My newbie experience on the game

[Derakon]

The other question is spell failure rates. As a paladin you won't get below 5%, of course, so your spells will never be 100% reliable, but it's worth taking a look to see if a spell you like has gone from "too unreliable to be worth bothering with" to "willing to try using it".

[Azrad]

For most part, I only use teleport other and self, and of course heal, during a battle. Word of destruction is at 14 percent, and I suppose it could be lowered with the wisdom boost, so it would be more reliable as a last resort option.

[Derakon]

If you're at last resorts, then you should be reading a Scroll of Destruction, not trying to cast the spell. But being able to cast Word of Destruction is still valuable in the last battle, where you can use it to dispose of uniques that Morgoth summons (after of course teleporting Morgoth himself away).

[Azrad]

dl91 now. I reckon I should be at 99 and 100 by the weekend, if all goes well. Currently shuffling through more weapons than usual. There's my old gear, Wrath, Ulmo, and Ringil, but found a mace of disruption of Gondolin, which does almost 700 damage to a lot of types of monsters. There's also the blade of chaos of extra attacks, which does 490 damage to anything - which is currently the highest damage I can do without having a slay on it. Could be useful, I think.

Decided to retire Isildur at home. In exchange for the plus 1 to constitution, I went with the power dragon scale mail instead. A little less lower in defense, though my current AC doesn't go below 200 so I guess it's all right. More importantly, it gives resistances to a lot of things, provides shard resistance which I don't have.

Lastly, without Ulmo I still don't have nether defense. On the other hand, wielding the mace of disruption of gondolin provides me with stun protect, so I'm not really sure which would be more handy for me.

On one hand, without nether resistance I get hit pretty badly if someone has nether. Too many close calls in rooms that have eye and skull drujs. On the other hand, getting heavy stunned put me in just as many close calls as well, so being protected from stun will be a boon on that. I certainly don't want to fall into a situation where I get knocked out, that's for sure.

[Azrad]

Well, it is done. Found an ego ethereal cloak, turns out to be an ethereal cloak of aman. Currently wearing one, but the new one is so much better. Higher defense boost, plus 3 stealth instead of 1, and resistance to nether.

With the mace of disruption of Gondolin for protection on stunning, I now have resistances and protections to everything. The mace itself replaces Ulmo and Wrath, since it does high damage to undead and dragons as well. I could retire Ringil as well, but the speed boost might come in handy (though my speed is not plus 30 without it anyway). The mace does slay demons much better than Ringil, but the mace doesn't have a boost on evil creatures, so I could keep Wrath on me since it deals 450 to evil creatures, but Ringil would be better (443 on evil creatures, but speed boost is there)

...never mind. Looking at things. I retire Wrath, Ulmo, and Ringil. The mace would be my default, and the blade of chaos of extra attacks will be the evil and normal creature slayer due to it's 490 damage on everything.

Or, instead of the blade of chaos, I could always go with the Glaive of Pain. Much higher damage, 529.5 at 5 blows per round instead of 490 at 7 blows. It'll be heavier though.

[Mondkalb]

Repost your char, so that we can admire the MoD. ^^

Also: Drujs and undead in general are best avoided. They are not worth the effort and can cause too much trouble.
Some may have nice drops, but make sure that you have sustains, because lots of undead can drain stats.

[Azrad]

How do I repost? Do I just upload the updated file again?

As for the undead, they're certainly a headache to me. I got the ethreal cloak with the nether resist on a pit of undead. Thankfully, no druj on that one. Unfortunately, there were arch and demi liches and black reavers... they're the ones that tunnel through walls, right? That caused a lot of trouble. If it wasn't a lich that was on walls, there was a reaver tunneling through one to surround me. Moving back was a pain, and I had a few close calls. Used banish evil to teleport some of them away to give me some breathing room. Took a long while, but eventually I cleared the crowd.

As for stat drains, unfortunately not all my stats get protected. I saved up a lot of mushrooms of vigor at home, and carry a lot on hand. If I need it on a fight, I use the mushroom. If the current area is safe I just cast restoration instead.

[Zikke]

Just upload the file to the ladder again with the same name. It'll automatically overwrite the old one, but keep the comments. The URL to the character is the same.

[Azrad]

Ah. All right, then. Done.

Hopefully this does get me ready for Morgoth and Sauron. Still cautiously and slowly going down each floor, checking if there's any new items to nab. Got lucky on one and found four potions of life.

[Timo Pietilä]

Ah. All right, then. Done.

Ladder uses char name to distinguish between dumps. If you want to post other char with same name there is a checkbox for "protect this for overwriting" (or something like that) near the bottom of the page.

[Azrad]

This is it. Floor 98, took out all my potions and scrolls. Coming down to 99, and then towards destiny or somesuch.

[Azrad]

Come to think of it, the stairs to 100 won't show until Sauron is beaten, yes?

What if I intentionally walk into a pit trap, then?

[debo]

Come to think of it, the stairs to 100 won't show until Sauron is beaten, yes?

What if I intentionally walk into a pit trap, then?

You can't get to 100 without beating Sauron first. I can't remember what the mechanics are, but you can't use pit traps to dodge around them (I think they might just not generate at all on DL99, or maybe they just drop you back on DL99).

[Azrad]

Either way, Sauron's done. He was lurking at the end of a big vault, didn't want to go through the hassle of clearing through another army of normal monsters so I went up and used one of the mass banishment scrolls. Fought in a tight corridor, and all he had summoned was a bunch of ghosts I ignored.

Gonna sort through what's on the vault first before I head down.

So far, just one scroll used. Two of them burned up though thanks to some annoying monsters.

[debo]

Either way, Sauron's done. He was lurking at the end of a big vault, didn't want to go through the hassle of clearing through another army of normal monsters so I went up and used one of the mass banishment scrolls. Fought in a tight corridor, and all he had summoned was a bunch of ghosts I ignored.

Gonna sort through what's on the vault first before I head down.

So far, just one scroll used. Two of them burned up though thanks to some annoying monsters.

Good job. Just be wary that Morgoth can be very demoralizing to fight if you've never done it before, because it might feel like nothing you're doing is causing any damage. (He has a lot of HP, and so his HP meter reduces very slowly.)

I would also heed what Angrist hinted at on your chardump already -- slay evil or just plain normal damage are the only things that matter against Morgoth. 400-500dmg per round is pretty reasonable against him, if you have less than that I think you might be in for a very annoying battle