I know that I am very late to the party with this one but given my internet is preventing me from online games at the moment, I'm currently mucking around with offline ones. Having chewed my way through most of FTL (still haven't unlocked the damn Crystal ship) I turned my attention to a game that had been gathering dust in my library.
It is everything I really want in a roguelike - a good UI but with the merciless beatdown associated with ADOM and that other classic roguelike whose name escapes me (Cogwheel plays it).
So, over the past few days I have learned the following:
1) Necroeconomics is an awful tree and will often get me killed on the first level.
2) Magics such as Arthimancy and Pyromancy need a lot of support trees like Blood Mage, Ley Lines and Master of Magic in order to be effective.
3) If you pick Smithing, you will get nothing but Tinker recipes.
4) If you pick Tinkering, you will get nothing but Smith recipes.
5) If you pick both, you will never, EVER see a Steel Ingot anywhere.
6) MONSTER ZOOS.
7) MONSTER ZOOS.
8) Bolts of Mass Destruction sell ridiculously well.
At the moment, I'm mainly just mucking around with the various trees to see what works and what doesn't. If anyone wants to give me a few pointers in this regard (please don't just link to the Wiki) I'd appreciate it.
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You can always use more fire. With enough fire you can even burn through enemies that would resist smaller amounts of fire (though having a source of damage that isn't fire IS helpful. I like Psionics for it's level one single target damage nuke.). And all you really need to keep the fire coming is an extra point in Blood Magic at say 3rd or 4th level.
The rest is kiting and occasionally kicking people in the face. My best run to date was a Pyro/Bloodmage/Unarmed/Dodger focused character.
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My IA Award and some quotes:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kobold-Bard
Planning just wastes valuable time that could be spent doing.
8) Bolts of Mass Destruction sell ridiculously well.
Why are you selling them when they're the single most effective weapon you have against a monster zoo? Drop one into the middle of the mob and have your heart warmed by the death and destruction visited upon your enemies!
Why are you selling them when they're the single most effective weapon you have against a monster zoo? Drop one into the middle of the mob and have your heart warmed by the death and destruction visited upon your enemies!
I've gotten better use out of squid bolts than BMDs, mainly due to BMDs going off ridiculously close to me every time I've tried to use one (despite aiming far away), and having the BMD either kill me or leave me open for the next monster to look at me cause my death.
I'll +1 on the fire is amazingly useful and not to mention fun. I've also found a rather useful melee build:
weapon skill of choice/dual wielding/beserker/viking magic/big game hunter/were diggle/crafting skill of choice(usually buglary for me)
I ususally get beserker up to lvl4(?) when you get the ancestral body paint first, and then focus on dual wielding or the weapon skill. At least in my experience, if you're running a melee build and not getting ancestral body paint, your character is obnoxiously squishy. Also encrust everything with meat. Even encrust your meat encrustations with meat. Makes for a much easier go of it.
Squid Bolts and Brimstone Flasks tend to be better than Mass Destruction against zoos; Mass Destruction does have the advantage of destroying walls though.
Necro is incredibly powerful if you have enough Necro Resist and/or healing and/or curse removal to handle the debuffs. Pact of Fleeting Life is great healing itself if you can melee at all. Tenebrous Rift can kill 90% of a zoo with one or two casts.
For extra steel, you can take Clockwork Knight and/or Perception to cause monsters to randomly drop extra metal; Perception alone usually gives me 20 steel (and at least that much Iron) by floor 8 or so. And some cheese. And some pants.
...search function appears to have died. There was another Dredmor post that's probably past the necro time limit by now, but there should be some more discussion there (a lot of which has been obsoleted by patches and expansion packs, but eh :P )
My current playthrough is Clockwork Knight centred. I have the recipes for Chainsaw Axe, Chainsaw Ravager, Clockwork Shield, Imperial Clockwork Plate and Clockwork Limb.
Am I better off going with the Limb or the Shield? I have the Shield skill tree.
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For this game I've just been grabbing a load of mods from steamworks, giving me loadsa skills when combined with all the expansions, and then pressing random and trying with what it gives me. That, plus the my slight ineptitude means I tend to not get far...
Am I better off going with the Limb or the Shield? I have the Shield skill tree.
The Limb is a Ring slot, IIRC, so eventually the answer is 'both' (although if you run across the recipe I prefer the Ring of Thorns for its very high block + counter combo.) If you want to know which one to make first given limited resources, get the shield.
and that other classic roguelike whose name escapes me (Cogwheel plays it).
Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup/dear god how do people still remember this LP.
Despite my loathing for necrowhatsit, I feel compelled to defend it. It is, as long as it's not your sole source of damage (I hear melee/mage hybrid is good for this), pretty amazing, but you'll need necro resist, especially early on.
