Do You Want Your Possessions Identified? Let's Play NetHack

Not really. It actually sucked a great damn deal.

Archaeologist on the other hand was an awesome class, especially to learn the game with. I feel like I learned a lot of very useful tactics that people who start out with Wizard or Samurai or Valkyrie don't. (But maybe I'm just deluding myself.)

Like last time --

ASCII Link: http://mysite.verizon.net/res10gez0/...LP07bASCII.htm
Tiles Link: http://mysite.verizon.net/res10gez0/...LP07bTiles.htm

In our last episode, we had a near death experience with a giant corpse far deadlier than the giant itself had ever been. Thus, we've decided it's a good time to find religion.



While temples can always be found in Minetown, they also occur in the wild on the deeper dungeon levels. Again, we have a priest with an alignment different than mine, so no sacrificing on this altar.

Later we’ll kill the priest and sacrifice him on his own altar. Being chaotic is awesome.



First though, I give the priest a large pile of money. He repays me by improving my armor class by three. Priests don’t care which alignment you are as long as you give them money, you’ll get AC.

I can still use the altar to check my inventory’s curse status too, and do so.



My next stop is a jewelry store, where they sell rings, glass fraudulently sold as gems, mimics sold as something that won’t try to kill you.

Now, rings can be very good, but the problem remains that I still don’t have a freaking means of identification (seriously, it’s the most common scroll in the game.)

What other methods reveal themselves to us? I pile up all the rings, record the prices, and pick up every ring with a duplicate (including copies of rings already in my inventory.)



I then dump all the rings down the sink and see what they do. This is called “throwing money down the drain,” but less efficiently. If anything useful comes up, I can buy their counterparts in the shop (which is why I didn’t take unique rings.)

Sustain ability is good in the early game (it prevents your stats from changing, so you can wear it while eating poisonous corpses to prevent strength loss,) but not worth much after you find a unicorn horn.



Regeneration is very good, and I might buy this. I’d definitely have gotten it were it not for the scale mail. Regeneration significantly increases food consumption, but makes recovering HP much faster. Especially in the wizard early game, I’ve appreciated it a lot – it means you get better quickly while running away.

The food consumption thing hasn’t been obvious, but for most of the time I’ve been able to get enough food just by corpses laying around, so much that I’m usually about to become satiated. In any case, the situations I’m concerned about generally murder me fast enough that my HP wouldn’t have time to regenerate.

If only I found something to regenerate spell energy faster.



This is a ring of polymorph control. If you polymorph yourself while wearing it, you get to choose what you polymorph into. I plan to play with this later, but it’s of limited useful right now. Since I have magic resistance and protection from shape changers, polymorph isn’t something scary to me, and polymorphing myself isn’t on the radar for quite some time.



I screenshotted this one just because I found the sink eating things amusing. Rings of hunger do exactly what they sound like they do.

Okay, so none of the rings are game changers (the prices indicate that the most important rings aren’t in this store.) Unhappy, I take my rage out on the hapless sink, kicking it so rapidly that you think I’m Chun Lee.



Now, what would you expect to happen if you kicked a sink?

Yes, that’s right, an incubus has come out to play. Please note that the next section is NSFW.



I take off all of my clothes, and lie with the incubus. It immediately takes me to level thirteen, another step on my road to maturity (note that level 13 required me to double my existing XP normally.)

Yes, this is exactly how I plan to get myself to level fourteen. Now we just need to put our clothes back on, find this guy, and do it (him) again.

Succubi and incubi are very amusing aspects of Nethack. Essentially, they can seduce you for various effects, some positive, some negative. If you do get seduced, all your clothing gets removed (this means it’s a bad idea while surrounded by powerful monsters to take a little siesta.) Females can only be seduced by incubi and males by succubi (yes, there is a sexual orientation patch that changes this.) Later on, I might use an amulet of change to change my sex temporarily in order to exhaust all the succubi in the dungeon once I’ve run out of incubi.

