OpTm Questions

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 08:52 by delarado

Hi Guys,

I really want to get an OpTm off the ground but I struggle profusely which leads me to think my strategy must be lacking.

The furthest I've got was yesterday - And that was thanks to a lucky ring of evasion I think (that still didn't help me vs a centaur) Being a Chei worshipper I didn't feel a scroll of blinking would have helped me where I was Vs a centaur so I decided to try and kill it which was a mistake.

Code:: Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.18.1-8-gdd0e5ea (webtiles) character file. 1103 Delarado the Insei (level 8, -2/48 HPs) Began as an Octopode Transmuter on May 21, 2016. Was a Follower of Cheibriados. Slain by a centaur (9 damage) ... on level 6 of the Dungeon. The game lasted 00:49:54 (11767 turns). Delarado the Insei (Octopode Transmuter) Turns: 11767, Time: 00:49:55 Health: -2/48 AC: 1 Str: 13 XL: 8 Next: 32% Magic: 9/11 EV: 19 Int: 20 God: Cheibriados [*.....] Gold: 302 SH: 0 Dex: 18 Spells: 2 memorised, 7 levels left rFire . . . SeeInvis . - Unarmed rCold . . . Gourm . (no shield) rNeg . . . Faith . (helmet restricted) rPois . Spirit . (no amulet) rElec . Dismiss . i - +3 ring of dexterity rCorr . Reflect . v - +6 ring of evasion SustAt + Harm . e - ring of sustain attributes (curse) MR ..... (no ring) Stlth +++....... (no ring) (no ring) (no ring) (no ring) @: very slow, not resistant to hostile enchantments, fairly stealthy A: almost no armour, amphibious, 8 rings, constrict 8, tentacle spike 1, camouflage 1, gelatinous body 1 a: Bend Time, Renounce Religion You were on level 6 of the Dungeon. You worshipped Cheibriados. Cheibriados was aware of your devotion. You were not hungry. You visited 2 branches of the dungeon, and saw 8 of its levels. You also visited: Sewer. You collected 302 gold pieces. Inventory: Hand Weapons f - a +1 trident Missiles a - 72 arrows j - 174 stones (quivered) r - 33 poisoned needles Armour t - a +0 shield Jewellery e - a cursed ring of sustain attributes (on tentacle) i - a +3 ring of dexterity (left tentacle) s - an uncursed ring of ice v - a +6 ring of evasion (right tentacle) Scrolls h - a scroll of enchant armour l - a scroll of magic mapping {unknown} o - 2 scrolls of teleportation p - 2 scrolls of blinking w - a scroll of amnesia {unknown} x - a scroll of remove curse y - a scroll of recharging {unknown} Potions d - a potion of mutation {unknown} k - a potion of curing m - 2 potions of might n - a potion of berserk rage {unknown} q - 3 potions of cure mutation z - a potion of resistance A - a potion of agility Books b - a book of Changes Spells Type Level a - Beastly Appendage Transmutation 1 b - Sticks to Snakes Transmutation 2 c - Spider Form Transmutation/Poison 3 d - Ice Form Ice/Transmutation 4 e - Blade Hands Transmutation 5 u - an Akashic Record Spells Type Level a - Dispersal Translocation 6 b - Malign Gateway Summoning/Translocation 7 c - Disjunction Translocation 8 d - Controlled Blink Translocation 8 Comestibles c - 5 bread rations g - 3 meat rations B - 2 fruits Skills: - Level 1.0 Fighting - Level 2.0 Dodging + Level 7.0 Unarmed Combat - Level 2.0 Spellcasting + Level 6.6 Transmutations - Level 3.1 Invocations You had 7 spell levels left. You knew the following spells: Your Spells Type Power Failure Level Hunger a - Beastly Appendage Trmt ####.. 1% 1 #...... b - Spider Form Trmt/Pois ###....... 14% 3 ###.... Dungeon Overview and Level Annotations Branches: Dungeon (7/15) Temple (1/1) D:5 Altars: Ashenzari Cheibriados Dithmenos Elyvilon Fedhas Gozag Kikubaaqudgha Makhleb Nemelex Xobeh Okawaru Pakellas Qazlal Ru Sif Muna Trog Vehumet Xom Yredelemnul Zin The Shining One Annotations: D:4 exclusions: black bear and door D:5 Sigmund D:6 Pikel Innate Abilities, Weirdness & Mutations You cannot wear most types of armour. You are amphibious. You can wear up to eight rings at the same time. You can use your tentacles to constrict eight enemies at once. Your skin changes colour to match your surroundings (Stealth). Your rubbery body absorbs attacks (AC +1). One of your tentacles bears a spike. Message History The centaur is severely wounded. The centaur misses you. You tentacle-slap the centaur but do no damage. You pierce the centaur, but do no damage. Your squeeze misses the centaur. The centaur is severely wounded. The centaur hits you. * * * LOW HITPOINT WARNING * * * You tentacle-slap the centaur. You pierce the centaur, but do no damage. The centaur is almost dead. The centaur barely misses you. You tentacle-slap the centaur but do no damage. You pierce the centaur, but do no damage. The centaur is severely wounded. The centaur closely misses you. The centaur hits you! * * * LOW HITPOINT WARNING * * * Drink which item? (? for menu, Esc to quit) You feel better. The centaur hits you! You die... ######### #.......## #........# #........# #........# ......##.# .......#.# .......#.########## .......#@..)......####### .......c.............>... ....##....#.......######. . ####+#.......# #... #......###### #.#. #......# #... #.....<# ####. #.......# #.... #.......# #.### You could see a centaur. Vanquished Creatures A centaur (D:6) An ogre (D:4) 5 wights (D:7) 3 crimson imps 2 hounds 2 orc priests (D:3) 4 orc wizards 4 worker ants A worker ant zombie (D:5) 6 gnolls 9 adders 2 shadow imps 2 worms 5 dart slugs 7 giant geckos 19 orcs 2 giant cockroaches 8 hobgoblins 12 jackals 10 kobolds 6 bats A giant cockroach zombie (D:5) A giant gecko zombie (D:6) 8 giant newts 8 goblins A jackal skeleton (D:4) 6 rats 136 creatures vanquished. Vanquished Creatures (others) A fungus (D:3) 1 creature vanquished. Grand Total: 137 creatures vanquished Notes Turn | Place | Note -------------------------------------------------------------- 0 | D:1 | Delarado the Octopode Transmuter began the quest for the Orb. 0 | D:1 | Reached XP level 1. HP: 13/13 MP: 3/3 280 | D:1 | You fall through a shaft! 284 | D:2 | Reached XP level 2. HP: 11/18 MP: 5/5 1057 | D:1 | Reached XP level 3. HP: 20/23 MP: 4/6 2336 | D:2 | Reached skill level 4 in Unarmed Combat 2336 | D:2 | Reached XP level 4. HP: 21/28 MP: 5/7 3500 | D:2 | Found an iron altar of Okawaru. 4019 | D:3 | You fall through a shaft! 4143 | D:3 | Reached XP level 5. HP: 28/33 MP: 8/8 4221 | D:3 | Found a glowing drain. 4326 | Sewer | Entered a sewer 4552 | Sewer | Noticed Purgy 4921 | D:3 | Found a blossoming altar of Fedhas. 5892 | D:3 | Learned a level 3 spell: Spider Form 6071 | D:3 | HP: 1/33 [orc wizard/magic dart (7)] 7046 | D:4 | Reached skill level 5 in Unarmed Combat 7179 | D:4 | Found a burning altar of Makhleb. 7179 | D:4 | Noticed a balrug 7379 | D:4 | Reached XP level 6. HP: 32/38 MP: 7/9 7842 | D:4 | Reached skill level 5 in Transmutations 7991 | D:4 | Noticed a black bear 8239 | D:5 | Entered Level 5 of the Dungeon 8485 | D:5 | Found a staircase to the Ecumenical Temple. 8508 | D:5 | Gained mutation: One of your tentacles bears a spike. [potion of beneficial mutation] 8540 | D:5 | Reached XP level 7. HP: 41/43 MP: 10/10 8549 | Temple | Entered the Ecumenical Temple 8630 | Temple | Became a worshipper of Cheibriados the Contemplative 8857 | D:5 | Reached skill level 6 in Unarmed Combat 8857 | D:5 | Reached skill level 1 in Invocations 9106 | D:5 | Noticed Sigmund 10611 | D:3 | Reached * piety under Cheibriados 10907 | D:6 | Noticed Pikel 11256 | D:7 | Reached XP level 8. HP: 48/48 MP: 11/11 11629 | D:6 | Reached skill level 7 in Unarmed Combat 11766 | D:6 | HP: 2/48 [centaur (8)] 11767 | D:6 | Slain by a centaur Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 | ---------------+-------------------------+----- Transmutations | 3 4 5 6 | 6.6 Unarmed Combat | 4 5 6 7 | 7.0 Invocations | 3 | 3.1 Fighting | | 1.0 Dodging | | 2.0 Spellcasting | | 2.0 Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 || total -------------------------+-------+-------+-------++------- Melee: Unarmed | 68 | 158 | 137 || 363 Constrict | 23 | 35 | 31 || 89 Tentacles | 12 | 19 | 39 || 70 Kick | 4 | 19 | 66 || 89 Punch | | 10 | 6 || 16 Blowgun | | 6 | || 6 Fire: Blowgun | | 41 | || 41 Throw: Stone | 7 | 93 | 15 || 115 Cast: Beastly Appendage | 3 | 13 | || 16 Spider Form | | 4 | || 4 Invok: Bend Time | | | 2 || 2 Use: Scroll | | 19 | 4 || 23 Potion | | 3 | 2 || 5 Stab: Sleeping | 5 | 3 | 2 || 10 Distracted | | 2 | || 2 Eat: Chunk | 2 | 5 | 7 || 14 Fruit | 2 | 2 | || 4 Pizza | | 1 | || 1 Meat ration | | 2 | || 2 Beef jerky | | 2 | 1 || 3 Armor: Skin | 8 | 18 | 2 || 28 Dodge: Dodged | 37 | 148 | 93 || 278

The blowgun was also a mistake, I stupidly wielded it to try and take out purgy with poison needles from deep water and it was cursed. I had no remove curse scrolls so was stuck with it for a while...

Is Chei the right god? I'm left wondering, since I'm playing an extremely fragile race that cannot fight anything yet cannot run away from anything either.
Is my skill build right? I originally started with training only transmutations and spell casting to get blade hands up ASAP but without any unarmed combat training I'm not sure whats better?

Any tips appreciated, I hear these guys are good fun once they get going but at the moment I just feel weak AF for the entire game until I die!

