Im about ready to give up on this game...

Every characters Ive ever made always goes into a downward spiral once I get to the 2nd and 3rd floors. I have to exp farm to the max. I only play on elves and dwarven-(sad).

I usually make melee rogues that focus on weapon skills and finesse/evasion. The problem is that evasion doesn't work even on easy.

Im beginning to wonder if melee rogues are broken and the only use to a rogue is ranged combat. Why use daggers when their biggest defense is faulty. There are no tactics to fighters and the only tactical approaches go to archers and mages. Fighters get no tactics whatsoever-its just click click.

What am I doing wrong?

 

I couldn't tell you from what you wrote. I don't know what skills you have tried or what tactics. There are plenty of threads that tell you what skills go really well together.

I am currently playing a rogue character that does throwing and crossbows but I do a bit of melee with him as well. The skills I chose are Throwing and Crossbows of course but also Unarmed to add strength to throwing and kicking. I dual wield books and/or shields. I also use Alchemy to get potions. I use Perception to see traps better and to get items when I kill sometimes. (That is currently bugged a little but the 1.1.4 feedback thread has my info to fix it if your comfortable modifying game files with a text editor, make a backup first ) I have Burglary for removing traps and getting items from vending machines and merchants as well as the invisibility and teleport. Finally, I have the Clockwork Knight so I have a couple of points in Tinkering and Blacksmithing and for it's stomp and blasting teleport. It also gives items sometimes when killing artifact creatures. I do use my mod Needful Things that adds some items that give more points in the crafting skills so I can boost my crafting higher when I need it. It also gives me recipes that can turn a few wooden items into wooden arrows for my crossbow.

As far as tactics, I retreat to a choke point so that only 1 or 2 enemies can get at me at a time when there are too many of them. If no choke point exists, that is what the invisibility and teleporting comes in handy for as well as the distance hitting skills from my chosen skills.

Between all of that, I have managed to melee most of the maps and have saved a ton of arrows and thrown items for the really hard mobs and bosses and ranged enemies. I am currently on my save standing at the stairs on Level 8, ready to take on Level 9. I haven't played with permadeath but my character seems like it wont have any trouble going the full distance.

If you don't want to use Crossbows or Throwing, that is fine but you are making the game much harder. Even fully melee players carry a crossbow and have a few good throwing items for when they need to take out some enemy at a distance because of corruption or something. It's just a matter of learning what skills help out other skills. For instance, I have long since learned that Unarmed's bonuses are added to my throwing weapons so that is great. Removing one of my other skills for the shield skill would also be beneficial because I dual wield shields.

There are many ways to play. There are even threads on the forums for the most broken character to play possible which will give you a hint on what skills you might not want to play together. My suggestion is to look at the forums and get a feel for what skills work well together and build yourself a character you believe will win. As an aside, the first 2 levels of the dungeon are harder on characters than many lower ones because you don't have a lot of options in the beginning. It does seem to get easier the further down you go and the more you level up.

EDIT: Fixed a spelling error, test to text in second paragraph.

 

If you're insisting on taking only one tactic to the scorn of all others, that is what will kill you. Melee characters need to use ranged sometimes, and casters need a heavy point investment to be self-sustaining. Using only daggers will allow mobs to eat you. Only using melee will allow caster mobs to blast you. Using only as a defense means you'll eventually take a life-ending hit from a random monster or boss. Having no healing skills will make you reliant on food, which is ineffective in emergencies. You need to find out where the holes in your defenses are (it sounds like insufficient to support your , and lack of reliable ranged option) and plug them with something. There are "classes" but this isn't a stringently class-based game.

If you want some more melee survivability without sacrificing sneakiness, try Master at Arms, Berserker, Geomancy, or even Piracy or Communism. If you want a ranged options, Tinkering for bolts and/or Rogue Scientist for the sonic guns/gas canisters work wonders. If you need a non--dependent defensive option, Psionics has that covered.

I should also point out that there is a very marked lack of light, high- "rogue armor" in the game past floor 2 or 3. You just can't bank on dodging alone to get you through.

EDIT: Ah, don't neglect your resistances, either. The early floors have and later IIRC. Even a couple point of those will save you a lot of damage over the course of a floor.

 

Rogues are a bit odd in this game. Rogue armor is in short supply and IMO it's not quite as good as warrior or mage armors of the same tier (of which rogue armor has much fewer). Your best bet IMO is to grab mage-y armors for exotic resistances (such as rubber pants which IIRC grants both and which is nice to have, as well as which is quite a bit less useful ; good resistances are , , . You'll also want some others on specific floors: for 7 and for 9, the former of which can be provided effectively with a Toque of Canada) and wear a couple pieces of warrior armor for . Rogues also offer few easily-accessable mid-tier daggers, so unlike warriors you can't rely on smithing to save your rump in case of bad luck.