The encounter is controlled by my charisma and intelligence. For each article of clothing, you have a chance of your charisma divided by twenty that your lover will ask before taking them off. Moreover, the higher your charisma, the less likely it is that you’ll have to pay for the encounter.

The probability that the intimacy turns out positively is affected by the sum of charisma and intelligence – it’s equal to (Intelligence + Charisma + 1)/35. Thus, I need one more point of charisma (or something boosting my intelligence further) to always be satisfied, but my odds are excellent already. Wizards make out like bandits at this part.

After the encounter, the paramour teleports away, and gets a headache. While they’re with a headache, they’ll simply attack you rather than do anything nice. You just have to wait it out at this point.

There are multiple effects of the encounter. Positive effects includes increasing my constitution, wisdom, and refilling my HP. Even better, they can also both refill and increase my power, and increase my level. The negative effects are the reverse of the above – decreasing the status, draining your magic, and decreasing your level. Note that all but draining your magic are pretty easily reversed, and unlikely at this point.

This, and other public service announcements about these public displays of affection can be found at http://www.nethack.de/spoiler330/succubi.txt .

Yes, Nethack combined dating games and long tedious random dungeons that all look the same before Tartarus was even a glimmer in your eyes.



After the encounter, I suit back up and attack the gold golem while waiting for a few more rounds. Touching things after an encounter removes your armor is one of the classic Nethack ways to die.



Yes, yes, now I have to find something else to do while waiting for him to recover his libido. Otherwise I could accidentally kill him.



Yes, I hit the 1/35 chance of a bad effect, and it decided to be the effect most devastating to me. Now I get to wait around while my energy returns to the proper levels.



Affair number three.



I descend another dungeon level for awhile to recharge for a bit and look for anything interesting. Early results don’t look good.

So I give up and go back upstairs. I see fire giants, inspiring me to kill and eat them. In addition to boosting strength if applicable, I can also receive fire resistance from fire giants, and do (surprisingly) on my first try.

Giants can carry around and throw boulders at you. One way to damage your luck in Sokoban is to polymorph into a giant and move in between boulders to push them (you can’t pick boulders in Sokoban up.) However, you can, without penalty, summon giants or turn into a giant, go down into the dungeon proper, pick up a boulder, and then use that in Sokoban.



Paydirt. Not only did I gain my fourteenth level, I got my power restored. That’s all we need, enough with this vale of tears.



Your quest is a set of levels unique to your class where you accept a mission to regain a powerful artifact from a powerful being that has stolen it. Each class has their own set of levels, artifact, leader, and nemesis. Finishing the quest is required to beat the game.



In the case of the Wizard, even if it wasn’t required, there’s no way in hell I would pass it up. Let’s go to the tower of darkness!

Special tip – don’t kill your quest leader (especially before you finish the quest.) It will not end well. However, one of my favorite hobbies is feeding the friends of the quest leader ambling aimlessly around to pets – they often have useful equipment.



I find two spellbooks in the chest, and lock myself in to read them.



I get the spells of cure sickness, wizard lock, and cancellation. Cancellation is too hard for me to cast right now, but will be strong when we improve our abilities with matter spells. Cure sickness has a forty percent failure rate, but the fact that sickness tends to kill you so quickly means that such a rate isn’t quite acceptable. It can be used for improving healing spells enough to get to basic level, and thus able to cast it perfectly.

Wizard lock will lock a given door, and can even create doors out of nothingness solely for the purpose of locking them. It’s of marginal utility (though it can be helpful if you’re trying to seal off an area to do something slightly dangerous, like playing in pools of water to dilute potions.) The best thing about it is that it’s a matter spell, and thus I can use it as a springboard for improving that school (for one thing, this could allow me to cancellation, and later on, polymorph.)



We stash the books near the stairs and start to dive (yes, you go down to get to the tower of darkness.)



Yes, yes, I actually went from the encounter with the incubus directly to my quest leader utterly naked. I’m sure that made a positive impression on them and all those apprentices in the middle of the tower. “This was a very educational experience.”

I’ve got to be a bit less absentminded.



