Advice for gnomish Ranger
Daniel Kraft
so partly because of interest and partly because of chance, I decided to
give gnomish neutral Rangers a try. After one was killed on entering
Minetown by a Vampire Lord called something (looks suspicious like a
bones file the RNG chose to kill me, though I admit it was clearly YASD
not YAAD, too) I now reached Minetown with my second one.
I finished Sokoban and got reflection, and just found a bones pile of a
wizard, so I probably have MR, too, if I switch displacement for magic
resistance. I think this will be a good idea, no?
BTW, this same bones level contained an orc mummy called something else,
which was surprisingly hard to kill but I found to carry *a lot* of nice
loot, too, including a long sword named Frost Brand (or death-drop, but
its there)!
Some questions on your opinion:
1) I did find speedboots and jumping boots in an armor store, now I wear
speed; I think the choice was quite easy, as I'm still lacking intrinsic
speed and jumping won't be quite that useful in corrdidors and the like
without a light source. Or could jumping be the better alternative?
2) Also, I just found a bow and some (two stacks of 5 by now) daggers,
so I decided to switch my crossbow against the bow and arrows, so I
build up bow skill for the Longbow later on; do you think this is a good
idea, or should I use the crossbow further until I get the Longbow or at
least until some time later? I do have a large dog and a magic whistle,
together with my daggers this should be a quite good defense by now, I
think good enough to survive even without yet built bow skill and arrow
stack.
3) Now that I found Frost Brand, would you use it as melee weapon and
train long sword, too? I think it could be nice later on, and also
strong now in the early-to-mid-game; but of course, I'm a Ranger so I
will try to use mainly ranged attacks. So would it be worthwhile to
carry Frost Brand around or should I stash it somewhere?
4) For the late game, I do want to cast some spells, things like
identify/magic mapping/light will probably be most useful, I don't think
Rangers are expected to fight with spells, right? Or should I try to
get finger of death or maybe cure sickness/extra healing also?
Nevertheless, should I try for a robe and GDSM with my amulet of
reflection? Or can I even cast good enough with SDSM and CoMR, together
with "oLS or some other amulet?
Thanks for your hints!
BTW, how can I enable auto-pickup for quivered items on NAO? There's a
"auto-pickup quivered" option, but it seems not to work; surely I have
to change some other settings, too.
Daniel
--
Done: Bar-Sam-Val-Wiz, Dwa-Elf-Hum-Orc, Cha-Law, Fem-Mal
Underway: Ran-Gno-Neu-Fem
To go: Arc-Cav-Hea-Kni-Mon-Pri-Rog-Tou
3cn...@gmail.com
> Hi again,
>
> so partly because of interest and partly because of chance, I decided to
> give gnomish neutral Rangers a try. After one was killed on entering
> Minetown by a Vampire Lord called something (looks suspicious like a
> bones file the RNG chose to kill me, though I admit it was clearly YASD
> not YAAD, too) I now reached Minetown with my second one.
>
> I finished Sokoban and got reflection, and just found a bones pile of a
> wizard, so I probably have MR, too, if I switch displacement for magic
> resistance. I think this will be a good idea, no?
>
*DISCLAIMER: I haven't ascended a ranger yet. I have, however,
ascended a Sporkhack rogue, which should theoretically be more
difficult.*
If you have no other source of MR, I would definitely switch. The
cloak of displacement won't protect against touch of death and
polymorph traps. If you want to ascend with displacement, wish for the
Eye of the Aethiopica, which will *greatly* enhance your spellcasting.
I'd forgo sacrificing until you can wish for the Eye since you won't
get anything better than Frost Brand anyway.
> BTW, this same bones level contained an orc mummy called something else,
> which was surprisingly hard to kill but I found to carry *a lot* of nice
> loot, too, including a long sword named Frost Brand (or death-drop, but
> its there)!
>
If you are killed by a vampire, you leave a #named vamp instead of a
ghost, similarly for mummies, zombies and W (W turn you into a
wraith).
> Some questions on your opinion:
>
> 1) I did find speedboots and jumping boots in an armor store, now I wear
> speed; I think the choice was quite easy, as I'm still lacking intrinsic
> speed and jumping won't be quite that useful in corrdidors and the like
> without a light source. Or could jumping be the better alternative?
>
As other posters have said, jumping boots are better if and only if
you remember to use them. Keep them for the Castle and for crossing
Medusa's lair anyway. In the late game, if you choose to cast spells,
remember that rangers can cast "jumping" at Basic, which is slightly
better than jumping boots.
> 2) Also, I just found a bow and some (two stacks of 5 by now) daggers,
> so I decided to switch my crossbow against the bow and arrows, so I
> build up bow skill for the Longbow later on; do you think this is a good
> idea, or should I use the crossbow further until I get the Longbow or at
> least until some time later? I do have a large dog and a magic whistle,
> together with my daggers this should be a quite good defense by now, I
> think good enough to survive even without yet built bow skill and arrow
> stack.
