User:Luxidream/How to win really fast

A realtime speedrun of NetHack is an attempt to ascend in the shortest amount of time. In order to ascend, a player must obtain all three of the invocation artifacts, perform the invocation, obtain the Amulet of Yendor, and sacrifice it to their god on the Astral Plane. Most realtime speedruns are completed in under three hours of play, with some under two hours.

While it might seem to require extraordinary luck to ascend in under two hours, such as a wand of wishing or a large scroll or ring shop,

The basics

The travel (_) command is your bread and butter. You can use it, then select a dungeon feature on the map using its symbol and press . to travel to it. You can also travel to items or unexplored areas.

Set up autopickup exceptions to reduce the amount of time you spend sorting through loot to see what items you want. This will depend on your role. For example, Valkyries will want to pick up tripe rations and eggs for confusion, but Wizards can cast confuse monster

Add MSGTYPE=stop options for any potentially run-ending message, including but not limited to lycanthropy, sliming, stoning, Vorpal Blade, fainting, etc. You will be going fast and are likely to miss these messages.

Choosing a role

The best roles for realtime speedrunning fall into one of two categories: melee combatants with high strength and constitution, or spellcasters with the ability to cast the magic mapping spell. The three best roles for speedrunning are Valkyrie, Wizard, and Priest.

Valkyrie

Unsurprisingly, dwarven Valkyrie is an excellent choice for speedrunning. They have virtually unsurpassed starting stats, frequently entering the dungeon with maximum carrying capacity from their strength and constitution. If you choose to startscum for better stats, it is important to have 19 or higher constitution, as this significantly improves the amount of HP gained when leveling up. Strength can be increased later on the Valkyrie quest. The starting +3 small shield is one of the best single pieces of armor any role can start with.

Their starting stealth is essential for clearing out special rooms such as the Sokoban treasure zoo, leprechaun halls, and throne rooms. Cold resistance can also be useful prior to obtaining reflection. However, their lack of poison resistance can lead to difficult situations involving killer bees or water moccasins.

Valkryies start with their endgame weapon already in hand, the +1 long sword that can be converted into Excalibur. Their quest artifact, the Orb of Fate, is also useful for saving time, as it reduces your need for better AC and can be invoked for level teleportation, which saves precious scrolls of teleportation.

Wizard

While elven Wizards are fragile in the early game, they can save a lot of time once they obtain a wand of wishing to complete their kit. Although their stats are mediocre, their starting inventory can be the best in the game, potentially containing ascension kit items like the magic marker, ring of conflict, and ring of polymorph control, as well as guaranteed magic resistance. The guaranteed instrument can be used to enter the Castle.

A Wizard's greatest strength is their enhanced ability to write unknown scrolls and spellbooks, most effective with high Luck. This along with their inherent spellcasting ability allows them to easily obtain a variety of useful spells such as healing, identify, and magic mapping. Their quest artifact, the Eye of the Aethiopica, gives energy regeneration, which allows for frequent spellcasting.

Since their first sacrifice gift is Magicbane, which doesn't do much damage, Wizards often struggle with dealing damage on their own, so they use polyself strategies such as polymorphing into a master mind flayer to make up for this.

Priest

Elven Priest can cast magic mapping, has the ability to see the BUC status of items, and may be able to train identify more quickly than Wizard if they also start with a level 1 divination spell. They gain more Pw than any other role because of their high wisdom.

If they are able to obtain Stormbringer, either through sacrifice or crowning, they can potentially exploit drain for gain strategies to obtain protection and clairvoyance from an aligned priest.

However, in all other respects they are worse than Wizards, lacking their starting inventory and their ability to write unknown scrolls and spellbooks. The Pw boost from the Mitre of Holiness is also less reliable than energy regeneration.

Barbarian, Samurai, Caveman, Knight

These are generally straightforward melee roles that are worse than Valkyrie, since they have worse starting inventory and harder quests. Barbarian is notable for having poison resistance, avoiding some difficulties that Valkyrie encounters. Barbarian, Samurai and Caveman all have excellent starting constitution and are viable picks. While Knight can easily obtain Excalibur, they can struggle due to having less HP and carrying capacity than the other roles.

Ranger

Despite having the worst HP of any role, Rangers deserve an honorable mention due to being good fighters with the starting bow and highly enchanted cloak of displacement.

Monk

Monks' inability to wear armor without obtaining the luckstone can slow them down. Martial arts is not a very effective weapon. The threat of Master Kaen may force players to obtain the wand of death from Orcus before completing the quest, especially in future versions when the scroll of scare monster is no longer effective against quest nemeses.

Rogue, Archaeologist, Healer, Tourist

Low strength and a difficult early game can hamper these roles.

OK, so you picked Valkyrie, what now?

Not writing this for every role sorry