Archeologist
Archeologists are one of the harder roles, but can become powerful in the late game. They are often called Arcs for short and start the game with speed and stealth. According to the guidebook:
Archeologists understand dungeons pretty well; this enables them to move quickly and sneak up on the local nasties. They start equipped with the tools for a proper scientific expedition.
The Archeologist role, especially its starting equipment, is influenced by 1954's Secret of the Incas where Harry Steele (Charlton Heston) is a dashing explorer of ancient ruins with leather jacket and fedora. Raiders of the Lost Ark's Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) was inspired by Secret of the Incas and added—in 1981—the army bag (sack) and bullwhip that this role carries to the iconic archeologist image.
Archeologists can be of lawful (human or dwarf) or neutral alignment (human or gnome).
Contents
Starting equipment
- +2 bullwhip
- +0 leather jacket
- +0 fedora
- 3 to 6 uncursed food rations
- +0 pick-axe
- uncursed tinning kit (30 to 99 charges),
- uncursed touchstone
- uncursed sack
- Following chances of one of:
- 10% uncursed tin opener
- 22.5% uncursed oil lamp
- 6.75% uncursed magic marker (30 to 99 charges)
Intrinsics
Archeologists gain the following abilities upon reaching the specified experience level:
Skills
Archeologist skills | |
---|---|
Max | Skills |
Basic |
|
Skilled |
|
Expert |
|
Archeologists start with Basic skill in the categories Whip and Pick-axe.
Special rules
Archeologists can use uncursed touchstones as if they were blessed, formally identifying the type of any gem.
Archeologists suffer a −1 alignment penalty for breaking a historic statue.
Non-chaotic archeologists suffer a −3 alignment penalty for digging up a headstone; chaotic archeologists get a +3 alignment bonus.
Strategy
Early game
Objectives
The early game must be played cautiously, like the Tourist and Healer. Archeologist is considered one of the most difficult roles, if not outright the most difficult. Its starting resources don't contribute as much to survival as many other roles, so the Archeologist is more reliant on items they find.
Your starting touchstone can make the first few floors of the mines very profitable. Your starting pick-axe can also be used to dig out gold, gems, and vaults in the early levels, and dig down through floors. Thus, you can accumulate a lot of wealth in just the first few floors of the dungeon and mines. Your sack can then help multiply it via credit cloning. This makes buying protection from Minetown doable, even if you gain a few levels on the way. If you do make it to Minetown at level 1, you should be able to buy protection several times.
The advantages of the Mines mean that it should be pursued before Sokoban. Continuing to Mines' End is very risky; although the luckstone and random tools can be useful to you, monster generation is difficult enough that you're not likely to survive as you are. Make sure to complete it eventually, though.
Sokoban can be a good choice afterward, because you can use your starting pickaxe to break boulders if need be, and your sack can store the food and items that are plentiful there. It's also good for exercising your low starting strength.
Luck is very important early in the game, so save at least one cheap gem to throw to a co-aligned unicorn. Because throwing an identified precious gem gives a +5 boost to Luck, consider doing it even before you find a luckstone.
Since you start with intrinsic speed, invisibility is a highly desirable quality for avoiding monsters. A fast, invisible, opponent is hard to chase down. Stealth is also helpful for clearing out treasure zoos and throne rooms, as it leaves enemies sleeping.
Weapons
The best early weapon is the pick-axe. In general, you want to seek out a dwarvish mattock (look for dwarves mining around in the Gnomish Mines), because they use pick-axe skill and do more damage than any other non-artifact weapon. Thus, it's best to use the pickaxe and enhance it when available, preparing for using a dwarvish mattock. However, if you start out with physical stats that assign penalties (i.e. 9 or lower Strength or Dexterity) you may need to use the whip at first for its +2 bonus.
The whip is decent at first because of the +2 bonus, but after a few levels it becomes less effective, and it doesn't train pick-axe skill. Don't forget that you can apply it towards a monster even while not wielding it, which will disarm the monster if your dexterity is 6 or higher. This can be a lifesaver when fighting some monsters, given your poor starting AC. It can also be a good way to deprive a dwarf of its mattock.
Archeologists suffer from a lack of good ranged weapon options. Boomerangs do 1d9 damage and can be advanced to expert, but they are quite rare and their flight pattern is unusual. Slings can be advanced to skilled, but they are weak and rocks are very heavy. However, with your starting touchstone you will identify numerous pieces of worthless glass which do the same damage as a rock but at 1/10 the weight. Darts and daggers are your other two plentiful options in the early game, both of which can be advanced to basic. Daggers are good because they will never break, but a large stack of darts with +2 or better enchantment is also worthwhile.
Starting in 3.6.1, the aklys is a ranged weapon and Archeologists can achieve skilled with clubs, the category of the aklys. Many of the gnomes in the mines are likely to be generated with aklys, identified initially as thonged clubs. The aklys will return to hand 99% of the time like Mjollnir when thrown, so it makes a particularly effective early ranged weapon. It does 1d6/1d3 damage which beats darts and daggers, since Archeologists can't multishot. Watch out for rusting as they are made of iron.
