A Tourist Speedrunning Strategy Guide This post contains thoughts and advice on tourist speedrunning based on my experience attempting to ascend a tourist in under ten thousand turns over the past month. Some of the advice here generalizes to other roles. There are two types of speedrunning: real-time and turn-based. My advice is for turn-based. The version of NetHack on which I am basing my advice is Vanilla 3.6.6. I assume no bones. If you want to start speedrunning, you will probably die a lot. Bones will become a big part of your games unless you turn them off in the options. Reasons to Speedrun A common complaint of intermediate players is that the game becomes boring. Speedruns place constraints on you that make the game more fun. New aspects of the game become relevant, like escape tactics. You get into more interesting and exciting situations. A negative reason to speedrun is that investing many turns into the game is often a waste be- cause you die to something stupid anyway. If you are intermediate, my recommendation is to start speedrunning as soon as possible. Feasibility of Turn Benchmarks The feasibility of ascending a tourist in under twenty thousand turns in a random game is very good if you are an intermediate player with the follow- ing characteristics. • You have ascended. You know the general flow of the game. You know about getting the Invocation items, traversing Gehennom, the Ascen- sion Run, etc. • You know the level layouts: Mines, Dungeon, Medusa, Orcus Town, Wizard’s Tower, Planes, etc. • You know standard plays: price identification, getting holy water, reverse genociding, polyselfing, etc. For a player at this level, I would even say the feasibility of ascending a tourist in a random game in under fifteen thousand turns is good. How- ever, from my experiences, if you are an intermediate player, ascending a tourist in under ten thousand turns requires lucky item generation in the early game. The absolute lower bound on speed ascension is two thou- sand turns because that is the amount of time it takes to get the alignment necessar y to enter the Quest. The closer you want to get to that lower bound, the more you will have to rely on extreme speed tactics, luck, or bones scumming. -2- The Excellence of Tourists for Speedrunning Some consider tourist to be the most difficult role. However, tourist is actu- ally one of the best roles for speedrunning. • Magic Mapping. You star t with four magic mapping scrolls, which lets you cruise through the first four levels and locate shops and vaults. Later on you can write magic mapping scrolls without having to identify one first. • Camera. This allows you blind enemies and avoid fighting them. It is useful throughout the whole game. You can even use it on the Riders. • The Platinum Yendorian Express Card. A tourist can use this for blessed charging every hundred turns or so. • Neutral Alignment. As a neutral, a tourist can get good artifacts. Mag- icbane gives early magic resistance, catches curses, and disables ene- mies allowing you to escape rather than fight. The Eye of the Aethiopica allows branchpor ting. The Orb of Fate allows levelpor ting. A neutral can get both lawful and chaotic helms of opposite alignment. This lets you ascend on any altar in Astral, and take advantage of the other alignment benefits during the ascension run: less Mysterious Force for chaotics in Gehennom, and less threat from archons and ti- tans in the Dungeons of Doom for lawfuls. • Skills. You can reach skilled in saber and two-weapon. You can reach basic in most other weapons. You can reach exper t in darts and multi- shot them at skilled. • Food. You usually start with enough comestibles that food is never an issue. • Money. You usually start with enough money to buy some important items you might come across early in shops. The Ideal Speedrun Assume that early on, you got teleport control, polymorph control, and the power to do the Castle and Gehennom. The ideal plan would be this. Al- ways be in the fastest polyform possible for your circumstances. This could be air elemental (for open travel), mountain centaur (for pickaxe), or xorn (for phasing). Dig down and find the Quest so you can teleport there later. It will be before turn two thousand so you will have to come back. Telepor t to the Valley of the Dead and go upstairs to the Castle. Get the wand of wishing and wish for necessary items. Enter Gehennom, get the Invocation items there, and find the Vibrating Square. Telepor t to the Quest, get to level four teen and turn two thousand, and do the Quest. Telepor t to the Vibrating Square, do the Invocation, and get the Amulet. Become chaotic to reduce the Mysterious Force, get out of Gehennom -3- using as many cursed potions of gain level as possible, and get to Astral. Convert alignment to ascend on the first altar you find. A Practical Speedrun In a regular game it will be impossible to follow the above plan due to not having the requisite inventory and stats. Here is a more practical plan. In the early game your goal is to get enough leverage to do the Castle. Use your starting magic mapping scrolls to map the first four levels. Check out shops. These will be evident from the map outlines. Get to Minetown for more shops. Go back to the Dungeon. Star t digging down with some form monster detection (telepathy, spell of detect monsters, vampire lord human detection...). Use monster detection find shops and temples, and visit them as necessary. Maybe do some monster rooms or further level explo- ration for items. Do the Castle as soon as possible, then do Gehennom and the Quest in your preferred order. The rest is as above. Things to Skip Sokoban is a time sink, although if your item generation has been poor and you can do it fast, it may be wor th doing. It is wor thwhile to get the two scrolls of earth on the first level (more on scrolls of earth later). I usually ignore luck maximization, so I am not concerned about doing Mine’s End, collecting gems, and sacrificing for luck. If these things concern you, you can speedrun Mine’s End, wish for the Orb of Fate (which acts as a luck- stone), or reverse genocide unicorns in the Castle gem room. You may want to foray past Minetown to get a pickaxe and dwarven armor if you have not found those yet. Do not altar camp: it is unreliable and can kill your speedruns. If you do have a source of monsters, by all means sacri- fice. You can skip For t Ludios unless you particularly need it for the experi- ence, items, and gold for protection. I ignore stat maximization because I use polyself, which can eliminate previous gains. For this reason I do not usually collect potions to do alchemy and increase stats. If you have no polymor ph control, stat maximization will be more important. I usually ig- nore spellcasting. Tourists are only proficient at low-level spells under nor- mal circumstances, but spellbook generation for these is unreliable, and casting them may be too much of