Stones throwing

[Sandman25]

Another thread has this:

The tactics remain mostly the same as in early game (don't fight too much dudes, throw stones, avoid with hard dudes

and I wonder "Is stone throwing that important?"
So I'd like to know how often other players use it.

Edit. Of course the poll assumes you are not playing a stabber.

[jejorda2]

I use level 2 conjurations for the same kind of thing when those become less costly than an inventory slot, and I'll throw javelins or tomahawks instead of those are handy. But yes, I make attacks from a distance at a single wandering monster that I suspect is part of a group.

[XuaXua]

I only target glass houses.

[tabstorm]

Only on the first few levels of the dungeon, afterwards there is no need.

[Tedronai]

Later on there is usually no need, but most of the time I continue throwing stones (or tomahawks / javelins) since it does that automatically when using Shift-Tab for auto-fight.

[Baldu3]

I throw stones or use magic dart whenever I really try hard to win. Not for every fight, just for when it matters, but then they make a pretty big difference.

I also read in a different thread a few days ago that shooting needles is like throwing stones/casting magic dart but better but havent tried yet, i normally only carry curare but will have to try sometime.

[Patashu]

Throwing stones is especially useful in that if you throw a stone at a monster that is wandering, it never shouts and always aggros. So it never stops being useful (but s/stone/weapon of choice if stones are not manly enough)

[crate]

I don't (didn't) throw stones or darts (when they existed) or clubs (back when that was a thing) but I always recognized that doing so is noticeably superior to not doing so.

[Wahaha]

Throwing stones is especially useful in that if you throw a stone at a monster that is wandering, it never shouts and always aggros. So it never stops being useful (but s/stone/weapon of choice if stones are not manly enough)

They should have a chance to shout. This should probably be called a bug or non-intended behavior.

[Siegurt]

I throw stones, then upgrade to tomahawks, ultimately to javelins or large rocks. (Presuming I don't have some more powerful ranged attack) By preference I use a ranged attack to start all combats (I use autofight_nomove so I can still just tab things when I have thrown weapon's equipped, although I keep it mapped to ';')

[duvessa]

needles

[all before]

Also you can throw stones or cast magic dart to lure a sleeping monster fairly reliably, you just need to do it from one tile out of LOS. See: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=13330&p=186097#p186097

[WalkerBoh]

Getting a blowgun and poison needles is an automatic "get to Lair" card. I never bother with stones, but I'll sometimes grab tomahawks in the early game.

[mopl]

I don't throw stones as often as I should... I often forget to

I guess it's optimal to do so, but not mandatory

[Sandman25]

So it looks like community split in half: 14 people use it always/often and 14 people use it rarely/never. Good to know.

[Indianageoff]

Free damage is free. So I throw all the time. By the time slots are dear, I will probably have other options.

[arcanist]

i am too lazy to throw.

[Sprucery]

I throw for damage all the time, not to attract attention. In my opinion all shouting monsters should shout every time the PC attracts their attention by any means.

[zrn]

I throw for damage all the time, not to attract attention. In my opinion all shouting monsters should shout every time the PC attracts their attention by any means.

Why do you want to nerf the stealth skill that badly? What does a thread about throwing rocks at enemies have to do with nerfing stealth?

[Sandman25]

I throw for damage all the time, not to attract attention. In my opinion all shouting monsters should shout every time the PC attracts their attention by any means.

Why do you want to nerf the stealth skill that badly? What does a thread about throwing rocks at enemies have to do with nerfing stealth?

How is stealth supposed to help when any monster is attacked? "I am being attacked by something but I don't see anything so I'd better keep my mouth shut despite pain, fear and worries about my neighbors???"

[and into]

I throw for damage all the time, not to attract attention. In my opinion all shouting monsters should shout every time the PC attracts their attention by any means.

Why do you want to nerf the stealth skill that badly? What does a thread about throwing rocks at enemies have to do with nerfing stealth?

How is stealth supposed to help when any monster is attacked? "I am being attacked by something but I don't see anything so I'd better keep my mouth shut despite pain, fear and worries about my neighbors???"

If enemies capable of shouting did so whenever they changed awareness level (dormant --> wandering --> alert to your presence), this would be a formidable nerf to stealth. That's what zrn is getting at.

There is a lot of weirdness and special cases around enemy noise generation, but the problem I have with that is not realism ("It just doesn't make sense that a magic pony-man would alert all of his brethren at only some signs of possible intruders, but not all such signs"), but rather with the fact that a pretty important game mechanic has numerous counter-intuitive and opaque aspects to it.

[damiac]

Well, that, plus everyone knows magic pony-men are notorious tattle-tales. I mean, we should keep some semblance of realism here...

[Sandman25]

If enemies capable of shouting did so whenever they changed awareness level (dormant --> wandering --> alert to your presence), this would be a formidable nerf to stealth. That's what zrn is getting at.

There is a lot of weirdness and special cases around enemy noise generation, but the problem I have with that is not realism ("It just doesn't make sense that a magic pony-man would fail to alert all of his brethren at any sign of possible intruders"), but rather with the fact that a pretty important game mechanic has numerous counter-intuitive and opaque aspects to it.

I don't care about dormant->wandering transition, there is no need to shout here. If your stealth level allows to stab the monster without it seeing you, that's fine. But x->alert of your presence transition should result in shouting IMHO as it is not only realistic but also a major game improvement: you will not need to use stupid tactics like throwing a stone near every monster to attract its attention without triggering a shout.

[damiac]

I agree with what Sandman said, and on top of that, I think enemies should periodically shout while chasing the player. That would mean dragging 1 enemy at a time is not only extremely difficult(since the monster shouts when you attract his attention), but probably a bad idea, as you're attracting more enemies than you started with.

Then, if it doesn't already, curare should prevent monsters from being able to shout.

[and into]

@Sandman: Your earlier post rubbed me the wrong way just because it seemed to focus more on "realism," but we don't actually disagree here. I think game play would be improved if it were clear when enemies shout, and what you can do to circumvent that.

[Sprucery]

I don't care about dormant->wandering transition, there is no need to shout here. If your stealth level allows to stab the monster without it seeing you, that's fine. But x->alert of your presence transition should result in shouting IMHO as it is not only realistic but also a major game improvement: you will not need to use stupid tactics like throwing a stone near every monster to attract its attention without triggering a shout.

Thanks, Sandman25, this was just what I meant. I just didn't express it clearly.

[duvessa]

it seems more reasonable to make the chance of shouting the same for waking up/being alerted/etc regardless of what led to waking up/being alerted/etc

(you would still throw stones)

[Indianageoff]

Monsters should not auto shout. While the game is set up for us to kill them... in "real dungeon" world, they would be eating each other too so quiet is smart.

The exception would be packs of similar creatures. They should shout and respond.

It would be fun for an adventurer to walk up to a dragon and giant having it out. And then getting to stab both for an easy quick kill.

[Arrhythmia]

I often keep stones on me but very rarely use them, mostly out of some perverse desire to see just how many I can get.

[duvessa]

yeah its actually better to throw bread rations or something so they dont get destroyed

[Patashu]

yeah its actually better to throw bread rations or something so they dont get destroyed

if you run out of stones you may as well ^qyes and think about how badly you fucked up