OT: Nethack

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

A quick question for those more experienced:
Does eating a unicorn corpse result in negative effects? I killed two of them and was scared to eat their corpse

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

Don't eat aligned ones (though I don't actually remember if it does anything bad - it might be fine). Unaligned ones are perfectly healthy and IIRC can convey PR.

Never sacrifice a coaligned unicorn.

-CG

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

-[B]SPF Leaderboard[/B]-
Forum Name           Char Name      Role    Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      ----    --------   -----
Smips                 Smips       Barbarian     3      5484
Vildecor              Ilana       Valkyrie      1         0

[b]Competition #1 - Role(Barbarian), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Any)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
NacRuno              Qual              2        7679
CG                   Larzuk            2        6770
Smips		      Smips	        3	 5484

Competition #2 - Role(Priest), Race(Elf), Align(Chaotic), Gender(Any)
End Date for Creation of New Chars: 3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   ?                 1           0
OHG                  Joe               1           0

[b]Competition #3 - Role(Rogue), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Female)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   Kashya            1        2889

I am playing like a ****ing idiot tonight.

-CG

edit: Still playing like a ****ing idiot.

 

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

-[B]SPF Leaderboard[/B]-
Forum Name           Char Name      Role    Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      ----    --------   -----
Smips                 Smips       Barbarian     3      5484
Vildecor              Ilana       Valkyrie      1         0

[b]Competition #1 - Role(Barbarian), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Any)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
NacRuno              Qual              2        7679
CG                   Larzuk            2        6770
Smips		      Smips	        4	 41037

Competition #2 - Role(Priest), Race(Elf), Align(Chaotic), Gender(Any)
End Date for Creation of New Chars: 3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   ?                 1           0
OHG                  Joe               1           0

[b]Competition #3 - Role(Rogue), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Female)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   Kashya            1        2889

Ahh...A damn good run I just had. Got to the bottom of the mines and competed the Sokoban. Level 11 of the dungeon was one of those big rooms. I should have stayed closer to the stairs so I could retreat, but I didn't =/. I learned a ton this time through though!

I am playing like a ****ing idiot tonight.

-CG

edit: Still playing like a ****ing idiot.

Happens to all of us, no?

 

[Ohomemgrande1]

Re: OT: Nethack

and I idiotically decided to eat a cockatrice corpse. :doh:

Classic stupid death! (YASD is the recognized Yet Another Stupid Death of course and very common in the world of Nethack.)

I took a step in to the room and attacked the dark blue thing next to me (my monitor does not display dark blue particularly legibly, especially for round letters). As it turns out, it was a floating eye, so I stood perfectly still while a hobgoblin walked up to me and took a very long, miss-filled time whittling away at my health. DYWYPI?

Another classic. Too bad it wasn't a newt though. Last night I encountered a floating eye, painstakingly tried to kill it with my only dagger while my paralyzed kitten waited for me to get it close to death. Suddenly, my kitten woke up, killed it and ate it before I had a chance to do anything

Never sacrifice a coaligned unicorn.

Sometimes there are reasons to do this, but only if you know what you're doing and NEVER before you do your class quest.

As for myself, I made two attempts last night. On the first try, my kitten wandered under a falling rock trap 6 turns into the game. Apparently, one of his kin decided to take it out on me as I was killed by an angry kitten on level 3.

Attempt 2 went slightly better. I found a scroll shop on level 4 and was able to identify most of the "exciting" scrolls. I also purchased a teleport scroll (which a kobold had kindly identified a bit earlier). Then I got chased down by something and died in the shop while holding on to that precious teleport scroll.


Out of curiosity, are people using the tiles or ASCII? Personally, I use ASCII. There's nothing like the fear you feel when you see a yellow c or a purple & chasing you down.

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

I'm ASCII all the way, but I'm a purist. I also started playing the game when, not only were tiles not an option, but there wasn't even color (D just meant "dragon") so I still consider the current ascii-with-color to be pretty fancy in the nethack world.

The game's meant to be played in ASCII, IMO - the graphics look a lot better to me when they are admitting they are not at all focused on looking good (ASCII) rather than when they try but fail to look good (tiles).


