Life without Archeology

I really don't care for crafting trees unless I use a build that makes a lot of them. Tinkering is for rogues, Smithing is for warriors, whatever is good for if you take Rogue Scientist or Clockwork Knight, and... I just can't seem to get good use out of alchemy.

In fact I can't ever seem to get good use out of any crafting tree. Especially with how obnoxious inventory is to manage. I'll dabble much more in Crafting once CoW comes out. Until then I'm just fine selling off that nonsense and taking another combat tree.

I play on NTTG, by the way. I've heard that has something to do with it. But honestly, FSF makes the inventory problem even worse. When NTTG was released I jumped all over it and never looked back.

 

NTTG decreases the value of crafting skills not because of "some sort of inventory management thing", but because with faster progression, it is possible not to find vital elements, whether they are ingredients or recipes, and most things you could craft lose value because they become obsolete quickly. Which makes those trees kind of pointless on NTTG, because they are taken to be sure that you'll have decent equipment, and on NTTG, by the time you can make something with crafting skills, it is on its way to stop being decent.

 

I can definitely see that. But it's just such a pain to have to sell so often in FSF. On NTTG you generally only need to dump your inv once or twice on brax. FSF takes a lot longer, generally.

I'll probably play FSF and take crafting skills once I can store stuff in the pocket plane.

 

To get great use out of Alchemy, you really just need three things:

1 - get in the habit of converting all your fruit + booze to Aqua Vitae.
2 - grind anything you can that gives rust (iron ingots, rusty helms, rusty swords, etc.) to make health potions.
3 - coal + Aqua Vitae = Potion of Invisibility.

That's pretty simple - just keep the alchemy kit, grinder, ingot press, Aqua Vitae, health potions, invis potions. 6 slots that you'll carry through the entire game. And in return? You'll have literally hundreds of health + invis potions - plus some elemental resists.

If you start liking that, next step is to maybe make potions of clear vision + potions of purity.

You can also craft some nice staff weapons, if you need them.

 

Wow, I can't thank you enough for this advice. I was worrying that I'd need all sorts of alchemical ingredients, but it turns out most of them aren't really useful to me. I've done the same for Tinkering and Wandcrafting as well, forming a "Wishlist" (i.e. Health potions, bronze bolts, steel ratchet crossbow, fiery wands) and only collecting ingredients for those. Unless I can craft something at the moment I find an ingredient that isn't for those items, I abandon them.

My Rogue Scientist build is now a rolling success! DL4 and onward. And by the way, I'm still on NTTG.

Edit: Died within 8 minutes of making this post getting careless with a mere thermoblobby on the same level. I am a failure.

 

Well, THermoblobbies are a bit absurdly strong.

Perhaps you do it that way, but I can point out a nice Let's play, where the person had to empty his inventory of crap on Brax a lot more than just twice.
And he plays NTTG as well. His inventory was constantly full. Perhaps he horded a bit too many bolts. But he's also playing on Going Rogue with Permadeath.

 

One more good tidbit - let's talk about what you earn at higher levels of alchemy skill:

LVL 2 - 2 health potions instead of 1!
LVL 3 - Can convert the last few booze types to Aqua Vitae!
LVL 4 - 2 invisibility potions instead of 1!

Getting LVL 2 is absolutely essential - LVL 3 and 4 are cool, but you can get great use out of alchemy without them. This is one of the reasons Rogue Scientist is so good - it gives you 60% of the Alchemy potion-brewing benefits! (Not the staff weapons, or the resists or the gem transmutation. Obviously.) Going above level 4 is a pretty low-priority for my characters - the resists are generally more tempting than the actual skill points.

 

I was actually trying to make a run without Alchemy at all, and replacing it with a more useful skill. I have an awful time without having the grinder, still and box around right away, though! It's occured to me I can't do alchemy simply because I don't have those. I also don't have those items to help compress my inventory right away, through grinding cheese and distilling things into aqua vitae. It was kinda depressing. And that wasn't even the run I tried Emomancy in.

