Ultra Questions

[FantomFang]

I just have a few quick questions before I start attempting to achieve an Ultra Ending:

1) Can all of the items you need for Gaab'baay's quest line be wished for? If not, which ones can't?
2) About when should I start focusing on the achieving the requirements for the chaos artifacts, as in, what is a good level to be able to beat Keriax, and when does your level become problematic in changing your alignment? Is their an optimal level range I should attempt to finish it by (realizing that once i give him all the items, i can change alignment freely without worry)?

3) What type of speed should i shoot for by the end of the game? Is 200/400 really a possibility like the Guidebook recommends?
4) Anything I should know about the Rift that the guidebook skips?
5) Anything else I should know about the Ultra-specific areas and monsters (Scintillating Cave/Emperor Moloch/Filk)?

That should be it! Thanks in advance for any advice.

[Baranor]

1. Yes.

2. I do Baba Yaga's stuff earlier than other people. It allows me to change alignment earlier in the game. I have had some trouble with Keriax, but I do know that he's much easier with dragon slaying ammo. I would save him until later in the game, but that is just me. I find there to be no reason to risk it.

3. The 200-400 in my experience is from potions of boost speed taken when needed.

4. Don't bring any really good stuff down there. Bring a bunch of crap that can get destroyed without you caring.

5. I found that they were pretty much like every other high level monster. Filk is super, super fast. The Emperor Moloch is super hard to kill.

[Silfir]

I guess training in arrows and quarrels *heavily* is a good idea for any ultra ending. I'd wager that slaying ammunition is the best way to kill Keriax, the emperor moloch and Andor Drakon without getting ravaged yourself. So with weapon skill of, say, 9, okay Dexterity, and appropriate slaying ammo Keriax is doable. Only, can't you delay Keriax for practically forever? You need to be chaotic to get the location of the ancient stone circle, but aren't you supposed to be able to enter it regardless of alignment?

I think we're going to make this a race, FantomFang... It's about time I get off my ass and get an ultra ending of my own.

[Molach]

1) Probably better to just spend some more time finding them. Save wishes for final-fight speed.
3) I think all my successful ultras took a trip to a certain overgrown temple and had a barbecue on its denizens. Mabye you can even get the speed increase by casting slow monster on yourself while eating.
4) Be light! Do _not_ bring a bunch of *heavy* crap because I think it will make you fall faster and damage more stuff anyway. (No, I can not back this fact up with code-dived facts. And I'm glad for it). My last trip down the rift I only brought my (mithril+) equipment, some holy water and a pack of stoma, along with 10 different kinds of useless arrows/quarrels, and some of the bad scrolls. Only smashed 1-2 things, and nothing useful.
5) Filk is non-aggro, so you can stand next to him and kill him with one (ball?) spell. Or burning hands. For emperor moloch, either demon slaying (you should have the runed trident) or penetration will work fine. Don't let him get an attack on you. If you want to lure him off the super-corrupting level he is found on, you open yourself to one round of attacks. Hm. But you should be able to survive this, considering that you want to fight with the Chaos God Himself.

[Grey]

1. Not a farmer corpse, but that's an easy enough find (though can require tactics to attain). I've not personally ever had trouble finding all of the ingredients naturally.

2. I normally complete them in my 20s. After level 30 amulets of order don't work as well, but before that it's still very easy to get up to L+ if needs be. Keriax can be trouble at low level - got pretty badly bruised by him recently with a L20 char, but I could have taken him down if I had enough dragon slaying ammo. Be sure to be well-prepared for that fight, with mega confusion resistance and well trained missiles.

3. I always chew through the quickling tree when going for ultras (the time lost doesn't normally matter in a long game). Normally gets speed up to around 180. I find the claw bugs don't help much beyond that, and I don't like the Wi abuse, so I never bother with them. Blessed potions of boost speed and a wish for speed before entering the gate can easily get your speed well over 400 for the final fight.

4. Bring lots of junk (worthless gems are great, and all those crappy wands you've been hoarding) and minimal good stuff and wear only indestructables. Bring two climbing sets, one blessed and one uncursed (if stacked together there's a chance both will be destroyed at once). Don't spend too long on the bottom two levels of the Rift. Be careful of the librarian getting killed by other monsters.

