YASD: Lyra-Val-Hum-Fem-Neu, on Astral, with the Amulet
Martin Read
>Still, for my first character to get past the Quest it wasn't a bad
>effort. I have several things on my list for next time:
>
> * don't get teleportitis
... without teleport control. *With* teleport control, it's immensely
useful. If you're nonhuman (or playing a caveperson), snack on Rodney's
corpse if you still haven't got TC when you kill him.
> * don't wish for artifacts when they aren't guaranteed
s/when they aren't guaranteed//
In general, there is always something you want more than you want any
artifact.
> * pay *very* close attention to cursedness on Astral
s/on Astral/as soon as you start meeting things that curse your stuff/
But in general, good points :)
m.
--
\_\/_/| Martin Read - my opinions are my own. share them if you wish.
\ / | a passer by was staring deep into your open skirt as we lay there
\/ | in the dirt as we lay there in the dirt should we make ourselves do
------+ painful things? and do they really hurt? -- Naevus, "Harm"
Colin Watson
never even made it as far as the Quest before.
The game started well, with a co-aligned altar in Minetown where I
chain-sacced to get Mjollnir and the Castle music, and there were a
couple more altars on DL4 which were initially cross-aligned but which I
converted. That level became the site of my main stash. Unfortunately, I
found no more altars outside Gehennom and the Planes for the entire
game, which made my life a little complicated. I got the AoR variant of
Sokoban, so I had to be burdened or short of stuff for far too long.
My first mistake was on DL9: I ate a leprechaun (duh) and got
teleportitis. This wasn't fatal, and in fact saved my life a few times
because I could teleport at will, but was VERY ANNOYING INDEED. Anyway,
I headed down and found the Quest portal on DL12, but dived further to
gain levels. Once I had XL14 I found that Lord Surtur is indeed, as
reputed, Utterly Wet And A Weed, and picked up the Orb of Fate and the
Bell.
I found a pair of incubi on DL19, danced with them for a while to gain
about five levels, and established my second large stash just above.
Shortly afterwards I was crowned and got Vorpal Blade.
I genocided L and continued to Medusa on DL22, which (after the brief
polytrap into an air elemental I mentioned here a few days ago) was not
a problem. Another trip back up to stashes and I genocided h, since I'd
spotted a master mind flayer a couple of levels below Medusa, and then
on to the Castle. Here, in retrospect, was where it started to go wrong.
The wand of wishing had two charges to start with, so I wished for two
blessed scrolls of charging and a blessed ring of teleport control
(phew!), recharged, then blessed +2 GDSM, blessed BoH, blessed +2 GoP,
and blessed rustproof +2 Magicbane with the final zap. Unfortunately
with two artifacts already in the game the latter was a bad idea, as it
immediately disappeared, meaning that not counting the RoTC I really
only got four wishes. This meant no SoR, no magic marker, and no speed
boots, although the last of those at least I found lying around in
Orcus-town later.
On into Gehennom, and the demon lords weren't a problem, although
unfortunately because I was using Mojo as my primary weapon I blew up
Orcus' wand of death. I'll know not to do that in the future, since my
total lack of wands of death was a major problem in the endgame. The
protection racket took my naked AC to 2, and some polypiling back at my
altars got me 9 blessed scrolls of enchant weapon, so I took both my
artifact weapons to +7. Dived to Vlad, who's a complete wimp, did some
rustproofing on my about-to-fall-apart shield, and found the vibrating
square. I then spent a fair bit of time working my way up to DL1,
carefully pick-axing clear the path I'd need for the ascension run, and
establishing my stash next to the entrance to the Planes.
By now I reckoned I was as ready as I was ever going to get, so I went
off to kill the Wizard, although I did (rightly, as it turned out) feel
that I was a bit underprepared in the instakill department. He
double-troubled me right from the start, but eventually I reached the
VS, performed the invocation, waded my way through the Sanctum and
grabbed the Amulet. The mysterious force made a major pain of itself,
appearing eleven times, but I got to DL1 fairly easily.
A lot of stash-twiddling later and I entered the Planes; Earth, Air, and
Fire were easy, while I got a bit lost in Water but found the portal in
time. (Not having any SoGD, I was using the Orb of Fate as a crystal
ball to find the portals.) Then Astral, with Death on the left,
Pestilence in the middle, and Famine on the right. I picked Death first,
and clobbered him quickly; but now I was starting to have serious
problems.
