Sender: bart@harlequin.com
From: Bart Wright <bart@harlequin.com>
Date: Fri, 8 Nov 96 12:51:41 EST
Message-Id: <713.9611081751@romulus.harlequin.com>
To: 74171.2136@CompuServe.COM
In-Reply-To: <961108172920_74171.2136_GHQ91-2@CompuServe.COM>
Subject: Finished the PC version

How to Win at Rogue

Bart Wright
Revision 1.1
January 23, 1995

The rogue described here is version 5.2, as it appeared on Unix boxes
(Berkeley, I think) around 1986.  A preliminary comparison with the PC net
version appears at the end.

Some of what I write here is undoubtedly not quite right; I would
appreciate any corrections or reactions (positive or negative) to the
advice offered (bart@harlequin.com).  I'd also appreciate anyone else's
insights or approaches to the game.

I assume you know the fundamentals of the game and have played several
times.


The Big Picture

My goal when I play rogue is to have the greatest number of wins per hour I
spend playing the game (though I am not averse to breaking any of the rules
in here to have fun).  Although I have won some 30 times, I average about
one win per 10 hours of play -- I still need good luck.  As an example of a
decision influenced by my goal, if I find a ring on the first level of the
dungeon, I try it on immediately.  If it is cursed, I quit the game and
start another one.  You wouldn't do this if your goal is to maximize your
chances of winning any one game.  Carried to its extreme, this would also
suggest that you not bother to pick up gold if it takes you out of your
way, and not waste arrows on leprechauns, but I haven't gone this far
myself.

Here is the basic situation.  To win rogue, you have to go down 26 levels,
find the Amulet of Yendor, and then come back up.  "Stuff" (magic, armor,
weapons, food) occurs with equal frequency on all levels when going down.
When you start back up, there is no stuff at all (except what some monster
may be carrying).  Monsters also occur on every level, but the species you
encounter get decidedly more threatening as you descend; as you come back
up they get less threatening.

You need to collect all the stuff you can, discarding what is not useful
and keeping what is.  Some of the good stuff helps you permanently, such as
enchantment of your weapon.  Most of it disappears immediately when you use
it (arrows, most scrolls and potions), some disappears after a number of
uses (charges of staves), and while the rings last forever, most use up
your food at a faster rate when you have them on, so their use is limited
by food supplies.  Food is also needed just to stay alive (I have died of
starvation many times).  Call all of this good stuff that gets used up
consumables.

The basic pattern of a good game of rogue is to scan every level thoroughly
for stuff, building up your consumables (and of course your permanent good
stuff as well), until you reach a level where (on average) the consumables
you consume fighting a level's monsters that you find after you find the
stairway exceed the value of the stuff you will find after finding the
stairway.  I think this is usually level 17 or 18.  You then shift to a
mode where you go down as fast as possible (including use of trap doors
when you find them), hoping that your consumables last long enough to get
you back up to where you can defeat monsters without consumables.  You may
be comforted to know that if you can get back up to level 15, you are
almost assured of victory.  You don't even need food at that point;
possessing the Amulet of Yendor decreases your food consumption to very
close to zero (unless you are wearing rings).


Basics of Combat

Magic is nice when you run into trouble, but you have to be able to
dispatch most of the monsters by simple combat, because you don't get
enough magic for more than a small fraction of them.  I have won several
times where I couldn't reliably defeat a xorn or umber hulk, but I never
won unless I could defeat a troll or invisible stalker.

Your blows against a monster are affected by your dexterity (the chance you
have of hitting as opposed to missing), and your damage (how many hit
points you take away with a hit).  They are also affected by the monster's
"armor" level (which affects your likelihood of landing a blow), and the
total number of hit points the monster started with.

The monster's blows against you are completely parallel.  The monster has a
dexterity value and a damage value, which are pitted against your armor
level and your hit points.

So dexterity, damage, armor, and hit points are the fundamental units
of combat.  They are often determined by secondary factors:

Your dexterity level goes up as your experience level increases, and it
goes up a little for strength values over 16.  It is also affected by rings
of dexterity and the first number on your weapon.  "A +1,+2 mace" is one
with one extra dexterity level and two extra damage points.

The damage you do is affected by the identity of your weapon (as well as
the second number).  Your original +1,+1 mace takes from 3 to 8 hit points,
for an average of 5.5.  You may find spears, daggers, long swords, etc. in
the dungeons, but the only one that is worth wielding (as opposed to
throwing) is the two-handed sword.  This takes from 3 to 18 hit points, for
an average of 10.5.  Your damage is also increased significantly as your
strength goes above 15, about 1 damage point for each strength point.

Your armor class is simply what is shown on the screen, though a ring of
protection has an additional, invisible effect.  A +2 ring of protection is
2 good units of armored-ness, meaning an armor class 2 units lower.

Your maximum hit points show on the screen.  They go up each time you gain
a level of experience, by a random number from 1 to 10.  They go up a
little when you quaff potions of healing and extra healing, assuming you
were reasonably well-healed to begin with.

A very important factor is your rate of healing, which also goes up as you
gain experience levels.  When you reach level 8, you recover one hit point
for each three turns you do not fight, and above level 8 you recover a
random number between one and (level minus 7) every three turns.  At
experience level 13, this is from 1 to 6 hit points, which can be very
significant in the art of running away.

The monster's dexterity level is a constant determined by the species.  The
number of hit points per blow is random (for each blow) within a range that
is constant for the species.  The monster's armor class is also constant
for the species.  The monster's dexterity level determines the number of
hit points the monster has.  Each dexterity level corresponds to an average
of 4.5 hit points (random from 1 to 8).

It also seems to me (though it could be a superstition) that a better armor
class for you also reduces the number of hit points a blow takes away from
you, though I don't think the monsters are helped in the same way.  This
might happen because each one of the monster's "dice" is considered a
separate attack, while the message that the monster hits you is true if
any of the dice land a blow.

It also seems as if high experience levels (say above 10) also increase the
damage you do with each blow.


Know Your Monsters

Here is the monster table.  This is based on someone peeking at source code
for a rogue version earlier than 5.2, but it is generally accurate as far
as I know in 5.2 (except for the "Carry" numbers, some of which I think
are wrong).