I find a wand of speed monster, and immediately zap it at myself. It has no immediate effects, but increased my natural speed. Thus if I end up swapping out the speed boots temporarily later on, my character will still be fast, though not quite as fast.



This actually doesn’t mean much, there are more dungeon levels to go.



Oh good, another cloudy outdoors level. I kill the tengus and bats endemic to the wizard quest and continue forth.



I score with a spellbook of light. In addition to the nice effect of permanently lighting whichever areas I cast it, it also quickly increases my divination (and that spell school is spectacular.) I’ve been hoping for this.



Sick of not having identify, I read the scroll I have the most of, and detect all the food on the level. Well, I’m glad I can now detect food. Anyhow, no other possible candidates present themselves.

The very first wish I ever received in Nethack was used on a scroll of identify, five years ago.

(To the ASCII people – sorry, I’ve done my best, but only managed a tile version of this shot.)

Yes, once again I had to try every single bloody wall before I found the one place with a secret door that I could break through. Being a master of arcane forces isn’t all that it is cracked up to be.



In case it wasn’t obvious, breaking through this part of the tower (or hole in the ground, because the staircases still go downward) was really bloody tedious.



We descend into another dungeon-like quest level, and play with a uranium wand (which I’ve been told has no long-term effect on your health.) It turns to be slow monster, which isn’t really worth the weight at this point.

I encounter a xorn, which are fun enemies that move through walls and can eat rocky objects. I zap him to death.



I find a gray spellbook, but it causes me great pain to read (indicating it’s probably cursed.) We’ll pick it up on our way back and uncurse it to see if it’s something interesting.



On a happier note, I find a wand of lightning. It can also burn the word Elbereth into the ground, and hits harder than wands of fire. This is a great find.



This is, I believe, the last dungeon level where the enemy resides. My strategy is to mainly attack and scurry up the stairs to heal whenever things look remotely scary.

Of course, the outcome of our courageous stand won't be revealed until next time. I can tell you right now though, it's scary. But if I prevail, well, let us just say that Dez won't have to wait until the end to become a demi-goddess.

I don't think they've been mentioned yet, but with all the hoohah over tiles, the Vulture branch might be interesting to some (heretical, blasphemous) folk.

Rawk.

I've never gotten past the gnome village in nethack, so this is all pretty intimidating stuff to me.

I am a ASCII partisan but if you're ASCII-llergic then I'd say Vulture's is a far better choice than most of the tilesets (the exception being Geoduck's tileset that Bongo Bill pointed out, because that tileset is really good).

I love this LP, I have no mind or patience for the dozen hundred arcane things there are to do in this game but it's fun to see in action.

Last night, I had a nightmare that Dez got killed by a poisoned arrow, and I got the dreaded message -- "Do you want your possessions identified?" It took me awhile to convince myself it didn't happen.

Some people dream in black and white. I dream in ASCII.

'spect knux

Also I approve of the suggestion of trying out different tilesets. I mean, as long as we're being unauthentic anyway...

For those of us not in the know (i.e. me), how far is Dez in the game at this point?

Depends on how you look at it. In terms of actual amount of dungeon traversed, still pretty early. (There are 50-ish levels.)

In terms of gameplay, pretty far. Netbrian is ridiculously well-equipped and has a lot of important intrinsics. Typically you don't want to descend down into the second half of the dungeon without magic/poison/fire resistance, some form of telepathy, reflection, and a negative AC. Our intrepid Dez has all that plus some other neat toys. Wait until you see what she gets at the end of her Quest.

What typically happens is the early game is a ridiculous uphill climb to get all your ducks in a row, then once you get them it's about 30 dungeon levels of mind-numbing tedium, then an incredibly exhilirating endgame sequence.

We're already farther than *I've* ever gotten, that's for sure. Hooray for resistances.

Wizards (and Valkyries) are basically all but unstoppable if they survive their class quests. Valks get max strength and Mojolnir (think by the Hammer of Thor, which returns to your hand when thrown, so you melee and ranged with the same thing). Wizards get a TON of new spellbooks (which cannot be emphasized enough; Netbrian has nearly tripled his arsenal of spells even before fighting the last boss) and the Eye which...you'll see.