As an update, after my first two extremely stupid 100%-my-fault 100%-avoidable barb deaths, I managed to force myself to slow down and actually pay attention to what's in front of me (and my health) before I take a swing at it, so my 3rd barb's still going. However, forcing myself to slow down with regards to combat didn't stop me from still playing like a ****ing idiot - sometime in the first half hour of the game, while standing on an altar, I put on an unidentified orcish helm. Naturally, it was cursed (and -1). So, after spending the last several pages of this thread talking about how it's a bad idea to touch fountains at low levels, I found myself dipping the cursed thing into whatever I could find. As it turns out, whatever I could find was limited to exactly one fountain in the thusfar-explored dungeons, which (immediately before drying up) decided to spit out a (hostile) water demon, which decided to immediately summon a buddy (fortunately, another water demon). I managed to take them both down thanks to a handy prayer in the middle and a good bit of luck, but didn't get rid of the helm. No more fountains in the dungeons, so I fought my way in to mine town. First fountain did a lot of nothing besides rusting my helm and stealing my gold, until it decided to spit out a (hostile) water demon, who immediately decided to summon a buddy (fortunately, another water demon). Again, survived (though not by much). After some more snakes and stuff, I finally got rid of the ****ing helm, and the barb is now parked in mine town (clvl 9), and will go hit up sokoban after work.

I'm still very proud of myself for managing to force myself to fight *four* demons (in pairs) before dlvl 6, all because I neglected to type "DX," before trying on armor - once.

-CG

 

[NacRuno]

Re: OT: Nethack

Quick question, how does identification work exactly? I just use my pet to identify cursed armor, weapon but i never got to use my wands & scrolls.

 

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

Quick question, how does identification work exactly? I just use my pet to identify cursed armor, weapon but i never got to use my wands & scrolls.

You can either use the item and sometimes that will ID it(though it shouldn't be done this way) or you can use identification scrolls. Go to a shop and pick up all the scrolls. If any are really cheap(around 30-40z), then it's probably an ID scroll. You can also drop items on an altar to id their BUC status. An amber flash is blessed, no flash is uncursed, black flash is cursed.

Edit: Oh, I think you can engrave with wands to ID them as well.

@OHG: I play with the tiles. I played a while back with the ASCII graphics, but I think it just makes the learning curve worse =/.

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

As already noted, pet identification or altars to determine B/U/C status. Wearing an armor will tell you it's enchantment level.

Pretty much everything can be id'd by price in a store (or at least narrowed down) - look up a spoiler that tells you the base price and look up the modifier based on your CHA.

Wands can be identified by engraving with them - after you engrave, in most cases you'll get a message that's a good hint to what the wand will do. There's also spoilers that list the exact messages you get for each wand if you'd like to refer to them. For the record, if it is a wand of wishing, you'll still get the wish if you engrave with it, so don't worry.

Other than b/u/c status, you can't really easily identify weapons - you're pretty much stuck with shop-id to figure out their enchantment.


My personal way of doing things is:
-pet check/altar check armor for any slot I don't already have something really good for
-stick with whatever (non-cursed) weapon looks best at the time
-engrave-ID wands pretty much immediately upon receiving them
-put on (non-cursed) rings/ammys just to see if they have some kind of immediate, obvious effect
-figure out which scroll is ID from a store (as previously mentioned, ID scrolls have a base value of 20, whereas the next lowest one has a base value of 50, so it is extremely easy to determine which scroll is ID)
-stash everything else that's unidentified
-convert an altar sometime after mines and sokoban
-make a large stack of holy water
-bless any ID scrolls I've managed to come up with
-hold as many different unid items as possible and read the blessed ID scrolls hoping for a full-inventory identify.

It keeps me without the benefits of any magic items besides wands until the midgame, but it's consistent and safe and generally guarantees I'll have a good stock of stuff at my disposal (and highly enchanted gear, particularly if I've found a magic marker) before starting the quest.