>
If you plan to cast spells, you must plan ahead by conserving skill
slots, since you'll need three slots for skilled divination (magic
mapping, identify, light). I'd steer clear of your crossbow for this
reason alone, not to mention the rarity of the ammo used. A single
blessed scroll of enchant weapon applied to your arrow stack will
trump the crossbow now that you've got the Mines' end luckstone (I
assume you have it now).
If you choose to extensively use arrows, *bless them*, as this will
greatly decrease their disappearance. Furthermore, if you have +7
arrows, it's trivial to get 10 +7 daggers by polypiling stacks of 10
arrows (beware of iron golems). :)
> 3) Now that I found Frost Brand, would you use it as melee weapon and
> train long sword, too? I think it could be nice later on, and also
> strong now in the early-to-mid-game; but of course, I'm a Ranger so I
> will try to use mainly ranged attacks. So would it be worthwhile to
> carry Frost Brand around or should I stash it somewhere?
>
Using Frosty for popcorn monsters is acceptable, but since you can't
#twoweapon anyway, I'd enchant your ranged weapons first. And if you
stick with displacement after wishing for the Eye, avoid melee attack
as much as you can. A single boss lich or cockatrice could ruin your
day.
> 4) For the late game, I do want to cast some spells, things like
> identify/magic mapping/light will probably be most useful, I don't think
> Rangers are expected to fight with spells, right? Or should I try to
> get finger of death or maybe cure sickness/extra healing also?
> Nevertheless, should I try for a robe and GDSM with my amulet of
> reflection? Or can I even cast good enough with SDSM and CoMR, together
> with "oLS or some other amulet?
>
You're restricted in attack spells, so I wouldn't bother with the
Finger. Magic missile is the only attack spell you're likely to use.
The most difficult spell a ranger will need to cast is Magic Mapping,
at level 5. Since you can attain Skilled in divination, you likely
won't need special equipment to cast once your intelligence is decent.
> Thanks for your hints!
> BTW, how can I enable auto-pickup for quivered items on NAO? There's a
> "auto-pickup quivered" option, but it seems not to work; surely I have
> to change some other settings, too.
>> Daniel
>
Not sure, sorry. Happy hacking!
ran...@pactechdata.com
> BTW, how can I enable auto-pickup for quivered items on NAO? There's a
> "auto-pickup quivered" option, but it seems not to work; surely I have
> to change some other settings, too.
If they're using Roderick Schertler's pickup_thrown patch
like slash'em does (and future nethack will, but you didn't
hear that from me...), you need to enable the regular autopickup
option in addition to enabling pickup_thrown. If you want to
avoid picking up anything other than previously thrown items,
you can set pickup_types to something which won't actually pick
anything else (boulders perhaps, provided you don't polymorph
into a giant). Or if the program was built with nethack's
autopickup_exceptions feature enabled, you could use that to
make sure nothing matches the pickup_types setting in order to
have autopickup on but not actively picking up stuff.
pickup_thrown overrides pickup_types (and autopick exceptions)
for objects marked as having been thrown, but it requires that
autopickup handling be active in order to actually do anything.
[That patch has a minor bug affecting boomerangs and Mjollnir.
If something is thrown, returns, and is caught, its internal
``was thrown'' bit stays set and if you later deliberately or
accidentally drop the item, it will behave as if last thrown
rather than dropped when subsequently stepped upon.]
funcrunch
> so partly because of interest and partly because of chance, I decided to
> give gnomish neutral Rangers a try.
I ascended a gnomish ranger once on NAO. Looking back at my writeup, I
used the starting crossbow for awhile but then primarily Vorpal Blade
and the magic missile spell. Gnomes can get up to 19 Int naturally, so
you may not need a robe (or helm of brilliance) unless you're doing
high-level spells. Had I gotten Frost Brand I would have used that
instead of Vorpy for the greater damage. I did use the Longbow as well
however, with rustproofed +6 arrows.
As for armor I've always preferred speed boots to jumping boots. When
I've occasionally used jumping it's usually been on the Astral plane
and mostly via spell rather than boots. And absolutely, magic
resistance beats displacement if you don't have another source of MR.
- funcrunch
notare...@wireless.co.il
> not YAAD, too) I now reached Minetown with my second one.
>
> I finished Sokoban and got reflection, and just found a bones pile of a
> wizard, so I probably have MR, too, if I switch displacement for magic
> resistance. I think this will be a good idea, no?
Yes, put on that cloak of MR ASAP - even if you can't uncurse it
first. As a Ranger, you should be avoiding melee combat, but having
MR and reflection will help a lot. You should also try to get sleep
resistance early.
...
> 1) I did find speedboots and jumping boots in an armor store, now I wear
> speed; I think the choice was quite easy, as I'm still lacking intrinsic
> speed and jumping won't be quite that useful in corrdidors and the like
> without a light source. Or could jumping be the better alternative?
Using the speed boots until you get intrinsic speed is a good
strategy. Once you have natural speed, you can switch to the jumping
boots and use them mostly to avoid melee combat.