Firstly, without reflection (I'd removed my AoR in favour of AoLS), I
was too vulnerable to nasties from the priests and angels. Secondly, I'd
prayed on DL4 for some more PoHW on the way up, and my prayer timeout
hadn't expired yet. Thirdly, my wand of teleportation ran out and the
other one was in my bag. That would've been OK, but both Mjollnir and my
shield had been cursed before I'd thought to do anything about it, and
suddenly I couldn't get to my BoH. With all the stuff that might save me
inside it, I was pretty much doomed.
The first altar was Tyr's, so I headed for Famine, now resigned to
hacking my way through monster by monster, and mistakenly killed a
priest of Odin, making matters even worse. Famine died, but in the
temple antechamber I got surrounded. The AoLS saved me once, but
eventually: DYWYPI?
1 2632909 Lyra-Val-Hum-Fem-Neu died on the Astral Plane.
Killed by a priestess of Tyr, while helpless (with
the Amulet). - [336]
Still, for my first character to get past the Quest it wasn't a bad
effort. I have several things on my list for next time:
* don't get teleportitis
* don't wish for artifacts when they aren't guaranteed
* don't use Mjollnir on monsters with wands I want
* get non-amulet reflection
* get a magic marker; I was very short on scrolls
* make sure to put flammable objects in a bag, which in the middle
game didn't help the above
* make sure I have an emergency prayer for the Planes
* pay *very* close attention to cursedness on Astral
* stock up on lots more teleportation and death gear
I guess it's back to DL1 ...
--
Colin Watson [cjwa...@chiark.greenend.org.uk]
Mark Grant
<mpr...@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:
>.. without teleport control. *With* teleport control, it's immensely
>useful. If you're nonhuman (or playing a caveperson), snack on Rodney's
>corpse if you still haven't got TC when you kill him.
I don't personally think TC is that important in 3.4+ since the Travel
command was implemented. I would definitely say that you should now
never risk catching teleportitis in a gamble to get teleport control,
whereas before I would have said it might be worth it if you were
secure enough that teleportitis wasn't going to get you killed.
But even with guarantees I honestly haven't bothered with TC/Tele in
any of my 3.4x ascensions, simply because the travel command is way
cheaper on food, particuarly if you wear a =SD.
Not saying the T/TC combo is useless by any means, but I mostly want
to say firmly that you should never now risk getting teleportitis
before having TC.
Erik Hesselink
> On 28 Nov 2003 14:43:31 +0000 (GMT), Martin Read
> <mpr...@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:
>
>>.. without teleport control. *With* teleport control, it's immensely
>>useful. If you're nonhuman (or playing a caveperson), snack on Rodney's
>>corpse if you still haven't got TC when you kill him.
>
> I don't personally think TC is that important in 3.4+ since the Travel
> command was implemented. I would definitely say that you should now
> never risk catching teleportitis in a gamble to get teleport control,
> whereas before I would have said it might be worth it if you were
> secure enough that teleportitis wasn't going to get you killed.
If you are above a certain level (12 IIRC) you can teleport at will
(even without control?), which can rescue you from a lot of situations,
including drowning (in which case it is automatic). Saved me a few times
when the travel command misbehaved.
Erik
Colin Watson
>If you are above a certain level (12 IIRC) you can teleport at will
>(even without control?), which can rescue you from a lot of situations,
>including drowning (in which case it is automatic). Saved me a few times
>when the travel command misbehaved.
In order to do this, you need to have either intrinsic or extrinsic
teleportation (the former by eating a monster that can teleport, as I
did, a.k.a. teleport sickness, or polymorphing into such a monster; the
latter by wearing a ring of teleportation), or know the "teleport away"
spell. It's true that you need to be at least level 12, or 8 for a
Wizard, though.
The problem with not having teleport control is that you can't control
where you end up, and because having teleportation means that you
teleport involuntarily on average one in 85 turns this gets very
annoying very quickly when you're trying to explore a maze. Trying to
make your way down through Gehennom with teleport sickness but no TC
would make the mysterious force on the way back up seem positively
soothing by comparison.
Also, unless you muck about with fountains a lot, the only levels with
substantial amounts of water are no-teleport anyway (Medusa, the Castle,
the Wizard's Tower, and the Plane of Water), so I find that the save
from drowning is a fairly small benefit; as long as you're not too
burdened and haven't gone too far in, you'll be able to crawl out.
Looking back, actually, the only times when it saved my life were times
when an involuntary random teleport got me into trouble in the first
place.
