Slings

[giygas]

How do I use slings in trunk? They already are a weak weapon, and now, due to the ranged nerf in trunk, the little ammo that I find on the ground mulches quite quickly (and stones tend to be too weak post-lair, unless you have a spriggan kiter). Slings seem more and more like a lose-lose scenario, and a no brainer not to use them.

[onton]

How do I use slings in trunk? They already are a weak weapon, and now, due to the ranged nerf in trunk, the little ammo that I find on the ground mulches quite quickly (and stones tend to be too weak post-lair, unless you have a spriggan kiter). Slings seem more and more like a lose-lose scenario, and a no brainer not to use them.

They are not weak at all (they are actually usable with a shield, which is great) and now all that ammo gifts stack the are not tedious at all. Though I admit I use them extensively only with Oka and Trog.

[pratamawirya]

I even think that slings are better than bows (not longbows).

[crate]

Ranged nerf??? I missed that. I noticed a nice ranged buff though, which was getting rid of ammo enchantment.

[cerebovssquire]

I've won a game with only slings and barely any spells (and I mean only slings), and that was with a deep dwarf who couldn't heal (no Makhleb, Ely, vampiric stuff or Jiyva). I didn't have that much of a rough time. Have you tried combining slings with translocations, shields, Heroism, etc.? Just slinging stuff maybe isn't too easy.

[smock]

Sadly, there's not enough good sling ammo in the game to easily support a slings-only strategy unless you follow Trog or Oka. I've actually had more success with slings than with crossbows.

With slings you need dex to get to min delay and str for a skill-associated damage bonus to kick it. (It used to be an ammo enchantment-associated bonus.) Basically, if you have high skill, an enchanted launcher and decent str (18 or 20 should be enough, I think, for slings), you get a significant bonus to sling base damage. The amount of str needed for slings is much larger than that needed for bows. The details depend the launcher enchantment, the type of launcher, the ammo, skill, and strength. Silly complex! So if you're playing a weakling Spriggan or something, your sling damage will be lower. This is all assuming that Henzell is current enough.

[pratamawirya]

Let's just wait for "nobody" a.k.a. CommanderC.

[crate]

With slings you need dex to get to min delay and str for a skill-associated damage bonus to kick it. (It used to be an ammo enchantment-associated bonus.)

The bonus from str existed before ammo enchantment removal. I am not sure that taking str just for sling bonus damage is worthwhile (it probably is for longbows up to about 15 str because they get a bigger bonus per point until they hit the cap).

[CommanderC]

crate, the strength bonus is extremely important. It's very easy to understand: a +0,+7 sling with strength bonus at max (plus2 + 1 =7+1=8, to reach it you need ~19 str if you are using bullets, or ~24 if are using stones) is completely equivalent to a +0,+22 sling without strength bonus (8+1d(7+1d3-1)-1 and 0+1d(22+1d3-1)-1 have the same average). With longbows this very difficult to notice because reaching the maximum strength bonus is trivial (~14 str).

smock, if your strength is below 10, the strength bonus is negative. A spriggan with str=3 has strength_bonus=-6. Since the strength bonus is twice as important as the launcher enchantment in the final calculation, this is quite bad.

To answer giygas, I never use slings past the early game, but if you want to use them, my advice is to go with Trog. You will get good ammo (which is very important), and slings with high plus2.

[pratamawirya]

Such formula... dang.

[crate]

I know the strength bonus is important (I messed around in wizmode enough to see what kind of difference it made), but whether that 1 point of str is worth more than 1 point of dex or int for a sling-user is questionable if you do not need it for anything else.

[CommanderC]

crate, agreed. Raising dex lowers the delay, while raising str increases the strength bonus. It would be interesting to study which one is more efficient. Of course, you also have to consider other factors like spellpower or evasion.

Thanks minmay, but I think kilobyte is already working on it (and I'm sure he will do a great job). Also, I don't know attack.cc and melee_attack.cc too well. The current ranged combat system is too complicated and obscure. Something similar to current melee system will be better, because the players are familiar with it and will understand it.

[smock]

Assuming a launcher enchantment of +8 and no skill, the strength needed for bows is 16 while the strength needed for slings is 24. With skill=27, this becomes 18 and 14.

With the +11 sling "Punk", you need str=28 at skill=0.

Ranged combat is odd.

[Laraso]

Slings are probably the most versatile of all the launchers in the game.

They can be used with a shield, they are very common to find on the ground, and stones usually appear in large groups all over the beginning floors so you should usually have plenty of ammo to carry into the mid-game.