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Code:: p - the +8 demon blade "Leech" {vamp, *Rage +Rage rN+}.

I found Leech. I do not have any weapon skill currently.

How good is this weapon now? How do you use *Rage weapons? Simply avoid them? Only switch to them when you do not mind berserk? Seems really annoying to use. (By the way, do you go berserk if you are hungry?)

I also found EOS:

Code:: a - the +10 morningstar "Eos" (weapon) {elec, Halo rElec}.

Which one would you train? Or should I leave both and train for a lajatang (plain +0 for now, I can enchant it to +3).

*Rage is a nuisance, as long as you avoid the cases where berserking - or the eventual paralysis post berserk - could kill you.
Overall it triggers very little, and considering that berserk is extremely strong buff, there are actually very few cases where you would avoid to berserk.
You certainly have to fight more carefully - e.g. avoiding fight near unexplored areas.

Leech is insanely good, one of the best 1h out there. Its vamp triggers at every hit. Vamp + bers is nuts. Overall I think the new leech is stronger than the old - just more annoying.
Eos is good if no other better weapon has spawned, but overall I suspect is worse than a highly enchanted demon weapon.
I'd train for long blade, carrying a backup weapon for cases where *rage is dangerous and\or vamp doesn't work.

edit: actually I don't know how often *rage triggers as bloodbane had an higher than average chance to trigger (I think). For the rest nothing change, you will just see red screen more.

*Rage is bad design as long as paralysis chance and luring exist. Even without the luring having a very small chance to die is bad design.
Consider this: would you accept idea of a new great weapon which makes you almost invincible except it can unavoidably kill you unless you spend much time making sure you have just a few enemies in view every time you decide to use it?

Make it *Fragile and give *Slow movement, kind of like Chei works.

VeryAngryFelid wrote:*Rage is bad design as long as paralysis chance and luring exist. Even without the luring having a very small chance to die is bad design.
Consider this: would you accept idea of a new great weapon which makes you almost invincible except it can unavoidably kill you unless you spend much time making sure you have just a few enemies in view every time you decide to use it?

Make it *Fragile and give *Slow movement, kind of like Chei works.

I agree with *rage being a very bad design - I've sum that with just "annoying".
I don't understand why are are you comparing Chei with *slow, they works very differently.

Are you suggesting to swap *rage with *slow? I don't see how would that change the "lure anything to safe area" as being slow isn't something you would like either and force to play more "carefully" as much as *rage - heck, possibily even more, as unintentional berserk is usually still better than slow.

*Fragile would at least reduce the swapping trick, but it would be pretty much a bad workaround for a bad design.

nago wrote:I agree with *rage being a very bad design - I've sum that with just "annoying".
I don't understand why are are you comparing Chei with *slow, they works very differently.

Are you suggesting to swap *rage with *slow? I don't see how would that change the "lure anything to safe area" as being slow isn't something you would like either and force to play more "carefully" as much as *rage - heck, possibily even more, as unintentional berserk is usually still better than slow.

*Fragile would at least reduce the swapping trick, but it would be pretty much a bad workaround for a bad design.

Probably I was not clear enough. When you have a weapon with *rage, you are encouraged to lure enemies deep into explored territory so that you will be safe if rage triggers or paralysis happens. That's why the weapon should make your movement slower. Fragile is suited to remove annoying swapping between rage and non-rage weapons. So you either use the rage weapon all the time without swapping or don't use it at all. Some other items have similar design - gong shield, maxwell's armour.

+rage, *rage, *slow movement, *fragile, all on the same weapon make it more balanced, more interesting and less annoying to use.

Thanks. Probably forgot to ask an important question: does *Rage triggers on riposte? (It have not triggered so far,but I have not played with it that much, things usually die before they reach me.)

*Rage can proc off ripostes IIRC, so using leech always carries that danger. Unless immune to berserk I'd probably use a regular +9 branded demon blade in most cases. I don't like weapons that are "better most of the time but can put you in awful situations rarely". Not when a regular weapon will suffice for any possible encounter outside of zigs with careful (and often even not-so-careful) play.

Eos is a reasonable weapon. It's like an elec broadaxe w/o the cleave effect. You will do better with +9 eveningstar or a good demon whip brand, but Eos is still a reasonable weapon that's great early and still has utility late game for its Sinv and rElec effects (and while not 100% ideal you can certainly win using it too). I don't change weapon training just to use it from 0 skill, but I'm always happy to see if it I'm training M&F or cross training. 99% of the time Leech is better, but Eos will never berserk you when you don't want to be berserk.

sanka wrote:Only switch to them when you do not mind berserk? Seems really annoying to use.

This is the correct way to use *Rage items.

