Is there another rogue-like that has the tileset that Crawl has? I love it.
I played this crazy Swedish one a long time ago that had you surviving in the wilderness...don't know what it's called, but it was fantastically hard.
It's Finnish and not really a roguelike, though it is awesome. UnReal World
So many babies will be sacrificed in your honor. Was looking for that.
Just got my highest crawl ever, I think it was in the four thousands. Demigod Ice Mage of all things. Between frost bolts, ice bolts, and ice beasts, much long-range rape was had. Also helps I picked up two big flame wands that lasted over 25 charges each.
Nothing spectacular item-wise, but I made it to the ecumenical temple (Demigods can't worship I guess?) and died in the orc mines after clearing it about halfway. Went downstairs into a literal throng of 8-10 orcs including warriors, mages and priests. Felt like a fucking Warcraft raid on my ass.
They surrounded me, so I casted Ice Beast and failed. Luckily, it failed into a huge cloud of freezing ice, engulfing everything around me and my ring of cold protection. When the smoke cleared, the ice beast had raped everything under the frozen clouds and I was left to mop up.
Also, is there a way to sell my shit to the vendor?
Edit: Also, Ice Mage was my first time killing my own ghost. Three times. Yay for random everything!
Nothing spectacular item-wise, but I made it to the ecumenical temple (Demigods can't worship I guess?) and died in the orc mines after clearing it about halfway. Went downstairs into a literal throng of 8-10 orcs including warriors, mages and priests. Felt like a fucking Warcraft raid on my ass.
That's right -- Demigods can't follow a religion. They used to be considered much worse than the other races for this reason, because their advantages weren't enough to make up for it. I think they've been improved over the past year or so.
Wow, I've occasionally been for a bit of a nethack session in the past but Crawl really had me hooked today nothing else. I'd never be getting anyone past dunfeon level 3 or 4 but uponmy inevitable death I was powerless not to to instantly restart a new random character. I'm loving the graphic interface (sorry ascii purists) and that it retains the hardness of nethack whilst simultaneously feeling so much more accessable.
Best run so far just ending in typical boneheaded fashion. Human Beserker made it all the way to the giddy depths of level 10 and managed to kill himself by repeatedly hitting an oklob plant and getting acid in the face... I didn't know it would do that! I was just hammering away not looking and suddenly I was dead
Fortified with newfangled jewelry and assorted consumable goodies, I hied myself to the orcish mines.
The mines aren't particularly difficult if nothing crazy spawns; their primary problem is an issue I like to call swarming. The dungeon generation code in this area favors big, open caverns, and the monster generation code favors large crowds. This wouldn't be so bad if these crowds had the decency to consist of normal orcs and orc warriors... but the priests, friends, the priests and their terrible little friends the mages make it an adventure.
I abused the stairs relentlessly.
Towards the end of my rampage, I was surrounded by heaps of corpses and feeling pretty confident... until the sorcerers showed up. I didn't get a screenshot of these guys because I forget to take screenshots when dangerous things are happening, but I can assure you that sorcerers are bad news.
They summon demons.
Do you know what demons do, folks? Demons cast foul magicks and warp the fabric of reality. I got mutated, my friends, foully and cruelly mutated: my body was rotting, my vision was blurry so that I couldn't read scrolls, and I was slowly forgetting everything I ever knew.
Yes, it was a bad day indeed.
I owned one (1) potion of cure mutation, but sadly I was still forgetful and nearsighted after its kindly morphogenic magic coursed through my veins. So, with the orcs cleared out, my body rotting around me, and the elves probably a bit too much for me, what could I possibly do?
That's right! I could go back to the Lair of Beasts! Where apparently swarms of orcs had begun to appear, against all the logic of the world.
As you can see, being forgetful makes exploration difficult; by the time you've explored one section, you've forgotten the areas you previously explored. It's impossible to rely on auto-explore with this mutation, and that's a real bother.
