/s/ contemplating a life of sin
Kent Paul Dolan
Maybe.
1) are there spoilers? where?
2) is there a tiles/3D version? where?
3) is there a FAQ? where?
4) I'm guessing sourceforge, but exactly where do I get Slash'Em?
5) Other stuff I really need to know before starting off
on such a deviant and sinful course?
IMWTK
xanthian.
--
Posted via Mailgate.ORG Server - http://www.Mailgate.ORG
Kaelis Ebonrai
> Okay, so someone here urged me to try Slash'Em.
>
> Maybe.
>
> 1) are there spoilers? where?
>
> 2) is there a tiles/3D version? where?
>
> 3) is there a FAQ? where?
>
> 4) I'm guessing sourceforge, but exactly where do I get Slash'Em?
>
> 5) Other stuff I really need to know before starting off
> on such a deviant and sinful course?
>
> IMWTK
>
> xanthian.
>
>
1) There are a few around, but, i can't really remember much about
where, try Ali's Nethack Page, it should have links there. (assume you
know where that is)
2) Well, for a tiled version, noeGNUd is quite nice, but, its a bit of a
pain, to compile, and, if you're using windows, its probably not such a
good idea. But, I'd still say it is very nice. (darkarts.co.za) [Get the
aoki tileset, too, and possibly some of the others)
Slashem has a tiled version avialable offically, iirc, quite a nice one,
too. But, I'm not sure on that one.
3) I'm honestly not sure about that one...
4) Yes, sourceforge is you friend, in this case.. it should be..
http://slashem.sourceforge.net/
5) As for this one.. I'm probably not the one to answer that question.
Link
> Okay, so someone here urged me to try Slash'Em.
>
> Maybe.
>
> 1) are there spoilers? where?
>
> 2) is there a tiles/3D version? where?
>
> 3) is there a FAQ? where?
>
> 4) I'm guessing sourceforge, but exactly where do I get Slash'Em?
>
> 5) Other stuff I really need to know before starting off
> on such a deviant and sinful course?
1) Yes; http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/~eva/slashem/index.html
2) Yes; http://slashem.sourceforge.net/
3) I don't think there is an FAQ
4) http://slashem.sourceforge.net/
5) Slashem is easier than Nethack.
Shawn Moore
> 3) is there a FAQ? where?
In the Slashem source distrobution, there's a file in the top-level
directory called "slamfaq.txt" It asks (and answers) the following
questions:
Q. What is SLASH'EM
Q. What is SLASH?
Q. What is the Wizard Patch?
Q. What are the new commands?
Q. Where did feature xxx come from?
Probably not as thorough as you'd like, but it's something, and it
calls itself a FAQ, so.. :)
Shawn M Moore
rpresser
Link wrote:
> 5) Slashem is easier than Nethack.
Commercial games want you to win.
NetHack doesn't care if you win or lose.
Slash'em wants you DEAD.
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.roguelike.nethack/msg/93c178c839a2911a
L
>NetHack doesn't care if you win or lose.
>Slash'em wants you DEAD.
I'm sorry, but the more you repeat that, the more hackneyed it sounds.
I propose the following additional comparisons:
* Single-player commercial games never update.
* NetHack never updates, and when it does it never adds new features.
* Slash'EM never updates either, but nobody notices because nobody's
figured out exactly what the _current_ features are.
* Linley's Dungeon Crawl has all of the features it needs, so it
doesn't need to update. Which is good because it never will, _ever_.
* Commercial games cheat in your favor.
* NetHack tries to play it fair, even though it slips an extra card in
both directions every now and again.
* Slash'EM always plays with loaded dice, but sometimes it forgets
which side they're loaded on.
* Linley's Dungeon Crawl openly admits to traps that strengthen
monsters and weaken players. "What?" it grunts in response to your
stunned silence.
* Commercial games never release their source code.
* NetHack's code is freely available, though most people give up when
they try to decipher what "dochugw()" does.
* Slash'EM's code still contains "borg.c". I've said enough.
* The mere act of reading Linley's Dungeon Crawl's source code has been
known to drive its victims past the brink of sanity and emperil their
immortal soul.
* Commercial games reward attendance.
* NetHack rewards players for discovering connections between objects,
entities and commands. The moment that a player discovers that
cockatrices are as lethal to monsters as players, or that reading
scrolls while confused produces a different magic spell, or that a
loadstone is too heavy to kick, is a moment to cherish. Or you could
just read the spoilers, I dunno.
* Slash'EM rewards players by telling them the name of the monster that
just one-hit-killed them.
* Linley's Dungeon Crawl rewards raw, rat-like survival tactics. Then
again, sometimes it doesn't.
rpresser
> >Commercial games want you to win.
> >NetHack doesn't care if you win or lose.
> >Slash'em wants you DEAD.
>
> I'm sorry, but the more you repeat that, the more hackneyed it sounds.
I think this is the ONLY time I personally have ever posted it, so it
doesn't sound that hackneyed to me. I only discovered it last year.
> I propose the following additional comparisons:
But I like your replacements a lot!
