Life without Archeology

Is it hard? I guess what I mean is without the ability to refine and tweak your artifacts or trade them in for EXP does this exponentially make the game longer, harder, or both? I want to try something new but I admit Archeology has me hooked on the whole "Trade useless crap for useful growth" thing.

 

I admit Archeology is the best skill out there. My first successful character had it. On one level, I found 6 of those overpriced jewels worth between 2 and 3 millions golds and I earned 3 levels in a row thanks to them.
That was before the YHtNtEP patch though.

But the game is perfectly playable without it. It does make the game simpler but not that much. Some people will tell you Promethean Magic is overpowered for example. Me, I would promote Tinkering and Crossbow for the sweet, sweet ability to craft bolts of mass destruction and shot down Dredmor with only three of them.

Truly, there is no mandatory skill, except maybe something that helps you to see traps from far away, like Perception or Burglary.
God damn traps .

 

archeology feels like a nobrainer skill to me,pretty much EVERY build benefits from the free exp over time,feels almost abusive to take it.

as long as there are chests of evil dropping useless weapons i cant effectively wield might as well eat them for free levels.

 

I sort of dumped archeology after finding the combination of Clockwork Knight, Perception, Alchemy, and Tinkering.
Suddenly, infinite loot.

 

I don't take Archeology unless I'm running a Rogue build. I won't deny its usefulness, but I generally go for an archetype (Warrior, Melee-Rogue, Stealth-Rogue, or spellsword/gish) and pick skills based around what I want to do in-game.

Probably sub-optimal, but it's what's fun for me.

 

Since Archeology is pretty much all about the XP gain - I'd like to give another shout-out for Big Game Hunter - which gives MASSIVE XP game in the early game, and pretty decent XP gain all game long. Seriously - I'm using it in about 75% of my builds these days, and never putting a point into it.

 

Okay. I admit, I like Archaelogy, but it's mostly for the Kronging, and then the selling of things to museums for experience.

Now if only the re-rolling the artifacts was a little more useful.

 

I've found a great liking for Big Game Hunter. I've also found that it's a Rogue skill disguised as a Warrior skill. Or a Warrior skill that really wants to be a Rogue skill. Or maybe it's a skill for Warriors to make them Roguey.

It seems to have synergy with assassination, and Rogues in general, with XP gain, sneakiness, a Sneaky Shiv for animals, and pets. It's a great skill, but I kinda wish it had some more utility against non-animals. Hunter's Lure is a pretty great debuff, and at least it works on all enemies.

It just seems to pale in comparison to Vegan's stats, debuff cleanser, and other things. Perhaps that's merely because people love to rave on about Vegan and haven't discovered BGH, but I'm not so sure.

 

BGH was weirder in the past. It got changed some time ago into the cool skill tree it is now, but some people burned on it before and didn't care to check.

 

The only difference I've found when running without Archaeology is more inventory clutter if the levels aren't decently Brax'd (it just feels wrong to skol CoE items...).

That may just be because most of my character losses are due to brainfades or RNG shafting in any case, rather than the eyebrows being underpowered.

 

Vegan starts out really weak, and becomes more and more awesome as you invest skill points. Vegan is something you work on, and then get to reap the benefits.

BGH, on the other hand, starts out awesome - but doesn't give super compelling reasons to climb the tree. All of the BGH skills are solid, yes. But I only rarely feel like they are the best skills for me to grab.

I still like the tree - it's like Assassination in that it's awesome even if you never get around to putting points into it. And the points are certainly not wasted!

 

It depends on the build, really. The passive bonuses are great, but people who want something to shield them will likely want to get to the capstone (and the bonus meat you get for the first point is a good reason to start, too).

 

Now, call me crazy, but doesn't Vegan punish you for killing the wrong enemies? Because if so, that skill seems to be a bit on the weak side and can never be considered powerful in my eyes.
I mean, if when you max it out it cures cancer, ushers in a new era of world peace, causing a new golden age causing enlightenment in the world, then, yes, maybe then, it could be considered powerful.

