Ancient Domains Of Mystery, forum overview / Spoilers / Druids are annoying
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Jules Registered user Last page view: 4764 days, 11 hours, 28 minutes and 25 seconds ago. |
Can someone please give me some advice on playing druids? Currently playing a druid in the 13th challenge. Now this guy doesnt get any offensive spells at all. Is this normal?, i currently have Hellish Flames with low castings as my desperation attack. Mostly I just hit people with my orcish spear. I find spellbooks round every corner, and could cast light and dark enough times to cover the world however I choose, but can I find anything useful NO. I'm only alive due to my ROI, and etheral bridge. |
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soira x Unregistered user |
ussually class affects type of spellbooks generated. priests have nearly no chance of getting ball spells, iirc. cursing itself migt affect this. but i couldn't find any source info about spellbook generation. |
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Mewto Registered user Last page view: 3593 days, 3 hours, 29 minutes and 55 seconds ago. |
I usually find lots of spellbooks of Divine Wrath... For the Horde! [Edited 1 time, last edit on 4/17/2007 at 05:50 (GMT -5) by Mewto] |
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Jules Registered user Last page view: 4764 days, 11 hours, 28 minutes and 25 seconds ago. |
My starting book was Divine Wrath, the next 30 books were useless. Now if I could just get three more books of DW, I could start to move this guy on. An orcish spear alone in the hands of a wimp isnt going to scare the world. |
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Darren Grey Registered user Last page view: 4233 days, 1 hour, 7 minutes and 28 seconds ago. |
ID-scumming is probably your only choice. Normally druids get a decent supply of Divine Wrath, but your guy seems to be a little low on luck... ;) Waldenbrook, the dwarven shopkeeper, mumbles: "I'd offer 9 gold pieces for yer dwarven child corpse." |
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Molach Registered user Lord of DurisMud Last page view: 5135 days, 7 hours, 1 minute and 51 seconds ago. |
Yeah, almost as if he is cursed, or something. Get something better than orcish spear isn't impossible, is it? |
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Soirana Registered user Chaos Freak Last page view: 4143 days, 6 hours, 24 minutes and 19 seconds ago. |
or at least you can smith it up... A root is a flower that disdains fame. Kahlil Gibran(1883-1931) |
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Some guy Registered user I'm baaaack. Last page view: 5596 days, 23 hours, 39 minutes and 15 seconds ago. |
"Smithing up" is a very big thing to ask of a druid who's just starting up. 100 smithing and a pile of pickaxes take a while to get. I've played some druids, and it never seemed that I was getting unusually few offensive spells OR extra books of divine wrath. I think it's all luck. The following is a real Adom message: The homunculus hits you. You suddenly fall asleep! Do you want to continue to read the spellbook of Calm Monster? [y/N] |
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SirMason Registered user Paladin of the Shining Citadel Last page view: 4738 days, 20 hours, 38 minutes and 56 seconds ago. |
So THAT'S why my dwarvish priest can't find a ball spellbook for the life of him. Rats. You pick up the Wand of Do Nothing. 'z'... Nothing happens. 't'... The Wand of Do Nothing misses the kestral. Come on, it's a Wand of Do Nothing! |
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Molach Registered user Lord of DurisMud Last page view: 5135 days, 7 hours, 1 minute and 51 seconds ago. |
The real reason is that priests don't have any ball spell. They have freezing fury, rain of sorrow, major punishment, heavenly fury and invoked devastation instead :) One other of the things I find tough about priests, I keep forgetting the spell names. |
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F50 Registered user Last page view: 5469 days, 16 hours, 32 minutes and 56 seconds ago. |
Its in the guidebook and the manual. Yeah, the spell names take some getting used to. "If the bread weights that much in the draklor chain, then it's no wonder so many die of starvation. AND - what kind of IRON RATION weights as much as an iron shield?! A dinner for four, oven included? ;)" -Maelstrom |
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Darren Grey Registered user Last page view: 4233 days, 1 hour, 7 minutes and 28 seconds ago. |
