Rogue - let's beat it

[elwin]

I was playing on the testing server a few days ago.  The game started normally but kept improving.  I rustproofed my ring mail early on, and found a long sword.  I found a lot of food and a normal amount of gold.  Later I found a two-handed sword and got my strength up to 17.  But the best part was the HP increases.  By XL 10, I was up to 86.  I can't remember ever getting that high, even at XL 12.  I thought I had a good chance of at least meeting a Dragon.

Then on level 19, I blundered into a Medusa and a Venus flytrap on the same turn.  I had a wand of polymorph and managed to turn the Medusa into a Kestrel, but I couldn't get away from the Venus flytrap and I was too confused to hit it.

I hope I'm the only player who's ever had a 86-HP character pecked to death by a chirping Kestrel.

Later I discovered that Venus flytraps are not immune to polymorph and I should have tried zapping it again.

------

I guess there's enough interest in a tournament that I should do one.  It will work like the NetHack or DCSS tournaments - all games played in a two-week period are part of it.  Winners will be chosen by highest average score.

Are we watching each other play or is the format conducive to some sense of community?  I would love to be able to chat during runs on rlg.

I should be able to add chat functionality to the Web player without much trouble.

Speaking of feature requests, it would be cool to be able to filter my past games based on score or max dungeon level reached, rather than just having an arbitrarily long table where a third of the entries are "killed by a hobgoblin on lvl 1."

That's another good idea that I should be able to implement quickly.

I've got a bug fix or two that are top priority right now.  After that I'll work on these suggestions, and then I can schedule a tournament.

[Pertinax]

I guess there's enough interest in a tournament that I should do one.  It will work like the NetHack or DCSS tournaments - all games played in a two-week period are part of it.  Winners will be chosen by highest average score.

Highest average score seems like it might create a disincentive to play: have a great first game on day one, then avoid playing any more games for two weeks so as not to bring down one's average.

Something like "best of n" or "best n of however many" might work better. The latter would create an incentive to play more as there would always be hope that the next game could be The One, but it would favor people who have more free time during the tournament period.

I haven't spent much time looking at the details of the NetHack or DCSS tournaments, but it looks like they both address these issues by rewarding multiple achievements:

NetHack
DCSS

Edited to add:

I hope I'm the only player who's ever had a 86-HP character pecked to death by a chirping Kestrel.

That is brutal (and hilarious).

[Ancient]

Agreed that average score over all games kinda sucks enjoyment. I am sure you will find something better.

In my best game I found a two-handed sword on second floor and a scale mail not much later. Got nailed down when I met sleeping Ice Monster in a wide tunnel and typed too fast. It retaliated of course and that was it.

[elwin]

I can see that average score might be a bad criterion.  But I also don't want to reward whoever has the most time to spend playing.  So I came up with a plan.

There will be one scoreboard for average score, but you will need to play ten games to get on it.  That should even out the luck factor.  Then there will be another board with the best 20 games, where you can fight for the top places.

However, the real Winner of the Tournament will be the person who recovers the Amulet of Yendor.  If more than one player accomplishes this feat, they will share the title and the glory.  Anyone who finds the Amulet but doesn't win gets an honorable mention.  Maybe there can be little icons for making it to level 15, XL 9, etc.

If none of us can even find the thing, then we are all 100% failures, nobody wins the tournament, and we have to try again in six months.

How does that sound?

[Squeeealer]

Sounds good to me.  I just want to do it to do something with other people who love Rogue - being the winner is pretty secondary.

Pertinax - I saw your game the other day where you got 10th place on the list.  What an awesome run.  For those that didn't see it, he had some incredible luck with two wands of polymorph, two (identified) scrolls of scare monster, potion of haste, scroll of teleportation, waterproofing, etc.  I think the only thing you didn't find was wand of slow monster.

But you also had some really bad luck.  You deserved a much higher gold count.  There just weren't many Leprechauns... and a ton of Nymphs I might add.  Also when you decided to use your wand of polymorph... that was insanely bad luck.  The Wraith went from Dragon, to Wraith, to Black Unicorn, until finally something manageable if I recall.  Great run - too bad it wasn't reflected in the gold count.

[Squeeealer]

DANG!!!!!  I got to Floor 24, but couldn't find the Amulet.  I had to take the stairs to avoid a dragon.  On Floor 25 still couldn't find it and died.

[Legend]

Is there a way to use/activate the extended ascii mode and color used in the 3.6.2 version of rogue in rogue v5.4? Other than that what are the major differences between those version?

Anyone playing with the Donnie Russel port? https://sites.google.com/site/donnierussellii/rogue

[elwin]

Sorry Squeeealer, there's no Amulet on floor 24.  You have to keep going another two levels.  That's still an impressive run.

