I am terrible at this game.

[Nobuharu]

Hi all. Took a break after the last version when I realized I was spawning a FE of Su player ghost every two floors, more than happy to spam spells I didn't actually have and cut down every remotely promising start I have ever made.

So lately, I've been trying a different approach. Namely Huhu's and HoFi and occasionally DEFe or DeWi.

The problem being, I still suck.

I go Nemlex on the Fi because it's really fun, and the legendary decks are really, really powerful. Not to mention getting an Experience card is pretty game-breaking in the beginning. It also adds a great deal of utility, and I find Oka and Trog extremely boring. When I get bored, I tend to die, but moving on.

I usually Go Oka on the Hu mainly because ammo is always a concern for me (I like crossbows).

Thing is, I never seem to make it past lair with even 90% of of my characters or orc with 95% of them. My Fi tends to draw Damnation a lot. One memorable moment drawing one, getting abyss-ed, making it out a few levels higher and barely alive, then drawing the Wrath card, and getting dumped with no scrolls, no potions, and no charges left on that wand of heal wounds. Still lasted a few thousand turns before finally getting mauled by abominations. When I try to go the straight fighter route, I never seem to even make it to lair. Too many ogres, cyclopes, centaurs, and other nasty things tear me to shreds as I wander over to them. Even if I get lucky on the mutation roulette, it never stops me from getting shafted in Orc into a pile of knights.

My Hu tends to have different problems. Orc is a breeze, given that I am almost guaranteed penetration bolts by that point. The problem is surviving to that point, with (a) enough ammo, (b) finding halfway decent gear, and (c) not getting murdered by the RNG. I usually step around the corner and run into Sonja or Mara, and they go splat once I get the ball rolling. Their early game with less than 20 bolts is so pathetic, I don't know how to play them anymore.

My squishies tend to go splat upon meeting the first group big enough to expend all my mana on, of the first time I run directly into an ogre I run from for half the level, who I get a "That really hurt!" message from, and drop dead. IF I survive later, I usaually

So, long scrub-talking over with, how do you not feel like an idiot playing this game? People tell me "If you didn't screw up, you wouldn't have died" but my highest scoring games have involved things I had limited control over (shafts, getting Wrath immediately after something else, Getting a different wrath, Zot trap). How do you "win?" I've never even seen more than one rune, ever.

Is there an "easier" way of doing this?

I also play mutation roulette a lot. It's so much fun. The first time I got evolution created a monstrosity that was awesome, until I suffered a miscast and blew myself up. Been in lust with it ever since.

[Psieye]

I detect the "I must stand my ground and kill everything I see" mentality that is fostered by pretty much every other game out there, but which is extremely fatal in crawl. It sounds like you have no concept of noise management, splitting up big mob groups and outright running away from unfavourable fights. You are bedazzled by all the "cool things" like Nemelex cards and mutations before attaining the basic foundation player skills.

If I was to go back in time and advise myself on what the best way to learn crawl is, I'd say "start with MiBe, then SpEn". These are two ideal startups for learning many of the basic tactics of the game: how to not die while being melee, how to use limited resources to deal with limited crises (Brothers in Arms) and how to be a ninja who can't afford to stick around if conditions turn bad (e.g. stuff wakes up and can't be put back to sleep).

Since you say Oka/Trog bore you, go HOFi of Maklehb or HOAK. Both will give you reliable (with Invocations training) "oh shit" buttons for some renewable piety, so you can practice the art of "I must use a semi-limited resource to deal with this crisis which is beyond my normal melee". After you get used to using these semi-limited (i.e. renewable piety dependent) OhNo buttons, you start getting used to using actually limited resources (potions, scrolls) more reliably.

We'll need a sample character dump of a character who died at or beyond Lair to give you more specific advice on if you're screwing up with skill training.

[Nobuharu]

I like killing things, but I generally know when to cut my losses and run for it. I just tend to over-commit when I shouldn't and try to run from things faster than me. I think we can chalk that up to experience. I did play a lot of Nethack, but that game has some very game-breaking mechanics I can take advantage of from the get-go.

