OT: Nethack

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

:jig::jig::jig: I ascended!!!! :jig::jig::jig:

And guess with what class... a Priest! (A very lucky one...) I'm walking on air!

There's probably too much to say; I'm not sure if I should try and summarize it all. So I will list some thoughts:

a) I started off on a really good foot by finding a shop very early on that had Speed Boots and a Shield of Reflection. The former served me through the whole game, and the latter till my 2nd wish (for SDSM).

b) Pets are largely not as important for a priest, and altars aren't important at all. Didn't use a single altar, and no pet for the vast majority of the game.

c) Found a lamp in the mines, got a wish! Best decision I ever made: using first wish for Sceptre of Might. Side note: I'm pretty sure that weapon did more collective damage to me than anything else in the game!

d) Sokoban had a BoH; also lucky. I never was able to find a second bag, which I know was playing it risky. My BoH got taken to unblessed in the late game once, but I had holy water, thankfully.

e) jiansonz is a gentleman and a scholar for his alchemy suggestion. I used it to full effect, drinking I think 15 blessed full healing pots over the course of the game.

f) Another very lucky thing: found a bones pile with a cursed magic marker (0:1). Recharging it allowed for a genocide scroll and a couple early enchants.

g) Even luckier: I found a magic marker in the random dungeon later on.

h) Magic Missile is an *awesome* spell. Like, I was Unskilled in attack spells, but it still rocked.

i) Conflict is *awesome.* Don't think I could have beaten the game without it.

j) The priest quest yields a ridiculous amount of graveyards, meaning lots of wraiths and LOTS of chests. So many chests, in fact, that it got pretty tedious looting them all. But I stuck with it, of course!

k) More incredible luck: my Wand of Wishing from the Castle came fully charged.

l) Next best decision I made: wishing for a spellbook of magic mapping. That made Gehennom SO much nicer.

m) It seems to me that the late game is *all* about preparation. I wouldn't even say anything from post-castle up till (but not including) the Astral Plane was even hard, per se, but really tedious at points.

n) I hate the "magical force." I HATE THE MAGICAL FORCE. Boy, was it frustrating to try and go up stairs and get teleported back down levels. I don't know how many times I had to do dlvl 40. By far the stretch from Amulet to getting out of Gehennom was my least favorite part of the game.

o) Next least favorite was the Plane of Earth. Boy, was that annoying. In retrospect I probably should have used a means other than pickaxe, as getting interrupted all the time was horrid.

p) Thankfully I had enough death charges for the wizard's appearances.

q) The astral plane was pretty tough. I am so thankful I had a couple wands of teleport; next time I'll bring even more. So many monsters! The angels, I think, posed the biggest threat. Again, conflict was a lifesaver. I tried the left temple first; no luck Fought Death; he went down fairly easily. Then fought my way to the middle altar, where I used one of my last death charges on Pestilence. Fortunately, this was the right altar. Actually physically getting to the altar was daunting as well, though!

UJordanu the Lama            St:18/36 Dx:22 Co:18 In:12 Wi:22 Ch:11  Lawful
Astral Plane $:0  HP:104(269) Pw:318(348) AC:-42 Xp:24/40170833 T:33478

Final attributes
  You were piously aligned
  Your alignment was  177
  You were fire resistant
  You were cold resistant
  You were sleep resistant
  You were shock resistant
  You were poison resistant
  You were magic-protected
  You could recognize detrimental food
  You saw invisible
  You were warned
  You were invisible to others
  You caused conflict
  You were levitating
  You were protected
  You were very fast
  You had reflection
  Your life would have been saved
  You were lucky (3)
  You had extra luck
  Good luck did not time out for you
  You survived

Goodbye uJordanu the Demigod...
You went to your reward with 2771622 points

Inventory:

Spoiler

Your inventory
Amulets
k - a cursed amulet of life saving
l - a blessed amulet of life saving (being worn)
U - an amulet of magical breathing
Weapons
d - the blessed rustproof +6 Sceptre of Might (weapon in hand)
Armor
b - a blessed fireproof +5 robe named 3000 (being worn)
f - the blessed rustproof +4 Mitre of Holiness (being worn)
q - a blessed fireproof +4 pair of speed boots (being worn)
r - a blessed fireproof +4 small shield (being worn)
D - a blessed fireproof +4 T-shirt (being worn)
M - a +5 silver dragon scale mail (being worn)
V - a blessed fireproof +4 pair of gauntlets of dexterity (being worn)
Comestibles
g - a lizard corpse
h - a lembas wafer
C - 5 K-rations
Scrolls
w - a cursed scroll of charging
Potions
J - 2 potions of holy water
Rings
a - a rusty ring of conflict (on left hand)
O - a ring of regeneration
T - a ring of slow digestion
W - a blessed fireproof ring of levitation (on right hand)
Wands
s - a wand of death (1:0)
y - a wand of digging (0:5)
E - a wand of undead turning (0:5)
L - a wand of teleportation (0:3)
N - a wand of death (0:2)
R - a wand of teleportation (0:1)
Z - a wand of lightning (0:6)
Tools
i - a blessed oil lamp
j - a blessed bag of holding
o - a tinning kit (0:21)
p - a magic marker (0:7)
u - a blessed +0 unicorn horn
x - a rusty skeleton key
z - a towel
I - a very rusty +0 pick-axe
K - a pair of lenses
Gems
v - a cursed chrysoberyl stone
H - a blessed luckstone

Contents of the bag of holding:
3158 gold pieces
an amulet of ESP
an amulet of ESP
an amulet of reflection
a +0 mummy wrapping
4 lumps of royal jelly
5 cursed lumps of royal jelly
4 cheesecakes
a fortune cookie
2 lizard corpses
a sprig of wolfsbane
a banana
an orange
2 cloves of garlic
a scroll of enchant armor
4 blessed scrolls of blank paper
a cursed scroll of blank paper
a scroll of enchant weapon
2 cursed scrolls of teleportation
a scroll of remove curse
2 cursed scrolls of create monster
a cursed scroll of food detection
4 scrolls of create monster
a cursed scroll of enchant weapon
a spellbook of blank paper
a spellbook of remove curse named 20k
a potion of water
a blessed potion of enlightenment
a potion of healing
a potion of paralysis
2 cursed potions of extra healing
a cursed potion of healing
2 potions of gain level
a potion of booze
a potion of sleeping
a potion of enlightenment
a potion of unholy water
a blessed diluted potion of fruit juice
a blessed potion of invisibility
a blessed diluted potion of speed
3 potions of gain ability
a +3 ring of gain constitution
a blessed +2 ring of gain strength
a ring of polymorph control
a ring of stealth
a rusty wand of polymorph (0:5)
a wand of secret door detection (0:7)
a wand of cold (0:3)
a wand of digging (0:5)
a wand of digging (0:4)
a wand of digging (0:3)
a wand of cold (0:5)
a rusty wand of magic missile (0:3)
a wand of striking (0:8)
a wand of create monster (0:12)
a wand of striking (0:3)
a wax candle
a +0 unicorn horn
a rusty tin opener
a +0 unicorn horn
a leash
5 amber stones
2 rubies
6 obsidian stones
an agate stone
a black opal
2 citrine stones
4 opals
4 jasper stones
5 amethyst stones
a turquoise stone
5 garnet stones

So, does this mean I win the Priest tournament?

Thank you to CG, jiansonz, and everyone else who has given me so much help!!

 

[azn_apocalypse]

Re: OT: Nethack

Congrats, Nerigazh. I've been pretty close with a priest before but never actually made it. Nice AC too!

 

[jiansonz]

Re: OT: Nethack

YES! You made it. Cool.

My first ascendant, a Cavewoman, also used Sceptre of Might as main weapon.



Some comments and curiosity questions:

What´s the deal with the name of your robe?

What god did you serve? (Priests can worship any of the other classes´ 36 different gods)

Altars may not have been important for you, playing this character, but they are always important to me. Once my characters start to get strong, I pray a lot (for spellbooks, 'golden glow' boons, etc.) and I want an altar to sacrifice on, to see exactly when my prayer timeout is reached so I can pray again.

Why did you wear a ring of conflict when you could just as well have invoked the power of the Scepter of Might? Did you need to switch between on/off more often that the artifact would allow for?

Playing in Gehennom without Magic Mapping is indeed a lot less fun.