That wasn't the worst problem, though.
oh shi--
You need a blunt weapon or a flaming weapon to take Hydras out in close-quarters combat. I was plumb out. What to do? Well, after running like the coward I am.
The answer is the snakes, clearly.
To be honest, it was almost no challenge at all until the final level; I began to get nice kill-messages like the one above. Furthermore, I ran into one of my favorite things.
A bee's nest! With poison resistance, these things are a godsend. They always contain a pile of permanent food: honeycombs and royal jellies.
Unfortunately, in this case they also contain a pile of really annoying bees.
And shops.
Shops?! That's right, folks, the shopkeepers who graduate from the University of the Lair of Beasts make really poor location decisions. What's worse is that these are all weapon shops, meaning that any shopper who works his way through the deadly mass of killer bees also has a lot of local competition to choose from.
No matter, let's continue to kill, maim, and murder.
This room was filled with Naga of all variety. Naga aren't that nasty on their own if you have poison resistance, but this included Greater Naga and Naga mages who were able to cast some sort of poison blast that got through my resistance. I nearly died three times, including one spot of bother where I used my last potion of Heal Wounds and was still at less than thirty health. My next hit "opened the naga warrior like a pillowcase," and I managed to flee like a scared schoolgirl in an anime. Except more effectively, I guess, since I managed to not get raped by the terrifying snake beasts.
After that huge fight, the level seems to be pretty empty and I think this is the last anyway. I wonder what this item is? Press x and...
My Mountain Dwarf Berserker is doing well. He's level 5 with lots of food and darts and stuff. I've been letting his throwing skill go up because ranged damage is way handy, but am keeping his darts skill off. Also his Axes skill -- want that stuff going to Fighting. I hope this is a good idea. I expect him to die the first time he meets a pack of Orcs, though.
You'll be turning your primary school skill on and off the whole game to manage where your XP goes. (That is, Axes for a dwarven axe-fighter, Conjurations for a conjurer, etc.) You do need to build it quite a bit -- it should always be your highest skill -- but if it gets too far above the others, it will eat all your XP and it will become difficult to build anything else. I tend to try to keep Fighting at about 2/3 my primary weapon skill, or Spellcasting about 2/3 my primary magic school skill, for fighters and wizards respectively.
Hm -- crafty. I actually wonder whether I'm turning it off right -- it seems to grow slowly even after I get it grayed out on the m screen. Anyhow, since we've heard so much about Hydras, I was thinking of getting a hard start on picking up Mace skill. Good plan -- or waste of XP?
Syrion: Great chapter! I like how there's a constant struggle for survival even though you're doing really well. P.S. What's a Rune?
Syrion: Great chapter! I like how there's a constant struggle for survival even though you're doing really well. P.S. What's a Rune?
Yes, Crawl is awesome in that the tension remains pretty steady. There's very little "filler;" you always feel that this fight could be the end.
As for runes, well: you need three of them to get into the Realm of Zot. Doesn't matter where you get them, you just have to get them. There are (theoretically) an infinite number available, but the guaranteed ones are as follows:
The Snake Pits
The Swamp
The Vaults
The Tomb
The Four Branches of Hell (Cocytus, the Iron City of Dis, Gehenna and Tartarus)
In addition, the Swamp sometimes contains a rune; in the Abyss, they show up randomly (the source of the infinite runes); and Pandemonium apparently has a few (I've never been there at all).
After doing a three-rune game, it seems a lot of players do an "all runes" game for extra challenge.
Well, MC Frontalot the Cudgeler is doing pretty well as a MDFi. Level 10, lvl 10 of the dungeon, Has a ring of Yfrataon, Cloak "Quufuika", and a dozen wands(Enslavement + Teleportation can get you out of some tricky situations)
I found the entrance to the Orcish Mines. I am so not going in there. I just spent like half an hour coping with an unstoppable FLOOD of orcs from near the entrance. I've beat them off and am recuperating, but it was a non-stop extravaganza of Trog's, melee, occasional Berserker Rage, fleeing, and gobbling down food before re-entering the fray. Did I mention there was a lot of fleeing?
edit: This was after I recovered from a really nasty Scroll of Noise that pulled in just about every kind of animal you can think of.