5. Blessed humanoid/demon slaying ammo will take down several of the big baddies quickly - and you want damn quickly, because they're in such corrupting places. Wand of fireballs makes very short work of Filk (or crystal of fire or any ball spell).

Best of luck - ultras are very exciting when you finally achieve them.

[Baranor]

I've never done it, but I'm pretty sure that you can wish for a farmer which would then provide a corpse.

[FantomFang]

Awesome, thanks for all of the advice. You very well may beat me Silfir, it would not surprise me at all. I'll get in what playing time I feel like, but over the next couple of days i have to finish watching Yu Yu Hakusho, try out D&D 4th Edition, do chores, and other various things. I got a busy two days ahead of me!

[DeSt]

try out D&D 4th EditionSooo boooring...
Second battle taken almost 4 hrs 'cause of incredibly bad rolls(7 or 8 nat. 1).
More movement -> more battlemap changes -> much more time needed.
We'll finish one short module and forget it untill some splatbooks with above average powers.

And mainly - no focus on roleplaying, game feels like tabletop MMORPG...

[FantomFang]

DeSt - The focus on roleplaying is all up to the group really. Most of the time when I play PnP games with my friends this and plot takes center stage over combat, regardless of the specific game.

Another question: I have heard that if you remain some flavor of neutral alignment for 2000 (?) turns while in Dwarftown, the Dwarven Mystic will give you SoCR instead of the axe (which i've always gotten). Does this seem to be true?

[DeSt]

FantomFang:
I wasn't talked about roleplaying. D&D 4ed contains nothing about social interactions, no viable economical system. Only combat system, like some wargame. Well you can roleplay in wargame, and even in tetris :)

[gut]

> the Dwarven Mystic will give you SoCR instead of the axe

That info came from me I think. I was playing limited turns games, and
was having real trouble getting the SoCR. They were important, because
I could rarely save Khelly to get his, and couldn't spare turns to persue
others. I noticed that for 6 games in a row, if I held N+ or N- for ~2000
turns without changing, then chatted with the mystic, he would give SoCR.

This isn't a great test, as it could have been luck, or some other factor I
hadn't even considered. I have not paid attention to this in my other
games, as they aren't that important in my other games. To the best of my
knowledge, getting the SoCR's is supposed to be random chance,

[Grey]

Certainly in my experience being N+ or N- is essential. Whether the number of turns spent at that alignment matters or not would require a lot of testing to determine - there may be other forces at work, or it could even just be random.

[Nezur]

Being neutral is the sole requirement of having a 50% chance to get the SoCRs.

[gut]

I'm pretty sure you can't get the SoCR's, if you are N=.

[Nezur]

Some flavor of neutrality is the only requirement. Characters that are N= should be equally eligible.

RGRA - getting SoCR from dwarven mystic. (http://groups.google.de/group/rec.games.roguelike.adom/browse_thread/thread/a7681fdcd2dfa40d/687a662f9e6ef771?lnk=gst&q=dwarven+mystic#687a662f9e6ef771)

[gut]

I followed that link, and all I saw was:

> Somebody who disassembled the program told me it's a 50/50 chance for neutrals,

That's not much. I have never recieved the SoCR's while N, and I
have tried many many times. I don't really remember anybody posting
that they have recieved them, while at N. If anybody has, maybe I
will test that a bit.

[Grey]

Well, it was Malte that said it... one might presume he has good sources. However I've always been keen to point out that code-dived info isn't the whole picture, and it takes a very very skilled code-diver to find every relevant nuance to a game feature. The only way to prove it is to test the info in-game.

In this case I will point out that I came to the conclusion myself that N= never gets you the scrolls before I ever heard gut suggest his own views on the subject. So that's two experienced ADOM players that independantly came to the same conclusion. Whilst speaking to him only when N- or N+ I can only remember 2 or 3 times where he didn't give me the scrolls in at least the past year of gameplay - that means the odds for me have been way over 50%. Perhaps that's due to random chance, but from what I've heard gut say I think it's been the same for him.

