Second Win Doldrums

[Phoobnahr]

Wondering if anyone else experienced the same difficulty I'm experiencing right now.

Been playing on and off for many years now. I just got my first win a couple months ago (much thanks for the helpful advice from forum posters). My win came with a trollish monk, the first such combination I had ever played, infact the first monk I'd ever played past the very beginning stages of the game.

As I continue to play, I find that the difficulty of the game has increased exponentially... since my win I don't think I've had a single character make it to dwarftown! Part of this was general carelessness right after my victory (I've finally won now, I'm less motivated to play conservatively, so what if my character dies).
Part of it has been what seems to be consistently bad luck. Since my victory I've had more characters killed by ghuls than in my entire history of playing ADOM. I've always known to be careful around ghuls, I don't let myself get surrounded when there's one in a room, and I try to kill them with ranged attacks whenever possible, but since getting my first victory, every single ghul I've encountered in melee has been an instadeath. Just this morning I had an extremely promising dwarven wizard (started with Acid Bolt, Strength of Atlas, and Teleport, 23 learning, potion of wonder that yielded Petrification, got the waterproof blanket, stairs to UD right next to up stairs in the small cave, killed kranach, etc.) I cleared the keethrax dungeon down to level 6, just to get some extra exp before tackling the UD, only to be slaughtered from full health (about 70 hitpoints) by a single ghul who I'd run away from and was waiting by the stairs on level four of the Druid Dungeon.

I typically play my early game sort of aggressively, I aim to get the waterproof blanket, kill kranach and descend through the UD every time, but if any of those aren't in the cards I don't force the issue.
I played this same style before and up to my victory, and sure I lost a lot of characters in the early game, but I got to the point where at least half my characters made it to the pyramid...

Now I'm 50 characters down without even seeing Dwarftown... come to think of it, I think only one character has even made it to the CoC...

Wondering if anyone has experienced this same kind of post-victory suck-fest, or if its just me.

[JellySlayer]

I would probably chalk it up mostly to carelessness, with a touch of bad luck. If you've stopped playing for awhile, that can really send you back a ways.

If you're having a lot of trouble with ghuls, take a look at your character's PV. If it's below 10, a ghul can kill you easily. Above 10, you're probably in the clear unless the ghul is very experienced. Don't forget about tactics, too. A lot of people run around on berserk when they should really be running around on coward. You might want to browse through the wiki article on early game survival. I'm sure you know most of this already, but there's probably a few things in there that could be helpful.

Finally, I'd suggest you play an archer (hurthling or high elf). They are a great second win character.

[edit]If you like wizards, though, you might want to just wander over to Bugwil at level 1. In about 5 minutes or so, you can work your way up to level 9 or 10 by killing some greater claw bugs, which is a pretty huge boost to your survival prospects. Use your torches to increase your sight so you can see the bugs coming.

[Silfir]

With a wizard, ghuls should exist for the seconds it takes for you to roast them with a bolt spell after you spotted them and no longer. Did I catch that right; you ran away from it and left it waiting just by the stairs? Hindsight is 20/20, of course - you should have killed the damn thing. Surviving on a wizard does depend a good bit on completely annihilating anything from a distance that could conceivably harm you in melee. I don't usually get killed by ghul after ghul, so maybe you're not being careful enough. I would probably get some insight on your common mistakes by watching you play or seeing a list of the last twenty deaths.

I don't think I've experienced a post-victory suck-fest myself - but I can say that I improved a lot after my first win. Past a certain power level, you have more options to keep yourself alive, so if you spoil yourself silly, you're actually much safer than in the early game. Couple that with trying out new races and classes, and the lack of immediate success in the early game - which, thanks to your character surpassing it, you haven't played in a while - is almost to be expected. You never stop learning.

[anon123]

Just this morning I had an extremely promising dwarven wizard (started with Acid Bolt, Strength of Atlas, and Teleport, 23 learning, potion of wonder that yielded Petrification, got the waterproof blanket, stairs to UD right next to up stairs in the small cave, killed kranach, etc.) I cleared the keethrax dungeon down to level 6, just to get some extra exp before tackling the UD, only to be slaughtered from full health (about 70 hitpoints) by a single ghul who I'd run away from and was waiting by the stairs on level four of the Druid Dungeon.

