Sunday, 13th May 2012, 04:29 by Patashu
I like to edit my init.txt and add a line like this:
force_more_message = .*comes? into view
This forces you to press enter acknowledging when anything comes into view. While it gets tedious when you're fighting easy things, if it's anything remotely hard (and orc priests can start smiting you the instant they come into LOS!) you'll need every turn you can get to react.
OK, here are some tips:
Strategy
-Perhaps your problem is that you don't have resources in the first place to use. As soon as you're done with D:1 you should read every new scroll you come across. If a scroll prompts for a target, it's identify, enchant armour or recharging - figure out what identify is first, and identify all your potions. Don't identify things you can find out by wielding/wearing, since you will find plenty of remove curse and detect curse. If a scroll doesn't prompt you but does nothing, it's either curse, remove curse or amnesia (= forget one of your spells, but you didn't have any). The reason why you don't quaff potions blindly is because of the many dangerous potions (like strong poison, a game ender if you can't find curing).
-Identify wands, too. Whenever you find a new wand, zap it at a weak enemy like a bat. If it seems to have no effect but it still has charges, it might be heal wounds, digging, random effects or possibly a few others.
-Perhaps your problem is that you're skilling badly and so you don't have enough firepower. In the early game, the marginal benefit you get from training a weapon skill or offensive spell skill is much, much higher than that of training fighting, armour, shields, dodging, stealth, etc. You need to be able to kill dudes fast and quickly before you focus on anything else. As a general rule of thumb, look at the delay of the weapon you use, and train your weapon skill alone until it equals the number of 10%s in the delay.
-If you're a weapon user, look out for weapons of the kind you're using, but are larger. In spite of the lower accuracy and higher delay, the base damage has a compounding effect on how fast you kill things - and once you get your weapon skill high enough, the stated delay is almost irrelevant. Similarly, look for bulkier armour if you don't use spells and have the strength to wear it (3*the evasion penalty is enough). Also, look out for branded weapons - Some brands, like venom, electrocution and draining give a set boost to how much damage you do, and so are good early in the dungeon.
Tactics
-First, drill this into your head: You don't HAVE to kill everything RIGHT NOW. You might not even kill it later. You might just skip the level entirely. There'll be plenty of experience and loot in the dungeon, so pick your fights.
-Obviously, get into positions where as few things as possible can hit you at once (or see you, in the case of priests). Take note of how field of view works - backing behind corners and walls, and so on. Note it may not be worth backing up if it means taking too many attacks in the process - maybe you should read a scroll of fog, if you have one? Or cast Summon Butterflies? Don't forget about monsters with polearms and weapons or reaching!
-There is a technique called 'pillar dancing'. It's where you identify a circuit around a solid block that you've already mapped and know is clear of enemies, and continually back away from a monster that you are as fast or faster than - you can do this practically indefinitely, to regenerate HP without having to actually go anywhere. It's tedious, it feels cheesy - but it works. (Obviously, though, it won't work on monsters with strong ranged attacks. Great for ogres, however!)
-Identify when you're much faster than an enemy - worms, goliath beetles, agate snails, elephant slugs, etc. Such monsters can be defeated, if your weapon delay is low enough (swap to something lighter if you have to) via 'hack and back'. Basically, . until it's next to you, hit it once, back up and repeat. If you are sufficiently fast you will never be hit - it's purely because such tactics can be done on these monsters that they have such hard hitting attacks to begin with!
-Use diagonals to your advantage. Moving in a diagonal is like moving twice in one turn - it gets you closer to two things at once, if that makes sense. If you're running through hallways, cut the corners. Finally, note that the LOS-o-sphere is shorter diagonally than horizontally - if you run from things or to things diagonally, they have you in LOS for fewer turns. It'll cut the amount of damage you take by about 33%!! Finally, never move to a spot where you can't move away without getting hit - e.g., don't hug walls except to get closer to a hallway, and don't back yourself into a corner with no escape.
-Try to run towards places you've explored before. This highly increases the chance you won't run into some new dangerous pack and get trapped between a rock and a hard place. The same goes for escaping via staircases - use ones you know are safe on the other side, unless you have no choice.
-Don't forget about doors. If you shut doors nothing can attack through them, and only intelligent creatures can open doors (though jellies can eat doors!). It takes a turn to close a door and a turn to open it too, so you can 'door dance' by continually closing a door out of LOS from something trying to open it, and use this time to regenerate HP and MP.
-Don't forget about stairs. Stairs can be used not just to escape, but to split packs up - by going upstairs when only a few are next to you and the rest aren't. If something dangerous is around the bottom of a staircase, take a different staircase back to the level and approach them from a more tactically convenient spot (= less of them will be able to see them at once, you have cover to retreat behind, maybe a door to close, etc)
-If you see an orc, backpedal. Seeing a normal orc means it's very likely that there are more powerful orcs in the same group just outside of your vision.
-Don't forget orc wizards can't shoot you if they don't have a clear line of fire - regular orcs and even other enemies/allies can shield you from their spells. Also, orc wizards act the same whether invisible or visible - it's pretty easy to determine where an invisible orc wizard is, though hitting it is another matter altogether (you get a huge penalty to to-hit)
-Think about how many tiles you'd need to retreat to get behind cover from a priest/wizard. Don't expose yourself too much if you think you need to run - if you'd have to run a really long way, consider if your odds would be better trying to kill them then and there.
-If you don't think you can handle a situation, don't think 'I'll take a few whacks at them' - start running NOW. If you have things you need to do to run safely (like hasting yourself), do those right away not later.
-If you see a staircase to the orcish mines, don't take it unless orc bands have stopped making you shit your pants - because you're going to be surrounded by orcs EVERY staircase in there. Instead, try the lair, which appears somewhere between D:8 and D:13. (However, in the lair, watch out for hydras, which hit REALLY hard in melee, and blink frog packs, which are fast and blink around and hit reasonably hard. By this point you should be better equipped and prepared!)
Overpowered Races
You already know the importance of running. Spriggan and Centaur are two races that are much faster than most of the dungeon's fodder, but they both have disadvantages:
-Spriggans are small, so they have trouble using things made for bigger people like: two handed weaponry, large shields, gloves, shields... And they also have very poor strength. They also have very low max HP and can't eat meat, but have very slow metabolism so you shouldn't starve, but you can't fling around hunger-causing effects all day.
-Centaurs have swift metabolisms and get hungry very quickly. While you can run from things fine, you still need to get your sustenance from somewhere - and you want to avoid eating permafood for as long as possible.
Felids are another race that are faster than normal, but their many restrictions actually mean they're one of the hardest races in the game to play.
- For this message the author Patashu has received thanks: 5
- Dingbat, mkman1, Monican, MyOtheHedgeFox, sardonica
