The Weakest Link '09: League of Shadows

[Conundrum]

I was gonna spectate but I don't think PuTTY works over my connection at Uni

I'm willing to try this out, I think I can get it set up when I get home.

[furious_styles]

Okay, we're up and running.

First thing I do is drink our potion of learning. I figure we might as well do this now instead of waiting for an explosive rune to destroy it. It is blessed: Learning to 25.

Rather than go down a few ID levels just because we can, I decide to play it very safe and stay at the upper levels grinding experience, gear and weapon marks to set the PC up as best as possible for future turns. I apologise for the paucity of... well... stuff, in the event log, but large periods of time were me just walking around for fifty turns, killing a giant rat, walking around for another fifty turns, and so on, as spectators can attest. Little excitement was had!

50 -- The very first thing we find is a pair of black gauntlets lying on the ground. Equipping them boosts our PV to 4! Wow, that's a real bonus. Elsewhere we find a rusty potion and a blazing potion.
200 -- Level 2. Concentration (3), Detect Traps, Literacy, Healing.
300 -- Level 3. Concentration (5), Detect Traps. As for talent lines, for ID-diving chars I very much like the Skin talents for extra survivability, and as we are dwarven, they're potentially more valuable to this character than others. So, our level 3 talent is Hardy as a precursor.
500 -- Level 4. Healing (2), Literacy, Concentration (3).
700 -- Down to ID:2!
850 -- Level 5. Healing (2), First Aid (2), Concentration - maxed, Healing.
900 -- Staves to level 1.
1125 -- A kobold drops a short bow.
1200 -- A giant rat drops a rainbow-hued potion.
1250 -- An orc throws a crude knife, and drops a viscous potion.
1350 -- Yaaay orc scorcher!! I run it around, it throws a spear, I express my gratitude by killing it. I equip the spear and it is an orcish spear (+1, 1d8+4). Awesome!
1500 -- Somewhere around here a large gnoll drops a scroll labeled "ECNETOPINMO", and a goblin drops a sling to go with some rocks we found.
1600 -- Level 6. Literacy, First Aid, Healing (4), and I take the talent Tough Skin. Our PV is now up to 5.
...2000 -- I spend the remainder of the turn sweeping the level back and forth and killing the generated monsters. Nothing else of note occurs.

At some point we get +1 Mana taking us to 12, but I forgot to note exactly when it occurred - sorry about that.

I leave the PC standing on the down stair of ID 2.

The vlg can be found here.

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Furious styl  St:15  Le:25  Wi:15  Dx:12  To:15  Ch: 6  Ap: 8  Ma:12  Pe:12 L
DV/PV: 18/5    H: 39(39)      P: 39(39)      Exp: 6/2854        I2    M: 2000
Coward
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[evariste]

I'll play it now.

[mike]

That's a pretty flawless beginning.

[furious_styles]

That's a pretty flawless beginning.

Yeah, you can't really complain when the RNG sees fit to grant you +3PV gauntlets and a solid polearm weapon to kick things off. It makes you wonder who's going to be on the receiving end when it starts playing bad cop instead of good cop.

[evariste]

I'm omitting descriptions of almost all the creatures killed (they were very easy because this character is so strong) and the not very exciting object finds (rocks, a few weapons, thick furs, quarrels, a key, an unknown scroll, etc).

2000: I go down to I3.
2015: I find a kobold tension room. They drop several short bows (one from the largest stack wielded) and a few arrows.
2077: The only door has a booby trap, so I drop stuff and kick it down, taking 15 points of damage. (Oops, unequipping the fire resistance ring was probably a mistake...)
2104: I gain pole arms level 1. I'm meleeing most things, because I can.
2153: I find a small shield and wear it. Good, it is uncursed...
2273: I gain level 7. I don't see much worth advancing here, so I just push Healing up to 76.
2325: I finish exploring the level and notice that I am hungry. I eat a large ration and decide to descend to I4.
2540: I find a melon (and I found a raw meat at some earlier point, which gets eaten once I realize that it is spoiling).
2660: I decide to descend to I5, since we still don't have much food...
2793: I find an orc tension room, but the only notable drop is a loaf of bread.
2982: I finish exploring the level and decide that I have enough food to hang around for a while...
3003: I gain pole arms level 2.
3055: I eat the melon.
~3300: I gain level 8: Healing -> 89
3507: Oops, I ran into a dark elven warrior and got poisoned. Oh well, free training for Healing (which later rose to 90).
3551: I eat the bread. Now I'm down to just the iron ration again...
3587: I try briefly to get shield marks from a bat, but this shield isn't good enough for that to be reasonable... I'm taking too much damage and stop.
3656: I'm finally unpoisoned, so I'm going to head down to I6 now because of the slight food shortage...
3698: I find a second scroll of uncursing.
3786: I eat a lizard man corpse.
3973: I finish exploring I6 and sit on the down stairs for the last few turns.

