Ranking ten monster status wands/rods/staves

[kineahora]

Wands of Scare / Confuse / Slow / Hold / Stun Monster: ignore scare/confuse/hold. Keep and carry slow/stun (you can stop carrying stun late in the game, if you want, and you can stop carrying wands/slow when you get enough rods/slow. slow is the most important here.

Rods of Slow / Hold Monster: Keep slow, ignore hold.

Staves of Confuse / Sleep / Slow Monsters: ignore ignore ignore

Thx--learning a bit here. I have been holding Stun but tossing slow. Didn't realize how good slow is considered... This will probably help more early characters survive...

[Egavactip]

Wands of Scare / Confuse / Slow / Hold / Stun Monster: ignore scare/confuse/hold. Keep and carry slow/stun (you can stop carrying stun late in the game, if you want, and you can stop carrying wands/slow when you get enough rods/slow. slow is the most important here.

Rods of Slow / Hold Monster: Keep slow, ignore hold.

Staves of Confuse / Sleep / Slow Monsters: ignore ignore ignore

[archolewa]

I use pretty much all of these at various points in the game, especially if I'm playing a warrior (and thus don't have to carry around a bunch of books).

Scare and Hold Monster: Excellent early game if you have a powerful launcher, but don't have a particularly great melee weapon yet. Both allow you to spend as little time in melee (where monsters are their most deadly, especially in the early game) as possible. This is a huge benefit when you're playing without Recall and may not have a ton of phase door or CLW potions yet.

Slow/Stun Monster: I use these through the entire game. Both work very reliably on uniques through the midgame (and slow works on literally everyone) and a slow-and-stunned unique does a lot less damage than they would otherwise. This allows me to conserve CLW and phase door, means I'm less likely to phase into a bad situation, and means I'll spend less time recovering from killing a unique, which means less time on the level.

Confuse: I use this a bit less often, but it's still great early game against the various cats and spellcasters. Every turn enemies spend flailing around in confusion is a turn they don't spend spamming Blind at you.

Staves are excellent because they affect everyone in line of sight. Great if you've phased or teleported yourself into a large room full of baddies, or don't have the damage yet to set up a proper killzone for hounds.

Incidentally, Wand of Scare Monster is much better now, because if you zap a target, and they can't flee, they instead just freeze in terror.

[kineahora]

I've made very little use of monster status devices since I started playing again (first time in years), and thought perhaps I should just ignore them. But others advised keeping some, and a glance at the ladder shows plenty of people have gathered some of these all the way to the final fights. But stockpiling more than a couple of these types seems like a huge inventory cost relative to normal use.

So I'm asking: how would you rank these devices? Which do you think are worth using or stockpiling in the midgame or late game?

The ten devices are:
Wands of Scare / Confuse / Slow / Hold / Stun Monster
Rods of Slow / Hold Monster
Staves of Confuse / Sleep / Slow Monsters

I've heard a few comments on individual items from that list, and I know some things about which are commonly resisted, but I'd like to get an overall picture.

I play paladins.

(1) Of course obviously I hold as much TO as I can get--it is utterly essential.
(2) I tend to hold stun monster early until the character really gets going with speed--really helps win fights and seems to work on monsters that are "unaffected" by other stuff, unlike confuse and hold. Then they get squelched like everything else other than TO and teleportation.

[Estie]

Hound packs are rarely an issue if there is a bottleneck.

[wobbly]

Hold monster will stop a hound pack if you get 1 in a bottleneck

[Sphara]

Paralysis to a player: extremely hazardous.

Paralysis by hold monster: most monsters are heavily resistant or immune, and those who get it, wake up 1-2 turns later.

I've noticed that Staff of Sleep Monster has much, much longer duration. That might actually save you from that sabre-tooth cat, instead of the useless hold monster wand.

Hold monster affects so low number of monsters, that it's effect might as well be permanent.

[Estie]

Slow or stun might get used very early when inventory space is no concern. Once I have emptied a wand or need space to pick up the next {??} item to take home for identification, status items get squelched.

[tom]

Stun monster reduces by 25% the melee damage done to you by monsters, so if you are a melee type it's probably worth carrying.

The rest are less interesting once you have good means of escape.

Oh, slow monster always (?) works. It applies -2 speed per shot, up to max -10. Good against uniques

[Sky]

aside from the very early game where i can't do much of anything, or if i find an OOD wand of Drain Life or Dragon's Breath, the only thing i ever carry is TO and maybe a rod of Slow Monsters with a Paladin or Priest.
Rods of TO are excellent obviously, great for Warriors but also for Rogues and Rangers who only get decent TO around CL35.

Everything else gets sold. *maybe* i can use a Staff Of Power if i am in some very specific vaults, but otherwise it's just money.

[Gram]

I've made very little use of monster status devices since I started playing again (first time in years), and thought perhaps I should just ignore them. But others advised keeping some, and a glance at the ladder shows plenty of people have gathered some of these all the way to the final fights. But stockpiling more than a couple of these types seems like a huge inventory cost relative to normal use.

So I'm asking: how would you rank these devices? Which do you think are worth using or stockpiling in the midgame or late game?

The ten devices are:
Wands of Scare / Confuse / Slow / Hold / Stun Monster
Rods of Slow / Hold Monster
Staves of Confuse / Sleep / Slow Monsters

I've heard a few comments on individual items from that list, and I know some things about which are commonly resisted, but I'd like to get an overall picture.