How do warrior types ever get the hang of spells?
il...@rcn.com
more spellbooks, -- may get burned when they try to read a spellbook
above their level, but they gain practice as they cast easier spells.
Eventually they can read and use more difficult spellbooks. But how
does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
dust" stage?
Related question: Ranger seems to be a great character at early levels,
especially in Gnomish Mines (large open spaces are good for archery),
but he seems to be a one-trick pony. When out of arrows, or unable to
use a bow for some other reason (engulfed?), he may be in real trouble.
How do you balance a ranger?
ele...@yahoo.com
> Eventually they can read and use more difficult spellbooks. But how
> does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
> dust" stage?
The chances of successfully reading depend on intellegence. Wizards
especially start out near the maximum. Combat wombats can start out
near the dunce cap level, in which case you are wasting your time.
wcris...@hotmail.com
One word: Daggers.
They don't break, elven daggers don't corrode, and you can enchant them
to levels where they deal an absurd amount of damage (c.f. Ellora the
Elven Archer's Blessed Deadly Daggers.) Rangers can get to expert in
dagger (iirc) and hurl up to 3 (4?) per turn. Better than any amount of
arrows.
Go into the mines and pick up all the daggers you can find (well, until
you become burdened.) The ones that create huge stacks when combined
are +0. Test the others, keep the ones that work the best, identify,
and enchant until you have a stack of ~12 daggers at a nice +6 or so
level.
(Just out of curiosity, how does being engulfed stop you from using a
bow?)
Artemis the Ranger
blipster8
il...@rcn.com wrote:
> Ranger seems to be a great character at early levels,
> especially in Gnomish Mines (large open spaces are good for archery),
> but he seems to be a one-trick pony. When out of arrows, or unable to
> use a bow for some other reason (engulfed?), he may be in real trouble.
> How do you balance a ranger?
With daggers. Throw early and often, I believe the phrase is. And for
rangers, often means up to 4 per turn, since rangers can get to expert
in dagger (and should!). Basically get a nice big stack, enchant when
possible, and kill stuff from range. Also remember that you can keep
your bow useful by #untrapping arrow traps when you find them. In my
games, rangers do better than a lot of other combat types, just because
they can do both melee and ranged combat well; once I find some dwarf's
mithril armor, etc, I can get a decent AC, and use bow and daggers to
soften baddies up a little (or a lot) and still be able to whack them
when they get in range. If you have a hard time getting a weapon, you
can always altar-camp until you get one of the FBs or whatever. Also,
remember that once you get your quest artifact you can just hang out
creating new blessed arrows out of thin air every once in a while...
kanze
> Wizards, priests, monks -- all characters who start out with
> one or more spellbooks, -- may get burned when they try to
> read a spellbook above their level, but they gain practice as
> they cast easier spells. Eventually they can read and use more
> difficult spellbooks. But how does a fighter or a ranger ever
> get past "the spellbook crumbles to dust" stage?
Intelligence, and experience levels. Combat wombats can't
really cast well at low levels anyway, even if they know the
spell, so spell casting is more a late game activity for them. A
Samuri with 30 XL and 18 Int can read anything he wants; with no
metal armor, a +7 helm of brillance, and a robe, he can cast
very well, too. But of course, you don't start the game like
that.
> Related question: Ranger seems to be a great character at
> early levels, especially in Gnomish Mines (large open spaces
> are good for archery), but he seems to be a one-trick pony.
> When out of arrows, or unable to use a bow for some other
> reason (engulfed?), he may be in real trouble. How do you
> balance a ranger?
Daggers can be useful, but if you look for them, you'll
generally find enough arrows to keep you going. Just don't
forget to bless them -- you loose a lot less that way. And keep
the original dagger until you get an artifact weapon -- no point
in wasting arrows on a newt. And moving skill in daggers forward
means you improve both melée and ranged fighting.
Also, Rangers start with searching, which can be a useful
intrinsic if you play slowly enough, at least where the going is
dangerous. (Although the starting intrinsic I like best is
speed.)
--
James Kanze GABI Software
Conseils en informatique orientée objet/
Beratung in objektorientierter Datenverarbeitung
9 place Sémard, 78210 St.-Cyr-l'École, France, +33 (0)1 30 23 00 34
Doug Freyburger
>
> Wizards, priests, monks -- all characters who start out with one or
> more spellbooks, -- may get burned when they try to read a spellbook
> above their level, but they gain practice as they cast easier spells.
