The Tavern

Alright, joking aside - they're going to be weak early on but once you get a good transmutation going, they can use things like stone form/stoneskin for incredible AC (for a caster!

) while having *zero* armor melded to them. Early on spider form gives you some speed, and if you want to go melee as a dragon late game you could, although I think stoneform would probably be the most used.

Getting there from level 1 would be tricky, I'd probably start as a conjuror/venom mage and fight at range, then pick up more transmutations as you go. Sif Muna can promise you that or you can just pick any god and hope to find the books you need eventually. Anyone know how blade hands impacts them, if it stacks with constriction, etc? I think that having condensation shield/stoneform/stoneskin should give you plenty of defense to go melee, although the slow from stone form could be tricky. Has anyone tried this build? I'm pretty weak with casters so my octo conjurors tend to die before they even get 4+ rings, let alone start picking up transmutation spells.

I've been experimenting with Octopodes a bit myself, and you don't have to fight at range. They have enough stealth and the constriction thing going on that you can murder most early monsters pretty efficiently, once your Unarmed skill is off the ground. They certainly do better up close than, say, a Deep Elf caster with a dagger does. You're squishy, though, so you still don't want to try to melee things that can hit hard (ogres, uniques) - but then, that's true for non-octopodes, too.

Octopode Transmuter isn't actually so bad a combo, even early on... if you're having that much trouble surviving, you might try a Wizard instead, as they get Blink and Mephitic Cloud.

Aye I decided to give the direct start as a transmuter a shot, and your offense is really, really solid early on. Not much will survive more than 2-3 attacks. Your defenses are a problem, but it's a little bit better once you get spider form online and get the EV bonuses. A lucky ring of protection or finding a buckler/shield early on is really helpful though. Still working on keeping one around long enough to get up to statue form, my last decent run died in a bailey when an orc knight had a few too many axes of returning and I didn't have the mana to keep him mephitic'ed.

http://imgur.com/TBL9W (not sure why the above img tag isn't working...ah well)

I'm starting to feel like we desperately need Cthulhu to be added as a new god.

Appreciates: You or your allies dealing constricting damage.
Depreciates: The world's continued existence.

Anyone managed to get an Octopode transmuter to endgame/victory? Regardless of if you started as a transmuter or a more general caster, just so long as you used some sort of forms to make up for the lack of inherent defenses.

tasonir wrote:

http://imgur.com/TBL9W (not sure why the above img tag isn't working...ah well)

I'm starting to feel like we desperately need Cthulhu to be added as a new god.

Appreciates: You or your allies dealing constricting damage.
Depreciates: The world's continued existence.

Cthulhu appreciates your destruction or disassembly of traps, much as Cthulhu is trapped in sunken R'lyeh.

I'd say that Cthulhu would appreciate being corrupted, if we were playing ADOM. Mutations may or may not sound good enough to fill this

.

As your piety goes up monster glyphs start to appear as something else (lost sanity). If you don't get the orb before a certain amount of time you lose control of your character as they go insane

Cthulhu appreciates your spending several hundred million turns in the dungeon so the world ends.

I thought Cthulhu already was in the game. The locals just call him "Kikubaaqudgha" for some reason.

Happy Corner wrote:I thought Cthulhu already was in the game. The locals just call him "Kikubaaqudgha" for some reason.

Blasphemy! :evil:

Cthulhu also appreciates when you have an optional sexual encounter with tentacled monstrosities. (At least, if the Innsmouth incident is anything to judge by...)

I've been trying this out recently, dropping all stats but Fighting, UC, Spellcasting and Transmuting until I can get Ice Form/Blade Hands.

Smart move? Also, I was thinking of probably following Sif.

gungr wrote:I've been trying this out recently, dropping all stats but Fighting, UC, Spellcasting and Transmuting until I can get Ice Form/Blade Hands.

Smart move? Also, I was thinking of probably following Sif.

I've been playing Felids a lot and Stone Form is a good alternative, except they have Earth at -2.

gungr wrote:I've been trying this out recently, dropping all stats but Fighting, UC, Spellcasting and Transmuting until I can get Ice Form/Blade Hands.

