Hi all, for the first time I've completed both Sokoban and the Mines, and I have a decent barbarian character going. Looking at the wiki, I think brute-force killing a shopkeeper may be possible, but I thought I'd see what you all think.
I have a +2 Frost Brand and I'm skilled in longswords, but I don't have a wand of polymorph, or a source of reflection. I do have an uncursed ring of invisibility, but my ranged attacks aren't any good compared to using Frost Brand.
I was able to take out all of the watchmen including the captain without much trouble, so...any thoughts?
On Nov 8, 10:11 pm, Dan Dujnic <gamegrump...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all, for the first time I've completed both Sokoban and the Mines, > and I have a decent barbarian character going. Looking at the wiki, I > think brute-force killing a shopkeeper may be possible, but I thought > I'd see what you all think.
Sure, it's possible, maybe even with your character, but why bother?
> I have a +2 Frost Brand and I'm skilled in longswords, but I don't > have a wand of polymorph, or a source of reflection. I do have an > uncursed ring of invisibility, but my ranged attacks aren't any good > compared to using Frost Brand.
> I was able to take out all of the watchmen including the captain > without much trouble, so...any thoughts?
Hrrrm, if you have to ask, then you're asking for trouble, IMO. Resist the temptation and just buy what you need from the shopkeeper. You'll find out some other time just how tough a shopkeeper is.
> Hi all, for the first time I've completed both Sokoban and the Mines, > and I have a decent barbarian character going. Looking at the wiki, I > think brute-force killing a shopkeeper may be possible, but I thought > I'd see what you all think.
Are you neutral or chaotic? If neutral I suggest not doing it.
> I have a +2 Frost Brand and I'm skilled in longswords, but I don't > have a wand of polymorph, or a source of reflection. I do have an > uncursed ring of invisibility,
Attacking a priest in melee causes the deity to use lightning against you. If that fails then disintgration. Melee against a priest without these resistances is an extremel bad idea.
> but my ranged attacks aren't any good > compared to using Frost Brand.
Your ranged weapons are just fine. Throw a rock for distance then count that many space back from the altar. Carve out walls in the way. Gather every missile in the mines to those three locations. Start firing with the most powerful of them - spears then daggers and so on. If the priest dies before you run out of rocks then you did not lug 200 rocks for use as missiles.
You want to be fast - The priest can start creating insects that get in the line of fire.
> I was able to take out all of the watchmen including the captain > without much trouble, so...any thoughts?
If you killed that many peaceful humans your luck is now very low. While you can use the altar to cure your luck, your luck effects how many rocks hit the priest. You need to cure your luck first. 300 turns per murder.
The OP was about killing a shopkeeper. But while we're at it, let's improve on killing temple priests.
> Are you neutral or chaotic? If neutral I suggest not doing it. [...] > If you killed that many peaceful humans your luck is now very low. > While you can use the altar to cure your luck, your luck effects how > many rocks hit the priest. You need to cure your luck first. 300 turns > per murder.
Only neutrals and lawfuls get a Luck penalty. Of course, you can wait out bad Luck, but that takes 1200 turns per murder (600 if you have the Amulet or your god is angry, but never 300). More precisely: You need to pass turns divisible by 600 twice. So killing a shopkeeper on turn 598 gets you down to 302 turns of bad Luck.
> Attacking a priest in melee causes the deity to use lightning against > you. If that fails then disintgration. Melee against a priest without > these resistances is an extremel bad idea.
Disintegration only results from *prayer* with an extremely angry god. Harming a priest causes a lightning strike originating from the altar. This is where the tips collected at http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Aligned_priest#Killing_a_temple_priest_... come in: E. g. you can have a wall between you and the altar, using bounces to kill the locked-up priest.
> Your ranged weapons are just fine. Throw a rock for distance then count > that many space back from the altar. Carve out walls in the way. > Gather every missile in the mines to those three locations. Start > firing with the most powerful of them - spears then daggers and so on. > If the priest dies before you run out of rocks then you did not lug 200 > rocks for use as missiles.
> You want to be fast - The priest can start creating insects that get in > the line of fire.
People keep recommending that, but in my experience it doesn't really work well. Above all, the problem is 200 turns is way too slow. Priests can deal temendous amounts of damage per turn in melee, get two turns in a row in 33% of all cases due to speed, and have a real chance to paralyze players. The latter reduces to one turn (not negated!) if magic resistant or free action. See Wikihack for better alternatives.
(Someday, I'm going to write an article how to raise alignment as a neutral atheist pacifist. Preview: Sleep and charm a priest, or use the helm to heal your pets as a lawful.)
> > I was able to take out all of the watchmen including the captain > > without much trouble, so...any thoughts?
The watch is weaker than a shopkeeper with exhausted wands and much weaker than a priest. As for the shopkeepers, I recommend a combination of indirect theft and credit cloning. http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Credit_cloning
> The OP was about killing a shopkeeper. But while we're at it, let's > improve on killing temple priests.
Uh. I answered killing a temple priest not killing a shopkeeper. My method of clearing out a wall and using missile fire will definitely not work on a shopkeeper.
Then again my biggest objections don't apply to shopkeepers. They do not have a lightning throwing deity helping them, though many carry a wand of striking. Striking does a lot less damage than lightning. Also shopkeepers don't cast spells of healing or create insects. Then again shopkeepers carry cash, keys and sometimes wand of striking compared to the far more valuable items carried by priests - robe or [oMR plus spellbooks.
