Question about diving

[Wraitheist]

I came back to Angband after having not played for about a year. I'm a diver...I like to just dive, regardless of resistances, etc., and it usually works pretty well for me. However, I've been trying to get a ranger going and I seem to keep dying a few levels down due to (seemingly) unavoidable circumstances. A panther I can't outrun, a ranger that kills me before I can retreat to the stairs, etc.

My question is, do you all like to have certain items before starting your dive? Do you roam the first few levels to save up money for a "kit"? I think my ranger would have survived had I had a longbow as opposed to a shortbow. Think I should get a longbow before starting the dive?

[PowerDiver]

My question is, do you all like to have certain items before starting your dive? Do you roam the first few levels to save up money for a "kit"? I think my ranger would have survived had I had a longbow as opposed to a shortbow. Think I should get a longbow before starting the dive?

Are you playing 3.2? The powers that be have made longbows unaffordable. However, oil has been boosted ridiculously. Throwing oil is equivalent to shooting from a +4 longbow. The first purchase any 3.2 player should make is to buy all of the oil for sale at the general store.

Then you should check out the black market, and buy a ?telSelf, ?telLevel, or ?deepDescent if you can.

Beyond that, ?phase can save you sometimes, if you can manage to get across a wall. That's pretty iffy.

How often do you want to survive your first trip? That's just a personal preference. You can scum for money if you feel you die too often. Otherwise, you should return to town when you can afford to buy a staff of teleportation, a few ?recall, and a few sundries, again including all oil for sale. Your ranger should not buy a longbow even after the first trip. It is too expensive.

[Pete Mack]

Your ranger should *never* buy a longbow. Since enchant weapon scrolls are no longer available in the store, you will be using oil for quite a long time. (If a decently enchanted longbow does show up in the store, it might be worth buying.)

And don't stop diving: just about any longbow you find on the floor at dl 30 will be good enough.

[Derakon]

Phase and shortbow shots should eventually do for the panther. Just carry more ?Phase. I usually try to have 10 for my second trip and 15 thereafter. Enemies with ranged attacks are pretty nasty though, and if you get dumped into a room with a bunch of novice paladins there's not a whole lot you can do. My best advice there is to just know what's around you and not go near dangerous situations. If you do get dumped through circumstances beyond your control (e.g. disconnected stairs, undetected trap door) then yeah, there's decent odds you'll die early on. Fortunately your investment in your character up to that point should be pretty small, especially since you are diving.

[Philip]

Being very bad at diving, I can say what the big problem is. Something wakes up. Mostly due to attacking it. The panther is there just as an annoyance. Use your phase spell. I can't say much, because I gave up on rangers and started yet another mage. Phase is awesome, and so is teleport.

[buzzkill]

Archery has been weakened a bit, hasn't it??? but still, if you've got a bow and 2d4 arrows, and presumably a ranger does, then phase door (x2) is the solution to the panther. Everyone knows that .

Edit: that's 2d4 quanity, not quality.

[Derakon]

The only weakening to general archery that's happened is the move from multiplicative slays to additive slays (so flaming ammo on an x3 launcher does x6 damage, not x9). Rangers also now start with shortbows instead of longbows, but that's a result of starting all characters with the same total value for gear + starting money.

[d_m]

It's also worth noting that oil is weakened in the nightlies. It now does 1d4 branded fire (e.g. 3d4). This is still better than a starting shortbow (2d4) but given the shorter range, heaviness and fragility of flasks of oil it seems to be working better.

I'm interested to see how it plays for people.

[PowerDiver]

It's also worth noting that oil is weakened in the nightlies. It now does 1d4 branded fire (e.g. 3d4). This is still better than a starting shortbow (2d4) but given the shorter range, heaviness and fragility of flasks of oil it seems to be working better.

I'm interested to see how it plays for people.

I've been using 1d4 * 3 for quite some time. It plays fine. However, throwing has the same range of 10 as a shortbow or sling, so don't mention that as a drawback.

[d_m]

I've been using 1d4 * 3 for quite some time. It plays fine. However, throwing has the same range of 10 as a shortbow or sling, so don't mention that as a drawback.

Oh. That's... confusing.

Thanks for pointing that out. I feel like that must be an error.

[Pete Mack]

Hey wait a minute... 7 damage per throw is exactly what oil was when it started out 3 years back, at 2d6. So what's the point of the branding change in the first place? (I think it should do a little more damage than an unenchanted longbow--as you say, oil is a one shot ammo. I think it's a nice touch that it remains useful until you find your first bow in the dungeon.)

[PowerDiver]

So what's the point of the branding change in the first place?

Someone got a new toy, the ability to put branding in new places, and went crazy with it. It makes sense to change from 2d6 to 1d4 * 3 so that fire-based creatures take less damage AFAIAC.

IMO an unenchanted longbow should be more lethal than thrown oil, but that's not important to me. I see the oil vs longbow as being about whether you can afford the longbow. For a starting char, even a price of 150 on a longbow might put it out of reach, so you spend your last 40 AU on 10 oil. If you want the oil to do more, it really ought to have a max range of 2 or 3, and I'd prefer 2.

As for the shortbow vs longbow distinction, i.e. why would anyone ever use a shortbow, I have 2 ideas. It would not bother me if there was a minimum height to use a longbow, and e.g. hobbits and dwarves simply could not use a longbow under any circumstances. Also, str is a primary attribute for longbows. Only Odysseus could use his bow, because others were not strong enough to use it. At the moment, I am thinking about requiring str >= (might + 1)^2, so you would need 18/180 str to use an x5 launcher and x6 would be impossible. That's one way to stop weak mages from using heavy xbows as their primary damage source. As to the exact numbers, who knows, and things are further confused by my belief that the correct way to interpret stats is to divide by two before considering them in a D&D framework, and I'm sure plenty of players will disagree with that viewpoint.

[Derakon]

"Realistically", crossbows would come with winches to reload them which could be used even by weak characters, but would slow reloading down. Longbows as you say would require high strength to use. But I'm not convinced that moving to such a change would be good gameplay. Best I'd consider would be having a damage/accuracy penalty for not being strong enough, much like there's the "just lifting" mode for when you're too weak to lift your melee weapon.

[pampl]

As to the exact numbers, who knows, and things are further confused by my belief that the correct way to interpret stats is to divide by two before considering them in a D&D framework, and I'm sure plenty of players will disagree with that viewpoint.

I'm not sure it's a matter of disagreement so much as it being factually incorrect. It's impossible to start with stats high enough to be a ranger or paladin under that system, and other characters would be lucky to start with a 10 or 11 in their prime requisite, something which never happens in D&D. It would also mean girdles of giant strength are more powerful than any artifact in Angband

If there were a D&D campaign that let the player wear near a dozen artifacts and kill a god and a demi-god, then I wouldn't be surprised that it had to keep track of attributes going up to 40

[PowerDiver]

I'm not sure it's a matter of disagreement so much as it being factually incorrect.

A D&D mage with an int of 18 is happy. An angband mage with an int of 18 is a dunce.