But yeah, your inventory shouldn't be constantly full on NTTG, you're doing something weird (like hoarding a bunch of reagents you don't really need, like how I first tried crafting). I always play on GRPD, by the way.

That said, even in death my Rogue Scientist Magic dabbler build is far too fun to give up on. Currently it's something like Rogue Scientist, Wandcrafting, Alchemy, Tinkering as the base, and then I change up the last three with a magic tree and whatever else. I do enjoy taking Burglary, and I've found the same liking to Archeology as other people have, but unlike most people I feel as though the Crossbow tree can be quite valuable.

I didn't have much success at all with Mathemagic at all. Psionics was indubitably useful (and I still think it's overpowered because it gives far too much) and complements Rogue Scientist ridiculously well. Guess I'll keep tweaking.

 

To be honest, I'm not all that crazy about archeology. I see it as kind of a waste of a skill slot just to get an ability that brings in a lot of experience faster. Experience points are not exactly rare if you're willing to grind for them. That said, since archeology has become such a fixture of most people's builds, it might not be a bad idea to mod a dungeon room or item that has the same effect as 'It Belongs in a Museum" if you deposit an artifact in it.

 

HERESY!!!

 

I see grinding as a waste of time
I also always use a skill slot for its utility with zero or one skill point investment. So if I plan on maxing plenty of skills and it seems to be a stretch then Archeology seems to be a more fun choice than running around in circles waiting for monsters to spawn so I can level up. Plus it helps a bit with traps.

 

I find grinding very soothing. I usually do quite a bit of it before leaving a floor. There's nothing quite like feeling like you've "mastered" part of Dredmor's domain before pushing deeper into it. I'll admit that It Belongs in a Museum is a fun skill because it's fun to see sudden leaps in experience points, I think its usefulness is limited once you reach the capstone on one or two of your central skill trees, and levels lose importance. Though I'll grant you that it does indirectly make it easier for you to survive long enough that this can become an issue.

For me, the absolute must-always-have skill for all my builds is Perception. I nearly always find a use for it, especially if I'm a crafter. Being able to see farther equals being able to shoot farther, often at enemies who won't know you're there even after your bolt or spell connects. With enough ranks you pretty much never have to worry about accidentally walking into a trap again. Plus, if you're willing to grind, you pretty much get a constant rain of free stuff. It's not always useful, but for me free stuff is more fun than sudden experience bar jumps.

 

I guess I have to agree with Tea here.

I mean, I really like Archaeology, but if I really wanna try out another skill tree it's the first to go. Experience is great, but I'll often do just as good (if not better) with something a little more combat-y or craft-y.

Assuming I manage to make it through the 1st-2nd floors, that is.

 

Or so it says.

It actually removes ONE STACK of each debuff, and each of the debuffs can stack quite a bit.

Not as bad as the bankster capstone though.

 

I had a streak of "Killed by a Thermoblobby, on Floor 1" for a while. They are brutal.

Please do!

 

Thermoblobbies on the first floor!? You poor bastard.

I don't really care for Archaeology either. It feels like a wasted skill tree. I'm not one to grind so I can see how people like the extra experience but I'd still rather have something else in that slot. Even if it's something I'm only going to put a point or two in, there are better choices.

Dual Wield and Viking Wizardy come to mind, also Burglary and Alchemy. Only if you decide to put more than one point in these skills they continue being useful.

 

That's his first video in the series.
I forgot which one has him have to empty his inventory. But it happens a lot later on.
Wat. I don't mean to link it like that.

 

I used to be addicted to Archaeology, especially when Translation was bugged to give you ridiculous stats. I literally would not play a build without it. These days I just don't find the value, since the only thing the skill actually saves me is time.

I'm currently addicted to Tinkering. Certainly it is possible to win a game without Tinkering, it's possible to win a game investing in no skills at all, but why bother? Tinkering brings so much to the table, and my first GRPD win was with a Tinker.