> Eventually they can read and use more difficult spellbooks. But how
> does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
> dust" stage?
By being certain each and every spellbook you read is blessed
before you attempt to read it. But than you'll notice your failure
rate is very high. But even at 90% failure it is often worth trying
Identify until you run out of manna. Without much use for
attack spells your manna isn't a weapon so burn it up on
trying anything else. So long as you have plenty of food at
hand ...
By advancing to the level where the Quest is a cake-walk and
*then* dealing with spellbooks. Get your intelligence maxed
out, get up to XP 20, and spellbooks aren't nearly the problem
they were at the lower levels.
> Related question: Ranger seems to be a great character at early levels,
> especially in Gnomish Mines (large open spaces are good for archery),
> but he seems to be a one-trick pony. When out of arrows, or unable to
> use a bow for some other reason (engulfed?), he may be in real trouble.
> How do you balance a ranger?
Daggers don't run out. Melee combat *does* work. Even for
wizards. No reason to think it automatically fails for rangers
either. You just need to be very carefull about watching your
hit points and making sure you can run away when they get
down to half of your current max.
Note that each class has a specific favorite spell that they
get better odds at. A Valkyrie's Cone of Cold spell makes the
water squares of the Medusa level just another glacier that
feels like home.
wcris...@hotmail.com
kanze wrote:
> il...@rcn.com wrote:
> Daggers can be useful, but if you look for them, you'll
> generally find enough arrows to keep you going. Just don't
> forget to bless them -- you loose a lot less that way.
At first, I was inclined to nitpick at this spelling mistake (LOSE vs.
loose.)
<Pictures annoyed Elven Ranger with arrows mysteriously sticking to her
bow..."Hey, I thought blessing these things was supposed to make them
work BETTER!">
But then I realized it was actually, in its own strange way, true: if
you bless arrows, they'll do more damage on average, and so you won't
have to LOOSE as many (i.e. release as many from your bow.)
Rather serendipitous, that...
Artemis the Ranger
Jove
>il...@rcn.com wrote:
>>
>> Wizards, priests, monks -- all characters who start out with one or
>> more spellbooks, -- may get burned when they try to read a spellbook
>> above their level, but they gain practice as they cast easier spells.
>> Eventually they can read and use more difficult spellbooks. But how
>> does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
>> dust" stage?
>
>By being certain each and every spellbook you read is blessed
>before you attempt to read it.
Note that all spellbooks gifted by your god are blessed.
--
Welcome to NetHack. | I take what I'm given.
| You exploit the game.
All the best, | He's an abusive cheater.
Jove (Joe Bednorz)
Ohle Claussen
> wcris...@hotmail.com writes:
>> kanze wrote:
>
>> > generally find enough arrows to keep you going. Just don't
>> > forget to bless them -- you loose a lot less that way.
>> ^^^^^
>> At first, I was inclined to nitpick at this spelling mistake (LOSE vs.
>> loose.)
>
> underlined..
----------------------------------------------------------
Your font is: Proportional Monospaced
^
The amazing Font-o-Meter! http://world.std.com/~mmcirvin/
----------------------------------------------------------
Er, for clarity, it's Artemis' font that should measure Proportional (and thus
badly chosen for a newsreader), not yours.
regards,
Ohle
--
Jann Ohle Claussen | GPG-Key-ID E7149169
http://www.stud.uni-goettingen.de/~s251251
BOFH Excuse #222:
I'm not sure. Try calling the Internet's head office -- it's in the book.
Doug Freyburger
> Doug Freyburger wrote:
> >il...@rcn.com wrote:
>
> >> But how
> >> does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
> >> dust" stage?
>
> >By being certain each and every spellbook you read is blessed
> >before you attempt to read it.
>
> Note that all spellbooks gifted by your god are blessed.
Also note that altar dancing for extra protection points tends to
give piles of blessed spellbooks as a side effect. And even
warrior types want better AC.
me
news:yrj3beg...@despammed.com...
> wcris...@hotmail.com writes:
> > kanze wrote:
>
> > > generally find enough arrows to keep you going. Just don't
> > > forget to bless them -- you loose a lot less that way.
> > ^^^^^
> > At first, I was inclined to nitpick at this spelling mistake (LOSE vs.
> > loose.)
