The Phial of Galadriel

[Amplify]

I haven't played in around 6 years now but I'm grinding a new wizard up carefully, looking for the The Phial of Galadriel and having absolutely zero luck finding it. Seriously, I've mostly been wandering around floor 9 for two weeks now and I gotta figure the rates for it dropping have been drastically changed.

I can't really complain or say I've been unlucky, because out of desperation I just went down to floor 26 to find better items, found a Scroll of Acquirement by the stairs, read it int he hopes of finding something decent and ended up with this as the first artifact I've found so far in the run. Something feel pretty wrong if I can find that but not the Phial. Did the rates for it being generated get turned waaaaaaay down or something?

[Grotug]

I've found Galadrial's phial in my last game and current game, I think level 12 on the last game and in my current game I found it on level 15.

[debo]

I think phial recently got changed so it's not a must-find anymore?

Edit: also, randomness

Edit2: OK I think i made up the phial being changed thing

[Derakon]

The Phial is nowhere near as common as it used to be. Back in the old days if you hadn't found it by 500' then your game was an outlier. These days you're expected to upgrade from torch to lantern to Phial, with each one lasting 500-700' or so. So nowadays it's more unusual if you haven't found the Phial by 1500', not 500'.

Heck, sometimes you find an enchanted lantern that's better than the Phial (e.g. because it gives See Invisible). That always feels kind of weird.

[Philip]

Actually debo was right, it is not as important anymore. It's now two light radius with the activation unchanged. A lantern of everburning does almost all of that, a lantern of brightness has more light radius but needs to be refilled, and See Invisible is just good.

[Derakon]

3.5 restores the Phial's radius to 3, at least. Lanterns of True Seeing are probably too good though; at the very least they don't need to provide protection from blindness.

[Philip]

Nice to know. Yeah, true seeing sems powerful in comparison, since light radius matters, but not that much. What is important is knowing what you are next to, and what you are walking into, for the rest (targetting) you'll want to be in a lit room, or you'll want to have some more longrange method of seeing the monster, while pblind on a lantern is thematic, but powerful.

[AnonymousHero]

3.5 restores the Phial's radius to 3, at least. Lanterns of True Seeing are probably too good though; at the very least they don't need to provide protection from blindness.

I actually like certain ego items being better than (low-level) artifacts, but maybe that's just me.

[Derakon]

I actually like certain ego items being better than (low-level) artifacts, but maybe that's just me.

This is fine, but Lanterns of True Seeing have pretty good odds of showing up before you find the Phial, and that is always a letdown. The Phial is a pretty iconic item, and to have it show up only after it is no longer useful is disappointing.

My advice would be to move True Seeing deeper into the dungeon.

[Khuzdul]

I've got the Phial from Wormtounge, Azog and just found it! It comes up it random places all over the shop, but I find it really useful. You're best shot is to try and get it from Wormtounge, I reckon. I've also gotten Sting and The Small Metal Shield of Thorin from him, so I know he definatly DOES drop artifacts.

Even if he doesn't you'll still get something pretty nifty.

[Bogatyr]

This is fine, but Lanterns of True Seeing have pretty good odds of showing up before you find the Phial, and that is always a letdown. The Phial is a pretty iconic item, and to have it show up only after it is no longer useful is disappointing.

My advice would be to move True Seeing deeper into the dungeon.

Or, how about making the Phial desirable to equip? An artifact of that importance should be better than a plain old enchanted lantern that doesn't need fuel. Why shouldn't *artifact* light sources grant SI, for example?

For example, why not at least give the Phial either a permanent chance to "scare spiders", or at least it's activation a chance to scare evil or scare spiders?

[Estie]

The Phial is just too deep and/or too rare. I have had many games where I found it AFTER the Arkenstone and Palantir.
True seeing lanterns are better most of the time, but my warriors used to love the Phial as it allowed them to free an inventory slot for not needing light room device. These days it is _ of Light till 98 more often than not.

[quarague]

I think what happens here is that the phial of Galadriel counts as a fairly iconic item because it has a history outside of angband. So people expect it to be a fairly powerful item. However within Angband it is one of the earlies uniques and a pretty weak one. Giving it an activation like scare spiders/orc/all monsters would make it resemble the LOTR original even more but I don't think it would make it much more desirable within angband. Maybe giving it a very high light radius (say 5) with no refill and no other properties would make it an interesting unique without being overpowered.

[Derakon]

The Phial did show up a lot earlier in the old days; times were I fully expected to find it by 500' with over 90% of my characters. It got moved deeper at some point; I'm not entirely sure why. Probably to make lanterns more useful or something. Then (possibly at a later point) Lanterns of True Sight were added, with a distribution such that they had rather decent odds of showing up before you ever got the Phial.

[Maddz]

I know I haven't found it yet on my current run - cLvl 23, dLvl 21 - or thereabouts. I did find a Lantern of Brightness though, which I'm using (and keep wanting to refill it with the Phlogiston spell