It puzzles me that you did something other than setting your tactics to Coward and bolting the ghul to destruction the second you saw it.

[Phoobnahr]

It puzzles me that you did something other than setting your tactics to Coward and bolting the ghul to destruction the second you saw it.

That particular ghul was one of half a dozen in an extremely large undead tension room on level four or so of the Druid Dungeon. I had bolted several dead, running for the stairs the whole time, that one was left because I didn't have any mana when I decended the stairs. On my way back up I saw him, immediately bolted him, but he survived, and I never moved again. I wasn't using coward tactics (probably because I have a habit of thinking of dwarves, even wizards, as being pretty hardy).

JellySlayer
I will definitely take your suggestion of trying an Archer. I've never seriously played one, and I'm not really that into wizards. Lately I've been really into dwarves.

I think carelessness definitely plays an extremely large role in why I died so much right after my victory, but after so many deaths I've started playing a lot more carefully, just like I did before I beat the game. I chalk a lot of it up to bad luck lately, but I'm sure there's more to it than that... as I said, i definitely play aggressive early-game... I just need to get better at shifting to a more conservative play style when i have a really promising character in the early game.
Also a major factor is that for a good long while before and up to when I won, I played primarily trolls, which seems to be much easier in the early game. I've probably been having some difficulty adjusting to that difference (which is why I've been playing dwarves, as they're pretty hard to kill).
I tried lots of drakeling wizards in a row, but could never get anywhere... elven wizards likewise, were always too delicate, I was dead as soon as I ran out of PP...

I have heard a lot of people say that they only play characters born in the month of the candle, and I wonder how true that could be...
Personally I think that is one of the single scummiest tactics available, second only to save-scumming... How widespread is this? I'm sure most of the veterans here use several months, but when you were starting out did you shift-Q any character born outside the month of the candle?
(note: I won't be doing that, so please don't misinterpret)

thanks guys

[Silfir]

Not being on Coward when casting a spell is technically careless, since spells don't use to-hit, and there's no reason not to have maximized DV. (There's every reason to!) Not being on Coward while casting a spell and standing next to you is definitely careless. And I suspect that much of what you're chalking up to bad luck was also carelessness. You seem to have several habits that make it necessary for your PC to be quite sturdy to survive the early game, and fixing those will go a long way to getting you to a second win. I don't really get what "aggressive" means in connection to play style either.

[anon123]

I have heard a lot of people say that they only play characters born in the month of the candle, and I wonder how true that could be...

I am one of those. The uber-healing Candle gives can really help in the early game, compared with the minor bonuses other star signs provide. You still need to play intelligently, because better regeneration won't let you berserk a tension room with 1 PV, but it's a very welcome perk.

Personally I think that is one of the single scummiest tactics available, second only to save-scumming...

I think that's exaggerate. There's hardly any "shame" in rerolling until you get Candle, or using jaakkos' star sign selector.

[Silfir]

Maybe a little bit of shame...

[ScrollOfCureBlindness]

I believe that starsigns are random for a reason - it's a bonus, not something you absolutely need to have a say in as opposed to race/class. That's just a few steps from rerolling to get certain birth messages. On Creator's Day only. And only allowing a specific set of starting attributes.
Might as well hack then replicate a fresh save to achieve the same thing...

[Silfir]

The effect is rather small, all things considered, and if you're that convinced that your characters will die early anyway if they don't get Candle, might as well Shift-q them, or install third-party programs to help you.

For most of the time I spent playing ADOM, I took a random starsign and either found a halfway suitable r/c combo for it (Wand? Neutral caster!... and so on) or just let (f)ate decide. That's led to me winning the game with stuff like a Salamander-born Barbarian (not Hocus Pocus, some other dude, admittedly an orc) and tons of other mismatched ridiculousness. Similarly, exploiting the question system is a colossal waste of time if you ask me. The game is completely free for you to win or to lose regardless of what race or class to pick. (Also, if the game is planning to randomly screw you over, it's going to wait until after starsign selection to do it. Stone block traps ahoy!)