Online Advice

[Schillernde]

Hiya! I've been meaning to break into the exciting world of playing this video game where other people can see me on the web's site, but like, my main problems are lack of mouse support, which is a lot more damning than it sounds because having to stop every couple moves and figure out what key does what is a problem that will go away eventually, probably, but it's Annoying and i don't really wanna Deal With It, and also the worry that someone will spectate me and make fun of me, possibly for having to pause every thirty seconds and look at the controls. Is there anything to be done about this beyond either "get good" or some politer way of saying "get good"?

[Patashu]

I can confirm that the 'constantly forgetting what key does what' goes away after a week. If you want to speed up the process, hit ??, write down all the keys you need to remember that aren't currently burned into your brain, stick it beside your monitor or in a notepad document or whatever, and drill it into your brain that way.

[Schillernde]

oooh, that's a good idea! thanks!

[Draba]

Hiya! I've been meaning to break into the exciting world of playing this video game where other people can see me on the web's site, but like, my main problems are lack of mouse support, which is a lot more damning than it sounds because having to stop every couple moves and figure out what key does what is a problem that will go away eventually, probably, but it's Annoying and i don't really wanna Deal With It, and also the worry that someone will spectate me and make fun of me, possibly for having to pause every thirty seconds and look at the controls. Is there anything to be done about this beyond either "get good" or some politer way of saying "get good"?

Do not worry about anyone making fun of you.
Crawl players are a few orders of magnitude kinder than the average dota/pubg ones, you are more likely to get some advice if anyone drops by.

If you are a bit shy about letting others spectate you could also check out the standalone versions: http://crawl.develz.org/trunk/
Prefer using them myself as they are much more responsive, you do lose online scoring though.


Remembering commands does need a bit of time, but there aren't that many that you'll use routinely so don't get intimidated.
Macroing the most common ones will help a lot, my setup involves:
- throw quivered, shout, wait, ascend/descend stairs, use 'a' ability, use 'a' targeted spell , use 'e' untargeted/self targeted spell, evoke list, autoexplore(sorry, I'm lazy ) around the numpad
- F1-F4 targeted spells, F5-F11 untargeted spells (also mapped with shift in case of invisible enemies), F12 is reserved for blink or the closest equivalent
- a/b/c weapons at the end of the alphanumeric number row


This is a rare game in that once you get going mouse is more of a hindrance than an aid, and you'll get to that point sooner than you'd expect.

[Beholderp]

Hiya! I've been meaning to break into the exciting world of playing this video game where other people can see me on the web's site, but like, my main problems are lack of mouse support, which is a lot more damning than it sounds because having to stop every couple moves and figure out what key does what is a problem that will go away eventually, probably, but it's Annoying and i don't really wanna Deal With It, and also the worry that someone will spectate me and make fun of me, possibly for having to pause every thirty seconds and look at the controls. Is there anything to be done about this beyond either "get good" or some politer way of saying "get good"?

Do not worry about anyone making fun of you.
Crawl players are a few orders of magnitude kinder than the average dota/pubg ones, you are more likely to get some advice if anyone drops by.

If you are a bit shy about letting others spectate you could also check out the standalone versions: http://crawl.develz.org/trunk/
Prefer using them myself as they are much more responsive, you do lose online scoring though.


Remembering commands does need a bit of time, but there aren't that many that you'll use routinely so don't get intimidated.
Macroing the most common ones will help a lot, my setup involves:
- throw quivered, shout, wait, ascend/descend stairs, use 'a' ability, use 'a' targeted spell , use 'e' untargeted/self targeted spell, evoke list, autoexplore(sorry, I'm lazy ) around the numpad
- F1-F4 targeted spells, F5-F11 untargeted spells (also mapped with shift in case of invisible enemies), F12 is reserved for blink or the closest equivalent
- a/b/c weapons at the end of the alphanumeric number row


This is a rare game in that once you get going mouse is more of a hindrance than an aid, and you'll get to that point sooner than you'd expect.

You are so unbelievably correct that it's crazy.

Sent from my LGLS676 using Tapatalk

[Schillernde]

i have absolutely no idea how to make a macro.

[Draba]

i have absolutely no idea how to make a macro.

Bring up the macro menu with Ctrl+D or '~' (Shift+0 or AltGr+1 on most keyboards).
Press 'm', specify what you want the trigger to be, after that specify what the associated action you want to be.
After that bring up the macro menu again and press 's' to save macros.

Once you are in the menu everything is pretty verbose so you should be fine.
Remember to check ?? whenever you are feeling lost, you can find everything control-related from there with a bit of digging.

[Midn8]

Crawl players are a few orders of magnitude kinder than the average dota/pubg ones, you are more likely to get some advice if anyone drops by.

All the super salty players just quit after their first 20 games or earlier and just call the game impossible and a waste of time.

[tasonir]

i have absolutely no idea how to make a macro.

Draba explained the how; I figured I'd suggest what's probably the most common thing to macro: spells.

"za" will cast the first spell in your 'a' slot. This is great for buffs like regeneration or non-targetted spells like blink. If you cast a targeted spell (most conjurations; think magic dart), it'll bring up targetting so you can aim the spell yourself. This is the safest way to do it, but if you want to just automatically select what is closest to you, use "za!". ! is safer to use than . because . will waste a turn if you ever change that spell slot to be something that doesn't require a target. If you use "za!" and later switch in blink to that slot, you'll blink and then it will ask you to set an annotation for the level, which you can just cancel and it doesn't actually waste a turn.

Anyone use macros for things other than spells? That's about all I actually macro...

[Tumalu]

i have absolutely no idea how to make a macro.

This is the safest way to do it, but if you want to just automatically select what is closest to you, use "za!". ! is safer to use than . because . will waste a turn if you ever change that spell slot to be something that doesn't require a target.

I actually recommend using "zaf". This will make your attacks autofire like za!, but if you do not have anything quivered (and many spellcasting characters do not), there will be no action to cancel on non-targetted spells. If there IS a quivered item you can cancel the action, but this will only happen on more physical-focused characters with Throwing, or casters with sandblast.

[Siegurt]

i have absolutely no idea how to make a macro.

This is the safest way to do it, but if you want to just automatically select what is closest to you, use "za!". ! is safer to use than . because . will waste a turn if you ever change that spell slot to be something that doesn't require a target.

I actually recommend using "zaf". This will make your attacks autofire like za!, but if you do not have anything quivered (and many spellcasting characters do not), there will be no action to cancel on non-targetted spells. If there IS a quivered item you can cancel the action, but this will only happen on more physical-focused characters with Throwing, or casters with sandblast.

Huh, i always quiver *something* with my conjuration users, how else do you get something's attention so it walks into range of your spells?

[Tumalu]

...my spellcasters usually die before they have notable spare exp for leveling up stealth ;_;

[VeryAngryFelid]

...my spellcasters usually die before they have notable spare exp for leveling up stealth ;_;

First levels are very cheap and help a lot because early monsters have quite low HD.