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 10:42 by ZoFy

OpTm has a great late game (if you get Statue Form) but is quite squishy before reaching that point. Likewise, Chei provides you with sick stat boosts and invocations but until you can at least Slouch reliably, you're just moving slowly for almost no benefit and are quite susceptible to death. The rest of the Tavern would tell you that Chei is worse than having no god, i'd say doubling that early game weakness can make your run a challenge.
Good ol' boring Okawaru can bail you out: +5 to combat skills is great early on and even twice as great with UC. They also say Fedhas is amazing if you can tolerate her.
Skill-wise, i'd go with training UC at least to 10 before investing heavily in transmutations. Body transformations are buffs, so you don't need to spam them and reducing their failure rate from 50% to 10% doesn't do all that much. Blade Hands and Ice Form are basically uncastable early on but you're likely to die if you try fixing that immediately because you wouldn't be improving your damage/defences the whole time. The one spell in your starting book which isn't a buff (Sticks to Snakes) is actually surprisingly good, try abusing it.
I hope this helps.

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 10:52 by delarado

Thanks ZoFy. Thats interesting regarding Chei, I was thinking while playing "How is this strong in any way?!"

Won't Okawaru gift me crap that I can't wear? I'll look into Fedhas.

Is blade hands worth it on an Op? I find the EV that spider form gives EXTREMELY useful, and wouldn't dream of taking on harder enemies without it. Does the extra offence really outweigh the lack of defense?

I just died again on a very positive run. I had a silly "Lets try and see if this works" moment with a crocodile when I was at low HP. It didnt work! I lost an amazing ring...

l - the ring "Vebeot" (left front leg) {rC+++ rN+ MP+9 Str+4 Dex-4}

Code:: Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.18.1-8-gdd0e5ea (webtiles) character file. 5068 Delarado the Transmogrifier (level 10, -2/58 HPs) Began as an Octopode Transmuter on May 22, 2016. Was a Priest of Cheibriados. Slain by a crocodile (16 damage) ... on level 1 of the Lair of Beasts. The game lasted 01:01:56 (12510 turns). Delarado the Transmogrifier (Octopode Transmuter) Turns: 12510, Time: 01:01:57 Health: -2/58 AC: 2 Str: 21 XL: 10 Next: 56% Magic: 20/22 EV: 20 Int: 25 God: Cheibriados [***...] Gold: 518 SH: 0 Dex: 21 Spells: 4 memorised, 0 levels left rFire . . . SeeInvis . - Unarmed rCold + + + Gourm . (shield currently unavailable) rNeg + . . Faith . (helmet currently unavailable) rPois x Spirit . (no amulet) rElec . Dismiss . l - ring "Vebeot" {rC+++ rN+ MP+9 Str+4 Dex-4} rCorr . Reflect . q - +1 ring of slaying SustAt + Harm . I - ring of sustain attributes MR ..... (no ring) Stlth ++........ (no ring) (no ring) (no ring) (no ring) @: spider-form, very slow, not resistant to hostile enchantments, unstealthy A: almost no armour, (amphibious), 8 rings, (constrict 8), (camouflage 0), (gelatinous body 0) a: End Transformation, Bend Time, Temporal Distortion, Renounce Religion You were on level 1 of the Lair of Beasts. You worshipped Cheibriados. Cheibriados was most pleased with you. You were not hungry. You were a venomous arachnid creature. You visited 3 branches of the dungeon, and saw 10 of its levels. You also visited: Ice Cave. You collected 518 gold pieces. Inventory: Hand Weapons g - a cursed -2 dagger r - a +0 dagger of protection u - a +0 antimagic halberd x - a +2 antimagic war axe z - a cursed -2 battleaxe Missiles a - 87 arrows k - 230 stones (quivered) v - a javelin Jewellery l - the ring "Vebeot" (left front leg) {rC+++ rN+ MP+9 Str+4 Dex-4} (You found it on level 8 of the Dungeon) [ring of magical power] It affects your strength (+4). It affects your dexterity (-4). It renders you almost immune to cold. It protects you from negative energy. It affects your magic capacity (+9). q - a +1 ring of slaying (right front leg) I - a ring of sustain attributes (on tentacle) Wands f - a wand of flame (25/48) j - a wand of iceblast (7/15) y - a wand of iceblast (8/15) H - a wand of polymorph (4/24) Scrolls d - 3 scrolls of blinking i - a scroll of fog w - a scroll of magic mapping A - 2 scrolls of teleportation C - 3 scrolls of remove curse Potions e - a potion of might h - a potion of invisibility m - 2 potions of magic {unknown} n - 4 potions of curing s - a potion of cure mutation B - a potion of agility D - a potion of brilliance {unknown} E - a potion of ambrosia {unknown} G - a potion of flight {unknown} Books b - a book of Changes Spells Type Level a - Beastly Appendage Transmutation 1 b - Sticks to Snakes Transmutation 2 c - Spider Form Transmutation/Poison 3 d - Ice Form Ice/Transmutation 4 e - Blade Hands Transmutation 5 o - Kikubaaqudgha's Grimoire of Dark Arts (You found it on level 4 of the Dungeon) Spells Type Level a - Animate Skeleton Necromancy 1 Comestibles c - 3 bread rations p - a royal jelly F - a meat ration Skills: - Level 1.0 Fighting - Level 2.0 Dodging - Level 10.0 Unarmed Combat - Level 2.0 Spellcasting + Level 12.0 Transmutations You couldn't memorise any spells. You knew the following spells: Your Spells Type Power Failure Level Hunger a - Beastly Appendage Trmt ###### 1% 1 None b - Spider Form Trmt/Pois ####...... 10% 3 ###.... c - Ice Form Ice/Trmt ####.... 28% 4 ####... d - Blade Hands Trmt ######.... 8% 5 ######. Dungeon Overview and Level Annotations Branches: Dungeon (8/15) Temple (1/1) D:6 Lair (1/8) D:8 Altars: Cheibriados Dithmenos Elyvilon Fedhas Gozag Kikubaaqudgha Makhleb Nemelex Xobeh Okawaru Pakellas Qazlal Sif Muna Trog Vehumet Xom Yredelemnul Zin The Shining One Shops: D:4 } D:8 [ Annotations: D:3 Grinder; vogonpoet's ghost, amateur TeEn D:4 Calamarain's ghost, amateur DrMo D:7 exclusion: centaur Innate Abilities, Weirdness & Mutations You cannot wear most types of armour. ((You are amphibious.)) You can wear up to eight rings at the same time. ((You can use your tentacles to constrict eight enemies at once.)) ((Your skin changes colour to match your surroundings (Stealth).)) ((Your rubbery body absorbs attacks (AC +1).)) Message History Okay, then. Read which item? (? for menu, Esc to quit) Blink to where? Press: ? - help, Dir - move target cursor You are very lightly contaminated with residual magic. As you read the scroll of blinking, it crumbles to dust. A crocodile comes into view. Your transformation has ended. You start resting. Read which item? (? for menu, Esc to quit) Okay, then. Casting: Spider Form Confirm with . or Enter, or press ? or * to list all spells. You turn into a venomous arachnid creature. Your magical contamination has completely faded away. You closely miss the crocodile. The crocodile closely misses you. You bite the crocodile! The crocodile is poisoned. The crocodile is heavily wounded. The crocodile bites you! You die... .#.........†.................#..# .†.............................#* ...............................# #.....###..................##### ###P##.#####.P............## ###*## ###...........## ** ####...........# ,* #.=............# ,*** ##....Ps........# ,,,** ##......t........# ,,,,****#...............## ,,,,,**,......#.........## ,,,,,**,....###..........# **,,,,,,..#**#...........# **,,,,,###* #...........# **,,,..##.###...........# **,,,.##...#.............## You could see a crocodile. Vanquished Creatures A komodo dragon (D:8) Eustachio (D:6) A hippogriff (D:7) Menkaure (D:7) 3 orc warriors A phantom (D:5) 16 ice beasts 2 ogres (D:8) A sky beast (D:7) 2 eyes of draining (D:5) 3 wolves (Lair:1) A centaur (D:6) A giant frog (D:8) 3 scorpions 3 killer bees (D:5) A howler monkey (D:6) 4 crimson imps A centaur zombie (D:6) 4 hounds 2 jellies A giant frog zombie (D:8) A gnoll shaman (D:6) 4 orc priests 6 orc wizards A centaur skeleton (D:4) Jessica (D:2) 3 iguanas 8 worker ants A hound zombie (D:7) A hound skeleton (D:5) 6 gnolls 11 adders A howler monkey skeleton (D:7) 9 river rats (Lair:1) A shadow imp (D:5) 2 oozes (D:1) 3 worms 3 dart slugs 5 giant geckos 26 orcs 2 ball pythons 7 giant cockroaches 3 goblins 8 hobgoblins 9 jackals 2 quokkas A ball python skeleton (D:4) 9 bats 4 giant newts 6 kobolds 9 rats 206 creatures vanquished. Vanquished Creatures (others) A plant (D:8) 1 creature vanquished. Grand Total: 207 creatures vanquished Notes Turn | Place | Note -------------------------------------------------------------- 0 | D:1 | Delarado the Octopode Transmuter began the quest for the Orb. 0 | D:1 | Reached XP level 1. HP: 13/13 MP: 3/3 266 | D:1 | Reached XP level 2. HP: 17/18 MP: 3/5 600 | D:1 | Reached XP level 3. HP: 22/23 MP: 6/6 1791 | D:2 | Found a shadowy altar of Dithmenos. 1877 | D:2 | Noticed Jessica 1899 | D:2 | Reached skill level 3 in Transmutations 1899 | D:2 | Reached XP level 4. HP: 28/28 MP: 5/7 1904 | D:2 | Learned a level 3 spell: Spider Form 1962 | D:2 | Killed Jessica 2232 | D:2 | Found an opulent altar of Gozag. 2583 | D:3 | Noticed Grinder 2695 | D:3 | Reached skill level 4 in Transmutations 2716 | D:4 | Reached XP level 5. HP: 27/33 MP: 4/8 2770 | D:4 | Noticed Calamarain's ghost (amateur DrMo) 3185 | D:3 | Noticed vogonpoet's ghost (amateur TeEn) 3267 | D:4 | Reached skill level 5 in Transmutations 3537 | D:4 | Reached XP level 6. HP: 38/38 MP: 5/9 3624 | D:4 | Found a deep blue altar of Sif Muna. 3624 | D:4 | Found an ancient bone altar of Kikubaaqudgha. 3626 | D:4 | Found a radiant altar of Vehumet. 3629 | D:4 | Identified Kikubaaqudgha's Grimoire of Dark Arts 3869 | D:4 | Found an oddly glowing altar of Pakellas. 3870 | D:4 | Found Pakellas's Prime Provisions. 4041 | D:5 | Entered Level 5 of the Dungeon 4089 | D:5 | Reached skill level 5 in Unarmed Combat 4354 | D:5 | Reached XP level 7. HP: 40/43 MP: 10/10 5126 | D:5 | Found a bloodstained altar of Trog. 5143 | D:5 | Reached XP level 8. HP: 48/48 MP: 0/11 6477 | D:6 | Found a staircase to the Ecumenical Temple. 6478 | D:6 | Noticed Eustachio 6492 | D:6 | Killed Eustachio 6492 | D:6 | Reached skill level 6 in Transmutations 6498 | Temple | Entered the Ecumenical Temple 6586 | Temple | Became a worshipper of Cheibriados the Contemplative 6933 | D:6 | Reached XP level 9. HP: 53/53 MP: 8/12 7446 | D:6 | Reached skill level 10 in Unarmed Combat 7673 | D:6 | Reached skill level 7 in Transmutations 7939 | D:7 | Reached * piety under Cheibriados 8115 | D:7 | Noticed Menkaure 8141 | D:7 | Killed Menkaure 8733 | D:7 | Reached skill level 8 in Transmutations 9740 | D:8 | Found Eckanotz's Antique Armour Shoppe. 10186 | D:8 | Reached skill level 9 in Transmutations 10680 | D:8 | Got a twitching jade ring 10746 | D:8 | Reached ** piety under Cheibriados 10837 | D:8 | Identified the ring "Vebeot" {rC+++ rN+ MP+9 Str+4 Dex-4} (You found it on level 8 of the Dungeon) 11148 | D:8 | Found a staircase to the Lair. 11149 | D:8 | Noticed a komodo dragon 11179 | D:8 | Killed a komodo dragon 11179 | D:8 | Reached skill level 10 in Transmutations 11179 | D:8 | Reached XP level 10. HP: 42/58 MP: 13/13 11265 | D:8 | Learned a level 4 spell: Ice Form 11271 | D:8 | Learned a level 5 spell: Blade Hands 11967 | Lair:1 | Entered Level 1 of the Lair of Beasts 12087 | Lair:1 | Reached *** piety under Cheibriados 12222 | Lair:1 | Reached skill level 11 in Transmutations 12223 | Lair:1 | Found a frozen archway. 12291 | IceCv | Entered an ice cave 12466 | IceCv | Noticed removeelyvilon's ghost (journeyman DsSu) 12471 | IceCv | Reached skill level 12 in Transmutations 12510 | Lair:1 | Slain by a crocodile Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 | ---------------+-------------------------------+----- Unarmed Combat | 4 5 7 9 10 | 10.0 Transmutations | 3 4 5 6 10 12 | 12.0 Fighting | | 1.0 Dodging | | 2.0 Spellcasting | | 2.0 Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 | 10-12 || total -------------------------+-------+-------+-------+-------++------- Melee: Unarmed | 82 | 112 | 309 | 106 || 609 Constrict | 17 | 22 | 22 | || 61 Tentacles | 10 | 19 | 17 | || 46 Punch | 3 | 2 | 7 | || 12 Kick | 5 | 9 | 23 | || 37 Throw: Stone | 80 | 28 | 70 | 4 || 182 Javelin | | 20 | 5 | || 25 Cast: Beastly Appendage | 11 | 10 | 18 | || 39 Spider Form | | 4 | 41 | 10 || 55 Evoke: Wand | | | 4 | 1 || 5 Use: Scroll | 10 | 3 | 4 | 3 || 20 Potion | 1 | 1 | 1 | || 3 Stab: Sleeping | 1 | 6 | 1 | 1 || 9 Eat: Chunk | 3 | 5 | 5 | || 13 Fruit | | 3 | | || 3 Beef jerky | | 1 | 2 | || 3 Bread ration | | | 1 | || 1 Pizza | | | 1 | || 1 Meat ration | | | 2 | 1 || 3 Armor: Skin | 7 | 5 | 5 | 6 || 23 Dodge: Dodged | 57 | 64 | 188 | 100 || 409