a hassle. Some advanced strategies might use spellcasting. I usually skip keeping pets except when I need to shoplift a specific item in the opening game. General Item Strategy Items should be picked up in high-density areas, as necessary: Dungeon shops, Minetown shops, Quest shops, monster rooms, the Castle storage rooms, the Valley, Vlad’s Tower, Orcus Town... Graves are a nice source of items once you have a pickaxe. If you are low on items, you may want to -4- blessed genocide mimics to increase item generation in shops, especially before the Quest. You can identify items with price identification or blessed scrolls of identify. I do not like polypiling because I find it tedious and unre- liable, but it may be necessary for some items. You will want a container as soon as possible to protect your inventory. You should never be bur- dened. It may make sense to make a stash in a place to which you will telepor t later anyway, such as the Quest floor or a temple. You do not nec- essarily have to carry a full kit at a given time. You can pick up scrolls to blank for writing magic mapping as you go through Gehennom, as op- posed to having all your blank scrolls when you enter. Scrolls You will want twenty to for ty scrolls for blanking so you can write necessary scrolls like magic mapping (for Gehennom) and gold detection (for portal detection). Scrolls to identify are identify, gold detection, teleportation, en- chant armor, enchant weapon, remove curse, and genocide. A scroll of charging is useful for charging a wand of wishing or other item before you get the Platinum Yendorian Express Card. A scroll of earth and a scroll of scare monster are useful for making closed rooms where you can safely reverse genocide monsters like dragons for scale mail. Scrolls of scare monster can be identified in shops by standing over the $100-class scrolls near a pet or active mimic. A scroll of earth is a game-saver if you fall into a place in the Medusa level where you are surrounded by water with no room to dig. Scrolls of earth and stinking cloud can allow you to convert a temple altar if necessary. Scrolls of teleportation are useful for shoplifting, and cursed scrolls are useful for levelpor ting. You can identify scrolls of telepor tation behind iron bars once you can dig. Potions You will want potions to dilute so you can make holy water. Aside from the benefits of blessing items, holy water can be used to cure terminal illness if you are non-chaotic and not undead. It is better for curing sickness than a unicorn horn under these conditions. A difficulty with potions is that they are heavy, so you need to limit the amount you carry. If you ever have too many, you can quaff them, sell them, or make them potions of holy water which weigh less. I dilute most potions, but there are some that are wor th saving for identification and later use. If smoky potions are of a class that will be numerous enough, such as fruit juice, collect and save them for blessed quaffing. You will want one potion of object detection for the Cas- tle so you can locate the wand of wishing. You can pick one up from a nymph. There will often be a nymph on the Medusa level just before the Castle. Extra healing is identified from the outset because you start out with two potions of it. This type of potion can be a lifesaver, so keep -5- instances you come across. You will need to identify full healing, but it may not be wor th holding out your $200-class potions from dilution to do this if you need holy water. You may want to hold out potions in the $300-class for gain level to help you get to the quest or to make cursed potions of gain level for the ascension run. I use polyself and ignore stat maximization, so I do not usually care about potions of gain ability and raising HP with heal- ing potions. Some stat maximization may be necessary to survive the Castle if you lack polymorph control, so you may need these. You can dip your darts into potions of sickness to double their effectiveness. This is risky if you do not have poison resistance because intelligent monsters can throw the poisoned darts back at you. A blessed potion of invisibility gives you an impor tant intrinsic, but you can get that intrinsic in other ways, and early invisibility may be undesirable if it prevents you from entering shops. Potions of speed can aid you if you lack speed boots. Potions of oil are useful if you need to refill a lamp. Other potions like see invisible, levita- tion, and polymorph have uses in particular situations, and may indeed prove crucial to your speedrun. In general though, I ignore the potion as- pect of the game and dilute most potions for holy water. Spellbooks I ignore spellcasting. Tourists are normally only proficient at lower level spells. If you wanted to reliably cast say, magic mapping (which would be very useful), you would need to maximize your stats, eliminate interfering armor, and have a robe. I consider this to be too much of an investment, if not necessarily in turns then in attention. Wands and scrolls are more ac- cessible substitutes for spellcasting. The only time I would consider spell- casting wor thwhile would be if I found low-level spellbooks early and did not have to choose between spellcasting and lower AC. Some advanced strategies might involve spellcasting but I have not explored these. Spell- books have some other uses. They can be sold for $30 to $250, so picking up spellbooks is like picking up heavier gold. Cursed spellbooks can be used to teleport. If you learn a spell then forget it with a scroll of amnesia, you have an inexhaustible source of confusion. A novel can get you to level two or three in the early game, which can help you survive. Comestibles You usually start with enough comestibles that food is not an issue in the early game, but beware in the rare cases you do not. Tripe rations and eggs are good to collect for a source of confusion. If you polyform into a non-eating form like vampire lord, you can avoid having to collect food (though have some as a backup). You can become a mind flayer to get sa- tiated quickly by attacking enemies. -6- Wands Always engrave-test immediately. This eliminates a charge but you would not want to, for example, miss out on using a wand of speed on yourself as soon as possible. Wands of teleportation are useful for shoplifting and in- tra-level telepor t once you have telepor t control. You want a wand of death for the Wizard. For the Planes you want one or more each of wand of death and wand of teleportation. For moving around the Dungeon and Gehennom, and for escaping, wands of digging are nice to have. A wand of digging can also get you out of engulfing monsters. A wand of slow monster can do the same. Wands of opening and locking can protect you in Astral. Wands of striking can be used to raze doors and eliminate boul- ders. A wand of cold can be useful to freeze water, which could save your game if you get stranded on a Medusa