Best way to level?

[jayrshaw]

Thanks for the information, Christophe!


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

Honestly, I never bothered to grind once I could cast any spell at PAL level. I should note that it is usually easier to cast MON VI than PAL FUL BRO NETA in terms of success. Then again I rarely cast fireshield, pretty much only on level 8 (stray fireballs shooting around) and level 13 (with the black flames and demons).

• My normal way to grind spells isn't really grinding, but having a policy of never letting my champions walk around with full mana. The exception being when getting ready for a big fig like at the end of level 4 with "This is my prisoner, let him suffer", or before facing the pain rat regeneration room, especially the first time.
  If somebody reaches full mana, I'd either cast ZO BRO ROS if I had an empty flask, or I'd work on one of the spells I use more rarely like casting fireshield or more rarely lightning bolt or poison cloud.
  I woudln't bother grinding magic torch except in the beginning after you first reincarnate, since it uses the same skill as fireball. Work on something you use less often like fireshield (FUL BRO NETA), light (OH IR RA), or lightning bolt (OH KATH RA). The combat bonus DOES apply to spells.
• For grinding ninja skills, on some levels with creatures that drop junk I like to keep tossing about a club or falchon and let my lowest ranking ninja or weakest champion work on ninja skills. I only toss it as I move, but if monsters are near I'll hold it until I can toss it at them. In fact, on levels 3 and 6 I try to toss the dropped junk at monsters whenever possible, especially if they are out of melee range.
  Also for some of the easier monsters that you can tank, I like to equip daggers and melee them. Note that that means you should keep every dagger you find as IIRC they are the best melee weapon that increases ninja skills.(Somebody correct me if there is something better).
  Good targets for this are screamers, swamp slimes, wizard eyes (maybe), rusters, vexirks, pain rats (maybe) oitus.
  Also I tend to literally punch out rockpiles and sometimes stone golems with shield spells up, but that only works for the tougher champions and I still have to retreat.
  Other than that, don't neglect your thrown weapons in favor of spells. Mummies, trollins, vexirks, and gigglers tend to be vulnerable to them, although hitting the latter is difficult and I'd still poison bolt them. Oitus and scorpions aren't immune either. Skeletons seem more vulnerable to thrown wooden shields and falchons than launched arrows, rocks, daggers or poison darts for some reason. Wizard eyes and couatls seem immune to missiles, while rockpiles, worms, and swamp slimes seem resistant.
• For fighter levels I don't really grind that at all, since it tends to be my main method of attack along with fireball and poison bolt. It's the ninja and priest spells that I need to work on to keep up, hence why I mentioned fireshield. Even though I mentioned throwing and shooting, my ninja levels tend to lag behind my fighter levels until I decide to pull out the daggers on a swamp slime, pain rat, or oitus. I'm still ready to switch to better weapons if something dangerous like a couatl or animated armor shows up.

[jayrshaw]

Thanks for the additional information, slickrcbd! I've also noticed that different enemies tend to be susceptible to different forms of attacks (e.g., thrown items work great on mummies and trolins but don't seem to work well on rockpiles, and fireball doesn't seem to be as effective on some enemies as others).

Also, do any of you know if the bonus for being combat is actually a multiplier of 2 or a multiplier of 4? I ask because the website Christophe linked to actually seems to mention two separate bonuses:

Bonus 1: "If the Improved Skill associated to the action you perform is between 04 and 11 (hidden Fighter and Ninja skills) and if no creature has attacked the party for at least 150 clock ticks (25 seconds), then Experience is divided by 2."

Bonus 2: "If the Improved Skill associated to the action you perform is above 04 (any hidden skill) and if a creature has attacked the party less then 25 clock ticks ago (about 4.17 seconds), then Experience is multipled by 2."

I guess this makes it sound like you get 4 times as much experience in combat than out of combat for fighter and ninja skills but only 2 times as much experience in combat than out of combat for casting spells. Is that right?


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

Thanks for the additional information, slickrcbd! I've also noticed that different enemies tend to be susceptible to different forms of attacks (e.g., thrown items work great on mummies and trolins but don't seem to work well on rockpiles, and fireball doesn't seem to be as effective on some enemies as others).