So, my third Mummy Deathkinght died on the first floor from random encounters. What advice do you guys have for me, so that I won't be feasted upon by rats so very quickly?
Edit: Relkurinous the Grave Robber has attained level 2! I feel ruinous powers of death welling up inside me!
Edit2: I can't drink potions? Crap.
Hm -- crafty. I actually wonder whether I'm turning it off right -- it seems to grow slowly even after I get it grayed out on the m screen.
That's correct. Turning off a skill makes it exercise much less frequently, but not never. (Way back in the dim mists of prehistory when I started playing Crawl, it reduced the chance of exercise by 75%. I don't know whether that's changed.)
Anyhow, since we've heard so much about Hydras, I was thinking of getting a hard start on picking up Mace skill. Good plan -- or waste of XP?
Waste of XP. If you find a nice mace, wield it for hydra-bashing, but don't deliberately spend XP building the skill, unless the mace is so nice that you want to switch to Maces & Flails as your primary. Much safer to kill hydras with that wand of fire you've been carting around for emergencies, instead.
Incidentally, Axes and Maces & Flails are related: if you have a lot of Axes skill, building Maces & Flails skill costs fewer XP, and vice versa. Short Blades and Long Blades are similarly related, and once upon a time there was a relation between Staves and Polearms, but I don't know whether that's still true.
Elemental magic skills are anti-related: magic of elements other than your best elemental magic skill costs more XP to learn, especially for the opposed element. (There are also some items that improve magic of one element and simultaneously retard magic of the opposed element.)
So, my third Mummy Deathkinght died on the first floor from random encounters. What advice do you guys have for me, so that I won't be feasted upon by rats so very quickly?
Honestly? Don't play mummies. If you really want to play a Death Knight, try a Human or a Sludge Elf. Mummies are powerful in knowledgeable hands, but they have a lot of frustrating weaknesses.
Argh. I was in the process of taking the last level of the snake pits. Things are going okay, I'm at 68/130 hp or so and fighting a huge swarm. My hp was decreasing 8-10 per turn max. Then BAM, down to 4 in one round. I was sitting on escape stairs and couldn't even get up before I died.
So, my third Mummy Deathkinght died on the first floor from random encounters. What advice do you guys have for me, so that I won't be feasted upon by rats so very quickly?
Honestly? Don't play mummies. If you really want to play a Death Knight, try a Human or a Sludge Elf. Mummies are powerful in knowledgeable hands, but they have a lot of frustrating weaknesses.
But, Mummy DeathKnights are so cool!
Aside from that, My current problem is that all of my spells are miscasting, with full health and nothing bothering me. How would I find out why they are miscasting?
So, my third Mummy Deathkinght died on the first floor from random encounters. What advice do you guys have for me, so that I won't be feasted upon by rats so very quickly?
Honestly? Don't play mummies. If you really want to play a Death Knight, try a Human or a Sludge Elf. Mummies are powerful in knowledgeable hands, but they have a lot of frustrating weaknesses.
But, Mummy DeathKnights are so cool!
Aside from that, My current problem is that all of my spells are miscasting, with full health and nothing bothering me. How would I find out why they are miscasting?
So, my third Mummy Deathkinght died on the first floor from random encounters. What advice do you guys have for me, so that I won't be feasted upon by rats so very quickly?
Honestly? Don't play mummies. If you really want to play a Death Knight, try a Human or a Sludge Elf. Mummies are powerful in knowledgeable hands, but they have a lot of frustrating weaknesses.
But, Mummy DeathKnights are so cool!