I learned very early to leave our friend Sigmund alone, but it sure took me a while. I generally run from uniques and OoD monsters unless I am SURE I can take them, even if another similar threat wanders up. Ditto on diving straight into every Bailey.

I liked the cards because they were extremely powerful "Oh shit" buttons with even mediocre skills. My early results with them were very good. Once I got lower, they tended to get worse. Although I was very satisfied when I mowed down Maurice, a stone giant, and that ogre mage chick that was tossing crystal spears my way. One pull, Executioner ruined them all in a very short timeframe. Although although, I am finding them less reliable than I would like.

Stealth mechanics confuse me. And I have never heard the term "noise control before" I notice when I start fighting, things start yelling, and I got half the level on my ass, so I funnel them all in one direction and just I manage my limited resources poorly: I regulate too many things as "too awesome to use." Guilty of dying of starvation while butchering a corpse with 4 rations in my inventory, dying to orcs while having more than a few potions of cure wounds, dying to a mob of killer bees with four charges on my fireball wand, etc.

Sometimes the classes with limited slots scare me. I get very, very sad when I find a nice piece of equipment I can't possibly ever use, but I am sure I will get over that.

And I seem to have forgotten how to dump character files. This install only has one dying at the bottom of lair when I held back and didn't just triple draw (which probably would have saved my ass). Although it's the most promising one I've had in a while.

Thanks for the quick reply, and I should try out those characters.

[Turgon]

I manage my limited resources poorly: I regulate too many things as "too awesome to use." Guilty of dying of starvation while butchering a corpse with 4 rations in my inventory, dying to orcs while having more than a few potions of cure wounds, dying to a mob of killer bees with four charges on my fireball wand, etc.

I recently said it in another topic, and those who read it for a second time may forgive me.
"I'll save this potion/scroll/charge of..." is well known as famous last words.

And I seem to have forgotten how to dump character files.

Just type #

The dump should be saved in crawl.akrasiac.org/scoring/players/nobuharu.html although actually there isn't any file.

And concerning your problems to win the game: the philosophy is that it's a hard game, this applies for all players. The more you play the more experience you'll get.

[Psieye]

I think it's "#" to get a character dump, which will appear in your morgue/ folder in offline installs.

Hmm ok so you know to run away and you just need experience to judge when you've got more on your plate than you can handle. As for noise control, lots of things make noise: casting/zapping big spells, hitting hard with a big weapon and shouting (you or mobs) being the common sources. Complex calculations are performed to determine how noise propagates through walls but the result is similar enough to real world noise so go with intuition.

A mob can either be aware of you or not. Here, "aware" means "has visual confirmation". When a mob hears noise, they remain unaware of you while going over to investigate. They then need to check against your stealth to "get visual confirmation". Until they have that awareness, the game makes it clear when a mob isn't paying attention to you. Once they've established visual confirmation, it's hard to 'shake them off' but possible if they lose sight of you when they have no further idea which way to go. It's best to play an SpEn of Ashenzari to actively see how this works as you're fast enough to shake off pursuers and with "Ash radar" you can see how they move even through walls.

So when it comes to mobs that move in a pack: when a mob spots you, it makes some noise to help alert packmates of your position. If you then run away, that first mob chases you as it has visual confirmation but the remainder don't have a clue and aren't smart enough to just follow the first mob. That first mob will never shout again as it stupidly thinks everyone knows where you are. Thus you've successfully peeled off part of the pack and now have time to rest up between fights.

I regulate too many things as "too awesome to use."

I know that feeling, it's something everyone has to go through. Eventually, it gets replaced with "omg I just used so many Awesome Consumables to deal with that. IT PAINSSSSSS" - that feeling of pain is proof your character is still alive. Even later you'll end up with "this resource is awesome NOW and it'll be worthless LATER. There is no point holding back on it" - e.g. potions of speed become almost worthless when you can reliably cast Haste yourself and scrolls of fear don't work once you run out of living opponents to fight.