--
Colin Watson [cjwa...@chiark.greenend.org.uk]
Roger Broadbent
news:5pn*pD...@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk:
> By now I reckoned I was as ready as I was ever going to get, so I went
> off to kill the Wizard, although I did (rightly, as it turned out)
> feel that I was a bit underprepared in the instakill department. He
> double-troubled me right from the start, but eventually I reached the
> VS, performed the invocation, waded my way through the Sanctum and
> grabbed the Amulet. The mysterious force made a major pain of itself,
> appearing eleven times, but I got to DL1 fairly easily.
You do realise a Valk with the Orb of Fate and a =oTC can get to the VS in
approximately 2 moves? Doesn't leave long for the WoY to cause trouble
before the Sanctum. I always save a c!oGL to exit the Sanctum quickly too.
> Both
> Mjollnir and my shield had been cursed before I'd thought to do
> anything about it
This, combined with praying on the way up through the dungeon, was indeed
your fatal mistake.
> Still, for my first character to get past the Quest it wasn't a bad
> effort.
Agreed. My first few Valks to pass the Quest died on VotD IIRC.
> I have several things on my list for next time:
[...]
> * stock up on lots more teleportation and death gear
I don't find /WoDeath that useful. This may be because I prefer to stay in
the lev 15-17 range and miss more often as a consequence, but I find I can
whack their possible targets to death as quickly as I can zap them, and I
don't use charges up either. /oTele hit automatically and are
indispensable. I use them until they have one charge left, then save them
to break if I'm surrounded. Very effective.
You seem to prefer a shield over twoweaponing. As soon as your AC is
reasonable without it, take off the shield and try twoweaponing. You might
be surprised quite how deadly it is.
Roger
Roger Broadbent
> Trying to
> make your way down through Gehennom with teleport sickness but no TC
> would make the mysterious force on the way back up seem positively
> soothing by comparison.
>
True but irrelevant unless you're going wishless as anyone with
uncontrolled teleportitis will use the Castle wand to fix that before
entering gehennom. Mazes between the medusa and the castle can be bypassed
with a pickaxe or /oDig on the way down at least.
Roger
Erik Hesselink
> Erik Hesselink <sel4yix...@SPAMsneakemail.com> wrote:
>
>>If you are above a certain level (12 IIRC) you can teleport at will
>>(even without control?), which can rescue you from a lot of situations,
>>including drowning (in which case it is automatic). Saved me a few times
>>when the travel command misbehaved.
>
> In order to do this, you need to have either intrinsic or extrinsic
> teleportation (the former by eating a monster that can teleport, as I
> did, a.k.a. teleport sickness, or polymorphing into such a monster; the
> latter by wearing a ring of teleportation), or know the "teleport away"
> spell. It's true that you need to be at least level 12, or 8 for a
> Wizard, though.
Yeah, I said the above in the context of having teleportitis and its
benefits.
> The problem with not having teleport control is that you can't control
> where you end up, and because having teleportation means that you
> teleport involuntarily on average one in 85 turns this gets very
> annoying very quickly when you're trying to explore a maze. Trying to
> make your way down through Gehennom with teleport sickness but no TC
> would make the mysterious force on the way back up seem positively
> soothing by comparison.
Believe me, I know. I did that once, and it's very annoying.
> Also, unless you muck about with fountains a lot, the only levels with
> substantial amounts of water are no-teleport anyway (Medusa, the Castle,
> the Wizard's Tower, and the Plane of Water), so I find that the save
> from drowning is a fairly small benefit; as long as you're not too
> burdened and haven't gone too far in, you'll be able to crawl out.
I think it saved me on several occasions, though I can't recall most of
the specific circumstances. I do remember once when I started the travel
command next to a water square from an overflown fountain, and it walked
me right into the water.
Erik
JPEG
> Colin Watson <cjwa...@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote in
> news:5pn*pD...@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk:
>
>
> [...]
> > * stock up on lots more teleportation and death gear
>
> I don't find /WoDeath that useful. This may be because I prefer to stay in
> the lev 15-17 range and miss more often as a consequence, but I find I can
So this is the reason why I'm "always" missing!? I never would have thought
that Xp would have any impact on zapping wands!
jpeg
JPEG
> *sigh* And I really thought this one was going to make it, too ... I'd
> never even made it as far as the Quest before.
You'll make it! Next time you'll know what to expect and what (not) to do.
> My first mistake was on DL9: I ate a leprechaun (duh) and got
> teleportitis. This wasn't fatal, and in fact saved my life a few times
> because I could teleport at will, but was VERY ANNOYING INDEED. Anyway,
Teleportitis actually is on my list of intrinsics I need, right before
disintegration resistance, but I do agree that it is quite annoying as long
as you don't have tele control. After that, the occasional "Do you want to
teleport?" is no problem anymore.
