Sil players?

[Kneller]

I'm starting to get into Sil. I'm doing well enough (I took the easy race and sunk most of my points into melee/evasion). I do have some questions though.

1) I'm worried about light levels. I have some torches, but I tend to play cautiously. I burned through one on the first floor alone, and I'm not finding any more. What can I do for a more reliable/permanent source of light.

2) Does holding a torch affect stealth? I assume it does so I unequip it when I'm looking to be sneaky, but if it doesn't matter, I could use the light.

3) What's the Lembas Bread for? I also got an item that gives me a bonus to sustenance. Is hunger an issue?

That's all for now.

[Vanguard]

As you get deeper, better light sources become more common.  Using an entire torch on the first floor sounds excessive to me.  There's no need to explore the entire floor, and the experience system doesn't reward grinding or wasting time so don't be too afraid of descending deeper.  You should start finding lanterns soon.  One thing to be aware of is that you can use the fuel in one lantern to fill up another.

I just checked the manual and I didn't see anything about light sources affecting your ability to sneak.  If you push shift+s you go into stealth mode which makes you sneakier at the cost of speed.  You're also less likely to be seen if you're standing in a corner or against a wall rather than in the open.

Lembas is food but starvation is really not an issue.  Oh yeah, lembas also restores your grace too.  Don't take the will ability that makes you need less food.  It's not worth it and it's arguably more harm than good.

e:

Push x to examine any item in your inventory and the game will tell you what it does.  Sil has some unusual mechanics, but it explains everything really well.

[Vanguard]

I have a question too: how do you make smithing builds work?  If you start with enough smithing to make anything better than basic equipment you need to sacrifice a lot of combat ability and making really good equipment trashes your stats.  Does smithing mean trading  a bad early game for an easier late game?  Should I not invest heavily in smithing until my combat stats are good?

[mushroom patch]

My understanding is that people usually combine smithing with song to supplement the loss of raw combat awesomeness. I don't know the details though. Apparently there's some synergy in the ability scores the two skills draw on.

[Vanguard]

Interesting.  Yeah, both smithing and song are improved by your grace score, so it makes sense to do both on one character.

[Kneller]

As you get deeper, better light sources become more common.  Using an entire torch on the first floor sounds excessive to me.

I like to be thorough.

[Kneller]

One other thing, I've collected a bunch of junk (weaker gear, etc.) that I will never use, but I'm holding on to it in the event there is some way to turn it into something useful (xp, other items, etc.). Is there or should I just dump the junk?

[Vanguard]

You should always carry at least one backup weapon in case you get disarmed.  Mithril gear can be melted down and made into something better through smithing.  Also identifying unknown items earns good xp, so experiment with those until you find out what they are, even if you don't intend to use them.  Beyond that, throw away everything you can't use.

[jim]

Vanguard: I've only used smithing successfully in two ways.

1) get enough smithing to use the guaranteed forge on level 2 - cloak, shield, whatever - to make up for what i haven't found yet.
2) mid game, bank XP. there is no reason to allocate 8000XP when you are at full HP by yourself. if you end up getting ambushed, allocate your XP to combat stuff and make the best of it. if instead you find an enchanted or artifact forge, smith yourself a ring of speed! this way you risk very little by attempting to create a smith if it turns out to be impractical.

[debo]

I have a bunch of sil playthrough videos here http://www.youtube.com/silstreamer, including some "new player" guides (most recent playlist is one of these) if "let's plays" are your sort of thing.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXv8_CX1dHNtU_fI5jiwHnb9TU8rY14TT

[Vanguard]

They are not my sort of thing but it's cool that you've got so much information out there.

Do you know of any good written guides?  I briefly looked at your newbie guide #11 video and your dude is way stronger than any of mine have ever been.

[debo]

They are not my sort of thing but it's cool that you've got so much information out there.

Do you know of any good written guides?  I briefly looked at your newbie guide #11 video and your dude is way stronger than any of mine have ever been.

Not really, no. I keep meaning to make a FAQ or something but haven't had the energy. You can check out the oook ladder for Sil http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-browse.php?v=Sil and look at more recent chardumps to get an idea for builds or what the metagame is like. Several people also often termcast Sil on termcast.org, so if you telnet in there you might be able to learn a thing or two

[awake]

The manual is good about explaining the rules but doesn't do anything to clarify the UI. All that data about combat rolls that gets tossed up in the screen might be useful but it's Greek to me.

[taptap]

I have a question too: how do you make smithing builds work?  If you start with enough smithing to make anything better than basic equipment you need to sacrifice a lot of combat ability and making really good equipment trashes your stats.  Does smithing mean trading  a bad early game for an easier late game?  Should I not invest heavily in smithing until my combat stats are good?

Extreme smithing is (in my opinion) trading fun (because you are into smithing so much, you can not afford many abilities) for endgame power.

With the famous artistry start (armoursmith + artistry at start = loads of bonus protection / evasion from the first forges) there is also a way to use smithing as a significant boost in the early game.