Brogue

fugori · by **fugori** » March 1st, 2013, 5:13 pm

Hello everyone, and welcome to this weekend's contest! This is our 53rd Brogue contest.

The seed for this contest, created by isolating myself in a closet, turning off all the lights, and whispering "Michael Toy" three times, is 946017238.

How to compete:

1. The contest begins right now, on Friday March 1st, 2013 at 23:00 UTC (6:00 PM EST). You can start your game any time after this. The contest is open to anyone.

2. Start a game by control-clicking "New Game" in Brogue v1.7.2 and entering the seed. Verify that the screenshot below matches what you see on your screen.

3. Play through the game. You only get one chance. We are all on the honor system here.

4. Once you are finished, record your score and post the details of your game in this thread. Minimum requirements for consideration include your score, cause of death and lowest level reached. However, the thread is open to all spoilers, so feel free to add screenshots, game recordings, character dumps, strategy tips, etc. You do not need to wait for the end of the contest.

5. The contest will run for 72 hours (three whole days) and ends on Monday March 4th, 2013 at 23:00 UTC (6:00 PM EST). You must finish your game and post your results by that time to be considered in the contest.

6. As a result of point 4,

PLEASE DO NOT READ THE REST OF THE POSTS IN THIS THREAD UNTIL YOUR RUN IS FINISHED.

As always, honor system.

7. Good luck! Have fun, etc.

fugori · by **fugori** » March 1st, 2013, 5:13 pm

Results:

24 people participated in our 53rd Brogue Weekend Contest! Our dungeon this weekend was fairly balanced, with lots of interesting options for our rogues - including offensive and mobility staffs, several good ring choices, and early plate armor. More than a few powerful, early allies made an appearance as well, leading to some very impressive runs down to the amulet and beyond.

Our winner, for the first time, is butteredtoast, who also scored a first ascension in the process! Congratulations! Do yourself a favor and watch butteredtoast's recording if you want to see an absolutely mad escape back up from level 26. This rogue was crafty, brave, and just crazy enough to make it out alive.

In fact, butteredtoast's ascension was the only ascension this time around. Though the dungeon was varied in its gifts it was also as relentless as ever in the dangers it threw at our rogues. An astounding 19 contestants made it to level 10 or beyond before dying, and the deaths were as varied as the ring selection the dungeon offered - krakens, falling from great heights, caustic gas, defeatism, fire, furies, furies who explode, dragons, and the list goes on and on.

Of particular note, Creaphis died deep in the dungeon, again, diving ever deeper in search of level 40.

The only other players to reach the amulet were stevelosh, whose promising run was cut short by a kraken, and Personman the Pauper, whose allies were eaten up by a hungry dragon leading to a lonely death by fury.

We also had a chance this time around to experience a new key room up close and personal. We all love flaming zombies right? Well be careful what you wish for.

Code: Select all: ============== ========= ========= ================================== Contestant Score Depth Cause of death / Victory ============== ========= ========= ================================== butteredtoast 46506 26 Escaped the Dungeons of Doom! Creaphis 30630 32 Burned to death on level 32, amulet in hand. stevelosh 24252 26 Killed by a kraken on level 26, amulet in hand. Zinspire 21020 24 Killed by a fall on level 24. Levi 20253 23 Gave up on level 23. thedrin 17612 22 Killed by a cloud of caustic gas on level 22. sorta-stupid 16500 21 Killed by a violent explosion on level 21. ds_creamer 15217 21 Killed by a dragon on level 21. Loynis 10184 17 Killed by an ogre on level 17. tinyrodent 8861 16 Starved to death on level 16. Personman 8473 24 Killed by a fury on level 24, amulet in hand. tmdnth 8404 17 Killed by a dar blademaster on level 17. indecisive 7598 14 Killed by a zombie on level 14. MasterBlaster 7381 14 Killed by a centaur on level 14. Schpwuette 4484 12 Killed by a spectral blade on level 12. Rev 4484 12 Killed by a spectral blade on level 12. jonathanmcc 4483 12 Killed by a spectral blade on level 12. Franny 3998 10 Killed by a wraith on level 10. mirth23 3806 9 Burned to death on level 9. andrewdoull 1709 8 Burned to death on level 8. Mercury13 1709 6 Killed by a goblin on level 6. ggoDeye ? 23 Lost in the Dungeons of Doom. ooo7 ? 12 Killed by an underworm on level 12. BlueMaxima ? 3 Killed by a cloud of caustic gas on level 3. ============== ========= ========= ==================================

Schpwuette · by **Schpwuette** » March 1st, 2013, 8:10 pm

4484, killed by a spectral blade on level 12.
Unbelievably kind seed - I felt confident that I would ascend (for the first time), but then a goblin steps on a paralysis trap after summoning spectral blades... perhaps my confidence was misplaced.

