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Yup.

65 (12.2%)

Not even close.

391 (73.4%)

Almost . . . but didn't

26 (4.9%)

Maybe managed halfway

51 (9.6%)

Total Members Voted: 530

[RoguelikeRazuka]

And now?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[JoshuaFH]

Yeah that works.

Sokoban has a lot of weird properties to stop you from breaking the levels, though I'm pretty sure you can break the boulders, it just gives you a luck penalty IIRC. Also remember that you can aim it DOWN (I believe the < key) to point it at the ground and just get straight out. However, If your wand of digging doesn't work...

Worse comes to worse, you can chill out in Sokoban for a while and farm randomly generated enemies. Nymphs and other creatures can't teleport while in there, so you don't have to fear them as much. You can use your wand of fire to engrave a permanent Elbereth to stand on while you wait for creatures to spawn, which will protect you from 95% of everything. Just keep on doin that until you come across another wand of digging or a pickaxe to break the boulders apart. I'm actually pulling from my memories of the game that are 7+ years old now, so I apologize if I can't draw out a perfect answer here.

One of the great things about Nethack is that unwinnable games are extremely rare. Enough effort and enough cleverness can almost always win you the game.

[Neonivek]

Not that "rare", you need to know a few metagame tricks to avoid some of the more aggravating deaths.

A big one for me is "Secret doored to death" where my character fails the perception check over and over again to see secret doors and starves. Which has happened to me multiple times (50% of the runs I did in Nethack)

[RoguelikeRazuka]

lol I tried to dig under myself by pressing '.'. Maybe I'm not hopeless and it will work out now. But which floor tile should I make a hole in? Does the choice depend on what type was the previous level of? I believe it was 3b. And are you sure the right key is the '<' one, not '>'? Or maybe you meant ',' (it's what you type if you want to eat a corpse occupying the tile where you are on)?

By the way, I had got a wand of enlightenment with myself and it revealed to me that a) I am unlucky and b) I can't pray safely (I'm also poison and fire resistant and have spell reflection, cool). What does the later mean? I remember not having invoked for a period of more than 1k turns. 

[quinnr]

However, If your wand of digging doesn't work...

Every wand has at least one charge left in it. It may take 200 or so zaps (1/121 chance each try), but if you have the wand you can always wrestle one last charge out before it crumbles into dust.

lol I tried to dig under myself by pressing '.'. Maybe I'm not hopeless and it will work out now. But which floor tile should I make a hole in? Does the choice depend on what type was the previous level of? I believe it was 3b. And are you sure the right key is the '<' one, not '>'? Or maybe you meant ',' (it's what you type if you want to eat a corpse occupying on the tile where you are on)?

By the way, I've got a wand of enlightenment with myself and it revealed to me that a) I am unlucky and b) I can't pray safely (I'm also poison and fire resistant and have spell reflection, cool). What does the later mean? I remember not having invoked for a period of more than 1k turns. 

It's '>' for down.

And you may have angered your god to the point where you can't pray. You can solve that by standing on an altar and sacrificing corpses until your god doesn't hate you any more (no "you feel inadequate" when sacrificing should mean you are fine now.)

[RoguelikeRazuka]

Just a minor issue, do I put the corpse on the altar if I want to make a sacrifice?

[quinnr]

Just a minor issue, do I put the corpse on an altar if I want to make a sacrifice?

Yup. Put corpse on altar, #offer. It just can't be too old.

[RoguelikeRazuka]

Aaah! A vault's guard harasses me! Is he tough? What am I supposed to do after having stolen money from a vault?

[quinnr]

Aaah! A vault's guard harasses me! Is he tough? What am I supposed to do after having stolen money from a vault?

I wouldn't try to fight him. If you do as he asks, he'll lead you out of the vault and leave you be. If you drop your gold you can leave. If you lie to him and say your name is "Croesus", he will disappear (but won't lead you out of the vault, so you need to find a way out yourself.)

[RoguelikeRazuka]

Aaah! A vault's guard harasses me! Is he tough? What am I supposed to do after having stolen money from a vault?

I wouldn't try to fight him. If you do as he asks, he'll lead you out of the vault and leave you be. If you drop your gold you can leave. If you lie to him and say your name is "Croesus", he will disappear (but won't lead you out of the vault, so you need to find a way out yourself.)

Uhm he really proved tough to survive two fire bolts in a row, though quite beatable. I simply could not afford to leave all my gold there for just because. But could I grab the money and escape before he entered?

I'm also kind of surprised that my large cat and dog seem not to do bickering as much as it apparently should be.

[0x517A5D]

Aaah! A vault's guard harasses me! Is he tough? What am I supposed to do after having stolen money from a vault?

I wouldn't try to fight him. If you do as he asks, he'll lead you out of the vault and leave you be. If you drop your gold you can leave. If you lie to him and say your name is "Croesus", he will disappear (but won't lead you out of the vault, so you need to find a way out yourself.)

Uhm he really proved tough to survive after getting shot by two fire bolts in a row, though beatable. I simply could not afford to leave all my gold there for just because. But could I grab the money and escape before he entered?

I'm also kind of surprised that my large cat and dog seem not to do bickering as much as it apparently should be.

Yes, if you escape before he arrives.  Or just drop your gold, let him lead you out, and come back for the gold later.  Or even abandon it.  Seriously, gold is not that important.

Pets won't fight each other.

Spoiler:  Except when they're (click to show/hide)

starving, confused, or conflicted.

I vaguely recall that the combo of orc pets and elf pets are also a special case.  Maybe.

Other ways to deal with boulders: you can crawl through a boulder tile if you're not carrying anything at all.  Be advised that you will attempt to push the boulder before you crawl under it.

If you self-polymorph into a giant/ettin/titan, you can pick up the boulder.

[RoguelikeRazuka]

Not that I really want to brag about it, but I'm doing pretty well now.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh damn I got surrounded by some freaking squad of soldiers with wargs. They appeared just from nowhere. What was that?

PS I was mistaken when said I was fire resistant (actually I possessed resistance to shock).
PS2 Is it worth training my character's proficiency with dual wielding?

[Delta Foxtrot]

If I'm not mistaken, dual wielding samurais were one of the easier classes to play. Pair of enchanted/artifact longswords deal a ton of damage.

I never actually ascended one though, always managed to fumble them towards the end.

[Urist Imiknorris]

Yes. Samurai can get expert in both long sword and two-weapon skills, so do it and go to town.

[Trapezohedron]

A Grayswandir +7 or a Frost Brand against most demons and a +7 long sword allows you to go to town with about everything else.

Building those skills are pretty dang important.

For two-weapon leveling in early game, I suggest you find a good-enough armor, a pair of weak weapons, a single weak enemy, #twoweapon it and start missing like crazy. If you're able to level it up to basic it should be much, much easier to survive.

Otherwise I suggest leveling up your skill of choice (long swords) first to at least skilled or expert, before going #twoweapon, so as to counter the -hit penalty.

IMO easiest class to play in Vanilla Nethack was (and still is) a dwarven valkyrie. Hits like a truck, good stats, the Orb of Weight can offer good physical and magical defense and offers warning and luckstone powers. Can also be invoked for levelportation escapes.

Almost ascended with a Valk, died due to the dungeon collapsing on me (crash). There was a backup save, but at that point I was too burned out to progress.