I keep meaning to put together a monster guide on how I deal with each type of creature.
Mummies are vulnerable to fireballs and ranged weapons while immune to poison.
Trollins are extremely vulnerable to poison bolts and vulnearble to thrown ranged weapons. On level 3 a LO level DES VEN is sufficient to kill any one trollin.
When you meet them again later you only need ON level poison bolt, although an UM level has a chance of dropping one. The only issue is that they come in groups and poison bolt is single target while fireball damages groups. Fireballing a group of four and then chucking items or shooting ranged weapons is often more effective. A group of two on the other hand you might want to poison.
Giant wasps are vulnerable to poison clouds. All but two can be killed with a LO OH VEN on level 6. That group of two needs an UM OH VEN and is near the end in a secret room.
Deeper on the scorpion level you need UM or ON poison clouds.

[jayrshaw]

Thanks again for the additional information. Based on what you're saying, it sounds like the poison bolt spell can actually kill an enemy instantly (as opposed to doing damage over time) - is this right? To be honest, I never tried experimenting with it. I think you said in your earlier post that poison bolts are also effective against gigglers - if so, I definitely think I'll try using it since gigglers are (at least in some respects) the most annoying enemy in the game; furthermore, if I recall correctly, fireballs are only somewhat effective against them (I remember having to use two or three high level fireballs to kill a giggler the last time I played, but it's been a really long time).


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

The poison ball spell (OH VEN) does damage over time, the only foes it can instantly kill are wasps.
The poison Bolt spell (DES VEN) can kill some enemies instantly.

Generally, the wasps on level 6 (The riddle room) can be killed by LO OH VEN, although there is one group of two that needs na UM OH VEN. When you meet them on later on level 11 you need UM (50% chance) or ON OH VEN to beat them in one shot.
For gigglers, I think a LO DES VEN can drop one on level 8 about half the time, but an UM does it almost all the time. Generally increase the power as you go deeper. I think UM level fireballs work on level 8 about half the time, and ON all the time.
It's been a while, I could be remembering wrong.
Couatls seem to take multiple spells to take down, but three LO or UM poison bolts or fireballs work, otherwise you need two of ON or higher. Then again, I can rarely cast PAL or MON level anything at the time I encounter couatls. Consider that fireball and poison bolt work about equally on them, and that poison bolt costs less mana. Which to use should be obvious, although if you have a fireball prepped (swamp slimes are immune to poison) by all means fling it, then follow up with a poison bolt.
Trollins are extremely vulnerable to poison bolts (DES VEN, not OH VEN) and can be dropped by LO level ones on level 3, IIRC have a 50% chance of being killed by UM level ones one level 11, or ON level for a sure kill. On the other hand trollins often come in groups of two or more, and a poison bolt only kills one at a time. A fireball damages the entire group, so your mileage may vary. It might be better to fling a stronger fireball at a group of four. On level three a LO level fireball has a good chance of taking out one of a pair of trollins while damaging the other, but it's not a sure kill like the poison bolt (though an UM level can take out one of a group of four, but you most likely can't cast that yet until the end).

The main value aside from fighting wasps of poison clouds (OH VEN) is that it can and will make an enemy that isn't immune to it retreat. Great if you get trapped between two monsters or in a dead end like an alcove for making one move away from your only escape path to give you room to maneuver. Unlike some games (like some Final Fantasy) you should not hesitate to run away from monsters and come back to them later. They generally don't regain health while you do. Sometimes such as when spotting a non-material being you just need to run away and equip the vorpal blades.
Other enemies like the worms you need to use hit and run tactics.

[jayrshaw]

Thanks for this additional advice. I actually read the hints section in Christophe's encyclopedia, too, and that says that the easiest way to kill the red dragon also involves the use of poison cloud spells. I'll definitely try poison bolt for the gigglers if nothing else if they can be killed instantly with it, since I really hate it when they manage to survive and run away with a bunch of my items...


--Jay

[terkio]

Gigglers only grab stuff you hold in your hands.

[jayrshaw]

I don't know if this is something that varies with different versions of the game, but I swear on past playthroughs on the SNES version of the game I'm currently playing that they could steal random items from my characters' inventory. It's been a really long time since I've played this, though (more than ten years), so maybe I'm not remembering correctly...


--Jay

[terkio]

I was talking about gigglers in DM.
I played a bit the SNES version, I remember I saw a couple of things not the same.
It could very well be you are right about gigglers, with better skills in SNES.

A side point. What about rusters ?
In the original DM they do not rust at all. In custom RTC games they do, but only at stuff you hold in your hands.
Correct me if I am wrong and remind me how rusters behave in the various DM derivatives.