Yeah, it's in the guidebook, but it's so easy to forget during normal play. Is "lesser divine touch" magic missile or stun ray? Is "invoked devastation" fireball or lightning ball? It's annoying to look up the guidebook or manual all the time (where they're not even alphabetically sorted), so it adds an element of nuisance to playing priests or druids. Of course I also thoroughly believe priests are by far and beyond the best all round class, capable of mastering anything. Waldenbrook, the dwarven shopkeeper, mumbles: "I'd offer 9 gold pieces for yer dwarven child corpse." |
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Mewto Registered user Last page view: 3593 days, 3 hours, 29 minutes and 55 seconds ago. |
I agree about priests being the best all round class, one can play them as a fighter, as a spellcaster or as a combo. And Detect Item Status is damn nice. For the Horde! |
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Silfir Registered user Writer of Overly Long Guides Last page view: 4062 days, 1 hour, 49 minutes and 38 seconds ago. |
I dunno. The skillset doesn't seem too spectacular, and being clerics, they don't achieve the same raw arcane power of wizards as quickly. They do have good starting armor, which makes them reasonable fighters in the beginning, but can they really become melee "masters"? Priests are, in my eyes, nothing more than wizards with a little bit starting help in form of decent melee equipment and better weapon skill training. Detect Item Status is convenient, but becomes more or less obsolete later, when the PC has a decent stock of blessed scrolls of identify. The fact that they are clerical spellcasters means that you have to cast an arcane spell (Most damage spells are arcane spells) more often to increase its effectivity compared to a wizard. I don't know how that really affects the endgame, though. And, of course, priests need their god's favor for any of their powers. You drop the golden ball. You kick the golden ball. It slides to the west. Suddenly Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, appears! "That's not how you play Quidditch! are you even listening?" Which direction? (123456789) 4 Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is hit by a bolt of acid! Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is annihilated. You hear the ecstatic cries of a large crowd! |
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Darren Grey Registered user Last page view: 4233 days, 1 hour, 7 minutes and 28 seconds ago. |
Priests only needs their gods favour for the class powers of dispelling undead (which I never use) - otherwise they're normal casters. The only spells that they are really less proficient at than wizards is ball spells, of which they find few spellbooks and don't increase in effectivity as quickly. However, effectivity doesn't actually improve these a great deal compared with character level. Much more effected by effectivity are burning hands, dispel undead and the various curative spells - all of these are clerical, and priests become excellent masters of them. Cure Light Wounds can become an amazing cheap healing spell, and dispel undead is statistically the most damaging spell in the game (though obviously of limited use, and can be resisted sometimes). In terms of becoming melee or missile masters they require 50% more marks than any fighter - that's half of what a wizard needs. This means they can master a weapon much quicker, and importantly also applies to the shield skill. Wizards have a hard time relying on weapons or surviving in melee until they're tanked up in the end game, but priests are significantly more able to use melee as a primary attack. Combine it with a hurthling who has archery and you've really got the best all-round machine in the game. Only thing that could maybe rival it is a healer or elven ranger, but they wouldn't be able to match the spellcasting to anywhere near the same degree. Waldenbrook, the dwarven shopkeeper, mumbles: "I'd offer 9 gold pieces for yer dwarven child corpse." |
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Soirana Registered user Chaos Freak Last page view: 4143 days, 6 hours, 24 minutes and 19 seconds ago. |
than i played a priest i needed god favour to get spell reduction. ir really sucks than you are converting yourself get some summoned stuff and realize spells are a good bit more expensive. p.s. turn undead power is not a dispell undead spell. which means (i guess) you haven't played much priests. A root is a flower that disdains fame. Kahlil Gibran(1883-1931) |
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nOOb-mAsTeR Registered user Master of all things nOOby!!! Last page view: 5757 days, 15 hours, 2 minutes and 46 seconds ago. |