For the Plane of Earth, use wands of digging. If you know where the portal is, you will only need (at most) one more wand than the one the minotaur at the entrance drops.

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

Grats!

-CG

 

[Ohomemgrande1]

Re: OT: Nethack

Right on. Nothing like that first ascension.

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

Thanks all! Couldn't have done it without you

YES! You made it. Cool.

My first ascendant, a Cavewoman, also used Sceptre of Might as main weapon.



Some comments and curiosity questions:

What´s the deal with the name of your robe?

Oh, that was for keeping track of a prayer timeout when I was a young priestling.

What god did you serve? (Priests can worship any of the other classes´ 36 different gods)

Anu!

Altars may not have been important for you, playing this character, but they are always important to me. Once my characters start to get strong, I pray a lot (for spellbooks, 'golden glow' boons, etc.) and I want an altar to sacrifice on, to see exactly when my prayer timeout is reached so I can pray again.

Ah, this is just me being retarded. I didn't realize there were more benefits to be had.

Why did you wear a ring of conflict when you could just as well have invoked the power of the Scepter of Might? Did you need to switch between on/off more often that the artifact would allow for?

More retardation, pretty much. I basically forgot about #invoke. However, one thing that game was frugal with was rings, so in practice using the ring slot wasn't too bad. Major facepalm though... doh.

For the Plane of Earth, use wands of digging. If you know where the portal is, you will only need (at most) one more wand than the one the minotaur at the entrance drops.

I'll definitely keep this in mind, if I ever make it back there!

 

[maareek]

Re: OT: Nethack

Congrats, Nerigazh!

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

Thanks! Rather ironic that my "YAFAP" is in a D2 forum! But I think D2 is a great intro to NetHack (or vice versa), and I think they share a lot of the same good points (mainly, a different experience every time).

 

[maareek]

Re: OT: Nethack

I got into Nethack from a community based largely around Starcraft, so I don't think it's that odd at all, actually. Frankly, though, after reading this behemoth, it would have been hard not to at least take a peak.

I think your point is a very good one: Nethack has a lot to offer the person who enjoys a game with incredible replay value. And D2 definitely has that. It also really rewards the gamer looking for flexible strategies.

 

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

Awesome job, Nerigazh . I'm still trying to make it half way through the game .

 

[jiansonz]

Re: OT: Nethack

Laura the Archaeologist, Report #6, Descent, Item Preparation Interlude, and Final Run.


On just about every level in Gehennom, I started by casting Magic Mapping, then Detect Treasure. Then I tried to envision a reasonably short path between the stairs that would require just a little digging to make. I was pretty lucky here - got several floors with less than a dozen steps between the stairs.

After a while, I had to lay off the Detect Treasure spells, because I was running low on power. There weren´t any items I was really looking for either (I even had three unspent wishes at the time).

"My dear Baalzie, it has nothing to do with cowardice. I pay you because it´s more convenient than to kick your sorry bottom." (imagine a snotty Lara Croft voice...)
(And I laughed at stupid demon princes as they laughed at cowardly mortals.)

I made my way to the bottom floor, found the vibrating square, burned Elbereth on the square with my fire wand, dropped the Candelabrum and the Bell on the square and read a cursed scroll of teleportation which took me to Dlvl 4.

I had found some more extra healing potions that I blessed and drunk. I wished for another magic marker and wrote 5 scrolls of charging. I used four of them to considerably boost my power (if you read one while confused and at full power, your maximum power is raised by 5d4. "You feel charged up").

I cursed some more teleport scrolls with my last unholy water, moved back to the main dungeon and read one of them. I wanted to go to one of the levels with a potential wizard´s tower portal, but I ended up in Valley of the Dead instead. Looks like you can´t go all the way down there in one go. Another scroll from the Valley worked, however.

Time to visit the Wizard, then. Three-step high-tech spellcasting to get into the small towers: Dig to make a hole in a wall, Light to see where to land, and Jumping to get there. I wanted to have some spellcasting fun before the amulet would make such luxuries too expensive.

The Wizard was not on the lazy side when he appeared (note my neat little preparation of the moat, so I do not need to worry about the Book falling into water when I kill the Wizard).

