I am playing Nethack again

Liet

Golden Member
Jun 9, 2001
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Arrrrrgh, a goddamned half-elf werejackal bit me and now I'm a goddamned orc barbarian werejackal. All my armor fell off, but that's ok because earlier I tried to dip my axe in a fountain, which exploded, and my general issue badass orc helmet (with Thundercat logo stencil) rusted up really bad. The other nice thing about being a werejackal is that the evil cursed flail of libido-draining that welded itself to my hand... well, it fell off.

The only downside so far: My dumb kitten eats the store owners' tripe (that the idiot left on the floor of a dungeon), racks up a massive bill, and now I can't figure out how to get out. Tried praying. Did not help.

Download it now:
http://www.Nethack.org

Some humorous reading:
http://archive.gamespy.com/legacy/fargo/nethack_a.shtm

If you don't like Nethack, just remember that it has 45 times the depth, creativity, and replayability of modern games like Assassin's Creed.

I am going to polymorph my kitten into a cockatrice and ride that tripe-stealing bastard until he drops. Later.

Note: I did not know this...
- If a lawful character dips his long sword into a fountain, the Lady of the Lake may reach up and transform it into Excalibur. If a non-lawful character tries the same trick, she will be annoyed and curse the sword.

- If you are given the chance to choose a level to teleport to, and you choose level 0, you'll go to nowhere and cease to exist. If you choose -1 to -9, you'll wind up high above the clouds. The fall will kill you, unless you're levitating or flying, in which case you'll land on the surface and escape the dungeon. If you choose -10 or less, you'll go straight to heaven (not a good thing, as it means you're dead).

- It is sometimes possible to change into a monster (polymorph), and when you do, you acquire the monster's abilities. For example, if you polymorph into a female red dragon, you can breathe fire and lay eggs, which will later hatch into your pets.
Badass.


Edit: THANK YOU Phew for mentioning Nethack in another thread... Made me reminisce and then download it!
 

AtaruMoroboshi18

Senior member
Apr 1, 2005
552
1
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Incursion, UnAngBand, Dwarf Fortress, IVAN, SteamBand, etc. There are just so many awesome rogue-likes around that I can't get enough of them. I've been playing them religiously ever since I got into Dwarf Fortress, even though that had a monstrous learning curve to it. I wish more unique rogue-likes were released though...
 

Elcs

Diamond Member
Apr 27, 2002
6,278
6
81
I prefered Ancient Domains of Mystery (ADoM) by Thomas Biskup.

Very good game, very very very tough and unforgiving.
 

acheron

Diamond Member
May 27, 2008
3,171
2
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Originally posted by: skace
If you aren't playing on nethack.alt.org, then you aren't playing nethack.

http://alt.org/nethack/player.php?player=skace

And I hated corruption in ADOM, such a pain in the ass to deal with.

I couldn't deal with the lag playing Nethack remotely when I tried the devnull tournament several years ago, and never really tried again. Does playing on NAO feel the same as playing locally in responsiveness?
 

skace

Lifer
Jan 23, 2001
14,488
7
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Originally posted by: acheron
I couldn't deal with the lag playing Nethack remotely when I tried the devnull tournament several years ago, and never really tried again. Does playing on NAO feel the same as playing locally in responsiveness?

Had lag on a few occasions, it was rare, 90% of the time it was completely lag free.

The ghost files make it so worth it, especially when someone you are spectating hits your ghost file, even better when your ghost file kills him :)
 

acheron

Diamond Member
May 27, 2008
3,171
2
81
Originally posted by: skace
Originally posted by: acheron
I couldn't deal with the lag playing Nethack remotely when I tried the devnull tournament several years ago, and never really tried again. Does playing on NAO feel the same as playing locally in responsiveness?

Had lag on a few occasions, it was rare, 90% of the time it was completely lag free.

The ghost files make it so worth it, especially when someone you are spectating hits your ghost file, even better when your ghost file kills him :)

well maybe I'll give it a shot. I was thinking about getting into Nethack again. I never did ascend a rogue. (Ascended the other 12.)
 

LeonarD26

Senior member
Feb 12, 2004
826
1
71
Any advice for a Nethack beginner?? I'd love to give this a try. I see there are some interface updates... are those popular or is the original ASCII used the most??

Thanks!
 

skace

Lifer
Jan 23, 2001
14,488
7
81
Originally posted by: LeonarD26
Any advice for a Nethack beginner?? I'd love to give this a try. I see there are some interface updates... are those popular or is the original ASCII used the most??

Thanks!

#1 killer of newbies is starvation. You need to know what you can and cannot eat. This means corpses too. You can either sorta-cheat and just use guides such as an nethack.alt.org or you can just take notes and do your own experimenting. I'd suggest the guides route unless you are some sort of hardcore can't look at any information or spoil anything type of person.

I would stick to survival based spoilers though and try not to spoil specific battles, levels or items.

Although I'm very foggy on this, I recall 2 pieces of information helping me quite a bit and I'm going to speak of them in generalities because I don't recall all the info:
1- there is a word you can scrawl on the floor that creates a place of protection from _most_ monsters. Giving you a place where you can rest
2- your pet will never step on a cursed item, regardless of whether it is identified or not. So drop something you found and see if you can get him to step on it.