island, or the Papyrus Spellbook falls into the Wizard Tower moat and you need to dig it out. A wand of can- cellation can let you blank and dilute conveniently, and uncurse items. It can be a gamesaver if your bag of holding becomes cursed. Keep it in a separate sack to avoid putting it inside your bag of holding. The most im- por tant wand if you will be polyselfing is the wand of polymorph. It is defi- nitely wor th a wish once you have polymorph control. Rings and Amulets Use-test uncursed rings and amulets before using scrolls of identify. Use- ful rings are, in the $100-class, protection (chargeable with the PYEC) and stealth; in the $150-class, invisibility, cold and shock resistance, and in- crease damage (chargeable with the PYEC), ; in the $200-class, fire resis- tance, free action, levitation, and regeneration; and in the $300-class, con- flict, polymorph control, and teleport control. A ring of polymorph is useful if you have no other source of polymorph, so pick up any $300-class ring from a store if you can. It is risky to guess what the $300-class rings are, because sometimes the game plays with the usual formula of having poly- mor ph be the cursed one, and you cannot easily tell if an uncursed ring is telepor t control or polymorph control. An amulet of ESP is useful for find- ing shops and temples, and is easy to use-identify. An amulet of magical breathing may be necessary for the Castle. An amulet of unchanging is rare, but useful to control your polymorphs. Be careful to take it off before you are about to die in monster form. Armor Due to your camera and ranged attacks, you can get away with being naked in the early game. I would want to have an AC close to 0 as I move out of the opening game. The best situation is finding magic accessories and a mithril coat in an armor shop on the first four levels. Mithril coats are impor tant because they are lightweight. Heavier armor is impractical -7- without gauntlets of power, and even with them sacrifices carrying capacity. With luck you can get a mithril coat and dwarvish helm in the early Gnomish Mines. I do not bother with the iron shoes and dwarvish shields because they are heavy and have better replacements later. It is better to postpone donning armor until you can curse test it. Otherwise you can end up stuck with inferior armor. However, if you are in a dangerous situation, like a dark Gnomish Mines, take the risk of putting on a mithril coat. The most important piece of armor for a speedrun is speed boots. Early speed boots are a game changer for your turn count and survival. They are wor th an early wish, though I would take a polyself kit over speed boots. Weapons The starting +2 darts are reliable in the early game, even in melee when combined with the camera. You can get to skilled with them in a decent amount of time for multishot, but be careful about upgrading before Mine- town, since multishotting there can cause you to hit a peaceful. You can poison the darts to double their efffectiveness, but this has the risk that in- telligent monsters will throw them back at you, possibly resulting in in- stadeath. Darts are good in the later game for ranged attacks on monsters like sea creatures, mind flayers, and footrices. You may want to convert to daggers for ranged attacks because they do not break. Get to exper t with them for multishot. I would not say you should transition from darts to a melee weapon immediately, but do not put it off or you will run out of darts and have to forfeit the game. A pre-requisite to making the transition is having a low enough AC to melee, which I usually get from dwarven armor. The best situation is when you can get an artifact weapon before running out of darts. Otherwise I would take a long sword, dwarvish mattock, dwar vish shor t sword, or elven dagger. You can only reach basic in the first two, but they are more powerful than short swords. Long sword and dagger have artifacts. Dwarvish mattock lets you dig and fight without hav- ing to switch weapons. You can reach exper t in short sword and dagger. In any case, enchant your weapons as soon as possible. It makes a sub- stantial difference in your game outcomes. Strength bonuses also make a substantial difference, so gauntlets of power are a crucial item. At maxi- mum strength, you can throw projectiles much far ther. Erodeproof your melee weapons if you have extra scrolls or you accumulate multiple levels of erosion. You can get a silver saber off a captain in the Quest for Gehen- nom. If you have high enough accuracy and want to forgo a shield, you can two-weapon. If I have a magic lamp in the early game, I have no bet- ter wishes to make, and I am about to run out of darts, I will sometimes wish for Grayswandir. Your wishes may be spent better elsewhere if you can get a highly enchanted regular weapon. As far as sacrifice gift weap- ons, Magicbane is useful because it gives early magic resistance, catches -8- curses, and disables enemies so you can skip them rather than fight them. It is weak, so have ways to increase damage like polyselfing into a mind flayer or a ring of increase damage. The worst sacrifice gift weapon is Gi- antslayer, but it gives you a long sword if you need one. I am not sure about this, but Mjollnir might have the effect of waking monsters even if you have stealth. Tools Replace the credit card with a lockpick or key as soon as possible so you can lock doors. Locking doors is useful for escaping, and for making a closed room to reverse genocide monsters. If you use a room in Minetown for this, you need to lock the door to avoid guards coming in. A container is a impor tant and you may want to polypile for one. If you have a bag of holding, keep a sack for wands of cancellation and some holy water in case your bag of holding becomes cursed. This saved me on my one suc- cessful speed run below ten thousand turns. Avoid having a wand of can- cellation in your open inventory if you have a bag of holding. Do not even pick up bags of tricks once you no longer need them for altar work. Get a blindfold or towel to protect from lights and to use telepathy. Otherwise, blind yourself with your camera. The timeout for camera blindness is lower than for light blindness or hallucination. Get a tin opener if you are going to use tins, otherwise substitute with a dagger or pickaxe (make sure daggers are uncursed). Unicorn horns are very useful, but can be substituted with holy water to curse sickness if not chaotic or undead. Tonal instruments are useful for the Castle and should be picked up. If you need one before the Castle, you may be able to get one off of a soldier in a soldier room. Later on, a drum or bugle is useful for scaring monsters, par ticularly on the Plane of Air. Be careful about using an instrument you have not identified, since it may be magic horn that can rebound on you, or a horn of plenty that does not scare monsters, or a drum of ear thquake that angers the Minetown Watch. Light