[pikkle]

As I've improved at DCSS, I've come to consider consumables an absolutely not-precious resource. In my mind, these things aren't "oh shit" buttons, they're "Out of Depth monster" buttons -- these consumables are how you're supposed to handle certain encounters, not emergency tricks for when you've accidentally screwed up otherwise.

Threat recognition is terribly important, but can only be improved by playing (and dying) more. As a general rule, I expect to use consumables against any Ogre before XL9, any Hill Giant before XL13, any Jelly ever, and any Centaur before Lair. If I see an Orc Priest behind more than one other Orc, I'll retreat and enter the level from another staircase. Orc Warriors are a threat according to what kind of weapon they're wielding.

Also, learn to use all available resources: Wands of Polymorph, Paralysis, Slowing, and Confusion are all irrelevant by the mid-game, but spectacular before it. Same with Potions of Might, Agility, and Berserk Rage. Set autopickup to collect every Dart, Javelin, Net, and Needle in the early-game; Blowguns, Javelins, and Darts of Poison and Dispersion don't need training to be effective early on, and you'll probably ignore them later. If you can find an uncursed Blowgun and some Curare, no unique besides Grinder will be a threat before Lair. If you find some Arrows of Dispersal, grab a bow -- they can be life-saving. Throwing Stones at Jellies is effective, slinging them is more effective, and if you stumble across a Sling of Frost or Flame, Jellies are no longer a problem (still don't bother to train it). Later on, when your inventory is full or you're Burdened, just drop all this crap and don't worry about it. Turn off all that auto-pickup whenever you feel like all that stuff is no longer useful (though Curare Needles and Darts of Dispersal really never go out of style).

How much of this great stuff you'll find is totally random, but you're guaranteed to get at least some of it.

Master the item-ID game. In general, ID scrolls immediately (or as soon as you've got enough to be reasonably certain of a Remove Curse, if you're wielding a non-bladed weapon). ID wands immediately, first on a monster, then on yourself if the monster resisted and now you're alone. Scrolls of Fog, Blinking, Teleport, and Fear are all plentiful and can all get you out of a jam. The scrolls you have the most of will probably be Remove Curse or Identify. Use ?Identify on Amulets and then Potions, at least until you've ID'd !Mutation (dangerous) and !Cure Mutation (precious), after which it's reasonably safe to quaff-ID if you don't mind wasting one of the "good" potions. Whatever potion you have the most of is probably !Curing and whatever you have the second most of is probably !Heal Wounds. Start putting on jewelry as soon as you've got a ?Remove Curse. Any Ring that isn't cursed is helpful, so leave it on even if you haven't ID'd it (Potions and Amulets are priority for ID scrolls). You want to scroll-ID Amulets because many potentially dangerous ones don't auto-identify: =Inaccuracy usually isn't cursed, =Stasis can bite you in the ass when you try to ?Blink or ?Teleport, and =Faith when you don't want it will really mess up your Piety when you want to swap back to that sexy =Gourmand or =Conservation.

Also, be sure you've set your skills to "manual" (press 'm' to bring up the Skill screen and '/' to swap to manual) and train your primary attack exclusively until your weapon is at minimum delay or your favorite spell is at low low fail rate. Electricity and Venom are your go-to early-game weapon brands, all the way through Lair.

Remember, things are called consumables for a reason, not stockables. Their destiny is to be consumed. Would you deny an innocent potion its destiny just because your ego is bigger than a Giant Spiked Club?

[Psieye]

use consumables against ... any Jelly ever

Not when you're in a 1v1 situation with a nice wall to run circles around. Jellies are speed 9, with patience you can kill it with just stones and running around in circles.

ID wands immediately, first on a monster, then on yourself if the monster resisted and now you're alone.

Uh, not until you know wand of polymorph and also wand of random effects. Really, it's not hard to find some no-MR mob to zap wands on.

[rebthor]

Wand of polymorph other no longer mutates self. I don't remember if it still identifies.