Also I haven't really kept up with the game in some time, so there's that. But I think some of the encrusts in the Wizardlands expansion also make the necromantic damage backfire off these spells pretty laughable. Alchemy, was it?
Which reminds me, alchemy solves your mana issues nicely for the most part (Blood Mage is still amazing, though) with infini-alcohol.
Also I haven't really kept up with the game in some time, so there's that. But I think some of the encrusts in the Wizardlands expansion also make the necromantic damage backfire off these spells pretty laughable. Alchemy, was it?
None of the default ones. Might be a hidden recipe that does it.. there's a weapon crust that adds necromantic damage, but no resist.
Quote:
Which reminds me, alchemy solves your mana issues nicely for the most part (Blood Mage is still amazing, though) with infini-alcohol.
They nerfed crafting outputs pretty hard; you won't get *that* much extra alcohol from alchemy these days. It's still nice for turning Sewer Grog and bottles of Hard Cider/Pear Wine into more potent boozes before said boozes start showing up naturally, but the overall amount of MP regeneration you get isn't that much larger (except in Sewer Grog -> Rotgut, I think that one just about doubles the available regen.) Still nice to have, and you can make your own mana potions for 'oh crap I need more mana RIGHT NOW' moments.. but again, nerfed craft output (and cluttering up the item tables, so Aluminum is relatively rarer now) means you probably won't get the stacks of 200 potions you used to be able to make.
I'm totally (re-)addicted to Dredmor at the moment, feels like I'm only just starting to grasp the secrets of survival. I defeated Dredmor once on DMPD, and now I'm trying for going Rogue.
My current build is also focused on Clockwork Knight, and it's by FAR the most succesful Going Rogue run I've ever had (at level 8 right now). It's also my first serious crafting build, and I'm really realizing its power. I have almost full Clockwork gear with the most powerful encrusts I could find on everything, and right now I'm doing pretty well.
I'll be reaching 100% block soon, and then I only have to fear magical assault. I think this could defeat Dredmor unless I make some stupid mistake (like I always do).
I usually prefer rogues or mages, though. With rogues I like to focus on maxing burglary early on, and then (with luck) steal some stupidly overpowered high-end equipment from Brax at level 1-2 and steamroll everything for a while - SO much fun.
I used to prefer Promethean magic for mages, but I've found that both Necronomiconomics and Egyptian Magic does its schtick (killing zoos/big groups) better.
Of course, they both have some pretty hefty drawbacks (necro can kill you, egyptian is insanely mana-hungry), but if you built around the drawbacks you'll explode everything. Egyptian is especially potent when you get a full sandstorm going, even if they "nerfed" it a little bit last patch.
Overall I prefer mages, mainly because your feeling when encountering a monster zoo with a warrior or rogue tends to be "oh well, this will probably take a while, better go slow and careful" - whereas an AOE-focused mage goes "IT'S PARTY TIME!".
Last edited by Corlindale : 10-27-2012 at 12:47 PM.
This thread reminded me that I bought the game a few month ago, but had never gotten around to playing it. So I started up a roguish character on the easiest difficulty. And proceeded to die a lot. (No permadeath for me.) I was so proud of myself when I realized I could clear about half a floor (the second one) without dying.
For a change, I decided to roll up a mage as well. Who proceeded to die without getting any XP whatsoever... And then died several more times, each time with me adjusting her skills a little. I finally put one together that allowed me to get to the second floor, although by now, she is a mix of rogue and mage.
The game is a lot of fun, but wow is it hard. I am amazed that anyone can beat it on GRPD!
Edit: I am not one who plays games for the difficulty. I tend to play on Easy or Normal most of the time, so anyone that plays harder impresses me.
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Me: Having defeated the evil necromancer queen with your homosexuality, you gain 750 experience. Now kindly die in a hole.
-- Fiendish_Dire_Moose
Yeah, it takes a while to learn what'll let you survive those first couple of levels. Armor (starts you with actual armor), Viking Magic (Power of Magic Steel is an *awesome* buff) and Psionics (sleep and if you survive a level Shove is strictly overpowered) are pretty good. If you don't have a good first-level skill, well, you mostly are hoping you find a decent weapon so you can survive long enough to put enough points in your skills to become effective.
I never have problem with floor 1, but always seem to get overconfident and subsequently killed on floors below that, and if not that, then something explodes and kills me anyway...
Edit: Yep, happened again. Cleared out the Floor 2 monster zoo, then got completely curbstomped by the invisible guardian of one of Inconsequentia's trinkets, which killed me in two hits.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JaronK
Frankly, a Wizard can suck even more than a Fighter could ever dream of sucking. A Fighter can stab himself to death, but only a Wizard could Plane Shift to some horrible far realm to be tortured for an eternity of insanity.
There are any number of Let's Play threads on here but I wonder about a Vs Play of Dungeons of Dredmor.