sources are useful for finding more treasure on the Castle dig and giving you advance warning of monsters, par ticularly in cor- ridors. They are also important in dark levels of the Gnomish Mines. Magic lamps are important for wishes, but blessing them can be a major time sink. If you need to you can rub-test a lamp after blessing. It is best if you can use scrolls of identify on magic markers so you can see their charges and plan accordingly. Gold This can be necessary to buy items in the early game. It can also be used to buy several points of AC off a priest. You can usually find a vault from magic mapping. Break in when you have a pickaxe. Even if you have no immediate need for gold, it is good to stockpile for future shops. There are -9- four guaranteed shops in the Quest, so there will always be future shops in the early game. You will want some gold to bribe demon lords, but this can be a small amount that you pick up in Gehennom. Gems, Stones You can pick up gems as dummy items to catch curses or for nymphs to steal. A touchstone might be useful in the opening game if you can bless it and use it to identify and sell valuable gems. A blessed luckstone is nice to have. Attributes If you polyself, or you make yourself elusive enough, you can avoid having to gain resistances. In my speedrun that was under ten thousand turns, I only had poison resistance as an inrinsic, and I am not sure I even needed it. Rings are a substitute for resistances, though their generation is unreli- able. A tinning kit, for which you may need to polypile, can help you eat cor pses. You may want to reverse genocide certain monsters to eat. If you do not have a ring of teleport control, and you have enough paper, you might wish for a magic marker to reverse genocide tengus rather than wish for the ring. This will cost some turns, but might leave you with extra marker charges. The chance of getting teleport control is 80% according to the Wiki. Being in an unbreathing form like vampire lets you eat without fear of choking. If you are a mind flayer and satiated, never eat. Unlike when you are human, you will not get a warning before you choke to death. In the early game, floating eye corpses are particularly impor tant so you can get telepathy to find shops, temples, and monsters. If you make your- self elusive and do not spend much time in lower levels, you can skip re- flection and magic resistance before the Castle. I have done the Castle successfully several times without either. I prefer reflection to magic resis- tance because I consider wands more of a threat than polytraps or spell- casters. Invisibility is highly useful, especially for the Castle, but have a way to enter and leave shops. Stealth is useful for the Castle and monster rooms, including mandatory ones like the treasure zoo in the Wizard’s Tower and the graveyard in Moloch’s Sanctum. Altar Work Altars are important for holy water and possibly an artifact weapon. Neu- tral altars seemed to occur in my games much less often than chaotic and lawful altars. If you have a cross-aligned altar and you kill a monster nearby, sacrifice it to convert the altar even if you do not intend to use the altar immediately. This may be the only altar you will get. Make holy water as soon as possible. I would take the risk to dilute a potion in a fountain when I start the game just to get this task out of the way. If you can get -10- one potion of holy water, that can be your seed for the rest of the game. If you there are monsters near your co-aligned altar, or you have a way to generate them, sacrifice for an artifact weapon. As a neutral, you are at the disadvantage that a confused create monster scroll generates fewer hostile acid blobs, but you still get some. Do not altar camp in the hope monsters will show up. This is too unreliable and eats turns rapidly. You can get a regular weapon and enchant it instead of holding out for an arti- fact weapon. If you get an undesirable artifact weapon like Giantslayer, use it and do not spend more time trying to get a better gift. If you do not find an altar before Minetown, and Minetown has a cross-aligned priest, you may want to convert the altar. You can avoid the priest by trapping him away from the altar using a scroll of earth (which you can find in Sokoban) or killing him with an uncursed, preferably blessed, scroll of stinking cloud. Be ready to convert the altar, get holy water, and get out. The priest can still be a danger if you trapped him, and if you killed him, you can get over- whelmed by ghosts. Experience Level You can get to level five naturally as you fight through the Gnomish Mines. Leveling up serves as a kind of healing at this early stage. You can level up by fighting mimics inside a store with your darts if you are not in a store that buys darts. If the mimic is in a store that buys darts, lure it outside and kill it in a corridor. Reading novels can get you to level two or three, which helps to get higher HP for early survival. You can get to deeper floors in the Dungeon at a low level if you are elusive. One perk of this is that ene- mies tend to be lower level. They will still be tougher than at higher floors, so if you kill them, you can increase your level quickly. If you reverse geno- cide dragons for scale mail, that can raise your level quickly. If you crush monsters in the Castle drawbridge, that can raise your level quickly. By the end of the Castle, if you fought some enemies, you can be at level nine to eleven. I usually get the resources to write cursed genocide scrolls by then, so I can write between one and three scrolls to wraith farm to level four teen for the Quest. Another option for getting to level four teen is to lure wraiths out of graveyards. There are guaranteed graveyards in the Valley and the first level of the Quest. I find this luring process tedious, so I prefer the reverse genocide method. Vampire lord is a good form for wraith farm- ing because it avoids choking and level drain. Wraith eating as a satiated mind flayer is extremely risky. Potions of gain level can be used to get to level four teen, but usually I do not find enough to carry me fully. Another option which you may want to explore is foocubi. -11- Annotation, Naming, Adjusting I annotate levels with vaults as soon as I know there is a vault from magic mapping or sound. Other interesting features to annotate are altars and their alignments, iron bars (which have telepor t scrolls), graves, and clos- ets and rooms where you can make 3x3 scare-monster cages for reverse genocide. Annotate immediately, because you might fall down a trap door before you do. When price-identifying, I type-name items with their price class using the Wiki article on price identification. Make sure to differenti- ate items in the same price class that will not auto-identify before an event occurs that would informally identify one. For example, if I have not deter- mined which $100 scrolls are scare