I hope nobody minds too much that I descended four levels -- I get nervous when I'm down to a single ration of food, and this character can handle I6 just as easily as I4.

The vlg is here.

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Evariste      St:15  Le:25  Wi:15  Dx:12  To:15  Ch: 6  Ap: 8  Ma:12  Pe:12 L
DV/PV: 21/5    H: 45(45)      P: 48(48)      Exp: 8/9353        I6    M: 4000
Burdened Coward
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[BurnedToast]

Starting my turn soon if people want to watch

Edit:

4000 - check my inventory out, descend the stairs I'm standing on to I7
4022 - notice a tension room message, uh oh!
4070 - burned, bolted, and melee'd a bunch of rats and giant rats. Looted a girdle which I wore (+0 +0) and a ration
4135 - frostbolted a fire vortex
4162 - looted a sausage
4258 - blasted a ratling fencer for some water, dry meat, and a +0 +1 metal cap which I wore
4364 - Encountered a barbarian leader and a werewolf, who summoned some help
4394 - leveled up to 9 killing some of the wolves! spent 5 points getting healing to 100, 1 pumping literacy to 77 and choose iron skin. Still fighting
4462 - I'm Hungry! but still battling wolves and the barbarian
4485 - I'm Starving! but the wolves keep coming!
4490 - Having dealt with the werewolf and the barbarian leader, I eat the sausage while dodging blows from the wolves
4515 - I finish off the wolves and loot a scroll labeled Gnay-Gnay. I don't risk reading it.
4558 -> 4593 - Rest to heal from the battle with the WW and barbarian
4636 - Equip ID our black robes (-3 +1) which I drop, Equip ID our thick furs (-1, -1) [+0, +2] which are cursed. I decide not to waste our uncurse scroll on them
4699 - eat some corpses I find, I'm now Bloated and carrying a giant rat corpse in addition to our other food
4766 - +1 mana while stabbing an owlbear
5059 - encountered a jacklewere which I frostbolt, then melee it's summons to death
5116 - Strained so I drop a bunch of junk we are carrying, eat a goblin corpse and a large ration taking me back to bloated and burdened
5311 - Poisoned! while fighting a dark elf of some sort. Rest and use first aid to survive
5483 - Polearm skill +1 to 3 while fighting a kobold
5635 - got careless fighting a hill orc, down to 18 HP. retreat to downstair room to heal
5700 - w5'ing for a while
5910 - Leveled up to 10 fighting something I forgot to record (sorry). +1 literacy to max for this level (81) +3 first aid to 59, +2 detect traps to 38 (didn't know what else to pick).
5910 -> 6001 decide to rest to give the next guy full health/mana for his turn. w5 stuck me on 6001 instead of 6000 for some reason, sorry!

Mostly I just cruised around killing monsters and taking it easy. Tried to use our bow to get some bow marks but I missed alot. I notice most people seem to keep us on Coward - I don't think you gain weapon marks that way so I left us on normal most of the time. I increased our food supply from 1 ration to 3 rations and some dry meat, plus the next guy is starting out at satiated. I used quite a few castings of burning hands, but we get tons of those and a few of frost bolt. I didn't use any other castings.

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BurnedToast   St:15  Le:25  Wi:15  Dx:12  To:15  Ch: 6  Ap: 8  Ma:13  Pe:12 L
DV/PV: 12/8    H: 56(57)      P: 53(53)      Exp: 10/19369      I7    M: 6001
Satiated Burdened

[vogonpoet]

Wow, avoid being too competitive before the chaos gate opens, fair enough, but finishing your turn on the downstairs? Thats just insanely generous to next plater . Nice.

Incidentally Grey, nice Intro, but reading it made me feel you had missed a referencing oppurtunity - you definitely reminded me of the Cenobites. We could have the Infinite Dungeon being held within the internal space of Lemarchand's box perhaps.

[BurnedToast]

Wow, avoid being too competitive before the chaos gate opens, fair enough, but finishing your turn on the downstairs? Thats just insanely generous to next plater . Nice.

Incidentally Grey, nice Intro, but reading it made me feel you had missed a referencing oppurtunity - you definitely reminded me of the Cenobites. We could have the Infinite Dungeon being held within the internal space of Lemarchand's box perhaps.

Evariste left me on the down stairs, so I figured I'd pass the favor on. This is as much a test as it is a competition, anyway.

I agree that Grey did an excellent job on the intro, I'm not a big fan of the Hellraiser series so I can't really comment on if the reference would have made it better or not though

I sure feel slow and noobish compared to the other people I've been watching play, that's for sure. The spectator feature is awesome!

[Grey]

BurnedToast: The spectating is indeed fun. My and furious_styles were watching you play - we thought you were a gonner when you were starving and surrounded by wolves, but you pulled yourself out of it well. Congrats on getting through your first round

vogonpoet: Cenobites? Don't know what that is I'm afraid.

Competition is still open for more to join. If the current players want to keep rotating the rounds as is then they're welcome to until new people join in. I'm off for a few hours now - will be back later.