@Legend: I didn't know about the color version of 3.6.2.  I'll have to take a closer look.  I don't know of any similar mode added to 5.4.  Version 5.4 has some improvements to the UI, and it's been rebalanced, with a few added items and renamed monsters.  I think it ended up being slightly harder.

[Squeeealer]

Oh, okay.  26, not 24.  I don't think it would have made a difference because on Floor 25 I landed right next to whatever it was that killed me.

I finally got to spend some good time with the ring of stealth today.  It's great when you get to the Trolls... and the Black Unicorns I bet!  Unfortunately, I met up with a spawned Troll in a maze.  Even more unfortunately, I tried to get away with just using a scroll of monster confusion on him.  After confusing him I missed like four times in a row and with 20 HP left he took me down with one blow despite a 9 armor.  Then again, I never seem to understand if armor class determines ability to dodge an attack or affects how much damage you take on a hit.  My strategy would have been to back up and hammer him with projectiles, but I had none.  I left a wand of polymorph, a wand of slow monster, and a scroll of scare monster on the table.  My main problem was my cursed -2 long sword.  After two enchantments it was simply a 0,0 long sword when I died.  Still, I think the pieces were in place for me to take it to the Medusas or beyond and I failed.

Oh, and 3-4 treasure rooms in the first 12 floors helped.  I found and identified three rings of protection, a ring of dexterity, a ring of stealth, a ring of see invisible, a ring of searching, a ring of increase damage, a wand of polymorph, a wand of magic missile, a wand of drain life, and a wand of slow monster.

[Squeeealer]

DANG!  Made it to 24 again, but poor gold count.  I had two unidentified scrolls and dropped them as a Black Unicorn chased me, but neither were a scroll of scare monster.  Had I read them one might have been a scroll of hold monster. Oh wait, I bet one was scroll of monster confusion!  DANG DANG!  I then defeated the Black Unicorn anyway, but another one was right behind... I was really low on resources, but it would have been cool to actually see the Amulet.  I also had the misfortune in this run of clearing a treasure room only to step on a trapdoor before collecting the loot.

[Squeeealer]

Thanks for the lesson, Pertinax. I just watched you get back on a scroll of scare monster. For some reason I thought I'd tried it and it didn't work so I assumed it wasn't in this version.  Now I know. I also learned (from the help menu) that I could have picked the scrolls back up that I'd dropped as I stood on them... although I bet it would have cost me a turn.

Pertinax - how do you stand still and gain HP in giant chunks?  Are you just holding down the rest button?

When is "/" (identify object) useful?  Can you stand next to a Xeroc and identify it before it attacks you?

[Pertinax]

How does that sound?

Sounds good.

Pertinax - how do you stand still and gain HP in giant chunks?  Are you just holding down the rest button?

I'm typing a number prior to hitting period, which causes one to rest for that number of turns, or until something happens. I use a similar command (e.g., 10s) to search a particular number of times rather than having to hit s repeatedly.

When is "/" (identify object) useful?  Can you stand next to a Xeroc and identify it before it attacks you?

It's just a form of help intended to tell you what an ASCII character means in case you don't know or have forgotten.  I think that it will tell you that X is a Xeroc and that % is a staircase, but not that the particular % that you're looking at is really a Xeroc.

[Squeeealer]

Pertinax - how do you stand still and gain HP in giant chunks?  Are you just holding down the rest button?

I'm typing a number prior to hitting period, which causes one to rest for that number of turns, or until something happens. I use a similar command (e.g., 10s) to search a particular number of times rather than having to hit s repeatedly.
[/quote]

Holy crap - this is huge for me.  The key is this part, "or until something happens."  So many times I am repeatedly searching or resting and hit the button one too many times and get hit.  It's particularly a problem when it's a Rattlesnake, Aquator, or an enemy who you need every bit of HP for.  Thank you for all the help!

[Squeeealer]

Well, I made it to 24 again with a stupid flippin unenchanted mace (found no weapon enhancements the entire run).  I had some good wands, but I just got inundated with powerful monsters on 24 as I was searching for the stairs.  Two Jabberwocks, two Medusas, and a Griffin.  A stupid Phantom polished me off.  And man those Wraiths can change the course of a run.  I did at least beat some Trolls, my first Jabberwock, a Griffin or two, and a Medusa or two for some nice exp gains.  Poor gold count.

[Pertinax]

Well, I made it to 24 again

You've had some nice runs recently. Grats on those.

I've been in a bit of a slump. The top two annoying things that I've been experiencing recently are (1) having 20 hp at level 5, and (2) swinging at a level-appropriate monster literally a dozen times and missing every time. Going to keep plugging away at it...