monster, I might name $100-class scrolls “100a,” “100b,” “100c,” etc. Items to do this with are the $100-class scrolls for scare monster, the three $60/$80-class scrolls, and the three $300-class potions (in case you see a monster drink cursed gain level). This kind of naming can also be useful if you want to differentiate items like rings so you know when you have duplicates. I name particular wands to determine charges sometimes. I name a dead wand “0,” and name a cre- ate monster wand with its number of uses so I can guess when to break it to maximize my monsters. If I wish for blessed and cursed magic markers, I name them “B” and “C.” I adjust inventory items to regularize my letters across games. I make my main weapon “a” and my blindfold “b” for exam- ple. Develop your own code that works for you. Intra-Level Movement You should not always use the auto-navigation feature because it can lead you down paths you know are dangerous or inefficient. In the early game, it can run you over corpses where you know there are traps. In Gehen- nom, it can lead you down a longer path to stairs when you know you can dig a shorter path. Moving diagonally can save you time, as can razing doors if you have the ability to do so quickly. Ideally you would always be in the fastest polyform for your circumstances. The fastest polyform is air elemental in terms of raw movement points, but it might be faster to use a xorn to phase in some cases. Autopickup gets items on a square without expending a turn, so take advantage of that. Otherwise you do lose time picking things up, so do not pick things up without a good reason. You will want to autopickup your own darts in the early game. Inter-Level Movement For this you have pickaxe, wand of digging, holes, trap doors, cursed gain level potions, level telepor tation traps, cursed teleport scrolls, confused telepor t scrolls, the Orb of Fate, and the Eye of the Aethiopica. You will want teleport control for the teleport methods. Trap doors and level tele- por ters can be found behind “Vlad was here” closets. You can read more -12- about the precise mechanics of inter-level telepor ting on the Wiki. Traps Cer tain movement patterns might decrease your chances of stepping on traps, but I would have to research the trap generation algorithm. I do think that in maze levels, skipping corners by moving diagonally avoids traps. When you hit level ten, you get automatic searching, which can help you avoid traps. Levitation avoids certain traps A good way to avoid traps is to just not explore levels. I usually skip mid-Dungeon levels by digging, so I do not worry much about polymorph traps. You can #untrap containers and doors. #Untrapping containers is a must if you want to be careful. I will attempt to #untrap up to five times, or even skip containers entirely. If you are not careful about trapped containers, eventually you will burn your scrolls and potions, vaporize your rings and wands, or kill yourself. It is ad- visable to #untrap doors too. A favorite trick of NetHack is putting a dan- gerous monster like a nymph behind a trapped door so it can get to you while are stunned. Store Strategy in General You can find stores from magic mapping. They always have doors. Usu- ally they appear on the sides of levels, but sometimes they occur towards the center. You may want to skip small stores, but they do sometimes have crucial items like a magic lamp. Fighting mimics in stores can be a good way to level up in the opening game. Do not do this if the store buys darts. Lure a mimic outside if you necessary. You can shoplift with teleportation, but be prepared to escape the shopkeeper and deal with kops. Never lev- elpor t to shoplift while standing next to the shopkeeper or he will follow you. It is best to avoid killing the shopkeeper because of the luck and alignment penalties. If you find a $500-class wand, cannot identify it, and do not want to pay for it, get close to the shopkeeper and zap it at him while facing the door (close the door if the ray would rebound). If it is death, you can kill him, if it is wishing, you can wish for items that let you escape. Shoplifting with pets is tedious but may be necessary. Use con- tainers and treats to speed up the process. Pick up tripe rations from a store before your pet gets in if you need extra treats. You may want to spend turns price identifying items in the shop. If you want to price identify and sell items in your inventory, drop them all at once and write down the bid prices of the shopkeeper as they come up. Then pick up the items you did not sell and label them. Strategy for Particular Stores • General. These are often disappointing but sometimes have crucial items. They can be used to price-identify any item. Be careful about -13- picking up $100-class scrolls in case they are scare monster. Use a pet or mimic to identify those. Make sure to #untrap chests, and do not open the ones that you price-identify to be empty. The store may have a telepor tation scroll for shoplifting, but beware of just reading any $100-class scrolls, and do not assume there will be one and start incur- ring debt. • Armor. The best is when you find speed boots. If there are $50-class gloves, be careful about putting them on before BUC-testing in case they are fumble gloves. A mithril coat saves you from hunting in the Mines. Do not put on cloaks in the store because they might be cursed cloaks of invisibility. • Scroll. Leave the $100-class scrolls on the ground and use a pet or mimic to identify whether they are scare monster. In a large store you often find a teleportation scroll to shoplift, but be careful about just reading the $100-class scrolls, and do not assume there will be one and incur debt. I would use an identify scroll on the $100-class scrolls before reading them for teleportation. In order, I would identify $300-class scrolls, $100-class scrolls till I find scare monster, telepor ta- tion, and gold detection, then two $60/80-class scrolls (once you iden- tify two, the third will be known). If the store is large, it can supply you with most of the scrolls you need for blanking in the later game. The store will often have a novel, which is good for going to level two or three. With a novel and some mimics, you can get from level one to level four. • Potion. Pick up water and smoky if possible. If you will be paying at- tention to potions in the game, price identify. • Weapon. My least favorite. Usually useless. Sometimes they have a long sword or broad pick for you. Rarely they have a silver saber. Even more rarely they have an artifact. Be careful about the blast if it is cross-aligned. • Food. Often useless, but can have holy water; regular water, juice and booze for diluting; or useful corpses in iceboxes. If the iceboxes are near an altar, you can use their contents for sacrifice. • Ring. My most favorite if large, because it can get you early polyself. If you BUC-test the $300-rings using a pet, be