what exactly is the point of min delay?

[jazzadellic]

I don't understand what difference there is between a fast and slow weapon. The wiki says "A character with a small attack delay will swing more frequently than a character with a large attack delay." But I am only getting one swing per turn just like when I was using a slow weapon. I'm currently using a quick blade with min delay. Can anyone explain?

[chequers]

Your "turn" takes less in-game time. When you take an action, the number in brackets next to "time" shows how long your previous turn took. For instance, attacking with a min-delay quickblade takes 0.2 turns, while moving one square takes 1.0 turns. Monsters typically perform all their actions taking 1.0 turns, so a mindelay quick blade would allow you attack five times per monster attack.

[Siegurt]

There's a display that indicates the current "time" if you walk one step, it will increment by 1.0 for most races (the amount of time your last action took is displayed in parentheses next to the time)

Swinging a quick blade will take anywhere from 0.7 to 0.3 depending on your skill, Most monsters get an action after 1.0 has passed on your "time" meter. So if you attack and it takes 0.3 time for you to do so, monsters will be able to attack you back, roughly once every three swings.

[jazzadellic]

Ah....silly me, I never noticed the time thing. I actually thought that number was just a turn counter...even though it clearly says "TIME!!!" lol. Ok so when I thought I was just doing one turn I was in fact not....Thank you guys that cleared up my confusion. I'm playing a spriggan enchanter btw, so with his quickblade he must be pretty damn fast on the time meter! Having fun playing SpEn. He's like my 5th one...I have had a hard time keeping them alive past XL 10. But he's on XL12 now, hopefully I've learned something since the last one ;o)

[Siegurt]

Ah....silly me, I never noticed the time thing. I actually thought that number was just a turn counter...even though it clearly says "TIME!!!" lol. Ok so when I thought I was just doing one turn I was in fact not....Thank you guys that cleared up my confusion. I'm playing a spriggan enchanter btw, so with his quickblade he must be pretty damn fast on the time meter! Having fun playing SpEn. He's like my 5th one...I have had a hard time keeping them alive past XL 10. But he's on XL12 now, hopefully I've learned something since the last one ;o)

Spriggans actually move faster, but don't specifically attack any faster.

[jazzadellic]

Spriggans actually move faster, but don't specifically attack any faster.

Yeah, haha, I meant with his extra fast movement and quickblade he is fast as f**** as far as the time meter is concerned ;o)

[Sprucery]

Having fun playing SpEn. He's like my 5th one...I have had a hard time keeping them alive past XL 10. But he's on XL12 now, hopefully I've learned something since the last one ;o)

If you want any tips, here's a guide for SpEn, written by hyperbolic, a very good player (and although this was for 0.16, it's still good; I would add Tukima's Dance to the good spells list):

1. 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.
2. SPELLS: Use Ensorcelled Hibernation when possible. Use Confuse against rC+ monsters 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.
3. GODS: Ideally you want a god who helps with hard-to-stab monsters. Some good choices: Kiku (pain melee, zombies), Dith (shadow step, shadow form), Jiyva (slimify), Lugonu (corruption, disto melee), Makhleb (greater demons), Ashenzari/Vehumet (conjurations).
4. 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 and want better melee, demon whips are reasonable. Oh, and get a buckler. STATS: Raise Int or Dex.

[jazzadellic]

Having fun playing SpEn. He's like my 5th one...I have had a hard time keeping them alive past XL 10. But he's on XL12 now, hopefully I've learned something since the last one ;o)

If you want any tips, here's a guide for SpEn, written by hyperbolic, a very good player (and although this was for 0.16, it's still good; I would add Tukima's Dance to the good spells list):

1. 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.
2. SPELLS: Use Ensorcelled Hibernation when possible. Use Confuse against rC+ monsters 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.
3. GODS: Ideally you want a god who helps with hard-to-stab monsters. Some good choices: Kiku (pain melee, zombies), Dith (shadow step, shadow form), Jiyva (slimify), Lugonu (corruption, disto melee), Makhleb (greater demons), Ashenzari/Vehumet (conjurations).
4. 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 and want better melee, demon whips are reasonable. Oh, and get a buckler. STATS: Raise Int or Dex.

Yeah I've been using that guide, although in a another thread it was credited to "elliptic".

[njvack]

I believe elliptic and hyperbolic are the same person? They're both definitely conic sections

[Shard1697]

Thought this was gonna be a thread questioning the design goals of a system where attack speed is capped instead of increasing indefinitely(at different rates?) for all weapons and I was getting ready to reexamine my core crawl design beliefs

[Queen Cassie]

Thought this was gonna be a thread questioning the design goals of a system where attack speed is capped instead of increasing indefinitely(at different rates?) for all weapons and I was getting ready to reexamine my core crawl design beliefs

Would that really be a good idea? Wouldn't that make melee even more absurdly powerful?

[Shard1697]

Depends on how it was implemented. If weapons get faster at different rates, it could be an overall nerf to big base damage weapons-for example, if a battleaxe only lost 0.1 delay every 3 skill, it would only reach 1.0 lowest delay at 21 skill instead of 0.7 at 20. That's probably an extreme example, but the point is that it could be a buff or nerf-but either way would remove the hard "breakpoints" for weapon skill that we have now.

[genericpseudonym]

Having more weapons with min-delays other than 0.7 could also change the relative value of brands like elec/disto/pain more.

Currently it's just "0.7? elec good. <0.7? elec gooder". It might be nice to have some longer-delay weapons where elec is actually noticeably worse than e.g. freezing.

[HardboiledGargoyle]

Ah....silly me, I never noticed the time thing. I actually thought that number was just a turn counter...even though it clearly says "TIME!!!" lol.

Fun fact - earlier versions of DCSS didn't display time at all. It was confusing as all hell and made me give up figuring out what weapon delay was and whether or not diagonal movement took more time than orthogonal movement. (Monsters tend to mirror your movement, e.g. moving diagonally when you move diagonally, so it's not trivial to check.)

[Sprucery]

I believe elliptic and hyperbolic are the same person? They're both definitely conic sections

Well, we're all just usernames anyway...