hoops removed.

[KoboldLord]

That explains why you lose so many games.

Edit. Maybe you didn't understand my idea, then I apologize. Do you try to kill dangerous monsters because you know you can use scroll of Blink if something goes wrong?

I absolutely do use items that I have. Putting aside blinking for the moment, if I actively use a potion of speed when I see a difficult fight, I can make that fight into a walkover in my favor and then bask in all the extra loot and xp I get. If I pretend I don't have a potion of speed because I want to 'save it for when I really need it', I'll get progressively farther and farther behind the curve until I have to quaff it just to get away from something. Consumables that you aren't prepared to use are the same as consumables that never actually spawned. Judicious use of most consumables on a compatible character will get you ahead of the power curve, and if you are ahead of the power curve you will need consumables less in the future.

Short answer: yes.

Early in the game, my first priority towards items is to know what I have so that I can better use them, and the item I want to identify the most is scroll of teleportation (or to a lesser extent, blinking). Once I have at least two of one scroll and at least three other scrolls, I will read the stack, and if it is identify I will target scrolls with it. If I have at least two of a potion and enough hp to survive poisoning, I will drink it, and yes, if I am otherwise about to die to poison, I will quaff ID whatever.

This goes on until I identify teleportation, the reason being that in most situations that I find actually deadly early on, teleportation is the best option (identified potions just aren't as helpful if you walk into grinder or whatever). Later, I can read-ID scrolls, and because I tend to have more identify from use-IDing items earlier, I can just use it on jewellery that doesn't wear-ID, potions, wands I might have acquired, etc.

Huh. I parsed the thread as asking about how best to use identify scrolls that are in-hand. I suppose your way of parsing it is fine, too, and I definitely agree that you don't necessarily want to wait for scrolls of identify if you have a stack of mystery consumables that could be something urgently needed.

If nothing else, it is rather hard to scroll-identify your consumables if you haven't gotten around to read-identifying your scrolls of identify yet.

[Sandman25]

Do you play differently because you know you have a scroll of fear, fog or teleport?

Note, I was talking about these 3 items. These are strictly escape items (unless you have huge number of fear scrolls and are AM who will learn Cause Fear soon). I understand that might/brilliance should be used offensively and speed/agility may be used offensively.

[crate]

I definitely play differently if I know I have teleports available compared to if I do not.

Fog is actually very rarely useful as an escape item, by the way. It's dramatically more useful overall as a way to force enemies to approach so you can kill them.

[Sandman25]

Stone Giant throws a rock and hurts character, player uses fog and either escapes or regenerates while waiting for the giant. Kind of escape item IMHO. Fog is mostly useful in Zot IMHO.

[KoboldLord]

Fear is also pretty good at breaking up packs. If I enter a new Lair level and am greeted on arrival by a pack of death yaks, it's easier to lure just a couple into a secluded area if the rest of the pack is definitely going to be moving away from me for a bit. Using a different stairwell is another option that may be good, but it involves its own set of risks and may not actually be possible if the stairwells are clustered together.