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Finally Beat The Game!!!
Hi All,
After playing vanilla Angband on and off for 17 years, I'm pleased to share that I've finally managed to beat the game!
Previously I would play extremely conservatively, only descending when I was comfortable that I could easily clear the current dungeon level. With that strategy, my previous best character reached clvl 37 / dlvl 52 before dying a gruesome death.
I read some forum posts on diving quickly, and this inspired me to create a Dwarven Warrior who would descend the depths extremely rapidly and live in constant fear that every step could be his last. My strategy would be to first obtain rFire, rCold, rAcid, rElec, rPois, FrAct and Invis by playing conservatively at shallow depths, and then dive straight down to dlvl 98 to look for great gear lying around on the floor.
I managed to get all of these initial resists without any issue, but I did not dive immediately due to an unfortunate encounter with a Nexus Vortex. It swapped my STR and CHR stats, reducing my STR by ~10 points and crippling my damage output. I did not feel it was fair to have my character start his big dive in that state, so I spent a lot of time around dlvl 40 looking for stat potions to restore his STR. I ended up almost maxing all stats in the process, effectively performing the traditional stat gain phase.
Before diving, I had my first fortunate find - an Iron Crown of Lordliness, granting telepathy. This would prove to be invaluable in detecting and avoiding danger, and I would continue to use this headpiece until finding my first Ring of Power on dlvl 99 (after killing Sauron).
After my warrior's stats were close to maxxed, I set off on the relatively quick road from dlvl 40 to dlvl 98. Another extremely fortunate find was the light crossbow "Cubragol" on dlvl 52. The permanent +10 speed granted was invaluable in killing monsters which would have been otherwise impossible, and I continued to keep this artifact equipped all the way up to the final battle with Morgoth.
The dive was nerve-wracking - I would descend as fast as possible, and run for my life at the first sniff of danger. This often led to me going up and down stairs many times in quick succession, and using a lot of teleportation staves and scrolls. If I detected any interesting, unguarded loot on my way to the stairs I would make a detour to pick it up, and I would also cherry-pick easy kills which would grant a lot of EXP - Mûmaks were a personal favourite for this purpose.
As I was diving quickly, I started lacking some key resistances traditionally recommended for certain depths. I didn't have pConf until dlvl 59, and I didn't find a non-swappable form of HLife until dlvl 99. However, I dealt with this by making ample use of potions of Cure Critical Wounds and Restore Life Levels.
Eventually I reached dlvl 98, and I began the process of looking for great gear. I had obtained several wands of Teleport Other by this stage, and I found that with some careful planning I could raid vaults full of monsters that could easily kill me. Any monster I couldn't handle could just be teleported to another part of the level, uniques included! It was by sneakily raiding vaults and finding equipment otherwise lying on the floor that I slowly filled out all of my high resists, and obtained enough speed and damage to start fighting the monsters toe-to-toe.
I ended up spending quite a long time on dlvl 98 (and after killing Sauron, dlvl 99), preparing for the final battle. I had read up on what a fearsome foe Morgoth was, so I wanted to spend time ensuring I had enough equipment and consumables to take him on. I also decided to kill all of the other uniques in the game, to prevent him from summoning them during the fight.
I found enough gear to become quite formidable (had almost every resist, 500+ melee damage per round, 1000+ HP, 32+ permanent speed even when 180lb overweight encumbered), and I'll admit that I made use of the pillar dancing trick help kill many uniques. Eventually, I had killed every single unique in the game except for Morgoth and Qlzqqlzuup, the Emperor Quylthulg (in my opinion the hardest monster to kill in the game, due to constantly summoning monsters to shield itself). By this point I could comfortably and consistently clear the entire level on dlvl 99, including whole pits/graveyards and vaults.
It was then that I finally felt ready to face Morgoth. I descended to dlvl 100, used a few charges of *Destruction* to sculpt the battleground, dropped my staves and waited. I didn't have to wait long - Morgoth appeared in short order, tunneling through walls at a frightful pace to make a beeline for my character.
However, after all of my preparation, the final fight was quite anti-climatic. I had stockpiled enough potions of *Healing* to quaff one every time my HP dropped below 700, and enough scrolls of Mass Banishment to read one every time Morgoth summoned anything I couldn't tank. In the end he fell quite easily to my 834.2 melee damage per round vs evil, and the game was won.
I look forward to trying to finish my next game as a spellcasting class, and perhaps without using the pillar dancing trick (I'm starting to feel this trick is extremely cheap).