Changes monsters into other monsters, likely to be harder, but without equipment. When used on players by monsters, it causes bad mutations 9 times out of 10, or otherwise a random mutation, which can still be bad. You can't use it on yourself.

FYI, jellies are speed 8 in trunk IIRC.

[BlackSheep]

Polymorph wands don't ID if you zap yourself with them, but except for the case of a wand of random effects yielding "Nothing appears to happen," all other wands do.

To the OP, this is a complex game with a lot of threats. Taking unnecessary risks like mutation roulette is not going to help you win more. It can be fun to run around with a horned, fire breathing dude with scales, but more often than not you'll wind up with reduced stats, defenses and power. If losing is getting frustrating, I would suggest that you set aside things like that for a while.

As for backgrounds, Fighter isn't the strongest starting choice. It can work fine if you know what you're doing, but if you're having trouble, there are better options. Hunter is a better option, but as you said, once you run out of ammo, you're a Fighter with worse equipment. If you're going to play a crossbow Hunter, you'll need to be very restrained with your shots until you start getting god gifts or encountering yaktaur packs. Gladiator is a good choice if you want to start off as a melee fighter. In addition to a nice weapon selection, the nets they start with can bail you out of some early jams.

You didn't mention what species you like to play. If you enjoy the Hunter style, but find that you keep getting overwhelmed, try playing a Centaur. Their extra speed will let you escape situations like the one you described with an ogre because you'll be able to outrun nearly everything.

[Fungus]

Here's my suggestion, for what it's worth:

Instead of going with a fast race like spriggan or centaur, go with the slow race so that you force yourself to carefully take stock of your resources and use them appropriately. From the wiki: "Even more than most species, Nagas need to make ruthless use of the resources available to them, and get their panic buttons lined up early. " My suggestion is Naga Wizard. I feel like it's an amazing hybrid melee/spellcaster combo and used it to clear multiple Zigs (somewhere upwards of five IIRC). The cons? You are slow. Swiftness and Haste will help you eventually. The pros?:

-Extra AC helps an otherwise fragile caster
-Poison spitting helps with some early game threats
-Poison resistance means you can abuse Mephitic Cloud vs... the world. But especially helpful for the likes of early game threats like centaurs, orc priests, etc.
-Great HP, Great aptitudes, Great MR. Stealth helps with your low speed problems.
-Inherent see invisible is nice too.

Wizards have an amazing starting spellbook:
-Magic dart... macro this to something easy like Spacebar until you get something better.
-Blink... for when you can't run
-Call Imp... SPAM this to take care of nearly all early game threats and unique mobs. With enough mana could might even take down a hydra.
-Repel Missiles... helps when you have a centaur and it will take too long to walk to it / deal with it otherwise.
-Slow... if you really need to run and have no other options, this might help you. I never used it much.
-Conjure Flame... People swear by this, but strange I never used it either. You can put it in a hallway to block pursuers.
-MEPHITIC. CLOUD. Enough said.

You'll need something to deal with the likes of hydras and other poison-resistant creatures by Lair, but you'll usually find some other spellbook with Ice/Fire/etc. by then.

Why Okawaru? My experience running this combo several times is that even though he gives a lot of junk, you will tend to get a decent naga barding from him. Normal naga bardings more than make up for a naga's deformed body loss IMO... you can enchant them to +4 for a total of +8 AC in the boots slot. Eventually you'll want dragon armor (I like mottled --> eventual pearl) with the GDR. Be careful how/when you use Oka's gifts... ID any weapons, wear armor only if it's safe to put it on and you have a scroll of remove curse available.

Sometime after the Vaults you should have a bunch of decent armor and a decent weapon and you can abandon Okawaru. With my NaWz I went for Vehumet to help with the high-end magics (Fire Storm, etc) but recently I found I like Makhleb as well. With constriction, dragon armor, and a decent weapon, you can be a terror both in person and with magic.