Priests are definitely the all-rounded class...bards are. Bards have the possiblity of getting the 5 necessary skills IMO:Healing, Herbalism,Concentration, Archery,Find Weakness. You could constantly re-roll till you get dodge, detect traps/item status, but that takes awhile...though with my human bard win, I got every starting skill i wanted: Archery, Concentration, Dodge, Find Weakness, Healing, Herbalism, Detect Traps, Detect Item Status, Fletchery, Mining, Smithing, Backstabbing. Needless to say, this made the early game with that char easy, and winning was rather easy too. "You try to give Fang, the large dog the bone. Fang, the large dog says,"Do you know who I am, mortal?!?!" My smartest dog ever:D |
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Darren Grey Registered user Last page view: 4233 days, 1 hour, 7 minutes and 28 seconds ago. |
Soirana: I've killed Andy with a priest. I never bothered with the turn undead thing because, well, what's the point? Relies on piety, doesn't do anything useful as far as I'm aware (I want to kill them, not turn them). And what do you mean by spell reduction? The 25 and 40% off you get at certain levels? Waldenbrook, the dwarven shopkeeper, mumbles: "I'd offer 9 gold pieces for yer dwarven child corpse." |
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Silfir Registered user Writer of Overly Long Guides Last page view: 4062 days, 1 hour, 49 minutes and 38 seconds ago. |
Dispel Undead is both a spell and a priest power, I assume? Priests need 75% of the marks that wizards need, not half, and 50% more than any other melee character, some of which (healers) have quite decent spellcasting powers too. (They do not need the insane spellcasting abilities of the priest because unlike him, they ARE melee characters.) They do make for a relatively easy early game compared to wizards, I'll agree, but as wizards find decent equipment (namely, the chain mail the priests start out with usually), they do fine as well. It's just the little extra kick from starting equipment. You can play hurthling wizards just as well as you can play hurthling priests if you want archery (But why would you want archery if you have spells?). Or you can play dark elves for decent spellcasting, Alertness and Find Weakness. Or high/gray elves for decent spellcasting and Dodge. Compare the skills of wizards and priests: (Detect Item Status, Music on the priest side - Alchemy, Ventriloquism on the wizard side. Not counting the other skills since both get them.) The priest gets a skill that is like a permanent blessed scroll of identify without the identifying part (Or a portable altar without the being able to sacrifice or get holy water, depending on how you look at it), and another that could be very useful if he were properly trained in it, the drawback being that very powerful pets could also kill him. The wizard gets a skill that, coupled with herbalism, can grant him infinite amounts of random potions if he gets a decent booze recipe, or lots of PoGA if he gets a decent PoGA recipe, or even more badass potions if he gets both. Not counting the other eight potions he can make. In addition, he gets a skill that has been used with success against powerful opponents such as the Ancient Chaos Wyrm, nemesis of every uncautious mid-game PC. Note that the priest has none of the "melee fighting" skills over the wizard. One could even argue that Ventriloquism is useful in melee, while Music and Detect Item status certainly are not. Alchemy is only useful in melee if improperly used, though ;) Finally, all ball spells and most notably Magic Missile are arcane, while the priest can still use all the bolt spells and Burning Hands with the same power as the wizard. So, to recap: Wizard pwns priest in skillset (IMHO at least) Wizard pwns priest in raw damage spellcasting (Dispel Undead works only on the undead, not on balors, orb guardians or the sort. Emperor Liches probably tend to be able to resist that spell anyway) Priest pwns wizard in early game survival All melee classes pwn priest in melee fighting (Healing alone a melee master does not make) You drop the golden ball. You kick the golden ball. It slides to the west. Suddenly Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, appears! "That's not how you play Quidditch! are you even listening?" Which direction? (123456789) 4 Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is hit by a bolt of acid! Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is annihilated. You hear the ecstatic cries of a large crowd! |
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Darren Grey Registered user Last page view: 4233 days, 1 hour, 7 minutes and 28 seconds ago. |
