Archived from groups: rec.games.roguelike.nethack (
More info?)
On Wed, 16 Mar 2005 xrunesx@gmail.com wrote:
>
> I would actually like to hear a few tips from ya all on the
> boulders....what is the point of them....do they lead deeper into the
> dungeons..or can i just side step them completely? Im having some
> issues tho...ahah...it seems that when i go a level below the
> oracle...all i ever get down there..is a massive amount of
> baddies...LIKE MASSIVE im always in AWE when i see them....and throne
> rooms...to which i dont know what the purpose of them is.....I dont
> know what mine town is...i dont know what towns there are...there are
> towns in nethack? cause i could use some i have like 5000 gold and i
> need to re-equip with some wands and potions and food.....where are the
> towns at? how deep does the dungeon go? and what level should i be at
> when i do go deeper or get to the boulders..or what not...im level 9
> Wizard right now...and how can i upgrade my wizard? like make him have
> more HP he doesnt seem to be gaining much HP but plenty of MP before
> they were about neck and neck in previous games.....oh well....yeah ya
> guys..this is as far as ive gotten and it seems as if i have some
> choices...any tips from you all would be greatly appreciated....
All the following is spoiler. You may consider it as a way of cheating the
game by having information you should otherwise learn/find the hard way.
As you're asking kind of precise questions, I'm asuming you don't mind
about spoilers. If you do, stop reading right know.
If you only want a small spoiler, skip the first paragraph of my response
(or don't read the web pages), I'll try to answer your questions without
saying too much.
The short answer (learning the man to fish):
http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/~eva/nethack/spoilerlist.html
Eva's page has more spoilers on nethack that you may ever dream of...
Beware, there are really far more that needed at beginning and you'll
probably be drown under them and need a few time to get use to all this
(at least I was at beginning).
(I personnally also use http://www.steelypips.org/nethack/ which has older
(3.4.1) spoilers but in html form, better suited for browsing when I need
the special effect of specific item)
The long answer (giving the man the fishes he needs right now).
Sokoban (the "blue wall" area).
This is a 4 level area going up. The first level is always accessible via
a second stairs up at the level just below the Oracle (see Dylan's
gazetter for detail, accessible from Eva's page). Each level is inspired
from one of the old sokoban computer game. You have to push boulders in
holes in order to make a passage to the stairs up for the next level.
The last level, has a big zoo (a room with *lots* (around 30) monsters in
it) and, after that zoo, a very usefull objet (two objects are possible
and you'll always have only one of them but both are *very* usefull at
that point of the game. They also can be found at other point in the
dungeon but not very often. You can completly skip Sokoban but that will
make a real goodie less (plus boulder pushing is a good way to improve
your strength). If you don't manage to find the solution (cheating, like
breaking boulders entail a small penalty that can become huge if you do it
too often), see Boudewijn's spoiler on solving Sokoban.
Huge amount of monsters below oracle: that doesn't really seem normal. You
may find throne rooms (full of monsters) below oracle but not really much
monsters that usually. You may repetidly found a "bone file", that is a
level where a prvious adventurer died which has been saved just in the
state of the death and so you run in the bunch of monsters that killed the
previous adventurers. But that seems very unlikely that this happen
*every* time.
Throne rooms. Like other special rooms (eg shops), they appear from time
to time. Like other special rooms, they add a few variety plus a bit of
fun in the game. You can get many objects from the monsters (plus gold),
plus do something more or less usefull with the throne (see the list of
extended commands (#) and you should find youself which one is designed
for thrones). Something else is also doable with thrones, like with almost
any feature of the dungeon, but I'll let you read that in the spoilers if
you don't want to find by yourself.
Towns.
You may have notice shops atsome levels of the dungeons. You may also have
notice an early level (between level 2 and 4) with *2* stairs down instead
of one. The second stairs goes to the gnomish mines (notice that, when in
the mines or Sokoban, the status area change and indicate that instead of
saying that you're in the "dungeon of doom". We call that "branches" of
the main dungeon, there are many more branches below).
The 3rd of 4th level of the mines is always "minetown". A special level
with at least 3 or 4 shops in it and an altar.
Mines are often considered tougher than main dungeon because it's more
open space so you cannot easily run and hide in corridors to face one
ennemy at a time. Plus there are more traps than in the main dungeon. With
a fighting role, I tend to go early in the mines because that a lot of
easy XPs (I often send level 1 monks in the mines to kill a few gnomes and
become level 3). With spellcasters roles, I'm more cautious about the
mines. Some people only do the mines after Sokoban. The mines below
minetown are even more dangerous and only give a few guaranteed items that
are much less useful (at least for a beginner) than what you'll find after
Sokoban, so I strongly recommend not to go below minetown before you're
character is really tough. (I usually do minetown, then Sokoban, then rest
of the mines, unless I've already what I need in terms of altars/shops in
which cases I may dash for Sokoban and it's reward)
There is another town but much more deeper. It's called Orcus town and
it's deserted. By the time you'll reach it, you'll probably won't have
much questions about towns...
Depth of the dungeon. There's two answers in it. The global depth is
around 45 to 50 levels. But the dungeon has a main "break" around level 25
where things change dramatically. Above, it's the dungeon of doom, below
it's Gehennom (hell). There are many branches in that (something like 5)
plus a few special level whose maps are not randomly generated. See
dylan's gazetter for all you ever want to know about the organisation of
the dungeon.
(and, FYI, once you've reached the lastlevel, you have to climb everything
up and pass a few more special levels before you win... Nethack is a
really *hard* game)
Concerning the level of your character versus the level of the dungeon,
well that depends of so much things... The weakest your character, the
weakest your oponnents, so you may want to do Sokoban as soon as possible
just to have easy monsters in it (and let your pet deal with them). Or you
maywant to be as high level as possible... In another thread, someone is
doing Sokoban with a level 6 character and is in position to end it. I
often am around level 10 when in Sokoban.
Keep in mond that the real point is not the depth you're at but the
equipement you have. The real risk is to be at too high level with too few
equipement and thus not being able to deal with the high level monsters
you're facing...
Concerning gaining HPs. Well, the easiest way is various potions of
healing. If you're already close to max HPs when you quaff them, then
you'll gain a few max HPs. The other solution being to play a combat role,
wizard are not meant to have a lot of HPs. See the spoilers to find out
how many HPs you'll win at each level.
(Constitution plays a very important role here, that's also why a
barbarian with 18 CON will gain, on average, 4 more HPs/level than a
wizard with 11 CON. If you have a ring of gain constitution, you may want
to put it just before gaining levels (option show_exp will be useful
here))
Hypocoristiquement,
Jym.
best game ive ever had...and coolest most crazy
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