-CG

 

[NacRuno]

Re: OT: Nethack

Thanks for the answers. I tried 5 more times but couldn't surpass my previous score. I couldn't even reach the minetown. 4 out of 5 of my deaths were due to hunger. I just eat any corpse i find without carrying it, but i still can't get enough nutrition.

 

[smips]

Re: OT: Nethack

Thanks for the answers. I tried 5 more times but couldn't surpass my previous score. I couldn't even reach the minetown. 4 out of 5 of my deaths were due to hunger. I just eat any corpse i find without carrying it, but i still can't get enough nutrition.

When do you eat your food rations? Usually I'll eat any corpses I find to keep out of hunger(unless my pets need it) and then if I don't find anything by the time I'm 'weak,' I'll eat a ration(or other type of food in my inventory). Also, keep in mind if you're starving to death(weak or fainting), you can use #pray and your God will fill your stomach, provided you haven't made him angry. Use this sparingly though, or you'll anger him. This will also cure food poisoning.

Just keep at it though, eventually you'll get the hang of it(like I did last night ).

Edit: Another thought. When I started playing, I would die of starvation because I would use search too much. Now if I think there's a secret passage or hidden door, I search about 12 times before giving up(unless I can't find an exit).

 

[NacRuno]

Re: OT: Nethack

That think about searching might be my problem. I got an habit of pressing s almost after each step . When i am looking for a secret door i usually press n 30 s, i should definately reconsider that.

I also use my food ratios only when i am weak, and go on with corpses otherwise. And dinding altars to pray is a very rare occasion for me, but i will keep that in mind.

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

First of all, n5s (x2-3) is generally sufficient to search for secret doors, and wastes less turns (using n, you don't stop searching when you find something, which is why I n5s a couple times rather than just n10s). The only time I'd ever go above the 10-15 searches is if I absolutely know there's a secret door where I'm looking (or at least somewhere nearby). After you get a feel for the maps, it becomes pretty obvious when there's probably something hidden. It's also rarely worth searching in corridors (that aren't dead ends). Also, in case anyone didn't know, there's no "hidden treasure" or anything to be found by searching (with the indirect exception of the vaults, which you don't want to get near without a pickaxe anyways), so for the most part, you're not really going to find anything except alternate ways to get where you already were (again, barring dead ends).

Second, regarding food: this is probably the #1 problem most people have with the early game. Here's the secret: prayer. I consider it safe to pray every 1000 turns (this seems to give me about a 98-99% success rate). In my experience, you need 0-2 corpses in addition to prayer-food to live pretty much indefinitely (meaning, sometime around turn #800, eat a lichen or a jackal; pray whenever you start fainting after turn 1k; eat a corpse somewhere between 1500 and 2k; pray whenever you start fainting after turn 2k). Even if you start with no food and have bad corpse luck, you basically aren't going to die of starvation. By turn 2kish, you should be pretty much self-sustaining and/or have some lichens/rations in reserve.

While I'm at it, lichen corpses never rot - consider them (heavier, less nourishing) food rations and save them for when you need them, don't just eat them right away.

By the way, once you get the hang of prayer-for-nourishment and realize how little you actually need in the early game to keep from starving, don't be too greedy - your pet also needs food and can't pray for it.

Also, if you're an out-of-game-notes person, write down when you last prayed. If you're not an out-of-game-notes person, name one of your items "p1234" or something, where 1234 is the turn number on which you last prayed. Then it's really easy to check if it's (probably) safe to pray.

I'm using approximates for the prayer timeout because it's random and highly varied - if you're otherwise going to die (from starvation or otherwise) and have no tricks up your sleeve, pray regardless of when the last time you prayed was.

-CG

edit: just read something above more clearly. You do not need to be at an altar to pray. You need to be at an altar to sacrifice, and to get certain results from prayer (such as holy water), but you can get fed by prayer anywhere. Don't pray when standing on someone else's altar, though (and yes, just like sacrificing coaligned unicorns, there are exceptions, but if you're reading my advice you're not far enough to be able to take advantage of those exceptions.)

edit2: Personally, I will pray for food (assuming I've waited 1k turns) instead of eating food rations/etc that I have in reserve just so I can pray again sooner and hold back the food as reserves. If you're used to relying on prayer to save yourself from low hp or other assorted nasties, you might not want to use this tactic. I also stop praying for food before entering the mines or really proceeding past about dlvl 4, because food is generally plentiful by this point and there's the potential for things like soldier ants to pop up and cause problems. In the early game, though, the only real danger (at least to me) is hunger, so that's what the prayers are spent on.