I fried one of the wizards with a FoD spell, and he was the one with the Book. Read a cursed teleport scroll to get to the lowest floor. Oh my, the Wizard can follow your level teleporting! (at least when he´s next to you when you zip away) And he Double Troubled again! My next attempt at a FoD spell failed, but I got to move again before they did, and this time I hit a jackpot. The death ray missed the wizard, bounced on a wall, killed the wizard I aimed at, passed by me and killed the other wizard. Neat!

I bulldozed through the horde in the graveyard and wiped out lots of priests at a bottleneck. One of them cast a malignant aura spell. My BoH went to uncursed, becoming heavier and I got burdened. Pulled out a holy water and remedied it.

Fried the high priest of Moloch, grabbed the amulet, named it 'The Real One!' and drank a cursed potion of gain level to leave this crazy place.

The ascent to Dlvl 1 was uneventful. I got away pretty easily, having to go though Baalzebub´s and Asmodeus´ lairs only twice each. From Juiblex´ swamp, I kept levitating until I was above the Medusa level.

I had moved my important spellbooks to a pile at Dlvl 4. I re-read Charm Monster. Remove Curse looked to be the next in line to forget, so I tried that as well. I knew it well enough already. OK, should be good for what´s left.

I alternated rings quite a bit on the planes. Slow digestion or free action for whenever nothing else was needed. Levitation on air, fire and water. Conflict on air and fire. I found the portal early on the plane of water. I was hanging around it for a while so my power would regenerate. I switched out my speed boots for jumping boots, lit my lamp, cast Haste Self, and went through the portal.

Astral Plane
Temple in Famine´s direction apparently belonged to Huhetotl. Famine got distracted and killed in a mess caused by conflict, but he eventually found me inside the temple. I used jumping to maneuver around him, moved some priests and angels from the doorway with a teleport wand and made a beeline for the next temple. The central one, with Pestilence. FoD spells cost some major power now that I have the Amulet, so I used my two death wands instead. Reached this temple as well, but this one was Quetzalcoatl´s. Figures...

Pulled the same jumping stunt with Pestilence, got out of the temple and actually managed to lock the door. Yay! I have no idea if these denizens know how to unlock/destroy doors, but I didn´t bother to hang around to find out...

Kicked down the door to the final corridor. It was not too crowded in here, so with a combo of teleport wands and jumping, I could make my way in there without much trouble. Wheee!!!


Some stats:

Final Attributes:

You were the Envoy of Balance.
You were piously aligned.
You were fire resistant.
You were cold resistant.
You were sleep resistant.
You were disintegration-resistant.
You were shock resistant.
You were poison resistant.
You were magic-protected.
You saw invisible.
You were telepathic.
You had automatic searching.
You were stealthy.
You aggravated monsters. (<- Croesus á la Kraft...)
You caused conflict.
You could jump.
You could teleport.
You had teleport control.
You were protected.
You were very fast.
You had reflection.
You had free action.
You were wielding two weapons at once.
You were extremely lucky.
You had extra luck.
Good luck did not time out for you.
You survived.


Vanquished creatures:
(the most powerful ones)

Orcus
Juiblex
The Wizard of Yendor (6 times)
Pestilence (thrice)
Famine (twice)
a high priest
4 mastodons
Medusa
Croesus
2 iron golems
a ki-rin
5 storm giants
a titan
a glass golem
3 balrogs
The Minion of Huhetotl

Goodbye Laura the Demigoddess...

You went to your reward with 3107256 points,
Frost Brand (worth 3000 zorkmids and 7500 points)
The Orb of Detection (worth 2500 zorkmids and 6250 points)
3 amulets of life saving (worth 450 zorkmids),
1 amulet of ESP (worth 150 zorkmids),
1 amulet of reflection (worth 150 zorkmids),
and 0 pieces of gold, after 59854 moves.
You were level 30 with a maximum of 373 hit points when you ascended.



All in all, a fun adventure. Not as wacky as I sometimes feel like, but I also take pleasure in going slowly and being well prepared. I am especially proud that I managed to visit all three high altars, losing very few HPs doing so, and that I never allowed a Rider to get a move when it was next to me.

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

Big congrats, jiansonz! "One attempt, one ascension." I like it!

Teleport control and those cursed scrolls/potions seem awesome. I'll have to give them a shot

Could you expound a bit on your tactics for praying at high levels?

What was your scariest moment, and what was your happiest?