Monster	Levels	Carry	Mean	Skill	Damage	Armor	AvgHP	Points
K	1-8	--	yes	1	1-4	7	4.5	1
J	1-8	--	yes	1	1-2	7	4.5	2
B	1-8	--	--	1	1-2	7	4.5	1
S	1-9	--	yes	1	1-3	5	4.5	3
H	1-10	--	yes	1	1-8	5	4.5	3
E	2-11	--	--	1	--	9	4.5	5
A	3-12	--	yes	2	1-6	3	9	10
O	4-13	15	yes*	1	1-8	6	4.5	5
Z	5-14	--	yes	2	1-8	8	9	7
G	6-15	10	--	1	1-6	5	4.5	8
L	7-16	gold	--	3	--	8	13.5	10
C	8-17	15	--	4	2-12	4	18	15
R	9-18	--	yes	5	--	2	22.5	25
Q	10-19	30	yes	3	3-8	2	13.5	35
N	11-20	100	--	3	--	9	13.5	40
Y	12-21	30	--	4	2-12	6	18	50
T	13-22	50	yes	6	4-28	4	27	55
W	14-23	--	--	5	1-6	4	22.5	55
F	15-24	--	yes	8	inc	3	36	85
I	16-25	--	--	8	4-16	3	36	120
X	17-26	--	yes	7	7-33	-2	31.5	120
U	18-	40	yes	8	8-34	2	36	130
M	19-	30	--	7	3-12	7	31.5	140
V	20-	20	yes	8	1-10	1	36	380
P	21-	70	--	15	4-32	6	67.5	7,000
D	22-	100	yes	10	5-46	-1	45	9,000

Key to the monster table:

Monster:  The letter that identifies the monster on the screen.

Levels:  The levels of the dungeon where the monster appears.  Note
that in treasure rooms, monsters can occur one level earlier and one
level later than shown here.

Carry:  The chances that the monster is carrying some "stuff" which
you can pick up if you defeat it.

Mean: There are two kinds of monsters, those that are put on a level when
you enter the level (settled) and those that are created more or less
constantly as you spend time on the level (itinerant).  All itinerant
monsters start chasing you as soon as they are created.  Mean refers to
whether a settled monster will "wake up" and chase you.  Monsters that are
not mean never do, unless aggravated by ring or scroll.  Those that are
have a good chance of doing so when certain triggering events occur: you
enter the room, leave the room, or end a turn next to the monster.

*Orcs go for gold and sit on it contentedly if there is any in the room; if
not they go for you.

Skill:  The monster's dexterity level.

Damage:  The range of possible damage the monster can inflict in a
single blow.  This is modeled as a certain number of N-sided dice.
If the bottom of the range is 1, it is a single die, if it is 2, then
it has 2 dice, etc.  For instance, a Centaur has 2 6-sided dice.
Monsters with multiple dice have a greater tendency to inflict damage
in the middle of their ranges, compared to single-die monsters.

Armor:  The armor level of the monster, just like your armor class.

Average hit points:  How many points the monster has, on average.
This is always 4.5 times the Skill level.  In fact, it is computed
as if the monster rolled an eight-sided die for each skill level,
so you can compute maximum and minimum from that.  My impression
is that monsters in treasure rooms have fewer hit points than
others of the same type, but I don't know how big the effect is.

Points:  How many experience points you get for slaying the monster.
Yes, purple worms and dragons have values in the thousands.


Scanning a level.

Your goal when you enter a level (on the first 15-17 levels, anyway) is to
find all the stuff you can, as quickly as possible, defeat all the monsters
you meet, and get on to the next level.  There are two reasons for not
dallying.  First, you have a limited supply of food, and even if you're not
in danger of starving a surplus is good if you want to use rings later.
Second, itinerant monsters are being created, and the longer you hang
around, the more of them you have to fight.  (But if I'm about to face
trolls on level 13 and am 5 experience points short of getting to the
next level, I'll sometimes wait near the stairs for another monster.)

The game provides you a variety of options for moving.  When I want to go
more than a single space, I typically use the "f-direction" syntax (f key
followed by direction key).  This stops you whenever you find anything.
When I talk about "waiting", I usually do that by searching (s).  (You can
pass time without searching with the period key.  Occasionally this is
desirable, for instance when you are healing after combat and don't WANT to
discover any hidden passages just yet.)

There are only nine possible rooms on a level, arranged in a 3 x 3
grid.  The only passageways go from one room to an adjacent room (not
on a diagonal).  In some cases a single hallway space is created as a
placeholder for a room, and passages can go to that.  All passages
consist of (at most) a straight segment toward the other room, a
straight segment laterally, and a straight segment toward the other
room again.  Occasionally when these overlap you see more interesting
patterns, but if you look you can always see how it was made according
to these simple rules.

So when you are searching for hidden passages leading to new rooms, you
never need to search for passages leading off the screen, for more than one
secret door on the side of a room, or for any passage that leads to a place
you can already get to by passages you know about.

Generally you do better to seek out the corner rooms first when you have
a choice about where to go.  Since the screen is wider than it is high,
you generally minimize your walking distance by going up/down first
instead of left/right.

You want to look for things in every square of every room (I'm assuming the
room is dark), but you don't want to walk on more floor than you have to,
to minimize your chances of falling into a trap.  All rooms are 2, 3, 4, or
5 squares high.  When you first enter a room, first move up and down to
discover which height room you are dealing with.  In addition, you may or
may not care about discovering doors.  For instance, suppose you enter a
5-high room on the top of the screen (from the right).  There are no doors
on the top wall, but there may be a door on the bottom wall, so you can
scan the room in two passes.  You can first walk along the second row from
the top, and then along the bottom row, and you will have scanned the whole
room.

When you zip across a room, you scan three rows at a time.  With a little
effort, you can actually scan four rows at a time.  Suppose that you
enter a 3-high room on the top of the screen, from the right.  Go to
the bottom row and repeat this pattern of moves: left, left-up, left-down,
(left, left-up, left-down...)  You scan four rows without taking extra steps.
Of course this is a bit tedious, so I generally only do it when I am
deep in the dungeon (say level 13 or deeper) and invested in my game.
When you need to scan a 3-high room in the middle row of the screen
(including looking for doors on top and bottom walls), you can get an
efficient search pattern by going to the middle row and repeating this
pattern of four steps:  up-left, down, down-left, up-left.

