Noob Player(playing troll) questions again

[LittleLady]

I'm pretty newb this is the first character to make it past dwarftown (at least in last couple years)

I just got the orb of fire from the elemental temple, needed to get it to pass the flame stairs. I also have the orb of water. I just found 'true aim' arrow and have an artifact bow from a surge of power.

My polearm skill is lvl 13, 4500 marks to increase
My shields is lvl 10, 1300 to increase
My bows is lvl 1

Should I start practicing archery? It seems to do a silly amount of dmg, do I need to skill it up before I go past the flame stairs? Any tips to proceed would be great. I really don't want to RIP suddenly.

I havn't done the minotaur maze to the west of the elemental flame tower, is it worth going?

I havn't spoiled any of the CoC (I did google the flame stairs to grab the orb hint) and the banshee I died to a very long time ago several times and remembered the death floor.

I ended up giving garth 150,000 and never got an upgrade to str so I used all my gain attribute and str potions. I got 3 wishes, 2 from pool and one from a ring. Used them all on writing sets and found 2(or 3?) as well.

Char stats are following

Troll (12yr old, merchant 78 days played) drank 7 or 8 blessed longevity potions
L+ (crowned) piety very close(just left altar live sacing / mining / buying out wand shop a few times)
150,000gp
Str 43 / 44 +12(belt) 55
Lrn 21 / 21 +4(helm) 25
Will 21 / 21 +10(tool) 31
Dex 28 / 31 31
Tgh 46 / 46 +4(brc) 50
Chr 18 / 20 18
App 13 / 13 13
Man 4 / 4 4
Per 23 / 23 23

SPD 123
HP 400
DV 102
PV 63
PP 46
XP 23 / 3884400
Carry Cap 42,471 stones

EQUIP
He: Crown of Havlor [12,12]
Ne: Ankh
Bo: Natures Companion
Gi: Girdle of Giant Str (+12) [8,7]
Cl: Invisibilty [7,0]
Rh: Rustproof orcish spear of devastation (+9, 5d8+8)
Lh: Tower Crystal Shield [13,4]
Rh: Ring of Ice/searching
Lh: Ring of High kings
Br: Bracers of Toughness [0,0] To+4
Ga: Elemental Gauntlets
Bo: 7league [8,7]
MW: Elven longbow (+15, +15)
Mi: Silver Arrow True Aim (+10, 15d5)
Tl: Chaos Orb of Elemental Water

Notable gear(in a newbies opinion)
Helm of Water breathing
All amulets except petrification I think
Holy Avenger(seems to do less dmg than the spear though???)
Fire orb and water orb
Every wand (except wish :( :( )
Book of teleportation
9 cure corruption scrolls (wrote 3)

I wrote (and bought) around 20 educations scrolls
Got Alertness, dodge, find weakness, ventrioquism, woodcraft

I have had 3 scroll shops which I mined the floor and bought out restocks a (few) times. I have around 70 identify scrolls and less of others and 1 wand shop(read danger scrolls x 7 for but never got a wand of wishes).

[grobblewobble]

Should I start practicing archery? It seems to do a silly amount of dmg, do I need to skill it up before I go past the flame stairs?
No, you don't need to train. Getting both the artifact bow and the arrow is awesome; they deal amazing damage without any training. Just use it a lot, because there is no reason not to. The skill will train itself soon enough.

Did you bless the arrow, though? Blessed weapons deal extra damage on undead and demons.


I havn't done the minotaur maze to the west of the elemental flame tower, is it worth going?
Normally it is, but your missile setup is so great that even the axe of the minotaur emperor isn't that good anymore. If it is strong, shoot it.

Oh, and the fire orb is better to wear than the water orb.

[LittleLady]

No, I have only blessed the non artifact equipments I have 2 holy waters available though.

[grobblewobble]

Using one of them on your arrow is very much worth it. It increases your damage against some of the most dangerous monsters (including all orb guardians) by as much as +50%.