Beginner Questions

[Tiburon Silverflame]

Absolutely right Buzzkill, nothing stops time's exp drain. (Or stat drain, or hp drain for that matter)

Banish.

And sometimes Mass Banishment.

[Sirridan]

Banish.

And sometimes Mass Banishment.

I see what you did there.

[miyazaki]

Stat sustains can be penetrated by time breath, which in Vanilla can only come from Time Vortices, Time Hounds, Aether Vortices (unlikely, since they have so many other breath weapons to choose from), and Aether Hounds (ditto). To my knowledge, stat sustains are otherwise perfect. The most important stats to sustain are CON, STR, and your spellcasting stat (or, as a warrior, CON, STR, and DEX).

There is another irresistible stat drain--when you over-extend your MP casting spells. It can drain your constitution; and is the only time IIRC that your stats can be permanently decreased.

[Pete Mack]

There is another irresistible stat drain--when you over-extend your MP casting spells. It can drain your constitution; and is the only time IIRC that your stats can be permanently decreased.

That's correct, although nexus breath stat swapping can have the same functional effect.

[Timo Pietilä]

There is another irresistible stat drain--when you over-extend your MP casting spells. It can drain your constitution; and is the only time IIRC that your stats can be permanently decreased.

There is at least one another, but it requires that you find the most rare item in the game and use it (not the Feanor, which seems to be even more rare to me). And I think potion of ruination also reduces your stats permanently, but apparently that does not exists anymore in 3.1.2.

[Timo Pietilä]

Angband is 75% avoiding fights, 20% fighting, 4.99% planning, .01% luck. IMO, you will never "get lucky" and win.

I think that goes: 50% of planning, 20% of fighting and 30% of avoiding fights. You don't run from 75% of monsters, but if you need to fight something tough you need to plan that carefully. Especially later in game your planning starts before you even enter the dungeon.

Only extreme divers need to avoid just about everything. IMO that's boring way to play.

Luck does play a role, but it's overall effect from bad luck vs good luck approaches zero. At least when you stretch that to several games.

[Sirridan]

I'd say its 75% knowledge, 25% execution.

knowledge includes planning, knowing the monster list, the ego/artifact list, consumables, spells, etc.

Execution is basically using that knowledge to win. You know not to engage time hounds, you know that dragon is worth xp and loot, you know that drolem isn't worth fightning, etc.

Also, I think all luck in angband is bad luck. If you find boots of speed at DL 1, you're faster and that's "lucky" sure, but that doesn't really change anything in the end, it just gives a boost in the early/mid game. In the end, you'll have speed rings, or boots, or any number of things that make up for a lack of early finds.

It's the random unavoidable deaths that constitute luck. Even being surrounded by timehounds going down disconnected stairs with no escapes isn't bad luck, it's bad execution. Why go downstairs if you don't have escapes?

Reading ?tele and landing in plasma hounds would then be bad luck, although at that depth hopefully you have foolproof escapes, but alas, you must take *some* risks.

[Derakon]

I have to disagree with you over your definition of luck. Good finds are lucky. After all, all else being equal, a character that finds a useful early item is far more likely to win than one that doesn't. Those early boots of speed may not make a big difference in the endgame, but they sure as hell make a big difference in getting the character to the endgame.

To make some numbers up, I'd say that for a skilled player, at least 90% of their characters die before 2000'. Of the remaining 10%, maybe 30% will win. Ergo, if a randomly-generated item improves a character's odds of surviving to 2000', then that item has improved the character's odds of winning enormously, even if it isn't used in the endgame.

[Sirridan]

I have to disagree with you over your definition of luck. Good finds are lucky. After all, all else being equal, a character that finds a useful early item is far more likely to win than one that doesn't. Those early boots of speed may not make a big difference in the endgame, but they sure as hell make a big difference in getting the character to the endgame.

To make some numbers up, I'd say that for a skilled player, at least 90% of their characters die before 2000'. Of the remaining 10%, maybe 30% will win. Ergo, if a randomly-generated item improves a character's odds of surviving to 2000', then that item has improved the character's odds of winning enormously, even if it isn't used in the endgame.

