[Crawl] Controlling the Undead Population in Dungeon

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After losing my third promising character to a ghost I'm starting to
consider a search and destroy sweep through the upper dungeon. My morals
won't let me just delete the offending ghosts, so I'm wondering what
would be the most effective pest-controller character.

The obvious choice might be a TrBe but I have been in the habit of
playing spriggan stalkers whose ghosts make short work of most melee
oriented characters. A MiMo might also be a contender especially if I
focus on EV for those pesky ranged attacks. Unfortunately my collection
of passed-on adventurers is fairly wide. I don't think there are any
ghosts of high level conjurers left, but just about everything else.

Hmm, maybe I should finally install hearse for crawl...

On a related note, how do the ghosts actually function in Crawl? Meaning
for example when my character gets killed by a ghost, how many ghosts
are potentially left on the level?

JJ

 

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jjv wrote:
> After losing my third promising character to a ghost I'm starting to
> consider a search and destroy sweep through the upper dungeon. My morals
> won't let me just delete the offending ghosts, so I'm wondering what
> would be the most effective pest-controller character.

Depends on how low the levels are. The Necromancer's Dispell undead is
quite handy against player ghosts but it's (IIRC) a level 4 spell so you
won't get it too early. Also remember that for some reason player ghosts
don't resist cold.

> The obvious choice might be a TrBe but I have been in the habit of
> playing spriggan stalkers whose ghosts make short work of most melee
> oriented characters.

why that? Berserk/haste matches the speed and the troll's natural
regeneration should take care of the poison.

> A MiMo might also be a contender especially if I
> focus on EV for those pesky ranged attacks.

Never fight them in open spaces (learned that when I met one of my
summoner ghosts). Use corridors and stairs.

> Unfortunately my collection
> of passed-on adventurers is fairly wide. I don't think there are any
> ghosts of high level conjurers left, but just about everything else.

Also you can simply speed-dive . Ghosts are deleted from the disk
once you meet thm.

> On a related note, how do the ghosts actually function in Crawl? Meaning
> for example when my character gets killed by a ghost, how many ghosts
> are potentially left on the level?

One. And, as said above, ghosts are unlinked upon loading.

Lars

 

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jjv wrote:
> After losing my third promising character to a ghost I'm starting to
> consider a search and destroy sweep through the upper dungeon.

Besides the advice you already got, you shouldn't forget wands.
Favourites are cold and disintigration, for weak ghosts even frost and
magic darts if you are able to gain enough distance (hint: !oSpeed).
Also !oMight and !oBerserk help sometimes. Forget any kinds of fire
wands. More often then not I don't have the proper equipment when I meet
a ghost for the first time. In this case I usually dive and come back
later when I've found a proper booster (wand, potion, equipment, spell).

After some time you'll also get a feeling for the ghost's attributes
(weak, average, experienced and so on) so you'll know better what ghost
to fight now or better to prevent and fight later.
--
Rubinstein
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Quidquid latine dictum, altum videtur.
Ceterum censeo Microsoftem delendam esse.

 

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Lars Kecke wrote:
> jjv wrote:
>> After losing my third promising character to a ghost I'm starting to
>> consider a search and destroy sweep through the upper dungeon. My
>> morals won't let me just delete the offending ghosts, so I'm wondering
>> what would be the most effective pest-controller character.
>
> Depends on how low the levels are. The Necromancer's Dispell undead is
> quite handy against player ghosts but it's (IIRC) a level 4 spell so you
> won't get it too early.

Unfortunately my necros are usually either too weak and the ghost gets
the drop on them or mummies and get burned horribly to death. Bad luck,
but it has been (un)fairly reliable.
Still, perhaps a necromancer with a horde of slaves to block spells
would be the best option.

A death knight would be buff enough, but it takes ages to get the spell.

> Also remember that for some reason player ghosts don't resist cold.

Now that is handy, if a bit weird, to know.

>> The obvious choice might be a TrBe but I have been in the habit of
>> playing spriggan stalkers whose ghosts make short work of most melee
>> oriented characters.
>
> why that? Berserk/haste matches the speed and the troll's natural
> regeneration should take care of the poison.

Don't actually know why, but it has been my experience. Of course the
latest berserker to succumb to a ghost was due to berserk ending and the
ghost apparently having a weapon of electrocution...

Generally though buff melee characters seem to fare better than
spellcasters.

> Never fight them in open spaces (learned that when I met one of my
> summoner ghosts). Use corridors and stairs.

Unfortunately there isn't always the choice. Stairs are very useful
against ghosts, though.

> Also you can simply speed-dive . Ghosts are deleted from the disk
> once you meet thm.

Yah, but that is a bit too close to simply deleting them.
So, Crawl has a fairly similar approach to ghosts as Nethack.

>> On a related note, how do the ghosts actually function in Crawl?
>> Meaning for example when my character gets killed by a ghost, how many
>> ghosts are potentially left on the level?
>
> One. And, as said above, ghosts are unlinked upon loading.

At least I'm not increasing the population by dying to them...

