Killing Morgoth in Melee?

[Infinitum]

Well, he's there isn't he? Curently playing 1.41. Had pretty high hopes for my last attempt (~55 effective evasion, ~25 attack, +20 Free Action, singing Song of Freedom, Riposte+double attack) but it turned out that my Sharp Mithril Greatsword (3d9 effective strength) wasn't quite enough to overcome his last powerups regeneration.

Lowish attack score, but thought I could go with Anticipate to compensate but couldn't actually get him to become Aggressive at low hp. Thought cutting a Silmaril or two was enough, but seems I was wrong.

Realistically I did find Saithnar shortly after making my artifact sword so could have optimized a bit by foregoing the smithing and anticipation and putting a few extra points in power/attack skill, but not sure if that'd work outside of some very good RNG. Has anyone succedeed with a pure melee character in this version?

[Quirk]

Well, he's there isn't he? Curently playing 1.41. Had pretty high hopes for my last attempt (~55 effective evasion, ~25 attack, +20 Free Action, singing Song of Freedom, Riposte+double attack) but it turned out that my Sharp Mithril Greatsword (3d9 effective strength) wasn't quite enough to overcome his last powerups regeneration.

Lowish attack score, but thought I could go with Anticipate to compensate but couldn't actually get him to become Aggressive at low hp. Thought cutting a Silmaril or two was enough, but seems I was wrong.

Realistically I did find Saithnar shortly after making my artifact sword so could have optimized a bit by foregoing the smithing and anticipation and putting a few extra points in power/attack skill, but not sure if that'd work outside of some very good RNG. Has anyone succedeed with a pure melee character in this version?

Morgoth hasn't been buffed since: http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=22041
... though I note that was a character packing four additional damage sides (five with Power) and Angrist. Balancing for the additional brokenness of Smithing currently makes Morgoth tough to overcome without a dedicated smith.

I do feel he should probably be thematically permanently aggressive when angered though. I'll try and bake that into the next release.

[wobbly]

Looking at the linked dump and comparing to mine from last version we both had insane hps. I think this may be critical to doing it without song of mastery. If you can't take enough hits without healing he'll regen and you lose the concentration bonus. Mine was twin swords
A sharp vampiric and Galadriel as off-hander.

Sorry fire brand rather then sharp.

[Infinitum]

He stops EQ'ing you at evasion values slightly over 50 so long as there's no flankers about in my experience. Managed to 1v1 him by drawing him into the secret passage. Had concentration as well, but only 9 effective perception iirc (it does work with flanking, right). How'd you get past his armor with a Fire Brand? Shouldn't that be like effective 2x(3d8) assuming 2lb Mithril Longsword and Power? He starts out with [+20,5d4] and I can't imagine that value goes down. Damage artifacts? Mithril Greatsword should outdamage that on average so guess I could bruteforce similar setups then.

[wobbly]

It's this here:

http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=21779

So it's 1.3.3 & prior to the archery changes, I'm not sure what else has changed. It's 2x(3d10) + 1x1d12. A 2d6 branded sword, power & finesse, an extra damage side on the gloves.

It's a while ago so I don't really remember but judging off the abilities (concentration + cruel blow + controlled retreat), I probably was using the bow to build up a concentration bonus & land cruel blow on the retreat. I likely stunned him first with an earthquake to squeeze a little extra. Then hit, back, hit, back & if he ever staggers poison arrows to keep up concentration. I don't think cruel blow worked as well as it used to, with slaying you got crazy hits against him.

I also suspect there's a better setup with a great sword, however my attempt with Saithnar had gone disappointingly, so I'm not sure. I have been idly wondering if there's a way to get Glend to work. Get vengeance & smith crazy amounts of str onto everything. There must be something though, Thraalbee used the artifact mattock on a bugged Christmas run, though the dump appears to be gone & only the screenshot remains. Mostly I've been too pessimistic to make the attempt. It's a lot of work to get to that level of OP only to fail anyway. I was sure MITZE would get through with subtle Ringil & that didn't seem to work though I didn't see the run to judge his technique.

[Quirk]

I guess my question would be where the sweet spot is with Morgoth. People still seem clearly set on killing him.