Character dump here: http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=19471
After playing vanilla Angband on and off for 17 years, I'm pleased to share that I've finally managed to beat the game!
Previously I would play extremely conservatively, only descending when I was comfortable that I could easily clear the current dungeon level. With that strategy, my previous best character reached clvl 37 / dlvl 52 before dying a gruesome death.
I read some forum posts on diving quickly, and this inspired me to create a Dwarven Warrior who would descend the depths extremely rapidly and live in constant fear that every step could be his last. My strategy would be to first obtain rFire, rCold, rAcid, rElec, rPois, FrAct and Invis by playing conservatively at shallow depths, and then dive straight down to dlvl 98 to look for great gear lying around on the floor.
I managed to get all of these initial resists without any issue, but I did not dive immediately due to an unfortunate encounter with a Nexus Vortex. It swapped my STR and CHR stats, reducing my STR by ~10 points and crippling my damage output. I did not feel it was fair to have my character start his big dive in that state, so I spent a lot of time around dlvl 40 looking for stat potions to restore his STR. I ended up almost maxing all stats in the process, effectively performing the traditional stat gain phase.
Before diving, I had my first fortunate find - an Iron Crown of Lordliness, granting telepathy. This would prove to be invaluable in detecting and avoiding danger, and I would continue to use this headpiece until finding my first Ring of Power on dlvl 99 (after killing Sauron).
After my warrior's stats were close to maxxed, I set off on the relatively quick road from dlvl 40 to dlvl 98. Another extremely fortunate find was the light crossbow "Cubragol" on dlvl 52. The permanent +10 speed granted was invaluable in killing monsters which would have been otherwise impossible, and I continued to keep this artifact equipped all the way up to the final battle with Morgoth.
The dive was nerve-wracking - I would descend as fast as possible, and run for my life at the first sniff of danger. This often led to me going up and down stairs many times in quick succession, and using a lot of teleportation staves and scrolls. If I detected any interesting, unguarded loot on my way to the stairs I would make a detour to pick it up, and I would also cherry-pick easy kills which would grant a lot of EXP - Mûmaks were a personal favourite for this purpose.
As I was diving quickly, I started lacking some key resistances traditionally recommended for certain depths. I didn't have pConf until dlvl 59, and I didn't find a non-swappable form of HLife until dlvl 99. However, I dealt with this by making ample use of potions of Cure Critical Wounds and Restore Life Levels.
Eventually I reached dlvl 98, and I began the process of looking for great gear. I had obtained several wands of Teleport Other by this stage, and I found that with some careful planning I could raid vaults full of monsters that could easily kill me. Any monster I couldn't handle could just be teleported to another part of the level, uniques included! It was by sneakily raiding vaults and finding equipment otherwise lying on the floor that I slowly filled out all of my high resists, and obtained enough speed and damage to start fighting the monsters toe-to-toe.
I ended up spending quite a long time on dlvl 98 (and after killing Sauron, dlvl 99), preparing for the final battle. I had read up on what a fearsome foe Morgoth was, so I wanted to spend time ensuring I had enough equipment and consumables to take him on. I also decided to kill all of the other uniques in the game, to prevent him from summoning them during the fight.
I found enough gear to become quite formidable (had almost every resist, 500+ melee damage per round, 1000+ HP, 32+ permanent speed even when 180lb overweight encumbered), and I'll admit that I made use of the pillar dancing trick help kill many uniques. Eventually, I had killed every single unique in the game except for Morgoth and Qlzqqlzuup, the Emperor Quylthulg (in my opinion the hardest monster to kill in the game, due to constantly summoning monsters to shield itself). By this point I could comfortably and consistently clear the entire level on dlvl 99, including whole pits/graveyards and vaults.
It was then that I finally felt ready to face Morgoth. I descended to dlvl 100, used a few charges of *Destruction* to sculpt the battleground, dropped my staves and waited. I didn't have to wait long - Morgoth appeared in short order, tunneling through walls at a frightful pace to make a beeline for my character.
However, after all of my preparation, the final fight was quite anti-climatic. I had stockpiled enough potions of *Healing* to quaff one every time my HP dropped below 700, and enough scrolls of Mass Banishment to read one every time Morgoth summoned anything I couldn't tank. In the end he fell quite easily to my 834.2 melee damage per round vs evil, and the game was won.
I look forward to trying to finish my next game as a spellcasting class, and perhaps without using the pillar dancing trick (I'm starting to feel this trick is extremely cheap).
Character dump here: http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=19471
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