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 11:07 by ZoFy

Okawaru will only gift you crap you can wear but it's all about that Heroism button rather than gifts or even Finesse (even though doubling your dps is insane). Speaking of insane dps, i find Blade Hands damage too good to pass up. Ice Form should be better for a lot of Lair encounters because of extra HP, rPois and slowing cold-blooded dudes.
Also, warning you in advance, don't try to melee hydrae in Lair if you can help it. That's one common way to splat Tm's.

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 11:38 by tasonir

Four out of five of my Op wins have been with Chei, so I don't consider chei to be a detriment to octopodes. I actually just picked Gozag in the fifth game because it was for this tournament and I didn't have any non-chei wins yet... The chei backgrounds were two transmuters, one monk, one earth elementalist. The recent Gozag game was a hunter, with slings.

It's been said a lot because it's very true: the early game is difficult and you're very fragile. Using a ranged attack and then branching into unarmed + statue/blade hands is one strategy, pick either EE or hunter with slings for this. Otherwise, you just want to train dodging, unarmed, and a little bit of fighting and try to let constriction win your fights. Because of constriction, you can afford to build slightly more defensive skills (mostly dodging, some fighting) than usual, leave unarmed slightly lower. Since the usual has unarmed a few levels ahead of dodging, in this case it means the two are roughly equal. I usually focus on the physical skills for a while first, and only dive into blade hands when I can get it online quickly (because the exp required to raise it to 10 is now trival). It doesn't take much to get it online when you have ~30 int, either. That said there have been plenty of games I played where I didn't start with the transmuter background and had to wait to find the spell much later on, which is also okay. I generally don't bother with spider form, the EV is nice but with chei's dex you'll have tons of EV anyways. The rough part is just getting to roughly 5* piety.

Morgues:

Octopodes:

http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 105635.txt Transmuter, Chei, 15 runes.
http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 072327.txt Transmuter, Chei, 15 runes #2.
http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 185823.txt Earth elementalist for an easier start, Chei, 3 runes.
http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 100951.txt Monk, Chei, 15 runes.

http://crawl.akrasiac.org/rawdata/Tason ... 103421.txt Gozag game, hunter for the nemelex bonus points. 3 runes, was on a streak. Found punk early, score. Eventually used unarmed + statue form, but took a while to get there. Used a morning star of protection for most of the midgame, before switching to unarmed for the end.

Felids:

So Felids play basically the same way, no AC, low health, somewhat better EV. There's the speed bonus, sure, but not once you've gone chei, which is of course, the only way to truly fly. You do want to fly, right?

http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 155739.txt Transmuter, Chei, 3 runes.
http://crawl.akrasiac.org/rawdata/Tason ... 052647.txt Necromancer, Chei, 3 runes. If you look at the action table you can see I'm using melee by the level 7-9 range, and by the 10-12 range it's basically all of my damage, I never learn any necromancy spells past pain, vampiric draining, and regeneration. The healing abilities are very handy to counteract felid's -40% health.

Felids are definitely the challenge version of this though; octopodes are much stronger late game. I just mentioned them if you want to see more examples of basically the same build.

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 11:43 by crate

fedhas and okawaru are better than chei

optm is very bad so you will struggle

tm is a melee background that happens to also cast spells, not a spellcaster that happens to melee

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 12:19 by delarado

Thanks for the input, its all really useful. I still don't understand though how you win a species that relies on running away from battles it cannot win with a god that prevents them from running away from anything.

I wanted to try chei but he is literally a death sentence for me. Every time I take him I'm dead in a couple of floors, and I feel like I'm playing cautiously. I generally use stones to try and soften them up. I wanted to try and avoid wielding any weapons (slings etc) because of the wield/unwield delay but if you think its worth it ill give that a go.

Ive mostly been going UC till level 3, then transmutations to get spider form to 20%, then more UC/dodging/invvocations (For bend time) and transmutations for ice form/blade hands. Then I generally get stomped by a player ghost, or a small pack of slightly harder enemies.

Ill try building more evasion and ignore spider form.

tasonir wrote:Four out of five of my Op wins have been with Chei, so I don't consider chei to be a detriment to octopodes. I actually just picked Gozag in the fifth game because it was for this tournament and I didn't have any non-chei wins yet... The chei backgrounds were two transmuters, one monk, one earth elementalist. The recent Gozag game was a hunter, with slings.

It's been said a lot because it's very true: the early game is difficult and you're very fragile. Using a ranged attack and then branching into unarmed + statue/blade hands is one strategy, pick either EE or hunter with slings for this. Otherwise, you just want to train dodging, unarmed, and a little bit of fighting and try to let constriction win your fights. Because of constriction, you can afford to build slightly more defensive skills (mostly dodging, some fighting) than usual, leave unarmed slightly lower. Since the usual has unarmed a few levels ahead of dodging, in this case it means the two are roughly equal. I usually focus on the physical skills for a while first, and only dive into blade hands when I can get it online quickly (because the exp required to raise it to 10 is now trival). It doesn't take much to get it online when you have ~30 int, either. That said there have been plenty of games I played where I didn't start with the transmuter background and had to wait to find the spell much later on, which is also okay. I generally don't bother with spider form, the EV is nice but with chei's dex you'll have tons of EV anyways. The rough part is just getting to roughly 5* piety.

Morgues:

Octopodes:

http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 105635.txt Transmuter, Chei, 15 runes.
http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 072327.txt Transmuter, Chei, 15 runes #2.
http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 185823.txt Earth elementalist for an easier start, Chei, 3 runes.
http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 100951.txt Monk, Chei, 15 runes.

http://crawl.akrasiac.org/rawdata/Tason ... 103421.txt Gozag game, hunter for the nemelex bonus points. 3 runes, was on a streak. Found punk early, score. Eventually used unarmed + statue form, but took a while to get there. Used a morning star of protection for most of the midgame, before switching to unarmed for the end.

Felids:

So Felids play basically the same way, no AC, low health, somewhat better EV. There's the speed bonus, sure, but not once you've gone chei, which is of course, the only way to truly fly. You do want to fly, right?

http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/tasonir/mor ... 155739.txt Transmuter, Chei, 3 runes.
http://crawl.akrasiac.org/rawdata/Tason ... 052647.txt Necromancer, Chei, 3 runes. If you look at the action table you can see I'm using melee by the level 7-9 range, and by the 10-12 range it's basically all of my damage, I never learn any necromancy spells past pain, vampiric draining, and regeneration. The healing abilities are very handy to counteract felid's -40% health.

