Easiest Classes for Following Races?

[arandomperson12]

Demigod
Felid
Mummy
Naga
Formicid
Octopode

[Shard1697]

Easiest class for Formicid is Fighter, no contest. Easiest for Demigod I would guess is FE, though I don't play much Demigod. For Naga, probably Berserker?

[njvack]

IE (good for all)
Be (all except Dg)
Fi (better than usual for Formicid)

Generally, good backgrounds are strong across species, unless there's a serious aptitude imbalance or gear restrictions.

The game's recommended combos are not generally terrible ideas either.

[BabyRage]

NaBe, FoFi, for others I'd say FE.

[Shard1697]

Be (all except Dg)

Fo can't Berserk, which means you lose Be's earlygame dominance-takes a while to get BiA. And your gear is worse than Fighter's even if you're not Fo

[VeryAngryFelid]

DgCj, FeCj, MuCj, NaBe, FoAK, OpCj.

[stickyfingers]

DgIE
FeIE
MuIE
NaBe
FoAK
OpIE

[Reptisaurus]

I've been playing a lot of felids, and really think enchanter is easier than ice elementalist.

I really like Octopode Fighter. starting with a shield is a huge, huge boost to defenses.

[njvack]

Be (all except Dg)

Fo can't Berserk, which means you lose Be's earlygame dominance-takes a while to get BiA. And your gear is worse than Fighter's even if you're not Fo

Oh yeah, that's right. Man, that's weird, they should be able to 'zerk without hasting.

So Trog is not so great for Fo.

[duvessa]

my set of easiest backgrounds for each species
HuIE
HEIE
DEIE
DDEE
HOBe
HaIE
KoIE
SpEn
OgBe
TrBe
NaIE
CeBe
MfIE
MiBe
TeBe
DrIE
GrBe
FoEE
VSBe
DgIE
DsIE
MuIE
GhIE
VpIE
FeIE
OpIE
this is just personal opinion, other people might replace some IEs/EEs with Bes and vice versa

[goodcoolguy]

DgWn, FeSu, MuNe, NaBe, FoAK, OpIE

For good measure...

OgBe, HuBe, MiBe, MfBe, HEBe, DEFE, TeBe, SpSu, CeBe, HOBe, HaBe, KoBe, GrBe, GhFi, VpNe, DsBe, DrIE, VSBe, background unimportant for DD and Tr.

[arandomperson12]

Why is DgWn so easy?

[goodcoolguy]

It's a secret to everybody.

[tabstorm]

IE IE IE Be Fi IE

[Shard1697]

Why is DgWn so easy?

when I first started playing I met some Japanese players who were remarkably better than anyone I've seen play, to this day, and they said that Demigod Wanderers were so easy to ascend with that they classified runs as DgWn runs and Non-DgWn runs
神々の末裔 放浪者

(it's not)

though maybe once in a while you get a start with multiple good spellbooks

[Floodkiller]

Demigod - IE
Felid - IE
Mummy - IE
Naga - IE/Be
Formicid - EE/Fi
Octopode - IE

If you are willing to miss 'easiest' to avoid always picking IE:
DgFE/Cj
FeEn
MuAr^Pakellas (easiest non-book/non-zealot start to last until worship, imo)
NaAK
FoAK
Still OpIE, honestly

Joke answer: scumming MuCK.

[Psieye]

Be (all except Dg)

Fo can't Berserk, which means you lose Be's earlygame dominance-takes a while to get BiA. And your gear is worse than Fighter's even if you're not Fo

Oh yeah, that's right. Man, that's weird, they should be able to 'zerk without hasting.

So Trog is not so great for Fo.

I ran a FoBe once. The inferior earlygame isn't unplayable and getting faster access to BiA/gifts is a fairly solid perk.

Also, if they could 'zerk without hasting, then they can't be slowed afterwards so arguably that'd be OP.

[HardboiledGargoyle]

there's always paralysis chance you could tweak

getting faster access to BiA/gifts

how? berserk does not cost piety

[Psieye]

getting faster access to BiA/gifts

how? berserk does not cost piety

As opposed to starting as FoFi and finding a Trog altar.

[Gerad]

there's always paralysis chance you could tweak

Stasis prevents paralysis, doesn't it? Unless that changed with the mostly-removal of stasis.

