Wand of destruction.

[ghostjghost]

Playing a human thief - D37 I encounter a black wizard who summoned a bunch of quickling lords.

Having no magic and no humanoid slaying ammo, and no tp control, I decided to try my luck with some unidentified wands (having used all my fireball wands on the cat lord.)

I thought I had lucked out when the first one I tried was a wand of destruction, but it killed me also, and the text said I died to overusing a wand of destruction.

I never noticed these things damaging me before - is that relatively new? or was I just not paying attention when I used them to destroy the levers in previous games?

[Blank4u47]

Lol, you weren't paying attention before, it's always cost pp and hp.

[Blasphemous]

Not sure if the cost is a percentage or an absolute value but it drains well into tens of points.
If you were already severely damaged, this might have tipped the scales.

[ghostjghost]

Something to figure out then

I think I only had ~40hp when I climbed the staircase.

[ghostjghost]

Some limited testing in exploration mode

lvl 1 toughness 9 hitpoints used 18
lvl 1 toughness 7 hitpoints used 32
lvl 1 pv 4 toughness 7 hitpoints used 20
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 10 hitpoints used 21
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 9 hitpoints used 26
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 10 hitpoints used 21
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 8 hitpoints used 30
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 10 hitpoints used 21
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 7 hitpoints used 30
lvl 1 pv 3 toughness 8 hitpoints used 30
lvl 1 pv 1 toughness 7 hitpoints used 32

lvl 5 pv 3 toughness 9 hitpoints used 29
lvl 5 pv 1 toughness 7 hitpoints used 32
lvl 5 pv 1 toughness 8 hitpoints used 37
lvl 5 pv 1 toughness 9 hitpoints used 40
lvl 5 pv 1 toughness 8 hitpoints used 44


Didn't think to test/check B/U/C status but it does seem there is some scaling with level - it also looks like pv might affect it but I didn't really test enough to say for sure either way.

[Grond]

Better to test with a single character, so you can isolate the factors (thanks, reloadable games mode).

Summary of results: Level, willpower, toughness, and PV have negligible-to-no impact on damage. The base damage for cursed wands is somewhat higher, and the base damage for blessed wands is somewhat lower. Damage is increased when something (terrain or monsters) is actually destroyed.

Character 1:
Cursed wand:   61, 64, 54, 60, 56, 52, 62, 60, 58, 58 (58.5 average)
Uncursed wand: 28, 22, 33, 24, 38, 22, 34, 30, 28, 26 (28.5 average)
Blessed wand:  15, 10, 14, 15, 21, 16, 10, 16, 18, 14 (14.9 average)

Uncursed wand 55 PV (+50):    23, 35, 32, 31, 37, 30, 26, 20, 25, 31 (29.0 average)
Uncursed wand level 40 (+39): 32, 25, 28, 28, 27, 27, 34, 33, 28, 32 (29.4 average)

Character 2:
Uncursed wand:             26, 38, 40, 30, 38, 26, 27, 24, 32, 25 (30.6 average)
Uncursed wand 99 To (+89): 28, 28, 29, 23, 27, 31, 27, 30, 30, 27 (28.1 average)
Uncursed wand 99 Wi (+88): 26, 27, 27, 35, 23, 34, 28, 28, 26, 27 (28.1 average)

Uncursed wand next to a dungeon wall:          78,  68,  79,  67,  72,  73,  67,  66,  76,  75 ( 72.1 average)
Uncursed wand in the middle of a jackal pack: 120, 117, 119, 106, 116, 119, 117, 121, 111, 124 (117.0 average)
Cursed wand in the middle of a jackal pack:   145, 141, 149, 135, 134, 157, 135, 131, 135, 141 (140.3 average)

[ghostjghost]

Nice to know - thanks.