Shawn Moore
> [additional comparisons]
Wow, I'm going to have to give Linley's Dungeon Crawl the old college
try.
Shawn M Moore
Jove
>* NetHack tries to play it fair, even though it slips an extra card in
>both directions every now and again.
Which means it wants the character dead. Killing an extra monster is
nothing compared to DYWYPI.
--
Welcome to NetHack. | I take what I'm given.
| You exploit the game.
All the best, | He's an abusive cheater.
Jove (Joe Bednorz)
L
>>both directions every now and again.
>Which means it wants the character dead. Killing an extra monster is
>nothing compared to DYWYPI.
That wasn't really what I meant at all. But okay!
Kent Paul Dolan
Kent Paul Dolan wrote:
> Okay, so someone here urged me to try Slash'Em.
> Maybe.
Okay, I downloaded SlashEm off the sourceforge site,
and for any one of a possible list of reasons, I didn't
figure out how to make it run under MS-Windows XP
professional (It might even be the chip in my new
laptop, an AMD rather than an Intel CPU based machine)
whether I attempt to execute it in graphics mode or from
the command line, nothing useful happens (in graphics
mode, a cmd.exe style window opens, then closes, in
command line mode, the command silently does nothing)..
However, I downloaded and installed the full Vulture's Eye/Claw
kit, and both of those run fine, so I'm creeping slowly, slowly
around a SlashEm dungeon with a hobbit healer, and so far
the only really startling differences are the 3D effects, a "larva"
or two (young "worm"), and having to work with a numeric
keypad which on a laptop is two levels of complexity strange,
but it does slow me down a useful amount.
Thanks to all for hints, pointers, and other help!
xanthian.
By the way, I'm a graphics geek, and plaudits indeed to the
author(s) of the Vulture's kit, that's just way pretty.
Link
Well, Slash'em doesn't want me dead. Who cares if polymorphed items
revert, when the game hands out so much stuff that you never need to
polymorph. If there is a powerful Slash'em monster that is too hard,
then just go around it. You aren't required to kill everything you
see. For example, I've never killed a diamond golem... ever. When I
see one of those, I just walk around it.
Glunky Black Snorklehopper
> NetHack's code is freely available,
> though most people give up when
> they try to decipher what "dochugw()" does.
if
(
occupation
&&
!rd
&&
!Confusion
&&
(!mtmp->mpeaceful || Hallucination)
&&
/* it's close enough to be a threat */
distu(mtmp->mx,mtmp->my) <= (BOLT_LIM+1)*(BOLT_LIM+1)
&&
/* and either couldn't see it before, or it was too far away */
(
!already_saw_mon
||
!couldsee(x,y)
||
distu(x,y) > (BOLT_LIM+1)*(BOLT_LIM+1)
)
&&
/* can see it now, or sense it and would normally see it */
(
canseemon(mtmp)
||
(sensemon(mtmp) && couldsee(mtmp->mx,mtmp->my))
)
&&
mtmp->mcanmove
&&
!noattacks(mtmp->data)
&&
!onscary(u.ux, u.uy, mtmp)
)
{
stop_occupation();
}
Looks to me like it says "stop what you're doing if you see
a scary monster". Or some damn such thing. Really just a
boolean which ANDs 10 things together and runs a function
iff they're all true. Not really challenging.
More challenging is trying to see why it's called "dochugw"
rather than "StopOccupationIfSeeScaryMonster".
Anyway...
/s/sin/fun/g
--
Cheers,
Robbie Hatley
(sometimes aka "Elendil the chaotic elven ranger")
(But more recently aka "Prof. Fangs Thunderwoof". Neigh.)
East Tustin, CA, USA
lonewo...@pacbell.net
http://home.pacbell.net/earnur/
Link
> /s/sin/fun/g
Someone in RGRN knows sed! This is very exciting!
L
>see one of those, I just walk around it.
Lousy Lethe golems. Why must they have such obscenely huge power? This
isn't Angband, you know! 8d12 melee damage is something you ought to
save for uniques!
Kent Paul Dolan
> Kent wrote:
Well, no, that was "L" who runs Dudley's Dungeon.
One of the hazards of a one character Poster ID or
one character article title is that it is likely to
get ignored completely in passing.
"Glunky Black Snorklehopper" isn't likely to
encounter the same problem, though.
>> NetHack's code is freely available, though most
>> people give up when they try to decipher what
>> "dochugw()" does.
[...]
> Looks to me like it says "stop what you're doing
> if you see a scary monster".
That's how I see it too.
> Or some damn such thing. Really just a boolean
> which ANDs 10 things together and runs a function
> iff they're all true. Not really challenging.
> More challenging is trying to see why it's called
> "dochugw" rather than
> "StopOccupationIfSeeScaryMonster".
Especially since there is a common "chug" event,
heard when a monster drinks a potion out of your
sight, which seems to be what that routine _should_ be
about. Maybe this is a "stop if you hear a potion
being drunk" function???
> /s/sin/fun/g
Heh.
