Late game stash

[Bim]

Pretty much every player I know uses a stash - to the point that it's a sort of given really. I've never played a game where I haven't used lair:2 as a stash to which I forever am traipsing back to over and over again and as we always hear, one of the main tenants of crawl is for it not to be a grind-fest/tedious.

Therefore, I'd like to know your thoughts on another late game stash which is guaranteed free of humanoid/jellys after being cleared.

(I know the Vestibule of hell is sort of safe (or at least it was) but I don't know how safe it really is?)

My thoughts were perhaps some sort of 'lockable' vault that could randomly appear (with a chance of not doing so) around level 18 or so, or similarly giving the vaults:1 a permanent place to stash. I don't think this would really over power the player in anyway, as it's all stuff you've collected and most mid to high level char's can easily deal with the hunger of the trip, with it being nothing more than a nuisance to run back to Lair all the time.

What are your thoughts?

[Baldu]

You might wanna consider doing a search about this subject or browsing a few pages, this is a fairly common subject that has had a bunch of discussion.

edit: basically vestibule is almost completely safe, and leaving stuff on the ground anywhere else is almost completely safe as long as it isnt in corridors but in room corners (monsters only super rarely path to room corners).

[Bim]

I'd had a bit of a search (granted not as thorough as I probably should have) - thanks for your comment, I hadn't realised about the corners. In terms of the vestibule, does anything spawn there, or is it just accidentally dragging stuff down with you that's the problem?

[Baldu]

Once in a while a demon spawns, but the vestibule is small, so even in the off chance he picks something up you'll find him in a sec and get it back. For reference, i probably saw one demon respawn in the vestibule per 15 rune game, and I don't remember seeing one pick up one of my items as they seemed to come from the hell portals and i shot them on sight. But I eventually stopped stashing and just dump stuff close to stairs in corners now, or if i want to save turns throw stash items in the general direction of a corner. I don't remember ever losing an item since I began doing that something like a dozen 15 rune games ago.

edit: if you care about score, since i stopped stashing my average score has roughly doubled since it seemed that i was stashing so much that it was responsible for half my game turns (and low turns seem to be one of the most important things for scoring)

[crate]

I have a good late-game stash, it's called the floor where I'm standing when I decide I want to drop items.

[hopelessDelvder]

I think I just lost 2 potions of curing doing this. i found them with ctrl f on lvl 17. when i got there the rest of the stack was there, but they are gone. i dont have them and they dont show up on ctrl f anymore.

i had left them on a down staircase, which was stupid, but I've always thought stash concerns are way overblown.

[njvack]

I remain convinced that if monsters would not pick up (or eat) stuff once you stepped on it, stash concerns would almost entirely go away. I don't think any narrative justification is needed beyond "it is annoying when they do that."

Anyhow: there have been lots of past discussions about this; google a bit and you'll find 'em.

[Tenaya]

Pretty much every player I know uses a stash - to the point that it's a sort of given really. I've never played a game where I haven't used lair:2 as a stash to which I forever am traipsing back to over and over again and as we always hear, one of the main tenants of crawl is for it not to be a grind-fest/tedious.

Why lair 2? Just leave it on the entrance or exit stairs to lair. Then you can just ^GL and boom! you are on your stash.
Same with Vaults. Or, you can do like all the high scorers do and just leave your valuables strewn all over. I rather like to see just how many treasurers I've gathered on the same few stacks.

(I know the Vestibule of hell is sort of safe (or at least it was) but I don't know how safe it really is?)

Good enough. Just leave your loot on the arrival steps in Vestibule and you have a same-level stash for D:21-27.

[Psieye]

The only time when I ever lost anything in my Vestibule stash was when I worshipped Jiyva. I frequently try to clear Vestibule ASAP when I hit D:21.

I HAVE had a jelly incident on Lair:1. But that was way back when I didn't understand monster pathing AI and had everything laid out nicely around the entrance staircase. It essentially boils down to: monsters don't path to items. They will eat/pick up (if they can) an item if they HAPPEN to walk over it, but otherwise they cannot 'see' items. I once encountered a jelly room in D:24 - 15 jellies packed into a tiny room. I teleported away and dreaded having to hunt them down afterwards when I came back. Nope, they obediently just camped around the room itself. No slurping of anything.

[rebthor]

I think I just lost 2 potions of curing doing this. i found them with ctrl f on lvl 17. when i got there the rest of the stack was there, but they are gone. i dont have them and they dont show up on ctrl f anymore.

i had left them on a down staircase, which was stupid, but I've always thought stash concerns are way overblown.

At the risk of being overly snarky, "Oh no, not 2 potions of curing!!!"

At least claim they were speed or resistance or something else useful and rare.

[crate]

Well resistance wouldnt vanish like that since enemies don't use them (and I think don't even pick them up).

[ebarrett]

All the dungeon's a stage,
And all the HOBe's and SpEn's merely players:
They have their YASD's and their YAVP's;
And one HuWn in his time makes many stashes.

[Bim]

Thanks for the advice/setting that straight. I had always thought there were quite a few demon respawns in VofHell but that was probably just from non-thorough clearing on my part.
However, the 'leaving in corners of rooms' bit, although it may work, seems a bit like a bug to me. As in, you'd have to be pretty spoiled on the actual mechanics of crawl to know that that's the case. I just find it tedious that for a (mostly) unspoiled player, the only place that seems safe is Lair (as you can quickly work out that the lair is safe) - so you have to keep going alllll the way back to a L2 stash so far back when you want to make absolutely sure stuff stays safe (like resistance potions, curemut, speed)

[Baldu]

Dude, you have the safest stash in Temple and Lair2, very safe stashes in Lair1 and Vestibule, safe stashes anywhere in corners, and mostly safe stashes everywhere. Other options could be nice but the issue is convincing a non paid developer in doing it, which is the reason why all these stash threads end with a whimper, the time involved doesn't seem worth it to those who could do something about it.

ps: would you have known to stash in lair if you hadn't been spoiled by the forums? I know when i was fully unspoiled I only stashed in temple (so I kept it very small). The pretense of crawl being played by fully unspoiled players is very thin, it is more a matter of how much spoiler info is known from bots/wiki/forums.

[Pereza0]

I just use mildly contrived vaults around the dungeon for most items. Items that are particularly valuable I leave at the temple or lair. Never had an issue so far. Only time something has eaten something I really wanted was when a brown ooze spawned in one of the Royal Jelly's treasure vaults