how long do you scum DL 90+ ?

**Pete Mack** · October 18, 2016, 01:59

Don't overlook archery. Good ammo isn't all that rare. The staff of *destruction* won't be much good vs. M if you melee him. With that much healing you should be fine. It is summons you have to worry about.

**Ingwe Ingweron** · October 18, 2016, 02:58

Forget DL 94 and go straight to DL 98, the dangers are no different and you need to be ready to drop to DL99 as soon as you can take on Sauron.

**Sky** · October 18, 2016, 10:31

well, it doesn't matter anymore, i took 1 step into a room, got hit by 3 stuns from plasma hounds which knocked me out. you know the rest of this story.

**Thraalbee** · October 18, 2016, 11:55

Been there. pStun is irritating since you can easily win without it so dont make it prio. then you tend to forget to act accordingly and rip

**MattB** · October 20, 2016, 19:01

Originally posted by Sky

well, it doesn't matter anymore, i took 1 step into a room, got hit by 3 stuns from plasma hounds which knocked me out. you know the rest of this story.

Story of my life...well, story of the end of the life of my first nearly-winner. Was gutted at the time, only true victory finally assuaged that hurt!

**Egavactip** · October 24, 2016, 19:47

Originally posted by Ingwe Ingweron

Forget DL 94 and go straight to DL 98, the dangers are no different and you need to be ready to drop to DL99 as soon as you can take on Sauron.

Not sure what you mean by this. I never go from 98 to 99 just like that. Before I go after Sauron, i go up to 0, get all my gear and consumables, THEN go down and kick his ass.

**Ingwe Ingweron** · October 24, 2016, 21:04

Originally posted by Egavactip

Not sure what you mean by this. I never go from 98 to 99 just like that. Before I go after Sauron, i go up to 0, get all my gear and consumables, THEN go down and kick his ass.

Yes, but recalling to 94 versus 98? Also, just before Sauron, I sometimes descend to 99, recall to town to supply, then recall to 99 to go to guns directly.

If you're going to scum levels, after about DL 65, I find it about the same level of danger at 98. Certainly, there's no appreciable difference in danger between 94 and 98. There is, however, an appreciable difference in loot.

**Sky** · October 24, 2016, 21:09

still, that's not what i mean.
with this -now deceased- character i had some good gear, but no real weapon, and i had been scumming low levels for a long while ... hours .. and did not find anything. I'm still not sure how the artifact generation process works, i'd figure, the lower down i am, the more likely that *every* artifact can be generated. I was hoping for either the Mban axe of Durin, or at least the Plate with *heal* (forgot the name). But nothing, level after level of 9-9 but not artis at all (preserve mode on).
i had already killed practically every unique, only the tarrasque and chronos (or atlas, not sure) were still alive, maybe one or two dragons.

So my question is .. does everyone experience this "drying up" of the artifacts, or was it just bad luck?

**PowerDiver** · October 24, 2016, 21:15

Originally posted by Sky

well, it doesn't matter anymore, i took 1 step into a room, got hit by 3 stuns from plasma hounds which knocked me out. you know the rest of this story.

Did you learn the lesson? Will you embrace it next game?

It's better to take a 5% chance of dying in a fight with M, than to take repeated 0.5% risks while scumming. The precise numbers will vary with your situation, but the general argument remains the same.

**Pete Mack** · October 24, 2016, 21:22

There's a finite number of artifacts and a finite number of uniques who have a better hsn average drop, so yes artifacts do dry up slowly. In any case it only makes sense to collect as many as you need to kill the bosses, not mess around waiting for uber drops...as you found out.

**Ingwe Ingweron** · October 24, 2016, 21:51

Originally posted by PowerDiver

Did you learn the lesson? Will you embrace it next game?

It's better to take a 5% chance of dying in a fight with M, than to take repeated 0.5% risks while scumming. The precise numbers will vary with your situation, but the general argument remains the same.