So far, at least, but the interface issues are
really making me crawl my PC, more than likely a
good part of the reason she's still alive.
xanthian.
One absolutely baffling thing about Vulture's Claw
is that it seems to swap the meanings of the
diagonal versus orthogonal move keys in numeric
keypad mode, between 3D view (which _sits_
diagonally on the screen) and overhead map view, in
both of which you can play the game. That is to
say, movement, say west, along a long passageway
across the bottom of the dungeon level, is done with
diagonal move keys in 3D view, and with horizontal
move keys in overhead 2D view. This way lies
instant, just add water, madness.
Robbie Hatley
Yep. Ironically, I learned SED way back around 1990 or so,
years before I even acquired a computer, from reading a book on
Unix. I thought the whole "regular expression" concept was
fascinating. I didn't have immediate application for it at
the time, though.
Years later, I used it to write scripts to automate conversion
of programs from C, to assembly, to machine language, to ASCII
representation of the hex values of the machine language
instructions, to C array of those values. (Why do such a
bizarre thing? To embed a precompiled program in flash, copy
to RAM, and transfer program control to RAM image, in order to
do flash writes on a machine where flash was used as program
memory.)
(Absolutely irrelevant side note: Failure to use the above
technique to perform routine flash garbage collection nearly
destroyed the two Mars rovers. I was tempted to call NASA
and tell them "I think you've ran of of flash room". I should
have, because I was right.)
I've also often used SED to change all instances of one thing to
another in Nethack. I'm afraid the copy of Nethack I like playing
with is a bit, ummm, non-standard. :-)
"The gnome corpse is delicious! You finish devouring your
toothsome feast!" (Hey, I got tired of being told, over and
over and over, that my meals all "tasted terrible", so I fixed
that.)
--
Robbie Hatley
East Tustin, CA, USA
email: lonewolfintj at pacbell dot net
web: home dot pacbell dot net slant earnur slant
Ohle Claussen
license from, eh?
--
Jann Ohle Claussen | GPG-Key-ID E7149169
http://www.stud.uni-goettingen.de/~s251251
BOFH Excuse #32:
techtonic stress
Robbie Hatley
> "Glunky Black Snorklehopper" wrote:
Yikes, that quite surprised ME when I saw it. That should
read "Robbie Hatley wrote:", but alas, that was the first
time I'd ever actually used my Outlook Express to post on
that account. I'd forgotten I'd put that in the settings.
> > Kent wrote:
>
> Well, no, that was "L" who runs Dudley's Dungeon...
I somehow missed that. For one thing, the person who wrote
the immediate message I was replying to left out all the
"person A wrote:" lines. Those are useful in avoiding
confusion.
> "Glunky Black Snorklehopper" isn't likely to
> encounter the same problem, though.
:-)
And the funny thing is, I have absolutely no memory whatsoever
of concocting that name. Hopefully not a sign of impending
Alzheimer's. Surely not at age 47.
> ...
> > More challenging is trying to see why it's called
> > "dochugw" rather than
> > "StopOccupationIfSeeScaryMonster".
>
> Especially since there is a common "chug" event,
> heard when a monster drinks a potion out of your
> sight, which seems to be what that routine _should_ be
> about. Maybe this is a "stop if you hear a potion
> being drunk" function???
Is THAT how you parse that? I wonder. I was seeing it as
"doc hug w", and thinking "Document, huge, windowed"
or some such. "Do chug" never occurred to me.
I went into
C:\Programs\Games\Nethack\nethack-3.4.3\src
on my machine and did
grep -i -n 'chug' *
but "chug" does not occur except in the names of dochug()
and dochugw(), and in the function call
"You_hear("a chugging sound.");" in muse.c .
dochug() is huge and seems to handle
all kinds of monster attack situations. Doesn't look like it
has anything specifically to do with chugging. Should be
named "MonsterAttack()", instead of "dochug()".
I love this comment:
/* The whole dochugw/m_move/distfleeck/mfndpos section is serious spaghetti
* code. --KAA
*/
One programmer's way of saying "real programmers write in K&R C
and have never heard the word 'structure', let alone 'object' or
'class'. If it was hard for me to write, then dammit, it should
be hard for you to read and understand! So there! :-P"
(Though after working on the code left behind by my former boss,
Nethack looks almost pristine by comparison.)
--
Robbie Hatley
East Tustin, CA, USA
lonewolfintj at pacbell dot net
home dot pacbell dot net slant earnur slant
Link
Ohle Claussen wrote:
> On 2006-05-21, Link wrote:
> > Glunky Black Snorklehopper wrote:
> >> /s/sin/fun/g
> >
> > Someone in RGRN knows sed! This is very exciting!
> >
> You mean there's people who don't know sed? Where'd they get their computer
> license from, eh?
A lot of people think that sed is too hard, so they use awk for
everything.
rpresser
Kent Paul Dolan wrote:
> "Glunky Black Snorklehopper" <bogus....@no.spam.com> wrote:
>
> > Kent wrote:
>
> Well, no, that was "L" who runs Dudley's Dungeon.