If there is any chance you may later have to search for a secret door
along a wall, it's best to initially explore by hugging the wall, so
you don't later have to walk across more floor.  You COULD follow your
same step pattern when you search, but I've never had the patience for
that.

When you search, you search all eight of the surrounding squares including
diagonals with equal effectiveness.  So if you are looking for a secret
door on a wall (but not the adjacent wall), it never pays to search in the
corner.  My general pattern is to go one away from the corner, search 7
times, then move left, search twice, move left, search twice, etc. until I
reach one from the other end and search 7 times.  Then I repeat the
procedure going back to the right.  I know this could be further optimized,
but I haven't done so.  When you have a choice of looking for a secret door
on a horizontal or vertical edge, it pays to search the vertical edge
first, because if the door is there you will find it with less effort.  In
fact I often search horizontal edges (7-10 times) when I am near them in
case I may need them later.

Often you end up going down a corridor which comes to a dead end.
First, if there aren't four rows or columns between you and the edge
of the screen, there can't be a room (two rows of room plus two rows
of walls), so you don't need to search for it.  Second, if the corridor
ends while you are moving laterally (e.g. you move down from a room,
to the right, and there is no way down), there is always a room there.
What's more, you can back up one square from the end of the corridor
to do your searching.  You will find the door just as fast, and if
there are monsters waiting to get out, you get an extra turn to look
at them before they are upon you.  Critically, you can take off your
armor if a rust monster appears.

When you want to be especially cautious, you can throw an arrow (or dart,
or whatever) down a corridor before you walk down it.  If there is a
monster there, you will be told about it (maybe it's the distinctive grunt
of surprise that gives the beast away?).  Then you can react appropriately.

Another thing to be aware of is the "homing patterns" of itinerant
monsters.  Once created, they essentially walk towards you in the X,Y
plane, pretty much oblivious to whether there are passages leading to you,
when they are at a distance.  (I don't know their full algorithm.)  Suppose
the passages joining rooms on your level are like a big E.  If you explore
the bottom two arms quickly and find the stairway there, but then end up
spending a long time in the top arm (fighting tough monsters or whatever),
then you can expect to meet several itinerant monsters just as you get
partway down the shaft of the letter E, because that's when they will
"drain" toward you.  So when you start heading back down the E shaft is a
good time to send down an arrow, or even wait a few turns so the monsters
come to you before you stumble into one.


Doorways and Bends in the Road

When you first appear in the doorway to a (dark) room, you should consider
searching for several turns before you enter.  I mentioned under monsters
that "mean" monsters often wake up when you appear in the doorway.  For one
thing, if there is more than one in the room, you will be able to fight
just one at a time.  Also, if you are moving and you start a turn 1 space
away from a monster who is coming for you, the monster gets a hit on you
before you know he is there.

One reason to prefer first entering a room from a door on the top or bottom
(rather than the sides) is the much greater chance that a monster will
first appear diagonally from you in the doorway instead of straight ahead.
With a rust monster, this typically makes the difference between losing an
armor level or not.  (This is generally a minor factor; I don't take long
detours to enter a room from the top or bottom, but it is another reason to
explore up or down corridors before sideways corridors when all else is
equal.)

I played rogue for a long time before I learned a lesson from a dragon.  I
was in the doorway of a room fighting something like a purple worm, and the
dragon was visible diagonally one square away within the room.  Said dragon
fired a bolt of fire at me from that position.  This led me to the insight
that you too can send bolts on diagonals, and more importantly you can send
arrows and other projectile weapons.  This can be a real help.  Note that
arrows and crossbow bolts are still quite effective when thrown, even
without the bow or crossbow to fire them.

Here is a classic case.  You stand in the doorway for a turn when a rust
monster appears.  You immediately take off your armor, probably losing an
armor point to rust in the process.  A troll becomes visible diagonally one
square away.  You could defeat the rust monster, and then face the troll
without any armor on.  But you're better off wielding your bow, ignoring
the rust monster, and fire arrows at the troll until you kill it.  Then
wield your main weapon again and dispatch the rust monster, then put your
armor on.

Many other cases are also worth it.  If you face a jackal straight ahead
and a centaur on the diagonal, you might take hits from the jackal while
you soften up the centaur with arrows.  If you face a gnome and you view a
rust monster on the diagonal, you might want to take off your armor to
fight the gnome, figuring you can defeat the gnome comfortably without
armor.  Even if you don't want to fire arrows, seeing the next monster you
have to face can help you plan your strategy (can I defeat this duo, or
will I need magic?)

The same principle applies to bends in corridors.  If a monster lunges
out of a room at you as soon as you discover the hidden door, it's often
worth backing up a few squares to a bend to see if there is another
monster behind.


The Art of Running Away

It's great when you can dispatch a monster without moving.  But all too
often, you find yourself losing the battle.  Even if you could use magic,
your supply is limited.  But if you run away, you will gradually heal,
while most monsters don't (in one older version, at least, trolls and
vampires were thought to heal, but I've never seen any evidence of this
as a perceptible factor in 5.2).

There is always the danger that you will run into another monster as you
run.  For this reason, it's not a bad idea to start running away while you
still have enough hit points to survive one vicious hit from another
monster who might surprise you.  I often try to keep 30 hit points (once
trolls have appeared).  I fight until my hit points drop to 30, then run
away until they have recovered to 50 or so.  Your healing gets much better
right around experience level 8.  Once you get to experience level 13 or
so, you can even heal enough while running away to defeat purple worms.

When you run away down a dead-end street, you don't have very far to
run.  Running away works best when you can go in a circle.  Circles are
of various kinds.  A circuit may go through a number of rooms, or
sometimes strictly within a set of corridors.  The less obvious case
is a non-mean monster stationed in the middle of a room (not adjacent
to any wall).  You can use a series of diagonal moves around this
monster to avoid the one who is chasing you while you heal.  Often
the one chasing you will reverse directions, so you have to be alert.
As long as you don't hit it, the non-mean monster will blithely sleep
through the battle raging about it.