The goal is for two people to run through the game as per a normal Let's Play each looking to see who can get the highest score. However, the difficultly level and theme would be picked for the two contestants by the audience. For example, the audience suggests "Pets" as the theme and the two contestants make a skillbuild based on it, so one might go for Golemancer + Fleshweaver, the other might go for Psionics and Hunter Diggles.
Would this idea work and would anyone be interested? =)
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Yeah, level 1 can truly be a pain if you've chosen a build that doesn't really start with a good weapon/power and with no armor. Odds are you won't even be able to kill a Diggle without any offensive power, so the first level becomes a matter of using the environment and desperately hoping to find something useful until you gain a level/find a weapon.
Battle Geology is also an amazing skill for early levels, with the permanent buff that gives +5 melee power - much better than any weapons you might hope to start with - and it even makes *softballs* a deadly and safe offense early on.
->Succubus: Sounds like a cool idea, I might be interested. It's always fun to try out new builds and leave the comfort zone, that's also why I've been enjoying trying out random builds on GRPD (though I often die on the first floor!). I'm probably going to do horribly in any contest, though, because I tend to die a lot to stupid mistakes and overconfidence
EDIT: Another option would be to make the audience pick a number of skills the contestants have to use, and then they can freely fill in the rest as they wish.
Last edited by Corlindale : 10-29-2012 at 05:32 AM.
I've beaten the game once (on normal difficulty with permadeath) by going pure melee. By the end, all the defensive skills were enough to drop my regen time to 1 round, I had well over 100% block and enough armour to ignore most things.
Only things with heavy elemental damage were a threat and I saved up thrown weapons/bolts for them.
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Spoiler
Medium Humanoid
Str 26, Dex 26, Con 26, Int 25, Wis 25, Cha 25
Speed: 90 ft
Initiative: +12
(1d4(max)+20)hp (27 hp)
AC 37 (touch 32, flat-footed 29)
Attack: Dagger: +34 melee, (d4+28)
Greater dispel magic, haste, see invisibility (CL 15, 3/day each)
Fire & cold resistance 10
DR 10/epic
SR 40
Fast healing 20
Ref: 18 Will: 17 Fort: 18
Feats: Improved Initiative, Weapon focus (dagger), toughness Yes, it's a paragon commoner (CR 15.5). Rawr!
Would this idea work and would anyone be interested? =)
Yes!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Corlindale
EDIT: Another option would be to make the audience pick all the skills the contestants have to use, and then they can freely choose which skills to level from there
Fixed that for you.
Edit: So long as I'm not paried up with Cogwheel anyways . Cogwheel + Roguelike = roguelike weeping in the nearest corner
Last edited by Wookieetank : 10-29-2012 at 08:25 AM.
Aaah, my Clockwork Knight just perished at level 15 Got careless while fighting simple regular mobs, and suddenly my health was all gone. Stupid! I didn't even meet Lord Dredmor, despite having stocked up on everything I could possibly need to defeat him.
It's my own fault for rushing things, I guess. I had kept a steady pace until level 12, then I decided that I had all the levels and gear I needed and skipped ahead to 15.
It's my own fault for rushing things, I guess. I had kept a steady pace until level 12, then I decided that I had all the levels and gear I needed and skipped ahead to 15.
You probably did have everything you needed; the lower Diggle God levels are often a bit pointless if you full-cleared all the previous levels. Only real reason I can think of to sweep them is if you have a specific Diggle God you're trying to get the blessing of, there's a craft recipe you want that you still haven't found, or you're trying to break the Zorkmid counter by selling off all those Lirpas and Serpentine Platemails and assorted other 11+ star value items you find scattered around the floor.
Also, put me down for another interested in Let's Play Vs.
A let's play VS does sound pretty fun, and I've been meaning to get back into Dredmor; I bought the latest DLC there a while ago, but I haven't touched in it ages since I got bored with my BURN EVERYTHING WITH FIRE, EVEN FIRE ITSELF pyromancer which just brute-forced through everything with no difficulty.
So yeah, I'll be up for a VS let's play, if we get one going.
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I guess two people either former a BFF-Rivalry or a Not-Gonna-Let-That-Sombitch-Beat-ME rivalry, then the audience set the rules of engagement, then we go from there.
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2e Exalted Player/ST.
My IA Award and some quotes:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kobold-Bard
Planning just wastes valuable time that could be spent doing.
Well, what I'll do is I'll draw up a list of interested parties at the end of the week and roll a dice a few times. It'll just be 1 v 1 or would how would people like to run it?
Perhaps have one episode per level and see how it goes?
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. Cogwheel + Roguelike = roguelike weeping in the nearest corner 
Got careless while fighting simple regular mobs, and suddenly my health was all gone. Stupid! I didn't even meet Lord Dredmor, despite having stocked up on everything I could possibly need to defeat him. 
