Have you ever ascended?
What codes of conduct did you follow?
What character class did you play?
Were there any stupid deaths or close calls for stupid deaths?
http://www.nethack.org/ for those who don’t know about this game.
I’ve never ascended. The furthest I’ve ever gotten was the Big Room.
I’ve ascended twice, in the “easy” classes: Valkyrie and Barbarian. Come bloody close with a Samurai three times, as in, died on the planes.
Stupid deaths? Thousands, after all, I’ve played since the days of Rogue and Hack on my trusty 88086. I used to be a save-scummer, and could never win. After breaking myself of such a filthy habit, I got significantly better, and was able to beat the game. I’m guessing by the phrasing of your you questions, raisinbread, that you save games in case you die. I’d recommend stopping; it will probably improve your game remarkably. (If I’m mistaken, I apologize.)
This is the greatest, most intriguing, and by far the most satisfying game ever invented.
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Justin
Hmm, I don’t see anything in the OP that suggests save file cheating. I agree that it ruins the fun of the game though (and invalidates any possible bragging rights).
Anyway, I ascended VTBHEPCRKASW in version 3.2.2, in that order. The first time was a Big Deal. I went up on the roof and celebrated with a couple of beers. Many people play for years without getting there. After you’ve done it once it gets much much easier.
I had some self-imposed conduct restrictions. I didn’t genocide anything on my first ascension, didn’t use any wishes on the second, and didn’t polypile on some of the others. I never attempted the really crazy things like completing the game without eating.
My stupidest death was Banth the Barbarian who choked to death on a fortune cookie in the castle. Some free advice: don’t go for dessert after you eat a dragon.
I used to be a regular on r.g.r.n., but I eventually shook the addiction and lost interest.
…Although I did just start up a Tourist in 3.4.0. Argh, maybe it’s impossible to get completely free.
I’ve ascended, but I back up my saved games. You can gripe about all you want, but it’s just blah blah blah to me, pal. If you want to put days of work into a poor digger just to have him die because he fumbled his cockatrice corpse while going down some stairs, be my guest, buddy.
I just started playing this again-- it’s like smoking or some other horrible addiction. I’ve never ascended, and I’ve played on and off for a couple of years-- I have gotten the XXXX, XXXX and XXXXXX and gotten to the vibrating XXXXX before but after that things went horribly wrong. I have no qualms about genociding and wishing-- I feel sort of bad when I recharge a wand of wishing, though. I played archaeologists for a while but now am into elves-- I like being fast AND auto-searching and casting spells.
I can’t really imagine winning. I think it’s become something without a long term goal, like the Sims, for me.
Once I discovered poly-piling winning became somewhat trivial. Just survive the first 10 levels or so and it quickly became rote. The newer versions supposedly discourage poly-piling but I tried it last year and it seemed to work almost as well.
All deaths are stupid deaths. But picking up that cockatrice corpse when you forgot to put your gloves on is stupider than most.
What exactly is poly-piling?
You take all sorts of stuff, leather armor, Orc knives, bad scrolls, dubious potions, useless rings and tools, etc. Well, in short everything you can pick up that’s not useful and put them in a big pile (or a row of piles if they all won’t fit). Then you zap it with a wand of polymorph (or any other polymorphing spell, etc.) Then go thru the piles, pick out the good stuff, zap it again, etc.
There’s a lot of other stuff that goes along with it involving generating blessed water, blank scrolls and stuff to write with and how to keep wands going (in the old version anyway), but I’ll leave that to you to figure out.
Anyone try the TNG variant? I have an English translation (TNG is usually in Japanese) around somewhere, love playing the Hacker. Nice change of pace from Nethack and Slash’Em.
I infer it by the wording of his questions. To me, he (she?) was asking for details of ascensions, i.e., class, conduct, and stupid deaths along the way. Given that stupid deaths are meant to be final, no ascensions could follow one in the same game without savescumming. Maybe I read too much into the questions.
**
I know a very patient soul who did a foodless monk. He’s hoping to pull off a foodless atheist monk soon. Yikes. My only conducts now are genocide-less and wand of wishing-less. I’ll still take wishes from thrones, potions, and the like. Otherwise, it’s just not challenging enough, and I start to get bored.
**
Really? Me too. I read it avidly for a few years, then abruptly got tired of it. Same threads, over and over again.
I still fire it up every now and again, even playing it after something like Halo or Medal of Honor gets too dull. I think that’s the mark of a true classic.
–
Justin
Yeah, you do read way too much into questions because I made no inference towards save scumming at all with my four questions.
I’ve been playing off and on since the fall of 1992. Mostly off but my wife has come to recognize the glaze in my eye when I’ve entered and “on” phase.
I’ve ascended once. A Valkyrie.
Stupidest death? How to distinguish among thousands. Up there is the time a very high tourist (the only “very high tourist” I’ve ever had) wanted to eat a ration. Unfortunately the intentory letter for that item was “y” and I was standing over a cockatrice.
No matter how long I play I’ll never remember to slow down and read messages.
Another death was a very powerful wizard in Gehemmon. I was battling something and losing (I’d lost my weapon to a nymph) and and finally killed all comers. I was at 2hp or something. And immediately walked into a known fire trap.
Of course then there are the games where all goes right and you have gray dragon scale mail, a powerful weapon, gauntlets of power, and a blessed bag of holding by the third level.
Flipped me out the very first time I ran into a bones level. I found a huge pile of goodies, just unattended in the middle of a level. As I’m going through all these things it occurs to me…
Hey, this was MY stuff!
Then I learned about how most items in a bones level are cursed…
:smack:
ADOM (Ancient domains of mystery) is also worth trying out.It has outdoor adventuring , well implemented quests, and a great skill sytem. I find the interface more intuitive as well.
[Adom link](http://www.aleph-null.com/adom/)Rats. Now I have to come up with something harder. Foodless monk is my toughest ascension so far.
Maybe a wishless, foodless monk next time…
Just out of curiosity, how do you manage to survive without food?
I was just killed by a newt.
I’ve managed to ascend three times: a dwarven Valkyrie, a human Tourist, and an orcish Ranger. That’s after, oh, about seven freakin’ years of playing this game off and on. I figure I’ll consider myself a master of this game when I ascend a gnomish healer.
No particular favourite character class (I usually choose “random”), and no particular conducts, except that I usually don’t wish for artifacts, and I don’t polypile often.
Only one really stupid death stands out…playing an Elf (back in version 3.2.3) I had found the amulet but hadn’t gotten out of Gehennom yet. Enter the Wizard of Yendor, who promptly double-troubled…one Wizard took the amulet, and the other stole my Palantir. Then they teleported (so I didn’t know which was which), then one Wizard escaped upstairs while the other jumped down a hole to the next level below. I got so frustrated having to chase two Wizards of Yendor all around Gehennom that I started getting careless…so much so that I accidentally tried to use a cursed unicorn horn. Sigh…that character was so close to becoming my first ascension…
Judicious use of praying, potions of fruit juice (I think), and acquiring a ring of slow digestion ASAP. Staying unburdened helps, and being as fat as possible. He also spent lots of time planning his moves carefully to have as few unneeded steps as is feasible. Oh, and lots of luck, both in-game and IRL.
Naturally, he found not one, but TWO horns of plenty.
One of the hardest things about it was the inability to eat corpses for the various intrinsics, and the risk of getting crowned too early, which increases your prayer timeout.
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Justin
I’ve ascended once…
My most hilarious death:
“killed by an unwise tinning decision”