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[Burnzy503]

I read all of these stories of a bunch of you guys having really crazy fun adventures and killing all sorts of crazy monsters! I've been trying and trying to read up on other players questions and finding guides to make a hero that can at least hold his own...nothing has been working. If I get a quest and a few companions odds are I'm killed by the bandits, or before I even get there I'm ambushed and slaughtered in mere seconds. I tried to even wrestle a ram and it killed me with only a few hits. Am I doing something wrong here? If anyone has a decent strategy to start off and keep alive for at least a little while (losing is fun!) I'd really really appreciate it!!!

[Sappho]

I had the same problem until very recently when I learned that (unfortunately) armor and grinding, together, are the only way to become strong enough to survive in this game. You can find armor in keeps or dungeons or, if you're lucky, steal it off of bandits. Once you have it, you have to train armor using skill by finding a small animal somewhere, grabbing it using wrestling so it can't get away, and then lying on the ground and hitting . all day until the sun sets, so your dodging and armor/shield skills get up high (hopefully legendary). Then you have to pick up a thousand rocks and knap them into sharp rocks, then throw them on the ground to train your throwing skill. By the time you've done all this, your stats should be superhuman in several areas and even if you get in a fight with someone talented, you can either dodge it or block their hits with your armor.

And even with all this, it's still best to always be sneaking, never be visible, and take out most enemies with thrown sharpened rocks or bolts or arrows or sand or whatever is available before they even know you're there.

I've heard tell that others can survive without resorting to this, but I've never succeeded without this method. On the other hand, once you've got high stats and legendary skills, you can try attacking things (except for ranged fighters) directly and with interesting results without dying immediately, most of the time.

[Burnzy503]

Yeah that's what I've been reading, that if you wrestle a bunny for a day you'll get good stats. The weakest animal I've ever come across was the ram that decimated me with only a few hits! As for armor I've never been lucky enough to stumble on some in the fortresses I've explored. the one issue I had with animals too was I wrestled a cat and about 8 more of them attacked me and after I finally defeated them all I went to town and I was slaughtered by all of the villagers. I just have almost no luck with this game

[Sappho]

Never attack any animal that has "tame" in it's name. It's a member of the civilization and if you attack it, the civilization's hive-mind will immediately label you an enemy and destroy you.

Wrestling animals doesn't work very well unless you have armor to block their hits. Armor is (perhaps too) important for defense. Especially avoid hoofed animals - they seem to be incredibly powerful and will destroy you quickly, as a general rule. So a ram is probably not a good starting foe. If you're having trouble in your current world, just try genning a new one and give it another shot. Maybe give it a longer history so the ruler has more time to stash useful armor in the local keep. Or in your current world, just try starting in a different civilization than the one you're in. There will be different animals around and hopefully better loot in the local keeps. Or just sneak around until you find different animals - traveling to a different biome will do this.

Another option is to start a dwarf fortress, trade with humans, and get some of that large armor from them. (This worked in previous versions, but I'm not 100% certain that they still offer large armor for trade - can anyone confirm?) When you have what you want, you can abandon, then travel to the fortress as an adventurer and pick up the armor. Dwarven-made armor is too small for human adventurers, but if you use a dwarven adventurer, you can use whatever equipment your fortresses produce, as it is the proper size already.

[coldmonkey]

I think that most crazy adventure stories are actually about BEING killed by crazy monsters, as opposed to killing them. And if you'd measure the number of dead adventurers who never got to the crazy monster stuff with the number of dead or living adventurers who's got any real stories to tell, you'd find that the ration is something like a dozen to one. Honestly, those numbers were taken straight out of the air with absolutely nothing to back them up, but the point is that there's a lot of unsuccessful adventurers for every successful one. Even if successful means being killed in funny ways.

[DisgruntledPeasant]

I've had a bit of luck without grinding, you just have to be extremely careful and where possible- pick your fights.

Sneak EVERYWHERE, have as high agility as you can and always bring a bunch of companions. if you get in a little too deep then you can run away and hide (you only need to be out of an enemies line of sight to start sneaking as far as i can tell, so jump in a ditch or behind a few trees) then relocate, pick off enemies one-by-one, wound them by throwing shit at them with hit-and-run tactics if you have to.