[jayrshaw]

I've only played the SNES version, and as far as I can recall, the rusters never inflicted any rust or damage to any of my characters' weapons or armor in that version of the game.


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

Gigglers only grab stuff you hold in your hands.

Depends on the version, in the IIGS version they can grab from the upper-left slot in your backpack if you have nothing in hand, and they move on to the first occupied slot if you leave that blank too. They will steal from the left hand first however and only go for the inventory if you try to be cleaver and leave all the hands empty.

I never confirmed if this applies to any other version. I never bothered.

As for rusters, there is nothing special about them. No rusting weapons or anything. That is probably a good thing since there is no way to fix that and it would really hurt you if your vorpal blades were destroyed, or even the really good weapons like hardcleave, inquisitor, or diamond edge.

[Phoenix]

If you try Conflux after completing DM/CSB, both gigglers and rusters are nastier. Gigglers in Conflux can steal items from anywhere including your active hand. Rusters can actually break weapons!

[ChristopheF]

in the IIGS version they can grab from the upper-left slot in your backpack if you have nothing in hand, and they move on to the first occupied slot if you leave that blank too

The source code tells this is not true.
In DM Atari ST, Apple IIGS, Amiga 2.x, PC-98 2.0a, FM-Towns and CSB Atari ST, Gigglers can only steal from the ready hand (the left one on the screen).
In all other versions of DM/CSB, they can steal from both hands (with a low probability for the action hand of 1/8, and a higher probability for the ready hand of 7/8).
They never steal from anywhere else in the inventory.

[slickrcbd]

I know that I tried leaving my ready hands all empty, only for the gigglers to either steal a weapon or from inventory.
I distinctly recall being frustrated at my solution to the problem back when I was a kid.

[Phoenix]

I like to carry a rock in my non-active hand to deal with gigglers. They seam to always go towards a torch or rock in that hand.

Gigglers can steal from your inventory in Conflux, but it's most likely from added code.

[Ameena]

If I know there are Thieves around I just make sure I have a Fireball or two ready, and lob them the moment I see the little bugger. From what I remember of the Atari version they could only steal from your left hand so if you just emptied that you were fine. Still would destroy the little buggers on sight, though .

[slickrcbd]

Back on topic, the ranged weapon debate in another thread made me want to give this tidbit on leveling.

Wizard Eyes seem immune to ranged weapons, as do wasps and animated armor. Rockpiles and worms seem virtually immune as well, with pain rats being resistant.
I do recall that with wasps and wizard eyes, you can often throw an item and it will hit the monster and bounce off, landing right in front of you so that you can pick it up again. This lets you train ninja skills if you decided not to keep the daggers from level 2 with combat bonuses, but the critter is still attacking you so it is dangerous.
I find that using the daggers on less dangerous foes like screamers, swamp slimes, rusters (about the same threat as a pain rat, but only comes as a solo monster so it's easier), and oitus outside the regeneration room is a better way to train ninja levels. Actually daggers can be used against most foes on level 9, with pain rats being the most difficult.

In addition, I train ninja levels by using ranged and thrown attacks against mummies, trollins, and skeletons. On level 6 I probably kill a quarter to a third of the skeletons by throwing the leftover falchons and wooden shields lying around at more skeletons.
Gigglers are vulnerable as well, but unless a falchon or shield is right there handy, I tend to fling poison bolts (or a fireball if it is ready) at them so I don't have to worry about retrieving the item if it misses.

[jayrshaw]

Yeah - one thing I always liked about this game is that you can pick up random stuff from the dungeon floor and throw it at the enemies as a weapon. My wife thought it was really funny when I would pick up and throw screamer slices and worm rounds at enemies immediately after defeating a screamer or magenta worm.


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

Can I be excused for being juvenile by thinking and possibly saying out loud "Food Fight!" when I killed a mummy with screamer slices shortly after getting the game (which I had previously tried at a friend's house) at age ten 30 years ago?
At that age/time, I had NOT yet seen Animal House.I don't recall seeing that until I was a teenager.

The shameful thing is the thought still comes into my mind when doing that. I guess I'm just young at heart. Well that and maybe a little immature. Hopefully that means I'll survive to 105.

[jayrshaw]

Yeah, that's pretty funny. It's interesting that the non-weapon items seem to do almost as much damage when thrown as the weapon items. The way I handled things at the very beginning of the dungeon was to fill everyone's left hand with random items like torches and quickly throw these items at any enemy I encountered - this worked pretty well, since most of the enemies on the first floor of the dungeon can be killed by 1-3 hits from a projectile weapon.