"L" does not run Dudley's Dungeon; Dion does. "L" is a frequent and
excellent contributor of comics though.
Erik Piper
> * Commercial games cheat in your favor.
> * NetHack tries to play it fair, even though it slips an extra card in
> both directions every now and again.
> * Slash'EM always plays with loaded dice, but sometimes it forgets
> which side they're loaded on.
> * Linley's Dungeon Crawl openly admits to traps that strengthen
> monsters and weaken players. "What?" it grunts in response to your
> stunned silence.
Which traps are these? The Mechanical trap types affect monsters the
same as players (except for jellies, which will heal up more from a
trap hit than the trap hurt them), teleportation traps are as helpful
once discovered as they are harmful when encountered by accident, and
Zot and amnesia traps, while harmful to the player and not harmful to
monsters AFAIK, are not helpful to them either.
The rest of your LHDC notes (obviously partly in jest anyway), I'll
leave un-nitpicked. I'm a little sad that it gets so much bad, or at
least frightening, press, but I won't single out your post in that
regard, as it's hardly unusual that way. But really, trust me, LHDC can
be won just as Nethack can, and perhaps is won in less time on average
from first contact to first win. (OTOH the bad press may scare off
those unfit for it and thus skew the statistics.) :-)
e.
Kent Paul Dolan
> "L" does not run Dudley's Dungeon; Dion does. "L" is a frequent and
> excellent contributor of comics though.
Sorry to both L and Dion for my confusion, and thanks for
setting the record straight.
xanthian.
Klaus Kassner
> rpresser wrote:
>
>>Link wrote:
>>
>>
>>>5) Slashem is easier than Nethack.
>>
>>Commercial games want you to win.
>>NetHack doesn't care if you win or lose.
>>Slash'em wants you DEAD.
>>
>>http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.roguelike.nethack/msg/93c178c839a2911a
> Well, Slash'em doesn't want me dead. Who cares if polymorphed items
> revert, when the game hands out so much stuff that you never need to
> polymorph.
Also you can keep them in their polymorphed state by #dipping them into
a potion of restore ability. Polymorphed monsters are more of a
nuisance, because you have to kill them twice.
Nevertheless, having a better statistics at NH than at Slash'em, I would
indeed say that the latter is more difficult, but only due to the
tougher monsters you meet in the initial game. (But since it has more
monsters, you can get lucky as well. What I find hilarating is that
there are so many "q" in the early game and very rarely a mumak.) Once
your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG. Also I have the feeling
that certain things are guaranteed. It seems to me that there are
always potions of enlightenment in Grund's stronghold and alway potions
of invulnerability in the spider caves.
> If there is a powerful Slash'em monster that is too hard,
> then just go around it.
You can't always do that - if it is fast or if it comes back all the
time (troll mummies are a pain in the neck in the early game).
> You aren't required to kill everything you
> see. For example, I've never killed a diamond golem... ever. When I
> see one of those, I just walk around it.
I don't. I kill them for fun. I usually clean out Frankenstein's lair.
Diamond golems are not too dangerous, as they appear so far down in the
dungeon that almost any player will have the means to kill them (bullets
and an assault rifle are a good approach). You can also kill them in
melee, if you retreat every once in a while to heal. (They heal more
slowly than you do.)
--
Klaus Kassner
Ohle Claussen
> Once
> your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
> because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
> whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG.
Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
--
Jann Ohle Claussen | GPG-Key-ID E7149169
http://www.stud.uni-goettingen.de/~s251251
"We'll let our friends be the peace keepers and the great country called
America will be the pacemakers." --dubya
Link
Klaus Kassner wrote:
> Link wrote (schrieb, a écrit):
> > rpresser wrote:
> >
> >>Link wrote:
> > If there is a powerful Slash'em monster that is too hard,
> > then just go around it.
>
> You can't always do that - if it is fast or if it comes back all the
> time (troll mummies are a pain in the neck in the early game).
Elbereth-block them at chokepoints. I sometimes create chokepoints
with a pick-axe, so that I can Elbereth-block monsters.
Link
Ohle Claussen wrote:
> On 2006-05-24, Klaus Kassner wrote:
> > Once
> > your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
> > because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
> > whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG.
>
> Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
> not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
> in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
> but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
> stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
Slash'em has a special level with a 'black market'. About 90% of this
level is a giant shop. Try to imagine how many items can fit in a shop
that big. The shopkeeper is also guaranteed to have
gray-dragon-scale-mail and a shield-of-reflection.
Ohle Claussen
>
> Ohle Claussen wrote:
>> Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
>> not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
>> in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
>> but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
>> stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
>
> Slash'em has a special level with a 'black market'. About 90% of this
> level is a giant shop. Try to imagine how many items can fit in a shop
> that big. The shopkeeper is also guaranteed to have
> gray-dragon-scale-mail and a shield-of-reflection.
>
IIRC, he also had a super killer artifact weapon and a hord of named pets.
