HOFi learning magic

[Herode2]

I'm playing a HOFi whith Int 17 (13 + 4 through a worn artifact) and Spellcasting to raised ro 6.
However, evel low levels spells still show a 100% failure chance for learning - at least after the Memorization screen.
Why is that ? How can I make this character lear some spells ?

[savageorange]

Without a character dump, we won't get far here.

[Tedronai]

Wear lighter armour and train the actual school to which the spell belongs to.

[Sar]

Take off your body armour, memorize some spells (use rings/staves of wizardry if necessary), put your armour back on, train their spell schools until you can cast them.
Some spells might be to difficult to learn still (most likely Haste), due to that level. In that case, learn a lower-level spell from that school (ideally something useful) and invest into that school.
You can carry staff of wizardry with you and swap to it for easier buffing. Pressing ' swaps between items in a and b slot and you can assign items you want to swap that way - so, say, your weapon and a staff of wizardry - by pressing =

[Herode2]

Wear lighter armour and train the actual school to which the spell belongs to.

Yup, that's the point, thanks !
I forgot the (plate) armour ^^. My bad...

Well,I'm afraid this means I spoiled the XP put in spellcasting then, unless some interesting light armour shows up later in the game.
And I'm also afraid that's very unlikely because I'm such a bad player that in 2 years of irregular crawling, I never saw more that 3 runes, and only once
So, this Lvl 15 orc will soon meet his fate - after my previous experience and runs

[Sar]

A HOFi with 17 Int can definitely cast some useful stuff in plate. Not to say it should be a priority - get good offense and defense first. Haste is an obvious spell you might want to get (and with a source of wizardry that won't take much more that ~14 Charms to get it to acceptable (I usually stop at 8%) failure). Regeneration, Spectral Weapon, Flight, Apportation, Summon Butterflies can also be useful. Probably more spells I am forgetting.

[Herode2]

OK, thanks for the advice !
I raised the spellcasting because this character found a lot of books with low level spells, and some hexes & charms stuff like you said.
You tell me it's an option for a heavily armoured guy, then that's good news for me : I'll try to use this spellcasting XP investment then

Moreover, this HOFi has a stack with rings and staves of magical power, along with an artifact armour : +1 ring mail "Psach" {Dex+2 Int+4 Dam+4}
Maybe it could be interesting to swap its current +5 plate armour of magic resistance with this Psach stuff when I'll come to have effective and usable spells ?
On the other hand, having AC 30 is cool. I'm unsure of how I could balance that...

[Sar]

I would continue using plate. If you want further advice, posting dump file would be appreciated (press # and look for the character_name.txt file in morgue folder, assuming you play offline).

[Herode2]

Sure, advices are welcome !
I'm sometimes kinda tired to die all the time, either in stupid ways or (sometimes) just because Crawl has obviously decided to kill me right now
But... right, I guess my mean play style / tactical choices / whatever is THE reason why I fail.
BTW, I'm also under the impression that Crawl has become even harder since the 0.11 & 0.12 release. Now, I'm often dying even before running to Lair when I consistently reached Orc Mines, the first Elven Hall levels, Snake Pit and D20 or more with the 0.10 version ^^

Anyway, back to the topic, this one is still alive & I'm interested in any advice/clue that could help him to survive a bit more ^^
Dump file attached !

[Sar]

Next time you can just copy the relevant part of dump (so pretty much stuff up to "Vanquished Creatures") and post it between code tags.

Some stuff:
I would definitely wear MR ring over the randart one. You don't need SInv because Ash (and you wouldn't need it otherwise anyway) and Hungr- is not relevant. MR is.
When I follow Ash I usually keep gloves and one ring uncursed so I can swap in a necessary resist - that is, unless I am comfortable with mine resists without need for swapping.
Don't carry benemut around. Probably quaff it right now - there are a couple of not-entirely-positive effects but they're not as likely as something good. Don't carry mutation around, because you don't want to quaff it pretty much ever.
Weapon: your weapon is not exactly good. If you really want to go axes + shields you can look for a broad axe and enchant it. You have a lot of axes skill though, if a good battleaxe or executioner's axe exists you can use it too.
Stat points: those should probably go in Dex.
Skills: you have 15 Armour with Ash boost. That's ok for now. What I would raise is Fighting, a lot of Fighting.
Armour: MR plate is OK, I would probably prefer an rF plate on this guy though, but it's worth enchantment. Also if you find regular +2 gloves, I would consider replacing randart ones.