Only engage in melee combat if you know you will win, avoid ranged enemies like the plague (if you HAVE to fight a group with an archer, take him out first), guerrilla tactics are key and get good at throwing,  even if you only use it as an auxiliary skill, its very useful to be able to wound an enemy before the fight starts by chucking your dagger at them.

as far as equipment goes,  you can often steal decent gear from forts and always be sure to bring a stack of something worth throwing such as bolts or coins.  (if you are a dedecate thrower, then spears or daggers are ace)

EDIT:  also, dont forget you can retire adventurers before they die! you can recruit them with your next adventurer.

[Burnzy503]

I think that most crazy adventure stories are actually about BEING killed by crazy monsters, as opposed to killing them. And if you'd measure the number of dead adventurers who never got to the crazy monster stuff with the number of dead or living adventurers who's got any real stories to tell, you'd find that the ration is something like a dozen to one. Honestly, those numbers were taken straight out of the air with absolutely nothing to back them up, but the point is that there's a lot of unsuccessful adventurers for every successful one. Even if successful means being killed in funny ways.

You have a very very good point coldmonkey! It does seem that most people die pretty quick in adventurer, and I know what the rest of you mean it's a lot more about sneaking and pelting people with rocks and such. I guess maybe I shouldn't rush into a fight as quickly, usually I was a swordsman so I figured all I should do is go in and stab someone but usually I took a crossbow bolt to the face or whoever I was fighting against tore me to pieces. I'll have to try wrestling with very small animals, checking out fortresses, and throwing rocks at people more. I'll also try to do what you said Sappho and generate a new world to mess around in! I'm sure you guys didn't just go off and become great heroes I'm sure there were many points you were killed quickly, I just need a tad more patience with this game

[ExRedux]

Or... you could skip all the mindless grinding and use Cheat Engine at the character creation screen and start with legendary stats... Its barely cheating if all it does is take mindless grinding out of a game so you can get to the !!FUN!! part.

Personally, I think the game is more fun not grinding any skills at all and trying to survive with low stats. Starting out as a peasent outsider ftw.

[Alestom]

Get used to dying, its dwarf fortress son.

You can have a bunch of weapon masters who are jacked and run faster than a cheetah, but only about 1 of my 40 or so get anything of note done.

[Burnzy503]

You're right I should get used to it the only real fun was watching zombie emus tear my fortress down

I'm also too scared to try peasant outsider but I bet if you can get going it's an acomplishment!

[Nightcaper]

You can find armor in keeps

I haven't found a keep at all so far. Frankly, I don't even know what a keep looks like on the travel map (using Ironhand's). Could use some help on that one myself.


As for surviving, it's a challenge, I agree. Although on my world gen, I've been having trouble encountering anything to fight on the travel map. I've worked on my character too hard to do a re-gen (assuming genning other worlds makes your character unusable on those other worlds). As Sappho said, Dodging and Armor Use grinding is probably smart. If you can't find any creatures to do it on, if you've got good wrestling, you COULD try to... actually, no, nevermind, my idea is horrible and got me in a big mess. Best I don't advise you on that. 


Hide behind your companions for most fights. Sometimes, I go in while they are engaged to disarm the enemy's weapons, but try not to take too many risks. Death is just one seemingly harmless choice away, as I've found many times now.

[Graknorke]

The mistake is expecting to win, and thinking that success is fun.
The success isn't really too great, because you can probably beat most things pretty easily once you're there. It's the losing that's fun. Especially when you get something brilliant, like carrying the loot from a sewer entrance only to be pushed down by a falling companion and having your head cracked against the bottom.

Stuff like that is what makes the game worthwhile, when you can only really lean back and laugh out a "what.".

[Person]

I don't know if it's been said yet, but the longer worldgen goes on, the more skill bandits and such get, to the point where they can overpower trained demigods. Try making your worlds shorter. This also has the added bonus of giving you more beasts to hunt.

[Nightcaper]

I don't know if it's been said yet, but the longer worldgen goes on, the more skill bandits and such get, to the point where they can overpower trained demigods. Try making your worlds shorter. This also has the added bonus of giving you more beasts to hunt.

That's a handy tidbit I didn't know, I think I'll use that to my advantage...