JJ

 

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jjv wrote:
> Lars Kecke wrote:
>
>> jjv wrote:
>>
>> Depends on how low the levels are. The Necromancer's Dispell undead is
>> quite handy against player ghosts but it's (IIRC) a level 4 spell so
>> you won't get it too early.
>
> Unfortunately my necros are usually either too weak and the ghost gets
> the drop on them or mummies and get burned horribly to death. Bad luck,
> but it has been (un)fairly reliable.

Damn. Dind you try DSNe? More hitpoints than your usual spellcaster,
plus extras, and they learn Necromancy at 90. IMHO Demonspawn make great
death-knightly Necros.

> Still, perhaps a necromancer with a horde of slaves to block spells
> would be the best option.

The problem is that the "raise undead" spell is also rather high level
(don't even bother about "raise skeleton"), so maybe you should get
dispell, draining and a decent short blade first. Dispell should get the
ghost in ~2 zaps and vampiric draining should keep you alive in melee.

Lars, whose DSNe usually die around the swamp

 

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Rubinstein wrote:
> jjv wrote:
>> After losing my third promising character to a ghost I'm starting to
>> consider a search and destroy sweep through the upper dungeon.
>
> [...]
> Forget any kinds of fire wands.

Correction: obviously wrong. Right now I killed an average ghost with
just 2(!) zaps from a wand of fire. IIRC "some" ghosts resist fire but
no ghost resist cold (again: IIRC).
--
Rubinstein
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Quidquid latine dictum, altum videtur.
Ceterum censeo Microsoftem delendam esse.

 

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Rubinstein wrote:
> Rubinstein wrote:
>
>>jjv wrote:
>>
>>>After losing my third promising character to a ghost I'm starting to
>>>consider a search and destroy sweep through the upper dungeon.
>>
>>[...]
>>Forget any kinds of fire wands.
>
> Correction: obviously wrong. Right now I killed an average ghost with
> just 2(!) zaps from a wand of fire. IIRC "some" ghosts resist fire but
> no ghost resist cold (again: IIRC).

Isn't that: The ghost inherits the original character's resistances and
gains additional poison and draining resistance for being a ghost.

Lars

 

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jjv wrote:
> Lars Kecke wrote:
> > Rubinstein wrote:
> >
> >> Correction: obviously wrong. Right now I killed an average ghost with
> >> just 2(!) zaps from a wand of fire. IIRC "some" ghosts resist fire but
> >> no ghost resist cold (again: IIRC).
> >
> > Isn't that: The ghost inherits the original character's resistances and
> > gains additional poison and draining resistance for being a ghost.
>
> Certainly seems so. I wonder what kind of abilities ghosts gain from
> their former equipment since at least their spells seem a lot more
> powerful than the original characters. Especially the ghosts of wimpy
> summoners are supprisingly dangerous.
>
> On the original topic, it does indeed seem that a DSNe is close to the
> optimal ghostcleaner. The RNG keeps on mocking me though, and constantly
> gives me all sorts of nifty melee abilities as mutations. Horns
> specifically seem to be a given.

Why not just run with it? If you decide to spend significant time in
the Hells/Pan, you'll appreciate having an attack option that actually
works against demons.

e.

 

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Lars Kecke wrote:
> Rubinstein wrote:
>
>> Correction: obviously wrong. Right now I killed an average ghost with
>> just 2(!) zaps from a wand of fire. IIRC "some" ghosts resist fire but
>> no ghost resist cold (again: IIRC).
>
> Isn't that: The ghost inherits the original character's resistances and
> gains additional poison and draining resistance for being a ghost.

Certainly seems so. I wonder what kind of abilities ghosts gain from
their former equipment since at least their spells seem a lot more
powerful than the original characters. Especially the ghosts of wimpy
summoners are supprisingly dangerous.

On the original topic, it does indeed seem that a DSNe is close to the
optimal ghostcleaner. The RNG keeps on mocking me though, and constantly
gives me all sorts of nifty melee abilities as mutations. Horns
specifically seem to be a given.

JJ

 

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Archived from groups: rec.games.roguelike.misc (More info?)

Erik Piper wrote:
> jjv wrote:
>> Lars Kecke wrote:
>>
>>> Isn't that: The ghost inherits the original character's resistances and
>>> gains additional poison and draining resistance for being a ghost.
>> Certainly seems so. I wonder what kind of abilities ghosts gain from
>> their former equipment since at least their spells seem a lot more
>> powerful than the original characters. Especially the ghosts of wimpy
>> summoners are supprisingly dangerous.
>>
>> On the original topic, it does indeed seem that a DSNe is close to the
>> optimal ghostcleaner. The RNG keeps on mocking me though, and constantly
>> gives me all sorts of nifty melee abilities as mutations. Horns
>> specifically seem to be a given.
>
> Why not just run with it? If you decide to spend significant time in
> the Hells/Pan, you'll appreciate having an attack option that actually
> works against demons.

That's precisely the problem. I start branching to melee too early,
eager to use my new abilities/bodyparts thus ending in a sorry heap at
the feet of an orc knight or something.

JJ