> The wand of wishing had two charges to start with, so I wished for two
> blessed scrolls of charging and a blessed ring of teleport control
> (phew!), recharged, then blessed +2 GDSM, blessed BoH, blessed +2 GoP,
> and blessed rustproof +2 Magicbane with the final zap. Unfortunately
> with two artifacts already in the game the latter was a bad idea, as it
> immediately disappeared, meaning that not counting the RoTC I really
> only got four wishes. This meant no SoR, no magic marker, and no speed
> boots, although the last of those at least I found lying around in
> Orcus-town later.
As an alternative for next time: you might have polypiled for the stuff
you still needed, and/or you might have fashioned your own DSM, and/or you
might have reverse-genocided tengu (their corpses have a chance to confer
teleport control). IMHO, for a Valk there isn't really an artifact that
can beat Mjollnir (well, maybe Grayswandir in Gehennom).
If you're really short on wishes there's still the magic fountains in the
dungeon. I presume you *did* check Perseus' statue for [Refl.
[...]
> Firstly, without reflection (I'd removed my AoR in favour of AoLS), I
> was too vulnerable to nasties from the priests and angels. Secondly, I'd
> prayed on DL4 for some more PoHW on the way up, and my prayer timeout
> hadn't expired yet. Thirdly, my wand of teleportation ran out and the
> other one was in my bag. That would've been OK, but both Mjollnir and my
> shield had been cursed before I'd thought to do anything about it, and
> suddenly I couldn't get to my BoH. With all the stuff that might save me
> inside it, I was pretty much doomed.
One question: What has reflection got to do with priests and angels?
The missiles surely don't harm you with MR - or does that not protect you
against them? Aw, obviously it doesn't. Why else cast MM against loads of
monsters?
IMHO, the bigger problem is the paralysis spell of the priests. That's the
reason why I count =FA into a complete AK. But then I always had reflection,
so I shouldn't talk.
As someone already mentioned the real mistake was not realizing the cursing
of your weapon and shield, and not having a replacement /Tele (or something
to remove curses) in your inventory.
> The first altar was Tyr's, so I headed for Famine, now resigned to
> hacking my way through monster by monster, and mistakenly killed a
> priest of Odin, making matters even worse. Famine died, but in the
> temple antechamber I got surrounded. The AoLS saved me once, but
> eventually: DYWYPI?
>
> 1 2632909 Lyra-Val-Hum-Fem-Neu died on the Astral Plane.
> Killed by a priestess of Tyr, while helpless (with
> the Amulet). - [336]
Horrible! The worst nightmare for every ascender-wannabe!
> I guess it's back to DL1 ...
Better luck next time!
jpeg
Roger Broadbent
news:c7a732f9.03120...@posting.google.com:
Well actually I don't really know - I do know some wands (e.g. death,
lightning, fire) can miss while others (e.g. teleportation,
cancellation) always hit[1]. And I know that the chance of hitting with
weapons is affected by experience level. I am assuming this logic is
carried over to wands that can miss, particularly when other people's YAAPs
suggest /WoDeath mostly hit for them.
I can't see any of this information in spoilers[2], which doesn't
necesarily mean it isn't there.
Roger
[1] a quick scan of the spoilers suggests RAY wands are the ones I have
seen miss while BEAM wands seem always to affect targets in their path.
wan1-342.txt says striking is a beam, which might make it useful against
hard-to-hit opponents if my surmise is correct.
[2] There's a lot of stuff in weap-342.txt on "to hit", which specifically
mentions the different ways to hit with wielded, thrown or kicked weapons
and objects and with hands and feet, but nothing that I can see about
wands.
Dylan O'Donnell
> Well actually I don't really know - I do know some wands (e.g. death,
> lightning, fire) can miss while others (e.g. teleportation,
> cancellation) always hit[1]. And I know that the chance of hitting with
> weapons is affected by experience level. I am assuming this logic is
> carried over to wands that can miss, particularly when other people's YAAPs
> suggest /WoDeath mostly hit for them.
No, there's no bonus for experience in ray to-hit chances.
> I can't see any of this information in spoilers[2], which doesn't
> necesarily mean it isn't there.
> [2] There's a lot of stuff in weap-342.txt on "to hit", which specifically
> mentions the different ways to hit with wielded, thrown or kicked weapons
> and objects and with hands and feet, but nothing that I can see about
> wands.
My comment in <86u1qlb...@strackenz.spod-central.org> still
stands: if someone can codify the details I give in that article into
a concise formula, I'll be happy to add it to the wand and spell
spoilers.