The ladder shows 23 Sil-Q wins, 6 Morgoth kills, 6 deaths at 20 or on the ascent. Some of the kill strategies would no longer be fully viable of course, but restricting to 1.4.0 or newer we have one kill in 6 wins and 3 deaths at 20 or on the ascent. Of the 542 Sil wins, 302 were Morgoth kills, and there were a further 132 deaths at 20 or on the ascent.

How overpowered should a character be to reasonably be expected to off Morgoth? And if I do make it easier, how do I stop people generating these characters every time they roll a smith?

[wobbly]

I'd say look at Mitze's death with Ringil think a little how he might of stream-lined it a little better for melee and that's about the ballpark. I have no idea how to keep smiths in order but Ringil is so rare that that'd should be just out of reach of pure melee while still plausible. Really I'm just guessing here. It's hard to find a magic pt without someone doing it then everyone copying the magic win button.


Edit: Argh. One day I'll learn to grammar.

[Thraalbee]

The dump was removed from the ladder since it was using an exploit, but for reference the abbreviated dump is attached below. It is from the final dump at surface except I replaced the simlaril with the lamp. Don't remember changing anything else after the kill

  [Sil-Q 1.4.1 Character Dump]

 Name   Barnel        Age    3,891       Str  13 =  2  +8      +3
 Sex    Female        Height  5'11       Dex   5 =  3  -1      +3
 Race   Noldor        Weight   158       Con   7 =  4          +3
 House  Feanor                           Gra  16 =  5  +6      +5

 Game Turn   21,936   Melee (+21,6d14)   Melee       21 = 22  +5  -3  -3
 Exp Pool       100         (+21,6d14)   Archery      8 =  1  +5  +1  +1
 Total Exp   50,000   Bows    (+8,2d8)   Evasion      8 =  2  +5  +1
 Burden       114.1   Armor   [+8,3-4]   Stealth      2 =  6  +5  -1  -8
 Max Burden   1068.8                     Perception  27 =  9 +16  +2
 Depth           0'   Health     71:71   Will        25 =  9 +16
 Min Depth       0'   Voice    336:369   Smithing    18 =  1 +16      +1
 Light Radius     9   Song     Mastery   Song        41 = 21 +16  +4

  [Equipment]

a) The Mattock 'Burkfelek' (-4,6d2) <+3> 11.0 lb
b) a Longbow of Dorthonion (+0,2d5) <+1> 2.5 lb
c) a Pearl Ring of Strength <+2>
d) a Pearl Ring of Strength <+2>
e) a Coral Amulet of the Blessed Realm <+2>
q) The Feanorian Lamp of Barnel <+1> grace & song of trees
g) The Robe of Barnel [+1] <+2> str & grace
h) The Cloak of Barnel [+1] <+4> song 
j) The Helm of Barnel (+1) [-1,1d2] <+2> grace percept
k) The Set of Mithril Gauntlets of Barnel [+0,1d1] <+1> str & dam + power
l) The Pair of Boots of Barnel [+0,1d1] - great speed
m) 67 Arrows of Piercing
n) 47 Arrows (+3)

  [Abilities]

Finesse
Zone of Control
Rapid Attack
Two Weapon Fighting
Cruel Blow
Quick Study
Keen Senses
Concentration
Alchemy
Master Hunter
Inner Light
Indomitable
Vengeance
Weaponsmith
Armoursmith
Jeweller
Enchantment
Artifice
Expertise
Grace
Song of Delvings
Song of Mastery
Grace

[Quirk]

Damage sides might need to vanish from smithing, I fear. They are a big part of the brokenness.

One approach might be to make Morgoth fast when hurt. This would make him significantly more dangerous, which could be balanced by weakening his boosts to Melee and Evasion and his health regeneration. I would like a battle with Morgoth to last somewhere around a couple of hundred turns: at the end of that one of you should be dead.

[Infinitum]

Smithing isn't strong though. Dedicated smithing builds are painful to get through the early and middle game, and the return of investment for all that XP doesn't kick in until well after other melee builds beats the tar out of everything that isn't Morgoth.

Also, apart from getting enough damage output to actually polish off V most smithables doesn't get appreciatively better than findable items until mid-high 30's (and beyond) in the smithing skill.

I've mentioned this before, but I still think Smithing is inherently unbalanceable and, frankly, not that interesting (much of what makes roguelikes interesting imo is in figuring out how to utilize with the euipment you find). This goes for any game with any sort of "crafting" system. If smithing is the big reason you're finding Morgoth hard to balance I'd swap out the entire tree for something different instead.

