YAAP: Funcrunch-Cav-Hum-Fem-Neu, genoless, polyselfless, artwishless (NAO)
funcrunch
last time I ascended with one was in '95, as I found when searching
Usenet for advice on the quest (more on that later). I think the only
time I've even played one since then was when I accidentally started
up with a random character on NAO, and immediately quit. But I didn't
like that zero-score for the class on my record, so figured I'd try
ascending a cavewoman again sooner rather than later.
Since I played this particular game slowly and intermittently over a
couple of weeks I don't remember a lot of details. I do remember
starting a brown pudding farm in Minetown as the altar was co-aligned.
I was getting some decent death drops so farmed for longer than I
normally would. When I finally got too bored I unlocked and opened the
door, only to find the level was knee-deep in pudding. (I'm not
skilled/patient enough to intentionally fill the whole level; I
usually just split a few, then kill a few, etc.). By the time I'd
slogged through them and the other monsters that had appeared, I was
the proud owner of a wand of wishing. GDSM and amulet of reflection,
please.
So onto the quest. I hate the tight squeeze on the first level, and
thought I might be able to get through with jumping boots. Oops, I
guess they fixed that bug. Now I know how some people have managed to
get killed by "wedging into a small crevice" (I didn't die, but was
amused to see the message). Then arriving at Chromatic Dragon's lair,
I zapped a wand of death, to find it reflected back at me. Hmm,
Chromey's had an upgrade since the last time I did this quest. (I
stoned her that time, and knew that was no longer an option, but then
silver dragon scale didn't exist in that version either so I didn't
think that she might have reflection.) At least once I offed her and
returned to the home level, I could make plenty of use of the co-
aligned temple.
Though cavepeople are supposed to be combat-wombats, I thought it
would be nice to cast some spells, especially once alchemy and a helm
of brilliance got my Int up to 23. I was disappointed that I still had
a 48% failure rate on everything. A Usenet post provided a handy link
to a spell failure rate calculator (http://www.gridbug.de/spells.html)
which convinced me to wish for a robe (as I had plenty of wishes to
burn). Zero % for magic missile turned out to be very handy,
especially against flayers and sea monsters as I'd by now decided to
play a no-genocide game.
The rest was uneventful as far as I remember. Rodney miraculously did
not return a single time except for his guaranteed appearance on the
Plane of Earth. Had to visit all three altars on Astral which was a
pain, and I'd stupidly used up all my wands of teleportation, so had
to slog through a lot of monsters, including many summoned by those
pesky L's I usually genocide. Hungerless conflict from the Sceptre was
a big help here, more so than its fighting capabilities; I thought
expert at mace plus double-damage against cross-aligned monsters
sounded pretty good, but I found I got better results from Frost Brand
even against cold-resistant monsters.
In any case, I sacrificed at the high altar and ascended for the
eighth time since I started playing on NAO this January. I've now
ascended more than half of the classes on this server - whee.
Funcrunch the Pioneer St:18/** Dx:22 Co:18 In:23 Wi:23 Ch:18
Neutral S:2984484
Astral Plane $:0 HP:607(615) Pw:39(269) AC:-48 Xp:30/100408383 T:
75453 Burdened
Final attributes
You were the Envoy of Balance
You were piously aligned
You were fire resistant
You were cold resistant
You were sleep resistant
You were disintegration-resistant
You were shock resistant
You were poison resistant
You were magic-protected
You saw invisible
You were telepathic
You were warned
You were invisible to others
You were stealthy
You could teleport
You had teleport control
You were protected
You were very fast
You had reflection
You had free action
You were extremely lucky (13)
You had extra luck
Bad luck did not time out for you
Good luck did not time out for you
You survived
Vanquished creatures
Asmodeus
Baalzebub
Orcus
Yeenoghu
Juiblex
The Wizard of Yendor (thrice)
Death (twice)
Pestilence
Famine (thrice)
9 arch-liches
[...]
3371 creatures vanquished.