Rev · by **Rev** » March 1st, 2013, 9:38 pm

Schpwuette wrote:4484, killed by a spectral blade on level 12.
Unbelievably kind seed - I felt confident that I would ascend (for the first time), but then a goblin steps on a paralysis trap after summoning spectral blades... perhaps my confidence was misplaced.

Same.

That little room is instant death.

tinyrodent · by **tinyrodent** » March 1st, 2013, 11:05 pm

8861 Starved to death on level 16.

I knew I was in trouble on level 15 without any food. Skipped the vault full of coffins, that looked way too dangerous and time consuming. Started to starve at the start of level 16, but stretched out the death as long as possible using potions of life and repeatedly dumping enchants into the health charm. Got most of the level explored without finding any food. A quick look at the replay with omniscience didn't reveal any missed morsels. Guess I just wasted a few too many turns somewhere... tried two unidentified rings out of desperation, and one of them was clairvoyance which could have been helpful, but it was too little too late. Final equipment:

Some bugs observed:

A hostile ogre and ally naga alternately disappear in one section of the dungeon. This can be seen at around turn 4495 in the replay. Even with omniscience, the ogre is not visible some of the time, and seems to change location by a few squares.

Centaur ally shoots at, but cannot harm, an enemy on the edge of an obstruction. Centaur ally shoots at, but cannot harm, a turret. Both can be seen in the replay also.

Recording

Personman · by **Personman** » March 2nd, 2013, 1:00 am

8473, Killed by a fury on level 24, amulet in hand.

Man. This game is so fun.

A couple terrible mistakes: I mismanaged my Salamander leading to some ally deaths. I didn't switch optimally between my wisdom ring and my +5 transference ring, including forgetting to put on transference before a fight that made me use a potion of life. Use-ID'd a negation scroll when I had a goblin shaman and a naga that could weaken things. And I uh, found the 5 levels out-of-depth Dragon. That was a pretty bad mistake! :P

Actually my mistake with that dragon was letting my allies die to it while I ran away, instead of protecting them better.

Here's the recording.

I don't really understand what everyone is doing that causes them to starve to death so much. I definitely keep it in mind more than I used to, but I got the amulet with plenty of food to spare, while still fully exploring most levels. It does mean you have to make hard inventory choices sometimes - you can't get away with too much item hauling. But that's great! Item hauling is super boring, and it's definitely still an option you can take advantage of once or twice in a run.

tinyrodent · by **tinyrodent** » March 2nd, 2013, 1:17 am

Personman wrote:I don't really understand what everyone is doing that causes them to starve to death so much. I definitely keep it in mind more than I used to, but I got the amulet with plenty of food to spare, while still fully exploring most levels.

Not sure, but it looks like you didn't pick up very much of the gold on the way down. That may be a viable strategy since the amulet reduces hunger - leave the gold for the return trip. But I'm currently still obsessive about fully exploring every level on the way down, and didn't notice a lot of opportunities to save turns by leaving gold in any case.

Creaphis · by **Creaphis** » March 2nd, 2013, 2:12 am

Burned to death on level 32, amulet on hand. 30630 points.

Two volleys of dragon fire in a single turn left me with too few health points to survive the burn. My single healing ally didn't give me life support in time, I'd drunk the only potion of fire immunity I bothered to carry down to D:26 and my health charm was charging. I still could have obstructed my healer next to me to shorten his list of possible spell targets. Better yet, I could have adopted more precautions ahead of time, like popping my invisibility charm before trying to kill two sleeping dragons with my warhammer. More details and the recording when I feel like it.

I think I've said before that I mostly just play Brogue for contests and challenges - it's harder for me to focus otherwise, as "just another ascension" feels less significant. This means that my only chances of ever reaching the mysterious level 40 are in contest games, which means that in any contest where I feel like I have a hair of a chance of getting that deep I'm going for it, so these deaths in the 30's will likely be the norm.

BlueMaxima · by **BlueMaxima** » March 2nd, 2013, 3:20 am

Died to bloat gas on level 3...

andrewdoull · by **andrewdoull** » March 2nd, 2013, 5:43 am

Burned to death while paralyzed around level 8. Score 1709.

It appears that taking damage due to being on fire doesn't wake you from paralysis... which is more than a little disappointing as I'd like to think I would have drunk the unid'ed potion of life in my inventory given half the chance. I had made a few sloppy moves just prior to hitting the paralysis trap which cost me a goblin mystic but otherwise was more than happy with how I was playing.

Loynis · by **Loynis** » March 2nd, 2013, 7:02 am

Killed by an ogre on a level 17, score 10184.

I went for staves, got poison from d3 vault and firebolt from d4. Got poison to n\8 and firebolt to n\7. I failed with my allies on d16. First, I was blasting goblin totems from a safe distance while myu centaur walkend into my line of fire, and I didn't noticed him. Then, I explored the last remaining room which had 5 wraths and goblin pack. My sanity told me to ignore it, but the "what if an enchant is here" prevailed. Well, I managed to take them out, but lost my fire immune, blinking naga and an ogre.