Exactly! This post has my full-blown thoughts on the subject. http://angband.oook.cz/forum/showthread.php?p=107826

**PowerDiver** · October 25, 2016, 17:55

Originally posted by Ingwe Ingweron

Exactly! This post has my full-blown thoughts on the subject. http://angband.oook.cz/forum/showthread.php?p=107826

That's a great post. "Great" doesn't do it justice. Awesome.

I've tried to explain the game theory to people, but my examples were things from games like poker or sports and the analogies weren't that close to Angband gameplay. The mountain-climbing comparison is inspired.

My completely unjustified estimate is that if you aren't dying to M in the 2% to 5% range [that my gut says includes optimal play], then you are dying more than that to scumming while trying to avoid it. I'd recommend a multi-winner should aim for the neighborhood of 10% likely to die to M. You gotta test your limits if you want to know what part of your game needs improving the most.

**Ingwe Ingweron** · October 25, 2016, 22:21

Originally posted by PowerDiver

My completely unjustified estimate is that if you aren't dying to M in the 2% to 5% range [that my gut says includes optimal play], then you are dying more than that to scumming while trying to avoid it. I'd recommend a multi-winner should aim for the neighborhood of 10% likely to die to M. You gotta test your limits if you want to know what part of your game needs improving the most.

For me, it is quite rare now to die to Sauron or Morgoth, it happens, but I'd say 1 or 2% of the time. Death before getting there is also getting rarer for me, but happens yeah, maybe 10% of the time. 20% if I'm playing a mage. More than that in some of the very difficult competition conditions (Leon the artifactless ranger comes to mind....)

**PowerDiver** · October 25, 2016, 23:44

Originally posted by Ingwe Ingweron

For me, it is quite rare now to die to Sauron or Morgoth, it happens, but I'd say 1 or 2% of the time. Death before getting there is also getting rarer for me, but happens yeah, maybe 10% of the time. 20% if I'm playing a mage. More than that in some of the very difficult competition conditions (Leon the artifactless ranger comes to mind....)

1 or 2 % compared to 10% overall seems reasonable. However ...

You're not challenging yourself. You're not going to discover your weaknesses if winning is that automatic.

Think about trying 3.0 again. Find a version with the best squelch you can, and add id on walkover. You'll probably have to tweak more stuff, but the main thing is

cmd1.c in py_pickup

Code:

        /* Scan the remaining objects */
        for (this_o_idx = cave_o_idx[py][px]; this_o_idx; this_o_idx = next_o_idx)
        {
                /* Get the object and the next object */
                o_ptr = &o_list[this_o_idx];
                next_o_idx = o_ptr->next_o_idx;

                /* ID aware stuff not already squelched on walkover */
                if (o_ptr->k_idx && !squelch_hide_item(o_ptr) &&
                     (p_ptr->lev >= ID_ON_WALKOVER_CL) && !blind &&
                     object_aware_p(o_ptr) && !object_known_p(o_ptr) && !(o_ptr->tval == TV_CHEST)) {
                        object_known(o_ptr);
/*
                        o_ptr->ident |= IDENT_MENTAL;
*/
                        if (squelch_hide_item(o_ptr)) {
                                object_desc(o_name, sizeof(o_name), o_ptr, TRUE, 3);
                                msg_format("You ignore %s.", o_name);
                        }
                }

Where to set IDENT_MENTAL may be tricky. I think I moved that around because of other stuff I modded. Who knows, you might not even want it set on walkover.

object2.c in object_known I added

Code:

        /* this next is for auto-inscribing artifacts on walkover */
        p_ptr->notice |= (PN_AUTOINSCRIBE);

I wanted autoinscriptions for artifact lights. I don't think you need that, but it won't hurt.

I don't know how difficult 3.0 truly is any more. I modded what I play to be more severe, and straight 3.0 is a distant memory. Still, it might be worth a shot. If you want a challenge, you may have to create it for yourself.

how long do you scum DL 90+ ?

how long do you scum DL 90+ ?

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