some questions about classes

[gosos]

I want to play some new classes to learn the game. just curious on a few things

1. beastfighter and barbarian seem to be very similiar in how you play them. The differences seem to be subtle. Am I correct on this?
2. what are some good races to play a merchant/gardener? I want to see what happens with them just out of curiosity.
3. monks are basically melee guys that go unarmed right? so they get some speed to them. they seem similiar to duelists (who I found boring cause its almost all melee, but they were very easy to start) except you just dont use weapons.
4. if i play an archer in 1.2, do i need to do the kranach quest to get the 5000 arrows? or are there enough fletchery sets where i can get enough arrows early on?
5. what is a good race for a bard? I am thinking drakeling. Not sure.

[_Ln_]

I want to play some new classes to learn the game. just curious on a few things

1. beastfighter and barbarian seem to be very similiar in how you play them. The differences seem to be subtle. Am I correct on this?
2. what are some good races to play a merchant/gardener? I want to see what happens with them just out of curiosity.
3. monks are basically melee guys that go unarmed right? so they get some speed to them. they seem similiar to duelists (who I found boring cause its almost all melee, but they were very easy to start) except you just dont use weapons.
4. if i play an archer in 1.2, do i need to do the kranach quest to get the 5000 arrows? or are there enough fletchery sets where i can get enough arrows early on?
5. what is a good race for a bard? I am thinking drakeling. Not sure.

1. Barbarians can use weapons and therefore have access to all kind of stuff: dual-wielding, 1hander&shield, 2hander. Beastfighters are royally screwed with weapons and have some problems with special monsters like eternium golems and such. This is far from subtle, but from overall perspective they are somewhat similar.
2. Merchants are really bad and you can normally fix them with drakelings or orcs. For farmers it all depends on how much you are going to farm. If you are going to spend 10k first turns on it and are ready to use potential increasing herb methods, you can play anyone. Mist elven farmers in this case should be quite a nice combination.
3. You can use any weapons with monks and they are good with it. Be sure to stay unburdened and don't use heavy armor to get bonus speed and DV (these are independent from unarmed).
4. Depends on your race. Normally people offset fletchery until class power kicks in (level 12? sorry, don't remember). Archers are a good class to tackle Kranach due to their missile evasion. 3000 gp early one can be a huge advantage.
5. Starting pets on a bard are best from drakes, dwarves and orcs. If you want 7 league boots, you will have to reroll a lot or play a high-Mana races (gnomes, elves).

[gosos]

i tried a dark elf archer last night. first time i had a guy who didnt have healing or herbalism and my first chaotic. so i take it i should go the quest that give same healing and not herbalism right? so just copy with having unidentified and curses herbs? From the wiki orcs or dark elf's are supposed to make good archers. I did notice that my dex potential on a dark elf is like 46. which is kinda funny just thinking how much gold it would cost me to make that...

chaotics make me concerned cause its so easy to accidently step on an altar and then game over. any value in getting the amulet of law for killing hotzenpotz and turning my dark elf into a neutral? or probably a bad idea?

[GordonOverkill]

The easiest way to change your allignment is to sacrifice small amounts of money (1 gold each time) on a neutral or lawful altar... that's what I try to do early on with most chaortic characters. I once won the game with a dark elven archer who didn't farm herbs at all. He got treasure hunter and thus got enough potions to train his stats. The big advantage of orkish or dark-elven archers is the find weekness skill, I think.

[gosos]

so chaotic is generally considered to be harder than neutral or lawful? it looks like chaotic is for people who want special ultra endings.

[GordonOverkill]

A big disadvantage is that they do not get a guaranteed co-alligned altar in Dwarftown. On the other hand they can sacrifice every monster on their altars, which is not too bad, if they find an early one. At least I find it harder to play chaotic chars.

[gosos]

there is also the tricky part of not walking on the altar. I have found with neutral/lawful characters stepping on the altar is critical to getting mobs to walk on it so you can sacrifice. i find if i go around it, its harder to get them to step on it.
chaotics have alot more ultra ending options too right?

[anon123]

I find chaotic to be the best and most fun alignment, simply because you can do more things without having to constantly worry about overdoing it and losing favor with your current deity. Downsides include having to be careful with altars (easily manageable with doors and/or invisibility unless you're livesaccing), some quests being unavailable (barring the mystic, nothing major for my playstyle) and accelerated corruption if you're C- (but there's plenty of corruption removal in the game).

[gosos]

how do you handle live-saccing with chaotic? i find i usually need to walk on altars to get mobs to follow me. I like to crown early. it is usually pretty qucik with live saccing at low levels. I can crown and then do 1 pre-post crown in about 2 hours in UD.
what favor do i have to worry about losing with neutral/lawful. amulet of balance warn when doing stuff pretty much negates most things (such as pickpocket) and reduces it alot such as eating spectures. then amulet of law to get me back up. amulet of law is easy to get from the kill hotzenpotz quest. amulet of balance is easy to get for crowning as a neutral. harder to find as lawful.

[anon123]

how do you handle live-saccing with chaotic? i find i usually need to walk on altars to get mobs to follow me.

Just lead them in a straight line until you're next to the altar, then walk around it. Monsters will follow you and step on the altar when you're in its row again.


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what favor do i have to worry about losing with neutral/lawful. amulet of balance warn when doing stuff pretty much negates most things (such as pickpocket) and reduces it alot such as eating spectures. then amulet of law to get me back up. amulet of law is easy to get from the kill hotzenpotz quest. amulet of balance is easy to get for crowning as a neutral. harder to find as lawful.

You have to remember to wear the amulet of balance, or keep it on all the time (and it only works if you're already neutral). The effect of amulets of order is pretty slow and less effective as you level up. And in both instances, you can't equip anything else in the neck slot in the interim. Chaotics can follow their alignment and wear the amulet of their choice. ;)