>
> underlined..
the ^^^^^ is in the correct spot on my newsreader ;)
Dragontamer
wcris...@hotmail.com wrote:
> il...@rcn.com wrote:
> > Wizards, priests, monks -- all characters who start out with one or
> > more spellbooks, -- may get burned when they try to read a spellbook
> > above their level, but they gain practice as they cast easier spells.
> > Eventually they can read and use more difficult spellbooks. But how
> > does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
> > dust" stage?
> >
> > Related question: Ranger seems to be a great character at early levels,
> > especially in Gnomish Mines (large open spaces are good for archery),
> > but he seems to be a one-trick pony. When out of arrows, or unable to
> > use a bow for some other reason (engulfed?), he may be in real trouble.
> > How do you balance a ranger?
>
> One word: Daggers.
>
> They don't break, elven daggers don't corrode, and you can enchant them
> to levels where they deal an absurd amount of damage (c.f. Ellora the
> Elven Archer's Blessed Deadly Daggers.) Rangers can get to expert in
> dagger (iirc) and hurl up to 3 (4?) per turn. Better than any amount of
> arrows.
Yes, yes, no.
Rangers best weapon is definitly Arrows. Arrows can also be
enchanted to +7 (+9 if you are feeling lucky :-p). With the
quest artifact LoD, you don't have to worry about running out
of arrows again. Poisoned arrows == roxxorz.
Elven Archers using elven bows and elven arrows shoot upto *5* arrows
in a single turn (on expert). Orc archers using orc bows and orc arrows
also shoot 5 arrows in a single turn.
Daggers only go up to 4, which is still impressive.
Daggers also are very heavy; carrying 20 daggers is heavier
than 150 arrows.
Early game though, Daggers are king. High luck and enchantment
means arrows don't disappear as often, so lighter, more damaging,
poisoned, infinite (#invoke LoD) arrows are better in late game.
--Dragontamer
Ugly Newt
Doug Freyburger got out a spraycan and scrawled the following:
Not if you manage your luck properly. I use Section 4 of
http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/pray.html
to optimise my altar-camping, but the author of the second half of
http://dominia.org/djao/protection.html
seems to know what he's talking about, too ;-)
--
Glyn Kennington - remove caps from email address to reply
Doug Freyburger
>Doug Freyburger wrote:
> > Jove wrote:
>
> > > Note that all spellbooks gifted by your god are blessed.
> >
> > Also note that altar dancing for extra protection points tends to
> > give piles of blessed spellbooks as a side effect. [...]
>
> Not if you manage your luck properly. I use Section 4 of
> http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/pray.html
> to optimise my altar-camping, but the author of the second half of
> http://dominia.org/djao/protection.html
> seems to know what he's talking about, too ;-)
Chuckle. I did that for myself to figure out wizard strategy. I
have since rethought the best combat wombat strategy - Since
spellbooks are gifted based on spell schools you can learn*
and combat wombats have specific favorite spells, it makes
sense for them to go ahead and get spells in those schools
with the goal of getting their favorite spells. Valk rocks
blasting cone of cold before even starting with daggers. And
who cares if a Valk runs out of manna with all those daggers
and artifacts and stuff but a few blasts of cold work.
Jove
>
>wcris...@hotmail.com wrote:
>> il...@rcn.com wrote:
>> > Wizards, priests, monks -- all characters who start out with one or
>> > more spellbooks, -- may get burned when they try to read a spellbook
>> > above their level, but they gain practice as they cast easier spells.
>> > Eventually they can read and use more difficult spellbooks. But how
>> > does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
>> > dust" stage?
>> >
>> > Related question: Ranger seems to be a great character at early levels,
>> > especially in Gnomish Mines (large open spaces are good for archery),
>> > but he seems to be a one-trick pony. When out of arrows, or unable to
>> > use a bow for some other reason (engulfed?), he may be in real trouble.
>> > How do you balance a ranger?
>>
>> One word: Daggers.
>>
>> They don't break, elven daggers don't corrode, and you can enchant them
>> to levels where they deal an absurd amount of damage (c.f. Ellora the
>> Elven Archer's Blessed Deadly Daggers.) Rangers can get to expert in
>> dagger (iirc) and hurl up to 3 (4?) per turn. Better than any amount of
>> arrows.
>
>Yes, yes, no.