 

[jiansonz]

Re: OT: Nethack

Could you expound a bit on your tactics for praying at high levels?

It´s not so much 'at high levels' as it is 'I feel like it´s very unlikely I will need to pray in order to save myself for the next couple of thousand turns'. If my AC is good (it can be 0, it can be -20, depending on how tough the monsters that I meet are), I have enough food, decent weaponry, some way to deal with monsters from a distance, and some fleeing tools, etc. then I am generally good to go.

The main idea is to pray as often as possible, while having good or at least decent luck. I milk it for what it´s worth. There are nice gifts to be had, like a raise in maximum HP, spellbooks (which is usually a spell you don´t know - the game tries several times to randomize one that is new to you), blessing your wielded weapon, uncursing stuff in inventory (I drop things I want to keep cursed), etc.

I hang around near the altar and sacrifice everything I don´t absolutely need to eat (or want to eat, if it may give me useful intrinsics). As soon as it´s safe to pray (I get no 'hopeful feeling' message) I pray on the altar (praying on the altar carrries a luck bonus, extra so if it´s in a temple with a priest). If I have water potions, I drop them to bless them as well.

This process speeds up as soon as I have a way to summon monsters. Wand/scroll of create monster, bag of tricks, or the best (as it´s an unlimited source), the spell Create Monster. If I have an identified wand of monster summoning, I will often break the wand ((a)pply it) when it has one charge left. This sends in a dozen monsters.

What was your scariest moment, and what was your happiest?

Scariest: when I realized I had angered the Minetown guard. I was pretty sure at least the captain was too much for me to handle.
Fighting that leocrotta on the level below Minetown (when I fled down there because of the above incident) was also very scary. If I had missed that second round of attack, I would probably have been nearly dead.

Happiest: three moments I can´t decide between:
1. Seeing that Minetown priest of Camaxtli with telepathy, so I knew the altar would be of my alignment.
2. Getting intrinsic teleport control from eating a tengu (on my second try - what luck!).
3. Finding out that one of my spellbooks called 'Level 6' (that I had saved since like forever) was of polymorph, and that I had 0% fail with it.

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

That's interesting about praying. Does being crowned make this more tedious?

And I know what you mean about minetown guards! I myself accidentally angered them, and so I was going to lead them downstairs if possible. But get this! There was a trap door right in front of the stairs. So I stood on the stairs and let them approach, and every single stinkin' one of them fell through that trap door I was excited about that, and may use it in the future via a wand of digging.

I HATE LEOCROTTAS. For the level they start appearing, they are absolutely nasty. I've lost a couple characters to them.

 

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

Great job, jiansonz :thumbsup:.

I was playing last night and got quite upset at my recent death. I was doing very well(especially for my standards). I was at level 8 of the mines, had -4 AC, +2 Excaliber, the altar at minetown was of my alignment, I had 4 lamps waiting to be blessed, ect...Level 8 was a bones level. I found my old corpse and took out the monsters that had killed me. I found the exit and continued exploring, but out came some soldier ants. Fearing I was quite ready for them, I retreated to the next level. As usual, I went on a killing spree, killing all the gnomes in my path. Then I saw this 'gelatinous cube'. "Psh," I told myself. "What harm could this cube possibly be?" Well, it made it's way next to me and began freezing me. Before I knew it, my HP was at 6. So, I prayed and ran. Figuring it was probably a bit injured, I went back after killing everything else and took it on again. My HP dropped to 10. So, I went down to the next level. I saw a shocking sphere, kobold mummy, and 2 other monsters. Using my head, I retreated! A true first for me . I decided "Retreat to minetown, gather the items I left in the dungeons, then make my way back down." Now, remember those soldier ants I told you about? Yeah...1 failed prayer later, I was dead. This was truly my most disappointing death thus far.

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

That's a bummer Anything that can freeze you with a passive attack shouldn't be underestimated. You didn't mention what class you were, but almost all classes can throw daggers or use some sort of missile weapon. (Daggers are actually pretty overpowered in this game, too.)

Soldier ants are scary. Even a successful prayer might not help if they are swarming you; it will just delay the inevitable. They can have me reaching for my teleport scrolls/wand of digging...