So, I was alone and stumbled upon reflective ogre shaman, who summoned ogres and cornered me.

MasterBlaster · by **MasterBlaster** » March 2nd, 2013, 9:19 am

Died of level 14 like a noob, score of 7381. Was feeling a bit too cavalier when I ambushed a bunch of sleeping ogres and didn't see the two centaurs. I took two hits from the ogres and two spears from the centaurs and was left with very little health, thought I could just walk out of the room but those spears hurt a little more than I thought; two more were the end of me :roll:

. Should've obstructed them when I had the chance. Remarkably kind seed! Early plate and broad sword with staffs galore! I'm feeling tempted to seed-scum that one just to see if I could've made the ascension if I hadn't made that mistake.

thedrin · by **thedrin** » March 2nd, 2013, 11:16 am

17612: Killed by caustic gas on depth 22. While levitating I blinked over lava not realising the gas was there. I had less than 5% health, no more potions of life, an imp had just stolen my health charm (which was unlikely to have recharged), and I was starving. Death by gas was something of a surprise. The blink revealed a food source in the north east. My decision to explore south and then south east didn't pay off.

I hadn't seen the [edited for spoilers] key trap on depth 15 before. A very cool trap. I was particularly pleased with how I came through it.

I almost died around depth 12. I got caught by the paralysis trap in the goblin totem room in the north west, immediately west of the down stair case, and was then surrounded by spectral blades. I was very fortunate that the gas dissipated when it did. One more turn and I was a goner. [edit] Yep, I'm not surprised that ended some runs.

+1 mace or +3 sword (the +0 war hammer that I left behind earlier in the game probably would have been better)
+3 Plate mail (3 enchants)
[5/5] staff of blinking (2 enchants) - I really enjoy playing with this. I'd like to revisit the combination of blinking and entrancement that was used in a particularly challenging contest early last year.
[5/5] staff of firebolt (2 enchants)
[2/2] staff of obstruction
3 unused enchants at death.
Naga (strength sapping, fire immune), Centaur (negated, then learned haste), Troll (bonded), Ogre (invisible). 2 mystics perished. The first died soon after I rescued him. The second died after learning fire immunity and blinking.

ooo27 · by **ooo27** » March 2nd, 2013, 1:45 pm

Killed on level 12 by two Underworms. Really no reason for this death, I was in good shape on my way to pick up a Centaur ally with Naga and Globin Mystic already in hand. +7 stealth. I just didn't take the time to examine the Underworm. 100% chance to hit me for 40% of my health and I only have 73% chance to hit for 11% of its health .. and there's two of them. Instead of shielding me, my Goblin Mystic walked right up to them. Knowing he would be killed fast I displaced him and died for it.

Does being +7 stealthed make it harder for my goblin ally to shield me? It sure felt like it ...

Franny · by **Franny** » March 2nd, 2013, 3:03 pm

MasterBlaster wrote: Early plate and broad sword with staffs galore! .

hummm...didnt see the plate... -

died on level 10 to a wraith -- a totally avoidable death...just not paying enough attention

score 3998.

i might have missed the plate 'cos i was trying to conserve food. I can starve to death in other versions of brogue and really don;t want to in this one. Checked the recording...it wasn't before level 10 -- had only two strength potions by the time I died, and that limits options severely.
Put the enchants into the ring of stealth.

stevelosh · by **stevelosh** » March 2nd, 2013, 4:35 pm

24252, killed by a Kraken on 26 with the amulet in hand.

Never found any weapon better than the +3 sword through the whole game. I got excited when I saw a runic pike, hoping for multiplicity, but instead it was the useless toad slaying. If I had gotten a broadsword or war axe (or even a rapier) I would have done much better, but since I didn't I had to use a lot of items just to survive normal encounters.

Also discovered two things:

1. Shielding absorbs poison.
2. Your allies won't shield you or each other if there are no mobs around, even if your beefy Naga ally is dying of poison and it would save him. Stupid allies.

ds_creamer · by **ds_creamer** » March 2nd, 2013, 6:59 pm

15217, killed by a dragon on level 21.

This seed was crazy. I had a sapping centaur, haste+blinking naga, and eventually a troll, but my last mystic died in that coffin-lined vault. Because my allies were so powerful, I didn't have any obvious enchant dumps, so I put one into the health charm, one into firebolt, 3 into the plate, and eventually 2 or 3 into a positive war pike. I luckily chose to ID the chain of respiration, and spent most of my time wearing it.