[HardboiledGargoyle]

No, berserk may make you "pass out" which bypasses stasis. Forcimids can pass out from Trog wrath or from starving themselves, but not from berserk since they can't berserk.

[Shard1697]

Also, if they could 'zerk without hasting, then they can't be slowed afterwards so arguably that'd be OP.

I severely doubt it'd be OP(in comparison to normal berserk), or even better than normal berserk which hastes and then slows. You shouldn't be berserking in a situation where berserk won't kill everything anyways, the Slow downside doesn't matter much once you know how the ability works(and just like I have severe doubts for Te ever being OP, I don't think Fo would ever be OP).

[cerebovssquire]

Ar Ar Ar Ar Ar Ar

[WingedEspeon]

I would say Cj for Fe, Fi for Fo, can't really comment on the rest as I am very biased to playing melee charaters. Like have better success with melee deep elves than deep elf casters biased.

[gammafunk]

I just wanted to take the opportunity to remind everyone that Su is also very strong. Thanks for your time.

[VeryAngryFelid]

I just wanted to take the opportunity to remind everyone that Su is also very strong. Thanks for your time.

In trunk too? I have not tried new Sif Muna but from what I read it is summoner nerf.

[edgefigaro]

Summoners are really strong, and the summoner minigame is one of the most interesting and best developed minigames. You really pay attention to how everything on the map moves and acts. The summoner minigame also extends far later into the game. Frequently, characters normalize to some kind of stable plain character by the time you are entering sbranches. The summoner minigame stays through vaults and beyond.

While playing a summoner is strong and interesting, it is also a pain in the ass over the span of the game. Food is awful. Also, you frequently are stuck stairdancing way more than other characters, which is exceptionally irritating. Summoners frequently play very slowly.

Vampire Summoner is the best summoner I have ever played, and I would recommend that combo to be recommended. I made a write up about it a couple weeks ago, but forum submit ate it.

I don't think I'll ever seriously play a non-foodless race as a summoner ever again, unless for Nemelex Challenge.

[Utis]

While playing a summoner is strong and interesting, it is also a pain in the ass over the span of the game.

It's the same for me. But I think that's a question of habit forming. E.g. sound melee fighting involves a myriad of trivial decisions: when and where to retreat, how to move, what to attack first, when to disengage etc. Imagine we would have to make all of those trivial decisions consciously while also being conscious about which key to press. Melee fighting would be a pain in the ass, too. It isn't because we committed the basics to the muscle memory of our fingers and only wake up when our intuitive pattern recognition tells us that we should better stop to think.

I imagine it's the same for somebody who plays a lot of summoners. I know that it's the same for AE who also have a bad rep in this regard.

[Siegurt]

While playing a summoner is strong and interesting, it is also a pain in the ass over the span of the game.

It's the same for me. But I think that's a question of habit forming. E.g. sound melee fighting involves a myriad of trivial decisions: when and where to retreat, how to move, what to attack first, when to disengage etc. Imagine we would have to make all of those trivial decisions consciously while also being conscious about which key to press. Melee fighting would be a pain in the ass, too. It isn't because we committed the basics to the muscle memory of our fingers and only wake up when our intuitive pattern recognition tells us that we should better stop to think.

I imagine it's the same for somebody who plays a lot of summoners. I know that it's the same for AE who also have a bad rep in this regard.

Can verify wrt AE, i don't think about double zap positioning or targeting, i just do it.

Summoner is slightly more attention load, because there are more moving parts.

[celtis]

Could anyone explain why Ice Elementalist is apparently considered the best mage background (according to several posters above) and in particular why Wizard is not the best one?

Wizard has Mephitic Cloud which instantly beats all early game encounters (even if it's a pack of monsters!) and all non-poison-resistant enemies in the mid game including most uniques. In a corridor, Conjure Flame instantly wins all fights in the early/mid game, and Slow covers the remaining case of poison-resistant enemies without a corridor (i.e. black mambas, spiny frog and hydras in Lair). If the enemy has ranged attacks, Repel Missiles comes to the rescue. And there's even Call Imp which I never used but seems like it could be OK if you need more damage.

And if something goes wrong, or if you just need more shots to kill an enemy that has closed the distance, Blink comes to the rescue.

