ADOM Newb: Is this common?

[anon123]

I count 4 or 5.

My vote goes to the black tome of crap. That one is bad even for a wizard. What are your picks?

[Dudley]

black tome, both missiles (if only they were returning..), gauntlets of eternal peace (save if spellcaster), silver key (save if you're a wimp :P)

[JellySlayer]

black tome, both missiles (if only they were returning..), gauntlets of eternal peace (save if spellcaster), silver key (save if you're a wimp :P)

Three of those artifacts are crowning-only though. Even the missiles probably aren't terrible early on... sure they don't return, but they'll at least 1 shot kill pretty much everything.

The book is only really good to sell early on...

[FatMagic]

You're pretty lucky to have received an artifact at this point in the game! Whirlwind isn't exceptionally good overall, but with the inventory you have right now, you'll find it very helpful. (Actually, I can only think of one artifact that wouldn't be good for a new PC.)

Rocks are the most plentiful ammunition in the game. You can get them as random loot, from digging with a pickaxe, or by killing monsters that are made of rock. They make up for this by never having special prefixes or suffixes (barring a special case), however.

Luckily I just waited around while the Ants dug all over the place, and eventually collected about 150 rocks, good enough for now. If I can hit with the sling, it's a guaranteed one-shot kill at this point.

A scroll of gold detection or magic mapping will let you know exactly where it is. Then you can dig or teleport inside, although you might not have means to do either, so luring ants there in Coward tactics might be the best choice. I'd try to get the gold right now if possible, as that's when it'll prove most useful. If you can get in, just pick it up and leave. Don't 'C'hat to the guard.

Well as luck would have it, the Royal Vault spawned on the same level as the ants... and in the same area as the Ant hole. When I went to find rocks from the ants, they had already dug into the Vault! I just grabbed the gold, left the guard alone, and bolted.

p.s. Thanks for all the help and advice everyone!!

[Lasher]

Congrats! Good luck with your char!

Keep us updated!

[BrianL]

Drink a potion of healing to take care of sickness lickity quick. Or you could live sac non-aligned monsters until you feel much better.

To get rocks, cast earthquake. : p Nah, that's not exactly an early-game spell. Ants are good, though. I never have a shortage of rocks, but then again, I never look for them in particular.