Aside from that, My current problem is that all of my spells are miscasting, with full health and nothing bothering me. How would I find out why they are miscasting?
Wearing heavy armor?
Bah. I suppose I should take off my +2 Dwarven Chainmail, then? Also, the Ring of Cold Resist won't do a mummy much good, will it?
Does anyone know how Shiren the Wanderer compares to Crawl?
Sure. It's nowhere near as hard, and there isn't as much depth, but Shiren overall is a polished and enjoyable experience. It's perhaps a bit closer to Nethack in terms of gameplay; a lot of it is focused on interesting item interactions that you will have to figure out.
l - the +10,+4 trident of the Octopus King (weapon)
A hafted weapon with three points at one end.
Damage 9 Accuracy 2 delay 140%
It poisons the flesh of those it strikes.
It protects you from poison.
It amplifies your intrinsic magic resistance.
This trident was stolen many years ago from the Octopus King's garden by a really unimportant and already dead man. But beware of the Octopus king's wrath!
This ancient artefact cannot be changed by magic or mundane means.
There was that picture. The floating island of orcs with warriors, priests, and hard to get to spear-throwers. The orc party on the same level as that picture. I survived all of that, had to thank my freezing sword and sustenance ring.
I ended up dying next level. I was about to starve, so I kinda bum rushed enemies trying desperately to get food. Man, that game had ups and downs.
It was that room spawning that killed my most promising run. After raging through the squidgy hordes I thought I'd kill time hacking at the plants. The plant in the middel squirts acid back. I found this out after hammering attack about a billion times and could only watch in horror.
Do most people keep trying out various weapons hoping for the auto ID or or just hold onto 'glowing' and 'runed' etc for when you get an ID scroll and ditch the rest?
That big room full of slime and so on? That's called a "jelly nest" or a "jelly pit." Run like the wind. They're even worse in Angband.
Do most people keep trying out various weapons hoping for the auto ID or or just hold onto 'glowing' and 'runed' etc for when you get an ID scroll and ditch the rest?
I wait until I have some detect curse scrolls. Read that, then pseudo-ID all of the glowing/runed ones that aren't cursed. I never burn an ID on a weapon unless it's an artifact.
Aside from that, My current problem is that all of my spells are miscasting, with full health and nothing bothering me. How would I find out why they are miscasting?
Type Z? to see a list of your spells and their expected success rates. Heavy armor imposes a large penalty to spellcasting success, the heavier the worse. You need to build your magic skills up quite a bit to compensate. Hybrid spellcasters should generally stick to robes or leather for the beginning of the game; this is one big reason why hybrid spellcasters are difficult to play, because you're expected to fight hand-to-hand more than a pure caster, but you can't take any punishment. Elven armor hinders spellcasting less than other armor of the same type, but it doesn't come in any kind heavier than chain.
I'm having a pretty oddly succesfull run as a troll bezerker. I say oddly because I have been cursed several times, got level drained, somehow lost my ability to go beserk, accidently renounced my religion somehow (I think it was an amulet I put on) and got cursed a couple times before I reconverted. On the plus side I now have a really good collection of wands and healing potions for when things get rough.
Should I continue hitting things with my hands or try wielding something? Will my hands get +4 to awesome somehow later, or what?
Unarmed Combat is a very powerful skill; its damage goes up quite fast as you gain skill levels. You'll also get some spells later that let you transform to do even more damage. Transmuters should generally stick with unarmed.
accidently renounced my religion somehow (I think it was an amulet I put on)
Something might have changed recently, but I don't believe there is any such thing. You can lose your religion by renouncing it with the command (aX) or by getting to a certain negative piety level (by offending your god, or for gods like Trog that demand constant sacrifice, by failing to sacrifice for too long). I don't think there are any amulets whose use offends any god, and I think the only way to offend Trog is by casting spells.
Should I continue hitting things with my hands or try wielding something? Will my hands get +4 to awesome somehow later, or what?