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

I still do the same. I've killed more mummies on level 2 with scrolls than anything else. Possibly as many as with everything else combined, but there is that one spot with screamers and mummies and just as often I kill the screamers and the mummies come to me while fighting them so I wind up killing them with screamer slices. HAAA!
I tend to keep scrolls in my champion's left hand to leave behind at those two pressure plates (technically 3, but that boulder works just as well). At least for levels 2 and 3 where you discard items. After that I don't bother, though I do keep something light in inventory that is worthless to leave behind (like a scroll). At least until I get to level 9, then I can substitute drumsticks.

[jayrshaw]

Hi all,

I just thought I'd post some observations I made while experimenting with various ways to train Fighter and Ninja skills in the screamer room of Floor 3 of the dungeon (i.e., the floor with the magenta worms). I am playing the SNES version of Dungeon Master and do not know if my findings are applicable to other versions of the game. Here are my findings:

1. Attacking an enemy directly apparently gives more experience than attacking the air using the same attack with the enemy attacking you from your flank. I found this to be the case using the jab attack (Fighter experience), stab attack (Ninja experience), and punch attack (Ninja experience).

2. The recovery time is sometimes longer when you are attacking an enemy directly with a weapon than it is when you are attacking the air using the same attack with the enemy attacking your flank. I found that, in some cases, the increased recovery time for attacking the enemy directly can almost entirely negate the experience bonus you get for attacking the enemy directly (in other words, you are gaining more experience for each attack but you are completing fewer attacks over time due to the increased recovery time). However, you can sometimes counteract the lost experience due to long recovery times by alternating between your two front-row characters (i.e., have your first character attack and then have your second character attack immediately afterwards instead of waiting for the first character to recover).

3. Attacking the enemy directly using the jab attack (including the time it takes to clean up screamer slices and periodically regenerate the enemy once it dies) gave significantly more Fighter experience than using the war cry technique directly at the enemy (I was able to gain a Fighter level in ~5 minutes by using the jab attack directly at the enemy, whereas it took two characters ~15 minutes to both gain the same Fighter level by using the war cry technique directly at the enemy). Conversely, using the jab attack at the air with the enemy attacking my characters' flank gave less Fighter experience than using the war cry technique directly at the enemy (it took two characters ~15 minutes to both gain Fighter levels by using the war cry technique and it took more than 7.5 minutes to gain the same Fighter level by jabbing at the air with the enemy attacking my flank [I cut the test off after jabbing the air for 7.5 minutes]). So, if you are interested only in gaining Fighter experience, jabbing directly at the enemy seems to be one of the better options; of course, if you do this instead of using war cry, you will give up the Healer experience you would have gained by using the war cry technique.

4. Attacking the enemy directly using the stab attack (including the time it takes to periodically clean up screamer slices and regenerate the enemy once it dies) gave somewhat more Ninja experience over time than stabbing the air with a dagger while the enemy was attacking my flank, provided that I alternated my direct stab attacks between two characters (I gained a ninja level for each of the two alternating characters using the direct stab attack in 7.5 minutes, whereas a lone character stabbing the air with the enemy attacking my party's flank gained his Ninja level in 4.5 minutes [so it would have taken roughly 9 minutes for two characters to both gain a Ninja level]). A lone character using the punch attack directly against the enemy gained his Ninja level in about 4 minutes (faster than stabbing the air with an enemy attacking the flank but slower than alternating between two characters stabbing the enemy directly). As a result, it appears that having two alternating characters in the front row stab the enemy directly is one of the better ways of gaining Ninja experience. I have also heard people claiming to earn a good amount of Ninja experience using the "climb down" technique that is accessible with the rope item; however, I wasn't able to try this technique because I haven't obtained the rope yet.


Anyway, I hope someone finds this information useful. I'd also appreciate it if any of you have additional insights on the topic that you'd like to share.


--Jay

[jayrshaw]

Just writing to make the following modifications to my last post:

1. Whenever possible, I suggest training your characters by performing actions while in the character menu view of the game instead of the normal dungeon view. This is because in-game time passes twice as fast when you are in the character menu view, resulting in the following advantages: (a) the recovery time for combat actions (e.g. war cry, stab, etc.) is half as long as it would be in the normal dungeon view, allowing you to perform roughly twice as many actions over time; and (b) your mana recovers twice as fast as it would in the normal dungeon view, allowing you to train your magic skills much more frequently.