[FantomFang]

Well, i was gonna try a bard for this, but he is so utterly weak at the beginning that it is problematic. I don't want a rat for a first kill, but i don't have the abilities to go kill a bandit or something. Any advice on this front? (I got a nice 6 talent gnome that I have rolled that I was saving for when I can get past the road bumps =)

EDIT: Random question, but thinking about it, why in the world can you bless scrolls by dipping them in holy water when water traps/rivers ruin them??? I can't believe I have never thought about it before, but now it just seems plain odd.

[Sidrick]

I can't be 100%, but I'm pretty sure that I've gotten the scrolls directly after having been crowned as a champion of balance, and hence N= at the time.

FantomFang, try and find yourself a beggar in Lawl, if you can. *chuckle* I always try to make one my first kill. Or, if there isn't one there, you mihgt try a giant frog, perhaps? Not all that frequent in dungeons, and fairly easily avoidable in the overland map.

[Soirana]

In this case I will point out that I came to the conclusion myself that N= never gets you the scrolls before I ever heard gut suggest his own views on the subject. So that's two experienced ADOM players that independantly came to the same conclusion.

i thought you guys were experienced enough not to trust things like i feel that...:confused:

To stop guts nonsense i did mini research (luckily digging proper file in my saves library):
Adom 1.1.1
N= 13lv char piety at pleased, lucky, fate smile, no ankh or rongs of luck (having nothing in backpack except wand of teleportation):
7times - 4SoCR+7potions of insight
3times - 1PoGA+2potions of training

Same char at N-
5times - 4SoCR+7potions of insight
5times - 1PoGA+2potions of training

Same char at N- and bad standings with diety (inventory cursing level):
8times - 4SoCR+7potions of insight
2times - 1PoGA+2potions of training

Numbers are not statistically reliable but I see no point to do deeper researching.

For future I would greatly ask to do at least minimal investigation before stamping false statements with your own authority. Thank you.
P.S. I was sober at research moment, so don't even bother with jokes about booze.

[gut]

> i thought you guys were experienced enough not to
> trust things like i feel that

Hence the wording 'pretty sure', not absolutely sure : )
Coincidence does happen, and in this case it seems like it
is coincidence, that I have never recieved SoCR's while N=.
I now wonder if this has been true for all versions, as I
have thought this for ~6 years.

> ask to do at least minimal investigation before
> stamping false statements with your own authority

Well, 'pretty sure' is not much of a stamp of authority.

In a way, I prefer not testing things imperically, (in this
game at least). You see, it wouldn't be much trouble for me
to re-load save files, and I have done plenty of that in
the past, believe me! Besides, I'm proficient enough with
memory editors, to not need re-loading anyway, I think that
parameter fiddling is superior. I've also done hordes of
that in the past with ADOM, but no longer.

It's just that testing things that way (mem edit/svg re-load,
leaves me feeling a bit...blah (for lack of a better word).
I now prefer 'seat of the pants' info gathering. With enough
players contributing, the (sometimes MORE) correct answer can
still be achieved.

I will still sometimes test things using re-loading/mem editing,
if I can't get the answer other ways. I consider it a last
resort though, because it bores me.

[Grey]

Numbers are not statistically reliable but I see no point to do deeper researching.

For future I would greatly ask to do at least minimal investigation before stamping false statements with your own authority. Thank you.
P.S. I was sober at research moment, so don't even bother with jokes about booze.

Re-reading my post I think I came across a bit arrogant unintentionally - when I said "players of experience" I simply meant people who've done it a few times, and certainly didn't mean any sort of authority. This is a discussion board after all, and I'm ever eager to hear of experiences different to my own. And I did point out that perhaps it was just random chance - evidently it was.

This testing is quite interesting - and surprising, of course, given how different my experiences have been. But ah, I have myself said before about how dangerous the mind's pattern recognition system can be, and how you tend to reinforce your own biases with what you observe, forgetting the instances where you were wrong... Anyway, thank you for the testing (something I've been meaning to do myself for some time, but since I save so infrequently I never remember to back up saves for testing like this) - you should maybe post a YAGBU on RGRA.