Unarmed Combat is a very powerful skill; its damage goes up quite fast as you gain skill levels. You'll also get some spells later that let you transform to do even more damage. Transmuters should generally stick with unarmed.
Transmuters usually use unarmed combat, because eventually you will get spells like "blade hands" and so on.
Heh, I'm watching your game Syrion. Doing fine. Probably better than I would.
Yeah, until the room full of orcs showed up.
Huh... I didn't watch that far. Just until you started throwing potions around quite liberally.
Well, the confusion and water potions are pretty decent for fighting, and I wanted to use up the experience on Transmigrations so that I could do BLADE HANDS consistently.
Mountain Dwarf Berserker: Dead on floor 16. I moved in to attack some bees, but the corridor I was angling for suddenly got filled in by a stream of skeletal warriors, with the result that I was being hit from all sides at once. I couldn't do enough damage to break free, and didn't have any more scrolls of teleport. Fail
Posts
So many babies will be sacrificed in your honor. Was looking for that.
Just got my highest crawl ever, I think it was in the four thousands. Demigod Ice Mage of all things. Between frost bolts, ice bolts, and ice beasts, much long-range rape was had. Also helps I picked up two big flame wands that lasted over 25 charges each.
Nothing spectacular item-wise, but I made it to the ecumenical temple (Demigods can't worship I guess?) and died in the orc mines after clearing it about halfway. Went downstairs into a literal throng of 8-10 orcs including warriors, mages and priests. Felt like a fucking Warcraft raid on my ass.
They surrounded me, so I casted Ice Beast and failed. Luckily, it failed into a huge cloud of freezing ice, engulfing everything around me and my ring of cold protection. When the smoke cleared, the ice beast had raped everything under the frozen clouds and I was left to mop up.
Also, is there a way to sell my shit to the vendor?
Edit: Also, Ice Mage was my first time killing my own ghost. Three times. Yay for random everything!
That's right -- Demigods can't follow a religion. They used to be considered much worse than the other races for this reason, because their advantages weren't enough to make up for it. I think they've been improved over the past year or so.
No. The only way to get gold is to find it.
Best run so far just ending in typical boneheaded fashion. Human Beserker made it all the way to the giddy depths of level 10 and managed to kill himself by repeatedly hitting an oklob plant and getting acid in the face... I didn't know it would do that! I was just hammering away not looking and suddenly I was dead
The mines aren't particularly difficult if nothing crazy spawns; their primary problem is an issue I like to call swarming. The dungeon generation code in this area favors big, open caverns, and the monster generation code favors large crowds. This wouldn't be so bad if these crowds had the decency to consist of normal orcs and orc warriors... but the priests, friends, the priests and their terrible little friends the mages make it an adventure.
I abused the stairs relentlessly.
Towards the end of my rampage, I was surrounded by heaps of corpses and feeling pretty confident... until the sorcerers showed up. I didn't get a screenshot of these guys because I forget to take screenshots when dangerous things are happening, but I can assure you that sorcerers are bad news.
They summon demons.
Do you know what demons do, folks? Demons cast foul magicks and warp the fabric of reality. I got mutated, my friends, foully and cruelly mutated: my body was rotting, my vision was blurry so that I couldn't read scrolls, and I was slowly forgetting everything I ever knew.
Yes, it was a bad day indeed.
I owned one (1) potion of cure mutation, but sadly I was still forgetful and nearsighted after its kindly morphogenic magic coursed through my veins. So, with the orcs cleared out, my body rotting around me, and the elves probably a bit too much for me, what could I possibly do?
That's right! I could go back to the Lair of Beasts! Where apparently swarms of orcs had begun to appear, against all the logic of the world.
As you can see, being forgetful makes exploration difficult; by the time you've explored one section, you've forgotten the areas you previously explored. It's impossible to rely on auto-explore with this mutation, and that's a real bother.