Whoah man, don't get me wrong - I never said priests were better than wizards, just that they're (in my opinion) the most all-round class, in the best position to specialise in everything. There's no way I could outright say that priests are betteer than any specific class - that's very subjective and depends on how you play and the conditions you end up in within the game (finding the right equipment etc). In response to a couple of your points though, wizards only beat priests in ball spells and magic missile, the latter of which is the most suicidal spell in the game (yeah, it requires stupidity to die from it, but it is one of the most common causes of death for late game wizards). Ball spells can still be learned very well by priests (far better than the non-spellcasting classes), the big problem really is that they don't find many spellbooks - sometimes none in fact. You also neglect to mention healing spells - 80 hp for 2 pp is quite nice sometimes. Dispel Undead is rarely resisted at high effectivity, but admittedly I'd rather use burning hands or missiles on an emperor lich. Overall wizards are better than priests at spells (additionally from the fact they get a bigger discount on pp cost from their class level abilities) but priests are really not far behind at all - they are by far the best casters in the game after wizards. One other minor advantage to priests over wizards is they have better crowning gifts. Waldenbrook, the dwarven shopkeeper, mumbles: "I'd offer 9 gold pieces for yer dwarven child corpse." |
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nOOb-mAsTeR Registered user Master of all things nOOby!!! Last page view: 5757 days, 15 hours, 2 minutes and 46 seconds ago. |
Well, I believe I have an excellent point: Wouldn't everyone agree that the best fighter, in real life, and in adom, is one that is well-rounded, and thus able to adapt to any give situation? For example: Ancient times: Melee combat only, when ranged forms of attack became available, it changed the way battles were fought, and those who could attack from a distance and close effectively came out on top. From club to thrown/wielded club Modern: We used to purely train soldiers in ranged weaponry, closest range was pistol, but now, with adding martial arts, and knives, which are seemingly simple forms of attack, we have an extremely effective killing machine. From gun, (which may not work forever due to ammo, to knives too and fists) Adom: A barbarian is usually extremely effective at killing at close, no one will disagree with me on that, I believe. Of course this puts him closer to his enemy.... An archer or wizard spends a lot of time training his ranged skills, so doesn't have enough melee combat ability to fight effectively when ammo, magic, or the need to fight close and personal arises. But a mindcrafter..... Can train equally fast and well in: ranged melee and the hard process of magic and mindcraft, making them practically unstoppable. In the end, whoever has the most tricks or possibilities in a battle wins, period. Note: sorry for long statements, trying to prove my point:D "You try to give Fang, the large dog the bone. Fang, the large dog says,"Do you know who I am, mortal?!?!" My smartest dog ever:D |
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Silfir Registered user Writer of Overly Long Guides Last page view: 4062 days, 1 hour, 49 minutes and 38 seconds ago. |
I think you were trying to point out that in ancient history, the army that had a well-rounded combination of ranged troops, melee and cavalry, tended to beat the army that was superior in melee or ranged only, but had shitty cavalry, as it happened with Hannibal's battles in ancient Italy against the Romans. It is true, the most well-rounded character is likely to just have that one more trick up their sleeve to help them win *all* battles. However, mindcrafters lack almost all of the important melee skills, they lack archery and fletchery, they cannot learn spells the natural way and will always require lots of mana for spellcasting from books. All this can be offset with superior training and scrolls of education, of course, except the spellcasting, which will remain shitty until after 50000 wands of wonder so. And if you get this far in the game, well, any character is über-powerful, you don't need a mindcrafter for that. There is a category of fighting monsters made for mindcrafters, completely inaccessible to other PCs, who have only access to ranged weapons, melee weapons, and normal spellcasting, that is true. And yes, in the archmage stadium, however tedious and boring it is to get there, mindcrafters can still do ONE THING MORE than the other PCs. Great for them. They could kill monsters by throwing bits of candies at them, by jokingly poking them with a wooden stick... (99 St, 99 Dx...) Instead, they WILL them to death, just because they can. Big deal. But before they get there, other characters will be as or even more powerful and able to kill their opponents. You drop the golden ball. You kick the golden ball. It slides to the west. Suddenly Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, appears! "That's not how you play Quidditch! are you even listening?" Which direction? (123456789) 4 Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is hit by a bolt of acid! Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is annihilated. You hear the ecstatic cries of a large crowd! |
