The Tavern

What skills should a spen take at various levels? Here is my morgue file:http://crawl.berotato.org/crawl/morgue/arandomperson12/arandomperson12.txt.

Here is a well-known guide for SpEn from a very good player. You can find it in the learndb under the entries "hyperbolic" and ''spen.''

learndb wrote:22:45:31 Sequell | My 0.16 SpEn guide: SKILLS: Approximate goals are as follows: 1) 5 Short Blades,
| 8 Stealth. 2) 4 Spellcasting, 8 Hexes. 3) 3 Fighting, 8 Dodging. 4) 8 Short
| Blades, 12 Stealth. 5) 6 Fighting/Spellcasting, 10 Short Blades/Hexes, 15
| Dodging/Stealth. 6) 10 Fighting, 27 Stealth, and whatever spell skills you want.
| / SPELLS: Use Ensorcelled Hibernation when possible. Use Confuse against rC+
| monsters
22:45:31 Sequell | or if you want a higher success chance. Other starting spells are decent but
| unnecessary. Invisibility is the best spell in the game if you find it. Other
| good spells include Haste, Repel Missiles, Dispel Undead, Apportation, Blink,
| Passage of Golubria, Controlled Blink. / GODS: Ideally you want a god who helps
| with hard-to-stab monsters. Some good choices: Kiku (pain melee, zombies), Dith
22:45:31 Sequell | (shadow step, shadow form), Jiyva (slimify), Lugonu (corruption, disto melee),
| Makhleb (greater demons), Ashenzari/Vehumet (conjurations). / WEAPONS: Use short
| blades, stab high-HP monsters with a dagger. For regular melee, early on look
| for elec, draining, or venom weapons. Later look for a quick blade and/or pain
| brand a weapon with Kiku. Distortion is nice also. If you can't find a quick
| blade
22:45:31 Sequell | and want better melee, demon whips are reasonable. Oh, and get a buckler. STATS:
| Raise Int or Dex.

I've found Tukima's Dance, in the starting spell book now, to be very helpful as well.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure if Tukima's would have in the book of Maledictions in 0.16, it would have been mentioned in that guide.

I also have a fen folio. Are the spells in that any good? Also, is Gozag a good god?

Corpses' rot is very strong all the game (especially f you bother to kite things to corpse) and require 0 experience for a SpEn. Perhaps leda's isn't terrible for a SpEn, I have no idea.
I wouldn't bother with the others.
Gozag power wise is kinda passablein current version, he has no particularly synergy with a SpEn so you could take it or not if you have found an early altar, as you like. Obliviously, corpses' rot doesn't work with Gozag, so don't learn it in that case.
If you're in temple there are much better choices - the list posted earlier is obliviously very good. Personally I wouldn't ever take Vehumet with a SpEn but who am I to criticize aElliptic's advic

Spriggans are surprisingly decent with arbalests, so you can grab one and play like a centaur of sorts. It's good to have some Str items or level up investment for it though or it will take ages to kill things later on.

I just don't like stabbers and spellcasters, I guess.

nago wrote:Gozag (...) has no particularly synergy with a SpEn

I'd have to disagree. It turns every corpse(for which you otherwise have no use unless you go Necro) into gold/piety(Sp synergy), and gold distractions provide free stabbing opportunities(En synergy)

I found some evocable items (sack of spiders, lamp of fire, several wands). Should I train evocations?

Evocation will certainly help you use those items, which are pretty good. Maybe don't make it your first and only priority, but evocations is nearly always worth some investment.

How do I kill death yaks? I managed to get a few of them by luring them to the stairs one by one, then kiting them on the level above while spamming confuse, until they are confused, then running in and stabbing them to death.

arandomperson12 wrote:How do I kill death yaks? I managed to get a few of them by luring them to the stairs one by one, then kiting them on the level above while spamming confuse, until they are confused, then running in and stabbing them to death.

If you need to kill them, poison works best. (unless 0.18 changes that?)

Use Mephitic Cloud if you want to go for confuse stabs.

Otherwise, I would try Dazzling Spray and get blind stabs.

I don't have a book with mephitic cloud, but I can try dazzling spray. Should I train conjurations for that? Spriggans have a bad aptitude for that. Also, should I take int every stat up, or dex, or a mix?

arandomperson12 wrote:How do I kill death yaks? I managed to get a few of them by luring them to the stairs one by one, then kiting them on the level above while spamming confuse, until they are confused, then running in and stabbing them to death.

Last time I played SpEn, Death Yaks were the sole reason I went to orcs first and then got my hexes all the way to 15 before doing lair. You can power through their MR with enough tries and the fact that you outrun them, and then stab them to death.

arandomperson12 wrote:I don't have a book with mephitic cloud, but I can try dazzling spray. Should I train conjurations for that? Spriggans have a bad aptitude for that. Also, should I take int every stat up, or dex, or a mix?