Just a few skill recommendations: obviously, you'll want Dual Wielding, but you'll also want Tinkering and Alchemy (or Rogue Scientist will do if you have YHTNTEP). Assuming you're going with daggers, you can encrust (if you have CotWL) your lowly daggers with things like chainsaw blades and whatnot to make them stronger until you can get your hands on a good dagger (and then you can encrust THAT with chainsaw blades). Getting a high Tinkering level also allows you to make strong bolts (the Ingeniously Scythed ones, though all of them will work if you have a good crossbow) which, even though you don't want to use crossbows, will come in handy. Alchemy is great for getting health potions reliably (which WILL save your rump) and by putting just one point in the skill for 2 , you can trade 1 rust and 1 aqua vitae (or 1 strong liquor) for two health potions. Rogue Scientist offers the same ability, but it takes 5 points for the same ability (on the other hand it offers its own goodies, like a helmet with nice resistances and two great attacks... the others are good as well but don't deal a lot of damage unless you jack up your to 13 or something by getting every possible source of the stuff. Even then, the two attacks that deal a lot of damage are only good on later floors if you have Alchemy to go with it.

TL;DR: Focus on getting exotic resistances (. are common, somewhat less so, has a damaging mob class, Fish Paladins, dedicated to it, have their own floor as well as / and IIRC but they come late) as well as getting . Don't focus on going pure rogue skills unless you want 100 , and even then consider Alchemy. Skills to look in to are Alchemy (healing potions are THAT good and it offers good resistances too), burglary (free items and no locked doors), tinkering (one of the few sources of a mid-tier dagger, as well as useful encrusts and xbow bolts), rogue scientist (two damaging attacks, two utility attacks, a source of /, and 2 for if you are using a shield/tome instead of dual wielding for a wandcrafting encrust that grants /), dual wielding (you can use a CoE sword and a plain dagger until you get past the mid-stages where normal daggers don't cut it, but tomes can fill in the gap to some degree), etc.

 

Going the pure rogue route (with absolute emphasis on dodge) is a lot harder than nearly any other kind of build, so when you say that you are having problems, I'm not surprised at all. While there are some advantages to going with a so-called pure build because of the stat bonuses, that's really not how the game is designed. Even though the skills have listed classes, the game itself is classless. Skills complement one another that are not necessarily the same class. That stat bonus is just one minor aspect of the whole picture of what makes skills work well together. And you always have to take into account gear. Not only is Defense a whole lot more reliable than dodge, but Defense-oriented gear just tends to be a hell of a lot more impressive.

What I would suggest is going with a different sort of build, at least until you know the game better. Save the rogue build for a challenge after the game feels a lot easier to you. I guarantee that it will be less frustrating then. There are a lot of really good builds in various threads on these forums which you can either copy or get ideas from.

 

RELEVANT THREAD----> http://community.gaslampgames.com/threads/melee-rogues.5924/

 

I just restarted the game with almost pure rogue build. This time I use Mathemagick when I need to. I have this one debuff which I use defensively as well as offensively. When defensively, I cast it at a mediumstrength enemy almost next to me. I do that so they miss and do less damage-While that is happening I attack the others trying to encircle me. It works well and the only I die is when my escape route is compromised.

Its still hard but when I cast calculus on enemies its a nice save/break when I need it.

 

Don't sweat it -- treat every death or near death as a learning experience.

Also, BEFORE you get into a tight spot (if you can anticipate the possibility of its approach), examine your inventory because very often there will be something there -- maybe a potion, or a mushroom, or a wand or even a thrown or bolt weapon that can soften up your enemies or give you some kind of an advantage. When you aren't getting past the third floor anyway, there's no sense letting stuff sit in your inventory waiting to be buried with your corpse. Use what you have. Even baseballs can be used to soften up enemies before they get in close. When you get better at the game, you will undoubtedly learn what you should conserve. But if you are going to die, there's no sense in conserving anything.

 

Ok, Im doing well with understanding this game so far. So far this has been some of the best gameplay Ive had in a rpg in a long time. One of the things I liked about it was that it was all randomized.

I had a monster zoo on left side of lvl 7, I hastily retreat and take down a few before going to the right where another monster zoo. In a last ditch effort, I made it to the bottom which tele ported me to safety. A lot of fun.

The last questions

1-how hard is Dredmor on easy

2-what lvl should I be at when I face him.

3-What resistance should I have to resist his magic.

Thanks for any info.