Rangers too. That was the third and last class i ascended. You get the Bow of Diana...which magically creates arrows of random enchantment every hundred or so turns.

Having a quiver of 500 +6 blessed arrows and shooting three at a time is even more broken than the multiple-dagger throw (i carry so many because they often break, and dont' want to enchant all over again and risk the new arrows not stacking)

I wonder if there's ever been a serious (by which I mean obsessed with completing a run) roguelike player who didn't have a dream like that.

Basically, barring bad luck and stupid errors, this is an ascension if he finished the class quest boss. Congrats!

I'm enjoying this LP quite a bit. It's tempting me to try this game out, but I'm not sure I have the time to dedicate towards learning all the intricacies I'd need to actually have a chance at beating it. I do love this window into the complexities of the game through someone who knows all about it.

I just read this whole LP in one sitting, and I'm completely sold. I know I don't have the free time to play this damn game myself, but reading it has been amazingly entertaining. I'd also be in favor of seeing the Vulture mod in action. Thanks Netbrian!

Well, I’m back. We’re about to face the perilous quest. If we win, a powerful game-changing artifact will be ours.

As usual, the different versions for purists --

ASCII -- http://mysite.verizon.net/res10gez0/...hackLP08aA.htm
Tiles -- http://mysite.verizon.net/res10gez0/...hackLP08aT.htm



Wait a minute. Who is Lyll? What happened to Dez? Actually, wasn’t Dez about to finish the quest?

Well, erm, let’s back up a bit.

” Basically, barring bad luck and stupid errors, this is an ascension if he finished the class quest boss. Congrats!”



I think this falls under the “really, really stupid errors” category. Remember what I said happens if you overeat in Nethack?

Yes. You die.

What’s the best way to describe this experience? Well, this is Talking Time, so I’ll assume you’ve all played Persona 3. This is best compared to the final boss of that game, which has a fiendish tendency to, hours into the battle, inflict you all with charm and instantly kill you. It feels kind of like that.

The exception being, of course, that it takes longer to beat the final boss of Persona 3 than it does to beat most of Nethack itself.

So, the last several days have been spent playing through Nethack characters (with an infant mortality higher than a 10th century peasant), trying to get one to where Dez was. Originally I took screenshots of their progress, but as the death toll grew, I gave up. You didn’t miss much – ever seen someone start with a ring of conflict, a ring of slow digestion, and a spellbook of identify get eaten by a unicorn? I have.

Twice.

So, finally, I created Lyll, named after the awesome character in Legacy of the Wizard. She had the same unassuming start as Dez, her second spell being Wizard Lock and no useful rings. However, she managed to triumph, and clawed her way back to where we left off.

After this experience, all I can say is that I think games where the death mechanic is “bump you back to your last save” is incredibly generous.



Lyll races through her dungeon, heedless of the danger before her.

The first thing you might notice is that Lyll’s strength is twenty-five, well above the Elvish maximum. This is because Lyll wears gauntlets of power (appropriate for a Legacy of the Wizard character), which boost your strength, but interfere with spellcasting.

That brings us to another one of the differences between the two sisters. Unlike Dez, Lyll still hasn’t found a spellbook of magic missile, which is the essential Wizard spell. This means that Lyll relies much more on melee combat and throwing daggers, even now. Due to this, the trade-off the gauntlets offer is more attractive than it otherwise would be. They offer significant bonuses to carrying capacity, melee damage and missile damage. And make it easier to kick things.



There we go, back here again. This place is filled with vampire bats. Lyll didn’t have much trouble getting poison resistance, but she will have to deal with the bats hand to hand.



It doesn’t take long. Whenever I’m not satiated (yes, I learn from my mistakes), I eat the vampire bat corpses. The less food I have to carry, the better.



The Wizard quest includes several peaceful prisoners. Even as a chaotic, I get no benefit from killing and eating them, but I still feel obliged to let them out. Unfortunately, I have no idea who “Newt the Wizard” is, or what it’s a reference to.