At levels where you can expect to meet monsters you can't easily defeat,
it's a good idea to be on the lookout for circles.  For instance, if
you have explored the center, west, and south rooms, and you see
corridors leading from both the west and south rooms to the southwest,
you may want to explore that room first, to find secret doors or defeat
monsters in it so it is available as a circle.  (There may be only a
passageway instead of a room, but you are guaranteed that the passages
connect.)  Of course, the shorter the circle, the less chance you have
of meeting an itinerant monster as you go around it.

Walking into a teleport trap does not count as running in circles, but it
can be very handy when you are being chased by a bad monster.  Remember
where your teleport traps are.

At other times you may simply want to leave the level, foregoing any
magic you haven't yet discovered.  If you have found trap doors or
the standard stairway, you can run away and down to the next level.
Monsters never follow you down the stairs or through the trap.
Scrolls of magic mapping can be used when you want to run away, to
find the stairway.  They work best when you have a choice as to
where to go (for instance, in the middle room).


Managing Strength:

A high strength can be a major asset in winning.  The story is that
strength from 7-15 does not either hurt or help you.  Values above 15 help
by about 1 damage point (with an occasional dexterity point thrown in) per
level, and values below 7 hurt both by a damage and a dexterity point per
level.

A potion of poison reduces your strength, a potion of gain strength
increases it one point, and restore strength restores it to the highest
value it has ever been.  Poison dart traps occur on all levels and can rob
you of strength, but the greatest threat to your strength is ants.  They
appear on levels 3-12.

My general strategy is to try to save all potions I have until I am
finished with level 12.  By then my strength is almost always below
16, but still above 6.  I almost never use an identify scroll on a
potion, so I have a mystery at level 12.  You would love to encounter
your potions in the order poison, restore strength, and gain strength.
To maximize your chances, it helps to know that poison potions are
less common than restore strength, which are in turn less common than
gain strength.  So if you have more than one of some potions, it pays
to quaff the ones you have least of first.

I have added one twist to this strategy.  As long as my strength is
at 16, I tend to quaff a new, unknown potion shortly after I find it,
hoping it will be gain strength.  The main reason is that you are
likely to run out of room in your pack before you reach level 12
(and the extra strength can help you with the first 12 levels).

If my strength goes below 7 and there are other good parts to my
game, I will try all my potions immediately; it's hard to survive
long with strength of 5 or below.


Managing armor:

If I encounter armor that promises to be good (chain mail, band mail,
splint mail, or plate mail) on the first few levels, I am likely to simply
try it on (and then immediately try to take it off).  It will often be
cursed.  If nothing else good has happened to you, you might want to quit
and start over.  When you are more invested in your game, you often want to
spend an identify scroll to make sure the armor is OK before you try it on.
But there are two scrolls which will remove the curse, both "remove curse"
and "enchant armor".  So if you have a half dozen scrolls of unknown type,
it's not a bad idea to try on the armor and if it is cursed then hope
that one of your scrolls will help you get it off.

The only danger to armor is rust monsters, which are present on levels
9-18.  I generally wear armor and take it off when I encounter a rust
monster.  The encounter often loses a level of armor strength (it takes two
turns to get the armor off, but after the first turn your armor is no
longer "on you" and so is not vulnerable to rust).  Once the rust monster
is defeated, I put armor back on.  If I have a choice of armors, I tend to
wear less good armor (class 7-5) until at least level 12.  It would be nice
if you could save your best armor (class 4 and up) until level 19, but it's
often hard to survive if you do.  I often find myself taking my chances
with my best armor at level 13 (when trolls first show up).

A ring of maintain armor can be very good.  I rarely wear it all the time
because of its drain on food, but whenever you see a rust monster, you can
put it on, avoiding the usual drain of an armor point.  (And if space in
your pack is tight, you can throw away the ring when you get to level 19!)
A staff of cancellation will also cancel the rust-inducing properties of
rust monsters.

Strange (and unrealistic) as it may seem, with very good armor (say of
class 1 or better) and good fighting strength, I sometimes walk around with
no armor on at all.  When I see a bad monster, I then put on my good armor.
This requires me to take one hit from the monster without armor and another
with armor on before I land my first blow, but the armor is usually good
enough to let me still win.  If you are wearing less good armor, this isn't
a practical strategy since you would have to take four hits (three of them
without much protection) while you change armor.  My strategy protects my
good armor from rust monsters most of the time.  This strategy really
suggests itself when you don't have any spare armor better than class 9,
which happens all too often.  Class 10 (no armor on) is not much worse than
class 9.


Managing Rings

The ring of slow digestion is a very nice ring.  You leave it on
constantly because it reduces your food consumption.  The ring of
adornment is said to have no effect on food consumption.

The other rings all (as far as I know) cause you to consume food at a
greater rate.  I think the effect is larger for regeneration and somewhat
larger for stealth, but I'm not certain of this.  Usually this added food
consumption is enough so that you will run out of food if you keep the ring
on constantly.  One good strategy is to save up your food and then put on
the ring for the "dash" from level 20 to 26.  Wearing a ring together with
a ring of slow digestion also works.  You can also get a lot out of rings
by only wearing them at certain times.

When you meet a difficult monster, you might take a hit while you put on
your ring of regeneration, assuming you have some space to back up.  This
makes your running away strategy much more effective.  (The regeneration
ring also heals you during combat, which ordinary healing will not.)  This
could also apply to any of the "fighting" rings (dexterity, increase
damage, protection, or add strength).

Putting on a ring of maintain armor immediately when a rust monster
appears adjacent to you is very effective in keeping your armor
intact.  It doesn't protect you from an "ambush" by a rust monster,
however.  Maintain strength will similarly work when you run into an
ant.  And obviously you can put on your ring of searching only when you
want to find something.

The ring of stealth is the best one, and you can get its full effect
without wearing it all the time.  The stealth ring does nothing against
itinerant monsters, since they always chase you, nor does it do anything
against non-mean, settled monsters, who won't chase you in any event.  But
it does keep mean, settled monsters from waking up and chasing you.  The
only times they may wake up are (a) when you go into or out of the room
they are in, and (b) when you end the turn next to them.  So you never have
to wear your stealth ring in a corridor, or when going back through a room
you have already explored (assuming you didn't tiptoe around any mean
monsters there the first time).  Taking the ring off at every
opportunity gets tedious, but you can get much of the effect if you
keep the ring on when you are going forward and exploring, and taking
it off when you need to backtrack.  Remember to put it on again before
you go down the stairway!