Not positive, check those out before taking them as law.

Edit: As far as UI goes, original ASCII however you need to configure it, I can't help with that, would take some time, nethack.alt.org lets you copy other peoples configuration files / etc. So you can experiment easily. A lot of things can get a lot nicer once you get into the config stuff. Especially when you increase your telnet resolution size beyond the default.
 

acheron

Diamond Member
May 27, 2008
3,171
2
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Originally posted by: skace

1- there is a word you can scrawl on the floor that creates a place of protection from _most_ monsters. Giving you a place where you can rest

yes. When you download Nethack, it comes with a Guidebook text file that has some tips, including this one. Of course, some methods of writing on the floor are quicker than others, and some are more permanent than others...

2- your pet will never step on a cursed item, regardless of whether it is identified or not. So drop something you found and see if you can get him to step on it.

You *can* force your pet to step on a cursed item, but he won't like it (don't remember the exact message, but I think it's "Fido moves reluctantly" or something along those lines). A pet will never step on one on his own though.

 

Liet

Golden Member
Jun 9, 2001
1,529
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0
Just to clarify: Playing on NAO is the same as playing single-player, except there are other players' ghosts around and your stats are tracked?
 

s44

Diamond Member
Oct 13, 2006
9,427
16
81
The guidebook is a nice intro but it doesn't really tell you much about strategy or tactics.

Food: Eat non-poisonous/otherwise harmful corpses as soon as possible (they get tainted after a while). Or feed them to your pet! (He may also indicate what's safe to eat, though there are certain things like bats that affect you but not him.) Don't be a cannibal, though. Note that certain corpses give you "intrinsics" that can be very, very useful.
Armor: Try to make sure things aren't cursed before you try them on. Note that some armors give you a "magic cancellation" effect besides just AC and special resistances and stuff (note that cancellation is different from actual magic resistance). Most of these are cloaks, so try to have a cloak on. Note that metal += spell failure %. Note that there's also a shirt slot underneath the armor slot.
Practice: Not only spells and weapons improve with successful practice, but your stats. Push boulders and kick open doors for strength... I've forgotten a lot of the others.
Luck: There's a luck stat that's you can't ordinarily see. There are also luckstones.

There's definitely a general "path" to winning, but learning about it is sort of spoilerific. A wish is *much* more useful to a veteran than a newbie, for example, and perhaps the most useful thing about an altar is less than obvious.

Here's the wishing spoiler if you want to read it. It does reveal a fair amount about how items work.
 

s44

Diamond Member
Oct 13, 2006
9,427
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Originally posted by: skace
If you aren't playing on nethack.alt.org, then you aren't playing nethack.
Ack! It's been a year and I forgot my password...
 

skace

Lifer
Jan 23, 2001
14,488
7
81
Originally posted by: Liet
Just to clarify: Playing on NAO is the same as playing single-player, except there are other players' ghosts around and your stats are tracked?

People can spectate you as you play and send you mail and offer tips. Very good for newbies. I remember getting a lot of help that way. You can also spectate better players to get an idea but sometimes they can be very hard to follow because of rapid key presses.

It's really fun when you get to the higher levels and you join the IRC channel for help and have 4-5 people watching you almost certainly plow to your death.

It may not sound like a lot from a multiplayer perspective, but it adds to the enjoyment.

Also it forces you to not be able to SCUM or whatever it's called where you make backups of your save files so that you never 'really' die.
 

Liet

Golden Member
Jun 9, 2001
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That's actually really interesting! I couldn't imagine how a turn-based Roguelike could be multiplayer without having some timer on moves or something.

I'm going to mess with Nethack some more before trying NAO. I played Moria like a fiend, but didn't get as much time with Nethack so it's still new to me. Don't want to ruin it by being told what I'm doing right and wrong, not just yet. :)

Edit: That's not stopping me from trying to learn stuff on the Nethack Wikia while simultaneously trying to keep as in the dark as possible so it's fresh when I get to play, hahaha!

Edit 2: I've been trying to quit smoking and a kickass turn-based game is not going to help at all. :)
 

LeonarD26

Senior member
Feb 12, 2004
826
1
71
Having a great time so far... one question though...

What's the best way to identify items? I'm playing as a Valkyrie, and I have a inventory full of stuff that's unidentified....
 

Liet

Golden Member
Jun 9, 2001
1,529
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Dunno about identifying, but I know you can drop stuff on altars to see whether they're cursed/blessed. Well, also your pet will avoid stepping on cursed stuff.
 

s44

Diamond Member
Oct 13, 2006
9,427
16
81
Well, there are specific ways of identifying certain item classes, but saving up for some blessed scrolls of ID is a not-bad baseline.
 

acheron

Diamond Member
May 27, 2008
3,171
2
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Learning how to identify items is the core of the game, really. (Blessed) scrolls of identification are the easiest way to go. If you can learn the spell of identification (and can cast it well enough) then it's a huge help.