 

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

That's a bummer Anything that can freeze you with a passive attack shouldn't be underestimated. You didn't mention what class you were, but almost all classes can throw daggers or use some sort of missile weapon. (Daggers are actually pretty overpowered in this game, too.)

Soldier ants are scary. Even a successful prayer might not help if they are swarming you; it will just delay the inevitable. They can have me reaching for my teleport scrolls/wand of digging...

Oh, I was a lawful Valkyrie. I didn't have any weapons on my to throw, though I probably could have found some. I didn't think of that. I would have gone for teleport or digging against the soldier ants, but I didn't know if I had any at that point! I had 2 ID scrolls, but I was waiting to bless them. I needed to get back up to the dungeon to find some fountains to dip my potions in to get holy water.

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

Oh, well valks start with daggers already at basic, and you can totally get an acceptable stack of them by just doing the top couple levels of the mines. When you get Expert in them, you throw like 3 during one round, so they are pretty strong, especially with a bit of an enchant. Also note they don't break like arrows.

The stylish option, of course, is to throw Mjollnir, which I've found to be quite fun: it does a lot of damage and comes right back to you (with a 1% chance of hitting you). However, you need 25 strength to do this (read: gauntlets of power). You are guaranteed to get Mjollnir as your first sacrifice gift.

 

[Nerigazh]

Re: OT: Nethack

:jig::jig: Ascension #2: Wishless Edition! :jig::jig:

WHEW. Now this was intense. Just like it had been bugging me that I'd killed so many priests, likewise for Wizards. Then finally this one got to level 10 or so, which most of mine had not. So I figured I'd probably have a chance.

Ironically, this wizard didn't even start with good gear. No magic marker, no cool wand, no good spell (I think it was Detect Food), no good wand. The rings were alright, though: +2 protection (used for the rest of the game) and +1 damage.

Comments:

1) High level wizards are damned strong (until you get the amulet, it turns out)... that's why I decided to go for the Wishless conduct.

2) I love Touch of Death! Runners up: Magic Missile, Dig, Fireball.

3) Fireball is really fun in graveyards/zoos

4) Wizard quest artifact is insanely overpowered.

5) From the point that I got the Eye up until Moloch's Sanctum, I'd say things were easier than they were for my priest.

6) Moloch's pad was crazy. A lot of stuff there is immune to death and magic resistant. Then something summoned my arch nemesis, Yeehongu! Big Y really liked to Summon Nasties. Needless to say, it took forever to get to the temple, and of course the door was on the 4th wall I checked. I was taking full advantage of Magicbane's fast Elbereth engraving. Finally I found the door and made it inside... WHAT! The high priest is already dead, and the amulet is gone! The place was still swarming with monsters; one of them had to have stolen it. A lucky hit against the ever-annoying Yeehongu proc'd a successful probe, which showed his inventory: flail, junk... Amulet of Yendor. Okay, fight my way back to the upstairs, plant myself on them, kill Yeehongu. Whew!

7) The mystical force wasn't quite as annoying this time, but still stunk. The wizard was less of a problem, due to my death spell.

8) I hate the Amulet. Stupid increased power cost!

9) No wishing meant I was severely lacking in a couple of things that would have really helped for the ascension. My armor wasn't fully enchanted, and I could definitely have used some wands (especially of teleportation). Most of all, I'd only found two Scrolls of Gold Detection. This turned out to really hurt...

10) Wand of Digging made PoEarth easy.

11) Wand of Air wasn't TOO bad, but something destroyed my other gold detection scroll. Finding the portal using just the Amulet takes forever.

12) The Plane of Fire. Oh, the Plane of Fire. This had me sooo frustrated. I was talking to a friend at the time, and he could tell I was getting really angry. I actually almost died. Why?

13) Archons. I HATE ARCHONS. I HATE ARCHONS. I ended up having to deal with SIX archons on that stupid plane. And of course they have reflection, which means I have to use my piddly dagger. This is a huge drawback for wizards: Mêlée attacks are weak. Of course the summoning storms started, and all hell broke loose. The wizard came, stole the amulet, I couldn't find the portal, SO MANY MONSTERS, I kept getting stunned and blinded (I didn't have telepathy for some reason, btw. No idea why). Finally my salvation: "you kill the cockatrice." Oh yeah!! Cockatrices!! I've never wielded a dead one before, but it was time to start. Oh boy are they awesome! I eventually cleared out the archons and quite a few other things along the way. "The Green Dragon picks up the Amulet of Yendor." Oh, that's useful too. Find him, kill him, take it back. Of course, the corpse I was wielding rotted, and two more Archons spawned before I found the portal. I developed a tactic though: put on a towel so that I wouldn't get stunned, put on my quest artifact so that I'd have ESP and could keep track of the Archon. Then plink away with my dagger and hope for the best.