I haven't starved in 1.7.2, and this seed made me wonder if I ever will. I went haul-crazy because there were like 8 different rings in addition to some weapons and armor, plus extra scrolls of mapping, *and* several scrolls of enchanting that I didn't know what to do with yet. I ran out of food in my pack a few times, but always found more by the time I was actually hungry.

tinyrodent wrote:Some bugs observed:

A hostile ogre and ally naga alternately disappear in one section of the dungeon. This can be seen at around turn 4495 in the replay. Even with omniscience, the ogre is not visible some of the time, and seems to change location by a few squares.

Centaur ally shoots at, but cannot harm, an enemy on the edge of an obstruction. Centaur ally shoots at, but cannot harm, a turret. Both can be seen in the replay also.

I also observed all 3 of these bugs, and saved my recording in case it was needed. Watching it, I can see that the ogre existed on the level from the beginning. I went down to level 9 briefly to test a potion. When I came back to level 8, my goblin mystic appeared on top of the ogre.

My naga then wandered over the "empty" space and stopped there, then moved to attack a toad, then moved *back* to the ogre's space. Eventually the ogre moved (I was wearing a ring of stealth) and my naga disappeared from the map and appeared as a '.' in the sidebar. Moving around caused the ogre and naga to appear and disappear.

Personman · by **Personman** » March 2nd, 2013, 8:49 pm

stevelosh wrote:2. Your allies won't shield you or each other if there are no mobs around, even if your beefy Naga ally is dying of poison and it would save him. Stupid allies.

Yet another use for Scroll of Summon Monsters! Awesome!

Levi · by **Levi** » March 2nd, 2013, 9:10 pm

20253, gave up on level 23.

Seriously, I think the mutations are a really neat idea, but a Horror that blinks is just overkill. I managed to escape it, and honestly had no desire to go on. Part of my build was using a Staff of Blinking with an Invisibility charm to get out of tight 1v1 situations, and the first Horror I got to canceled out that plan altogether.

Went into the trap room with the cage key knowing that it would probably kill me, and it did.

indecisive · by **indecisive** » March 2nd, 2013, 10:29 pm

7598 - Killed by a zombie on level 14. Well, technically I was dying of starvation, the zombie just happened to get the killing blow. Still a relative newbie to the game (this is my 5th play) so I guess I was just overslow in exploring and doing a bunch of unnecessary backtracking/gear hoarding, for the last like 6 floors I was constantly out of food and would find one just in time. Found the plate and broadsword but didnt carry the broadsword on the assumption that I would find another by the time my strength was high enough, was using the +3 sword at the time of death. Hit some nasty confusion traps, one in a room that I had just set on fire which killed one of my goblin mystics, another that dropped my entire crew of pets into a nearby pit so that I had to dive in after them - unfortunately me and the naga ended up in the water and the other 3 somehow were on the other side of a wall I couldn't find a path to and they got killed by something I never met before I starved out. I really didn't use the 2 blinking staves enough, but being unable to ID them so I could keep track of charges kept me wary of wasting them. Fun seed though, can't wait to do it again.

mirth23 · by **mirth23** » March 2nd, 2013, 10:48 pm

3806, Burned to death on level 9.

This felt one of my better games to date (my deepest dive is 19). I had better focus because I was maintaining a log for this contest post, which meant I didn't tune out.

At D3 I started identifying potions in order to find detect magic for the vault. Turned out my stack was descent, so I ended up on D4 next to a toad that made me hallucinate. I managed to survive, and used my staff of blinking to circumvent a kobold and get back up to D3.

I took the magic sword from the vault on D3, and a staff of firebolt from the vault on D4, ending up with two firebolts. At this point I decided to go for a staff build. On D5 I had a firebolt party against the goblin horde and jackals. Used my second detect magic on D6 to do some inventory management. Ring identified as stealth +1 and sword identified as +3. I ended up putting on the +0 banded mail. I think I may have missed a room in the middle of D6 because of the blank space but I couldn't find a door to it.

On D7 I freed the mystic too soon and it got ganked by its friends almost instantly. In retrospect I wish I'd pulled that room more effectively so I would have gotten his protective shields. That probably would have made a huge difference for me later on. I spent a lot of time avoiding the ogre on this level and was happy to get yet another staff, obstruction.

D8 is when things started to go a bit downhill for me, at least as far as my play went. I threw a firebolt staff at an ogre instead of applying it. My other firebolt staff helped me survive. I found another ring of stealth so I equipped that as well. Then I fought some vampire bats across a chasm, which I thought was a smart move until I discovered that firebolts light bridges on fire. I also fizzled both staffs after my first shot, so the melee with the bats was pretty hairy. Then I tried to blink across the chasm and ended up being one short, so ended up falling to D9...