careful about just putting on the uncursed ones. One may be conflict and cause your pet to kill you in one turn, or the shopkeeper to kill your pet. If you have a cursed $300-ring and a non-conflict $300-ring, it can be temping to put on both in the chance they are polymorph and polymorph control. This some- times pays off, but sometimes does not. • Wand. May have a wand of teleportation to let you shoplift. You can test if a wand that makes an engraving vanish is teleportation, -14- cancellation, or make invisible by shooting one of your +2 darts. If you have a way to escape, you can engrave test all the wands and leave without paying. • Tool. Often has useful things, including magic markers and lamps. Loot, rather than apply, $100-class bags to test for bags of tricks. Do not do so if you have low HP or you could die. #Untrap chests that you price-identify to be non-empty and price identify their contents. • Spellbook. I do not spellcast so spellbooks are not useful to me. Sometimes there are scrolls and novels, which are useful. The store can be used to identify scrolls. • Health. Useful for identifying healing potions, scroll of food detection, and fruit juice. • Lighting. Good for magic lamps. Pick up a lamp if you need a light source. You may want to buy out the candles so you can save some turns searching for candles in Vlad’s Tower. Wishing If you find early magic lamps, it can be difficult to bless them. You can use them for items to help you get to the Castle. Blessing may require convert- ing the Minetown altar for holy water. Before wishing, identify the items in your inventory to see what you would want. If you have a $300-class ring for example, and you find out it is polymorph control, your wish could be for a polymorph wand. When you get the Castle wand of wishing, identify it so you can see how many charges it has and plan accordingly. This also avoids accidental wresting. If you need to access more wishes before the Quest, and you have not identified charging, you may need to make your first wish for blessed charging scrolls. You will want a way to levelpor t, which may require wishing for a source of teleport control. You can wish for a marker to reverse genocide tengus for an 80% chance of teleport con- trol instead of wishing for a ring. The Orb of Fate can be used to levelpor t, and it has the benefit of reducing the damage you take and giving you a cr ystal ball for portal detection. However, telepor t scrolls are common enough for levelpor ting that you may be better off wishing for an extra magic marker. The Eye of the Aethiopica can be used for branchpor ting if you have a strategy where that would be a time-saver. You will want a marker to write magic mapping. You may want to wish for a blessed marker and a cursed marker so you do not have to bless and curse blank paper. If you have not identified genocide, wish for cursed scrolls of geno- cide. You will identify scare monster from the scroll on the chest square. You can use that scroll or write one scroll for making a reverse-genocide cage. Reverse genociding dragons for dragon scale mail is better than wishing for it directly. Wresting can be wor thwhile if it gives you a turn- -15- saving item like a helm of opposite alignment. Ideally, you would be able to wish for helms of opposite alignment till you get both chaotic and lawful ones, but consider whether other items are more important. If you have extra wishes, you can use them on a polyself kit, or useful rings like regen- eration and free action. If you find an early wand of wishing (about once every two hundred games for me), wish for items that will let you do the Castle as soon as possible. I have found a polyself kit to be better for this than improved armor and weapons. If you found the wand in a shop at ex- perience level one, do not rely on polyself to let you escape without paying if you are below level three. Your polyself can fail and kill you. Polyself The ideal polyself kit is a rechargeable wand of polymorph, a ring of poly- mor ph control, an amulet of unchanging, and a ring of regeneration. I have found a ring of polymorph to be unreliable, but if that is your only source of polymor ph, you may need to use it. You can get by the whole game with just a rechargeable wand of polymorph and a ring of polymorph control. If you use an amulet of unchanging, make sure to take it off before you are about to die in monster form. If you are not unchanging and are flying above water as a monster, you may want to equip a ring of levitation so you do not drown if you revert. If you need a way to recover HP you can be- come an undead creature for regeneration. Vampire lords are a go-to form for that reason. Arch liches haver higher HP but are slower. Vampire lords have lower HP but are faster. Vampire lords have human detection, which is useful to locate shops, temples, and soldiers (for a bugle) on the dig to the Castle. Vampire lords cannot handle silver objects, so they cannot per- form the Invocation. They are vulnerable to silver. There are soldiers in the Quest that have silver sabers, so watch out for those in vampire form. Arch liches can safely attack footrices with a weapon. Vampire lords will bite, which will cause stoning. If you are undead, you cannot use holy or unholy water to cure sickness. Master mind flayers are strong in melee and have telepathy, but be careful about slimes and footrices, and never eat while satiated (you get no warning before you choke to death). You will suffer cannibalism penalties for attack humans, so be careful about that, especially before wishing. Xorns are slow and weak, but can phase. Air elementals are the fastest and cannot be engulfed, but are weak and lim- ited in their actions. Mountain centaurs are the fastest forms that can wield a pickaxe for digging. Titans are fast, manipulate boulders, and cannot be engulfed, but they cannot wear body armor. Skeletons and xorns are ston- ing resistant but slow. If you have not gotten some resistance like fire re- sistance, you may want to polyself into a form that has that resistance in a par ticular place, like the Plane of Fire. Do not forget that you do not have the resistance when you leave that form. Polyselfing into a non-eating form -16- like vampire lord can help avoid dealing with nutrition, but have some backup food. There are some cases where polyselfing will save you in an emergency. It can be used to recover HP when you are close to zero. Controlled polyself to a green slime stops death by sliming. Polyselfing into a ghoul stops sickness. Polyselfing into a stoning resistant monster stops stoning. Before you polyself, be aware of your armor. Otherwise you may, for instance, casually turn into a xorn and lose your dragon scale mail. Opening Game Before turn one, take stock of your inventory and stats. Note your charisma for price identification. Note your gold. Note whether you have enough food (rarely, you will not). Check whether your