Tuesday, 23rd August 2016, 11:45 by goodcoolguy
The best species for generic book backgrounds is Dr. Good hp and reasonable AC throughout the game without armor penalties. [edit: Best for generic book backgrounds with the intention of following a "caster" game plan.]
If you really want to win book combos, especially middling-to-bad ones, you gotta stop thinking that backgrounds come with a conduct or natural strategy. They don't. If you just want a win, take a god that's going to carry you through the game. The best choices here, in my opinion, are Fedhas, of course, Yredelemnul, Hepliaklqana, and Nemelex. These gods will make the player character irrelevant for a huge chunk of a 3 rune game. You just have to understand some basic ally tactics and with Nemelex you have to have a general idea of what the cards do. Once you're riding the wave of god ability goodness, take stock of what items you've got and build your guy around that. Maybe it comes out a "caster," maybe not.
Now if you're having a hard time winning the good book combos (the MfIE, GrFE type stuff people are talking about) with the usual Vehumet level 9 silliness, then I suggest you fall back to the more generic picture above. Vehumet is a god for funsies, not for winsies. I would kind of caution you on Makhleb too. This is a god that develops slowly compared to the ones mentioned above, though it's generally a fine choice.
Another fine option is going Kiku. This makes good use of your starting stats and gives you a clear path to a spellcasting heavy game most of the time. It also works fine with a more melee-with-allies kind of style. Once you can do Kiku and Fed/Yred/Hep/Nem styles you'll be able to win book combos pretty comfortably and reliably.
For the really bad book combos, it's pretty much the same story except you also consider Trog.
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