That wasn't the worst problem, though.
oh shi--
You need a blunt weapon or a flaming weapon to take Hydras out in close-quarters combat. I was plumb out. What to do? Well, after running like the coward I am.
The answer is the snakes, clearly.
To be honest, it was almost no challenge at all until the final level; I began to get nice kill-messages like the one above. Furthermore, I ran into one of my favorite things.
A bee's nest! With poison resistance, these things are a godsend. They always contain a pile of permanent food: honeycombs and royal jellies.
Unfortunately, in this case they also contain a pile of really annoying bees.
And shops.
Shops?! That's right, folks, the shopkeepers who graduate from the University of the Lair of Beasts make really poor location decisions. What's worse is that these are all weapon shops, meaning that any shopper who works his way through the deadly mass of killer bees also has a lot of local competition to choose from.
No matter, let's continue to kill, maim, and murder.
This room was filled with Naga of all variety. Naga aren't that nasty on their own if you have poison resistance, but this included Greater Naga and Naga mages who were able to cast some sort of poison blast that got through my resistance. I nearly died three times, including one spot of bother where I used my last potion of Heal Wounds and was still at less than thirty health. My next hit "opened the naga warrior like a pillowcase," and I managed to flee like a scared schoolgirl in an anime. Except more effectively, I guess, since I managed to not get raped by the terrifying snake beasts.
After that huge fight, the level seems to be pretty empty and I think this is the last anyway. I wonder what this item is? Press x and...
...find a Rune! Frabjous day!
Well, that's one down.
Next Episode: Furious Buzzing
Hm -- crafty. I actually wonder whether I'm turning it off right -- it seems to grow slowly even after I get it grayed out on the m screen. Anyhow, since we've heard so much about Hydras, I was thinking of getting a hard start on picking up Mace skill. Good plan -- or waste of XP?
Syrion: Great chapter! I like how there's a constant struggle for survival even though you're doing really well. P.S. What's a Rune?
As for runes, well: you need three of them to get into the Realm of Zot. Doesn't matter where you get them, you just have to get them. There are (theoretically) an infinite number available, but the guaranteed ones are as follows:
In addition, the Swamp sometimes contains a rune; in the Abyss, they show up randomly (the source of the infinite runes); and Pandemonium apparently has a few (I've never been there at all).
After doing a three-rune game, it seems a lot of players do an "all runes" game for extra challenge.
hahahahahah
...
Edit: And I died of starvation, god damnit.
Holy shit, he got 7735 points though
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
edit: This was after I recovered from a really nasty Scroll of Noise that pulled in just about every kind of animal you can think of.
Edit: Relkurinous the Grave Robber has attained level 2! I feel ruinous powers of death welling up inside me!
Edit2: I can't drink potions? Crap.
That's correct. Turning off a skill makes it exercise much less frequently, but not never. (Way back in the dim mists of prehistory when I started playing Crawl, it reduced the chance of exercise by 75%. I don't know whether that's changed.)
Waste of XP. If you find a nice mace, wield it for hydra-bashing, but don't deliberately spend XP building the skill, unless the mace is so nice that you want to switch to Maces & Flails as your primary. Much safer to kill hydras with that wand of fire you've been carting around for emergencies, instead.
Incidentally, Axes and Maces & Flails are related: if you have a lot of Axes skill, building Maces & Flails skill costs fewer XP, and vice versa. Short Blades and Long Blades are similarly related, and once upon a time there was a relation between Staves and Polearms, but I don't know whether that's still true.
Elemental magic skills are anti-related: magic of elements other than your best elemental magic skill costs more XP to learn, especially for the opposed element. (There are also some items that improve magic of one element and simultaneously retard magic of the opposed element.)
Honestly? Don't play mummies. If you really want to play a Death Knight, try a Human or a Sludge Elf. Mummies are powerful in knowledgeable hands, but they have a lot of frustrating weaknesses.