extra healing po- tions are smoky. Check whether you have a magic marker. #Adjust your inventor y (I set the credit card to “k” for “key” and the camera to “C” for “camera”). Now star t playing. Use your magic mapping scrolls to map the first four levels, noting vaults and stores. Someone recommended not mapping floor one so as to have an extra scroll for shop-searching. I rec- ommend mapping floor one because manual exploration can eat up turns, and you may be playing many games so you will just want to move on to the shops immediately. (Aside: Start-scumming for a wizard is restarting till you get a good inventory. Star t-scumming for a tourist is restarting till you get good shops.) Whether you want to explore all the rooms on the first four levels is your choice. It consumes both turns and real time, but can improve your outcomes. If you find more magic mapping scrolls, you can go search for stores further down in the Dungeon. Be careful because the monsters get worse, and you can hit a monster room. In rare cases, you may get enough from the early Dungeon to skip Minetown. You may want to get a pickaxe from the Gnomish Mines as soon as possible so you can loot vaults. You may also want to do the Mines as soon as you find them. In addition to searching for shops, you should search for an altar. If you find none, you may want to convert the Minetown altar. One way to do this is to get an earth scroll from Sokoban. The strategy for fighting mon- sters in the opening game is: blind with camera, move away, kill with darts. It is important to blind intelligent monsters immediately to prevent them from using wands. Do not hesitate to use your extra healing potions if your HP gets too low. But use prayer first if you can and you do not need to pray for holy water soon. The Gnomish Mines If they are lit, you are in luck. If not, you may want to use an extra magic mapping scroll to find the down stairs. It is desirable to have a light source. If you have none and you hit a dark level you can still survive, but it is more -17- dangerous and stair location is more tedious. The strategy for monsters is: blind, move away, shoot. You may want to autopickup projectiles to prevent monsters from shooting them at you again, but this can lead to burdening. You can level up quickly, which serves as a way of restoring HP. Occasion- ally you will hit a dwarf with an AC that is too low to hit. Be careful about losing all your darts on him. You will want to dwarf hunt for a digging tool and a mithril coat. You can identify when a dwarf is digging on the level be- cause you will see a dug passage, or hear a crashing rock or strange wind. If you get a digging tool you can dig down after you have cleared some monsters, though this is risky. When you get to Minetown, note which ver- sion it is. If you get Orctown, just leave. Otherwise, know which locations you will be hitting, and in which order. Beware around general stores, hardware stores, and wand stores, because gnomes may steal ray weap- ons from there. You may want to hit these first to beat them for that rea- son. You may want to lock them up. Minetowns have two gnomish wizards around the temples as minibosses, and they can actually be dangerous with their stunning attacks and difficulty to kill with darts. You can blind them or lock them up in the temple. Above all, do what you need to do in Minetown and get out as soon as possible. Otherwise you may get an a- storm or a d-storm before you are ready. Rarely, you will get a co-aligned altar. It may be wor th sticking around to sacrifice, especially if there is an icebox nearby. If you found no altars in the Dungeon, you may want to convert the Minetown altar using a scroll of earth or stinking cloud. You may want to venture further into the mines for loot if you have not found a digging tool, mithril coat, or weapon. Mid-Dungeon When you come back up, it should be between turn one thousand and three thousand. You will ideally have an AC at 0 or below and have transi- tioned to a melee weapon. You should have a digging implement. In the best case you will have leverage to survive the Castle: polyself kit, or gauntlets of power and speed boots, or enchanting scrolls, etc. You will need a way to enter the Castle, such as levitation or a tonal instrument. If you have not gotten the requisite equipment, you will need to explore more as you dig down. A light source is useful for this. Telepathy or human de- tection is useful for locating additional shops, temples, and monster rooms, par ticularly a soldier room for a bugle. If you are aiming for a certain turn goal and you think you are taking too long, you may want to just try to do the Castle even if you do not feel prepared. You can escape monsters while digging by using the camera. One of the worst situations is if you fall into the Big Room. For this reason you may not want to dig around levels ten to twelve, opting for stairs instead. You may want to genocide H, L, or ; before the Castle. -18- Medusa’s Island and the Castle If you fell onto a part of Medusa’s Island where there is too much water to dig down, you may save yourself with a scroll of earth, a wand of cold, levi- tation, flying, or unbreathing. Otherwise, you may have to forfeit the game. You want to get to a place where you can dig down. The titan version of Medusa’s Island is dangerous because the titan can summon nasties. If you get this version, disable and kill the titan quickly, or zap a wand of dig- ging downwards. You may face a labyrinth before the Castle, in which case you may have to escape a minotaur. At the Castle there are many threats, including a minotaurs, liches, sea creatures, and xorns. Invisibility is help- ful here, as are the camra and darts. You will want a potion of object de- tection to detect the wand of wishing. You might be able to get a potion of object detection from a nymph on the Medusa level. Know how you are getting into the Castle. If you have a tonal instrument, you can open and close the drawbridge, killing monsters along the way. A mastermind solver can help you guess the passcode quickly. The sea creatures and xorns can kill you outside the drawbridge, so be careful of them. You can use boulders to plug the moat and prevent sea creatures from passing near you. Do not break boulders in front of the Castle, because they could be useful for filling the moat, making barriers, or plugging trap door holes. If you are unfor tunate enough that a guardian naga or higher-level lich sum- mons nasties around you, you need a way to escape, and preferably kill the summoner as soon as possible. If you have polyself, you can fly around the back of the castle and clear it out by luring monsters into the trap doors. The fastest way to do the Castle is to xorn to the wand of wish- ing. Be careful when you do this because xorns are weak. Once you get the wand, wish for your items and teleport to the Quest level. The Quest If you want to ascend in under ten