Speed ascension

A speed ascension is a type of informal conduct, taking one of two forms: lowest turn-count, or shortest real time elapsed. Short ascensions tend to be low turn-count ascensions too.

How fast is fast?

First ascensions vary greatly in turn-count, with most falling between 50,000 and 100,000 turns. A careful well-spoiled player can ascend in under 50,000 turns with most classes, and ascensions below 30,000 are not uncommon. Anything below 20,000 probably counts as a speed ascension. On NAO, 1% of all winning player accounts have a sub-10450-turns ascension, and 10% have sub-24450.

Real-time speed records are very hard to determine, since vanilla NetHack does not track real time elapsed. The usual method is to time the ttyrec of the game with a utility such as timettyrec.

Certain classes are better than others at the very fastest ascensions, though any class can be ascended relatively quickly. Good spellcasting ability and being able to get The Eye of the Aethiopica are both very handy, making wizards and neutral monks the two classes that pushed speed ascensions the farthest.

General speed strategy

• Don't fully map every level
• Become very fast as soon as possible
• Avoid monsters rather than fighting them
• Avoid being burdened to any degree
• Make extensive use of digging and level teleportation

Specific speed tactics

• Move diagonally
• Kick down doors (be careful in minetown)
• Wear a ring of conflict
• Wish for The Eye of the Aethiopica
• Teleport into the Sanctum, or have a covetous monster (e.g. Asmodeus or Orcus) fetch the amulet for you
• Use jumping and a helm of opposite alignment to reduce time spent on the Astral Plane
• Controlled polymorph self into a xorn to phase through the Castle walls
• Controlled polymorph self into a master mind flayer and use #monster to wake the Wizard from outside his tower
• Wake the Wizard of Yendor from outside with a mind flayer blast or a drum of earthquake, or at least levelport within his tower.
• After retrieving the Amulet of Yendor, convert to chaotic to minimize the effects of the Mysterious force

Sample ascensions

• A 8683-turn ascension by marvin: RGRN post
• A 6480-turn ascension by Rast: RGRN post
• A 5456-turn ascension by theta: RGRN post
• A 2607-turn bones-free ascension by Maud: NAO dumplog
• A 2318-turn ascension by Maud: NAO dumplog, ttyrec
• A 2185-turn ascension by nht: RGRN post ttyrec
• A 2135-turn ascension by Maud: NAO dumplog
• A 2:48:30 ascension by Eidolos: RGRN post
• A 1:42 ascension by Adeon: ttyrec from devnull 2009