Tips For Melee Naga?


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Halls Hopper

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 15:12

Tips For Melee Naga?

I have not beaten the game. Furthest I've gotten is one rune, in a playthrough where I cleared Orc, Lair, Dungeon, and Spider. I was a Minotaur Berserker, so I basically just took all the advice for beginners and ran with it. I'm still not good at the game, but I'm improving.

I have recently gotten bored of my usual play, which is usually Minotaur/Hill Orc heavy fighters. Also played as a Gnoll Skald a bit, which was fun, but I've recently turned to Nagas. I've previously avoided them because they were labelled as "advanced". (The implications of telling new players to avoid these races is a discussion for another day.)

What I've ended up doing is starting as NaFi, and immediately abandoning the scale armor for leather armor as well as training dodge and long blades. I put most of my attribute points into Dex, since Strength starts high enough as a Fighter. This creates a hybrid melee character with both AC and EV, although I mainly focus on improving EV. I also regularly worship either Okawaru (preferred over Trog because magic) or Hepliaklqana. (Because having a perma-ally is fun)

This might not be optimal, maybe not even good at all in the late game, (I wouldn't know) but I find it fun and interesting. The perks of playing as a Naga compared to the drawbacks are interesting to me, and playing as a build that I haven't played with much or heard much about is fun. I've also played some as NaSk, but I feel like the investment in Int as a Skald wouldn't be worth it compared to what I'm doing now.

All that explaining aside, does anyone have any tips for improving this build? How much should I be investing in Magic use? Would it be more efficient to find a different background to start as? Any other good God choices? And, when I worship Hepliaklqana, what's the best background for my ancestor?
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Blades Runner

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 15:20

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

Investing in dex is generally pretty bad unless you're going for lots of confuse stabbing AND light/medium armor. Strength actually improves damage, and INT improves spell casting success rate and power (also less hunger, if you happen to care which normally you shouldn't).

Naga is harder than most species because nagas are slow. One of the best defensive measures in the game is walking away from stuff, and a normal speed species can do that safely with a much higher pecentage of enemies in the game.

Unless you plan on using spells above level 4, NaFi is probably best off just pumping strength and picking god + spells + maybe evocations to help with living in situations that are normally solved by running away.
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Halls Hopper

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 16:04

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

TheMeInTeam wrote:Investing in dex is generally pretty bad unless you're going for lots of confuse stabbing AND light/medium armor. Strength actually improves damage, and INT improves spell casting success rate and power (also less hunger, if you happen to care which normally you shouldn't).

Naga is harder than most species because nagas are slow. One of the best defensive measures in the game is walking away from stuff, and a normal speed species can do that safely with a much higher pecentage of enemies in the game.

Unless you plan on using spells above level 4, NaFi is probably best off just pumping strength and picking god + spells + maybe evocations to help with living in situations that are normally solved by running away.


I mostly put points in Dex because I want to at least get to slightly a higher number, since 10 Dex is a little less than I think I'd want. Improving EV, weapon accuracy, and riposte seemed to be worth it.
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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 17:35

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

MisterPersonMan wrote:I mostly put points in Dex because I want to at least get to slightly a higher number, since 10 Dex is a little less than I think I'd want. Improving EV, weapon accuracy, and riposte seemed to be worth it.

It isn't.
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Halls Hopper

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 18:33

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

Siegurt wrote:
MisterPersonMan wrote:I mostly put points in Dex because I want to at least get to slightly a higher number, since 10 Dex is a little less than I think I'd want. Improving EV, weapon accuracy, and riposte seemed to be worth it.

It isn't.


Good to know.
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Zot Zealot

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 18:34

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

I think pumping dex will give you a slightly easier early game, but I harder late game (for NaFi). I'd never do it myself unless I was setting myself a challenge. After XL 13 strength will also increase constriction damage.
You will get some 'free' Dex from random stat increased and random good armour.

I think naga's want some kind of ranged damage, so consider transitioning into slings (pump Strength) or spells (pump Int)

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 19:51

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

Nagas have a -1 aptitude in ranged (all types) and are large for shield purposes, so probably want fustiablus, hand crossbow, throwing, or magic.

Throwing with Oka is very devastating. Otherwise magic might be the best ranged option, in that it's more flexible and nagas have better aptitudes in spell schools. They also have some penalty to base AC from armor so the relative penalty you take from wearing medium armor compared to heavy is less.