But in my eyes, a skillset that punishes you for killing certain enemies is fundamentally flawed. Not to mention, this is the only Roguelike to ever do that. Which says something.
Okay, ADOM punishes you for killing cats, but the Master Cat can actually be killed if you don't try to melee him.
And it's the only other example, and you don't need that ring to beat the game.

 

Yeah, I can see that. BGH has fewer points but they're more immediately useful. Of course, Butchery is nothing compared to green harvest (given it does no extra damage and it only gives you subpar food items unless you've got a grill handy.) I found ground meat and such only really useful for fisking, which I only recently started doing.

It can't even be crafted into stuff. :c

Oh, hopefully this won't be too terribly tangential but are they reworking crossbows+throwing skills to make them Actually Appealing to take? Either by instating a penalty to using them without the skills, or giving better stats/buffs/active skills?

 

Yeah, it doesn't do it now. In the past it added +5 slashing damage on a proc that activated when a monster died. And much fun was had.

 

Butchery procs on attack, too. That might only come from the fourth skill though, I'm not sure, but I do get meat drops when the monster is still alive.

 

This is absolutely the downside to Veganism - but it's not quite "Vegans are punished for killing enemies." Instead it is:

Vegans get a 200-turn debuff to all stats (-5!) when they melee an animal. So you options are:

1 - kill animals with your pet (Vegan gives you a pet at level 2)
2 - kill animals with spells
3 - kill animals with bolts
4 - kill animals with throw weapons. (my favorite)
5 - kill animals and just live with the debuff.

I'll often just throw up my hands and start hacking up animals - especially diggle nest rooms with 15 diggles or the like. Yes, I'm a bit sub-optimal for a while after, but I can deal with it. And if you have any magic at all, it's not much of a problem.

 

True, BUT you also forgot to look at the Vegan capstone skill "Level 5 Vegan", which will cancel out all the vegan debuffs. Granted, you can't cast it that often, but if you save up the mobs you want to kill and get them all at once, then it really shines (plus you can charm some of them to help speed up the process). Generally speaking, they won't fight back, so the debuff is negligible.

Killer Vegan is not a perfect skill in that it can slow things down for you a little, but that's balanced out by the really nice buffs.

BTW, didn't nethack have some kind of honor if your character didn't eat meat (or something like that)? It's been a long time since I've played it, but I do remember something about a vegetarian achievement. In any case, I wouldn't put down the game because other devs didn't think of it first. That's kind of flawed logic. There always has to be a first for anything. I didn't care for it at first either, but my most recent run on GR/PD using Vegan as my keystone skill got me down to the 13th floor -- so it ain't too bad from where I'm standing.

 

I'm not putting down the game. I'm putting down the skill design of Killer Vegan.
A skill at level 5 that allows you to remove the debuff is not what I call the best thing ever.

I'm sorry, but a skill tree that punishes you for stabbing something in the face in melee and isn't called "Quasi-Pacifism." is not a good game idea. I will not change my opinion on this, it is set in Supermanium-reinforced Admantium. Best of both DC and Marvel there.

I'm sure it has it's unique qualities, but the penalties do not outweigh the benefits, and that's really how you have to measure punishment vs. reward.
Sorry, but these are my thoughts on it. I'm fine with others liking it. But to me, that's like wearing an Albatross around your neck.

Supermanium was made by Superman in the Silver Age, and it was basically more indestructible than Admantium.

 

Nethack and Slash'Em and the other clones thereof had conducts that worked like that. Monks could only eat certain foods without penalties. Most if not all meats violated this. And there were sometime in-game penalties for eating that dragon meat you needed to get all the base resistances and benefits like every character had to in order to survive.

There were ways around this limitation though. But they are vastly off topic. Check this. Click "Conduct" on the page this links to:
http://nethack.tiddlyspot.com/