14) Astral Plane. Also very tough! I hate priests; for some reason, their melee attacks do a lot of damage considering their crappy mace. And I had no wands of teleport or jumping boots (and the spell had become forgotten by this point; I have no idea how many turns I spent in Fire but it was a lot). Angels are hard also. A couple of tactics I was proud of:

a) Close and lock the door in the first temple (which of course wasn't mine). I could now rest to full health and power before making the baleful journey to another altar.

b) Use the insects. As you know, the priests have a Summon Insects spell which brings out a big group of ants. I used this to my full advantage, finding strategic areas where I would be surrounded by all ants (which couldn't really damage me) except for one spot. I let the tough monsters fill that spot one by one, whittling them down with Magicbane, very occasionally using a magic missile when I could afford it. (I had to save my death spells for Famine and Pestilence.)

15) Overall difficulty summary: hard->medium->easy->easy->ridiculous


Anyway, here are some highlights of my gear, for style points:

Amulets
  m - an uncursed amulet of reflection (being worn)   <-- originally cursed, from a bones file
  s - an uncursed amulet of life saving   <-- from Vlad
  v - the blessed Eye of the Aethiopica
  Y - an uncursed amulet of life saving   <-- from a corpse in Astral Plane!
  Weapons
  i - the +2 Grimtooth   <-- from bones file, never used it once
  p - the blessed rustproof +6 Magicbane (weapon in hand)
  L - 7 blessed +6 daggers
  Armor
  b - an uncursed +3 cornuthaum (being worn)   <-- from Astral Plane! Till then I used a +1 Helmet of Brilliance
  c - an uncursed +0 oilskin cloak  
  h - a blessed +5 pair of speed boots (being worn)   <-- lucky find in midgame
  t - an uncursed +0 mummy wrapping
  A - a blessed +4 robe named DCGEB (being worn)   <-- killed me a priest around dlvl 20
  P - an uncursed thoroughly burnt +0 pair of leather gloves (being worn)  <-- uber gloves, no?
  V - a blessed +2 Hawaiian shirt (being worn)  <-- another lucky find
  X - a blessed +4 black dragon scale mail (being worn)  <-- total style points

Voluntary challenges
  You genocided 11 types of monsters
  You polymorphed 41 items
  You never changed form
  You used no wishes

UJordanu the Sorcerer     St:18/11 Dx:18 Co:18 In:18 Wi:18 Ch:19  Neutral
Astral Plane $:3029 HP:142(237) Pw:67(205) AC:-31 Xp:18/1409450 T:39150

Other stats and gear:

Spoiler

Your inventory
Amulets
m - an uncursed amulet of reflection (being worn)
s - an uncursed amulet of life saving
v - the blessed Eye of the Aethiopica
Y - an uncursed amulet of life saving
Weapons
i - the +2 Grimtooth
p - the blessed rustproof +6 Magicbane (weapon in hand)
L - 7 blessed +6 daggers
Armor
b - an uncursed +3 cornuthaum (being worn)
c - an uncursed +0 oilskin cloak
h - a blessed +5 pair of speed boots (being worn)
t - an uncursed +0 mummy wrapping
A - a blessed +4 robe named DCGEB (being worn)
P - an uncursed thoroughly burnt +0 pair of leather gloves (being worn)
V - a blessed +2 Hawaiian shirt (being worn)
X - a blessed +4 black dragon scale mail (being worn)
Comestibles
a - 4 uncursed K-rations
d - an uncursed lembas wafer
f - an uncursed lizard corpse
F - an uncursed carrot
Potions
q - an uncursed potion of extra healing
w - an uncursed potion of full healing
U - a cursed potion of extra healing
Rings
e - an uncursed +2 ring of protection (on left hand)
l - an uncursed ring of slow digestion (on right hand)
D - an uncursed ring of levitation
Q - an uncursed ring of fire resistance
Wands
g - a wand of digging (0:2)
k - a wand of digging (0:4)
n - a cursed wand of death (0:0)
B - a wand of secret door detection (0:7)
G - a wand of enlightenment (0:11)
H - a wand of digging (0:4)
I - a wand of death (0:0)
M - a wand of lightning (0:3)
N - a wand of digging (0:4)
O - a wand of digging (0:4)
R - a wand of wishing (0:3)
Tools
j - a blessed greased bag of holding
o - a tinning kit (0:87)
r - the uncursed Candelabrum of Invocation (7 candles attached)
u - a blessed +0 unicorn horn
x - an uncursed skeleton key
y - the Bell of Opening (0:2)
C - an uncursed towel
W - an uncursed magic lamp
Gems
z - a blessed luckstone

