Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup questions/thread

[desocupado]

Lost the merfolk transmuter to a unseen horror. God damn it, I was having a good run.

I think I'm gonna start a crusader, but I wanted to know how does armor interfere with spell casting. It was awful in 0.6, but in 0.7 I saw no difference with or without an elven leather armour.

 

[protobob]

Lost the merfolk transmuter to a unseen horror. God damn it, I was having a good run.

I think I'm gonna start a crusader, but I wanted to know how does armor interfere with spell casting. It was awful in 0.6, but in 0.7 I saw no difference with or without an elven leather armour.

It depends on your skills, how heavy the armor is and how good your spell skills are.

Things to consider about armor: a) low armor skill gives very little advantage from what I hear b) armor skill increases faster the heavier the armor you are using (if you are low skill).

Once you can cast a spell at excellent you should be able to use heavy armor (or a shield) without little trouble (but probably not both at first--My DDNe tried using a shield/plate combo around clevel 14, but it was fizzle city. Just a shield was fine (I didn't try just the armor).

Merfolk are much better at dodge than they are at armor. I hear good things about demigod crusaders, granted you have to go without a god with them.

 

[Zomg]

I don't think there were any changes with armor and spell failure rate from 0.6 to 0.7. In my experience you can get away with 3-4ish evasion penalty with a late game character (e.g. dragon armor) and not have crippling spell success penalties, but early on when you actually need to cast low level stuff reliably or you die, forget it - you don't cast in anything non-elven worse than -2 at most, an elf in elven armor might do -3. The "elven" racial tag on stuff reduces the casting penalty, more so for elf PCs.

 

[Peeker]

The only way I know of that can happen is if you've taken Xom as a diety (god of random lulz).

Ah that would explain it then, Xom was indeed my deity, and I think I then changed religions. She obviously was none too pleased.

Ta for the reply Zomg

 

[Malakal]

Just buried my awesome Deep Dwarf berserker. Had +6/+6 vampiric executioner axe and full artifact set (minus the cloak and helmet) including +5 artifact golden dragon armor for 41AC and 20 EV. Got killed with three runes in the Slime Pit by the slimes spawned from the dead Royal Jelly. I think that overall lack of regeneration is too big a disadvantage compared to provided boni for deep dwarves... Great pity, breezed through other parts and had about 280MR.

 

[MisterStone]

There's a tournament going on at akrasiac, anyone trying to compete?

 

[Zomg]

Can't be bothered to run up numbers and still lose to mikee or 7#### or Stabwound or a speedrunner or whichever Crawl Jesus is playing.

Do not play nerdout chicken with Roguelike players :/

 

[protobob]

Just buried my awesome Deep Dwarf berserker. Had +6/+6 vampiric executioner axe and full artifact set (minus the cloak and helmet) including +5 artifact golden dragon armor for 41AC and 20 EV. Got killed with three runes in the Slime Pit by the slimes spawned from the dead Royal Jelly. I think that overall lack of regeneration is too big a disadvantage compared to provided boni for deep dwarves... Great pity, breezed through other parts and had about 280MR.

You should try a DD Necromancer, vampiric draining (spell) works great with DD, and pain doesn't cause any self-damage, either.

 

[Zomg]

People always say that but I'd think it would make the midgame an even bigger pain in the ass because you'd have to constantly look for shit enemies to top off your HP with v drain and Makhleb/Yred. Although I guess less of pain in the ass than a berserker without a vampiric weapon.

 

[Castanova]

I'm playing on the server during the tournament but I have no chance in the competition. Still fun to see some of the challenge awards, like the one for a win without visiting the Lair or the Nemelex Xobeh character choice (Ghoul Fire Elementalist). One dude did both of those challenges at the same time.

 

[protobob]

People always say that but I'd think it would make the midgame an even bigger pain in the ass because you'd have to constantly look for shit enemies to top off your HP with v drain and Makhleb/Yred. Although I guess less of pain in the ass than a berserker without a vampiric weapon.

Can't say much for the mid game, but I managed to get to lvl 14 with one so far. After playing DDNE for awhile you get used to healing during combat and it when you go back to playing other characters it feels really strange to do most of your healing outside of combat.

DD also has the advantage of being immune to all but the most potent poisons (due to the damage shave). Easily did the hive without poison resistance.

 

[Zomg]

It's obviously very doable but people (not you in particular) talk about DDNe like it's a money combo when it's really just a way to make DDs not-a-challenge-race. Kind of turns them into a slightly-annoying-but-not-weak race like Ghouls.

@Castanova: The no-Lair thing sounds like something I should try before the contest ends, I hate all those Goddamn branches

Has anyone on akrasiac been playing the GhFEs like FEs, or do they just toss the spellbook and start punching?

 

[Chip]

Anyone here tried playing air elementalists? I've been playing as a kenku one and while I get that it's weaker than fire/ice, I like bouncing the shots off walls because it makes the beggining a tiny bit less boring. I'm still very much a novice at this game and seen to die shortly after the temple every time but I think this is due mostly to me switching race/class combos so often that I don't get used to any single one.

 

[Castanova]

Has anyone on akrasiac been playing the GhFEs like FEs, or do they just toss the spellbook and start punching?

Guessing from the logs, it looks like they're trying to punch things as much as possible. I guess the FE aspect is mainly used to soften up tougher enemies.

 

[Zomg]

On AEs: They're pretty shit, you just have to hope you get some kind of decent way to kill stuff by like DL~8 or you die because zap bouncing stops working. Actually I played some in the development version of 0.7 and they nerfed them by extending the range of zap by one tile, which made it impossible to easily get double bounce kills, so even that sucks.

