How to not townscum?

[Donald Jonker]

Since it seems competitions from here on out will be using disconnected stairs and taking turn count into consideration, it seems that I ought to rethink my current practice of townscumming like a fiend... only I'm not sure how.

There are simply too many items that appear too essential to gather to return to the dungeon without buying, particularly as a warrior (which I play 90% of the time), such as _dEvil, ?mapping, ?enchant_weapon (in the early game), _tele, ?phase, !CCW, and of course the perennially necessary !restore_stat.

So how do non-townscummers deal with returning to the dungeon lacking these things? Do you just deal with it, accepting that sometimes you're vulnerable from lack of kit and you'll lose a character every now and then as a consequence? Do you stockpile when possible? - I never seem to accumulate enough cash for this.

Or is playing without townscumming kind of like learning to dive - you go through growing pains and die a lot but eventually become a better player?


edit: praise the maintainer that ?phase and ?WoR are no longer problems.

[buzzkill]

Life in the dungeon is tough. One must learn to do without luxuries, and necessities, on occasion.

But really, keep an strategic reserve of items that you can't live without in your home. A means of teleport comes to mind, as you'll need a 1000 turn dive in order for the stores to restock (is this still correct?).

Aside from that, just keep your fingers crossed. As your essential equipment gets low, you'll, quite naturally, have to recall more often, thus giving you more chances to find such items.

I just kind of tough it out. It's a challenge, and that's the way I like it... at least until it just becomes down right evil and disheartening.

[Donald Jonker]

As your essential equipment gets low, you'll, quite naturally, have to recall more often, thus giving you more chances to find such items.

I just kind of tough it out. It's a challenge, and that's the way I like it... at least until it just becomes down right evil and disheartening.

Thanks for the tips. I often get disheartened as it is, waiting for goods the easy way. I sometimes wish that simply popping into the dungeon for one turn would cause all stores to restock - maybe this should be the humans' racial ability. They sure need some sort of advantage.

All in all, I'm not sure I like the buying game anymore than I like the selling game.

BTW: I think I read somewhere that buying out a slot of items at a store forces the store to restock. How does this work - they don't seem to do it right away... do you have to go to the dungeon first and come back?

[Nick]

BTW: I think I read somewhere that buying out a slot of items at a store forces the store to restock. How does this work - they don't seem to do it right away... do you have to go to the dungeon first and come back?

Buying out the entire store makes it restock (immediately). Buying out a slot, IIRC, just means that there's more places to be filled next time there's a regular restock.

[Larvitz]

I have this same problem pretty often... there's just too much stuff I need all the time to not townscum...

So I resign to a life of scum. And more scum. Oh well. ^_^

[Pete Mack]

There are two types of townscumming: for gold and for shop turnover. It sounds like younuse it for the latter, which is minimally affected by disconnected stairs: a reasonable character shouldn't spend too much effort searching for the stairs back up. More to the point: by the time you really need dEvil, you should be able to buy out the store and force restock. In a competiton, where turncount matter, this is the right thing to do. As for townscumming for gold, all characters start with 200gp, and can afford ?WoR. It's not nearly so useful anymore.

[Donald Jonker]

More to the point: by the time you really need dEvil, you should be able to buy out the store and force restock. In a competiton, where turncount matter, this is the right thing to do.

I typically need _dEvil at 1000', so I can detect and avoid paralysers on account of the fact that I don't have FA yet. There's no chance in hell that I can buy out the entire store at that point... do you mean just one slot? At what point were you thinking that dEvil would become necessary?

[PowerDiver]

If you really want detections, perhaps you should try a half-troll rogue with 3 melee blows. You can restrict yourself to books 1, 4, 5, and 8 if you want to keep the bookcount down. OTOH, there's been a recent theme posted to always m3g after m1b ...

[Pete Mack]

I use dEvil when ghasts are native if going without FA. (of course I use it earlier if it's available.) I also make heavy use of light rods as early as possible. I buy them in the BM if I find it before finding one in the dungeon. With FA, I'll go to around 2000' without dEvil; so long as I'm diving fairly fast it's not a bad risk. Slowing down means the odds will catch up after a while. I do carry ?TL/?Tele/*destruct* when available for guaranteed escapes.


But the light rods & illumination really cut down on the need for _dEvil.

[chem]

There are two types of townscumming: for gold and for shop turnover. It sounds like younuse it for the latter, which is minimally affected by disconnected stairs: a reasonable character shouldn't spend too much effort searching for the stairs back up. More to the point: by the time you really need dEvil, you should be able to buy out the store and force restock.

Townscumming the black market for !heal, !speed, ?tele, or other interesting items is something which is quite useful to a character possibly even clvl 50, but perhaps not possible to perform repeatedly by buying out the shop to force restock. Even for a rich character, that will end up being quite expensive.

[Donald Jonker]

If you really want detections, perhaps you should try a half-troll rogue with 3 melee blows. You can restrict yourself to books 1, 4, 5, and 8 if you want to keep the bookcount down. OTOH, there's been a recent theme posted to always m3g after m1b ...

I think this might indeed be the answer. I keep coming back to warriors on account of my unconditional love for the wicked fast pseudo, but there's so much they can't do...

[takkaria]

There are two types of townscumming: for gold and for shop turnover. It sounds like younuse it for the latter, which is minimally affected by disconnected stairs: a reasonable character shouldn't spend too much effort searching for the stairs back up. More to the point: by the time you really need dEvil, you should be able to buy out the store and force restock. In a competiton, where turncount matter, this is the right thing to do. As for townscumming for gold, all characters start with 200gp, and can afford ?WoR. It's not nearly so useful anymore.

In 3.1.2, I'm going to be looking at the stores again, and I'd especially like some people to give essentials for certain depths so I can make sure they're in stock when the player reaches those depths. Basically, I want buying out stores to be a thing of the past.

[PowerDiver]

In 3.1.2, I'm going to be looking at the stores again, and I'd especially like some people to give essentials for certain depths so I can make sure they're in stock when the player reaches those depths. Basically, I want buying out stores to be a thing of the past.

Here are things I currently buy out stores to get in 3.0.9. Note that the character can carry 99 in a slot, so a mere 50 might mean buying out the store.

?phase
?id
?recharge
spellbooks [likely is not the same as guaranteed, and on a quick trip I might throw some away to take something else home before a restock happens]

?recall
ammo
[yes, I can dive too quickly and really use up above 2 faster than general store restocks]

!hero
?chant
!rCold
!rFire

!rLife [rare, but I have done it]
restore stat potions [uncommon, mostly time vortex related]
[the above two could be fixed with store services]

?+hit
?+dam
[those can be necessary to merge ammo being saved at home or Calris etc]

For comps or other extreme attention to turncounts:
?map

I can imagine resting for changeover to buy _telSelf, though that usually happens well before you have the money to think about buying out the store.

I am sure other people worry about
!CCW
_dEvil

I can see ?rCurse becoming necessary with the curse changes that are happening.

[Pete Mack]

RCurse is almost never necessary with the current pseudo model. What is much less useful is non-ego armor. Not that it was ever particularly useful in the 1st place.

[PowerDiver]

RCurse is almost never necessary with the current pseudo model. What is much less useful is non-ego armor. Not that it was ever particularly useful in the 1st place.

You aren't keeping up with the future. When there is a ring of slaying(-10,-10) {negation curse} that will change to a ring of slaying (+10,+10) when uncursed, the ?rCurse will be vital. If it periodically randomly recurses itself, stacks of ?rCurse will be important.