Noobish questions

[emulord]

Titles are for flavor only. It's dependent on level (Except for WINNER).

[Derakon]

Level and class. For example, a level-1 warrior is a Rookie, but a level-5 warrior is a Soldier and a level-45 a Hero. A level-1 mage is a Novice; a level-25 mage is a Spellbinder. And so on.

[Raxmei]

A strategy note on that mouse thing, archery usually isn't a very good way to take them out. You run out of arrows while the game often won't run out of mice and unless you have multiple shots you only kill one per turn. As a ranger you probably get multiple blows with a light melee weapon. One hit's enough to kill a mouse and in current editions a single attack will take a fraction of a turn to execute as long as you have more than one attack. Try to clear out contiguous patches and close doors to deny them access to clean parts of the dungeon. If you have reasonable access to a magic effect that can kill a bunch at a time like lightning bolt or especially stinking cloud that helps a lot.

You can also just leave the level or walk away and close a door behind you.

[captflint]

Thanks for the strategy hints. In my post I said I had wiped out the mice. I only thought I had. I couple of rooms later they came flooding in again though a connecting hallway. This time they nearly killed me. Thankfully, I was able to hack my way though to a staircase. I will no longer underestimate low level creatures. by the time I got out of their my HP was in the single digits. So on a related note, if I am shutting a door behind me do I need to jam it shut with an iron spike, or can I just close it? I ask because I currently don't carry iron spikes in my inventory. Maybe I need to?

[ghengiz]

So on a related note, if I am shutting a door behind me do I need to jam it shut with an iron spike, or can I just close it? I ask because I currently don't carry iron spikes in my inventory. Maybe I need to?

It depends.
You don't really need to jam it everytime, especially against so low-level monsters.
Later, things are a bit more involved, but I don't want to insert spoilers.

[buzzkill]

if I am shutting a door behind me do I need to jam it shut with an iron spike, or can I just close it? I ask because I currently don't carry iron spikes in my inventory. Maybe I need to?

A closed door won't stop many monsters, though it may work against mice. A door jammed with an iron spike (or multiple spikes) won't stop or significantly slow most monsters either. The turn(s) you gain from spiking a door are, in most situations, offset by the turns you waste spiking the door in the first place.

The whole point of closing a door is usually to block LoS (line of sight) and/or possible breath attacks rather than holding enemies back.

[Derakon]

Many monsters can open doors, and a fair number can also bash them down. A merely closed door will only stop monsters that can't do either (which includes almost all rodent monsters); a jammed door will stop those that can open but can't bash. But monsters that can bash doors down tend to do so pretty quickly regardless of how heavily you've jammed the door.

In the early game it may be worth carrying iron spikes around with you to facilitate escapes, but they pretty quickly become not worth using.

[Philip]

Is there a way to quickly find out how many monsters can bash and can't open and vice versa?

[Mikko Lehtinen]

Is there a way to quickly find out how many monsters can bash and can't open and vice versa?

If you're willing to spoil yourself, you can look in /lib/edit/monster.txt for flags OPEN_DOOR and BASH_DOOR.

[Derakon]

Aside from spoilers, you have to see the monster interact with the door, which almost always means that the monster needs to be visible by telepathy and interacting with a door that you've previously detected/discovered.

So basically, use spoilers.

[captflint]

Ok, so there is a spell in my first spell book (Magic for Beginners) that just reads as 'illegible'. What's up with that? Can I be told without spoiling something? If not don't worry about it.

Other than that I was wondering if it were possible to make it so my arrow keys always ran and my numeric keypad could be used for walking. I never seem to need to run diagonally so I thought I could save some time if I could configure the controls that way. I was also wondering of there is a way to set up a shared scoreboard or something like the ladder on this site. I am hoping to get some of my friends into Angband and it would be cool to have a access to a shared scoreboard.

[buzzkill]

Ok, so there is a spell in my first spell book (Magic for Beginners) that just reads as 'illegible'. What's up with that? Can I be told without spoiling something? If not don't worry about it.

Some classes share the same spellbooks. Some spells are class specific. If a spell is illegible, that just means it's intended for a different class.

[Derakon]

The illegible spell in your case is Detect Objects, which only Rogues get access to. In turn, Rogues can't cast a lot of damage-dealing spells (and the spells they do get access to come a lot later and are more expensive to cast).

Fair warning: mages in Angband are hard. They have weak starts and really benefit from the player having extensive knowledge of the game. By all means, play them if you like; I just want you to know that other classes are more "accessible" to beginners. The ultimate newbie character is probably a Half-Troll Warrior; they're practically indestructible early on, and despite being almost literally dumb muscle they're still plenty of fun to play...

Regarding your running question, what you can do is create a keymap to replace what the arrow keys do. Hit '=', then 'm' to bring up keymaps. Create a new keymap, hit the left arrow key, then for the command sequence, input ".4" without the quotation marks. Then hit $ to complete the keymap. What this means is that when you hit the left arrow, the game will input '.' (the running command), followed by '4' (the left command), so you'll run to the left. Create similar keymaps for the other directions and you're set. Just remember to save your keymaps (the "Append keymaps to a file" option) so you don't have to recreate them the next time you play.

[kaypy]

Other than that I was wondering if it were possible to make it so my arrow keys always ran and my numeric keypad could be used for walking.

Others have mentioned using keymaps. But this would require you play with numlock on, which breaks a bunch of built in keymaps. To get better control, you might want to look into an external macro program, eg AutoHotKey or the like.

I was also wondering of there is a way to set up a shared scoreboard or something like the ladder on this site. I am hoping to get some of my friends into Angband and it would be cool to have a access to a shared scoreboard.

I'm not sure of any automated solution, but if you don't all die at once, I think you could just email the /lib/apex/scores.raw back and forth.

[captflint]

Oh, I am not playing a mage. Though I am planning on playing one after (if) I go all the way through the game at least once. Actually I am currently playing a Ranger. They seem to be a class that is good at a little bit of everything. Obviously their main strength is with bows, but they get magic starting at level 3 and I have found it quite useful so far.