Powergaming at its best, Fort Ludios is nothing in comparison.
regards,
Ohle
Eva Myers
> On 2006-05-24, Link wrote:
> >
> > Slash'em has a special level with a 'black market'. About 90% of this
> > level is a giant shop. Try to imagine how many items can fit in a shop
> > that big. The shopkeeper is also guaranteed to have
> > gray-dragon-scale-mail and a shield-of-reflection.
> >
> Yes, that's about as far as I got in my only SE experiment, some time ago.
> IIRC, he also had a super killer artifact weapon and a hord of named pets.
> Powergaming at its best, Fort Ludios is nothing in comparison.
Next time, don't try to kill him :-) Just sort through his stuff, take
what you want, zap him with a wand of teleportation and make a run for
it. Alternatively, turn into a xorn and walk out through the wall and
straight into the portal.
Eva.
--
Eva Myers, Computer Officer, Statistical Laboratory, University of Cambridge
Email: erm...@cam.ac.uk WWW: http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/~eva/
Ignorance and deception can't save anybody. *Knowing* saves them.
dogscoff
Link wrote:
> Ohle Claussen wrote:
> > On 2006-05-24, Klaus Kassner wrote:
> > > Once
> > > your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
> > > because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
> > > whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG.
> >
> > Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
> > not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
> > in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
> > but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
> > stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
>
> Slash'em has a special level with a 'black market'. About 90% of this
> level is a giant shop. Try to imagine how many items can fit in a shop
> that big.
Of course, you neglect to mention that the black market doesn't have an
item on every single shop floor square- probably only about 1 in 8 or
ten squares has an item on it (and most of them are pretty junky). You
can still expect a lot of good loot though.
It's also worth mentioning that many of the standard shop-robbing
techniques won't work on Sam, or are at least somewhat complicated to
achieve. (Xorning works just fine though.)
> The shopkeeper is also guaranteed to have
> gray-dragon-scale-mail and a shield-of-reflection.
However if you can take him on, you almost certainly don't need his
armour. One Eyed Sam is one of the most one of the most dangerous
opponents you can face in [s]. Up in the top 5, certainly. I've lost
several high-powered characters to Thiefbane.
dogscoff
Link wrote:
> rpresser wrote:
> > Link wrote:
> > > 5) Slashem is easier than Nethack.
> > NetHack doesn't care if you win or lose.
> > Slash'em wants you DEAD.
> If there is a powerful Slash'em monster that is too hard,
> then just go around it.
Surely that applies to just as much to vanilla as to [s].
Jym
> Ohle Claussen <clau...@dpi.physik.uni-goettingen.de> writes:
>
>> On 2006-05-24, Link wrote:
>> >
>> > Slash'em has a special level with a 'black market'. About 90% of this
>> > level is a giant shop. Try to imagine how many items can fit in a
>> shop
>> > that big. The shopkeeper is also guaranteed to have
>> > gray-dragon-scale-mail and a shield-of-reflection.
>> >
>> Yes, that's about as far as I got in my only SE experiment, some time
>> ago.
>> IIRC, he also had a super killer artifact weapon and a hord of named
>> pets.
>> Powergaming at its best, Fort Ludios is nothing in comparison.
>
> Next time, don't try to kill him :-) Just sort through his stuff, take
> what you want, zap him with a wand of teleportation and make a run for
> it. Alternatively, turn into a xorn and walk out through the wall and
> straight into the portal.
Not straight into the portal. On the adjacent corridor square. So when
you'll go through the portal you won't be surrounded by guards on the
other side.
--
Hypocoristiquement,
Jym.
Link
...or you could make a boulder fort and hit him with ranged stuff.
Link
...or you could make a boulder fort and hit him with ranged stuff. You
don't need good armor to do that.
Klaus Kassner
Of course, when you take him on, you should make sure that he cannot hit
you...
My standard approach, when I am chaotic and decide to kill him:
1) stand outside the shop in front of the door
2) read a (preferably blessed) scroll of earth
-> that blocks the entrance
3) eliminate the boulder north of you to have a free route
to retreat in case Sam zaps a wand of striking or
his giant assistant (Thomas?) removes the blocking
boulder
4) wield a pick-axe - this will make Sam move directly in front
of the door
5) wield your trusty submachine gun or - even better - assault rifle
(you should have some 50 bullets in reserve, preferably
enchanted to +3 or + 4)
6) start shooting, until Sam dies (he will not move away from his
square)
7) repeat, as his amulet of life saving will bring him back
8) push the boulder into the shop to get your hands on Thiefbane
before someone else does (if you do this as a neutral or
lawful, you may get blasted) - but don't use the sword,
unless you are level-drain resistant
9) kill his assistants (put on a blindfold as long as Izzy the
rhaumbusun is still alive, a ring of free action will
probably work, too)
When I am neutral or lawful, I just rob him with the help of gems and
pets, as follows:
1) drop gems to get some 10000 zorkmids and buy a few tripe rations
from the shop (unless you have already some)
2) wait until a dog or cat is created randomly (happens surprisingly
often) or cast create familiar, if you are able
(I hope this works on his level), or bring a figurine - then
you probably won't need the tripe
3) tame the dog or cat with tripe
4) distribute the gems on free squares around the entrance
5) wait until your pet(s) pick up (a) gem(s) and magic whistle them
out of the shop, reward them with tripe to make them pick
up things more frequently
6) resell gems to Sam, building up credit when he's run out of cash
7) buy whenever your credit exceeds a few hundred thousand zorkmids
As time passes, monsters will be generated and you may get more pets (I
had four once - neither of which was brought along nor could be taken
back through the magic portal, that route being excluded).