I approach the lair of the boss, the dark one. After this horrific battle behind me, I can only guess what’s ahead – the last time I fought him was truly epic, going up and down levels as I slowly, slowly poked away at him, until at last he gave up the ghost. I stood, triumphant and covered in blood.



Here’s an unabridged, unedited transcript of the battle –

What do you want to zap? (wand of death)

In which direction? Southeast

You kill the Dark One!



This was somewhat less than Wagnerian. When Nethack says wand of death, they mean a freaking wand of death. None of this “insta-death spells don’t work on anything you could possibly want to bother with them on” nonsense.

I take my new toy up to the top..



Well, thanks. That means I get to keep this (like a chaotic character would ever give away an awesomely powerful artifact she could use.)



Yes, I somehow managed to find boots of speed again.

The Eye of Aethiopica is a truly incredible artifact. The first, minor effect is that of an amulet of ESP. Within a certain radius, I sense all non-mindless monsters, giving me excellent warning as to what’s ahead.

However, what truly makes the Eye incredible is the main effect. Remember how we had to carefully conserve our spellpower throughout Dez’s quest, using every chance we had to let our pet or our daggers do the work?

That’s over now. The Eye supercharges your energy regeneration to several points per every step or two. For all intents and purposes, I can cast spells with abandon, my reserves nearly limitless.



I return upstairs, to what became my home base. The bugbear over there a peaceful monster that had been wandering around. Lyll already sacrificed as much as I intend to for the rest of the game.



We stop to blast a cockatrice to death (yes, I’m using Force Bolt. Yes, it still sucks). Cockatrices are infamous Nethack machinations – anyone that touches their bare flesh to a cockatrice or their corpse is instantly killed. On one hand, this makes them very tricky to deal with – if you accidentally offer them without gloves on, this kills you. Their corpses are, if anything, even more dangerous than the normal monster. Wandering around blind? Touch a cockatrice corpse without gloves and it’s game over.

On the other hand, they have their benefits. If you wield a cockatrice corpse (while wearing gloves of course), almost any monster you hit will be instantly turned to stone. This includes the games most powerful monsters and boss enemies – the only exceptions tend to be creatures made out of stone already. This can rather help you out in a jam.

I can’t take chances though – I blast it at a range and leave the corpse.



We go into an armor shop, but it seems to be missing a shopkeeper.

How mysterious.

Well, early in the game, Lyll got the pony she always wanted. However, n a freak magical accident (and by accident, I meant “I dragged the pony on and off a polymorph trap for five minutes”), the pony (nicknamed “Deathpony”) was transformed into a powerful golden Naga. The new pet could not be controller – she rampaged through shops devouring shopkeepers (ironically, she eventually died when, after an epic battle with yet another doomed shopkeeper where she eked out a victory, it was promptly eaten by a tiny mimic.)

This was no fault of Lyll’s own, but she did take the opportunity to loot the shopkeeper’s wares, and even better, their bodies. This is one stop on this path of destruction.

Unfortunately, it’s not a stop with much to offer me. I can’t use any heavy armor, and already have the gloves and boots I want.



This was my first base camp, on the same level as the Gnomish mines. You can see my wading pool where I watered down my potions to the left.

I loot the chest, and then examine my inventory – I have plans.

First, my inventory. I have the same Magicbane we saw last time around, and a quiver of daggers. The Eye we saw earlier is there, as is the cloak of magic resistance, the pointy hat, and the speed boots. I’m also carrying a robe, dropped by a priest in the middle of an unfortunate Naga attack. The robe improves my chances of successfully casting a spell, and is useful when using difficulty utility spells.

This around, I did manage to get a magic whistle. One toot on this whistle will teleport all pets to your vicinity. This makes leading your hordes through the dungeon much easier, since you don’t have to keep up with them. The touchstone, when applied, will automatically identify gems for me (this is useful when dealing with unicorns.)

The Bell of Opening? It’s one of the three plot coupons we need later on.