...
Come on, Dungeon Crawl. Really?
But, Mummy DeathKnights are so cool!
Aside from that, My current problem is that all of my spells are miscasting, with full health and nothing bothering me. How would I find out why they are miscasting?
Wearing heavy armor?
Bah. I suppose I should take off my +2 Dwarven Chainmail, then? Also, the Ring of Cold Resist won't do a mummy much good, will it?
Sure. It's nowhere near as hard, and there isn't as much depth, but Shiren overall is a polished and enjoyable experience. It's perhaps a bit closer to Nethack in terms of gameplay; a lot of it is focused on interesting item interactions that you will have to figure out.
l - the +10,+4 trident of the Octopus King (weapon)
A hafted weapon with three points at one end.
Damage 9 Accuracy 2 delay 140%
It poisons the flesh of those it strikes.
It protects you from poison.
It amplifies your intrinsic magic resistance.
This trident was stolen many years ago from the Octopus King's garden by a really unimportant and already dead man. But beware of the Octopus king's wrath!
This ancient artefact cannot be changed by magic or mundane means.
On a Human Paladin.
Also, the thing I will miss most about MC Frontalot the Cudgeler is his +2, +0 dagger of returning. Fucking jellies eating shit.
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
Should I continue hitting things with my hands or try wielding something? Will my hands get +4 to awesome somehow later, or what?
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
There was that picture. The floating island of orcs with warriors, priests, and hard to get to spear-throwers. The orc party on the same level as that picture. I survived all of that, had to thank my freezing sword and sustenance ring.
I ended up dying next level. I was about to starve, so I kinda bum rushed enemies trying desperately to get food. Man, that game had ups and downs.
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
Warning food spoilers.
It was that room spawning that killed my most promising run. After raging through the squidgy hordes I thought I'd kill time hacking at the plants. The plant in the middel squirts acid back. I found this out after hammering attack about a billion times and could only watch in horror.
Do most people keep trying out various weapons hoping for the auto ID or or just hold onto 'glowing' and 'runed' etc for when you get an ID scroll and ditch the rest?
Transmuters usually use unarmed combat, because eventually you will get spells like "blade hands" and so on.
That big room full of slime and so on? That's called a "jelly nest" or a "jelly pit." Run like the wind. They're even worse in Angband.
I wait until I have some detect curse scrolls. Read that, then pseudo-ID all of the glowing/runed ones that aren't cursed. I never burn an ID on a weapon unless it's an artifact.
Type Z? to see a list of your spells and their expected success rates. Heavy armor imposes a large penalty to spellcasting success, the heavier the worse. You need to build your magic skills up quite a bit to compensate. Hybrid spellcasters should generally stick to robes or leather for the beginning of the game; this is one big reason why hybrid spellcasters are difficult to play, because you're expected to fight hand-to-hand more than a pure caster, but you can't take any punishment. Elven armor hinders spellcasting less than other armor of the same type, but it doesn't come in any kind heavier than chain.
Unarmed Combat is a very powerful skill; its damage goes up quite fast as you gain skill levels. You'll also get some spells later that let you transform to do even more damage. Transmuters should generally stick with unarmed.
Something might have changed recently, but I don't believe there is any such thing. You can lose your religion by renouncing it with the command (aX) or by getting to a certain negative piety level (by offending your god, or for gods like Trog that demand constant sacrifice, by failing to sacrifice for too long). I don't think there are any amulets whose use offends any god, and I think the only way to offend Trog is by casting spells.
Thus far transmuters seem like a fun class.
Yeah, until the room full of orcs showed up.
Huh... I didn't watch that far. Just until you started throwing potions around quite liberally.
Well, the confusion and water potions are pretty decent for fighting, and I wanted to use up the experience on Transmigrations so that I could do BLADE HANDS consistently.
BLADE HANDS
Next: Minotaur Chaos Knight of Xom!