 

[jdkerr]

Re: OT: Nethack

Alrighty, my first practice character just died. I was playing a monk and died in Dlvl8, where I accidentally attacked a unicorn instead of the other similar-looking baddie that was next to it (after being reduced in HP by a lich lord). People were doing this, so:

You were piously aligned.
You were sleep resistant.
You were poison resistant.
You saw invisible.
You were warned.
You were stealthy.
You were protected.
You were fast.
You are dead.
----------
You were vegetarian.
You never hit with a wielded weapon.
You never genocided any monsters.
You never polymorphed an object.
You never changed form.
You used no wishes.

I have no clue what that means. 81 creatures vanquished, level 7, 4231 points.

My dog left my in the first Dlvl. Is that normal?

 

[Hp_Sauce]

Re: OT: Nethack

-[B]SPF Leaderboard[/B]-
Forum Name           Char Name      Role    Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      ----    --------   -----
Smips                 Smips       Barbarian     3      5484
Vildecor              Ilana       Valkyrie      1         0

[b]Competition #1 - Role(Barbarian), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Any)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
NacRuno              Qual              2        7679
CG                   Larzuk            2        6770
Smips		     Smips	       4       41037
Hp_Sauce	     Hp_Sauce	       4	5956

Competition #2 - Role(Priest), Race(Elf), Align(Chaotic), Gender(Any)
End Date for Creation of New Chars: 3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   ?                 1           0
OHG                  Joe               1           0

[b]Competition #3 - Role(Rogue), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Female)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   Kashya            1        2889

I died of starvation. I prayed, but I guess I wasn't hungry enough at the time for my god to help me? It said my "god is well-pleased"... but alas, no food!

I'm not sure about the whole pet thing... it seems like he disappears a lot and I have to go back and find him, and then waste a whole bunch of turns coaxing him to come with me through the hall way/door/whatever.

Anyway, off to try again!

-hps

Edit: Added my 3rd attempt to the table (higher score).
Edit2: I didn't know you could throw food to your pets... Thanks Ohom!

 

[Ohomemgrande1]

Re: OT: Nethack

I have no clue what that means. 81 creatures vanquished, level 7, 4231 points.

My dog left my in the first Dlvl. Is that normal?

You killed 81 creatures before you died. Pets must be next to you when you go down the stairs for them to follow.

I died of starvation. I prayed, but I guess I wasn't hungry enough at the time for my god to help me? It said my "god is well-pleased"... but alas, no food!

I'm not sure about the whole pet thing... it seems like he disappears a lot and I have to go back and find him, and then waste a whole bunch of turns coaxing him to come with me through the hall way/door/whatever.

Anyway, off to try again!

-hps

To get fed when praying, it's best to wait until you are weak.

Pets can be finicky. If you feed them often (i.e. pick up corpse and throw them to your pet or buy some tripe and feed that to them), they tend to stick around a bit more. Alternatively, you can find a magic whistle which will teleport your pet to you.

edit: The current incarnation of Joe (#3) found a throne room on level 5, pretended to be king for a day, and was granted a wish!

 

[jdkerr]

Re: OT: Nethack

@Ohomemgrande,

Oh, I know what "enemies vanquished" means. I intended to suggest that I cannot yet draw a lot of significance out of what I put in the quote box like others here seem to be able to do.

Did my stats seem about right to everyone? I wasn't headed down too quickly or slowly?

Also, there were a lot of times I was in a dead-end corridor but could not find an outlet no matter how much I searched. Is that common?

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

@jdkerr: You might have been a little further down in the dungeon than you should be for your level, but you might not. There's (for me) a bit of a gray area between clvl 7 and 9 - sometimes I want to be clvl 8-9 before getting past dlvl 7, sometimes I'm at dlvl 12ish at clvl 7. Up until level 7 I like to be two clvls above my dlvl (as much as possible).