Nethack veterans will notice one thing I don’t have – a source of reflection. Sokoban didn’t have on this time around, and I wasn’t able to find one in the dungeon. I also haven’t had a wish yet, making getting reflection much more problematic. I resist nearly everything, so most attacks don’t bother me, but it means that if I get hit by, say, lightning, my rings and wands will be toast.



I was about to show people the entire contents of my bag of holding, but it’d be just one long neverending page of junk.

Lyll brims with ill-gotten gold, most from the shopkeepers Deathpony killed, but some from vaults too. One of the nice things about priests is that after you donate a satisfactory amount of money to them, you can simply feed them to your pet, get your money refunded, and go on to the next priest. The AC bonus you get from donation sticks around.

The water walking boots and the oilskin cloak will be used later on. An oilskin cloak means it’s much harder to grab me, but it’s a very situational item.

The gauntlets of dexterity (which are not metallic) provide a bonus to dexterity equal to their enchantment bonus (so a +2 set of gauntlets give you +2 dexterity, as opposed to gauntlets of power which simply set your strength to 25.) Since, unlike gauntlets of power, gauntlets of dexterity don’t interfere with spellcasting, I eventually plan to move these into my permanent armor set.

The rings are mostly junk, but levitation will be useful.



Now, I engage in a Nethack yard sale. I take my junk pile, spread it over recklessly the dungeon, instead of trying to con my friends into buying it, polymorph it repeatedly.

Polymorph – oh, this is fun. Zap it, and any monster or item nearby is transformed into something different. In the most trivial cases, it means that rather than running away from dangerous monsters, I can simply turn them into a newt and eat them.

Some people will tame cats or dogs in this fashion, and polymorph them with the spell or wand, hoping to get a more powerful monster. If I find a wand in the very early game I might try this, but later on I’ll avoid it if possible. It’s possible to kill a monster when they’re polymorphed, and there are substantive penalties for killing your pet. If your supply of polymorphes is limited (maybe you’re using a wand, or don’t have the eye to quicken regeneration to an acceptable level), it can also be tricky. Pet lichens are not the most useful pets.

I’ve found it safer, though more tedious, to simply use a polymorph trap. If you stand on the trap (you’re immune to it if you have magic resistance,) and swap places with your pet, they can also be polymorphed that way. This method will not kill someone with system shock, and you can use it until you run out of patience.

Items are even better – in a procedure called polypiling, I can take a stack of items and zap them to get new items to sift through. Some items vanish in the process, and things like wands lose power, but it makes it far, far easier to get specific items I want. One insane member of the Nethack newsgroup made it their mission in life to polymorph every item in the dungeon.

This person (Efembe) is my idol. Polymorphing has allowed a rapid expansion in my spell selection by morphing old spellbooks into new spellbooks. Many players abstain from this, but I don’t feel so inclined. One reason is because I prefer to be more risk adverse, given how tricky it can be to replay Nethack to a certain point when you’re on a schedule. Another is to just demonstrate yet another amusing Nethack feature. Finally, my personality is warped enough that I find it fun.



One of the benefits is a spellbook of fireball. Fireball is an awesome spell. You choose a single target a few tiles away from you, and it blasts repeated fireballs at the surrounding squares. The center of the fireball moves around too, so it’s great for crowd control. Unfortunately, spellbooks and potions are incinerated. Finger of death sends a ray that kills anything it touches (and I mean anything), but I’m not quite good enough at it yet. When I ditch the gauntlets, this will come front and center.



I could never do this without the Eye, which is wizard rocket fuel. Otherwise, you just end up waiting too long for your power to regenerate. Now though, I gain most of the points back just by rearranging the line of items to suit my desires.



One of the results of my experiment were large boxes. Unfortunately, I’ve never seen a box created by polymorphing some other item actually contain an item on its own. The process in reverse is fun – some people, doing rather absurd Nethack plays, accumulate so many items that the game starts running into memory issues. One quick way of removing these items from the dungeon is to dump them into a box and polymorph the box.