I once had a lawful hobbit monk who after an accident near the castle
(Lethe!) needed lots of potions to reequip himself and managed this way
to buy all the potions and almost all the scrolls from Sam's shop, just
using his four pets, a few diamonds, emeralds, rubies and sapphires, and
a magic whistle, of course.
--
Klaus Kassner
Klaus Kassner
> On 2006-05-24, Klaus Kassner wrote:
>
>> Once
>>your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
>>because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
>>whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG.
> Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
> not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
> in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
> but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
> stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
Actually, I like it this way. And this would be a reason for me to play
Slash'em rather than to avoid it. In my opinion you *should* be able
to survive more easily by buffing up your character. By playing well,
you should be able to get your survival probability close to one towards
the end. It is o.k. to die inevitable deaths early on, but you should
not lose a character into which you have invested a lot to anything but
your own stupidity. So if the game becomes more deterministic and less
dependent on the RNG - for characters that have already survived the
first 50000 turns - that's good, not bad, IMHO.
--
Klaus Kassner
Jym
<Klaus....@physik.uni-magdeburg.de> wrote:
> 3) tame the dog or cat with tripe
of fortune cookie, or food ration, ... Don't waste tripe on taming, spend
them on training.
> 4) distribute the gems on free squares around the entrance
or in one bag in one place. Faster credit cloning if there's only one
thing close to the entrance with huge value.
> I once had a lawful hobbit monk who after an accident near the castle
> (Lethe!) needed lots of potions to reequip himself and managed this way
Lethe is probably the reason why I start thinking that boots of
levitations are better than speed...
> to buy all the potions and almost all the scrolls from Sam's shop, just
> using his four pets, a few diamonds, emeralds, rubies and sapphires, and
> a magic whistle, of course.
Usually, I rob Sam with polyself into Xorn. In a polyselfless game, of
course, you'll need passwall.
--
Hypocoristiquement,
Jym.
Klaus Kassner
> On Thu, 25 May 2006 10:20:25 +0200, Klaus Kassner
> <Klaus....@physik.uni-magdeburg.de> wrote:
>
>
>> 3) tame the dog or cat with tripe
>
>
> of fortune cookie, or food ration, ... Don't waste tripe on taming,
> spend them on training.
Right. At that point one usually has enough food rations (which
otherwise I consider more valuable than tripe...)
>> 4) distribute the gems on free squares around the entrance
> or in one bag in one place. Faster credit cloning if there's only one
> thing close to the entrance with huge value.
Sure - if you have a spare bag. (I usually have two at that point, a
bag of holding and a(n oilskin) sack, which I both want to keep. But
usually the sack is almost empty, so it could be taken for that purpose.)
If you have several pets, having lots of gems distributed around might
be faster.
>> I once had a lawful hobbit monk who after an accident near the castle
>> (Lethe!) needed lots of potions to reequip himself and managed this way
> Lethe is probably the reason why I start thinking that boots of
> levitations are better than speed...
If you have the other combination of armor right, an amulet of flying is
the best. For the monk, that's difficult, however, as he should not
wear silver dragon scale mail. My monk ended up using water walking
boots, an amulet of reflection or drain resistance, according to needs,
and a cloak of magic resistance. Speed was obtained via the haste self
spell (and levitation in three of the planes via the ring).
>> to buy all the potions and almost all the scrolls from Sam's shop,
>> just using his four pets, a few diamonds, emeralds, rubies and
>> sapphires, and a magic whistle, of course.
> Usually, I rob Sam with polyself into Xorn. In a polyselfless game, of
> course, you'll need passwall.
The disadvantage is that you cannot (easily) return later. You have to
take all you need in one pass.
--
Klaus Kassner
Ohle Claussen
> Ohle Claussen wrote (schrieb, a écrit):
>> On 2006-05-24, Klaus Kassner wrote:
>>
>>> Once
>>>your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
>>>because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
>>>whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG.
>
>> Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
>> not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
>> in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
>> but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
>> stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
>
> Actually, I like it this way. And this would be a reason for me to play
> Slash'em rather than to avoid it. In my opinion you *should* be able
> to survive more easily by buffing up your character.
Of course. But it's not (just) survivability I'm talking about, it's the
abundance of stuff that makes it unnecessary to improvise. Once you are at a
certain level, you can just go collect stuff, build a stash, enchant your
armor, alchemize your HP, and you're done. It takes some variety from the late
game. When you're lacking one thing or another, you have to come up with
different ways to protect yourself from certain dangers, making the game more
interesting.
> By playing well,
> you should be able to get your survival probability close to one towards
> the end. It is o.k. to die inevitable deaths early on, but you should
> not lose a character into which you have invested a lot to anything but
> your own stupidity.
