Does draining monsters rob me of experience?

[kuniqs]

I'm curious.

[bel]

Draining no longer permanently reduces monsters’ stats (“hit dice”); instead, it now applies a temporary “drained” status, which reduces their hit dice while in effect for most purposes. This means, among other things, that draining attacks will no longer reduce the XP you get for killing monsters even slightly.

[MrRokkomies]

Does this mean, that draining is better on fast or hard hitting weapons? Is it possible to drain a monster to death? (I think it was possible, if you drained a monsters HD to 0) Would draining make tougher enemies easier to hex?

[Thalfon]

Here are the learndb entries on it:

1/2 chance of doing an additional (dam/4 + 3) damage (on average) and applying a debuff similar to a HD reduction which is stackable, refreshable, and lasts 20-30 turns. Checks rN and only works against natural enemies. Disliked by good gods.

This debuff lowers: damage, spellpower, accuracy, MR, and many other things related to HD. This debuff does not lower: monster max hp, your exp gain, or your piety gain.

So a fast weapon would have more opportunity to stack debuffs, but a higher base damage weapon gets more bonus damage from the brand. Since you want to kill things quickly, a high base damage weapon is probably better. (A fast, lower damage weapon with a brand whose damage scales with base damage isn't going to be great even if it's debuffing.)

Trying to melee an enemy with draining in order to hex it strikes me as a dangerous prospect. If it's strong enough that you'd want to hex it, it's strong enough that you probably don't want to melee it with a faster but weaker weapon for long. That said, I can't say that I've ever tried, and I have no idea how strong the debuff to MR is.

[njvack]

Trying to melee an enemy with draining in order to hex it strikes me as a dangerous prospect. If it's strong enough that you'd want to hex it, it's strong enough that you probably don't want to melee it with a faster but weaker weapon for long. That said, I can't say that I've ever tried, and I have no idea how strong the debuff to MR is.

I can imagine this being tedious-but-potentially-useful for enslavement + inner flame. Possibly spriggan tricks, too.

[MrRokkomies]

Trying to melee an enemy with draining in order to hex it strikes me as a dangerous prospect. If it's strong enough that you'd want to hex it, it's strong enough that you probably don't want to melee it with a faster but weaker weapon for long. That said, I can't say that I've ever tried, and I have no idea how strong the debuff to MR is.

Perhaps you want to hex it to be able to stab it for insta kill? Still, I agree that there would probably be better options. Perhaps in the pre-lair part of the game this might be situationally handy. Like if you have low mp and need to make the next EH succeed. Draingn the target might be a better gamble than to just try the hex.