Well, i was gonna try a bard for this, but he is so utterly weak at the beginning that it is problematic. I don't want a rat for a first kill, but i don't have the abilities to go kill a bandit or something. Any advice on this front? (I got a nice 6 talent gnome that I have rolled that I was saving for when I can get past the road bumps =)

Well if trying with bards I'd personally recommend this little guide (http://adom.brinkster.net/forum/messages.asp?thread=5990&start=57841&page=1&tmp=58119). As for first kill, it's not too hard. Get your pet to kill anything common you run into first, and try and find a rabid dog or large bat. When you run into them in future just tame them so you don't have to kill them, thus keeping Filk on a low level.

[Soirana]

> i thought you guys were experienced enough not to
Besides, I'm proficient enough with
memory editors, to not need re-loading anyway, I think that
parameter fiddling is superior.

Adombot actually doesn't need neither experience, nor parameter fiddling. If you prefer this way...

[gut]

AdomBot is limited though, it will not (to my knowledge) allow
you to edit things like whether quests are finished or not.
For this, and a load of other stuff, you have to sniff the offsets
yourself.

[FantomFang]

Gray: Yea, I've already looked at the guide. Thanks for the tip about the first kill though, for some reason it never occurred to me that I had music. Can you say "duh?"

[Silfir]

Well, how far are you, FantomFang? My human monk, level 17, has fed the ratling and is currently on search for a scroll of danger and an AoLS for Khelly. (He was randomly generated - not Khelly, the monk - and I had to use the old barbarian to later find out about my first kill. Orc, 42 killed, already have Courage. Should be doable.)

And you guys need to calm down. Okay, you already did. I personally always felt that the "You must not be N=" is a myth. Not calling myself a "player of experience" here, but the fact two players of experience come to the same conclusion doesn't really say much when others who certainly have talked to the mystic often enough don't. Fortunately we have Soirana to remind us of the importance of statistical research! :)

[FantomFang]

Not that far really. Barely started. Still been busy, but by Sunday/Monday I'll be REALLY buckling down and rocketing through (hopefully)

[Silfir]

Never mind. The skeletal king killed my monk. Back to the drawing board for me.

[Timpak]

I just have a few quick questions before I start attempting to achieve an Ultra Ending:

1) Can all of the items you need for Gaab'baay's quest line be wished for? If not, which ones can't?
2) About when should I start focusing on the achieving the requirements for the chaos artifacts, as in, what is a good level to be able to beat Keriax, and when does your level become problematic in changing your alignment? Is their an optimal level range I should attempt to finish it by (realizing that once i give him all the items, i can change alignment freely without worry)?

3) What type of speed should i shoot for by the end of the game? Is 200/400 really a possibility like the Guidebook recommends?
4) Anything I should know about the Rift that the guidebook skips?
5) Anything else I should know about the Ultra-specific areas and monsters (Scintillating Cave/Emperor Moloch/Filk)?

That should be it! Thanks in advance for any advice.

1. Yes

2. Gaab Rays quest as early as possible, then you can do them at whatever level you want to. I did keriax and filk at clvl 50 for example. But I did Gaab Rays quests early 20s.

3. Speed is a big help, but not needed. My wizard slayed andy with totrr and ~140 speed iirc. If you have good amount of socr a quickling tree raid before the final descent can get your speed really high, especially with the barbed trident of hunting from the bugcave and food preservation at 100, remember to bring stomaceptias though. 400 base speed sounds waaay high though, with potions of boosts speed 400 is a piece of cake.

4. Not really, sometimes you have to wait more than 2000 turns to get the wierd tome.

5. Scintillating cave should be done as quickly as possible, preferably with teleportation and magic mapping, monster detection on the last level. Emperor moloch have insane pv, blessed missiles of demon slaying is needed unless you have spells. Filk is a piece of cake with spells, a wand of fireball should kill him swiftly also.

[Silfir]

I think base speed caps out at some point with quicklings. I've gotten to over 200, but not much more.

[Timpak]

My fastest char ever had ~210 base speed after quickling tree visit. Never knew there was a cap, is there a cap on quickling blood potions also?