Identifying Things

You find lots of unknown magic in the dungeon, as well as weapons and
armor that may be cursed.  You never have enough identify scrolls to
identify everything.  For the most part, you have to find out about
things by trying them out.  This means that you rarely get much
benefit from the first scroll or potion of a type that you find.  The
good news is that the longer you survive, the more likely you are to
find second copies of things you then know how to use.

When you try out a ring or armor and find it is cursed, you are stuck with
it until you find the appropriate scroll(s), which may be a long time.  The
same goes for weapons you wield; however, the only weapon I ever wield
instead of my mace is a two-handed sword, and even when it is cursed it is
likely to be better than my mace.

a.  Potions

There is still considerable judgment involved in when you try things out.
As mentioned above under Managing Strength, I like to save my potions until
I am done with level 12, when ants disappear.  This is convenient because
trolls increase the danger of the game considerably at level 13.  I will
also sometimes wait until I have just attained a new experience level, so I
can get the most benefit out of a potion of raise level.

The bad potions are poison, confusion, paralysis, and blindness, and since
you are stuck quaffing beverages at random, you have to be prepared to deal
with them.  Blindness can be a real nuisance, but you can usually survive
it, especially if encountered before level 13.  You simply walk over every
square of every room, and test every square of the sides to see if you can
find a passageway.  It may be slow, but you can explore a level while
waiting to regain your vision.  You can't search for secret passages,
however.  When you meet monsters, you (amazingly) are still as good at
fighting them as ever.  When one attacks you in a room, you aren't always
clear where it is.  My solution is to back away a few squares until I am
sure where the monster is, and then fight.  (This same strategy also
applies when fighting invisible stalkers when your sight is intact.)
Potions of healing, extra healing, or see invisible cure blindness.

b.  Scrolls

When I can, I save my scrolls until I am done with level 7, sometimes
longer.  The increase in danger from the centaurs of level 8 is the reason
for picking 7.  Waiting gives me longer to perhaps find better armor (for
the enchant armor scroll), a two-handed sword (for the enchant weapon
scroll), or a ring or staff I really want to identify (for an identify
scroll).  If, as often happens, I have promising armor I haven't tried on
yet and six or more unknown scrolls, I will try on the armor (or armors).
If one is cursed, I have a very good chance of finding either enchant armor
or remove curse among the untried scrolls.

Until I have found the aggravate monsters scroll, I tend not to read
new scrolls until I am done with a level; it can be hard to survive
the sudden onslaught of monsters without healing time between them.

c.  Scare Monster

If you read this scroll, you hear maniacal laughter.  This scroll works
wonders when you drop it.  Once you pick it up again, it turns to dust.
But you can sometimes identify it before you pick it up.  Simply arrange
for a monster's normal path to lead it over the scroll; if it is scare
monster, the monster will step around the scroll; the scroll has its effect
before you drop it.  For instance, if the monster is chasing you from the
east, be east of the scroll, then step northwest, then southwest.  For a
scare scroll the monster will move to your northeast; otherwise it will
stand on the scroll to your east.  I used to get carried away leaving
scrolls untouched in a room and going to other rooms in search of monsters
to lead back over the scrolls, but this has problems: you can fall through
a trap door, you can meet a monster coming the other way on your way back
to the room, and you can use up a lot of food.  However, I still do this
when I see a monster and a scroll in the same room.  I will even take two
hits from a manageable monster as I step around it to lead it over the
scroll.

Ordinarily you can't lead monsters over scrolls in a corner, but you can
still diagnose the scroll if your pack is full.  With a full pack, you
stand on the scroll without picking it up, search a turn, and see if the
monster hits you.  You can step off it and back on repeatedly; you can lead
tough monsters back to it and dispatch them with impunity.  This is a good
reason to keep a full pack when possible.

The same reasoning works (and applies more often) after you drop a scare
scroll.  If you had a full pack and there is some other item nearby that
you can pick up to replace the scare scroll, you will again have a full
pack and can re-use your scare scroll on that level.  When you can do this
on a level with purple worms and dragons, you can achieve fabulous
experience levels (I think I've gone as high as 16, maybe 17).  The dragons
can still hit you with bolts of fire, however.

d.  Staves (aka staffs)

You can try out a staff on a monster and usually know right away what kind
of staff it is.  (If it says "you hit the monster", then it is a staff of
striking, or else the useless magic missile staff, which self-identifies in
this situation.)  But if it is a serious monster and you "haste" it (so it
moves twice for every move you make), you may not survive.  Similarly, if
you polymorph your friendly jackal into a dragon on level 5, you are
unlikely to survive.  So my general rule is to wait until I have 40 or 50
hit points before trying out staves, and only to try them out when I am
done exploring a level and am standing on the stairway.  I sometimes have
to wait around or go back to some adjoining rooms to find a monster for a
guinea pig.  That way you can make a quick escape, even from violet fungi
who hold you or umber hulks who confuse you.


e.  Identify scrolls

The top priority use of an identify scroll is to find the number of
charges on a staff of teleport away.  This is because of its immediacy;
you want to be able to use it with 1 hit point left, which is likely to
be fatal if the last charge is gone.  The number of charges on other
good staves, such as polymorph or slow monster, is also important,
but since you use them with a reserve of hit points, you usually can
use some other immediate magic to survive when your last charge runs
out.

Rings are another priority item to identify.  But note that if you
have a known scroll of remove curse, you should first try on your
unknown ring (ideally two of them, plus some unknown armor) to see
if it is cursed.  You don't care what a cursed ring is.  (I have
tried using a de-cursed ring of teleportation as a means of defense
while running away, but the results in practice aren't very good.)
If the ring is not cursed, you can often find out what it is without
identifying it.  Add strength rings cause a visible change in your
current strength on the status line.  Regeneration gives you back
one hit point each turn.  Searching helps you find doorways, which
you can test by moving back and forth where there is known to be
a secret door.  Sustain strength and maintain armor can be tested
by seeking combat with ants and rust monsters, respectively, but
this is often not practical because of the damage they do in the
usual case where you don't have that ring.  Slow digestion can be
determined by putting it on when you first get hungry and noting
how long it takes to get weak, but I've rarely done this.