Felids are definitely the challenge version of this though; octopodes are much stronger late game. I just mentioned them if you want to see more examples of basically the same build.

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 12:37 by delarado

Tried that. and whoops - Centaur on D:3; We all know how that ends... I think I'm done for the day!

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 14:39 by tasonir

I have a youtube recording of me playing this and commentating it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChruT8J ... DUynvDlHXW

And then I did it again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_i4P6e ... Ow&index=1

There's a few mishaps and deaths but there's ultimately a 15 rune win in there somewhere

Sunday, 22nd May 2016, 20:56 by Lasty

The advice tasonir is offering is focused on the part of the game where characters have had a chance to develop their strengths. Before this point, Chei mostly makes you more likely to die. If you want to focus on this part of the game try fedhas, who gives you a huge power boost at 1*.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 00:05 by duvessa

tasonir wrote:There's a few mishaps and deaths but there's ultimately a 15 rune win in there somewhere

So, when following your own advice, you can't even win when you want to, and you're still convinced it's good advice? Wow.

delarado wrote:Thanks ZoFy. Thats interesting regarding Chei, I was thinking while playing "How is this strong in any way?!"

It isn't, chei is bad and is especially bad for the character you are playing. Any other god except Qazlal or Zin would be better.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 00:25 by crate

Okawaru gives you more damage than chei and similar defenses (especially since this is op we are talking about, so you can't even shift up to heavier armour or anything) and doesn't slow you down.

I think chei does have actual uses but transmuter is not really one of them.

If you like chei and enjoy chei tm then that's fine, if you really want to play a chei character then tm is fine, but note the way I structured that sentence.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 13:16 by ZipZipskins

It's been said several times already but it bears repeating- you should try going fedhas and seeing how you like it. Make approximately a billion mushrooms. The fact that Ops love water is just icing.

Dungeon Farmer will get you there

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 14:06 by delarado

I read fedhas description and didnt liek the sound of it much. Ill have a look again though, I can see how the water thing would be cool!

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 14:06 by tasonir

I think some people might not quite understand my love for chei is largely emotional and I'm not actually irrational. For example, crate's post:

crate wrote:fedhas and okawaru are better than chei

optm is very bad so you will struggle

tm is a melee background that happens to also cast spells, not a spellcaster that happens to melee

This is all correct. In general it's a good idea to basically just assume anything crate says is correct, actually. Now I'd never phrase it this way, especially that first line. Fedhas and okawaru are terribly boring, but they don't ask you to be slow, and yes, being slow is difficult.

I'd rephrase the middle line as "OpTm is a very weak start and struggles in the early/mid game"...Of course, you never get to the end game without surviving the early/mid game, which is tough for OpTm's...I can see the logic there, I promise. I just struggle against it everyday, because Octopodes are fun! I picked up 75 points for an OpHu as a nemelex combo, and usually ignore nemelex combos. Full disclosure: I did that game with Gozag, but mostly just so I had any non-chei wins.

The last line I wouldn't rephrase at all, it's well said. Focus on your physical skills first.

And then there's people like duvessa, who don't get me wrong, I love dearly, but duvessa occasionally prefers snark to pure accuracy:

duvessa wrote:
Tasonir wrote:There's a few mishaps and deaths but there's ultimately a 15 rune win in there somewhere

So, when following your own advice, you can't even win when you want to, and you're still convinced it's good advice? Wow.

Apparently the gold standard for giving advice is now a 100% win rate, my bad. Sorry I have died some of the time

I got my winrate over 10% in the .18 tournament with 4/5 Chei wins, and I threw away several characters trying DEWn's for the nemelex combo, among others, quite a few of which were OpSk's back when that was a combo, before OpHu became available. OpHu is a much, much better combo than OpSk; it's practically night and day. If you're interested in trying an OpHu: start with slings, get it to a reasonable delay (doesn't have to be min delay, but close) and then train defenses and a transition plan. For me that's melee + statue form, but depending on god you could transition into just about anything, really. Slings are very powerful for the first 10-20 floors, and by then you can make an exit plan. I did get fairly lucky in that I found punk (the +7 freezing greatsling) in a bailey, but I had really horrible ring luck for a long time...

Anyways, that's a topic for another time. I don't think that I've died some of the time should disqualify me - Feel free to show me your account with a 100% winrate

(some exist - theglow had an 18/18 win tournament in .16 I think, or roughly then. xeno23 has a 6/6 win account in the .18 tournament)

Anyways, in short: If you're asking how to play a chei character, I'd love to help. I'm not claiming it's the easiest character, and octopode transmuters are frankly horrible starts. But, I love them and they can certainly be won, and I've done it several times

Minotaur fighter #3948 can be found that way ---->

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 14:19 by 4Hooves2Appendages

duvessa wrote:Any other god except Qazlal or Zin would be better.

I'm inclined to believe that Zin would be stronger than Chei, especially for a relative beginner. At least the silver god stops the player from over-investing in transmutations. (Of course starting as Tm is kinda pointless then, but hey.)

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 14:47 by duvessa

If you know chei is bad then stop telling new players to take chei! The OP said "I really want to get an OpTm off the ground", not "I really want to play whatever combo is tasonir's favourite, even if it's fucking awful."

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 14:50 by delarado

See I do like the thought of being an imaginary huge tentacled creature, slithering slowly through the dungeon, slowly smacking anything in its way with the swing of a huge tentacle.

I find the slow qualities of chei and an OP quite romantic in the sense of my imagination. However, I simply cannot make it work. The completely inability to run away from anything the second you pick Chei I just cannot deal with, and I've no idea how you can, or ever did to be honest!

Im in another game at the moment and going to try Oka or Fedhas once i do a bit more reading. See if i can get a win under my belt for a Tm (Ive never won one before)

after that I may look at doing a challenge build with Chei but at the moment its just too frustrating for me, Its a complete waste of about an hour every time i get to the temple and choose chei haha!

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 14:52 by duvessa

If you don't enjoy playing Fedhas or Okawaru, Makhleb and Ru are also good options.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 15:03 by ZipZipskins

duvessa wrote:Makhleb and Ru are also good options.

Ru also has the benefit of being incredibly fun to use

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 15:30 by Lasty

Also, selecting Ru has the benefit of making me happy.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 18:32 by Rast

^ Yeah, but other than that it's a good choice.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 19:20 by PowerOfKaishin

I really hate it when people say that OpTm is some bottom tier trash. Like yeah you'll get splatted a lot on D:1 by adders and jackals, but who doesn't? They are the best Op class IMO.

I haven't ascended an OpTm but I have had one with 15 runes that died at the last floor of its 4th zig, so basically the same thing. I've splatted about 250 of them and I realize this is a lot, but failure is how you learn. Most of my splats past d:4 were because I always try to 15 rune, anyway. I should stop doing that.

UC is incredibly important. Unlike with weapon skills, raising UC makes you do more damage in addition to increasing your attack speed. As someone else said, Tm is a melee class that can use spells, not a spellcaster with melee. They make better use of might and berserk than they do brilliance. Amulet of Rage is godly early game, so long as you have rHubris.

I once had so much UC I got a stab on a sleeping 2-headed ogre in Spider Form and killed it in one hit (which is part of the reason why Stealth is niiiice, albeit less priority than you think). In conjunction with training UC I recommend also training Dodging and Fighting for EV and HP respectively. I put half as much in those two as I do UC. I stop training UC when it gets to 10 (while still training dodging and fighting) and then concentrate on Transmutations so I can get Ice Form castable and S2S's spell power up for more than just those unpoisonous constrictor snakes. Worth it to fit Stealth in there at some point after your offense gets to good levels. Op has a nice Stealth aptitude and with Stealth you too can one-shot sleeping monstrosities with your bare hands.

Op has constriction and it has a lot of nice benefits. It continuously deals extra damage to a lot of pesky annoyances, including jackals and adders (try to avoid adders in the first place though) making Op more of a glass cannon than a straight up weak melee race. Supposedly constriction being OP is the reason Nagas no longer have it from the get-go. I don't recommend constricting 8 things at once though. Constriction also gets rid of imps with impunity, since it greatly hinders their ability to teleport away. Lastly, once it hits, it sticks until you move. That means you only have to make one EV check. You will thank the heavens you have this if you fight an adder you just can't run away from (though adders are still super lethal as always).

I don't know constriction damage but after swapping to another race and trying Tm there, I can assure you the difference was extremely significant. Constriction isn't available in Ice Form, Spider Form and the like, but it is with Beastly Appendage, Blade Hands, Statue Form, and I believe Lichform. Obviously if you're going to be playing a melee-oriented Op you're going to be using constriction, but it's important not to forget about it when it comes to things like bats and imps. Disabling enemy Tele comes in handy many times during the game, not just for imps.

Use a shield. It's worth the damage penalty to offhand. The Shields skill is low priority in the early game, but it is only 4 levels to remove the penalty for a buckler. Even then, at the end of the day you can power through the buckler penalties with solid levels in the other appropriate stats.

You are a fragile race with only one base AC and desperate to get more in addition to your two levels of Frail. Enchant the first hat you find, no matter what it is. It's not like Enchant Armor is good for anything else anyway, since you'll probably have enough to enchant another hat to replace your first one at a later point in the game.

Now, onto spells:

First off, all transmutations allow the use of 8 rings, which is why I say OpTm has nice synergy.

Tentacle spike is important. As a level 1 spell Beastly Appendage is quite potent for D:1 and D:2. It falls off fast but you should absolutely remember that you have it for the early game.

Sticks to Snakes is one of the best spells in the entire game, at least until the end of orcs. It's a summon spell with no summon cap that at high transmutations summons 3 or 4 Moccasins at once. S2S is pretty much the only reason why you would train Transmutations for significant periods of time right off the bat, as S2S gets more than just a more lengthy duration with higher spellpower, unlike most other transmutations. S2S gives you the ability to run away, the ability to take out threats much stronger than yourself (including both Grinder and Sigmund, if it comes to it), a way to defend yourself, and just a hoard of fairly strong summons that don't fall off until after Orcs. If you're having trouble meleeing everything to death, chances are you've forgotten that you have this spell. I know I do at times but when I remember it I can take on almost any challenge.

Spider Form (along with S2S) is your early game. It is important to train transmutations right away for Spider Form. After you get Spider to what you will deem as castable, then you turn it off. I actually get it to 30% or 34% where it's no longer yellow and then cast it out of sight of monsters, but you may want lower failure rates. There's only so low it will go in the early game though, and I often find that my survivability is more helped by having the UC to back it up rather that a slightly less chance of getting fucked when I really need it. With high UC those situations where you really need it will be significantly lessened.