A good combo is a Draconian Air Elementalist - they get inherent controlled flight, which means levitation+swiftness lets them run as fast as spriggans, and they also get a breath at CL7 which will be desperately needed by an AE for damage (and it doesn't pump XP into anything). If you get lucky and get a killer breath like a mottled draconian you have an easy win (I think being an AE skews you towards being a black draconian though). Mephitic cloud abuse will do okay with anything though, you just have to commit to getting some ways to do damage because Air skill sucks at it. Zap sucks, discharge really sucks, lightning bolt sucks and is also rare.

 

[Chip]

Thanks, i'd thought static discharge seemed pretty worthless from my limited experience with it. It seems like its only handy if surrounded, and if I got surrounded I'd just blink. Also I noticed there's only one level of resist electricity, are there alot of enemies who have this?

 

[Zomg]

Don't really know, I've never used electricity seriously for damage after the early game so I never noted the overall resistance profile. I think undead are mostly elec resistant?

Fire elementalists and Ice elementalists are interesting sides of the same coin (both have books that can get you pretty close to a win with 0 luck from the dungeon) and Earth elementalists have a unique and interesting playstyle, AEs are just clumsy and meph abusing gets old fast.

 

[Malakal]

Yea, AE definitely lack good spells. While not many creatures have res elec (undead dont) there isnt really anything worth resisting... FE and CE get boring fast since they are basically the same. I think that the best school is necromancy with a really diverse portfolio of spells ranging from summons and pets to damage spells and debuffs... Or transmutation, but that is more for magic monks.

 

[desocupado]

36935 Daniel the Destroyer (level 13, -4/63 HPs)
Began as a High Elf Wizard on Aug 17, 2010.
Was the Champion of Vehumet.
Slain by an eight-headed hydra (6 damage)
... on Level 8 of the Lair of Beasts on Aug 18, 2010.
The game lasted 02:01:03 (32017 turns).

Daniel the Destroyer (High Elf Wizard) Turns: 32017, Time: 02:01:03

HP -4/63 AC 4 Str 9 Exp: 13/51285 (278), need: 21464
MP 7/32 EV 14 Int 25 God: Vehumet [******]
Gold 1036 SH 0 Dex 16 Spells: 9 memorised, 5 levels left

Died to that hydra, one hit KO, full hp.

Shit, I really didn't expect that, since I was killing everything left and right, and had killed hydras before.

 

[Castanova]

Damage spikes in this game are pretty outrageous. Hence why most people win with characters that don't get hit (stabbers/casters with Blink, etc.).

 

[Peeker]

Can someone please help with info about the relationship between Paladins and swords. Falchions, scimitars and long swords are the most likely weapons for this class for quite some time, and they ae all supposedly better for the dextrous.

Yet if I play most of the viable species they mostly start with greater strength (except for high elf I think). So are they gimped from the start?

My main question is whether I should be putting points into strength or dexterity every three lvls. Or should I just follow what bonuses the game gives me on other level-ups. I've noticed that high elves naturally increase dex when using swords, and Hill Orcs Strength.

And if I want to use that great sword I find later on, does that change anything in regards to stats.

This is all a bit confusing, and I'm kind of surprised that I cannot find a single reference to it anywhere.

Ta in advance

 

[Zomg]

Last time I paid attention (version 0.6) the "better for the strong/better for the dexterous" thing is a minor issue compared to the most important weapon stats, base damage and delay.

Stats in general in Crawl don't mean much, but:

Different races get different automatic stat-ups (sometimes it's like 50/50 chance of two different stats, etc), plus everyone gets to up a stat of their choice every 3 levels IIRC.

Strength is generally not that important, 'cause the main benefit is less penalty from heavy armor and heavy armor currently sucks. It gives a small incremental damage bonus you probably won't notice. Dexterity is nice for giving you an evasion bonus and it's the most immediately useful stat for non-casters at like level 3 and 6 before you'll have found any spellbooks. Intelligence is generally the most whole-game useful stat for giving you bonuses to spell success, spell power, and reduced spell hunger.

If a stat is reduced to zero by something I think you fall unconscious now (0.7) and you have a smallish number of turns until you die unless you restore the stat somehow, so you generally don't want to run around with any extremely low (<6?) stats.

Tl;dr don't worry about stats, it's a game where you sperg in the dungeon not in the character screen

 

[Peeker]

Thanks Zomg

Not that I'm obsessed by it, but I needed a general rule of thumb, like the one you have just given. Actually I had the similar question about spears, because those species/classes that highight the choice are also strength based, yet spears are better for the dextrous (or so it says on the weapon description).

I wouldn't mind a modicum of understanding of the to-hit/damage ratio. I read somewhere that strength increases the to-hit chance for maces and axes, but haven't found similar info on swords and spears.

Anyway. thanks again for the quick reply

 

[Malakal]

Alas to hit and damage calculations in DCSS are a mystery. And a bad one since I truly cant comprehend why should I pump STR or DEX above certain values. And INT always gives something (spell power and casting chance).

Right now getting stats to 20/20 should definitely be enough for any weapon unless going for HEAVY axes.

 

[Castanova]

Speaking of, I noticed that Stabwound's sick 19-win streak is probably about to be broken. Elliptic (hyperbolic?) is at 19 right now. He's winning about 1 game per day. Crazy.

http://crawl.akrasiac.org/scoring/streaks.html