Hm true enough, I'll give you that. What I find early on definitely determines what I can fight on my way to the end game, but what I mean is that the only luck that truly matters is the bad luck.

Bad luck ruins your chances to get to the endgame at all. while finding something good early on helps get you there, most of the time I can get there without finding anything good until I'm already quite deep.

I consider not finding important things like FA, SI, rbase, rpoison, detection, and escapes to be bad luck, rather than finding them as good luck, since I could always chill at a 'safe' level long enough to find what I 'need' to go down.

[Fendell Orcbane]

Hm true enough, I'll give you that. What I find early on definitely determines what I can fight on my way to the end game, but what I mean is that the only luck that truly matters is the bad luck.

Bad luck ruins your chances to get to the endgame at all. while finding something good early on helps get you there, most of the time I can get there without finding anything good until I'm already quite deep.

I consider not finding important things like FA, SI, rbase, rpoison, detection, and escapes to be bad luck, rather than finding them as good luck, since I could always chill at a 'safe' level long enough to find what I 'need' to go down.

All I will say is that "grinding" although necessary at times is boring. But "grinding" will increase your chances of winning. Or getting to Morgoth in my case. Actually if I had grinded until I had more arrows of Holy Might I probably would have won: ) But I was sick of grinding.

[buzzkill]

I'd say that for a skilled player, at least 90% of their characters die before 2000'.

Really? I don't know what constitutes a skilled player, but I can say with certainty that I've never even come close to winning (a traditional variant), but I think that even I, with my excessive risk taking and self imposed handicaps, put 10% or better past DL40. But then again, I've rarely given up on a character or pushed forth a 12 pack of mages recklessly in hopes of one of them having a brilliant start.

[d_m]

To make some numbers up, I'd say that for a skilled player, at least 90% of their characters die before 2000'. Of the remaining 10%, maybe 30% will win. Ergo, if a randomly-generated item improves a character's odds of surviving to 2000', then that item has improved the character's odds of winning enormously, even if it isn't used in the endgame.

I don't think your statistics are very general. I am not a fantastic Angband player but I can probably get about 40-50% of my characters to that depth.

[Hariolor]

Really? I don't know what constitutes a skilled player, but I can say with certainty that I've never even come close to winning (a traditional variant), but I think that even I, with my excessive risk taking and self imposed handicaps, put 10% or better past DL40. But then again, I've rarely given up on a character or pushed forth a 12 pack of mages recklessly in hopes of one of them having a brilliant start.

Hm, my only winner got very lucky early on with drops, and kept that luck through most of the game. My normal MO is to burn through 10 or 20 of the same starting character in a row until I get some sort of decent start. But even those characters tend to die around CL 15 and 1500-2000'. Usually if I haven't chanced upon a couple nice ego items by the time I need them (for rblind, see invis, free action), I dive like mad until something kills me (generally a lack of reliable escapes), and then start over.

I think I probably took all the posts about diving a bit too seriously. My winner played pretty slowly through several stretches. Now I take more or less every > I see. It's almost compulsive behavior . . .

[Pete Mack]

To make some numbers up, I'd say that for a skilled player, at least 90% of their characters die before 2000'. .

That's way too high. I figure to lose < 50% of characters prior to 2000', with a significant number lost between 2000' and dl 4900' while trying to level up and get endgame gear.

[Timo Pietilä]

I don't think your statistics are very general. I am not a fantastic Angband player but I can probably get about 40-50% of my characters to that depth.

I can get almost all of them. If I die I die very very early to OoD monster or trap. So soon that I tend to ignore and forgot them entirely. I'd say most of my chars are safe after I reach 500 feet in usual game. Winners in something like 90% of them. It takes me roughly 1.5 million turns to get a winner. If I go faster then odds drop pretty quickly, but under 1 million turn winner is still pretty probable. OTOH I don't think I can reach 500kturn winner anytime soon. (Not so much because of lack of skill, but because of habits. I'm too curious and tend to explore ever vault and item I see).