Level 3 transmutations plus an int boost gets my out of yellow and lets me start training UC by D:2 or halfway through D:1.

Spider Form raises your AC, gives you a massive boost to EV, a significant to-hit bonus in the early game, and trades constriction for deadly poison. Rings aren't melded either. Fighting adders in spider form seems like an awful idea on paper since they are weak to poison, but the best way to kill adders before Ice Form is as a spider. Generally speaking the penalty to poison doesn't matter as much considering you're only getting hit about 1/3rd as much as in your normal form anyway. In addition, you're hitting the adder a lot more and adders are also weak to poison. Spider Form is so strong you can actually melee Sigmund as soon as you see him and win more than you lose. I don't recommend this but if you feel like gaining level 6 by D:2 and don't care about your character, you might find it an interesting strategy. S2S alongside Spider Form practically guarantees a win in this situation provided you can amass the necessary army.

It seems unintuitive but thanks to the evasion, the early game to-hit bonus, and the fact that, other than constriction, you are just as damaging as in normal form, Spider Form is great for fighting undead, including Menkaure.

Blade Hands and Ice Form are of low importance early game. You want Ice Form for lair because rPois and some durability, but the main point of it is to help you take out Spiny Frogs, Black Mambas, and Hydras, which are the most significant threats in lair until the lower floors. However, Ice Form is useless against these without the necessary UC. You need about 13 or 14 before you can take on Spiny Frogs. Again, S2S helps out a lot here, so save those arrows!

Blade Hands is detrimental to go for immediately (bad use of very precious exp) and with how much damage high UC gets in conjunction with your other forms is often superfluous. However, it has the greatest DPS so use it if you need to kill something fast. It's also useful considering Ice Form and Spider Form fall off damage-wise way before Blade Hands does, but generally speaking, by the time that happens you should have Statue Form. Statue Form does considerable damage to pretty much anything anyway and lets you keep your shield, and doesn't take away a bunch of useful options in evocables and spellcasting. Blade Hands is a backburner spell that you only pull out in a handful of situations, such as when fighting anything with LRD or the like. Jorgrun or Deep Troll Mages, basically. I'm sure you know this, but don't Blade Hands against Hydras lol.

Statue Form is the end all be all for Op. They have the best statue form since they don't incur any of the equipment penalties (they "lose" every slot that they already can't use except for capes) while still keeping their amazing racial. Statue Form gives them disgusting offense while also providing armor that a normal fighter could only dream of having while not penalizing their EV or spellcasting. It also has something that Op can't get any other way: GDR. Oh, and Statue Form keeps constriction too, giving you quite a few reasons to attempt 8-enemy constriction (still not recommended but unless you're surrounded by 8 Orc Warlords or the like your chance of dying is low). Statue Form is great against anything in lair, but I highly doubt it will be castable in time to trivialize that branch.

Statue Form plus a way of forcing opponents to fight you one at a time will demolish just about anything in the early and mid game, no questions asked. Be careful around Jorgrun, but your other transmutations should give you an answer to him.

The speed penalty doesn't mean much when barely anything can damage you anyway. You're immune to poison as well, so you can get some use of Olgreb's as well, if you're into that. Op has 0 across the board for apts except for Poison, which is +3. Also, casting spells or using wands in Statue Form is still faster than ending transformation with Blade Hands and doing the same. You're also not super squishy after the former.

Remember that ALL transmutation spells give you the ability to morph back into your normal form. Do not forget about this, as you will need it more than handful of times throughout any ascension with OpTm.

Keep an eye out for other transmutation spells as well. Petrify is a big one, and is great at getting rid of annoying lair threats (you then stab them to death with your bare hands or just run away). Chances are if you've found Statue Form you also have Petrify and have it castable with a good success rate. Both Petrify and Statue Form are Earth spells as well, so you may find yourself branching into Earth. The smite-targed LRD helps a lot with a spellcasting class that has range issues. I got a lot of success taking out pesky orb spiders with it while using Statue Form to tank the hits of all of the other spiders.

Remember, you are still a spellcasting class and have a leg up on the fighters as a result, so don't neglect spellcasting. Your first level up is best spent on Int, after that Int is still good but getting Agi to 24 is more important. Str only helps with damage which Tm has almost no problem with anyway, so don't worry about it.

Don't think you're just limited to spellcasting either. A wand of polymorph can come in handy and potions of lignification will annihilate a ton of early game threats.

Now onto gods, or rather just god.

So uh... Gozag is the best god for OpTm, period. Some other gods (like Oka) may help more with early game survivability but for OpTm Gozag is generally all around the best if we include start to finish. You should be playing your strengths as an Op and Gozag allows your racial to reach its full potential. Without Gozag you'll have trouble even finding 8 rings much less optimizing them for a whole bunch of OP Op goodness. He will also be extremely helpful in many sections of the mid and late-game due to potion petition. I never bothered with bribe branch but reportedly that's extremely OP as well (friendly Orb of Fire, anyone?). Gold confusion has saved my ass several times when being chased, even by significantly faster opponents.

The early game will be harder and most will probably tell you that making the early game easier is worth making the game harder later, but Op really needs the ring slots to be filled with useful rings. I find it extremely difficult to progress to mid and especially late game without proper rings.

Fuck shoals. Don't do it until XL27. I'm almost not joking; I hate that damned place. Your racial helps but you can't hide nor run forever as Merfolk are faster than you and there are a lot of them.

Major threats that OpTm really doesn't have a good answer for include, but are not limited to:
- Grinder: OpTm can fight Grinder but their chance of winning is fairly low even with S2S. Not worth it.
- Killer Bees: Stockpile Iceblast. Unlike Adders you can't really melee Killer Bees to death in Spider Form. In Ice Form (which has rPois, if you haven't figured that out), you will still be incurring lots of poison damage and Killer Bees stings by themselves hurt a lot, nevermind the fact that there's generally 8 of them in one place. Stair dancing is an option with Ice Form though. S2S is less effective than normal but extra allies are always welcome and can make for good fodder when running away since they won't get continuously one-shot.
- Ice Beasts: Ice Form is the earliest way to deal with other Ice Beasts but chances are that if you have Ice Form castable by the time you first run into them you don't have the UC necessary to fight them.
- Unseen Horrors: Lure into a hallway and hope for the best. OpTm struggles with these without SInv. With SInv they're just annoying stronger versions of bats. Wands of Iceblast can help but you never know when the damn thing is right next to you and you will hit yourself. Unseen Horrors are why OpTm wants Corona. Unfortunately they move so fast and they're invisible, so reading Tele and trying to get around by using another stair case can prove extremely annoying considering they often appear on the same floor as a branch entrance.
- Gargoyles: Lure them close and then quaff Lignification, which will give you AC and HP to tank their attacks while also giving you the firepower to breach their AC. This is the only way to fight a Gargoyle pre-lair. If there is no easy way to get into range without getting reduced to <50% health, or if you don't have Lig, run away. Do not quaff Tree Form from a distance since Gargoyles can and will hit you with what is mostly likely going to be an unavoidable Stone Arrow since your EV is shit. Without Tree Form or Statue Form you can only fight them with Blade Hands, but you're still taking a lot of damage. It may be worth it if you can lure them into melee first, though. Op really has no good answer to this until Statue Form other than Lig. Thankfully they don't move faster than you.

Late game OpTm has Statue Form and with proper planning and tactics can literally walk into a closed corridor on Vaults:5 and melee everything to death.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 19:33 by crate

the reason optm is bad is because op is bad and tm is bad, it's not complicated

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 19:35 by PowerOfKaishin

crate wrote:the reason optm is bad is because op is bad and tm is bad, it's not complicated

A man can dream can't he? It's not a game-breaking easy race like Vs, Sp, or Ga, but it's more than serviceable.

The main reason Tm is bad is because of frailty and the main reason Op is bad is because of frailty. These two things don't stack with one another.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 20:07 by delarado

Thanks for all of the useful replies guys, PowerOf Kaishin I dont even know where to begin with all of that advice but no doubt ill be referring back to it while I play!

I've posted a CIP thread for my new OpTm of Oka in the lair.

I hope that if I don't splat him anytime soon I can 15 rune it by converting to TSO for the relevant parts and just melee everything to death for now.

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=20012

Wish me luck! I have a Hydra to kill in a sec...I'm not sure I'm prepared but I don't want that chasing me round a largely uncleared level.

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 21:54 by 4Hooves2Appendages

PowerOfKaishin wrote:I really hate it when people say that OpTm is some bottom tier trash. Like yeah you'll get splatted a lot on D:1 by adders and jackals, but who doesn't?

Not meaning to be nasty here, but the answer to that question is actually a fairly long list that goes something like this: MiBe, TrBe, GrBe, CeBe, DDBe, DrBe, VSBe, CeHu, TrMo, TrHu, TrFi, TrGl, MfIE, HuIE and so on (not exclusive and in no particular order).

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 22:02 by crate

optm is actually reasonably good on d:1 (op does a lot of damage) but it has problems quickly after that and you stay really bad for quite a while since you're basically hutm with less ac and hp for much of the game

Monday, 23rd May 2016, 22:05 by delarado

I don't think ive actually ever been splatted on D:1 as an OpTm weirdly. I don't mind if i do die on D:1 either as i havent wasted much time.

I did almost die the other day though against an adder, Beastly appendage failed to cast four times in a row with a 3% fail rate. I actually keep finding that RNGesus hates me in this game. Earlier on i had spider form fail 6 times in a row with a 7% or so fail rate, and I missed an "almost dead" centaur 5 or six times in a row as a spider (which led to my demise)

Anyway, thanks for all the advice, im going to go post in the other thread now about some things I dont understand

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 10:15 by delarado

Interested on advice now, that shield gimps my ice form casting. Should I just carry it a while and train shields?

So far I'm using my great sling (as it seems really good) but have stopped training it. I generally shoot stuff until its 1 tile away and then ice form and kill it.

Problem now though is there's a hydra on lair:1 and two of them on lair:3 (Including an 8 headed one) so I'm not sure what to do. I've done the first room of the orcish mines but don't want to go downstairs yet for obvious reasons.

I'm also looking at my spells, and I genuinely cannot see a use for alastairs intoxication, am i missing something? Toxic radiance seems good on paper but I don't fancy poisoning myself, and as mentioned i guess this is a melee guy not a caster.

I worry about using blade hands because I don't think I have the HP to support it... am I wrong and should i start to use it?