Armor is the next priority item for identify scrolls.  I rarely identify
leather armor, studdied leather armor or ring mail, because they aren't
worth much anyway except in the rare case where they happen to be enchanted
to start with.

I probably use 50% of my identify scrolls on rings, 40% on armor,
and 10% on staves.  Don't be afraid to hang onto identify scrolls
for use later; you're likely to find something worthwhile.

When I am in dangerous territory (say level 22) and I find a new staff, I'm
likely to identify it immediately, since I don't have time to try it out
carefully.  The same may go for scrolls, if many have already been
identified but a few very good ones are still unknown (scare monster, hold
monster, teleportation).


The Best Magic:  Goodness vs Immediacy

One handy rule is to stop and think a while when you first run into a
difficult monster.  There is no time pressure in this game.  I've lost many
games saying "surely I'll get him this time" after a streak of bad luck
with the sword.  If after sober reflection you doubt you are going to win,
do you want to use some magic now while you have hit points, rather than
using more potent magic later?  This section gives some hints about what
magic to use when.

"Goodness" and "immediacy" are two different dimensions of magic.  For
instance, slow monster staff is very good, but to use it you need to take
one more hit.  "Teleport away" may be less good because the monster chases
you again and you have to deal with it later, but it is great that it is
immediate: it works with 1 hit point left.  Magic that stops a monster
permanently (such as hold monster) has an advantage over magic that limits
it for a while (such as the confuse monster scroll).

Here is a list of the best magic and what it can do for you:

Magic With Immediate Effect:

  Very good:

Teleport away staff: one of the best there is, because you can wait to use
it to see if you can beat the monster through conventional means, and then
it removes the monster (though it starts running toward you at once).  It
is a very good thing to identify because you want to know when that last
charge is used up.  Limits: if you are in a room, the monster can get
teleported to another square adjacent to you.  This has happened to me, but
it is infrequent enough that I just take my chances.

Scroll of hold monster: This holds every monster within two squares of you,
permanently.  It has virtually no limitations and will get you out of just
about any pickle.  Of course if another monster comes along from more than
two square awayk, you have to fight it.  But be aware of where the
monster(s) are when you use it.  If you hold the monster in the middle of a
room, it will then constitute a circle that you can run around in escaping
from another monster.  But if you hold the monster in a corridor or
blocking a door which you need to use, remember you'll have to fight that
monster again after you heal, which may often require more magic.

Scroll of scare monster: This was discussed earlier.  This is terrific
because it protects you permanently, until you step off of it.  Two
limitations: you can't use it when you're standing on something: weapon,
magic, etc., or most importantly, a doorway.  Second, dragons will still
shoot bolts of fire at you.  If your pack is full when you drop the scare
monster and you can find something else to refill your pack nearby, you can
step back onto the scare scroll and re-use it several times on that level.
This is a good reason for keeping a full pack, even if some of it is cursed
or junk.  (Another reason if that if a nymph gets you, there is less chance
she'll take what you really value.)

Potion of extra healing:  This is usually good enough that you gain ground
on even the worst monsters while taking a hit from them.  But you have to
go on fighting, so it's not the first weapon of choice if you don't think
you're about to polish the monster off.

  Good:

Potion of healing: This is better to use in the upper levels, while facing
things like centaurs, than in the depths, because you usually can't gain
ground with it against trolls, xorns, umber hulks, purple worms, or
dragons.  Sometimes it's useful as a hedge against a new potion turning out
to be blindness, because it cures blindness (as does extra healing and
see invisible).

Staff of fire, cold, lightning: As far as I can tell, all three of these
work the same.  If you hit the monster, it's usually pretty effective, but
if you miss, the bolt can bounce and hit you.  (I've known a dragon's bolt
of fire to miss me and kill the umber hulk I was fighting...)  So if you
are in desparate straits, it can have immediate effect; but if you are
trying to play it safe, you either avoid it or use it when you can take a
hit from both the monster and the bolt and still have some option left.
It's better against monsters like centaurs and trolls than xorns or purple
worms.  Purple worms often catch the bolt without being hit, somehow.

Staff of drain life: Takes half your remaining hit points away, and that
many from a nearby monster (divided among them if there is more than one).
You have to use it early in combat, while you still have hit points.
This is good against umber hulks who have confused you, if you have lots of
hit points.  And it has an advantage against monsters with good armor,
because you circumvent the armor (e.g. xorns and dragons).

  So-so:

Staff of cancellation: These can actually be great if used against rust
monsters to protect good armor.  But other uses aren't worth much.  The
staff will stop an ant from stinging, a leprechaun or nymph from stealing
(though they still carry their gold/magic), vampires from taking your hit
points permanently, wraiths from grabbing experience levels, violet fungi
from holding you, umber hulks from confusing you, and dragons from shooting
fire -- though I haven't verified all of these.  The umber hulk use sounds
promising, but the problem is that usually by the time you know there's an
umber hulk there, you're already confused.

Striking: The nice thing is that you always hit, so they can be good
against heavily armored monsters like xorns and dragons that you are on the
verge of polishing off.  But often you do less damage than you would with
your own weapon, if you are strong enough to have survived into the depths.
Also note that each time you use it, it uses TWO charges (in case you have
identified the staff and know how many charge are left.)


Magic With One Turn Delay:

  Very good:

Slow monster staff:  You take one hit, then the monster is slowed
permanently.  As long as you have space to back up (and just about any room
three squares high has enough space to maneuver around the corner and end
up going back the other way) you can kill anything by backing up when the
monster is active and hitting when the monster is inactive.  There is a
limitation against dragons:  if you are backing up and the dragon has a
direct line of sight on you (which includes in straight corridors), he can
still blast you with fire.  But if you have space in a room to back up
diagonally (so that your new position and his old position aren't on a
straight line), you avoid this problem.  This can also be effective against
a bunch of monsters, giving you time to gain ground on them, especially in
corridors.  But be aware that when they reach a room, the ones behind will
go around the slow one.