--
: Dylan O'Donnell http://www.spod-central.org/~psmith/ :
: "It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue." :
: -- Dave Lebling and Marc Blank, "Zork" :
Kevin Wayne
30 Nov 2003 08:33:11 GMT:
>You do realise a Valk with the Orb of Fate and a =oTC can get to the VS in
>approximately 2 moves? Doesn't leave long for the WoY to cause trouble
>before the Sanctum. I always save a c!oGL to exit the Sanctum quickly too.
Or any character with a cursed ?oTeleport, a non-cursed ? or
/oTeleport, and TC. But of course, you were responding to someone
concerning Valks.
--
Kevin Wayne
"Stark raving sane."
-- Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
David Leon
> stands: if someone can codify the details I give in that article into
> a concise formula, I'll be happy to add it to the wand and spell
> spoilers.
Looking at the code, ray attacks, including wand zapping, (dragon)
breath and hero casting a spell are handled in the same way. The one
difference between them is that when casting a spell you can get a hit
bonus (which includes dexterity, as people wondered in the hand-waving
thread).
First, if it is a spell, you calculate a spell hit bonus, as described
in the message you pointed out. start at 0, get -4 for Unskilled, +2
skilled, +3 expert, and then the dexterity bonus from your weapon
spoiler.
Now you roll a d20-1. If you fail badly (roll 0), then you simply roll
a d10 against the target ac(plus your spell bonus if you're the one
casting). the code says this is for a "small chance for naked target
to avoid being hit" which interestingly also makes it harder to hit
highly armored targets.
Then comes the fun part. The programmers wanted to make sure that
"very high armor protection does not achieve invulnerability", so if
the target AC is negative, a new AC value is used, randomly chosen
between -1 and AC. Then you actually check whether your original d20-1
is greater than 3 - new_ac - spell_bonus.
Now, that's hard to get into a formula because it has one die rolling
against the other. Instead, to get an idea of the chances, here's a
table of odds to hit, calculated over 100,000 castings for each
combination. Spell bonus is 0 for wand and breath. Max spell bonus is
15 for an expert caster with gaunlets of DEX. 11 with gaunlets but
basic skill. -4 for average Dex unskilled caster. I can calculate
other values, but I'm trying to keep the width down.
AC Spell Bonus
-4 0 1 2 3 4 8 11 15
-12 27.3 47.3 52.5 57.4 62.2 67.5 83.2 90.9 96.1
-11 30.1 50.1 54.9 60.0 64.8 70.2 85.4 92.3 96.5
-10 32.3 52.6 57.7 62.4 67.4 72.5 87.7 93.6 97.0
-9 35.0 55.0 59.9 64.9 70.4 75.0 89.4 95.0 97.5
-8 37.3 57.3 62.4 67.7 72.3 77.3 91.3 95.9 98.0
-7 39.6 59.8 64.8 70.0 75.0 80.1 92.9 96.5 98.4
-6 42.5 62.3 67.3 72.4 77.7 82.5 94.8 97.0 99.0
-5 44.7 64.9 69.8 74.9 79.9 84.8 96.0 97.6 99.5
-4 47.5 67.6 72.5 77.6 82.7 87.4 96.5 98.0 100.0
-3 49.9 70.0 74.9 80.0 84.8 90.0 96.9 98.5 100.0
-2 52.4 72.6 77.5 82.3 87.6 92.8 97.5 99.0 100.0
-1 54.9 75.2 79.9 85.0 90.5 96.0 98.1 99.5 100.0
0 60.1 80.0 85.0 90.5 96.0 96.6 98.5 100.0 100.0
1 65.3 84.8 90.5 96.0 96.6 97.0 99.0 100.0 100.0
2 70.1 90.7 96.0 96.4 97.0 97.5 99.5 100.0 100.0
3 75.1 96.0 96.6 97.0 97.4 97.9 100.0 100.0 100.0
4 80.2 96.5 97.0 97.4 98.0 98.5 100.0 100.0 100.0
5 85.1 97.0 97.6 98.1 98.5 99.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
6 90.4 97.4 97.9 98.5 98.9 99.5 100.0 100.0 100.0
7 96.0 98.0 98.5 99.0 99.5 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
8 96.6 98.5 99.0 99.5 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
9 97.1 99.0 99.5 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
10 97.5 99.5 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
So, if your target has a -5 AC you have about a 1 in 3 chance of
missing with a wand. Also, for an unskilled caster it's easier to hit
with a wand than with a spell. An expert caster with gauntlets of dex
will always hit anything above -4 AC, and still hurt a lot of others
most of the time.
Sorry I couldn't simplify the formula.