This array of repeatable escape options and instawin buttons is unmatched by any other background, and the downsides doesn't seem significant.

One downside is that you only have Magic Dart, but once the enemy is disabled by Mephitic Cloud or stopped by Conjure Flame, or if you just Blink when it gets in melee range (after luring to a cleared space) it doesn't really matter if you need 1 or 10 casts of Magic Dart to kill it. Vehumet and Sif Muna should gift some better conjurations by the time it's needed.

The second downside is that at XL 1 it might be weaker due to Magic Dart being lower damage than the level 1 spell of other backgrounds, but the higher range might make up for it.

[duvessa]

IE is the best background because it has Freeze which instantly beats all early game encounters (even if it's a pack of monsters!) and you get it at XL1 instead of later

also veh and sif are two of the weakest gods in the game so you probably shouldnt assume that everyone uses them every game

[Airwolf]

Plus Summon Ice Beast and Ozo's Armour, and Throw Icicle to a much lesser extent.

[MrRokkomies]

Also, IE trains Conj, IceM and Sum to get the starting book online. WIzard needs conj, tloc, sum, airM, PoisonM, hex. IE also ends up with higher levels on the relevant skills, which pays off in the future. Wizard gets really easily thinned out too much, if you try to get all starting spells online early. (I know that is a bad way to play a wizard, but that is what celtis's post suggests)

[celtis]

Freeze has the obvious drawback that you need to be in melee range, which is not optimal for a squishy caster

But it is indeed more powerful on XL 1: MuWz starts with 17 Int 3 Spellcasting 0.7 Conjurations 4 mp and thus (2.493 - ac/2) * 4 = 9.972 - 2ac average Magic Dart damage per mana bar, while MuIE starts with 14 Int 2 Spellcasting 2.4 Ice Magic 3 mp and thus 3.558 * 3 = 10.674 average Freeze damage per mana bar (I hope that my spreadsheet that computed this is correct).

Although MuIE starts with 13 HP, so the monster needs to have 6 or less damage to guarantee you can't die in 2 hits to be able to use Freeze for the whole 3 mp, and this already rules out naked gnolls and goblin/hobgoblin/kobold with dagger among the D: 1 spawns. OTOH on XL 1 without Blink Wizard could just notice a monster behind the corner/a door and thus be in melee range or only have one square distance anyway.

I guess it depends on how much XL 1 is important: looking at the longest streaks, the first XL 1 splat seems to be megabat's DSWz on the 26th longest streak, so maybe dying on XL 1 is not so frequent? (although of course the data is biased because streakers might be choosing backgrounds that are less likely to splat on XL 1)

Also probably depends a lot on the species: on a Naga Wizard gets much better because you really need ways to escape due to slow speed and you have poison spit to offset the low dps, while on a Mummy IE gets better due to the bad aptitudes.

[Utis]

XL 1 might enter into it, otherwise some other book starts might be close contenders. But, really, Freeze is just that good. In addition to its MP and time efficient damage dealing, it's also so XP efficient that you have more than enough space to do something about the squishiness. Including getting Ozocubu's online. In addition to that, it's also useful for longer than any other lvl 1 damaging spell. Shock and Sandblast are probably next best in this respect, and they both don't come even near Freeze.

I'm not convinced that spamming MephCloud on a Naga is a good enough idea to offset that. The wizards I play rely on their mobility. That's not to say that MD is bad or that Wz isn't a good start. For me, as a matter of taste, Wz is one of the nicest and most fun backgrounds. And I absolutely love the spellbook from a game design point of view: It's been around for years and still it seems that no two people can agree on the best Wz strategy. That's a good thing, IMHO.

[dowan]

The IE book will take you farther than the Wz book. Throw icicle and summon ice beast are useful for longer and against a wider range of enemies than mephitic cloud.

I do like the Wz book, it's a nice start, but if you don't find more books soon you do find yourself in a tough place trying to kill monsters with magic darts and conjured flames...

[duvessa]

Freeze has the obvious drawback that you need to be in melee range, which is not optimal for a squishy caster

it's optimal if you have freeze

[Siegurt]

Fwiw i find i can more reliably kill things at xl1 with shock than freeze

[Lacuenta]

For mummy its muck