At that point I hunkered down and identified most of my scrolls. My goal was to identify at least one of my staffs so that I didn't have fizzling issues, but it turned out I had zero identity scrolls. I did end up protecting my sword and armor, which I was happy to do because I had been seeing mounds, but knew it also might not be a great long term use of those scrolls. I enchanted one of my firebolt staffs and kept the other two enchant scrolls in reserve. I survived a nasty encounter with two mystics and a handful of jackals and goblins. The mystics kept shielding each other and I was only able to beat them with concentrated fire on one of the mystics. Blink helped me keep ahead of all the incoming melee, without that I would have been toast. This put me into overconfidence mode and I got cornered by two Ogres shortly after. I blinked into the opposite corner, and then threw my staff of firebolt at them, again. I managed to salvage this situation with blink, the other firebolt and obstructing them into a burning room. I limped back in to retrieve my staff and walked into a spider who promptly snared me in a web. Since I was directly adjacent to it I didn't want to firebolt it and set myself on fire. This led to my undoing. I missed it with my sword six or seven turns in a row, and in the meantime got fatally poisoned. I finally firebolted it and blinked out to safety, but was badly injured and still poisoned and on fire. Sadly I had no means of healing or putting myself out, so I just ticked 'z' for 3 more turns until I died.

Noteworthy items at the end:
2x staff of blinking
2x staff of firebolt
staff of obstruction
protected +3 sword
protected banded mail
ring of stealth +1
ring of stealth +?
3x scrolls of enchantment

Creaphis · by **Creaphis** » March 3rd, 2013, 1:01 am

Okay, here's my recording.

After some major indecision in the depth 3 vault (I picked up something just to put it back about four times) I grabbed the sword to use-ID it. After it turned out to be non-runic I brought it back and grabbed the warhammer. Poison is kind of unimpressive in the late game and I wanted to make sure that I had an end-game weapon. I prefer warhammers to broadswords anyway for their front-loaded damage and the higher damage per turn. Another warhammer turned up much later, though, so the ring of transference would have served me well.

I cracked the barricaded vault on depth 4 with a lucky shot from an unidentified staff. Sure enough, it was firebolt, and I was inside. It's bizarre how often that works. For my reward I took the health charm. I like these things even though they just encourage me to play more sloppily.

I was telepathic when I descended to depth 6. Seeing the captive naga and goblin, I knew that if I lost this game it would be my own damn fault. The second mystic on depth 7 was another great find, as two mystic protecting each other are nearly immune to lightning and turrets. I stepped onto the caustic gas trap next to him, though, and had a dickens of a time rescuing him from the gas and the guarding kobolds. At one point I read my only stack of multiple scrolls, planning to put an emergency enchant into my obstruction staff - and they turned out to be a pile of magic maps. What the heck?

In that paralysis-trapped totem room on depth 12, the pressure plate luckily revealed itself while I was fighting the goblins and before anything could step onto it. There but for the grace of God...

Descending to 13, my newly-rescued centaur stepped on a fire trap, igniting his half-dead self and one of my goblin mystics. Without staves of healing or protection, there's nothing you can do but let them burn to death, right? Wrong! I quickly blinked into unexplored territory, gaining line-of-sight with some enemies and triggering my goblin mystics to start casting protection back in the stair room.

Before I arrived on depth 15 I hadn't seen the new flaming zombies trap room before, but having already been spoiled as to what to expect I decided not to grab the key right away, planning to come up with some kind of strategy first. However, as I was leaving the crypt with all of my allies in tow, I spotted a zombie already wandering on the loose. Between my centaur's arrows and my mace, the zombie was instantly dispatched, and, while we distracted ourselves with a wraith that had just appeared from the other direction, the pulverized zombie's noxious gas slowly spread... until it reached the brazier inside the crypt. Before I knew what was going on, the entire crypt was ablaze with burning gas and bursting coffins, and my goblin mystics were still inside. I did what comes naturally and shot an obstruction at my mystics, ensconcing them in blue crystal, which they promptly blinked out of in a misguided attempt to escape the nearby zombies they were already safe from. Better yet, the obstruction completely blocked the entrance to the crypt, meaning I had no way to help them as they blinked desperately around their prison as the fire and the zombies wore them down. Well, except for one way. I threw a potion of descent at my feet.

Now, bear with me for a moment, I'll explain that one. All monsters, including allies, have their health and position frozen when the player is on another depth. However, gasses - and obstructions - continue to dissipate. When I ascended back up to depth 15, my mystics had a clear path and could blink to safety in a matter of turns. Sadly, one of my mystics was already nearly dead and burned to death before he could protect my hasting mystic (even though I ascended in line-of-sight of an enemy), and the haster then got clipped by a zombie during his exit and also burned to death on the crypt's front porch. It was worth a shot.

I know this is rather anti-climactic but the rest of the run was business as usual and I won't bother mentioning anything here. One notable highlight, though, was meeting a dragon juggernaut on D:25. Where's a wand of domination when you need one?

Final kit:

andrewdoull · by **andrewdoull** » March 3rd, 2013, 2:34 am

fugori wrote:The seed for this contest, created by isolating myself in a closet, turning off all the lights, and whispering "Michael Toy" three times, is 946017238.

