Well, long time no see, right? It's been over three years, and so much has changed since then. I've saved up some money and went on the longest vacation, then devoted a lot of time to playing and streaming Hearthstone Battlegrounds (which was ultimately a failure but at least i got into top 25 in my region a few times). Got a bit into chess as well so now i at least understand who's that Paul Morphy guy the posters above had mentioned. Surely wish i could be "financially secure thanks to [my] family fortune", huh. As for Crawl, the australian crew (Demise, UV4 and zxc) don't make content about it anymore (i might stream some maybe?), devs have removed food but also even more fun (where's Tornado and DMsl? what's the point of new Tm?), and people have almost stopped using the Tavern because /r/dcss and Discord servers exist. I'll still continue doing my reports here and miss my chance to farm some free Reddit karma.
So, obviously i'm coming back because the devs have come up with a new background, Delver. Technically there's Cinder Acolyte too but i'll wait to try that out until the 0.28 release (CA might not even get there). Also, there's
another felid streaker whose streak is actually longer than mine. I find it quite funny that the longest active streaks are literally 4 huge variety ones, then two streaks with 20+ felids and no other race even comes close. Clearly, that means felids are OP.
Delver is a strong contender for being the weakest start in the whole game, fighting for that spot with Chaos Knight. Instead of Xom summoning a
D:1 harpy (fine, that was a weapon of chaos but Xom could probably do it too), delver has a D:5 start and a possibility to turn a corner into a centaur/Sigmund/Grinder/orc wizard/priest and instantly die. Yet their killdudes kit is the most basic one possible (leather + weak weapon and 2 skill in it), the consumables are most likely getting used up to get to D:1 and all you really get from this start is a chance to find a very early altar. How is this any better than Monk actually (in a non-startscumming way)?
Of course, i had to come back to Crawl one day and streak a FeDe. So i played the combo a few times (a total of 8) on my other account and surprisingly only won 4 of them, not even being able to do it twice in a row. None of the deaths actually happened before i reached D:1 (despite having a few super close calls) but rather it was me being unable to stabilise pre-Lair (no help from the background and maybe me being rusty) or statue/dragon felid not being nearly as strong as before and routinely losing fights without divine help (no idea why, maybe i'm too used to having DMsl). A few days ago i got so sick of that practice that i just went for it and played the combo on the streak account.
The game started in a very optimistic way, with upstairs in sight. Too bad that immediately upon ascension, i was in range of Robin and a few of her goons so a fear scroll had to be used immediately. D:4 was a wide open floor and also made me run away from an orc wizard and a scorpion. I don't remember if it happened on my way up or down but that floor even made me up quaff ID some pots (thankfully, there were 3 heal wounds pots which let me fight adders safely). D:1 had a spear gnoll btw but at least a cat is too fast for him. After getting to D:1 i was still weak, excluded a lot of monsters out and was desperately searching for a way to kill things. It ended up being a book with Sticky Flame coupled with a D:4 altar of Vehumet (the second altar i saw this game after Nemelex). Obviously, Sticky Flame was very far away at that point but after killing some weaklings with 4 UC and a bit of wand use i did get offered Magic Dart (at XL 5) and that was the worst sufficient spell for kiting dudes. While it was barely piercing any armour (still better than Sandblast though) and i was hard losing magic duels versus orc wizards, i had acquired a secure tool for killing gnolls, iguanas, wights and even two-headed ogres at a "low" price of real life time and turn count. Four two-headed ogres have been slain that way for some massive experience.
Eventually i did get Sticky Flame online (still had to Magic Dart those ogres though due to being in one-shot range), and that could kill most things even in Lair with enough patience. Vehumet was offering me total crap until Fireball on Lair:3. Between that and Fire Storm i found in a book, my elemental school had been chosen, and Vehumet eventually did offer me the missing step in that plan in form of Ignition. Fire is the only elemental school i'd consider on a cat anyway: Ice wants you to surround yourself with enemies while casting Polar Vortex, Air wants you to literally wait or take damage and Earth's ultimate spell barely does anything to flying threats. Maybe if Absolute Zero was still a thing, i could've gone for that. Sigh.