>> Are you neutral or chaotic? If neutral I suggest not doing it. > [...] >> If you killed that many peaceful humans your luck is now very low. >> While you can use the altar to cure your luck, your luck effects how >> many rocks hit the priest. You need to cure your luck first. 300 turns >> per murder.
> Only neutrals and lawfuls get a Luck penalty. Of course, you can wait > out bad Luck, but that takes 1200 turns per murder (600 if you have > the Amulet or your god is angry, but never 300). More precisely: You > need to pass turns divisible by 600 twice. So killing a shopkeeper on > turn 598 gets you down to 302 turns of bad Luck.
Thanks for the correction. Also a mistake I made once - As a lawful I completed mines end so I had an uncursed luckstone. Then I returned to minetown and wiped out the watch. I had terrible luck because of the murders but I forgot to drop the luckstone so it stayed low. Eventually I was trapped by a pack of monsters strong enough to kill me based on the fact that my hits kept missing from the negative luck.
>> Attacking a priest in melee causes the deity to use lightning against >> you. If that fails then disintgration. Melee against a priest without >> these resistances is an extremel bad idea.
> Disintegration only results from *prayer* with an extremely angry god. > Harming a priest causes a lightning strike originating from the altar. > This is where the tips collected at > http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Aligned_priest#Killing_a_temple_priest_... > come in: E. g. you can have a wall between you and the altar, using > bounces to kill the locked-up priest.
Using bounces works great with limited wands. My missile suggestiion uses direct attack and unlimited missiles.
>> Your ranged weapons are just fine. Throw a rock for distance then count >> that many space back from the altar. Carve out walls in the way. >> Gather every missile in the mines to those three locations. Start >> firing with the most powerful of them - spears then daggers and so on. >> If the priest dies before you run out of rocks then you did not lug 200 >> rocks for use as missiles.
>> You want to be fast - The priest can start creating insects that get in >> the line of fire.
> People keep recommending that, but in my experience it doesn't really > work well. Above all, the problem is 200 turns is way too slow. > Priests can deal temendous amounts of damage per turn in melee, get > two turns in a row in 33% of all cases due to speed, and have a real > chance to paralyze players. The latter reduces to one turn (not > negated!) if magic resistant or free action. See Wikihack for better > alternatives.
Since you're at maximum missile range the priest can not ever hit you in melee at all. And maximum missile range is also farther than spell range so his spells can not effect you at all either. The only time I've had problems was when the priest started creating insects too soon because I started with lesser missile weapons.
A class that can get expert at dagger can multifire enough daggers from stacks that the priest goes down much faster than expected. Throwing several daggers per round, again and again, gives extremely fast damage. Use up all multifire missiles first, all missile weapons in damage order, then rocks.
> (Someday, I'm going to write an article how to raise alignment as a > neutral atheist pacifist. Preview: Sleep and charm a priest, or use > the helm to heal your pets as a lawful.)
>> > I was able to take out all of the watchmen including the captain >> > without much trouble, so...any thoughts?
> The watch is weaker than a shopkeeper with exhausted wands and much > weaker than a priest. As for the shopkeepers, I recommend a > combination of indirect theft and credit cloning. > http://nethack.wikia.com/wiki/Credit_cloning
Those take longer than brute force combat but they work very well. Once you have one skeleton key it's hardly even worth attacking shopkeepers for their cash. By then it takes a lot of cash to buy protection.
Thanks all, it sounds like there may not be much point in killing shopkeepers, but honestly, I'd gotten tired of using pets to steal all their stuff. I'm chaotic, so what the hell?
Also, for some unknown reason I sold all my gems from the mines to one, and now I realize I want them back to throw at a unicorn since I lost my luckstone somehow (I think a nymph took it).
I already have divine protection, so I don't need their money, but being able to freely root through their stuff is something I've wanted to do since I started playing Nethack.
> Thanks all, it sounds like there may not be much > point in killing shopkeepers, but honestly, I'd > gotten tired of using pets to steal all their > stuff. I'm chaotic, so what the hell?
> Also, for some unknown reason I sold all my gems > from the mines to one, and now I realize I want > them back to throw at a unicorn since I lost my > luckstone somehow (I think a nymph took it).
> I already have divine protection, so I don't need > their money, but being able to freely root through > their stuff is something I've wanted to do since I > started playing Nethack.
Well, if you take up credit cloning (which see in the NetHack wiki) you can quickly enough _buy_ everything a shopkeeper has to offer, using the shopkeeper's money, then retrieve all the money and cart all the goods off to the nearest altar to BUC-id it.
This (letting your pet steal money you've dropped on the shop floor to pay for the goods) is gobs faster than waiting for your pet to steal one object at a time from a shop. The only time I bother to do that any more is if the shop contains an artifact, which will have some ridiculously high price on it, one higher than the shopkeeper's likely stash of zorkmids (which seems to range from 1000 to 4000, biased toward the high end). Then it makes sense to move that one object close to the door and let the pet bring it to you outside the shop.
As to killing shopkeepers, you're far better off to polymorph a pet to some outrageously dangerous monster (or charm such a monster), and then let that monster do the killing.
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