Missed this earlier.

Mercury13 · by **Mercury13** » March 3rd, 2013, 7:10 am

For the first time I take part in the contest. Seemingly everything’s okay, mace, +2 health charm, ring of transference, staff of blinking, protected armor and weapon… and noobish death.

1709, killed by a goblin on level 6.

Got under crossfire of goblin totem and arrow turret.

jonathanmcc · by **jonathanmcc** » March 3rd, 2013, 7:41 am

Killed by a spectral blade on level 12 with 4483 gold.

I died in the paralysis trap triggered by the goblins also. Nothing I could do even though I had full health, the plate armour, and 3 allies (2 goblin mystics and a Naga).

I knew once I saw the spectral blades it was over. I had a nice thing going too with the +1 mace and +4 ring of transference.

Maybe spectral blades shouldn't be immune to the paralysis?

Re food: there seemed to be enough. I always had a least once ration in inventory.

tmdnth · by **tmdnth** » March 3rd, 2013, 10:28 am

Died on level 17 to a Dar Blademaster and his gang of friends, with a score of 8404. Easily the furthest I've gotten so far - I'm rather new to the game (also, this forum). A very entertaining seed indeed!

The first blow was grabbing that cursed -2 Spear - thank god for the Remove Curse Scroll later on.
I focused on hitting hard with the +2 mace; that doubly-enchanted Ring of Transference synergized quite nicely with it. Also loved the blinking staffs, they saved me from more than a few dire situation and pressure plates!

... and then I decided to throw an unidentified potion onto a centipede, in a swamp. The resulting explosion must not only have been audible up to the surface, it also killed my two goblins; I think my Naga survived by submerging in water (is that possible?).

On Depth 14, I came across the confusion traps. So did my allies, who kept stepping onto them over and over - until they fell down the chasm. So of course, I jumped in after them. The coffins on the next floor were a completely new element to me - so I thought "Hey, let's burn the vampires that are inside while they're sleeping!".
Rotten stench. Rotten stench everywhere. And so much vomit. My allies die, the Zombies eventually do to, and the Centaurs are still after me. I flee into a corner, praise god for the Health Charm, and zap them with firebolts from afar.

That Salamander ally was neat - except that he burned everything behind him, and lit me on fire quite a few times. But he made a nice meat shield in that room full of Goblins and Totems one depth deeper. I chucked a Levitation potion, flew out over the sea, and planned to surprise them from behind. Right before I was [i]swarmed[/] by every Spectral Blade that ever existed in the entire world. My Blinking staves and Potion of Life saved my ass here.

And finally on depth 17, I encountered Brimstone for the first time. While I was staring at it in awe, I heard my Salamander dying a few rooms away to that Dar gang - and then they came after me. I only died because I neglected to use my Health Charm (100% restoration at that point, too!) in time - otherwise, I think I would have been able to hold them off in a doorway.

But albeit the anticlimactic ending, a very fun game. The mace hitting hard was quite neat, but I did wish for a bit more accuracy later on - is there anything I could have done about that?

EDIT: Since a lot of people are sharing their recordings, decided to do the same - but apparently I cannot use the [url] BBCode (yet?), so here's a text link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/o3ldce0pgbds6il/GangOfDar.broguerec

Creaphis · by **Creaphis** » March 3rd, 2013, 10:31 am

jonathanmcc wrote:Maybe spectral blades shouldn't be immune to the paralysis?

I think that the player's own spectral blades refuse to enter gasses, so it'd be good to have consistency at least.

Creaphis · by **Creaphis** » March 3rd, 2013, 10:37 am

tmdnth wrote:I think my Naga survived by submerging in water (is that possible?).

Hey, welcome. Yes, that's most likely what happened.

tmdnth wrote:The mace hitting hard was quite neat, but I did wish for a bit more accuracy later on - is there anything I could have done about that?

The only ways to influence accuracy are to enchant your weapon to higher levels, to attack monsters while they're still sleeping or wandering for a 100% hit rate, and to let your allies learn strength-sapping from a centipede corpse (weakened monsters have lower defense).

butteredtoast · by **butteredtoast** » March 3rd, 2013, 5:28 pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFfCKy0nKr0

:mrgreen:

AWWWWW YEEEAHHHHHH :mrgreen:

FIRST ******* WIN!

Watching the recording now, probably going to edit in a novel while watching.

I play the contest almost every week then almost never post my score out of shame, that seems so dumb now that I've won.

I still don't think I'm very good, and this seed was pretty nice, and luck was DEFINITELY on my side, but this blind squirrel found a nut, and my adrenaline is still pumping with excitement.

Edit: How do you guys upload recordings? That seems better than writing a wall of text.

Creaphis · by **Creaphis** » March 3rd, 2013, 8:11 pm

Congrats dude. I didn't want to win by dying anyway.