Code:: Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup version 0.18.1-8-gdd0e5ea (webtiles) character file. Delarado the Martial Artist (Octopode Transmuter) Turns: 19908, Time: 02:12:08 Health: 81/81 AC: 3 Str: 11 XL: 12 Next: 97% Magic: 21/21 EV: 16 Int: 20 God: Okawaru [******] Gold: 422 SH: 9 Dex: 17 Spells: 4 memorised, 13 levels left rFire + . . SeeInvis . y - +2 greatsling (flame) rCold + . . Gourm . F - +2 shield of Resistance {rF+ rC+ MR+} rNeg + . . Faith . d - +1 hat {MR+} rPois + Spirit . g - amulet of regeneration rElec . Dismiss . e - ring of poison resistance rCorr . Reflect . j - ring of positive energy SustAt . Harm . r - +2 ring of evasion MR ++... a - +1 ring of protection (curse) Stlth +++....... (no ring) (no ring) (no ring) (no ring) @: very resistant to hostile enchantments, fairly stealthy A: almost no armour, amphibious, 8 rings, constrict 8, camouflage 1, agile 2, clever 1, gelatinous body 1 a: Heroism, Finesse, Renounce Religion You are on level 9 of the Dungeon. You worship Okawaru. Okawaru is exalted by your worship. You are not hungry. You have visited 4 branches of the dungeon, and seen 16 of its levels. You have collected 1473 gold pieces. You have spent 1051 gold pieces at shops. Inventory: Hand Weapons y - a +2 greatsling of flaming (weapon) W - a +0 blowgun Missiles i - 48 poisoned needles l - 319 arrows n - 23 sling bullets (quivered) Armour d - a +1 hat of magic resistance (worn) F - the +2 shield of Resistance (worn) {rF+ rC+ MR+} (You bought it in a shop on level 9 of the Dungeon) It protects you from fire. It protects you from cold. It affects your resistance to hostile enchantments. Jewellery a - a cursed +1 ring of protection (on tentacle) e - a ring of poison resistance (left tentacle) g - an amulet of regeneration (around mantle) j - a ring of positive energy (right tentacle) r - a +2 ring of evasion (on tentacle) E - a ring of dexterity G - an uncursed amulet of magic regeneration M - an uncursed amulet of dismissal O - a thick ruby amulet Wands x - a wand of enslavement B - a wand of iceblast C - a wand of paralysis {zapped: 6} D - a wand of lightning J - a wand of lightning R - a wand of flame {zapped: 3} Z - a wand of flame Scrolls f - 3 scrolls of enchant armour p - a scroll of recharging q - 4 scrolls of remove curse t - a scroll of amnesia L - a scroll labeled XEYBOI ACZEWI P - 2 scrolls of enchant weapon Q - a scroll of blinking S - a scroll of teleportation T - 2 scrolls labeled PEQAF BITT U - 2 scrolls of magic mapping V - 2 scrolls of fear Y - a scroll of fog Potions k - 3 potions of heal wounds m - a potion of magic o - 2 potions of mutation s - 2 potions of ambrosia u - 3 potions of curing v - 2 potions of lignification w - 4 potions of haste z - a potion of agility A - 3 potions of flight I - 3 potions of brilliance N - 2 potions of cure mutation Books b - a book of Changes Spells Type Level a - Beastly Appendage Transmutation 1 b - Sticks to Snakes Transmutation 2 c - Spider Form Transmutation/Poison 3 d - Ice Form Ice/Transmutation 4 e - Blade Hands Transmutation 5 K - a book of Beasts Spells Type Level a - Summon Butterflies Summoning 1 b - Call Canine Familiar Summoning 3 c - Summon Ice Beast Ice/Summoning 4 d - Summon Mana Viper Hexes/Summoning 5 e - Summon Hydra Summoning 7 X - a book of Envenomations Spells Type Level a - Spider Form Transmutation/Poison 3 b - Olgreb's Toxic Radiance Poison 4 c - Alistair's Intoxication Transmutation/Poison 5 d - Poisonous Cloud Conjuration/Poison/Air 6 Comestibles c - 8 bread rations h - a royal jelly H - 42 fruits Skills: + Level 7.1 Fighting - Level 3.3 Slings + Level 7.2 Dodging * Level 13.9 Unarmed Combat - Level 6.0 Spellcasting - Level 9.0 Transmutations - Level 4.4 Ice Magic - Level 4.1 Poison Magic + Level 0.0 Invocations You have 13 spell levels left. You know the following spells: Your Spells Type Power Failure Level Hunger a - Beastly Appendage Trmt #####. 1% 1 None b - Sticks to Snakes Trmt #####... 2% 2 None c - Spider Form Trmt/Pois ####...... 17% 3 ##..... d - Ice Form Ice/Trmt ####.... 52% 4 ####... Dungeon Overview and Level Annotations Branches: Dungeon (11/15) Temple (1/1) D:6 Lair (3/8) D:9 Orc (1/2) D:11 Swamp: Lair:3-6 Shoals: Lair:3-6 Snake: Lair:3-6 Spider: Lair:3-6 Altars: Ashenzari Cheibriados Dithmenos Elyvilon Fedhas Gozag Kikubaaqudgha Makhleb Nemelex Xobeh Okawaru Pakellas Qazlal Ru Sif Muna Trog Vehumet Xom Yredelemnul Zin The Shining One Shops: D:9 [ D:11 * Orc:1 ?(%= Annotations: D:3 exclusion: downstairs D:5 CyborgNinja's ghost, novice TrTm D:11 Josephine Lair:3 exclusion: hydra Innate Abilities, Weirdness & Mutations You cannot wear most types of armour. You are amphibious. You can wear up to eight rings at the same time. You can use your tentacles to constrict eight enemies at once. Your skin changes colour to match your surroundings (Stealth). Your rubbery body absorbs attacks (AC +1). You are very agile. (Dex +4) Your mind is acute. (Int +2) Message History n - 17 sling bullets (gained 1) Things that are here: a falchion; a runed chain mail; an orc corpse n - 18 sling bullets (gained 1); E - a ring of dexterity Things that are here: an enchanted flail; a club; an orc corpse n - 22 sling bullets (gained 4) n - 23 sling bullets (gained 1) There is an open door here. There is an entrance to Mippea's Armour Boutique here. F - the +2 shield of Resistance {rF+ rC+ MR+} Thank you for shopping at Mippea's Armour Boutique! Wear which item? (? for menu, Esc to quit) You start putting on your armour. You continue putting on the +2 shield of Resistance {rF+ rC+ MR+}. x4 You finish putting on the +2 shield of Resistance {rF+ rC+ MR+}. There is an open door here. Casting: Ice Form Confirm with . or Enter, or press ? or * to list all spells. Okay, then. #>.........# #. #.##.###.#.# #. #.##.# #.#.# #. #..#.# #.#.#########. ###'#.###.#.#..S[..... #.'∩'..##.#.#.#######. #.#'##....#(#># #. #......##..(..#######. ##.##@.##.<).......... #.##..##.))..#####..# #..........#.#####>.# ####..##.###......... #..##.####.#####.# #..#.....#.# #<# #..#)###.#.# #.# #....# #.#.# #.# ##.#.###.#.# #.# There are no monsters in sight! Vanquished Creatures Pikel (D:4) 2 orc knights (Orc:1) A manticore (D:11) A cyclops (D:11) 3 spiny frogs A black mamba (Lair:2) A gargoyle (D:11) A komodo dragon (Lair:1) The ghost of Potsanchik the Poker, an amateur NaWr (D:4) 4 trolls 3 blink frogs (Lair:1) 2 wraiths 26 yaks A wyvern (D:9) 2 basilisks Grum (D:9) Menkaure (D:7) 9 hippogriffs Edmund (D:4) A warg (D:11) 3 porcupines 4 water moccasins 11 orc warriors 6 sky beasts 4 black bears 4 phantoms 2 slaves (D:4) An ice beast (D:10) 6 ogres A necrophage (D:5) 3 wolves (D:9) 12 centaurs 9 crocodiles 2 big kobolds (D:9) 17 giant frogs A gnoll sergeant (D:9) A water moccasin skeleton (D:7) 4 scorpions 8 killer bees 6 wights 5 howler monkeys A centaur zombie (D:8) 5 crimson imps A wasp zombie (D:9) 2 quasits 7 hounds 3 jellies Crazy Yiuf (D:7) A centaur skeleton (D:6) 9 orc priests 11 orc wizards 2 giant frog skeletons 6 iguanas 8 worker ants A hound zombie (D:9) A hound skeleton (D:7) 24 river rats 18 adders 2 howler monkey skeletons (D:9) 4 shadow imps 5 oozes An adder zombie (D:5) 5 worms 4 dart slugs 3 giant geckos 37 orcs A ball python (D:5) 7 giant cockroaches 6 hobgoblins 8 jackals 4 quokkas A ball python skeleton (D:5) 9 bats 2 giant gecko skeletons 9 giant newts 8 goblins 14 kobolds A quokka skeleton (D:4) 15 rats 420 creatures vanquished. Vanquished Creatures (collateral kills) 2 hill giants A spiny frog (Lair:1) A komodo dragon (Lair:1) A centaur zombie (D:9) A giant frog skeleton (D:5) An iguana (D:5) 2 adders (D:4) A giant cockroach (D:4) A quokka (D:4) 11 creatures vanquished. Vanquished Creatures (others) A worker ant (D:4) A fungus (Lair:2) 2 creatures vanquished. Grand Total: 433 creatures vanquished Notes Turn | Place | Note -------------------------------------------------------------- 0 | D:1 | Delarado the Octopode Transmuter began the quest for the Orb. 0 | D:1 | Reached XP level 1. HP: 13/13 MP: 3/3 78 | D:1 | Reached XP level 2. HP: 12/18 MP: 5/5 555 | D:1 | Reached skill level 4 in Unarmed Combat 626 | D:1 | Reached XP level 3. HP: 23/23 MP: 4/6 1336 | D:2 | Reached XP level 4. HP: 28/28 MP: 7/7 1499 | D:2 | Reached skill level 5 in Unarmed Combat 1660 | D:2 | Learned a level 2 spell: Sticks to Snakes 2176 | D:3 | Learned a level 3 spell: Spider Form 2260 | D:3 | Reached XP level 5. HP: 33/33 MP: 8/8 2542 | D:3 | Reached skill level 1 in Poison Magic 3134 | D:4 | Noticed Pikel 3134 | D:4 | Noticed a slave 3134 | D:4 | Noticed a slave 3134 | D:4 | Noticed a slave 3134 | D:4 | Noticed a slave 3136 | D:4 | Noticed Potsanchik's ghost (amateur NaWr) 3353 | D:4 | Noticed Edmund 3578 | D:5 | Entered Level 5 of the Dungeon 3624 | D:5 | Noticed CyborgNinja's ghost (novice TrTm) 3728 | D:5 | Noticed a phantom 3785 | D:5 | Reached XP level 6. HP: 39/39 MP: 9/9 3924 | D:5 | Noticed a necrophage 3941 | D:5 | Killed a necrophage 4359 | D:4 | Killed Edmund 4359 | D:4 | Reached XP level 7. HP: 45/45 MP: 4/10 4407 | D:4 | Learned a level 4 spell: Ice Form 4414 | D:4 | Found a deep blue altar of Sif Muna. 4414 | D:4 | Found a stormy altar of Qazlal. 4936 | D:4 | Killed Pikel 4936 | D:4 | Reached skill level 5 in Transmutations 4936 | D:4 | Reached XP level 8. HP: 26/54 MP: 8/11 5077 | D:4 | Killed Potsanchik's ghost 6215 | D:5 | Found a sacrificial altar of Ru. 6232 | D:5 | Reached skill level 5 in Dodging 6521 | D:5 | Reached skill level 5 in Fighting 6675 | D:6 | Reached XP level 9. HP: 61/61 MP: 8/12 6815 | D:6 | Found an opulent altar of Gozag. 7538 | D:6 | Reached skill level 6 in Unarmed Combat 8055 | D:6 | Found a staircase to the Ecumenical Temple. 8064 | Temple | Entered the Ecumenical Temple 8151 | Temple | Became a worshipper of Warmaster Okawaru 8258 | D:7 | Noticed a red ugly thing 8436 | D:7 | Reached skill level 7 in Unarmed Combat 8580 | D:7 | Noticed Crazy Yiuf 8591 | D:7 | Killed Crazy Yiuf 8729 | D:7 | Reached * piety under Okawaru 9012 | D:7 | Noticed Menkaure 9085 | D:7 | Killed Menkaure 9132 | D:7 | Reached XP level 10. HP: 64/66 MP: 8/13 9509 | D:7 | Reached skill level 8 in Unarmed Combat 10118 | D:8 | Reached ** piety under Okawaru 10154 | D:8 | Noticed a hill giant 10278 | D:8 | Killed a hill giant 10727 | D:9 | Noticed Grum 10794 | D:9 | Killed Grum 10794 | D:9 | Reached skill level 9 in Unarmed Combat 11014 | D:9 | Reached *** piety under Okawaru 11510 | D:9 | Reached skill level 10 in Unarmed Combat 11521 | D:9 | Noticed a hill giant 11701 | D:9 | Found Mippea's Armour Boutique. 11896 | D:9 | Reached XP level 11. HP: 71/71 MP: 14/16 12123 | D:9 | Killed a hill giant 12123 | D:9 | Reached **** piety under Okawaru 12448 | D:9 | Found a staircase to the Lair. 13092 | Lair:1 | Entered Level 1 of the Lair of Beasts 13187 | Lair:1 | Reached skill level 11 in Unarmed Combat 13578 | Lair:1 | Reached skill level 5 in Spellcasting 13613 | Lair:1 | Reached ***** piety under Okawaru 13921 | Lair:1 | Noticed a five-headed hydra 14234 | Lair:2 | Reached skill level 12 in Unarmed Combat 14947 | Lair:2 | Reached ****** piety under Okawaru 15069 | Lair:2 | Reached XP level 12. HP: 77/77 MP: 16/21 15453 | Lair:3 | Noticed a six-headed hydra 16028 | Lair:3 | Noticed an eight-headed hydra 16190 | D:10 | Entered Level 10 of the Dungeon 16198 | D:10 | Received a gift from Okawaru 16588 | D:10 | Reached skill level 13 in Unarmed Combat 16629 | D:10 | Found a sacrificial altar of Ru. 17290 | D:11 | Reached skill level 1 in Slings 17516 | D:11 | Found a staircase to the Orcish Mines. 17934 | D:11 | Found Xaickant's Assorted Antiques. 18020 | D:11 | Bought a scroll of identify for 44 gold pieces 18020 | D:11 | Bought a scroll of identify for 44 gold pieces 18038 | D:11 | Noticed Josephine 18515 | Orc:1 | Entered Level 1 of the Orcish Mines 18515 | Orc:1 | Found Saadd's Food Shop. 18653 | D:11 | Gained mutation: You are agile. (Dex +2) [potion of mutation] 18653 | D:11 | Gained mutation: Your mind is acute. (Int +2) [potion of mutation] 18653 | D:11 | Gained mutation: You are very agile. (Dex +4) [potion of mutation] 19236 | Orc:1 | Found Xenk's Jewellery Boutique. 19240 | Orc:1 | Bought a cursed +1 ring of protection for 26 gold pieces 19240 | Orc:1 | Bought a cursed -3 ring of strength for 26 gold pieces 19240 | Orc:1 | Bought a cursed -2 ring of intelligence for 26 gold pieces 19517 | Orc:1 | Found Jikofuem's Weapon Shoppe. 19567 | Orc:1 | Found Geakuny's Magic Scroll Emporium. 19583 | Orc:1 | Bought a scroll of enchant armour for 90 gold pieces 19583 | Orc:1 | Bought a scroll of identify for 24 gold pieces 19583 | Orc:1 | Bought a scroll of identify for 24 gold pieces 19583 | Orc:1 | Bought a scroll of enchant weapon for 90 gold pieces 19745 | D:11 | Received a gift from Okawaru 19900 | D:9 | Bought the +2 shield of Resistance {rF+ rC+ MR+} for 657 gold pieces Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 | ---------------+-------------------------------------+----- Unarmed Combat | 4 5 7 10 12 13 | 13.9 Transmutations | 3 4 5 6 8 9 | 9.0 Poison Magic | 2 3 4 | 4.1 Fighting | 2 3 5 7 | 7.1 Dodging | 3 5 7 | 7.2 Ice Magic | 2 3 4 | 4.4 Spellcasting | 3 6 | 6.0 Slings | 3 | 3.3 Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 | 10-12 || total -------------------------+-------+-------+-------+-------++------- Melee: Unarmed | 54 | 42 | 233 | 724 || 1053 Constrict | 17 | 8 | 6 | 7 || 38 Tentacles | 10 | 4 | 3 | 9 || 26 Kick | 4 | 4 | 1 | 2 || 11 Punch | 2 | 2 | 1 | 3 || 8 Hunting sling | | 5 | | || 5 Fire: Hunting sling | 24 | 174 | 147 | 54 || 399 Greatsling | | | | 143 || 143 Throw: Stone | 14 | 8 | 6 | 50 || 78 Cast: Beastly Appendage | 1 | 6 | 3 | 4 || 14 Sticks to Snakes | | 17 | 21 | 25 || 63 Spider Form | | 3 | 40 | 37 || 80 Ice Form | | | 1 | 70 || 71 Invok: Heroism | | | | 2 || 2 Finesse | | | | 1 || 1 Abil: End Transformatio | | 2 | | 1 || 3 Evoke: Wand | | | | 2 || 2 Use: Scroll | 3 | 4 | 4 | 18 || 29 Potion | | 3 | | 2 || 5 Stab: Sleeping | 3 | | 1 | 2 || 6 Distracted | | | 1 | 2 || 3 Paralysed | | | | 4 || 4 Eat: Chunk | 1 | 5 | 12 | 18 || 36 Pizza | | 1 | 1 | || 2 Beef jerky | | 1 | 1 | 3 || 5 Meat ration | | 1 | 1 | 5 || 7 Bread ration | | | | 1 || 1 Armor: Skin | 3 | 6 | 7 | 93 || 109 Dodge: Dodged | 28 | 60 | 202 | 517 || 807