 

1) Really, that's very hard to judge, because it's your choice of tactics that will be your doom. Save all of your clockwork sawblades and clockwork drill bolts, shoot him a boatload, be prepared to retreat and heal around a corner...and you can beat him with any class. Try to be a badass and walk up and facepunch him, and unless your Magic Resistance is 100+ and your Dodge/Counter is approaching 100, you will die horribly.

2) At least 20th. At very least.

3) Magic Resistance as close to 100+ as possible, at least 10 Voltaic, at least 5 of basically everything else. Those Fulminaric Bolts of his are killer. Alternatively, wield 2 Mirror Shields (Or Mirror Darkly Shields) and use the 98% spell reflect -- it won't stop everything he does, but it'll buy you enough turns to do the damage you need.

 

So melee is useless? Then whats the point of having most weapons as melee? How on earth are you supposed to raise magic resistance to 100. Dodge I can do and also voltaic and every at 5. I usually use debuffs for ranged and melee I go with for damage.

That would be friggin ridiculous if melee is useless. Almost as bad as Avadon.

 

Dredmor is a very damaging opponent in melee (you need 39 to block the mundane damages from his non-crit attacks, and that's the DL10 version), and he can still use his most devastating spell (Thor's Fulminaric Bolt) from that range too. It doesn't help that he has a ton of (30) although he has only 10 so if you have something like the Morvaican Bushdagger you can still feasibly kill him.

I don't entirely recall how difficulty influences a monster's stats. However, according to Dredmorpedia, to completely nullify a non-crit Dredmor melee attack, you need 39 10 10 from the dl10 version and 60 15 15 from the dl15 version. The dl 10 version has 45 and the dl15 version has 71.

From what I know, the general strategy for meleeing Dredmor is pretty much "get in, deal some damage, and when you take a worrying amount of health, drink an invisibility potion, run away, heal, and repeat until he's dead". If you don't have at least a point in Alchemy (6 from Alchemy, 2 from Rogue Scientist, 1 from Paranormal Investigator, and a temporary +1 bonus if you quaff a rare Potion of Alchemical Inspiration) then you're going to need to resort to range.


What you really want to watch out for is Thor's Fulminaric Bolt. Seriously, that thing is DEADLY. Even on the weaker version, it deals 50+. You'd think that a lich would deal tons of , wouldn't you? Most of his other spells aren't TOO deadly though.

An effective, if cheesy, way to stop him from casting spells is with a Supersonic Wand or whatever it's called (it looks like a brass instrument). It dazes him, which prevents him from casting spells. If you took up Rogue Scientist, both of your Barometic Pulse skills have the same effect, though with cooldowns.

Anyway, when I first successfully killed Lord Dredmor (after two deaths), it was because I managed to stay out of his range while he was across a moat of lava. I could just stand there and fire bolts at him all day until he died. Keep in mind, back then I always played melee characters, and for the most part I still do. It's just that you will have more luck dealing damage through ranged options and staying the hell away from him in close range than you will any other way, even with an all-out warrior. A melee-oriented rogue has it even worse than a warrior as they're squishier.



I'd like to help you more, but first I'd like to know what build you have and what stuff your character has. That way we can help you find an effective way for you to kill him without us wasting time telling you to throw holy hand grenades if you don't have holy hand grenades or something along those lines.

 

Clockwork sawblades are my backup weapon of choice. And no, melee isn't useless, I've killed floor 15 Dredmor in around 12 turns in melee before. You just have to plan it.

(it was dual-wielding clockwork knight and piracy. Between the max counter chance and free swings with charge of the steam brigade, and silencing dred with a sonic wand, and dual-wielding axes of the sun disc, he went down FAST.)

 

Im currently using Maxed Pirating, Maxed Dagger and the next one I will start is dodge which I will also master. I am lvl 11. I have the following skills-

Mathematics, Pirating, Dagger, Dodge, Burglary, Perception and Archaeologist.

 

He's very killable in melee you just have to build for it and it's likely (incredibly) that you'll still have to retreat to heal at some point.

I did it with a dual wielding mace character once. Didn't use a single ranged attack just face beat for the win. I did have to back off and heal once though.

http://community.gaslampgames.com/threads/melee-a-love-story.3268/

 

Melee is certainly not useless, but it is riskier than ranged attacks. My last win, I actually finished him off with melee (and that was on Going Rogue). My gear wasn't even that great, because I was playing on NTTG. I was getting bored, and I had run out of my best ranged weaponry, and my magic was not hurting him (I was an Egyptian Mage).

If you aren't playing on NTTG, then getting sufficient ranged weapons is much easier.

