Sil screencasting / let's play

[debo]

Hey everyone,

I've started recording some "beginners" tutorial-like videos for Sil, in which I try to explain the game mechanics and other tidbits about it as I play. There's not much point to this, other than me liking the game so much that I want to talk about it

The first couple of videos are uploading now. In them, I created a bare-bones melee/evasion build, took the character to 300', and -- spoiler alert -- died.

You can check it out here if you're interested: http://www.youtube.com/user/silstreamer

Next up is a smithing/protection build.

[HallucinationMushroom]

Hey cool,

I watched these this morning while killing off my super strong fighter character. I blame you! Hah, not really... good quality videos. I'm looking forward to the next one. Now that you have the perfunctory introduction Sil video out of the way, it will be neat to see how you diagram out one of your smithing characters through the dungeons.

[debo]

Thanks! I'm definitely not the best person to be doing these videos, since I don't consider myself to be especially good at Sil, but whatever

My condolences re: your recent loss

[debo]

Videos from the next series are going up over the next few days -- protection/smithing builds loosely inspired by elliptic's antics last month. The first in the series has just been posted.

[HallucinationMushroom]

Yah, I had something to listen to at work. I wouldn't consider repeating until you get a forge a bad thing since it's not really that easy a task. Since you have a choice of a 50ft or 100ft first forge, I've often thought a guaranteed 3 or 4 use forge on 100ft would be nice since you've tackled the extra risk... but I don't forge much so my opinion should be worth about nothing. As far as gloves or robes, I will wear them to hedge my bet that these will get destroyed should I encounter acid worms. I used to keep them in hopes that orc thieves would take those instead of my liquor or herbs or something, but it never seemed to pan out that way.

[clouded]

Cool, I'm enjoying these. Any time I play an offline roguelike I always miss being able to watch other people play.


By the way, for archers they have some manipulatable AI that I find the easiest way of dealing with them. Say they are in a corridor like so:

#############
#..@.'....o..
#....########
#....#
#....#
######

If you move diagonal to the door you can make them move like this:

#############  #############  #############  #############
#....'....o..  #....o.......  #...o'.......  #...o'.......
#....########  #....########  #....########  #...@########
#..@.#         #..@.#         #...@#         #....#
#....#         #....#         #....#         #....#
######         ######         ######         ######

The rest of the pack will stay in the corridor and you can repeat.

[T-Mick]

I'm loving this so far. Very interesting to watch. Keep up the good work!

[fizzix]

I haven't watched the videos yet, but great job in just getting these out there. I've been planning to do a let's play for Angband for a long time now, eventually I'll find the time...

When I do, I'll probably ask you about recording software.

[debo]

As far as gloves or robes, I will wear them to hedge my bet that these will get destroyed should I encounter acid worms. I used to keep them in hopes that orc thieves would take those instead of my liquor or herbs or something, but it never seemed to pan out that way.

Makes sense. I never thought of that! I mentioned this rationale of yours in the most recent video

By the way, for archers they have some manipulatable AI that I find the easiest way of dealing with them. Say they are in a corridor like so:

<snip>

The rest of the pack will stay in the corridor and you can repeat.

Whoa! Thanks for this! I am definitely going to try it the next time I hit a pack of orc archers. Much appreciated.

I'm loving this so far. Very interesting to watch. Keep up the good work!

Thanks

I haven't watched the videos yet, but great job in just getting these out there. I've been planning to do a let's play for Angband for a long time now, eventually I'll find the time...

When I do, I'll probably ask you about recording software.

Right now, I'm just doing the lowest-tech thing possible: I use the free quicktime player that ships with OS/X, and use the "screen recording" feature. It's dead easy, but requires 10.6 or later. So, I dunno how much I'll be able to help you

I originally was going to _stream_ my games on twitch.tv, but this was faster to set up w/out dealing with resolution problems, so it's what I went with.

Thanks for all the positive comments, folks. I posted vid #4 just a few mins ago.

[Patashu]

I haven't watched the videos yet, but great job in just getting these out there. I've been planning to do a let's play for Angband for a long time now, eventually I'll find the time...

When I do, I'll probably ask you about recording software.

Try one of the following until you get something that works:
-Xsplit
-Camstudio
-Fraps

[fizzix]

Patashu: I think I tried out camstudio and it seemed to work, so I'll probably go with that first and we'll see how it goes.

debo: I watched your videos and they're very enjoyable! Great job.

[debo]

Patashu: I think I tried out camstudio and it seemed to work, so I'll probably go with that first and we'll see how it goes.

debo: I watched your videos and they're very enjoyable! Great job.

Thanks fizzix! Video #5 is up now.

[Philip]

Real cool, I hope it brings people to Sil and I think I can learn a lot from these videos. I hadn't played Sil for a couple months but remembered how good it was. My recent characters were a stealth/smithing guy(in return for 5000 XP, 400 of which you get back from identifying, you get +7 stealth from equipment, +2 gloves of forging, 8 points in smithing, armorsmithing and enchantment). I also like to play a character who takes armorsmithing and artistry which gives you really powerful armor and makes you almost invulnerable in the first 8 levels. I also tried a character going purely for criticals, forging or hoping to find a weapon that weighs 1 pound, putting lots into dex, taking finesse and subtlety for -3 to base critical cost, and later taking assasination and cruel blow from the stealth tree for amazing damage. The character is very much a glass cannon though, and 4 guys are already dead from the early orc unique. Great game though and I hope you continue with the videos, have to check the new one out.

[debo]

I've never taken artistry before... I keep meaning to try it and then I forget!

Next video is up

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZJzsZaa74k

[debo]

New video up! This one is kinda crazy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Qr4ElHwZtE