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 12:11 by Lasty

You should take off the shield for now, use the sling and also wands to kill hydras, and use ice form for your primary form of attack. Ice form gives you bonus HP and AC that you need as well as giving you a very strong offense.

If the sling and wands aren't enough to kill hydras, you probably should just avoid them. Your shield won't help much against them and your defenses are too low to give you good odds in combat.

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 13:34 by delarado

Shield gone.

So, after encountering a Hydra on Lair:1. And another two on lair:3. And another two on lair:4. And then one on lair:2 as well when I was stair dancing something else.... I Realised that every floor of lair seems to have at least one hydra in this game.

With ice form and heroism I can kill them though. IVe killed a few now.

However, I got given a shield by Okawaru, i equipped it and it has given me a mutation. Is this really intended? Seems like a pretty shitty mechanic to me if a god gifts you something that causes you mutations!

Chardump:

Spoiler: show

Code:: G - the +7 buckler of Reason {*Contam rPois Int+7} Message History The five-headed hydra is severely wounded. The five-headed hydra misses you. The five-headed hydra bites you! The five-headed hydra bites you but does no damage. The five-headed hydra misses you. The five-headed hydra bites you! Your body shudders with the violent release of wild energies! You feel frail. You feel less contaminated with magical energies. You punch the five-headed hydra! You freeze the five-headed hydra. You kill the five-headed hydra!

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 14:20 by PowerOfKaishin

delarado wrote:Shield gone.

So, after encountering a Hydra on Lair:1. And another two on lair:3. And another two on lair:4. And then one on lair:2 as well when I was stair dancing something else.... I Realised that every floor of lair seems to have at least one hydra in this game.

With ice form and heroism I can kill them though. IVe killed a few now.

However, I got given a shield by Okawaru, i equipped it and it has given me a mutation. Is this really intended? Seems like a pretty shitty mechanic to me if a god gifts you something that causes you mutations!

Chardump:
Spoiler: show
http://underhound.eu:81/crawl/morgue/Delarado/Delarado.txt

Code:
G - the +7 buckler of Reason {*Contam rPois Int+7} Message History The five-headed hydra is severely wounded. The five-headed hydra misses you. The five-headed hydra bites you! The five-headed hydra bites you but does no damage. The five-headed hydra misses you. The five-headed hydra bites you! Your body shudders with the violent release of wild energies! You feel frail. You feel less contaminated with magical energies. You punch the five-headed hydra! You freeze the five-headed hydra. You kill the five-headed hydra!

That's a bitchin' shield. However, IIRC, *contam only procs when you take it off. >.>

Frail is generally considered high priority to get rid of, so quaff cure mut. But before that you may want to quaff mutation since you have nothing to lose. It might get rid of frail and give you something good.

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 14:40 by Sar

PowerOfKaishin wrote:Unlike with weapon skills, raising UC makes you do more damage in addition to increasing your attack speed.

