Modernization wishlist

[zaimoni]

And I'm dubious about Pete's storied history of instadeath in roguelikes. Permadeath, yes, but instadeath? In Nethack you can count instadeath monsters on one hand,

I don't: Wand of Death makes any humanoid monster in NetHack instadeath.

and two pieces of equipment shield you from all of them.

The odds you will have that equipment on DL1 is rather minimal. (Yes, I have died on DL1 to Wand of Death in NetHack.)

I've never run into instadeath in Crawl or Adom either, although my experience with them is more limited.

Crawl: Sigmund/DL2 pretty much is instadeath if he ambushes you.

Adom: It is rather easy for an unspoiled player to make a strategic error that leads to instadeath.

I've never run into any kind of instadeath in minor roguelikes.

I presume you're ignoring the 1 hit point roguelikes (such as ChessRogue and Seven Weeks).