The rest of my spell kit ended up being more or less what you would expect: things like OOD, Freezing Cloud, Irradiate, Starburst, and of course, Mephitic Cloud, Blink and Passwall. But i also had to splash into some Hexes: Invisibility and Cause Fear. Yes, there was no stabbing going on but since there's no DMsl or even rMsl anymore, being invisible seemed to be the only way to stay on the same screen with yaktaurs, merfolk javelineers, stone giants and breathing draconians without being instantly removed as a non-melee cat. Invis was also the spell to use before going downstairs. However, it came with a downside of turning miscasts/Irradiate spam into a bad mutation/waste of cancellation.
When it was time to get runes, i made some mistakes in branch ordering, deciding to do Shoals before Snake Pits. Sure, i had Invisibility and Fireball made steam clouds everywhere but Snake Pit ended up being way easier due to lack of water, kite potential and Freezing Cloud owning quite hard. Shoals have actually claimed my only death due to me not noticing a water nymph and then getting a bit unlucky with damage rolls.
Going to Elf after both S-branches, i brought my Ignition to castability and finally felt like i'm doing something powerful as elves coming at me from the final vault were lining up perfectly for it. Vaults weren't very memorable except for me discovering i could kite Xtahua with OOD as their Bolt of Fire doesn't have perfect range. Slime was my third rune of choice and has put me in a predicament due to all stairs from Slime:3 to Slime:4 leading to an area with the same one stair down to Slime:5. And i was very low on digging, so i seemingly had to use just one set of stairs for Slime:5. I handled the situation using the good old "make a crapton of noise, then go up immediately and return right next to TRJ" method. It was not very effective but somehow by using !blink, ?haste, ?brilliance, !Immolation and Ignition while being at 60 health i managed to straight up kill TRJ and run away from the fire-resistant rockslimes.
Depths have also put me in an interesting situation by placing all Depths:2 upstairs at the same place (hangedman_pleasuredromes?). Instead of getting surrounded, i snuck to the lower floor and cleared Depths:3 before Depths:2. A true Delver experience. After clearing Depths, i actually tried myself at a Ziggurat. Unfortunately, Zigs got buffed with an increased amount of panlords while players got nerfed with the lack of Haste, CBlink and DMsl so not much fun was allowed for me and i had to bail from Zig:11, going net negative on blink scrolls and only getting a nice amulet with a bit of experience for it. Ouch. Jokes on me for forgetting to put on a fire ring and not stocking up on tree form potions though.
On the bright side, i did get Fire Storm online, making Zot fairly easy. I'll never understand people who say Fire Storm is useless in a 3-rune game. This had been the Tavern wisdom even before Ignition existed, now people say Ignition is a lot better instead. Sure, Ignition is nice for its requirements but unless you're fighting a very tight pack of mobs, its damage is way inferior to the level 9 spell. Fire Storm is a half-resistible Orb of Destruction instantly applied to a 5x5 square with the added benefits of clouds and fire vortices. Ignition is a weaker, fully-resistible Fireball cast on every monster in LOS. It's not even close in most situations. Yes, Fire Storm requires a ton of skills but you get to 2-shot most enemies in Zot with an AoE attack, for crying out loud. It does make tons of noise but so does Ignition and even Fireball. Just run to the stairs or something. I've learned Fire Storm on every fire mage i've ever played and never regretted it. It does make you miss out on some defence but even a goddamn cat call pull it off and not die. Because who needs defences at that point.
This would be the end of my report, i'll try to streak a FeCA in stable 0.28 if that ever happens, or consider trying retired combos like FeHe and FePr in Crawl versions where more fun was allowed. See you later or something.
Morgue
here, please don't look at the turncount, i was resting off my contamination way too much.