A mix. You're gonna want spells for the later game but you also want to push your amazing evasion to its limit. 24 DEX is the recommendation I believe. Anyway, it's worth pumping 3 or 4 levels into conjurations but with a -3 I don't recommend going any higher unless you decide to do extended. Getting conjurations up is irritating.

i recommend just walking away from the yaks

spen is only better than other --en because you are fast, you should take advantage of that

I only met one herd of death yaks, and I killed all of them. Also, I cleared out lair:8, and there was a treasure pile at the end, including a randart armor (can't use), a +3 speed rapier, an arbalest, and a wand of disintegration.

dracos369 wrote:
nago wrote:Gozag (...) has no particularly synergy with a SpEn

I'd have to disagree. It turns every corpse(for which you otherwise have no use unless you go Necro) into gold/piety(Sp synergy), and gold distractions provide free stabbing opportunities(En synergy)

Well, Gozag transmute corpses in his weird piety, which is what any other gods do anyway. I don't think this is a striking synergy with Sp, I'd take necro over it every day.
I regularly forgot that gold distraction nowadays is quite good. I've no direct experience with a stabber of Gozag but most probably that is a nice help for an En

I got the message for a volcano portal in orc:2. Should I use a scroll of magic mapping to try to find it and enter it? I have a ring of fire protection, but some of those monsters in the volcano seem really nasty.

Leszczynek wrote:Spriggans are surprisingly decent with arbalests, so you can grab one and play like a centaur of sorts. It's good to have some Str items or level up investment for it though or it will take ages to kill things later on.

I just don't like stabbers and spellcasters, I guess.

Wait... is this true? Does STR increase xbow damage? Because obviously that makes no sense, but at the same time, it's not entirely unexpected given that str increases all other weapon damage. I know way, way back when, str helped reach xbow min-delay faster, but I know it doesn't do that anymore.

you use your extra strength to distract the monster by flexing, so then your crossbow bolt hits a weak spot for massive damage

Obviously you use the extra STR to turn the crank on the rewind mechanism of the xbow a few notches tighter.

arandomperson12 wrote:I got the message for a volcano portal in orc:2. Should I use a scroll of magic mapping to try to find it and enter it? I have a ring of fire protection, but some of those monsters in the volcano seem really nasty.

I'd read a mapping scroll on Orc:2 even without a volcano. The usual "don't go out of your way to reach the portal" rule applies here. If you have no rF+, get ready to nope out of the volcano quickly (or, possibly, don't even enter).

The volcano was uneventful. No powerful monsters were in it. It was a tiny level (I magic mapped it), and had little useful loot. Also, SpEn seems a lot stronger than GrEE, at least in the early game. I bought 2 randart short blades in a antique shop (unidentified, so I just bought randomly because I have lots of money: a +5 venom branded dagger which gives rElec, and a +2 vorpal rapier that gives +8 intelligence. The rapier is worse than my +3 speed rapier, right? The dagger is better than the +3 flame dagger I had before? Also, now having cleared lair and orc, where should I go? Deeper into the dungeon? Into the elven halls? The lair sidebranches? In addition, can fire attacks destroy my potions and scrolls? Thanks!

Crossbows use Str for damage because the dev team chose consistency over simulation in weapon-stat interactions. I'm not necessarily defending it, but that's why.

Do the rest of the Dungeon and then the Lair branches (not Slime). Then Vaults: 1 - 4 (not 5). Stay out of the Elven Halls until later.

Item destruction was in Crawl for a long time but hasn't been for a few versions now.

@Lasty: I think its great to have consistency. Just a bit tongue in cheek talk.

How should I go about exploring swamp and spider without poison resistance? I have fully explored all 15 levels of the dungeon, all of lair, and all of orc, and when using ctrl-F, nothing giving poison resistance can be found. I managed to kill a swamp dragon in swamp, but it did not drop a hide. Then, I saw Frances, and she woke up, so I had to run. Also, I explored a tiny bit of spider, but the spiders there are numerous and keep poisoning me. What should I do?

Backtrack while confusing them then stab them en mass, or confuse a few and lure a few away.

Confuse works well in the swamps too. Can you tukima's dance Fances?

Dazzling spray should work decently well on Frances and on packs of spiders. Don't underestimate dazzling spray.

Frances has 14 HD (resists dazzling spray) and 100 MR resists confuse/tukima's dance. While spamming it on her would eventually get her, I can't just kite her indefinitely because of her powerful spells.

The Tavern

SpEn skills?

SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?

Re: SpEn skills?