Good news is that you will need to train much less magic skills since you're with Ash.

Edit: ID your wand!

[Klown]

Invocations can be a good use of magic too, especially armored melee characters.

[Sar]

Invocations? You mean Evocations? He has around 16 with Ash boost, that's a good amount.

[Klown]

Mostly meant if he dislikes this 'plate armour casting' run, that future runs could simply use makhleb or so instead of normal magic.

[Sar]

Well Makh is great but Makh does not give you Haste or Apportation. Why not both?

[Herode2]

Thanks for the tips, I am beginning to use them, I'll tell you later about this character when really hard stuff will come. I may need more advices at this time
SInv : my bad again, I forgot about Ash's gifts, this randart was a really useless ring. Protection from magic is fine instead. Moreover, I picked up a pretty powerful chimera in the Box of Beasts : the thing is a catoblepas/polar bear/bat composite and it splits insane amounts of petrifying clouds : then ennemies around are slowed then stuck and can be peacefully torned into pieces but from time to time my character is also caught on the cloud, protection from magic avoids him being turned to stone too often ^^

As for Mahkleb, I never tried this God, I'll give it a look next time.

Apportation, at the opposite, does not look so good here : Orcs have penalties on Translocation magic. I'll stick to Hexes/Charms and maybe some Conjuration spells if I have enough XPs to spend.

[Lasty]

Petrifying clouds do not check MR. They have a chance to petrify you only starting one turn after they are generated, and then (according to LearnDB) the chance that they petrify you is based on your experience level.

It can be a good idea to train skills in which you have a negative aptitude. Apportation is a level 1 spell, so it doesn't take much experience to get to a decent level, and Ash will boost that skill quite a bit. I'm not saying you need to get apportation with this character, but don't let negative aptitudes be the deciding factor.

[Klown]

As for Mahkleb, I never tried this God, I'll give it a look next time.

I just meant you could train invo up, and use something like makhleb's major destruction and get the same effect without the armour penalty. Piety loss would restrict you from spamming it but yeah. Insead of spellcasting & whatever magic schools; just invo. :3

[Sar]

Makhleb's not-spells are Conjurations and Summonings. They're good to have, but when I think of spells HOFi would want to cast, the only Summoning spell I think of is Summon Butterflies, maybe. There is no redundancy here, it's actually the opposite: if you get Haste as a Makh follower, you can Haste your servants to great effect.

[wheals]

This is a lot of fun if you're a formicid and you don't have anything better to do with your wand of hasting, by the way. Executioners haste themselves but the others can be crazy when hasted.

[Herode2]

Weapon: your weapon is not exactly good. If you really want to go axes + shields you can look for a broad axe and enchant it. You have a lot of axes skill though, if a good battleaxe or executioner's axe exists you can use it too.
Stat points: those should probably go in Dex.

1 - stat points : so now I should raise Dex rather than Str or Int ? Is there any penalty (alt: bonus) with Dex for axes ?
2 - weapon : I have found a +1/+4 orcish battleaxe of distorsion. But it's a two handed weapon, I would no more benefit from shield and the related skills. I'm unsure how much a battleaxe could be better here than my current +7/+8 war axe of chopping ? Is shield protection less relevant on deep levels ?

[Sar]

Well I would normally raise Dex because it helps with evasion (and yeah, I would train Dodging at some point). HO get plenty of Str on level-ups naturally.
Distortion is very strong, but can be annoying. Also if you unwield it you suffer some unpleasant effects: http://crawl.develz.org/info/inline.php?q=distortion. I would use a distortion battleaxe over chopping war axe if those were my choices.
Battleaxes have more base damage than war axes, and 1 point of base damage is roughly equal to 2 points of enchantment for one-handers and 3 points of enchantment for two-handers (all credit for this hint goes to crate).
Shields can be good if you have a great one-hander, but you don't (and the best one-handed axe, broad axe, is worse than other top-tier one-handers).