[crate]

Polymorph wands don't ID if you zap yourself with them, but except for the case of a wand of random effects yielding "Nothing appears to happen," all other wands do.

Digging and (if you're at full HP) heal wounds also don't ID on self-zap.

Anyway really the key to getting good at crawl is to ask yourself, after every single death "how could I have prevented that?". Find an answer, and don't make the same mistake twice. Eventually you will run out of mistakes to make, and you'll win!

[BlackSheep]

Heal Wounds does ID when you zap yourself, just not on full health monsters.

[nordetsa]

I don't think Nemelex is for an easy win. I still don't know how to play with that god.

But anyway, I think it is very correct in that you can and will have to use consumables. Don't be afraid to drink a potion of heal wounds when your health is below 5 while standing next to an orc priest. Wands usually lose their appeal by mid-game (except some good wands like haste, teleportation, and heal wounds), so use it a lot in early game.

Usually I zap wand to a rat or a adder to see what's it about. Even a wand of magic dart helps really much against ogres, especially if you are a melee character.

I think as a melee character noise isn't that significant as a stealth character, but it still helps to isolate one~two monsters. When you see a lone orc, chances are that he will be with company (priests and mage, for example). Fighter don't have much stealth, so the orc will spot you and shout. Lure him back into a corner, if possible. In that way you're facing just one orc, instead of an orc and orc priest (which can be really fatal in the early game). That orc priest will likely to follow the orc and spot you, but by that time you would've killed that orc and again face just one enemy instead of two.

[yogaFLAME]

"Teach me how to not suck" will not fit into a forum post. So:

1) go onto webtiles
2) check player's records on IRC by doing !gamesby player until you find someone with a good winrate
3) watch that player
4) ask them questions when you don't understand why that player is doing things

If you can play/understand console, replace webtiles with cao/cdo/cszo appropriately.

Alternatively:

Anyway really the key to getting good at crawl is to ask yourself, after every single death "how could I have prevented that?". Find an answer, and don't make the same mistake twice. Eventually you will run out of mistakes to make, and you'll win!

^

[Psieye]

I think as a melee character noise isn't that significant as a stealth character, but it still helps to isolate one~two monsters. When you see a lone orc, chances are that he will be with company (priests and mage, for example). Fighter don't have much stealth, so the orc will spot you and shout. Lure him back into a corner, if possible. In that way you're facing just one orc, instead of an orc and orc priest (which can be really fatal in the early game). That orc priest will likely to follow the orc and spot you, but by that time you would've killed that orc and again face just one enemy instead of two.

Go around 3~4 corners and that priest will never find you. Now you can kill the orc and rest up before taking on the priest (or just leaving him alone until later). There is more to 'stealth' than just how good your stealth stat is - anyone can ninja so long as they never show up in sight range.

[Nobuharu]

Wow, this thread exploded. Thanks for all the great replies, guys. I can't answer everyone directly, but here's some bullet points:

-Stop chugging down those mutation potions, it's a bad idea, and the odds aren't on my side to get one of those ten situational ones. Cost benefit analysis.

-Nemlex is powerful, but unpredictable, make sure you can survive a mis-draw. (what killed my most promising character at the bottom of lair in this build)

-Noise control is something to consider (something I never had, actually)

-Traps and doors is also important.

-I never knew how to peel groups, I always assumed they stuck together. This will help tremendously throughout the game, from those D level 2 knolls all the way down to Pan, I reckon.

-Use items, those four potions of speed do you no good when you're dead. That's what they're there for.

-Reliability can not be supplanted by potential high power.

Thankfully, I am already good at IDing things. I tend to use ID scrolls on (in this order) randart weapons I am skilled in, amulets, rings, potions (later on), and other scrolls if I pull a lucky twofer or trip. I can generally figure out which potion is which by looking at stacks. Although when I got 2 cure mutation in one stack on D level 1 my jaw visibly dropped. Most memorable: getting 6 potions of paralysis and four of the healing ones. Guess which one I drank while poisoned?

