How do you get good at ADOM?

[boxybrownfromaster]

I've played like 50 games and I haven't been able to live longer than 5 days each time I try. Any advice?

[Grey]

Well, for exploring the game I'd definitely suggest playing as a troll to start off with. Few things can kill them initially. Gnomish elementalists are good too for having excellent offensive magic from the start. What tend to be the main causes of your deaths? Some early game dungeons are actually best avoided, such as the puppy quest and the small cave.

[spectre]

"What tend to be the main causes of your deaths?"

I second that, hard to give any advice if we don't know what kills you (and whole lotsa things do in ADOM)
Other than that, it'd help if we knew how much of a beginner are you, so we won't give useless information such as learn the most important commands, such as the Tactics setting, or don't eat kobolds.

As far as general character suggestions are concerned, I'd suggest giving priests a spin.
They are competent casters and fare reasonably well in melee, most importantly, however, they start with high Detec Item Status, which saves a lot of beginner's frustration coming from cursed items.
They also have healing, which helps in general survivor.

As for the race, feel free to experiment. Contrary to Grey's opinion I would vote against trolls, however, since you can have problems with keeping them well fed, which is another thing new Adomers seem to have trouble with.

I would suggest Dwarves, since they are resilent, and start with Detect Traps skill, which is useful to know which doors are safe to force open. Take these if you have problems with traps.

If starvation is your problem, make good friends with the food shop in Terinyo and keep yourself well stocked on rations. Alternatively, choose a race that knows Food Preservation: Humans, Drakeling work ok.
Hurtlings also know Cooking which helps, but they are rather poor stat-wise.

Another option to try is an archer. Choose human or elven, so that you have plenty of ammo to work with.
You can stay out of harms way using missles.

Some more general advice:
(o)Always stay on your toes, as you already know you can get killed a lot in adom. If you start feeling an urge to get cocky and rush monsters headlong, tapping the movement keys frantically, it's probably time to take a break and save.
(o)Learn from your deaths, if you die because of traps, be sure to have detect traps skill, if a certain monster keeps killing you, avoid them. If you get killed in a certain place a lot, avoid it for the time being.
Not all quests were meant to be completed, and not all monsters were meant to be defeated (straight away). Discretion is the better part of valor.

[gut]

> How do you get good at ADOM?

By learning from mistakes. I'm still learning with just about
every game I play, and I've been playing for a loooooooong
time : ) The guidebook and save scumming will shorten the
learning process, but at a price. You might enjoy the game
more, by discovering the secrets in the non-spoil fashion.

In short, here are a few of the things that can increase
your servival rate:

Learn what monsters present what problems, like ghuls
stun, mimics paralyze, ochre jellies corrode weapons,
stone golems hit hard, and so on. Once you have the
troublesome monsters memorized, you can prepare well
for them. This probably is the best thing you can do to
improve your survival chances.

Use the ID, that's what it's there for! After you become
experienced, then you can add the restriction of no
ID scumming, if you like. Again, this is an extremely
powerful feature of the game, and if you're not using
it, you are missing out.

Learn the uses of herbs. This is an extremely powerful
feature of the game. Beating the game without herb
use is a challenge, even for experienced players. If you
are not using herbs, you are handicapping yourself
horribly.

Learn to evaluate how powerful your PC really is. There
are some parts of the game that shouldn't be taken on
if you are not powerful enough. Your evaluations will
change as you become more experienced. At first, err
on the side of caution, only later will you take on the
ToEF with 99 HP's.

Examples: I would reccomend not tangling with the mad
carpenter unless your PV is at least 6. Don't do the
puppy cave without the healing skill. Don't attack
Hotzenplotz unless you have bolt spells, or respectable
missile skills. The more you learn to evaluate how powerful
your PC needs to be, before taking on specific challenges,
the more likely you are to live through them.

Learn how to use altars. If you find an early game altar,
it can be a trememdous advantage, but only if you
know how to use it. It can help you to identify your
items, and yield holy water to improve your items. If
you spend enough time saccing things (monsters), it
can even yield early game artifacts.

Learn the effects of eating corpses. Eating specific
corpses can increase stats, decrease stats, petrify,
confuse, or just outright kill you.

By learning these things over time (or by spoiling
methods), you will get farther in the game.

[Nezur]

I've played like 50 games and I haven't been able to live longer than 5 days each time I try. Any advice?

It often pays to spend time leveling on the first levels of the ID which is the southeasternmost cave on the map.

EDIT: like gut mentioned.

[Ter13]

I honestly don't care for even going near the two recommended dungeons when you first start a character. I tend to immediately rush to save the puppy, and kill Kranach. The infinite dungeon has a nasty habit of spawning dark elf priestesses, which have the record for killing my characters, and the 7-level dungeon northwest of terinyo has far too high of a monster population rate to be very survivable by a new player.

Remember a few things that will save you:

Melee is nice, but being in close range gives you less room to run away.