> 2) Also, I just found a bow and some (two stacks of 5 by now) daggers,
> so I decided to switch my crossbow against the bow and arrows, so I
> build up bow skill for the Longbow later on; do you think this is a good
> idea, or should I use the crossbow further until I get the Longbow or at
> least until some time later? I do have a large dog and a magic whistle,
> together with my daggers this should be a quite good defense by now, I
> think good enough to survive even without yet built bow skill and arrow
> stack.
Dagger skill is very good to have. The bow has a longer range, and
you can poison your arrows. As a neutral, you can sac for Magicbane,
which would be very helpful.
> 3) Now that I found Frost Brand, would you use it as melee weapon and
> train long sword, too? I think it could be nice later on, and also
> strong now in the early-to-mid-game; but of course, I'm a Ranger so I
> will try to use mainly ranged attacks. So would it be worthwhile to
> carry Frost Brand around or should I stash it somewhere?
You should get up to Basic in long sword, at least. Keep Frost Brand,
but you don't need to use it much until you are facing serious
nasties.
Pasi Kallinen
> On Feb 16, 3:59 am, Daniel Kraft <d...@domob.eu> wrote:
>> BTW, how can I enable auto-pickup for quivered items on NAO? There's a
>> "auto-pickup quivered" option, but it seems not to work; surely I have
>> to change some other settings, too.
>
> If they're using Roderick Schertler's pickup_thrown patch
> like slash'em does (and future nethack will, but you didn't
> hear that from me...), you need to enable the regular autopickup
Nope, NAO doesn't have pickup_thrown. I guess Daniel's confusing autopickup
and autoquiver.
(And, Yay! for the next version ;)
--
Pasi Kallinen
pa...@alt.org
http://bilious.homelinux.org/ -- NetHack Patch Database
Daniel Kraft
> ran...@pactechdata.com wrote:
>> On Feb 16, 3:59 am, Daniel Kraft <d...@domob.eu> wrote:
>>> BTW, how can I enable auto-pickup for quivered items on NAO? There's a
>>> "auto-pickup quivered" option, but it seems not to work; surely I have
>>> to change some other settings, too.
>> If they're using Roderick Schertler's pickup_thrown patch
>> like slash'em does (and future nethack will, but you didn't
>> hear that from me...), you need to enable the regular autopickup
>
> Nope, NAO doesn't have pickup_thrown. I guess Daniel's confusing autopickup
> and autoquiver.
Right, I just tried and found it looks not like "pickup_thrown" ;)
But doesn't matter, so far it works without autopickup.
notare...@wireless.co.il
> On Feb 16, 1:59 pm, Daniel Kraft <d...@domob.eu> wrote:
>
> > Hi again,
> ...
> > not YAAD, too) I now reached Minetown with my second one.
>
> > I finished Sokoban and got reflection, and just found a bones pile of a
> > wizard, so I probably have MR, too, if I switch displacement for magic
> > resistance. I think this will be a good idea, no?
>
> Yes, put on that cloak of MR ASAP - even if you can't uncurse it
> first. As a Ranger, you should be avoiding melee combat, but having
> MR and reflection will help a lot. You should also try to get sleep
> resistance early.
...
Note, the combination of pet + magic whistle + MR makes it a really
good idea to find a polymorph trap and use it to upgrade your pet into
something REALLY kick-ass. You can frequently find polymorph traps
deep in the mines. Use caution, though, because hostile monsters will
also use polytraps, and if one becomes a summoner it can end your game
in a hurry. If you can collect a few more pets on the way down, be
sure to bring as many as you can. Nothing like an honor guard of a
purple worm, a dragon, and a non-eating pet of some kind to help you
handle the harder levels.
Stand on the trap, blow the whistle, and displace one of your weaker
pets onto the polytrap.
Lather, rinse, and repeat until your little private army is ready to
rock and roll.
3cn...@gmail.com
Psst: displacing pets onto a polymorph trap lowers your alignment.
Kill some popcorn monsters or sacrifice after doing this.
Daniel Kraft
Thanks for the hints, just tried it! I had lost my dog in the meantime,
but tamed a housecat running across my way, and the first try gave me a
baby blue dragon which I decided to keep (now a grown up blue dragon);
I'm new to this pet-polymorph-business (just used pets so far for
surviving the early game with my wizards and other weak roles), but I
thought this could make some nice time.
Or should I have tried for purple worms or other nasties? But so far
I'm fairly satisfied with my dragon... Only he's a bit slow and I've
not yet found a wand of speed monster (got my speed from a Quantum
Mechanics). But still, with magic whistle its simply fun!
nyra
You can also stand next to the trap and simply blow the whistle. Pets
which land right in the trap are likely to get polymorphed. You can
also leash your pet and manevure so that you and your pet are on
opposite sides of the trap; a leashed pet will often feel compelled to
step into the trap in order to reduce the strain on the leash.
Note that both methods work perfectly well without magic resistance.
The magic whistle has the advantage of working with multiple pets and
being generally faster to use. Remember that, absent magic resistance,
you need to find polytraps without triggering them ...
Oh, and remember: a Lich of any flavour is a _bad_ result when
pet-polymorphing.
--
's morgens: zorgen, 's avonds: min,
brengt het kruipen van de spin