As for uploading recordings, I used to use Mediafire but now I prefer Dropbox, though you have to install software on your computer to use it.

butteredtoast · by **butteredtoast** » March 3rd, 2013, 8:41 pm

http://www.mediafire.com/?0k0c93vb9gkrwes

That makes 3 ascentions for me in rougelikes:
[DCSS] DEWz of Veh
[DCSS} MiFi of Oka
[Brogue] Let the naga do most the work, then run away from everything after he dies

fugori · by **fugori** » March 4th, 2013, 9:26 am

Hey all - I will be slightly late in closing this out, and unfortunately will not be able to put an entry in myself.

I should be able to post results by tomorrow morning, though. Get those last-minute entries in!

ggoDeye · by **ggoDeye** » March 4th, 2013, 11:10 am

Score unknown, D23?, can't download save file.

I started playing on my home computer but didn't have time to finish. Tried something new and can't access the file from current computer.

Equipment
+8 axe (not war axe): 8 enchants
+4 plate: 4 enchants
+4 transference: 1 enchant
+2 transference
+4 firebolt: 1 enchant
2 dar priestess allies

I went with the rings of trans from the D3 & D4 vaults right away. In hindsight, not an awesome move as this turned out to be a spectacular ally seed. This was the first time I've made it this deep in 1.7.2 and I highly suspect that I would have ascended with at least 1 lumenstone. I'll likely finish it sometime this week and see if I am correct.

I had to resort to ingoring every single pile of gold in order to conserve turns. I still think I would have starved to death without the stack of 4 magic mapping scrolls and the 2 staves of blinking.

I'm tempted to play it again, pump enchants into obstruction and see if I can get that centaur to turn invisible and learn strength sapping.

Zinspire · by **Zinspire** » March 4th, 2013, 4:01 pm

21020, Killed by a fall on level 24

I was burning to death anyway, so I decided to drop myself down another level just to be there when I died.

It was really a stupid flame turret that did me in. I had teleported away from a dragon, and forgot that there was a flame turret in the upper right room in the upper right corner of depth 23.

This seed was stupid awesome:
Broadsword +6
Plate +5
Transference +3
Stealth +2
Descent Potion
2 Blinks
2 Obstructs
Fire 4/4
Lightning
Teleport Wand
Invisiblity Charm +1

I ended up losing all my allies in the late-teen levels

That flaming zombie trap was a freaky one. I suppose a better solution would have been to use obstruct, and wait for the flames to burn up, but I just popped a descent, losing 2 allies

Good game everyone

Personman · by **Personman** » March 4th, 2013, 4:10 pm

tinyrodent wrote:
Personman wrote:I don't really understand what everyone is doing that causes them to starve to death so much. I definitely keep it in mind more than I used to, but I got the amulet with plenty of food to spare, while still fully exploring most levels.

Not sure, but it looks like you didn't pick up very much of the gold on the way down. That may be a viable strategy since the amulet reduces hunger - leave the gold for the return trip. But I'm currently still obsessive about fully exploring every level on the way down, and didn't notice a lot of opportunities to save turns by leaving gold in any case.

ggoDeye wrote:I had to resort to ingoring every single pile of gold in order to conserve turns. I still think I would have starved to death without the stack of 4 magic mapping scrolls and the 2 staves of blinking.

There is an implication here that surprises me a bit, and may explain some of the disparity in peoples' experiences of the new food clock.

In a run where you intend to ascend (or one in which you prioritize depth over score, which seems like it's always better if you're not going to make it to 26) there is literally no reason to waste turns to pick up gold. On the way down, turns are expensive. On the way up, they are cheap, and you have way more information about whether you can afford them. I never walk even one square out of my way to pick up gold on the way down - doing so is literally killing yourself for no benefit.

Maybe some people don't realize that, and maybe realizing it would help them not die of starvation.

sorta-stupid · by **sorta-stupid** » March 4th, 2013, 4:51 pm

16,500, depth 21, EXPLOSIVE fury.
Thanks a lot to my troll allies for nonchalantly meleeing the explosive enemy. Not like I was going to finish the run in time otherwise, but yeesh. I'd have been better without them, I'd pumped the invis charm to +8 and was working up my war hammer. Adding in the +3 transference and 2 x blinking staves [3], I was pretty much a super-phantom. Guess that's a lesson for next time: when you have allies and an explosive mutant turns up, run.

fugori · by **fugori** » March 5th, 2013, 7:36 pm

The contest is now close and compete and results have been posted.

Congratulations butteredtoast - both on the well-deserved win and your first ascension! I had a blast watching you run for your life in your recording. :lol:

The wiki has been updated with the details of your victory!

fugori · by **fugori** » March 5th, 2013, 7:37 pm

andrewdoull wrote:
fugori wrote:The seed for this contest, created by isolating myself in a closet, turning off all the lights, and whispering "Michael Toy" three times, is 946017238.

