Forum:Nethack sans Elbereth
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
The server that I play on (telnet://nethack.csh.rit.edu) has "Elbereth" compiled out, and has for several decades. I once disagreed with this, but after realizing that the scroll of scare monster does the same thing, I conceded that removing the Elbereth trick is more in tune with the spirit of the game, especially now that the trick is very well known.
My question is: how much do people think this prohibition changes the game itself? Almost all advice and strategies mention it as an option. nethackwiki considers Elbereth to be a legitimate part of the game, while Polypiling and Farming are considered minor infractions on the Cheating page.
Davek 05:55, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
- I certainly makes the game harder as the get-out-of-dangerous-situations-spamming tactic no longer works. I'd also say that farming is more of an offender than polypiling as you have to exploit NetHack's design deficiencies more to effectively farm.
- The DevTeam seems to be a bit partial in regards to Elbereth as it is only a compile option since NetHack 3.0.0. Elbereth itself was already there in Hack 1.0.
- Now, people generally don't really like it when you make the game harder. :-) IIRC in RGRN Spork got a lot of criticism because of making Elbereth less effective and people on IRC are even more vocative about that. I myself wouldn't mind removing Elbereth completely but I think the outcry of certain people would be too much trouble.
- In UnNetHack, Elbereth got a little bit toned down, mostly for the unique monsters and it also contains Elbereth-tracking (using the patch from bilious). So if you play Elbereth-less, it will be shown in your dump. --Bhaak 08:51, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
- I was surprised how much of Elbereth can be replaced with movement tactics in my 12-conduct games. Of course, the game was making opponents for a level 3 wizard, while I was typically armed with several pet balrogs, a magic whistle, and a tooled horn. --Tjr 16:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)