True. Only that the amount of stupidity needed to die in the late game can be
quite high, leading to less thoughtful playing style. In the phase from the
castle to waking up Rodney (not that I've been there _that_ often...) , I'm
always playing on autopilot, knowing that if I prepare for all the nasty
things that can happen, I'll be fine.
> So if the game becomes more deterministic and less
> dependent on the RNG - for characters that have already survived the
> first 50000 turns - that's good, not bad, IMHO.
It makes the late game more boring. Of course, if you lose a late game
character the frustration is immense, but that possibility can only make the
game more exciting.
regards,
Ohle
--
Jann Ohle Claussen | GPG-Key-ID E7149169
http://www.stud.uni-goettingen.de/~s251251
BOFH Excuse #131:
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host: Connection refused
Klaus Kassner
> On 2006-05-25, Klaus Kassner wrote:
>
>>Ohle Claussen wrote (schrieb, a écrit):
>>
>>>On 2006-05-24, Klaus Kassner wrote:
>>>> Once
>>>>your character really gets going, Slash'em becomes easier than Nethack,
>>>>because there are so many places to find stuff that you will get
>>>>whatever you need even with an unfavorable RNG.
>>>Oh, so this is even more so in Slash'em then in NetHack? Yet another reason
>>>not to play it. I always find it peculiar how in the early game you are always
>>>in fear of being killed because you're lacking a long list of important stuff,
>>>but when your character is finally buffed up you find tons of useful surplus
>>>stuff everywhere (especially Gehennom).
>>Actually, I like it this way. And this would be a reason for me to play
>> Slash'em rather than to avoid it. In my opinion you *should* be able
>>to survive more easily by buffing up your character.
> Of course. But it's not (just) survivability I'm talking about, it's the
> abundance of stuff that makes it unnecessary to improvise. Once you are at a
> certain level, you can just go collect stuff, build a stash, enchant your
> armor, alchemize your HP, and you're done. It takes some variety from the late
> game. When you're lacking one thing or another, you have to come up with
> different ways to protect yourself from certain dangers, making the game more
> interesting.
That is true. But at this moment, I don't think there is a lack of
variety in the end game. Even now you have to make judicious choices.
A monk cannot (rather: should not) wear body armor, a barbarian is not
good at spells, a spell caster has restricted armor choices. I find the
game is mature enough by now (both NH and Slash'em are) that the end
games are not quite the same for all classes. Slash'em is even better
at this: due to the fact that drain resistance is another desirable
intrinsic and that pools of water can be created by high spell casters
below the character's feet (absolutely deadly in a crowd...) one has to
choose either between the amulet of reflection or the amulet of drain
resistance or the amulet of flying, one has to choose between gray, deep
or silver dragon scale mail, between gauntlets of dexterity or gauntlets
of swimming and speed boots or water walking boots. A monk cannot have
all the four desirables: safety from pools (gauntlets of swimming, water
walking boots or amulet of flying), reflection (permanently only by
amulet, since the armour is not available), magic resistance (only the
cloak as safe method) and level drain resistance (only the amulet for
the monk). I would usually forgo the last one, which is a necessity
only in a few places (in the end game, four or five lost levels don't
matter that much). Other characters can have all four, but the
combination to achieve them will depend on game history.
>> By playing well,
>>you should be able to get your survival probability close to one towards
>>the end. It is o.k. to die inevitable deaths early on, but you should
>>not lose a character into which you have invested a lot to anything but
>>your own stupidity.
> True. Only that the amount of stupidity needed to die in the late game can be
> quite high, leading to less thoughtful playing style.
Nevertheless, it seems to happen quite often...
> In the phase from the
> castle to waking up Rodney (not that I've been there _that_ often...) , I'm
> always playing on autopilot, knowing that if I prepare for all the nasty
> things that can happen, I'll be fine.
That is less true in Slash'em than in Nethack. You find more items, but
it is nontrivial to get a safe combination. You even have to be
prepared to change your scale mail or to spend a wish on a cloak of
magic resistance, which is almost as rare in Slash'em as in NH, except
when vampires wear that cloak, which tends to make them tougher (but
there are other ways beyond wishing to get the cloak).
>> So if the game becomes more deterministic and less
>>dependent on the RNG - for characters that have already survived the
>>first 50000 turns - that's good, not bad, IMHO.
> It makes the late game more boring. Of course, if you lose a late game
> character the frustration is immense, but that possibility can only make the
> game more exciting.
I am not advocating for winning at probability 1 after a certain stage.
Neither for removing instadeaths. You should be kept awake by those
possible failures. I am advocating against dependence on the RNG.
In fact, despite its abundance of stuff lying around, Slash'em is much
less boring than NH during the stage where you know you will almost
certainly win when you don't make major mistakes any more. The reason
is that in NH that stage (Gehennom) is lengthy (and has to be, otherwise
you will not find enough stuff in the mazes for a good ascension kit)
and repetitive - lots of mazes all alike. In Slash'em that stage is
much shorter and there are only very few noninteresting maze levels.
