Do melee octopodes need shields?

[le_nerd]

Playing almost exclusively melee octopodes for a while now. Was always of the opinion that two-handed weapons just dont work - you take too much damage relying on dodging alone. Then I had a game http://crawl.develz.org/morgues/git/svalbard/morgue-svalbard-20170202-111704.txt where I got a very early ?ACQ and
got this beauty:

a - the cursed +10 bardiche of Sauk Reo (weapon) {freeze, Str+5}

and used it to great success. I dont really know what was different this game though - am I a better player than before so that shield-less melee Octopode seems viable? Even with shields melee is swingy, without it there was not much difference.

Or is the weapon just that great, and any top tier fully enchanted weapon would be fine? Or is it the reaching that reduces damage input so much? I one-shot killed a lot of scary monsters.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Evasion works as defense too. See Felid, for example.

[ThreeInvisibleDucks]

I think this char proves that melee Ops don't *need* shields, but they still have a lot to gain from them. Not while paralyzed though, a shield wouldn't have made a difference here. Unless it was an artefact with MR+...

What could've saved you in this spot was AC, and that's what Statue Form gives, and you could've had it online by now at the cost of a couple of levels of Fighting skill, and HP+30% from it would've given you a net max HP boost.

But if you're going for statform, one might go for UC as well for synergy. And a shield is a net gain as an UC statuepode.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Floating eye ignores MR.

[ThreeInvisibleDucks]

Floating eye ignores MR.

I can't believe I've ever even won a game as I didn't know this. I didn't even realize their gaze was smite-targeted... From the wiki page on Giant eyeballs: floating eyes need "several turns" in LoS to paralyze you. It seems that they are a more of a threat than I used to think.

[VeryAngryFelid]

Yes, they are a good reason to use your last scroll of blinking if there are other monsters nearby.

[tasonir]

I'd probably point out that this polearm is very strong and also that it's a polearm. You have range 2, and getting an extra chop or two on most monsters before they hit you back is enough to kill a lot of mid-sized threats, which will go a long way towards protecting your health.

[papilio]

I always pick shield when playing melee octopodes.

There are three defensive sources: AC, EV, SH. (and just running if your spd faster than 10).
AC is out unless you get statue form. So there are only EV+SH.
Using EV as only defensive source is unreliable IMO.


(Actually I always try to get AC+EV+SH by StatueForm+Shield with melee Ops)

[duvessa]

SH is less reliable than EV

[papilio]

SH is less reliable than EV

That's no prob, you can get EV and SH at once anyway

at least AC 3/EV 25/SH 15 is much better than AC 3/EV 28/SH 0

[Rast]

There are three defensive sources: AC, EV, SH.

also HP

Of the first three, I think you want either good AC, or good EV plus good SH.

[VeryAngryFelid]

IMHO SH works better with AC than with EV:
1) you don't care about EV penalty or spellcasting penalty while training Shields.
2) you can melee hill giants and alike easier due to GDR
3) you have enough XP to invest into shields because you don't use spells and don't need to train Armour/Dodging that high for good defense

[amaril]

This might break your 'melee' conduct, but bows (or javelins, if you get lucky/choose oka or trog) are one of the strongest defensive options in the game. Even though you don't get to use a shield, you kill most things before they can hit you and it makes splitting packs/fighting in safe terrain way easier.

[le_nerd]

I play melee Ops because a) ranged is fucking annoying and b) because constriction makes melee actually acceptable for Op. Damage output is soo bad without constriction that I hate it.