I scored two scrolls of genocide. This scroll is simple – when you read it, you name a type of monster. That monster type will be removed from the game entirely (though certain monsters cannot be affected in this manner.) For instance, if you name “soldier ant,” all of those nasty killers will be purged forever. Blessed scrolls of genocide go further, and remove all monsters using the same character. Thus, a blessed scroll of genocide set to “soldier ants” will remove all insects permanently.

Early in the game, it’s often wise not to read scrolls of genocide. They’re very good ways from escaping from indescribably nasty situations. For instance, if you’re about to be hugged to death by an owlbear, this is a failsafe way of keeping yourself alive.

However, later on, when things aren’t so tense, there are some specific monsters that might be wise to erase. I’ll probably showcase liches and mind flayers before obliterating them – it pays to be careful.



Slow digestion is an absolutely game changing item early in the game – it reduces your food consumption to almost nothing. You can take a much more leisurely pace early on with such a treasure, giving more time for shoplifting or altar-camping. It’s particularly strong for Wizards, who are so fragile to begin with, and have no food.

At this point though, it’s probably more trouble than it’s worth. I’m already carrying about eight rations, and can easily get more (for instance, by polymorphing monster corpses.) We’ve already demonstrated the dangers of in a way I won’t soon forget. Monsters are bigger these days, and provide more nutrition. Finally, I’ll often want to eat corpses, to get abilities, stats, or other benefits.



I take the opportunity to eat a giant too. The boulder the giant carried gave me an easy way to stop up the doorway. You’ll notice that I’m detecting several monsters with no line of sight, thanks to (no pun intended) the eye.



Brilliant. A lost little nymph managed to steal my scroll of create monster. She got penetrated by my mighty dagger, stunning her. In her daze, she got the spell wrong.

Now both of us are surrounded by a horde of acid blobs, staring at me dumbly. Good going Miss.

Note that this will happen if I read a scroll of create monster while confused as well. Under certain circumstances (though it can be a pain to be confused on demand,) the thundering herd of acid blobs can save you.



I dump the corpses on my god to figure out. He needs more to eat anyhow.

Anyhow, you probably are bored by watching me slowly shuffle items around again and again. Tomorrow, we'll make actual progress.

If I can tear myself away from polypiling. It's like Christmas, over and over again!

...you CHOKED TO DEATH? On a RED MOLD?

Good lord, man. Dez was going places, too. =(

If you're gonna choke to death, at least have the decency to choke on a Wraith corpse like a decent upstanding Nethackian.

(Fun fact: I've had two FF11 and one Oblivion character named Lyll!)

No! Dez!! :'(

Yes, well, I wasn't thinking. I had just eaten a large chunk of meat, and that put me so far over the edge that I choked without any "stop eating" warnings.

It, er... happens.

Dez choking to death was simultaneously heart-wrenching and unbelievably amusing.

I just got warned by a passing RA that I'm going to have to not laugh so loudly.

Man, Dez. Just... Awesome. There are no words.

Genocide @.

I'm thinking "h". Luckily, I'm not a dwarf.

And Dez dying was like a punch in the gut -- it took a few hours before I could man up and reroll.

Ah, another classic Nethack death.

On my first ascension I genocided master mind flayers, mind flayers, ;, L and c. (Couldn't just genocide h because I was playing a dwarf.)

On my second I genocided h, L and ;, but I left c and had a great deal of fun slapping folks around with a cockatrice corpse.

Speaking of c, I didn't see a lizard corpse in your inventory.

eta: Also, the temptation to just savescum Dez back to life must have been enormous. Like, who would know, right? So mad damn props for starting a new character rather than committing the most grievous of Nethack sins.

It wouldn't be a Nethack Let's Play without a death. Having our first character ascend would be greatly disappointing.

The only acceptable places to savescum in this LP would be to show off hilarious death messages you get from things like drinking from fountains, genocide @, and playing around with Famine's corpse.

Although I too am happy you didn't savescum. Even more impressive that you ran another character to that point in such a short time.