Dead ends are common.

Ignore the "conducts" screen when you die until you're much better at the game than you are now. It's extra "challenges" because regular ascension isn't hard enough.

-CG

 

[NacRuno]

Re: OT: Nethack

-[B]SPF Leaderboard[/B]-
Forum Name           Char Name      Role    Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      ----    --------   -----
Smips                 Smips       Barbarian     3       5484
Vildecor              Ilana       Valkyrie      1          0

[b]Competition #1 - Role(Barbarian), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Any)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
Smips		     Smips	       4        41037
NacRuno              Qual              9        8015
CG                   Larzuk            2        6770
Hp_Sauce	     Hp_Sauce	       4	 5956

Competition #2 - Role(Priest), Race(Elf), Align(Chaotic), Gender(Any)
End Date for Creation of New Chars: 3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   ?                 1           0
OHG                  Joe               1           0

[b]Competition #3 - Role(Rogue), Race(Any), Align(Any), Gender(Female)[/b]
End Date for Creation of New Chars: [b]3/31/09, 11:59 PM local time[/b]

Forum Name           Char Name      Attempts   Score
----------           ---------      --------   -----
CG                   Kashya            1        2889

You do not need to be at an altar to pray.

Thanks CG for the tip, that will save lots of lives for sure , don't know why i thought otherwise.

I finally reached minetown with another char and even found the corpse of my previous one. But then got killedby a unicorn two levels below =(

A Question, do you proceed downward after minetown or do you climp up to go down again in the dungeon first?

Also my pet seems to get lost whenever there is a boulder trap around in the mine caverns. Is a single boulder trap enough to kill the pet?

 

[Colorless Green]

Re: OT: Nethack

Also my pet seems to get lost whenever there is a boulder trap around in the mine caverns. Is a single boulder trap enough to kill the pet?

Boulder traps can hurt quite a bit (I can't tell you off the top of my head if it's enough to OHKO a fully levelled pet, but it will definitely OHKO weaker ones). If you can find the boulder in question and move it even one square, it will disable the trap.

A Question, do you proceed downward after minetown or do you climp up to go down again in the dungeon first?

This is a question about which there is much debate and no objective answer - it's along the lines of max block vs max vita. My personal opinion on the early game which serves me well is:

-Main dungeon until clvl 5-8 (depending on how strong I'm feeling and whether I'm playing something where the mines will be mostly peaceful and whether I have poison resistance (poison weapons, which mine denizens like, can instakill, as can poisoned spikes in pit traps))
-Mines to minetown
-Back to main dungeon until sokoban
-Sokoban
-80-90% of the time: back to mines until mines end; 10-20% of the time: stay in main dungeon until I feel like risking all the polytraps and other scary things in the bottom half of the mines.
-(if I haven't already), find an altar that doesn't have a non-coaligned priest next to it, convert it, make a lot of holy water.

Your mileage may vary, but I follow that pattern pretty much always and it works out well for me. After there, there's a lot more variation depending on what I've found (levitation for example), whether I feel cocky enough to take on the quest, etc.


Update: Barb #3 finished both mine's end and sokoban ("oR, yay) last night. I'm currently sitting in a temple on dlvl 22 trying to decide whether to try out the quest (with no magic resistance and relatively crappy equipment) or whether to dig past medusa and try the castle (with no levitation, no magic resistance and relatively crappy equipment). It's been essentially smooth sailing thusfar, but I've found far less than my usual quota of gear by this point in the game - I'm almost exclusively wearing +0-1 generic equipment - the only exceptions are a rusty +4 orcish helm (thanks, throne room), and a +0 cloak of invisibility (thanks, random drop). I pulled a cleaver from an altar, which is currently enchanted all the way up to +2 - both of the enchant weapon scrolls I've found so far (even though blessed) just gave +1. No enchant armors or anything. TBH I can't think of any other time when I've gotten this far in the dungeon without basically any endgame gear (unenchanted weapon aside). I'm gonna have some difficult decisions to make when I grab the wand out of the castle.

-CG