Mid game
Objectives
Archeologists should have poison resistance by the time they attempt the Quest, which is full of poisonous snakes. The starting tinning kit is very helpful, allowing you to safely eat poisonous corpses for the chance of the intrinsic.
The locate level of the contains three altars, one of each alignment; this guarantees a co-aligned altar may be a good place to wait and sacrifice monsters if you haven't found an artifact weapon yet.
Archeologists planning to use The Orb of Detection as a source of magic resistance should have a reliable backup source, such as Magicbane, gray dragon scale mail or a cloak of magic resistance, in case the Wizard of Yendor steals it or else the player decides to stash it to prevent theft.
Weapons
Because you start with low physical stats and melee penalties, acquiring an artifact weapon is a central concern. It's not a bad idea to camp on an altar you find and sacrifice for a gift. Archeologists have good artifact weapon possibilities, such as Grayswandir, Mjollnir, Vorpal Blade, and Magicbane. Lawful players can also dip for Excalibur if they find a long sword (though it will not be unrestricted unless you have had another long sword gifted to you).
Dwarvish mattocks and silver sabers are good non-artifact weapons, and one or the other should be trained to Expert. If you are planning to get Grayswandir or at least two-weapon with a silver saber, you should begin training saber skill as soon as you find one. The watch captain in Minetown often carries one, so consider getting a pet to kill him for it. If you disarm him with your whip, it will anger him but not the other guards. Remember that if you only plan to use a saber while dual-wielding, you don't need to advance the saber skill past Basic, as Skilled two-weapon combat is unreachable for Archeologists.
Spellcasting
As you progress through the game and level up, spellcasting becomes more of an option. Your high starting intelligence makes you good at reading spellbooks without needing to bless them. You can become proficient in several spell schools, meaning that you can become competent at casting many low-level spells. However, armor usually remains more important than spells through the early and mid game. Don't ditch good metal armor in favor of spellcasting until you're confident you can survive without it.
Late game
Weapons
For Archeologists, the best strategy is to find a good artifact weapon, enchant it up, and stick with it through the rest of the game. Two-weaponing is reliable because your experience level and Luck at this point completely cancel out the the −7 to-hit penalty.
The best artifact weapon for you is Grayswandir, which does double damage and silver damage. It is one of the few artifact weapons you can advance to Expert. The neutral artifact weapons for Archeologists are quite good as well, but Grayswandir is so excellent that you might want to consider wishing for it even if you're neutral.
Spellcasting
In the mid-game and beyond, you may want to advance divination spells to Skilled for casting magic mapping, which is your special spell and can be greatly useful in Gehennom. Detect treasure and detect unseen are also nice to have, and identify is always useful. Don't advance them to Expert unless you really need your failure rates to be lower.
Since most of your useful spells are utility spells, it isn't necessary to avoid metal armor.
Rank titles
The status line shows you to be one of the following ranks when you reach the specified experience level:
- XL 1–2: Digger
- XL 3–5: Field Worker
- XL 6–9: Investigator
- XL 10–13: Exhumer
- XL 14–17: Excavator
- XL 18–21: Spelunker
- XL 22–25: Speleologist
- XL 26–29: Collector
- XL 30: Curator
Quest
The Archeologist quest artifact is the Orb of Detection, a crystal ball. When carried, it confers magic resistance, telepathy and half damage when attacked by spells. When #invoked, it toggles invisibility on/off.
Variants
Itlachiayaque
In UnNetHack, dNetHack, NetHack Fourk, SlashTHEM, and xNetHack, the Orb of Detection is replaced as the Archeologist quest artifact by Itlachiayaque, a shield of reflection. Itlachiayaque confers fire resistance when carried and can be invoked to produce a poison cloud (similar to a scroll of stinking cloud. In xNetHack, it also confers warning, and the player can choose to use it as a crystal ball instead when invoking it. In the other variants, it also confers telepathy and half spell damage when carried.
SLASH'EM
In SLASH'EM, Archeologists may be doppelgangers, elves, or hobbits in addition to the vanilla roles. They can use the research technique at level 1. The starting equipment has also changed.
They begin with a spellbook, one of detect food, detect monsters, light, knock, or wizard lock, 2 random scrolls, a 25% chance of a blindfold, a 25% chance of a towel if they did not get a blindfold, 25% chance of a leash, a 25% chance of a tin opener or a 25% chance of either an oil lamp or a torch if they did not get the tin opener, and a 12.5% chance of a magic marker. The starting fedora has also changed in SLASH'EM and gives +1 charisma and acts as a luckstone when worn.
UnNetHack
UnNetHack allows Archeologists to safely enchant their starting fedora past +5 up to +7, and the fedora grants a +2 bonus to Luck when worn.
FIQHack
In FIQHack archeologists get a +10 bonus to the base searching rate.[1]
Encyclopedia entry
Archeology is the search for fact, not truth. [...]
So forget any ideas you've got about lost cities, exotic travel,
and digging up the world. We do not follow maps to buried
treasure, and X never, ever, marks the spot.
References
This page is based on a spoiler by Dylan O'Donnell. The original license is:
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