  Good:

Staff of polymorph: This can be a wonderful piece of magic, because it
permanently changes a monster to something else, which you immediately take
one hit from.  Because it just randomly selects another monster, though,
you're much better off using this in the depths than higher up.  Use it on
a dragon or purple worm, and your chances are pretty good of getting a
softer monster.  Use it on a centaur, and you may well end up with
something worse.  And remember that the new monster might be an ant,
floating eye, or rust monster, that you were counting on not seeing
any more -- but that is usually an acceptable risk.

Potion of haste self: This is limited because you take a hit immediately,
and it wears off pretty quickly.  But it can function like a slow monster
charge if you can polish off the monster in four or five swings of your
weapon.  (A combination of slow monster and haste self can be very nice,
especially if you are in a confined space and can't run away; you land 4
blows to every 1 from the monster.)  If you quaff another potion of haste
self while you are already hastened, you faint from exhaustion.


Magic With More Than One Turn Delay:

  Good:

Scroll of monster confusion:  Here you first have to take a hit while you
read the scroll, and then you get no benefit until you actually hit the
monster.  Once you do, the monster is confused, sort of like a bat, but it
wears off -- sometimes after two or three turns.  The fact that you need a
hit makes it better to use against less-well-armored monsters.

Scroll of magic mapping:  This can also be used when not in combat, but in
a combat situation it can often show you how to run all the way to the
stairway so you can drop through (monsters never follow you down the
stairs).  I have often used it with success against Xs and Ps.  Of course
you have to hope you don't meet any other monsters along the way.  Best if
used early on a level where you have choices about where to go.


Interesting Monsters:

Ants are hard to hit and steal your strength points sometimes.  I
often spend arrows on them, especially if my strength is at its peak
value, or is down around 7 or 8.

Floating eyes are best left alone, once you are committed to your
game, for they can transfix you permanently until you die of starvation,
if nothing else.  But on the first few levels, when you are taking
risks, they are often an easy way to get experience points.

When violet fungi first score a hit, they hold you.  From then on, they
take one more hit point each turn, whether they hit you or not (e.g. 1, 2,
3, 4, ... on succeeding turns).  You can't fight any other monster while
you are being held.  But you can beat violet fungi one on one if you've
survived that far in the dungeon.

Invisible stalkers are usually not that serious a problem (so the potion
and ring of see invisible are not worth much).  Because they are slightly
confused, you can often run away.  One good place to run is down a straight
corridor and shower them with arrows until they catch up to you.  And in a
corridor, you either hit them or chase them.

Leprechauns always carry gold, but if they hit you, they steal your gold
and disappear.  If you're trying to win rather than accumulate a high
score, all they are worth is their experience points (and they might be
standing on some piece of magic or the stairway).  If you do fight them,
bow and arrow is a good idea.

Mimics pose as other objects or the stairway.  They are not usually a
problem if you keep in mind that any object you see at level 19 and beyond
might be a mimic (don't pick up that scroll with 2 hit points left).  It
is frustrating when one poses as the Amulet on level 26.

Nymphs are to stuff as leprechauns are to gold.  But they are definitely
worth dispatching for what they carry.  Bow and arrow from a distance away
is ideal.  When I confront one in a small room, one strategy is to move
down a corridor a ways and drop all your best magic (not scare scrolls!),
then attack the nymph.  Then if she steals you haven't lost much.  I
believe she will never steal the weapon you wield or the armor you are
wearing.

Vampires sometimes take away from your maximum hit points as well as
your current hit points.  They're not exactly welcome, but compared
to everything else at level 20, they (and mimics) are a comparative
pleasure to meet.

Wraiths sometimes cause you to lose an experience level.  The good news is
that if they do so and you can kill them, you get the level back.  (If they
take two from you, you still get only one back.)  What you always lose is
whatever experience points you were accumulating toward the next level.
It's interesting to watch what happens to your maximum hit points.  In
the typical case where you get back the experience level, your hit
points first go down by a random number from 1 to 10, then back up by
a different random number.  Sometimes this is bad, but sometimes I have
gone from 55 to 54 and back to 64, in which case I thank the departed
wraith for his intervention.


The Worst Monsters:

The hobgoblin is the worst monster you have in the game initially.
The centaur (level 8) is the next substantial increment in pure
fighting ability, followed by the troll (level 13).  But there
isn't much special to say about these monsters.  The ones that
follow are generally too tough to be called "interesting".

Xorn: These are the best armored monsters in the game, and they have a big
bite (like trolls, umber hulks and purple worms).  Slow monster is good
(the armor doesn't help them against the staff).  Monster confusion is
often frustrating because it can be a long time before you score your first
hit and actually confuse the monster.

Umber hulk: The worst monsters of all.  They sometimes (50% of the time?)
confuse you the instant you see them, then they take big bites.  Umber
hulks are always what I eliminate if I get a genocide scroll.  But note
that if they don't confuse you the first time you see them, they never will
(exception: if you move next to one and it doesn't "wake up", it can
confuse you if it later wakes up.)  In particular, if you teleport away
from them somehow and then you encounter them later, they won't confuse you
a second time.  If you're not confused, they fight like xorns with less
good armor.  But if you are confused, here are your options.  First, if
you're in a hallway, you can just swing away, because the game is gracious
(unrealistic?) enough to figure that if you hit the wall, you didn't mean
to, so when something actually happens, you either back up or hit the umber
hulk.  If you're not in a doorway but close to one, you can sometimes get
there in time.  I think I have observed that arrows (thrown weapons
generally) have a better chance of reaching the umber hulk than blows with
a weapon, and that staff charges have an even better chance.  But even they
can miss.  This is a good use for a staff of striking (though maybe not
your best option for escaping).  Similarly bolts of fire, cold, and
lightning are worth trying when you start out with lots of hit points.  The
drain life staff is often very good -- provided you have a lot of hit
points, and it helps to have good armor; I've often found that two drain
life charges will do the trick, especially if the umber hulk misses me
after the first one.  Healing or extra healing potions are rarely good
enough by themselves.  Slow monster is also rarely good enough by itself,
since you can't control your movements to hit with impunity.  But slow
monster can be a good choice if you have other "lesser magic" to team it up
with.  Teleport away and teleportation are good choices, but even they will
often not separate you from the umber hulk by enough so you are unconfused
(25-30 turns) before your friend reappears.  Polymorph is a very good
choice, because you will quite often get a manageable monster from whom you
can take many turns worth of hits until you land a lucky blow to dispatch
it.  But use the polymorph early, to allow enough hit points for a "bad
polymorph" (care for a dragon?  how about a xorn?) plus what you need to
fight a centaur or yeti.  Finally, hold monster or scare monster will
usually save you from this encounter, and it's often better to use them
right away than use up lesser magic and then discover you need them anyway.
With scare monster, remember to mark time by searching until you are
unconfused or you'll step right off the scroll!