On topic, yeah I agree that at present V is mainly a challenge becasue he requires orders of magnitude higher damage output than anything else in the game to actually kill. Maybe start off by removing the regeneration and rebalance from there.

Someone once posted the idea of the player only being able to temporarily knock him out at best (what with him being a god and all), meaning he'd return for the chase sequence no matter what.

[Quirk]

Smithing isn't strong though. Dedicated smithing builds are painful to get through the early and middle game, and the return of investment for all that XP doesn't kick in until well after other melee builds beats the tar out of everything that isn't Morgoth.

I think there's a distinction to be made here between smithing and dedicated smithing. A few hundred XP to get better equipment can enhance survivability for a while, and Enchantment for lore and as a means of shoring up missing resistances is fairly reasonable. If you commit to making smithing kits with early forges, spending on Artifice early, etc, it is significantly harder early on.

16 of the 24 Sil-Q wins used some form of Smithing. How they used Smithing varied; some used Artifice, some used Enchantment, a couple just stopped at the first skill. I would say that that does not look to me like evidence that Smithing is not strong.

Also, apart from getting enough damage output to actually polish off V most smithables doesn't get appreciatively better than findable items until mid-high 30's (and beyond) in the smithing skill.

Depends where you're finding them and what the items are.

I think the fine items you can craft at 100' with relatively minimal investment are not so easily replaced for a few hundred more feet. Eventually you can replace them, yes, but you can gain substantial survivability until then.

Mid-game I think having your pick of enchantable items such as gloves of strength or mail corslets of resilience or shields of frost makes it much easier to fill holes in your strategy. We're only up to about 14 or 15 smithing by this point.

Artefact-wise, you don't need to hit the mid-30s. A robe of speed is 28, and the only robe of speed in game is vanishingly rare. A mithril shield that covers fire, cold and poison resistances is just 19, and decently better than Hador. Boots that grant dodging, sprinting and exchange places? 22.

I've mentioned this before, but I still think Smithing is inherently unbalanceable and, frankly, not that interesting (much of what makes roguelikes interesting imo is in figuring out how to utilize with the euipment you find). This goes for any game with any sort of "crafting" system. If smithing is the big reason you're finding Morgoth hard to balance I'd swap out the entire tree for something different instead.

You've said this before, but I'm currently unaware of any other players who share your viewpoint, so I'm probably going to keep on trying to balance Smithing as it is.

Someone once posted the idea of the player only being able to temporarily knock him out at best (what with him being a god and all), meaning he'd return for the chase sequence no matter what.

This is plausible. Anyone else have thoughts on thta?

[HugoVirtuoso]

"Temporarily knock him out":

For how long? Imo, maybe for just one gameturn and that's it. Or maybe this can be balanced out depending how extremely good your Will is vs. Morgoth's

[Derakon]

You could set up something like, the first N times you fight him, you just drive him off, and he'll come back again later, then on the N+1th time you can actually kill him. Or you can maybe kill him when you drive him off, if you can deal enough damage before he makes it to the stairs, but this should be implausible. And N, as well as how hard he fights before he's driven off (~= how much damage you have to deal), can depend on how many Silmarils you take. So if you take all three, then he's much more persistent and will keep coming back, meaning you basically have to win four tough fights (three drive-offs plus the "real" fight) to score a kill. While if you take only one, then you might plausibly be able to drive him off once with a much weaker character.

This would change killing Morgoth from being one big fight to being a long sequence of encounters, which might be easier to balance.

[Quirk]

You could set up something like, the first N times you fight him, you just drive him off, and he'll come back again later, then on the N+1th time you can actually kill him.

He's definitely bailed out of rough spots before. The battle with Ungoliant springs to mind. This would make the actual battle take place somewhere on the upper floors, which might be easier for the player if they can easily abort and hop up nearby stairs. It's a line of design worth considering further though. I'm a bit concerned it could lead to things being very protracted if players felt they had to hang round and scum potions if they were two fights in and their supplies were low.

[wobbly]

Had an idle thought on what might work to kill him as is. If you can find Nevrast and something like a great axe of final rest, maybe you can punch through on raw brute force? That bit of extra FA saves a chunk of will that could go elsewhere.