Daggers do great damage. Expert Rangers throw up to 4 per turn,
average 2.5. (Players rejoice when they get Grayswandir for its 2x
damage. But Grayswandir only doubles base weapon damage and weapon
enchantment damage. 2.5 weapon strikes per move means 2.5x *all*
damage: skill, strength, ring of increase damage, poison, blessed,
silver, etc.) (Note that vs silver hating monsters, silver arrows fired
by an Expert Ranger will average almost twice as much damage as
Grayswandir.)
The problem with arrows is that they disappear. Dylan O'Donnell in
<861x8z9...@strackenz.spod-central.org>
(<http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.roguelike.nethack/msg/3d71a7dc254bbb35?hl=en>)said:
"The base chance of projectile survival is 1/(3 - enchantment +
erosion), capped at 75%. However, for blessed projectiles there's a
further saving throw dependent on your luck; with maxed luck, you'll
almost never lose anything blessed."
So early on +0 arrows have a 1/(3 - 0) = 1/3 chance of surviving.
That's a 2/3 chance of disappearing. +2 arrows have a 1/(3-2) = 1,
capped at 75% chance of surviving. That means a 50% chance of surviving
being fired twice. Until arrows can be blessed and luck permanently
enhanced with a luckstone, arrows disappear *fast*.
That's not just Nerfed(tm), that's Power-Nerfed(tm).
dzleon in <1114724642.3...@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>
(<http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.roguelike.nethack/msg/fda70487dd1f71de?hl=en>)
said:
:>See : 6744cbc1.03102...@posting.google.com
[<6744cbc1.03102...@posting.google.com>]
:>In short, I did a simulation and got:
:>
:>For 10000000 arrows shot: (enchanted at +2 or more and blessed)
:>
:>Luck %lost
:>-5: 24.88
:>-3: 24.89
:> 0: 18.77
:> 1: 18.72
:> 2: 18.74
:> 3: 12.64
:> 4: 12.65
:> 5: 12.64
:> 6: 6.53
:> 7: 6.55
:> 8: 6.55
:> 9: 0.45
:>10: 0.47
:>11: 0.47
:>12: 0.49
:>13: 0.5
:>
:>So, the best rate came at 9 luck, but anything above gives you one
:>arrow lost per every 200 shot, or so.
:>
>
>Rangers best weapon is definitly Arrows.
Once they're blessed, a luckstone found, and luck increased. Until
then throw daggers early and often. Keep the starting +1 dagger to
wield for finishing off monsters, and killing popcorn monsters.
>Arrows can also be
>enchanted to +7 (+9 if you are feeling lucky :-p). With the
>quest artifact LoD, you don't have to worry about running out
>of arrows again. Poisoned arrows == roxxorz.
Poisoned projectiles have a 10% chance of an instakill vs
non-poison-resistant monsters. (Note that the Tsurugi of Murumasa and
Vorpal Blade only have a 5% chance of an instakill.)
>
>Elven Archers using elven bows and elven arrows shoot upto *5* arrows
^
Ranger
>in a single turn (on expert). Orc archers using orc bows and orc arrows
^ ^
Ranger Expert
>also shoot 5 arrows in a single turn.
*Can* shoot 5 arrows in a single turn. The average for both elven and
orcish rangers using Expert racial bow/arrows is 3.0. That's 3x damage.
All damage: Skill bonus, rings of increase damage bonus, etc. (Turns a
+1 ring of increase damage into a +3 ring of increase damage. Not bad.)
(Note that missiles fired from a launcher do not get strength damage
bonus.)
The 10% chance of a poison instakill goes to a 27% chance with 3 hits,
vs non-poison-resistant monsters. Do it twice and there's an almost 50%
chance of an instakill.
>
>Daggers only go up to 4, which is still impressive.
Average 2.5x damage. Gets the strength bonus, which can be up to +6.
Here's a simplified version of the Strength damage table:
STRENGTH +DAM
~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~
3 to 5 -1
6 to 15 0
16 to 17 +1
18 +2
18/01 - 18/75 +3
18/76 - 18/90 +4
18/91 - 18/99 +5
18/** +6
19 to 25 +6
So at strength 18 Expert daggers will multiply the +2 bonus to +5.
(Note that even for an Elf 18/01 strength can be achieved with a ring of
increase strength.) The +2 Expert skill bonus will be multiplied to +5
as well.
>
>Daggers also are very heavy; carrying 20 daggers is heavier
>than 150 arrows.