Purple worm:  These are poorly armored, but with 50% more hit points than
anyone else (dragons are next).  They also hardly ever miss, so don't count
on your fine armor to save you.  The classic solution is the slow monster
staff.  Bolts of fire, cold, and lightning rarely work; the purple worm
seems to catch the bolt most of the time.  Monster confusion can help too.
What you need to beat them in straight combat is great damage potential and
a lot of hit points.  I have rarely had that capability, but have often
been able to handle them routinely if I have 20 or 30 squares to retreat
over while healing.  They give loads of experience points.

Dragon: With bolts of fire as an option along with the biggest bites of any
monster (up to 46 hp), dragons are deadly.  And they are well-armored.
Slow monster is great if you are in a room and can back up diagonally in a
zigzag pattern.  Running away from them rarely works, though it can if you
have enough twists and turns and a few healing potions.  And they can
shoot fire at you even when you are standing on a scare monster scroll (but
do so with the same frequency they would otherwise -- they don't send a
bolt every time).  Monster confusion is often a good bet if you use it
right away.  Polymorph is an excellent choice.  Otherwise the teleports are
OK, once you have landed some blows; you can heal before you meet the
dragon again.  Hold monster is the only thing that always works.  It's
often worth considering using magic to kill a dragon instead of polymorphing
or escaping since they are worth so many experience points.

Gang of monsters: What do you do when you find a treasure room deep in the
dungeon, or worse yet, drop into the middle of one when you go down a
staircase?  To a lesser degree, these suggestions apply to two or three
monsters that find you in a room.  If you are standing on the doorway, I
wouldn't go in; you'd rather fight them one at a time.  Scare monster is
the best choice (beware of dragons, as usual), but if you are standing in a
doorway and fighting it out, holding the scare scroll in reserve to use if
things get bad, it's often best to back up one square into the corridor
immediately, in case a monster coming down the corridor sandwiches you
where you can't drop your scroll (that is very frustrating).  Teleportation
is good (and in this case, is better than teleport away).  Hold monster is
good though if you use it in this case, it's often better to wait for the
monsters to form a seamless ring around you (if you can wait); otherwise
some monsters from more than two squares away will flow through the cracks
and attack you.  Haste self can be good if you can use it to get to a
doorway, and is in this case better than slow monster.


The Big Picture Again

Though it takes experience, one thing you want to keep track of is how
far above or below average you are at any given time.  If things are
going badly, why not try on those rings or that armor, and if they
are cursed, give up.  If they are going well, you both want to take
fewer risks and attend more closely to your game.  Occasionally you
are in such a good position that you should use magic instead of
fighting a monster that you could almost certainly beat.  Here are
the main factors I take into account in judging my situation:

How is your basic fighting capability?  A two-handed sword is a major good
thing.  Strength at 18 or above is quite good.  A good set of armor (class
4) is worth something, and armor of class 1 is worth a lot.  Having a mace
that has been enchanted three or four times is almost as good as a plain
two-handed sword.  Also, how are your maximum hit points coming?  This you
can compute.  You started with 12 at experience level 1, so if you subtract
12 from your current total and 1 from your experience level, and divide,
you get the average number of extra hit points you have got per level.  So
if I have 54 hit points at level 7, I have an average of (54-12)/(7-1) or
7.  The "average average" is 5.5.  7 is pretty good, 4 is pretty bad.

How much immediately-effective magic do you have?  Teleport away staffs,
scrolls of teleportation, scare monster scrolls, hold monster scrolls,
drain life staves, and potions of extra healing come to mind.

How much magic with latency do you have?  Polymorph staves, slow
monster staves, confuse monster potions come to mind.

And how much other magic do you have (genocide on umber hulks and
ring of stealth the first ones to consider).

It's hard to win without both a pretty good fighting character and at least
some immediately-effective magic.  Sometimes you cannot defeat a monster
without magic when they first appear, but with the gain of an experience
level or two you find you can.


PC vs Unix 5.2 Rogue


I have a little recent experience on the net-advertised PC port
of rogue.  These are some of the differences I've noticed:

Some of the monsters have different names.

PC			Unix 5.2

aquator			rust monster
emu			jackal
venus flytrap		violet fungi
griffin			purple worm (?)
ice monster		eye
jabberwock		(no equivalent?; gnome is quite different)
kestral			kobold
medusa			umber hulk
phantom			invisible stalker
quagga			quasit
rattlesnake		ant
ur-vile			xorn
xeroc			mimic

Better armor has a higher number, not a lower.  I believe you can
subtract the Unix number from 10 to get the equivalent PC number.

You can throw a potion of confusion at a monster and if you hit
it the monster is confused (I could never do this in Unix 5.2).

If you are confused and fighting in a hallway, your confused bumps
into the wall are counted as real turns, where they weren't in
5.2.  This is a big difference.

The Amulet of Yendor does not seem to decrease food consumption
significantly; you need food for the trip up.

There are sometimes mazes of hallways in place of rooms, which
can contain magic, monsters, or the staircase.  Monsters seem to
have a hard time keeping up with you there, which sounds like a
bug but can be a big advantage for you.

Ice monsters don't hold you permanently the way floating eyes do.

I think "haste self" lasts longer on the PC than in Unix 5.2.

A trip through a teleport trap leaves you confused briefly, and
a fall through a trap door injures you somewhat.

The monsters have different levels where they occur.  In general,
from centaurs through trolls at least, the monster appears one
level earlier.

There is no genocide scroll.

The magic detection potion not only detects magic, but tells you
whether it is good ($ sign) or bad (+ sign).

--------

Thanks to Torsten Nielsen for helpful comments on an earlier draft.

-Bart Wright
bart@harlequin.com
work: 617-374-2597