"Raising both your damage and attack speed" is exactly how weapon skills work (until you hit mindelay)...

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 14:47 by ZipZipskins

PowerOfKaishin wrote:Frail is generally considered high priority to get rid of, so quaff cure mut. But before that you may want to quaff mutation since you have nothing to lose. It might get rid of frail and give you something good.

you do have something to lose and that's mut giving you two bad mutations and something great and cure mut removing the three things that mut gave you, leaving you out a cure mut and with frail

so probably don't drink a potion of mut

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 16:23 by delarado

So, I previously had two good mutations from rolling the "lets drink a potion of mutation" dice. Which is why I was so annoyed that a god gave me something that forced me to have a mutation (As I understand it, there is nothing I could have done to stop that Contam from mutating me, right?)

The shield was unidentified when it was god given. And yes, it is a Bitchin shield, but I don't think players expect to have to identify god gifts to see if they are potentially harmful. So honestly, I feel like thats pretty crappy that Okawaru gives things like that, or at least that they aren't identified when you get them.

On a side note.... "he who dares wins" and all that...

Code:: You drop 63 poisoned needles. i - 2 potions of mutation Drink which item? (? for menu, Esc to quit) You feel extremely strange. You feel stupid. You feel yourself wasting away. You begin to heal more quickly. Drink which item? (? for menu, Esc to quit) It has a very clean taste. You feel robust. You feel clumsy. You feel healthier. A: almost no armour, amphibious, 8 rings, constrict 8, camouflage 1, agile 1, regeneration 1, gelatinous body 1

I rolled the dice, and won! I lost my agile 2 and clever 1, but the shield makes up for the clever, and i can take dex at level ups now i have a +7 int shield. So I'm left with regeneration.

Question - Does it stack with amulet of regen?

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 16:31 by njvack

Oka and Trog will absolutely gift items with *Contam and distortion brands. Identifying artefacts before putting them on is a great use of the pile of ?Identify you'll pile up by the late game.

Also... "he who dares wins" is really bad in Crawl (and roguelikes in general). With mutations it's kind of OK as long as you're willing to deal with bad mutations, but more generally, minimizing risk is basically the key to winning this game.

All sources of regen stack.

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 17:03 by delarado

njvack wrote:Oka and Trog will absolutely gift items with *Contam and distortion brands. Identifying artefacts before putting them on is a great use of the pile of ?Identify you'll pile up by the late game.

Also... "he who dares wins" is really bad in Crawl (and roguelikes in general). With mutations it's kind of OK as long as you're willing to deal with bad mutations, but more generally, minimizing risk is basically the key to winning this game.

All sources of regen stack.

Yes I agree about the "who dares wins" it was just a figure of speech. I have played this game you know haha

Re: the god gifts, I'd expect that from Xom but not from the others. I think that's kind of crappy.

Identify seem to be thin on the ground at the moment for me which is annoying! I've just finished lair:7 and D:14. Thats it for the night now

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 19:02 by PowerOfKaishin

Sar wrote:
PowerOfKaishin wrote:Unlike with weapon skills, raising UC makes you do more damage in addition to increasing your attack speed.

"Raising both your damage and attack speed" is exactly how weapon skills work (until you hit mindelay)...

Right, right, that's true. Obviously the faster you swing the more damage you do, but UC also improves the base damage of fists to rival that of Big Fucking Sword and the like while having the same delay at the same or a lower skill level (16ish UC for .7, which is the lowest that most BFW get, and most require more than that to reach .7). Transmuters make up for the lack of brand and enchantment by having Blade Hands and Statue Form, the former of which easily blows any actual weapon out the water (albeit only at max UC, but hey, it can at least match those weapons in the mean time and you don't have to actually find and enchant something), and the latter gives you armour with no spellcasting or EV penalties in exchange for making you slow enough that Chei would love you forever.

I almost forgot: Op has significantly less reason than most to learn Blade Hands, but if you don't have Statue Form it's actually a good idea. I underrated it since I normally play Gozag (and thus almost always have access to Statue Form via book shop), but Op has no aptitude problems with UC, Fighting, or Dodging, and doesn't have to use exp on Armour, meaning that if you can get Blade Hands to a castable level, you can do nothing but pump these three skills and your Op will be sturdy enough to melee most things to death. Blade Hands is also competent damage-wise for literally the entire game, unlike Ice Form and Spider Form.

Also Op Blade Hands looks badass. Their tentacles all turn into blades. I would fucking shit my pants if I ran into a Blade Hands Op in a dungeon. Unfortunately they do not get 8 attacks (wonder if I should suggest this).

Oh, and on the cure mutations issue: I forgot that they don't always cure at least 4 muts. However, cure mutation doesn't have any other use (provided you don't haste way too often) until you get to abyss and the like, since malmutate isn't a thing until then, with the exception of some unlucky Orc:2 spawns or Orc High Priest/Sorcerer summons.

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 19:07 by Sar

PowerOfKaishin wrote:Obviously the faster you swing the more damage you do

No, you don't get me, weapon skill (and Fighting) also improve base damage of a weapon, which is the whole reason why people say that base damage is more important than enchantment. The "until mindelay" part was referring to speed only, damage still continues to increase (but it's probably not worth training it solely for it).

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 19:33 by delarado

Ive been experimenting with blade hands... it kills most things in a hit or two (spiny frogs, manticores etc)

I still worry about my lack of AC when i use it though. Its only about 6 or 7 AC difference but that makes a fair lot of difference when I'm getting punched in the face.

Am I doing it wrong and should i be defaulting to blade hands? or should ice form still be my go to at this stage?

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 19:56 by duvessa

Basically everything PowerOfKaishin said was terrible advice, with the single exception of pointing out sticks to snakes is broken, which is true.

Ice form and blade hands have similar damage for most of the game. Since you mention spiny frogs I will assume you are talking about Lair. The default form for most Tms (i.e. ones that trained dodging) in Lair should be spider form, not ice form or blade hands, because spider form has EV and ice form does not. Ice form is, however, specifically good against cold-blooded monsters (all frogs and snakes, to a lesser extent hydras) because it slows them. It is similar in D and Orc.

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 20:20 by crate

the problem is that people see that UC skill improves UC "base damage" but the problem is that UC "base damage" is not at all the same thing as weapon "base damage" and calling them the same thing is really bad

use fsim if you need to compare UC to weapons

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 20:24 by PowerOfKaishin

Duvvy definitely didn't read my entire post, since there is no way the rest of it is completely wrong.

Spider Form is nice for most things in lair, sure, but the most dangerous threats before very late lair (when Death Yaks and Catoplepas start appearing) are solved with Ice Form (or running away; you really should not fight Hydras if you don't have to) and trying to use Spider Form against these threats will get you killed since they simply attack so fast and the EV doesn't do much. As for Death Yaks and Catoplepas, Spider Form EV will only carry you so far and it is generally safer to kill those things as fast as you can as they tend to do less damage to a character with 20 EV and crazy offense than they do to a character with 30 EV that can't kill them as quickly. In my experience poison really doesn't cut it for Death Yaks. They're just too durable. I often get hit about 3 or 4 times when fighting them in Spider Form. I get hit less with Blade Hands since despite lessened evasion I kill them crazy fast.

Spider Form is good for most of the rest of D as well as Orc, but so is Tm in general. You're at a high enough level that you trivialize most of D (with proper tactics) up until 14 or 15. In D the trouble arises at the later floors, where Spider Form doesn't do enough damage.

The most dangerous threats in Orc are going to be Orc High Priests or Sorcerers, where Blade Hands is the best option because you want to kill those things fast.

Orc is high priority immediately after lair, because of those shops. This is doubly true since you worship Oka instead of Gozag. I pray you find jewelry.

As for your question:

The problem with giving you advice on which form is best is because crawl is designed so that A: that answer changes heavily based on the situation and your resources and B: there are multiple correct answers.

Ice Form gives you rPois and slows a bunch of annoying things in lair, so it's better against Spiny Frogs and Black Mambas and *obviously* better against Hydras. But that's by itself. If you already have rPois then maybe it's not. Ice Form should kill things in 3 or 4 hits whereas Blade Hands kills them in 1 to 2. However, Ice Form prevents cold-blooded enemies from attacking as frequently (that's all three of Black Mambas, Hydras, and Spiny Frogs, as if I haven't said it enough), gives you better durability, doesn't restrict your spellcasting as much (wands are unusable for both forms), and doesn't decapitate Hydras.

Against Wolves and Lolar Bears Blade Hands is better because those creatures have rC+ and Ice Form doesn't do as much damage to them. This is different with Ice Beasts, as being in Ice Form defends from their attacks as well and Blade Hands will make you hurt when they bite you. Spider Form works on these too and doesn't take as much from your hunger while keeping you safer, so you'll probably prefer that. You shouldn't be pulling out your big guns for bottom tier threats anyway.

Ice Form will fall off later as the bonuses to your durability from a relative stand point become less and less significant. Blade Hands is better for Orcs, but most things in Orcs fall to Spider Form as well. However, there are threats in Orcs that Blade Hands is practically necessary for, such as Orcish Sorcerers and High Priests, who can potentially paralyze you or summon awful, awful nasties. At the same time, any situation in Orcs dangerous enough to warrant Blade Hands over Ice Form or Spider Form you should be employing kiting and supporting your offense with S2S anyway.

Sar wrote:
PowerOfKaishin wrote:Obviously the faster you swing the more damage you do

No, you don't get me, weapon skill (and Fighting) also improve base damage of a weapon, which is the whole reason why people say that base damage is more important than enchantment. The "until mindelay" part was referring to speed only, damage still continues to increase (but it's probably not worth training it solely for it).

How does this compare to UC?

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 20:26 by duvessa

wolves do not even have rC...

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 20:27 by crate

it's pretty reasonable to use ice form all game instead of blade hands

most people don't do it, because they build their characters to be blade hands characters, but for octopode I think ice form might actually legitimately be better than blade hands

Tuesday, 24th May 2016, 20:34 by PowerOfKaishin

crate wrote:it's pretty reasonable to use ice form all game instead of blade hands

most people don't do it, because they build their characters to be blade hands characters, but for octopode I think ice form might actually legitimately be better than blade hands

Yeah, because generally speaking Op loses only hats when they transform unlike most other races, causing them to gain AC.

Wednesday, 25th May 2016, 09:24 by 4Hooves2Appendages

delarado wrote:(As I understand it, there is nothing I could have done to stop that Contam from mutating me, right?)

Potion of cancellation clears some contamination I believe. There are other more esoteric ways that work too, but they aren't very practical.