Missed this earlier.

fugori · by **fugori** » March 5th, 2013, 7:44 pm

Personman wrote:
tinyrodent wrote:
Personman wrote:I don't really understand what everyone is doing that causes them to starve to death so much. I definitely keep it in mind more than I used to, but I got the amulet with plenty of food to spare, while still fully exploring most levels.

Not sure, but it looks like you didn't pick up very much of the gold on the way down. That may be a viable strategy since the amulet reduces hunger - leave the gold for the return trip. But I'm currently still obsessive about fully exploring every level on the way down, and didn't notice a lot of opportunities to save turns by leaving gold in any case.

ggoDeye wrote:I had to resort to ingoring every single pile of gold in order to conserve turns. I still think I would have starved to death without the stack of 4 magic mapping scrolls and the 2 staves of blinking.

There is an implication here that surprises me a bit, and may explain some of the disparity in peoples' experiences of the new food clock.

In a run where you intend to ascend (or one in which you prioritize depth over score, which seems like it's always better if you're not going to make it to 26) there is literally no reason to waste turns to pick up gold. On the way down, turns are expensive. On the way up, they are cheap, and you have way more information about whether you can afford them. I never walk even one square out of my way to pick up gold on the way down - doing so is literally killing yourself for no benefit.

Maybe some people don't realize that, and maybe realizing it would help them not die of starvation.

I understand this, but I disagree with it.

I don't think you can ever take ascension for granted in Brogue, so the sensible thing to do is maximize the one thing that matters pre-ascension for score - gold. 17 of our 53 contests have been won without an ascension. That's not a majority, sure, but its sizable enough to suggest that pre-ascension score matters.

Now in the end, your cost-benefit analysis may determine that your best chance is to ignore gold to provide yourself a bit more wiggle room with the food clock and hopefully a better chance to ascend in general, but I think that's somewhat dependent on play style. Even in 1.7.2 I seem to be able to manage full exploration (and even a little hauling) without starvation. I think individual play style is probably more important than whether or not you get all the gold. Also, I don't think gold tends to be that out of the way. You want to explore as fully as possible anyway to get all the scrolls of enchanting - you probably will have the opportunity to pick up gold during that process.

Then again, I could be wrong! It wouldn't be the first time.

Personman · by **Personman** » March 6th, 2013, 3:53 am

I agree that getting gold is probably a good idea if you are trying to place highly in this contest - you'll notice that I placed 11th, despite being one of four people to grab the amulet, and in a 3-way tie for 2nd in max dlvl.

But ascending is always more important to me than score, even when I'm in a contest - and if I succeed, score follows naturally. So I'd much rather maximize my chances for ascension, rather than hedge against my chance of failure by wasting time on gold.

fugori · by **fugori** » March 6th, 2013, 8:50 am

Personman wrote:you'll notice that I placed 11th, despite being one of four people to grab the amulet, and in a 3-way tie for 2nd in max dlvl.

Ack, you're right! I'm sorry, I failed to mention that in the description. I edited it to properly include you.

I think we're in general agreement, except when you said "there is literally no reason to waste turns to pick up gold". I still think it depends on how comfortable you are with a fast play style. If you need the extra time that avoiding gold provides you to maximize your chances of ascension then you're probably right. I think I can do without it so I still try to pick up gold hoping that even were I to die, I might end up placing higher or even winning.

Personman · by **Personman** » March 7th, 2013, 3:08 am

fugori wrote:
Personman wrote:you'll notice that I placed 11th, despite being one of four people to grab the amulet, and in a 3-way tie for 2nd in max dlvl.

Ack, you're right! I'm sorry, I failed to mention that in the description. I edited it to properly include you. ;)

Haha, I like my title :D

I think we're in general agreement, except when you said "there is literally no reason to waste turns to pick up gold". I still think it depends on how comfortable you are with a fast play style. If you need the extra time that avoiding gold provides you to maximize your chances of ascension then you're probably right. I think I can do without it so I still try to pick up gold hoping that even were I to die, I might end up placing higher or even winning.

For the sake of maximum pedantry, I'll go ahead and say that I stand by my statement from the perspective of score being strictly inferior to did-you-ascend as a metric, as in, I'm happier with a 0-score ascension than a 999999-score death. In that scenario (which is close to my actual value function), there is definitely literally no reason to waste turns to pick up gold :)

fugori · by **fugori** » March 7th, 2013, 8:15 am

Personman wrote:For the sake of maximum pedantry, I'll go ahead and say that I stand by my statement from the perspective of score being strictly inferior to did-you-ascend as a metric, as in, I'm happier with a 0-score ascension than a 999999-score death. In that scenario (which is close to my actual value function), there is definitely literally no reason to waste turns to pick up gold

lol, fair enough.

Brogue

Who is online