TheMeInTeam wrote:Eos is a reasonable weapon. It's like an elec broadaxe w/o the cleave effect. You will do better with +9 eveningstar or a good demon whip brand, but Eos is still a reasonable weapon that's great early and still has utility late game for its Sinv and rElec effects (and while not 100% ideal you can certainly win using it too). I don't change weapon training just to use it from 0 skill, but I'm always happy to see if it I'm training M&F or cross training. 99% of the time Leech is better, but (...)

I feel that you ( and everyone else in this topic) are horribly undervaluing Eos. It is an elec weapon so it is devastating against every monster with no rElec. It can be called "a reasonable weapon" against rElec monters, it is a +10 morningstar after all. Plus it has a very useful resistance. Plus it lets you see invisible.

Picking Leech would be reasonable if the alternative was only that unbranded lajatang. However, with a great weapon available, picking Leech is madness. Crawl is dangerous enough as it is, your weapon constantly trying to kill you is just too much.

Yeah agreed, Eos does good damage. (Some very quick and dirty fsimming makes me skeptical that you can be confident that "You will do better with +9 eveningstar." I'm sure it's true for some characters and some enemies though.) It seems to outdamage Leech by a solid margin at comparable skill levels and against electrocutable enemies (but again, quick and dirty fsimming with normalish stats, not trying several combinations of str and slay rings etc

).

As mentioned berserk is often a great buff, and this does make *rage less bad. I'm not sure how much ability to go berserk is a point in Leech's favor over another weapon, though---carrying Leech effectively lets you berserk at will with other weapons too, since you can swap to Leech, evoke berserk, swap back, and pound away. If you don't mind the annoyance of playing around *rage, it's not a huge downside for the reasons people have mentioned, but I think on balance it's most of the time worse than just having a swappable +rage item in inventory.

So it seems to me that, assuming you're willing to pay the annoyance cost of *rage, the next big question is how much you value vamping on every hit vs more damage.

Yeah agreed, Eos does good damage. (Some very quick and dirty fsimming makes me skeptical that you can be confident that "You will do better with +9 eveningstar."

I'm assuming a weapon brand of some decent variety for the eveningstar of course. It's hard for unbranded stuff to match elec weapons, unless target is resistant/immune or we're considering the biggest 2h options available.

If Eos out-damages a branded +9 eveningstar, would that have to be down to the increased accuracy from the halo?

So as far as I know, people generally regard vampiric as a pretty good brand, assuming it's on a good base type (demon blade is a good base type).

Leech's vampiric brand is 67% stronger than regular vampiric brand.

Factor that into your comparison.

petercordia wrote:If Eos out-damages a branded +9 eveningstar, would that have to be down to the increased accuracy from the halo?

That or the +1 slaying lol. In all likelihood, it's the electric damage that would make Eos competitive with an eveningstar rather than the other stuff. It's also nice to have a source of rElec that's not total dead weight when you swing it. Well, the monsters are dead but w/e.

I'm assuming a weapon brand of some decent variety for the eveningstar of course.

I used flaming, which I think of as a pretty "vanilla" standard brand.

So as far as I know, people generally regard vampiric as a pretty good brand, assuming it's on a good base type (demon blade is a good base type). [....]

Sure, of course if you would pick normal vampiric on a demon blade over Eos you'll be likely to want Leech over Eos. I can't be the only one suspicious of that first choice though.

vt wrote:Sure, of course if you would pick normal vampiric on a demon blade over Eos you'll be likely to want Leech over Eos. I can't be the only one suspicious of that first choice though.

Personally, I would rate a normal vampiric demon blade pretty close to Eos (probably slightly better, at least in pre-zot 3 rune games), and leech better by a significant margin *assuming things which are vulnerable to either* However that's a fairly big assumption.

There are several areas in the (post 3-rune)game where vampiric is useless (or near useless), and far fewer for which elec is as bad, so a long-term-view might put Eos ahead. Although by the time you're in those branches, you could possibly have a demon blade^elec (just a bit better than Eos) or a eudemon blade (which would win handily over EOS in most areas where vamp is useless)

I understand we're now in pure theoretical analysis, but yet I wouldn't give any weight to extended for my early game weapon choice.

Especially considering we're talking of two low-skill 1h, not a bardiche vs an exec axe with a whopping 26 skill cost. Nothing forbids to train two weapon skills to 14 by the time you've cleared Zot.

TheMeInTeam wrote:Eos is a reasonable weapon. It's like an elec broadaxe w/o the cleave effect. You will do better with +9 eveningstar or a good demon whip brand

The other important difference between Eos and a +9 branded eveningstar is that the OP actually has Eos

Anyhow my take is that Leech is the stronger weapon but that *Rage is extremely annoying to use safely so I would use Eos, especially if it's basically for killing popcorn. It's not like Leech does anything particularly fun, it's just good.

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