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Nightmare Registered user Soul Calibur 2 Last page view: 4592 days, 15 hours, 12 minutes and 42 seconds ago. |
Somebody was complaining about it taking a long time to get pickaxes and smithing up to 100. I've found that you can get some improvements even from the initial smithing score Glod teaches you. Level up once or twice, you can boost it to 30-40 or so. Smelt that pile of iron ore and whatnot, and that will generally train it up some more points. Then get to work smithing your items, IIRC iron stuff is easiest to work with when skills are low, you can get a few points added to your weapons and armor with a sub 51 smithing skill. Then when you hit that breakpoint you can add a few more. Once you reach 71 a few more. 80, 90, 100, a lot more. My Dark Elven Ranger got smithing at 30 skill, now at level 25 she has 100 in smithing. Killed Kherab in Darkforge with Humanoid Slaying Ammo, got his anvil and an eternium warhammer for smithing. Got the guarranteed pickaxe in the Pyramid, found a bunch more off of dwarven chaos knights. (If you are chaotic, you can lure dwarves from the stairs out of dwarftown and kill them for a good chance at pickaxes). She teleported Glod close to the stairs using a wand, and walked him off the level. Some items of hers "Eternium Boots 7 DV 8 PV, Orcish Helmet +8 +6, Adamantium Girdle +6 +5, Mithril Ring Mail +4 +9. And some nice backups in case of item destruction. I even smithed up a sword of sharpness! Smithing - get it early, use it early, double your DV/PV, double your fun! "As for me, I feel priveleged to be among the only species able to make scientific inquiries." -unknown "Be sure to keep your distance if you don't have resistance." -DG |
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Molach Registered user Lord of DurisMud Last page view: 5135 days, 7 hours, 1 minute and 51 seconds ago. |
** (If you are chaotic, you can lure dwarves from the stairs out of dwarftown and kill them for a good chance at pickaxes). ** If you are not chaotic, you can lure creatures of a certain level down to dwarftown and have them kill dwarves. Takes some while for them to notice dwarves, but it works too. |
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Silfir Registered user Writer of Overly Long Guides Last page view: 4062 days, 1 hour, 49 minutes and 38 seconds ago. |
Replace "if you are not chaotic" with "if you are not chaotic in the way the game recognizes", Molach. Other than that, nice trick ^^ You drop the golden ball. You kick the golden ball. It slides to the west. Suddenly Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, appears! "That's not how you play Quidditch! are you even listening?" Which direction? (123456789) 4 Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is hit by a bolt of acid! Harry Potter, the apprentice wizard, is annihilated. You hear the ecstatic cries of a large crowd! |
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Nightmare Registered user Soul Calibur 2 Last page view: 4592 days, 15 hours, 12 minutes and 42 seconds ago. |
Yeah I try to let the Greater Demon get a bunch, he does it nice and quick and frequently as all the halfwitted dwarves try and pick fights with him. Gotta be careful he doesn't get Garth or Glod or Thrundarr (or Waldenbrook if you still plan on selling to him though). Then you have to watch out, if you don't have all the NPCs killed, that the wandering ones don't pick up your loot before you get to it. "As for me, I feel priveleged to be among the only species able to make scientific inquiries." -unknown "Be sure to keep your distance if you don't have resistance." -DG |
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nOOb-mAsTeR Registered user Master of all things nOOby!!! Last page view: 5757 days, 15 hours, 2 minutes and 46 seconds ago. |
It'd be very nice if the muscular dwarves that Waldenbrook summons if you steal dropped pickaxes...would actually make robbing his crappy shop worth it. "You try to give Fang, the large dog the bone. Fang, the large dog says,"Do you know who I am, mortal?!?!" My smartest dog ever:D |