I'm going to see if I can 15-rune it, then do a firestorm/lichform caster of Veh, and then go play Tome 4 because I'm somewhat sick of Crawl.
(Somewhat off-topic, but we don't have a 'General Roguelike Thread' and we obviously all share them as an interest).
I'm at a bit of a loose end now in terms of what to play, now that the tournament's over. ToME was something I considered. But I keep trying to go back to it, because there's a lot about it that's engaging and unique (plus it's been way too long since I've heard the Elven Ruins music), but there's also so much that pisses me off about it every time I try to start playing.
The difficulty levels aren't well-balanced (videogame difficulty levels are rarely well-balanced in general; developers often attempt to balance Normal or Easy, then just quickly double a bunch of numbers for the hard mode). The early-game is extremely slow and repetitive. The campaign is far too long, and the damage levels are so high that a single inattentive keypress can kill you at late stages of the game, so it adds up to becoming a fatiguing experience.
So yeah, I used to like ToME a great deal, but every time I get tempted to go back (normally trying to get my first win on Insane/Roguelike) I quickly get tired.
Meh, I spent most of this afternoon playing Tome 4 to relieve frustration from losing so many promising characters. I won't comment on the harder difficulty levels, but for me, Tome is about building a character and wrecking things. Same with Crawl, really. The most fun I've had with Crawl, for example, was tearing through Ziggarat Sprint with a HOFI of Qazlal spamming Disaster Area. Its fun to press a button and watch everybody die or pile on so many buffs that you're moving faster then an ADHD cheetah and tankier then a small mountain, especially when you were once much much weaker. I guess that harder difficulty levels might make finally winning through feel more satisfying, but I see no need to move off of Normal/Adventure, except maybe to Normal/Roguelike. I've beaten the game without dying on Adventure several times, but sometimes its nice to have a safety net for absurdly stupid things like dying to a skeleton warrior because you kept trying to move through it.
I got fed up with crawl after a while and wish I could have contributed more but congrats guys, we did it!
Same, mostly, although I think I burned out later when my really good HEFE died a bullshit death.
In any case, the tournament was fun. I've gotten a LOT better at this game and I achieved one of my long-term goals for the game: Get the Necronomicon spells castable and use them to win. Now I just need to win with a Naga Transmuter of Chei...