Lucy [she/faer]

[DCSS] I have identified the last magical staff

(DCSS = Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup)

I forgot just how painful it is to play a pew-pew caster in Crawl so the game decided to remind me. With endless supply of mana (thanks to Sif Muna) you’d think it should be easy. Ha! Funny.

Mana management is the worst part of playing a pew-pew caster for sure but it’s not the only problem. All late-game spells are noisy as hell meaning you will constantly bring in attention from the floor. Your failure rates will never reach 0% on spells that matter. 1% chance to miscast? Three times in a row, please.

Resistances become a pain in the ass near the end. Don’t have Orb of Destruction or Bombard by Depths? Prepare to suffer :)
I’m not even gonna mention Zot - the Orbs are absurd!

Apr 6 at 6:26amWeb
Show threadJake in the desert17h ago
@catfeeder wooo congrats! I know how many staffs that is, wow
Show threadulo17h ago

Sounds tricky to manage everything! It’s cool that the game accounts for noise… What class do you normally play?

Your post reminds me that I have been meaning to try DCSS! I have quite a bit of Shattered Pixel Dungeon experience; if you are familiar, is there any overlap in the concept/approach to the games?

Show threadLucy [she/faer]16h ago

Pixel Dungeon was my first roguelike and Shattered was my first win in a roguelike too! DCSS in comparison is much more complex and combat-focused. No hunger, no inventory management, no consumable puzzles.

But it’s much more varied in ways you can approach combat. There’s melee of course, then there are all sorts of spells (shooting spells, summoning spells, necromancy, martial buffs…) plus every character will also join a god, each with their own unique gameplay. It might be a bit overwhelming but it’s very rewarding once you ‘get it’.

What class do you normally play?

I jump between different builds and have won with each ‘major’ build except stabbers (that make enemies vulnerable with stealth and magic then one-shot them with a dagger). My favorite is Shapeshifter who changes into different forms throughout play gaining unique innate abilities.

Show threadMothra15h ago
I’ve… Never heard of this game before, I must try
Show threadLucy [she/faer]10h ago
It is fun!
Show threadEphera12h ago
Hmm, is the last staff thing just the death message from Sif Muna? I seriously don’t play often enough with Sif Muna, because Heplhjdtfhxhdh always seems so good… 🫠
Show threadLucy [she/faer]10h ago

Nope, SIf’s death message would be blue. Actually, you just made me realize Sif Muna doesn’t have a death message. Interesting.

At the moment when it popped up I didn’t know what that message was about so it gave me a good laugh. After some thinking I figured it happened because, at some point before dying I saw a staff but didn’t approach, died a bit later and all unidentified stuff I’d seen was IDed, and it just so happened that this staff was the only type I hadn’t encountered in this run (staff of cold magic, most likely).

I seriously don’t play often enough with Sif Muna, because Heplhjdtfhxhdh always seems so good… 🥴

I want to eventually get a win with every god so I keep trying new ones. Hepli was my most recent win btw, their battlemage carried my frog archer til the end. Very strong god indeed.