Almost all the levels of hell are special levels. Demogorgon seems to
be stronger than in NH and you will always have to deal with him (I
never met him in a peaceful state). The castle is at about level 40, so
you will have to survive longer to get to the state where you can make
sure with a few wishes to have all you need to ascend. On the other
hand, Slash'em would not miss much if there were no wands of wishing at
all and magic lamps were made the only source of wishes (more in style
anyway) -- because you usually can get all your equipment without any
wishes and by the time you have reached the castle, you will have it
with the possible exception of one or two items.
--
Klaus Kassner
Klaus Kassner
> of swimming and speed boots or water walking boots. A monk cannot have
> all the four desirables: safety from pools (gauntlets of swimming, water
> walking boots or amulet of flying), reflection (permanently only by
> amulet, since the armour is not available), magic resistance (only the
> cloak as safe method) and level drain resistance (only the amulet for
> the monk). I would usually forgo the last one, which is a necessity
> only in a few places (in the end game, four or five lost levels don't
> matter that much). Other characters can have all four, but the
> combination to achieve them will depend on game history.
In fact, I forgot to mention that speed is a fifth desirable and that
gauntlets of swimming are not the best way to avoid being drowned in a
pool (your stuff will get wet). To have all five desirables permanently
is difficult for most classes. Drain resistance and reflection take up
the armor and amulet slots, unless you use the shield of reflection
which is not a serious option for spellcasters. But then the only good
way to avoid pools is to wear water walking boots, so you don't have
permanent speed. (You can use potions or the haste self spell. Of
course, if you keep your bag of holding in an oilskin sack and have
rustproofed all your stuff, you might as well take speed boots and
gauntlets of swimming. Which does not help against falling into the
castle moat.) Also, the fact that magic resistance as not provided by
an artifact is then essentially obtainable only by wearing the cloak may
mean that you have to exchange your early gray dragon scale mail later...
--
Klaus Kassner
Ohle Claussen
>
> In fact, I forgot to mention that speed is a fifth desirable and that
> gauntlets of swimming are not the best way to avoid being drowned in a
> pool (your stuff will get wet). To have all five desirables permanently
> is difficult for most classes. Drain resistance and reflection take up
> the armor and amulet slots, unless you use the shield of reflection
> which is not a serious option for spellcasters. But then the only good
> way to avoid pools is to wear water walking boots, so you don't have
> permanent speed. (You can use potions or the haste self spell. Of
> course, if you keep your bag of holding in an oilskin sack and have
> rustproofed all your stuff, you might as well take speed boots and
> gauntlets of swimming. Which does not help against falling into the
> castle moat.) Also, the fact that magic resistance as not provided by
> an artifact is then essentially obtainable only by wearing the cloak may
> mean that you have to exchange your early gray dragon scale mail later...
I admit that all this sounds more balanced than I thought Slash'EM was. I
might even try it again sometime if I'm in the mood (if there just wasn't so
_much_ new stuff to learn).
Jym
<clau...@dpi.physik.uni-goettingen.de> wrote:
>> Actually, I like it this way. And this would be a reason for me to play
>> Slash'em rather than to avoid it. In my opinion you *should* be able
>> to survive more easily by buffing up your character.
>
> Of course. But it's not (just) survivability I'm talking about, it's the
> abundance of stuff that makes it unnecessary to improvise. Once you are
> at a
> certain level, you can just go collect stuff, build a stash, enchant your
> armor, alchemize your HP, and you're done. It takes some variety from
> the late
> game. When you're lacking one thing or another, you have to come up with
> different ways to protect yourself from certain dangers, making the game
> more interesting.
Of course, a post-castle character should not miss anything unless playing
wishless.
> It makes the late game more boring. Of course, if you lose a late game
> character the frustration is immense, but that possibility can only make
> the
> game more exciting.
Somehow, I've lost more mid-game (past Soko/mines) characters in Slash'em
than in Nethack.
(in S: basilisk, Lethe, Demo, one or two in the quest, in Nethack, I do
not actually remember any death after Soko (ascended twice))
--
Hypocoristiquement,
Jym.
Aki Lumme
(snip about Sam)
> Of course, when you take him on, you should make sure that he cannot
> hit you...
>
> My standard approach, when I am chaotic and decide to kill him:
(snip some very good advice)
I'll give my strategy (I *always* kill him to get his weapon. :)
1. Boulder fort, as described. Have a wand of teleport ready in case
of some boulders get destroyed - to teleport *him* away.
1.1. Assault rifle him to death.
1.2. Cast-drain-life him to death.
2. Potions of invulnerability! Nice and sporty!
Not tested (so don't trust me):
3. Create a blue jelly fort and polearm him to death. Would it be
possible to lure some high-level spellcaster to create a pool
and then flood-fill some pits to create a "pool fort"? Or polearm
him with a boulder fort and the Eyes of the Overworld.
Also, if you have the Eye of the Aethiopica, you can portal some
pets in to kill his servants beforehands.
--
Aki Lumme