Wands I always will ID against a weakish monster that I whack once to see if it's healing, standing at an angle against a wall to see if it's digging. Only gotta zap it once. Although blowing myself up with disintegration was a great laugh, and also made me stop testing them on myself. Apparently I didn't learn after picking up deteriorating body with a DDHu.

The most frustrating deaths I've ever had were ones where there was absolutely nothing I could do. Had a great start on a SpAs, walked down stairs. Sigmund and four knolls, all with pole-arms. Doubt the poor blighter made it one step up the stairs. But those are much rarer than me just being stupid. Looking back it was obvious: went balls deep into the forest at bottom of lair, got surrounded, dealt four off a nearly spent deck, and NX was content to provide me with Trog's wrath. So many chances to get out alive, but I tried to teleport out way too late. Live and learn.

Fungus has a very interesting theory. I might test that out. Centaurs scare me a bit, their drawbacks seem pretty significant.

Although I learned that Spriggan's natural enemies are spamming their own spells, Centaurs, anything with magic dart, traps, and anything that chucks a high volume of missiles or AOE spells. Got blasted by one of my old hunters that had spammals. Although he was casting some weird bastardized version of it, what's that all about?

I like playing characters with options, which is why Nemlex appealed to me in the first place. Trolls and ogres and centaurs and minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions. I think magic is well-made in this game, but I am wary of creating more terrifying player ghosts, have a lot of fun with most mage classes. I an ideal world, someone who can be useful in any fight, but can hold his own in a slug-fest with most reasonable opponents, and still have enough utility to be a dirty bastard against assholes like Mara.

So, Zombie Jesus, I suppose.

Anyway, thanks for all the replies guys, I already learned a lot. This isn't a "make me not suck post" this is "I need general advice to suck just a little less"

[Psieye]

he was casting some weird bastardized version of it, what's that all about?

Player ghosts use monster-versions of spells. Sometimes that's the same as the player versions. Sometimes, it's a sick version that players USED to have years ago but were nerfed out of - monsters never got that same nerf. The ultimate case of this is if you die with Agony in your brain.

minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions

My crossbow-wielding, LRD-casting, Zin-lecturing, Freezing Cloud-rodding Minotaur would like a word with you. Trolls and Ogres get up to ridiculous magic feats behind your back too.

someone who can be useful in any fight, but can hold his own in a slug-fest with most reasonable opponents, and still have enough utility to be a dirty bastard against assholes like Mara.

Yep that's a Be (BiA most certainly is 'dirty bastard' qualified) or alternatively (read: harder to achieve), a melee/conjurer/summoner hybrid. Or actually, a necromancer of Kiku.

[crate]

Enemy agony is just agony now, and has been for some time.

[Fungus]

I think magic is well-made in this game, but I am wary of creating more terrifying player ghosts, have a lot of fun with most mage classes. I an ideal world, someone who can be useful in any fight, but can hold his own in a slug-fest with most reasonable opponents, and still have enough utility to be a dirty bastard against assholes like Mara.

I don't know how comfortable you would feel with this personally, but perhaps you should consider clearing out your Bones files? From what I understand, the consensus is that it doesn't count as cheating because you're basically playing a vanilla Crawl download.

One more thought on Naga (just to encourage you to try it) and threats like centaurs/etc:

Spriggans gain 30% less HP than average
Nagas have 20% more HP than average

You are slow but far less fragile than most casters.

[Psieye]

If you are going to advocate a Na to a beginner, at least advocate NaTm not NaWz. Spider form is just as fast whether it was cast by a spriggan or a naga.

[Fungus]

If you are going to advocate a Na to a beginner, at least advocate NaTm not NaWz. Spider form is just as fast whether it was cast by a spriggan or a naga.

I've played several NaTm, including some of Chei and some of other. Spider form is handy, true, but I still find Wz as easier than Tm since you are more likely to fight from a distance. I'd rather hit a centaur pack with Mephitic Cloud and watch them hit each other in confusion as I pick them off than slowly lumbering up to them to fight. Also, Call Imp takes care of most of the early game threats. *shrugs*

Just my two cents speaking as a mostly-newbie myself (though I've beat a few Zigs, all-runers).