2. I found that I could gain a Fighter level nearly as fast using the war cry technique directly at a screamer from the character menu as I could by using the jab attack from the normal dungeon screen (using the jab attack from the character menu isn't especially effective because jab is really fast even from the normal dungeon screen and because you have to exit the character menu every time you kill the enemy, anyway). For me, the benefit of added Healer experience for using war cry coupled with the benefit of having double the normal rate of mana recovery due to being in the character menu make the war cry technique from the character menu the preferable method of acquiring Fighter experience. I am not sure, but you still might be able to gain Fighter experience faster than this by repeatedly using the jab attack directly against an enemy that cannot be harmed by normal weapons; doing this would eliminate the need to periodically clean up dropped items and regenerate the creature(s) when they die; however, I do not know if you get the same bonus for attacking an enemy who is immune to normal weapons as you do for attacking an enemy that can be harmed by these weapons.

3. I found that I could gain a Ninja level faster by stabbing the air from the character menu while the enemy attacked my flank than I could by attacking the enemy directly using the stab attack from the normal dungeon screen (even when I alternated my direct stab attacks between two characters to bypass the technique's recovery time). Of course, you also receive the benefit of having double the normal rate of mana recovery due to being in the character menu if you use this technique.


Hope this information is useful to someone here!


--Jay

[Saumun]

Hmmm... the fighter levels through war cries must be a SNES thing.
In other versions (I can't speak for every one) it gives priest levels.

[jayrshaw]

In the SNES version, war cry gives both Fighter and Healer experience. You gain slightly more Fighter experience than you do Healer experience, but the amounts are comparable.


--Jay

[slickrcbd]

Apparently there are several differences between the SNES version and all other version, just like there are a few minor differences between an early AtariST version and all other versions.

I'm unsure what the "character menu view" means, do you mean the inventory screen?
I think I tried a pirated version of the SNES version once long ago, but couldn't get used to the interface after having spent over a decade playing the Apple IIGS version with keyboard and mouse. I'm too accustomed to doing the step dance with one hand on the keyboard while clicking on weapons or spells with the mouse.

I should also note that all my advice and findings have been based on the Apple IIGS version, although the PC version and CSBWin are both pretty much identical.

[ChristopheF]

Check here for description of War Cry experience gain (read note d below table): http://dmweb.free.fr/?q=node/690.

[jayrshaw]

slickrcbd - Yes - When I said the "character view menu" I was referring to the character inventory menu.

Christophe - Thanks for the additional information. Based on the encyclopedia, it looks like Brandish, Blow Horn, and Confuse all give more Healer experience than War Cry. Of course the downside to using these is that they don't also give Fighter experience; I'm not sure, but they might also scare some enemies away (War Cry is supposed to be able to do that too, but I've never actually seen it happen); also, it looks like Confuse might be limited based on charges. One other thing I've noticed is that the encyclopedia states that War Cry grants 12 Healer experience points but only 7 Fighter experience points; however, in practice, I notice that I get slightly more Fighter experience than Healer experience for using it; if I had to take a wild guess, I'd say that the 7 points of Fighter experience are being doubled when my characters perform War Cry from the front row directly at an enemy (no idea whether or not this is a quirk that is peculiar to the SNES version of the game).


--Jay

[jayrshaw]

Oh, I should also mention that in the SNES version of the game, you will gain Fighter experience (very slowly) if you use War Cry when an enemy is not present; however, you will not gain any Healer experience at all under these conditions. I think this may also apply to using War Cry at the enemy from the back row or at the air with the enemy attacking your party from the flank, but I would have to test this again to be sure. Regardless, at least in the SNES version of the game, you always want to use War Cry directly at the enemy from the front row (preferably while in the character inventory menu).

One other thing I have alluded to is that, at least in the SNES version of the game, there is some sort of separate bonus for attacking an enemy directly with a weapon in addition to the experience modifiers mentioned in Christophe's encyclopedia that check to see how recently your party has been attacked by an enemy. I have read other (very old) posts claiming that the amount of damage you inflict upon an enemy somehow factors into the amount of experience you earn for attacking an enemy and other posts claiming that simply being "toe to toe" with an enemy grants bonus experience (I take this to mean facing the enemy from the front row and attacking it directly); not sure which one of these is true, but in the SNES version of the game, I definitely receive more experience per action performed if I attack an enemy directly than if I attack the air while the enemy is attacking my flank.


--Jay