Contents of the bag of holding:
an uncursed K-ration
4 blessed scrolls of blank paper
an uncursed scroll of taming
a cursed scroll of remove curse
3 uncursed scrolls of create monster
2 cursed scrolls of light
a cursed scroll of teleportation
a cursed scroll of identify
2 uncursed scrolls of teleportation
an uncursed scroll of light
an uncursed scroll of teleportation
an uncursed scroll of light
a cursed scroll of blank paper
2 uncursed scrolls of magic mapping
a blessed scroll of fire
a cursed scroll of light
2 uncursed scrolls of identify
an uncursed scroll of blank paper
a blessed scroll of blank paper
an uncursed spellbook of extra healing
an uncursed spellbook of sleep
an uncursed spellbook of detect treasure
an uncursed spellbook of blank paper
an uncursed potion of confusion
an uncursed potion of gain energy
an uncursed potion of speed
a cursed potion of oil
a cursed potion of gain level
an uncursed potion of sleeping
a cursed potion of hallucination
2 uncursed potions of object detection
3 potions of unholy water
a blessed potion of polymorph
an uncursed ring of cold resistance
a wand of create monster (0:15)
a wand of create monster (0:8)
a magic marker (1:8)
a cursed +0 unicorn horn
a +0 unicorn horn
an uncursed dilithium crystal
3 uncursed obsidian stones
an uncursed agate stone
a cursed topaz stone
2 uncursed rubies
3 uncursed diamonds
an uncursed jade stone
2 uncursed emeralds

Final attributes
You were piously aligned
Your alignment was 205
You were fire resistant
You were cold resistant
You were sleep resistant
You were disintegration-resistant
You were shock resistant
You were poison resistant
You were magic-protected
You saw invisible
You were warned
You were clairvoyant
You were invisible to others
You had teleport control
You had slower digestion
You were protected
You were very fast
You had reflection
You were very lucky (9)
You had extra luck
Good luck did not time out for you
You survived

Spells known in the end
Name Level Category Fail
a - force bolt 1* attack 0%
b - sleep 1* enchantment 0%
c - identify 3 divination 0%
d - detect food 2* divination 0%
e - create monster 2* clerical 0%
f - jumping 1* escape 0%
g - protection 1 clerical 0%
h - extra healing 3 healing 0%
i - detect monsters 1* divination 0%
j - haste self 3* escape 0%
k - drain life 2* attack 0%
l - magic missile 2 attack 0%
m - magic mapping 5 divination 0%
n - charm monster 3 enchantment 0%
o - detect unseen 3 divination 0%
p - dig 5 matter 0%
q - fireball 4 attack 0%
r - detect treasure 4 divination 0%
s - cancellation 7 matter 55%
t - finger of death 7 attack 0%

 

[jiansonz]

Re: OT: Nethack

Wow, that was a crazy ascension!

I love wishes too much to try wishless conduct. Genocide-less appeals more to me.


Yeah, style points for the black dragon scale mail indeed. Other than for the AC, useless as well (I assume you ate the corpse of the dragon the scales came from).

Unless you have a crystal ball, 4 scrolls of dold detection is highly recommended for the elemental planes. In your situation, I would probably have written the remaining two. They are cheap - only 4-7 magic marker charges each.

Interesting that you kept Magicbane as main weapon. I usually go with something bigger (although I have only ever lived long enough to choose with two wizards so far...).