[Silfir]

Not sure. I've only once got a character up to "Ludicrous" speed, and corpses stopped working at some point. Quickling blood may still work. In any case, getting to 200 base speed is enough to get over 400 with some potions and a wish for speed.

[FantomFang]

Been working on this guy. So far got a pretty good Bard going, I've only found 1 spellbook over the course of the entire game (Acid Bolt) and I am finished with just about everything leading up to the temples. I just have to get an AoLS for Khelly and do the TotHK, maybe the Minotaur place (not likely). One thing I've realized during this game is that the Phial, while good fodder, can make a great way to train your mana, if it works like it appears to, since it fully drains you of your PP.

EDIT: Ok, now I have a problem =( I've emptied every pool that I have easy access to, with only 1 left all the way NE at the Puppy Cave, and I still lack a AoLS (Got a lot of nice intrinsics though). What would you all advise me to do? I have two PoE, and several rings I could bear to lose, so I could try Ring-dipping for them (even if I got several wishes, I'd probably end up blowing them on the AoLS and the items i need for Ultra, for the ease of it). Other possibilities include digging up the graves in the Dwarven Graveyard, ID hopping, exploring Cavernous level of TotHK, and pickpocketing, I guess. Just wondering what people think would work best.

EDIT 2: Tried the Ringdipping on D:8. Ironically, I started with two PoE's, dipped 2x, and got this ---> 4x!oStunResist -> 4x!oSeeInv -> 4x!oStunResist
Hrm. What to try next...

EDIT 3: I dug up every great treasure in the graveyard. Nothing. Nothing special even =(. On the good side, I gained a level from all the liches i killed. Kinda funny 1 shotting an emperor lich at lvl19, cuz you have blessed undead slaying quarrels =P

[FantomFang]

Cancel the questions. Right after finding the possible wish in the Mama Blup's cave (saw an ordinary ring, and an un-identified wand that could've been wishing) i accidently attacked a Greater Water Elemental. Not realizing its strength, i hit it like 4 times before i realized it had killed me. Wow. Didn't know they could hurt like that through 20 PV. Stupidity, you are the death of me!

[PeanutGod]

Speaking of the Weird Tome....

I've spent over 6000 turns, after 2000, 3000, 4000 turns were not enough respectively to get the tome, and still nothing. Haven't said a word, not cast any spells, not read any spells. Stealth at 100, even have stealthy talent. Still nothing. What's this damned Librarians problem?

All I can think of now, is eating a harpy corpse.

Any ideas? Or is this just one game where the stupid Librarian won't be handing over the goods?

[vogonpoet]

Are you leaving and then re-entering the library after your Chats with the ghostly one? Never had any problems getting tomb (unless damn ghost is dead of course) after 2000 turns of righteous wizardly (lots of loud spells - damn that improved fireball sounds like a UN-approved cluster holy hand grenade from hell) asskicking, so don't really understand your problem PG... your character isn't talking to hirself is (s)he?.

Maybe you just did sometime to piss the guy off - deliberately burned some books in front of him maybe?

[Molach]

Sounds like you got the "old crone" corruption - character randomliy starts babbling to himself, smelling and collecting bottles in old carts. Too bad.

[warheart]

I never had any problem geting the weird tome before. When I get there I always check what monsters are there, then set the display to show turns, and just w5 2k turns until I get my book.

[PeanutGod]

It's strange, I've never had a problem getting it before either. Got the turn counter set, counted it enough times already. Each time I failed, I've re-entered. Dunno if its just being a right bugger to me, but I've never had problems with it before. Now, the git is just being annoying. I don't really need the SOCR anyway, I've already completed the game, it just looks good to go on the Hi-Score when I eventually decide to leave the chain.

[vogonpoet]

Your only reasonably classy alternative is to deliberately burn some books in front of him, shout abuse, slay the selfish fuck, and then head over to the mad minstrel and beat him to death with a glockenspiel. Just as satisfying as delivering the Tome.

[PeanutGod]

That is a very very very very good idea.

I'll give the git one more chance. If not, his library will soon be flooded out with acid and the Mad Minstrel will be forced to eat the TotRR through his anus.