Voluntary challenges
You never genocided any monsters
You polymorphed 1670 items
You never changed form
You used 5 wishes
You did not wish for any artifacts
Goodbye funcrunch the Demigoddess...
You went to your reward with 6299618 points,
Frost Brand (worth 3000 zorkmids and 7500 points)
The Sceptre of Might (worth 2500 zorkmids and 6250 points)
Vorpal Blade (worth 4000 zorkmids and 10000 points)
17 sapphires (worth 51000 zorkmids),
17 emeralds (worth 42500 zorkmids),
13 dilithium crystals (worth 58500 zorkmids),
12 jacinth stones (worth 39000 zorkmids),
11 black opals (worth 27500 zorkmids),
10 diamonds (worth 40000 zorkmids),
9 rubies (worth 31500 zorkmids),
8 turquoise stones (worth 16000 zorkmids),
4 amulets of life saving (worth 600 zorkmids),
1 amulet of reflection (worth 150 zorkmids),
1 amulet of magical breathing (worth 150 zorkmids),
and 200 pieces of gold, after 75453 moves.
Killer: ascended
You were level 30 with a maximum of 615 hit points when you ascended.
You reached the 462nd place on the top 2000 list.
*462 6299618 funcrunch-Cav-Hum-Fem-Neu ascended
to
demigoddess-hood.
607 [615]
Janis Papanagnou
funcrunch wrote:
> A lot of Nethack players don't like cavemen. I'm no exception. The
> last time I ascended with one was in '95, as I found when searching
> Usenet for advice on the quest (more on that later). I think the only
> time I've even played one since then was when I accidentally started
> up with a random character on NAO, and immediately quit. But I didn't
> like that zero-score for the class on my record, so figured I'd try
> ascending a cavewoman again sooner rather than later.
And you needed only 4 tries. Cavemen are so easy ;-)
I see that ascending the tourist (which is a blank spot on my own
NAO ascension list) was a tough job.
> In any case, I sacrificed at the high altar and ascended for the
> eighth time since I started playing on NAO this January.
Congratulations!
> I've now
> ascended more than half of the classes on this server - whee.
What the heck was this "killed by a touch of death" on _level 10_(!)
(max level 14) with the Barbarian?
Janis
funcrunch
wrote:
> And you needed only 4 tries. Cavemen are so easy ;-)
Yeah, especially when I don't try to keep many conducts :-D
> I see that ascending the tourist (which is a blank spot on my own
> NAO ascension list) was a tough job.
I was trying to play strict vegan. Though that certainly wasn't the
only reason I died so many times; I was probably being careless. I
finally settled for vegetarian, and then got an early wand of wishing
which made it a lot easier ;-)
> Congratulations!
Thanks!
> What the heck was this "killed by a touch of death" on _level 10_(!)
> (max level 14) with the Barbarian?
My pet arch-lich got confused, and I didn't have magic resistance
yet...
Janis Papanagnou
How nasty! And so early in the game. :-/
Lately it also happend to me sometimes that (some of) my tougher pet(s)
got confused and attacked me and my other pets; in my case, though, my
characters had been advanced enough to survive the attacks and usually
I could slso isolate the pets from each other.
OTOH, I find Nethack's game mechanics fascinating; this one too! 8-}
Janis
funcrunch
wrote:
> > My pet arch-lich got confused, and I didn't have magic resistance
> > yet...
>
> How nasty! And so early in the game. :-/
The irony is that a) I didn't really want a pet lich, but that's what
my pet turned into (actually a demilich at first) when stepping on a
polytrap and, lacking magic resistance, I couldn't repeatedly displace
her onto the trap to try for something better; and b) I didn't even
want to play a Barbarian at all, at least not yet, but accidentally
got a random character at startup and decided to play rather than
quitting. (Normally I have little trouble ascending with Barbarians,
which is why I'm saving them for later...)
I ended up with a polymorphed pet lich and mind flayer in my most
recent game, both monsters I normally genocide; though I lost track of
them at some point, I decided to play a no-genocide game partly in
honor of my former pets. :-)