Daggers weigh 10. Arrows weigh 1. But arrows require a bow, weight
30. Carrying 20 daggers is certainly feasible. (The only other place of
equal importance to allocate carrying capacity would be protection.) 10
elven daggers seems more likely in the later game.
Daggers are also a "no-hands weapons". Not only do they *not* require
a wielded launcher, they don't even have to be wielded to be thrown.
>
>Early game though, Daggers are king.
Yes. For comparison, here are the base damages of the various daggers
and arrows:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ : ~~~~ ~~~~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~~~ ~~~~
WEAPON (Table 2) ABCH KMPRaRo STVW +HIT SDAM SAVG LDAM LAVG
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ : ~~~~ ~~~~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~~~ ~~~~
Dagger : bbbs b--E E bEEE
orcish dagger : +2 d3 2.0 d3 2.0
dagger : +2 d4 2.5 d3 2.0
silver dagger : +2 d4 2.5 d3 2.0
athame : +2 d4 2.5 d3 2.0
elven dagger : +2 d5 3.0 d3 2.0
Bow : -bs- b-bE - Eb--
orcish bow : d2 1.5 d2 1.5
bow : d2 1.5 d2 1.5
elven bow : d2 1.5 d2 1.5
yumi : d2 1.5 d2 1.5
orcish arrow : d5 3.0 d6 3.5
arrow : d6 3.5 d6 3.5
silver arrow : d6 3.5 d6 3.5
elven arrow : d7 4.0 d6 3.5
ya : +1 d7 4.0 d7 4.0
>High luck and enchantment
>means arrows don't disappear as often,
Without blessing the high luck doesn't help.
>so lighter, more damaging,
>poisoned, infinite (#invoke LoD) arrows are better in late game.
Definitely. The only problem is that the Longbow of Diana only gifts
regular arrows. Orcish and Elven Rangers are left a little short. That
means reserving racial arrows for tough targets. (Which should be done
in any case.) It also means wielding a racial bow, and not the Longbow.
That gives up the reflection the Longbow of Diana gives when wielded.
(Is that important? Depends, doesn't it?)
The problem of target acquisition and identification can be made easy
by Rangers' ability to get to Expert in Divination spells.
(Infravision, wand of light, spell of light, candle, lantern, oil lamp,
or a (lit) magic lamp can also help.) Skilled+ spell of Detect Monster
lasts. It shows every monster on the level. Mindless monsters are
shown (unlike with ESP/telepathy.) The whole level is shown without
having to be blinded (like telepathy) and unlike ESP. Non-threat
monsters are shown, unlike warning. That's the fire-control radar
ranged weapons desperately need to be really effective. (Is it worth
wishing for as a Ranger? I think so.)
Keep skilled+ spell of detect monsters going and monsters be killed
before they get to melee distance. For that matter, they can be killed
at so great a range they don't even respond to the attack. (Note:
missile weapon range is roughly Str/2. Weapons fired from a launcher
get an additional square of range.
The main problem with Rangers is that some thought is required to take
full advantage of the capabilities. What monsters to use your (fragile,
early on) arrows against. When to switch to melee with the +1 starting
dagger. Finding daggers to throw early and price-identifying they're
enchantment. Picking up arrows. Getting arrows from other monsters.
#untrapping arrow traps.
Learning to kill monsters at a distance seems to be the hardest part.
I watched someone on NAO using arrows in the VotD, but usually at range
one. Range two at most. Range 8 was possible. Since the VotD is
unlit, a wand of light would have been invaluable.
Jove
>I was hanging out with the cool kids in rec.games.roguelike.nethack when
>Doug Freyburger got out a spraycan and scrawled the following:
>> Jove wrote:
>> > Doug Freyburger wrote:
>> > >il...@rcn.com wrote:
>> >
>> > >> But how
>> > >> does a fighter or a ranger ever get past "the spellbook crumbles to
>> > >> dust" stage?
>> >
>> > >By being certain each and every spellbook you read is blessed
>> > >before you attempt to read it.
>> >
>> > Note that all spellbooks gifted by your god are blessed.
>>
>> Also note that altar dancing for extra protection points tends to
>> give piles of blessed spellbooks as a side effect. [...]
>
>Not if you manage your luck properly. I use Section 4 of
>
>http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/pray.html
Don't forget section 7, which tells how much luck is gained with the
sacrifice of a given monster.