Smart move? Also, I was thinking of probably following Sif.

I would say drop everything except UC until you become comfortable with your damage output, while getting a couple levels of Transmutations to get Spider Form castable by level 3-4. Once you're comfortable with UC, start pumping Transmutations/Spellcasting until you can cast Blade Hands. You can get Blade Hands running by Lair this way. Then you can pretty much do whatever you want until Zot. Granted, your defenses will suck, so you will want to boost those eventually, but damage is more useful than defense in the early game.

My cookie cutter for all races:
Only UC until it's at level 5, then only transmutation until spider is at 5% failure. After, mix UC (focus), spellcasting and transmutation(focus) until level 12. Only exception: few levels in translocations if you find blink. After level 12, you can broaden out with fighting and other skills. Transmutations school easily gives all the utility you'll need until lair.

Happy Corner wrote:I thought Cthulhu already was in the game. The locals just call him "Kikubaaqudgha" for some reason.

Lugonu is much closer to Cthulhu. Think about it, She has Mad Acolytes, wants you to corrupt the world, and has almost the same number of letters in Her name.

Jabberwocky wrote:
Happy Corner wrote:I thought Cthulhu already was in the game. The locals just call him "Kikubaaqudgha" for some reason.

Lugonu is much closer to Cthulhu. Think about it, She has Mad Acolytes, wants you to corrupt the world, and has almost the same number of letters in Her name.

Main difference: Cthulhu doesn't care what you do.

On a more serious note, what's a good god choice for these guys? Being an unarmed and mostly armourless hybrid really reduces the number of useful god abilities, especially if you don't want to branch out into other spell schools until later on. I've been using Okawaru just for Heroism and an almost guaranteed awesome piece of headgear. Also if you want to use Statue Form with a shield you'll have plenty of good shields to choose from! I've been considering Ash but I don't really know how he works with Octopodes' weird item slots.

rabidweasel wrote:On a more serious note, what's a good god choice for these guys? Being an unarmed and mostly armourless hybrid really reduces the number of useful god abilities, especially if you don't want to branch out into other spell schools until later on. I've been using Okawaru just for Heroism and an almost guaranteed awesome piece of headgear. Also if you want to use Statue Form with a shield you'll have plenty of good shields to choose from! I've been considering Ash but I don't really know how he works with Octopodes' weird item slots.

Jiyva!
Elyvilon is vvvv solid utility. Crowd control if you invest in Invocations, purification, and since octopodes are squishy it might be very handy to be able to pray-and-walk-away if you take a big hit and end up with low hp.

Thing with Ashenzari is he won't do anything for your melee combat, maybe if you really really need to spell power boosts to cast some defensive or offensive buffs?

/edit oops I posted this thinking you were planning to play an unarmed melee-focused guy, prolly of makes it harder for you to invest in invocations as a transmuter..

Chei works well with constriction, or Nemelex because Evo +1.

I was thinking maybe Okawaru until I clear out Slimes and then going Jiyva.

Struggling to make this work, I can get to around level 9 or so but then I'm just so frail against things like Centaurs, Jelly and the like. Any tips? I've been following what Banei posted for my stat progression - I also threw in some Fighting to see if that helped.

Always blow your scrolls of enchant armour on your current armour (hat, octopode) to max. It's not like you won't find more.

At 9ish+, try to use ice form against hard enemies, unless they are using fire. You can clear lair and swamp with ease using only that transmutation (be careful of fire drakes!). With poison resistance from ice form, food isn't an issue. You may need a wizardry ring/staff at first.

Jellies: wands, sticks to snakes, throw rocks
Centaurs: pull into L corridor and fight around corner. If not, use sticks to snakes to reduce number of incoming attacks

For centaurs just use spider form, spider form is seriously overpowered when you can first use it. They won't hit you much through 20-30 EV (depending on your dodging skill).

Nevermind, died again at level 9.

The Tavern

So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;)

So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;)

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;

Re: So Octopode transmuter is the best combo ever, right? ;