[Psieye]

Not saying NaWz is weak at all, just that it takes more skill and know-how to get going than a NaTm when I think of beginners. The key issue with meph cloud being: understanding that it's very loud and thus, quite likely to bring in enemy reinforcements if you have no situational awareness. A Na has to start getting out of the way even sooner than most other meph mages.

[pikkle]

Trolls and ogres and centaurs and minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions.

Techinially, no. But if you want to view it that way, it's a really good trick.

[daggaz]

kobold assassin is pretty solid for getting past lair/orc, tho if you dont find/receive a decent ego'd weapon or ring of slaying by then, you may suffer slowly until you actually do run out of consumables and die.

poison takes care of gobs of bad guys, and the needles are common, and curare will devastate any unique except grinder or that goddamn mummy of torment. stealth for sneaking around and peeling mobs expertly, and there is no food clock unless you get lost in the minotaurs maze. oh and you get double xp so it is usually quick to get your needed skills up.

[Nobuharu]

Okay guys, thanks to everyone's advice, I got a pretty good SpAs going. I attached my char dump, and I just finished lair. I think I am off to a pretty good start, and I have those wonderful Sage cards to thank for my weird skilling (and I somehow thought twisted resurrection was actually good....stupid me.). What to do from here? This is usually where I screw up in a big way. Curare, stabbing, kiting, running, and judicious item use has gotten me this far (Rupert was laughably easy), but I feel like I am losing momentum with monsters waking up one hex from me, and I have to run like the dickens and kite with poison, which is steadily losing effectiveness.

But in any case, it's thanks to your guy's advice I could even get this far. I still don't understand stabbing that much, but...

I do think finding meph cloud was a big boon, though. Is it worth getting that hungerless (and forgetting all those garbage spells I accumulated)?

How do I stop from becoming irrelevant? This is my next hurdle, after early-game. How to keep the ball rolling? Skill up long blades and try to get a good slicer? Learn some more magic? How do YOU guys keep on trucking?

EDIT: I have also had the grim satisfaction of killing my four most promising ghosts (minus the two in abyss and ice caves, will I find those later?).

[Nobuharu]

Trolls and ogres and centaurs and minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions.

Techinially, no. But if you want to view it that way, it's a really good trick.

Mind clarifying this for me? Their aptitudes make it a bit hard for me to imagine them doing much else other than pulverizing things with their main skill (centaurs excepting, but even they seem like they would kite all day long).

[some12fat2move]

Trolls and ogres and centaurs and minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions.

Techinially, no. But if you want to view it that way, it's a really good trick.

Mind clarifying this for me? Their aptitudes make it a bit hard for me to imagine them doing much else other than pulverizing things with their main skill (centaurs excepting, but even they seem like they would kite all day long).

Trying to survive on physical combat is hardly a "one-trick pony".

How do I stop from becoming irrelevant? This is my next hurdle, after early-game. How to keep the ball rolling? Skill up long blades and try to get a good slicer? Learn some more magic? How do YOU guys keep on trucking?

Well there are a few ways I do this:

badass physical killing power. With oka/trog and good apts, you can hack almost everything to pieces (or shoot them down if you go ranged).
badass magical killing power. Conjurations, summonings, and necromancy can each kill everything midgame with the right spells.
ninjaing: pretty much once you have haste and cBlink you win.

[Psieye]

Okay guys, thanks to everyone's advice, I got a pretty good SpAs going. I attached my char dump, and I just finished lair. I think I am off to a pretty good start, and I have those wonderful Sage cards to thank for my weird skilling (and I somehow thought twisted resurrection was actually good....stupid me.). What to do from here? This is usually where I screw up in a big way. Curare, stabbing, kiting, running, and judicious item use has gotten me this far (Rupert was laughably easy), but I feel like I am losing momentum with monsters waking up one hex from me, and I have to run like the dickens and kite with poison, which is steadily losing effectiveness.

