Crawl - Stone Soup

[Tripecac]

I tried out Crawl - Stone Soup recently.

It's not bad! Actually quite addictive so far.

It plays a bit like a combination of NetHack and Angband. I'm still confused by some stuff, but I'm sure I'll pick up bits of it here and there if I get time to play.

One thing I haven't figured out yet and that is: are there bones files? In other words, when we die, can future characters revisit those levels, like in NetHack? There's a "morgue" directory, but I don't know if that's for bones files or just scoring / character dump type info.

Any avid crawl players out there?

[Tripecac]

I've been playing Stone Soup (v 0.60) again recently, and am enjoying it a lot!

[Tripecac]

John Harris' excellent "@ Play" column has a few articles about Crawl. One of the most interesting lists recommended character types:
http://www.gamesetwatch.com/2010/02/column_play_crawlapalooza_part_2.php

I tried the Orc Priest combination and finally, after 20 attempts, had myself a nice little army. It was hard to tell what was going on, however, and after a while I just didn't care what happened. I think once you lose the clear vision of what's going on, you lose your attachment to your character. I never got to kill anything anymore, anyway, since my orcs kept doing it for me. So it became a bit boring. However, it enabled me to get much further in the game that I had before. Next time it happens I'll try to pay more attention. Cool feature overall.

Right now I'm trying the Spriggan Enchanter approach. I love throwing things in this game. And this character type is definitely dependent on ranged weapons, so it's fun for me. I also like the backstabbing feature.

So far I'm very impressed with Crawl. It's hard, very hard, in fact to keep your characters alive for long. Closer to Nethack in difficulty than Angband (which I play very conservatively).