Easiest/ Most difficult race/class combo?

[Derakon]

Half-trolls, honestly. No, they don't have the greatest INT scores in the world, but their STR and CON help counteract the mage's greatest weak points, and regeneration actually helps their mana supply pretty well. They'll also level up a heck of a lot faster than high-elves do, which means earlier access to the better spells.

[Oramin]

I found my second Gnome Mage to be easy to play after I had the good sense to equip a sling early in the game. We won't mention what happened to the first Gnome Mage...

[Raajaton]

I like gnomes for mages personally. You're still very vulnerable due to low HP, however the high int score and boosted magical devices make them extremely potent. I have been really enjoying this style of gameplay, as it seems to add an extra bit of tension, especially to the early levels. However, with a bit of caution and some tricky magery I find them able to take out uniques pretty easily, even early in the game. Finding some decent damage wands/rods helps a lot of course. My last game I had rod of fireballs and a rod of acid balls very early on, which helped dramatically.

Having the innate free action due to being a gnome proved really worthwhile on my last winning game as well, as I was playing with randarts, and the amount of items I found that included free action were unbelievably sparse. If I had to pick my gear around keeping myself safe from paralysis I would have had to miss out on some good equipment.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

I've found what is "easiest", to me, depends on what stage of the game I'm at. In the early and mid-game, a Dunadan Ranger is quite powerful, albeit at a slow experience rate, but in the end game must struggle through melee with Morgoth. A High-Elf Mage must struggle for hit points and flee combat in the early and mid-game, but does enjoy the advantages of seeing invisible, infravision and resist light. In the end-game the Mage is so powerful he can kill Morgoth without ever touching him. Human Mage really struggles in the early game some severe deficits, but gains experience quickly and can therefore reach the end-game much sooner (if he survives). I've only ever been able to defeat Morgoth with a Mage character. The other classes, I've always died before reaching him, or was bludgeoned to death by Grond. End game mages are simple once they have Kelek's Grimoire of Power and low enough fail rates and enough hit-points to employ Banishment and Mass Banishment consistently

[Oramin]

I've found what is "easiest", to me, depends on what stage of the game I'm at. In the early and mid-game, a Dunadan Ranger is quite powerful, albeit at a slow experience rate, but in the end game must struggle through melee with Morgoth. A High-Elf Mage must struggle for hit points and flee combat in the early and mid-game, but does enjoy the advantages of seeing invisible, infravision and resist light. In the end-game the Mage is so powerful he can kill Morgoth without ever touching him. Human Mage really struggles in the early game some severe deficits, but gains experience quickly and can therefore reach the end-game much sooner (if he survives). I've only ever been able to defeat Morgoth with a Mage character. The other classes, I've always died before reaching him, or was bludgeoned to death by Grond. End game mages are simple once they have Kelek's Grimoire of Power and low enough fail rates and enough hit-points to employ Banishment and Mass Banishment consistently

Umm....

Yeah, so why is a Ranger using melee attacks with Morgoth when a Ranger can deal out 4 shots/rd with Belthronding?

[Oramin]

I've been playing Elf Mages for the last week or so, trying to get my first Mage win.

You're not wrong about the lack of HP. My latest Elf Mage has almost maxxed CON and he's still vulnerable to anything that deals high damage.

http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=14437

Looks like I chose the wrong race. Once this character inevitably gets one-shot killed I'm going to switch to High Elf Mages. Unless someone has a suggestion for an easier Mage race.

Maxed CON is 18:220 not just the base character max of 18:100. Sure you aren't going to get that without a bunch of gear but you'll get around 800 to 900 HP at L50 with a truly maxed CON.

[Timo Pietilä]

Maxed CON is 18:220 not just the base character max of 18:100. Sure you aren't going to get that without a bunch of gear but you'll get around 800 to 900 HP at L50 with a truly maxed CON.

Elf mage internal maxed stat before equip is just 18/70. That's the reason why it is so hard combo to play. You need 13 from equipment to get it to 18/200 which is effective max for HP. 13 is hard to get: Thorin +4, Cambeleg +2, Dor-Lomin +4, Isildur +1 is just +11. From those Dor-Lomin is rarity (but he seem to have found it). Difference between 18/180 and 18/200 is 2.5 points / clvl, so for clvl 50 char that equals 125 HP.

For comparison Hobbit with d7 base would lose approx 50*d7 - 50*d9 = 50 HP for smaller base dice and gets that missing 125 points from CON. Makes adventuring quite a lot easier when you have far better flexibility with equipment.

BTW, this is one of my pet peeves, even H-Troll warrior with total of d22 from class and race gets on average just 11.5 / clvl so max HP before CON modification is just 575, and maxed CON effect is (for all race/class combos) 625 IE, more than half of the total HP. IMO it should be more like 2/3 from race/class and 1/3 from CON totaling closer to same max HP. CON has too big impact on game.

[Oramin]

Don't forget RoCON +6. My typical rings until I start getting Rings of Power are highest available Ring of Speed and Ring of Constitution.

[Bogatyr]

I've found what is "easiest", to me, depends on what stage of the game I'm at. In the early and mid-game, a Dunadan Ranger is quite powerful, albeit at a slow experience rate, but in the end game must struggle through melee with Morgoth. A High-Elf Mage must struggle for hit points and flee combat in the early and mid-game, but does enjoy the advantages of seeing invisible, infravision and resist light. In the end-game the Mage is so powerful he can kill Morgoth without ever touching him. Human Mage really struggles in the early game some severe deficits, but gains experience quickly and can therefore reach the end-game much sooner (if he survives). I've only ever been able to defeat Morgoth with a Mage character. The other classes, I've always died before reaching him, or was bludgeoned to death by Grond. End game mages are simple once they have Kelek's Grimoire of Power and low enough fail rates and enough hit-points to employ Banishment and Mass Banishment consistently

Human mage is awesome -- I just finished a win with one in less than one week of world time, the fastest win I've ever had. The c-levels fly by so fast that there is no grind at all: just finishing off most of the uniques was enough to get me to clvl 50 as I finished building my final fight kit. No see invis is a drag when you first hit the ghosts but there are options (!TrueSight, _DetectInvisible, ?DetectInvisible) to tide you over until you find a source of SeeInvis. The challenge of course is juggling equipment to get to 18/220 INT and 18/200 CON. The human mage has to avoid any big damage dealers until you get to later levels with increased CON. The mage with infinite perfect detection can pick and choose every encounter and so with knowledge of the game avoid the instadeaths easily.

However, Gnome mage with better starting INT and learning multiple spells per c-level gain can leverage the experience gain of casting new spells to gain the early levels even faster.