But in any case, it's thanks to your guy's advice I could even get this far. I still don't understand stabbing that much, but...

I do think finding meph cloud was a big boon, though. Is it worth getting that hungerless (and forgetting all those garbage spells I accumulated)?

How do I stop from becoming irrelevant? This is my next hurdle, after early-game. How to keep the ball rolling? Skill up long blades and try to get a good slicer? Learn some more magic? How do YOU guys keep on trucking?

EDIT: I have also had the grim satisfaction of killing my four most promising ghosts (minus the two in abyss and ice caves, will I find those later?).

I can't see your char dump, so I'm going to guess you didn't go Okawaru/Trog. SpAs without going into magic relies on paralysis/sleep needles and lots of throwing skill to get stabs in. Not really reliable unless you go Okawaru/Trog to get ammo gifts. Throwing nets are stab tools too but you can't use them as a Sp.

Ensorcelled Hiberation and Petrify (plus confuse) are the main stab spells, the former of which is the basic bread & butter of an En. Passwall (preferably with dig) being the alternate stab style. Later, Invisibility is the ultimate stab spell. Every stabber needs a backup plan in case things wake up. Really, whether that backup plan is melee, missiles, minions, blasting (conjurations/wands) or hexing to get a new stab attempt - all of them can work if you commit to the relevant skill(s). All else fails: run away and wait for things to go back to sleep - requires some hundreds of turns and don't traverse too many floors while waiting (time freezes for far-away floors).

Oh, I assume you were using a dagger for stabbing? And that you were one-shotting things that were asleep when you stabbed them?

Twisted Resurrection is extremely good if you get it online in the midgame (Lair and beyond to around D:18) if you are good at keeping your aboms alive. If you're casting it at low spellpower though, don't expect much success. Recall and worshipping Kiku are highly recommended for getting the most out of the spell. If you worship a god who you sacrifice corpses to, just don't take Twisted Resurrection as it's very corpse-resource intensive. Here, look at this Kiku CiP post of mine to see what I mean.

Trolls and ogres and centaurs and minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions.

Techinially, no. But if you want to view it that way, it's a really good trick.

Mind clarifying this for me? Their aptitudes make it a bit hard for me to imagine them doing much else other than pulverizing things with their main skill (centaurs excepting, but even they seem like they would kite all day long).

Their aptitudes just mean they have to be very selective about which spell schools to learn. -4 'just' means "it'll take double EXP so a human could get 2 schools up and running while you can only have one by this point in the game". If a troll really wants it, a troll can reasonably get a Lv 6 spell online. Because they are trolls, that Lv 6 spell will work much harder for them once online.

[crate]

Re: Minotaur aptitudes:

I link you to this post of mine explaining why you are looking at aptitudes the wrong way:
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=6384&p=85714#p85714

[pikkle]

Trolls and ogres and centaurs and minotaurs seemed a bit like one-trick ponies with very frustrating equipment restrictions.

Techinially, no. But if you want to view it that way, it's a really good trick.

Mind clarifying this for me? Their aptitudes make it a bit hard for me to imagine them doing much else other than pulverizing things with their main skill (centaurs excepting, but even they seem like they would kite all day long).

First of all, read Crate's post above. But if you insist on viewing Minotaur as a "pulverizing things with their main skill" class, it is effective.

But not as effective as learning Haste. I was sort of making a joke.

[Nobuharu]

Re: Minotaur aptitudes:

I link you to this post of mine explaining why you are looking at aptitudes the wrong way:
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=6384&p=85714#p85714

This is a VERY good way of looking at things. I never thought of that, and I wasn't quite sure how aptitude bonuses/malus worked. Thank you. Now I need to figure out how to get a spellbook with haste in it...I keep finding mediocre ones.

[Psieye]

Don't rush for haste, it takes time to get your combat skills ready beforehand. There's always something you can pick up while getting ready for haste, like swiftness or regeneration.