thousand turns, and you are between three thousand and five thousand turns, you are doing all right. Get to level four teen and enter the Quest. Preferably you will have reflection or invisibility to avoid wand-shooters. The Quest has four stores. You may want to genocide mimics to increase items there. If you have not collected enough gold and you need the shop items, you have to shoplift. You can skip the various monster rooms unless you want more loot. Move quickly by the usual methods (teleportation, digging). The Master of Thieves is easy if you can beat him to the up stairs. A captain in one of the intermedi- ate levels may have a silver saber for you to loot. Beware of silver sabers if you are a vampire lord. Be careful not to forget the silver bell and quest ar- tifact. Double check to make sure you have these before you leave the level where you kill the Master of Thieves. -19- Gehennom You may want to pause before Gehennom to prepare your inventory. A pickaxe is useful as a backup for wands of digging. Telepor t to the Valley and skip through with phasing or stealth, unless you want more loot. If you want to ascend in under ten thousand turns and you enter Gehennom be- fore turn five thousand, you are doing all right. Beyond turn six thousand, it gets more difficult. Ideally you will be able to magic-map every level. If you need to preserve scrolls or marker charges, you can dig down a level, magic-map it, take the down stairs, and repeat. This will leave you with mapped up stairs on every level when you come back up. When you get to the levels where Vlad’s Tower can generate, it is best to map every level. Otherwise you can use the previous method and go back up to explore if you failed to find Vlad’s Tower. Bribe any demon lord you can to avoid fighting. Have a way of curing sickness for Juiblex. You want to be very careful with Vlad, because he can be quite dangerous. Stoning is useful here. Get candles and loot from the chests if you need. Orcus Town is dangerous if you do not have free action because of the shades. You want to avoid them, or lure them into a safer place and kill them. Get the wand of death from Orcus. It is best to blessed-map the Wizard’s Tower levels to detect secret doors. Use portal detection on the Fake Tower levels and en- ter the Wizard’s Tower. Avoid fighting through the treasure zoo if possible. You can use stealth. I seem to recall having phased past the zoo once, though not every wall is phaseable. On the Wizard level, you can wake him up and have him teleport to you by a mind flayer mind blast, or more rarely, a drum of ear thquake. Otherwise, go to him and be careful not to kill him over water. If he falls over water, you can get his spellbook using unbreathing, or by freezing the water and digging. Find the Vibrating Square by the gold detection or orb methods. You cannot perform the In- vocation as a vampire, so become something else. Ascension Run A fast way to do the Sanctum is to be a stealthy xorn with conflict, and phase, dodging the priests. Beware of the priests: they are highly danger- ous. Stoning may help here. Use secret door detection or a blessed Bell of Opening to find the entrance to the Inner Sanctum. Kill the high priest with death, take the Amulet, and get out, preferably by phasing or cursed gain level. In Gehennom you want to become chaotic to reduce the effects of the Mysterious Force. If you have them, use cursed gain level potions on the lengthier or more dangerous levels like Juiblex’s Swamp and the Valley. Be careful when going up to Medusa if you did not kill her on the way down. Outside Gehennom you want to become lawful to make ar- chons and titans generate peaceful. Mapping is useful on the way up to find the stairs on levels you dug past. -20- Planes Have a good charging schedule for your wands if any need charging. Have your portal detection methods in order. The best method for portal detec- tion is confused gold detection. Otherwise you have cursed gold detection and an orb. When you enter the Planes you have to face the Wizard, a minotaur, and an elvenking. Be prepared, because they can hit hard. Phase or dig to the first portal. On the Plane of Air, a scaring instrument is useful for air elementals. Otherwise you may need to become a non-en- gulfable creature like a titan or air elemental, or use up many wand of death charges to kill engulfers. Beware of lightning if you lose your reflec- tion, and protect your wands and rings. Plane of Fire is the easiest if you have fire resistance. This may require polyselfing. Cursed gold detection will not differentiate the portal from fire traps, so have another method. The Plane of Water may have some risk of drowning, so you may want to become unbreathing. You have limited control over your movement. Ide- ally, you would be able to do frequent portal detection so you could decide when to move to another bubble. The best kit for Astral includes lots of telepor tation and death charges, and both lawful and chaotic helms of op- posite alignment. You may have to use death on enemies other than the Riders like priests. Regeneration and healing potions are helpful for sur- vival, but a lich can destroy potions in open inventory. Some polyforms cannot melee the Riders safely, like master mind flayer. If you have both helms, you can go to the closest altar and ascend. Otherwise you may have to run the gauntlet of enemies two to three times. Winning Setups These are promising early game setups for a speedrun: • Speed boots in an armor store, complemented by gauntlets of power. • A large scroll store that gives you genocide, scare monster, and en- chant armor for making dragon scale mail, as well as many other useful scrolls for reading and blanking. You take the whole stack by telepor t- ing away. • Early wishes from magic lamps or a wand. • A large ring store that gives you a ring of polymorph control, a ring of polymorph, and many other useful rings. You become a xorn and phase out with everything on hand. • Many enchanting scrolls that you use to max out your AC and weapons. • Early markers and the ability to write the good scrolls. -21- Practice Tips Tr y practicing stages before attempting the whole run. For instance, try speedrunning to the Castle without worrying about completing it. This will build familiarity and confidence. Do not think your setup has to be perfect to reach your speedrun goal. When I was attempting to ascend in under ten thousand turns, I had many “perfect” setups which I subsequently botched, whereas the one time I did ascend in under ten thousand turns I had a decent but not extraordinary setup. I will say that if your goal is to ascend in under ten thousand turns, your setup has not been good, and you are missing key turn benchmarks, you may want to set your sights lower or restar t. You can practice in wizard mode. Wish for key items on turn one and see how far you can get.
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