One final thing to note is that you can run a transmutation to attain normal move speed, though this will gut your AC for most transmutations other than statue form, which makes you slower rather than faster. If you cast a tmut for escape do it early. Passage of golubria is incredible on nagas, and swiftness can make you seem kind of normal for a bit too (or fast if stacked with the transmutation).

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Post Wednesday, 17th April 2019, 21:33

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

Nagas were my first love in DCSS, although I don't play them terribly often anymore. Back when I first played them in .10, they got constriction from level 1, so starting out was much easier. I tended to run them as transmuters, although they aren't really all that uniquely suited for transmutations, it isn't really any worse on them either. They probably shouldn't use statue form though as they'll lose their innate scales as well as the naga barding. Lately I usually just run blade hands on them and go heavy armor.

Here's the super huge writeup from years ago: http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Tasonir%27s ... Naga_Guide. While I technically haven't updated it recently, that's mostly just because little has changed and it should still apply. If anyone sees something horribly wrong let me know. It is focused on playing with Cheibriados, which is certainly optional.

A particularly relevant section would be the sample morgues at the bottom, look at the 5 rune CPA build:

5 rune pure melee in Crystal Plate Mail

Morgue: http://crawl.develz.org/morgues/0.10/Ta ... 013421.txt

YAVP: viewtopic.php?f=12&t=4047

This build is recommended for people who have not won any games yet - you will avoid spellcasting and just focus on melee power. Statue form is not very important for the regular game, as you will rarely be tormented. Skip going to slime if you have never done it before, I included it in this run as I'm very familiar with the area. Remember you only need 3 runes to win!


You can use a weapon, plain unarmed, or blade hands imho. Just remember you scale very poorly in the early game, and then eventually become quite strong usually around the end of lair, but especially after you've gotten a rune. It's getting there that's the hard part. I've started out as a hunter with slings just for getting through the first ~6 floors, then switched into melee afterwards. You really don't want to be approaching monsters often when there's no way for you escape without consumables.

Halls Hopper

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 01:37

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

I'd follow dynast/berder's advice (they have some of the longest NaWn win streaks). Early game train fighting and stealth until you find a good weapon. Then train that weapon skill. Learn to evaluate threats appropriately (i.e avoid d1 jackal backs, d2 and d3 gnolls, d2 adders, etc) and make use of poison spit. Don't be afraid to exclude anything your aren't sure you can take. Wear a shield and pick a decent god that gives you an immediate boost in power or at 1 *. The best choice is probably gozag, but other good choices are okawaru, trog, hepliakana, fedhas, and yred. Chei generally make the early game even harder for a naga so I don't recommend choosing Chei until you get constriction. Once you start wearing a shield, shift into heavier armour and training mostly fighting, armour and shield (till 9 or 15 depending on shield type). Generally naga's start becoming strong once you reach lv13 and get constriction.

Mines Malingerer

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 09:03

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

If you're choosing Long Blades with Riposte in mind (Riposte isn't strong enough to make any decisions based on it), then NaFi is probably one of the most anti-synergystic combos in the game - due to 4 base AC -2 EV from barding + lower shield requirements + naturally high strength Nagas are leaning towards heavy armour+shield. I second the suggestion to look up dynast streaks. He created this goofy yet pretty reliable build you'll see in every of his morgues: abuse poison spit early on, pick Gozag, go with heaviest armour and Broad Axe + Large Shield; don't train Dodging at all, only start training Axes around XL7-10, but then never turn Axes off until it hits 27.

Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 10:26

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

Stairdancer wrote:He created this goofy yet pretty reliable build you'll see in every of his morgues: abuse poison spit early on, pick Gozag, go with heaviest armour and Broad Axe + Large Shield; don't train Dodging at all, only start training Axes around XL7-10, but then never turn Axes off until it hits 27.


I hope you realize some of those things were pretty bad and were done by dynast just for fun.
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Mines Malingerer

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 10:53

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

I hope you realize some of those things were pretty bad and were done by dynast just for fun.

I mean, I explicitly described it as "goofy".

Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 11:01

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

Stairdancer wrote:
I hope you realize some of those things were pretty bad and were done by dynast just for fun.

I mean, I explicitly described it as "goofy".


Sorry, English is not my first language and I don't know this word. Online translator gave me "foolish; harmlessly eccentric" which is quite different from "bad or harming" which I meant in my comment.
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Zot Zealot

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 11:07

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

which of the things he did are harmful?

Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 11:25

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

petercordia wrote:which of the things he did are harmful?


go with heaviest armour, don't train Dodging at all, only start training Axes around XL7-10, but then never turn Axes off until it hits 27
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Vaults Vanquisher

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 12:00

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

"Go with the heaviest armor" is slightly reductive. You're supposed to make maximum use of naga stealth early in the game (this applies better to the NaWn early game than the NaFi one, maybe) in order to get more poison spits off at each possible target (incredibly tedious btw). Obviously it would be better to carefully manage your skills later in the game, e.g. mix in a nontrivial amount of dodging, don't train axes to 27, and that sort of thing might make a difference for a greener player.
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Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 13:57

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

The heaviest armor is a bad idea for Naga because for instance +2 scale mail (2 from enchantment and 3 from base) gives the same AC as +0 plate armour (5 from base) while EV is higher in the former of course. Even +2 robe can be optimal (gives just 2 AC less than +0 plate does but does not decrease your EV at all) depending on Str/Dex and Armour/Dodging/Weapon.
Or +0 CPA with its +7 AC is a new players trap comparing to +3 AC from +2 robe taking into account CPA completely kills EV.
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Zot Zealot

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 14:07

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

I interpreted "go with heaviest armour and Broad Axe + Large Shield" to be a late-game strategy. If he's training stealth early on, it's safe to assume he's not wearing plate at that point. (Because you need a lot of stealth skill for it to have any impact on a character with plate mail, as I once discovered to my detriment). Once your skills are > 10, going with heavy armour doesn't sound so bad any more. (Because 10 armour skill 'compensates' for the deformed body mutation.)
I imagine that surviving to XL 7 with only fighting and stealth skill would be quite tough though.

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 14:18

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

petercordia wrote:I interpreted "go with heaviest armour and Broad Axe + Large Shield" to be a late-game strategy. If he's training stealth early on, it's safe to assume he's not wearing plate at that point. (Because you need a lot of stealth skill for it to have any impact on a character with plate mail, as I once discovered to my detriment). Once your skills are > 10, going with heavy armour doesn't sound so bad any more. (Because 10 armour skill 'compensates' for the deformed body mutation.)
I imagine that surviving to XL 7 with only fighting and stealth skill would be quite tough though.


"Go with heaviest armour" is good when your EV is almost zero anyway due to ignoring Dex/Dodging and wearing naga barding and you have +14 CPA, +12 GDS, +10 plate and +2 robe to choose from while having all resistances maxed in any of them :) But basically what I wrote is true late game too: it is always a good idea to look at both AC/EV when comparing body armour pieces and it is obvious that Na in +0 CPA has much worse defense than one in +12 GDS or even +5 Steam.
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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 17:47

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

while VAF's last post basically adds the context already, I wanted to emphasize that nagas in heavy armor are not bad, and that you often should end up in heavy armor. It's just the case that a +0 plate armor on d:2 is likely a bad choice. Later on if you enchant one up or find an enchanted plate armor, it's a great choice (for a character which isn't a mage).

One of my favorite naga builds is blade hands + CPA. Of course, you can't always guarantee that you're going to find a CPA, but basically "the heaviest thing you can find" is the goal. The deformed body only hurts the base AC, and so enchantment and armor skill will eventually override the penalty. Your scales mutation will eventually always outweigh the penalty even in CPA, it just takes time to get there.

Nagas being a fairly extreme example of weak early, powerful later in a game which already has that overall pattern is one of the reasons why I have started several as hunters with slings, just because slings are great for the first 10 floors or so. Once you've survived 10 floors you can then transition into a late game plan.

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Post Thursday, 18th April 2019, 23:41

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

VeryAngryFelid wrote:
Stairdancer wrote:He created this goofy yet pretty reliable build you'll see in every of his morgues: abuse poison spit early on, pick Gozag, go with heaviest armour and Broad Axe + Large Shield; don't train Dodging at all, only start training Axes around XL7-10, but then never turn Axes off until it hits 27.


I hope you realize some of those things were pretty bad and were done by dynast just for fun.


Reliable:
abuse poison spit early on
go with heaviest armour and Broad Axe + Large Shield

slightly goofy:
pick Gozag (pro option is to pick the first strong altar you find)
don't train Dodging at all

super goofy:
only start training Axes around XL7-10, but then never turn Axes off until it hits 27.

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Ziggurat Zagger

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Post Friday, 19th April 2019, 05:47

Re: Tips For Melee Naga?

The funny thing is that I checked his last Na game and he had about the same levels in armour and dodging, axes at 18 etc. so I am not sure what we are talking about :)
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