Let's put it this way -- how easy do you want to make the fight? If you want to avoid gear corruption, and minimize the amount of running away that you do, fight from range, and use every trick in the book to maximize your damage, and deny him his attacks.

Depending on your stats, some weapons may not affect him at all. You specifically should always look out for weapons that do Righteous damage, and the not quite as good, but far more common, Piercing damage. Those are your bread and butter when facing Dredmor. If the damage is high enough to exceed his defense for a particular damage type, then that's good also. But those defenses can be quite high. If you are a melee though, odds are you're melee attacks will damage him, regardless. But he'll hurt you and he'll damage your gear.

I've never had 100 magic resistance. I've had 100 magic reflect easily (mirror shields and/or the right encrusts will do that for you). The problem with magic reflect though is that sometimes it's at the expense of defense and damage absorption. Plus it's limited to only reflecting missiles (nothing to sneeze at, but you should worry about more than magical missile attacks).

 

I give up. I doubt that I will have the patience to fight him. I read his bio on wiki and I don't think my tactics/skills will work. I'm deleting the game as its just like all roguelikes Ive played-impossible for regular people.

 

First of all, I was not talking about Elvishly Easy. If you play normally, and just think about what you should collect along the way, if you can reach Dredmor, he is certainly killable. Some people even complain that he's too easy (not a lot of people, of course, but some). And he can be, incredibly easy if you are lucky. But most of the time, with average to below-average gear, the fights can take fairly long, and you just need to save up your inky hoglanterns and Invisibillty potions so that you can get some respite to heal up every once in a while. This is NOT a hard-core rogue-like. It's not an easy one either.

Second, Rogue-likes are NOT about winning. As was pointed out in a recent Rogue-like Radio broadcast, Rogue-likes are NOT really rpgs (at least in the traditional sense). You are NOT a hero. You are a Rogue. You don't have to kill everything. You can and should frequently run away. You can and should take the opportunity to steal from Brax whenever you feel tempted by the occasional piece of gear that is nearly too good to be true. You can and should run away even at the expense of not clearing a monster zoo and collecting that reward, if that monster zoo is beyond your capabilities. You can and should use staircases and teleports when things get too hairy.

The game is hard, it is supposed to be hard, and you are supposed to die. Often. Sometimes in embarrassing ways. And you are supposed to have fun in spite of dying, or brag about your embarassing mistakes or how you avoided each death by a hair of health. That does not make the game hard-core. It makes it diffierent from a traditional RPG which is more about telling a story, and because death would interfere with that story, they don't make death come that easily and frequently. In a Rogue-like, you should expect death and welcome it if it means that you might get luckier or make better decisions next time.

People who play rogue-likes accept that they will almost certainly not win. If you keep at it, you might win. But I've played lots of rogue-likes over the years, and I've only won maybe 2 or 3 of them total (counting Dredmor). Many have never won.

 

I don't get that though. Ive had problems in the past with rogue likes. Why do they have to be impossible on every difficulty just to prove a futile point. Dredmor isn't a rogue like if you don't attach permadeath so whats the deal. Why do all Roguelikes only have to have a statistic of 10% people that buy will complete.

I just get so frustrated because in every game I PLAY, I need to do research on what builds work and then I play the game and get a consistent effect.

I fucking suck at these games and I can't figure out why I can't understand them. Oh well.

 

It's a matter of attitude. If you define success in a rogue-like as winning, you are going to be disappointed. That's NOT how you should define success. When I play a rogue-like, I define success as having an interesting time, maybe learning something new, maybe trying something that I haven't tried before, and enjoying my time in the game. When you die (which you will) it creates a kind of puzzle to solve -- what could I have done differently to have survived that one situation that killed me? How can I plan for the same thing happening? How can I make sure that when something similar happens next time, that I will live to the next encounter.

And that's basically it. You live from situation to situation, and each one is a puzzle. You hope to solve it before you die, but often you solve it after you die. And sometimes you come here for help. Over time, you will form better habits, better tactics, and will see that you nearly always have more options available to you to solve those puzzles than you first realized.

I can suggest some other rogue-likes that play faster -- I think that death is less painful if the game plays fast. One of my favorite fast-playing rogue-likes is called "Brogue". I've never won the game. But it's lighter than Dredmor in how quickly you can explore a level and go on to the next one. And it's very hard to actually die very early in the game if you play with even moderate care. You can download it here: https://sites.google.com/site/broguegame/

It's been one of my favorite rogue-likes (after Dredmor, that is).

 

Maybe try playing the game with permadeath off. A lot of folks seem to enjoy it more that way and a great number of people who play on permadeath started there.

If you still find the the game to be too frustrating it may be a simple case of 'different strokes for different folks'. Not every game is for everyone.