Some spells rebound off of things, don't zap wands carelessly, or you will pay the price.

Ochre jellies corrode your weapons. Don't use your main weapon on them. Also, don't kick them period. It eats your boots, and hurts you if you are barefoot.

Early food sources aren't always rations. Try eating bats, giant rats, lizards, and gnomes. NEVER EAT KOBOLDS!

If you aren't satiated at all times, you are probably not eating corpses you should be.

Try taming some animals. They often make great allies, or can hold back your enemy just long enough for you to get away.

Don't overburden yourself, you will regret it when you try to escape a fight you cannot win. Trust me, you will find another spellbook later.

Don't pick up everything. If you see a suit of full plate on the ground, think about wether or not you need it. If you are a caster type, you shouldn't even be having to think about it.

Gold is just shy of useless, and you will accumulate more than enough of it. Don't risk your life for loot so you can make money.

While it may seem like a good idea to kick in the locked door, you will end up regretting it eventually. Locked doors often carry traps that shatter your gear.

Enemies that can stun, or paralyze you should be noted, and dealt with long before they can get in melee range. I don't care if you have to throw money at them to kill them, just don't let them touch you.

If it's purple, 90% of the time, it will try to corrupt you. Don't let it. Having a spine has disadvantages, but overall, not being a puddle of chaos more than makes up for them.

When fighting groups of summoned foes, it is all too easy to get overwhelmed. Kill the caster ASAP.

Some enemies can disarm you. Take note of them, and don't let them.

I've got a lot more, but I'm running through literally years of dead characters, and reading memorial files. Trust me, a lot of my characters have died because of these reasons.

The most irritating way I've ever died, was due to ignoring a disarming enemy while ignoring three summoners after having my armor eaten away by corrosive monsters, all because I did not take care of any of the three encounters using ranged combat, and after I had killed the hundreds of summoned monsters, I was careless and stepped on a trap, which did just enough damage to kill me. Had I followed that list up there, I would have survived, and that character probably would have won (My best character ever, near perfect stats, artifact weapons and armor).

Anyway, good hunting!

[gut]

> The infinite dungeon has a nasty habit of
> spawning dark elf priestesses

It's pretty easy to control the danger level
in the ID. If you don't want to fight tough
monsters, just don't go too deep. As long as
you stay near a staircase, escape is easy.

> Try eating bats, giant rats, lizards, and gnomes

gnomes? : D

> Gold is just shy of useless,

Can't agree with that. You can use gold
in the early game to buy large rations,
and simply 'w5' your St stat to 18. You
can also pick up a few points of PV at
the black market. For the mid-game, there
is piety, Waldenbrooks and garth training.
In the late game, that is where gold is
useless.

> Locked doors often carry traps that shatter your gear.

I mainly do kick down doors. I just drop
my inventory beforehand with the command
':d+'. You can leave most of your worn
items on, just remove the really valuable
stuff.

> I don't care if you have to throw money at them
> to kill them, just don't let them touch you.

If memory serves, I think merchants are
the only class that can inflict damage
with thrown coins.

[spectre]

^I think Ter 13 meant goblins, not gnomes (-:

[> Gold is just shy of useless,
Can't agree with that.]

Ditto. You'll get plenty of it in late game, but it is scarce in the beginning, and there are definitely things to spend it on. Adding to gut's list: there is also the Thieves guild training for non-Lawfuls, and with some luck you should generate a few shops along your way through the caves. There is also one guaranteed in the High Mountain Village, and, for me, this one often had an artifact on display.

[If memory serves, I think merchants are
the only class that can inflict damage
with thrown coins.]

Yep, for other classes the -foo will simply grab and pocket the coin.

As for the Kobold Corpses, the sickness they induce is expolitable as well, but this is by no means a beginner's tactics. It lowers your stats, making them easier to increase with herbs and training, also successfully sweating through the fever trains toughness, according to the improved GB at least.

[Some enemies can disarm you. Take note of them, and don't let them.]
I think this one needs clarification, you need high Dex and weapon skill to prevent this. Early on, there's actually little you can do, except keep them at a distance.

[Laukku]

Learn what monsters present what problems, like ghuls stun

Enemies that can stun, or paralyze you should be noted, and dealt with long before they can get in melee range. I don't care if you have to throw money at them to kill them, just don't let them touch you.

Actually, ghuls paralyse you. AFAIK no monster has stunning as a special attack. It is just a random chance from any monster (but maybe higher with those that deal high damage.)

[gut]

> AFAIK no monster has stunning as a special attack

That's funny, because up until recently, I didn't
know that ghuls could paralyze a PC that wasn't
doomed. I suspect that is something that has
changed a bit since ADOM 1.0.0.

Ghuls do have a stunning attack. That's why
Thrundarr gives the ring of stun resistance,
when he opens up the Griffyard quest. The ring
is for the ghuls, the holy water is for the
grave, and the bone is for... well I have no
idea WHAT the bone is for : )