User:Testbutt

Variants

I'm a big fan of variants. If you haven't tried variants, you might be surprised how easy most of them are to play! You don't need to learn a whole new skillset. In fact, many of them are less frustrating to play, because they give you a yes/no prompt before allowing you to do something foolish.

Here are some fun things you can try if you want to sample a variant!

FIQhack

• did you forget something? watch a replay of your most recent actions... WITHOUT LEAVING THE GAME! or, press ctrl + f to search for objects on the floor. it searches the whole dungeon for that thing you lost! these features are, as far as i know, completely unique to FIQhack, and extremely helpful.
• as you play, you'll start to notice that the UI is trying to help you, instead of getting in your way. select items from your inventory for a full menu of interaction options!
• try a monk! thanks to FIQhack's power regen formulas, you can actually use your starting spells regularly!
• Also fun: play a gnome tourist, and try to do the protection racket. Much more fun than doing it as a healer! And you'll be pleasantly surprised what you see in the shops.

Fourk

• valkyries have intrinsic flying. very convenient, very cool, very fun.
• a sylph healer starts with a magic harp. if you were to say, use a fountain or a smoky potion to wish for a PYEC, then you can get a nice little army of pals to fight for ya!

dnethack

• A dwarf anachrononaut can gun down a shopkeeper with just their starting machine gun. Go have fun in minetown! Generally, any anachrononaut will start the game with something fun and powerful: drow have vicious unarmed strikes and some magical powers (press control+f), incantifiers have a lightsaber, elves have reflection, etc...

Splicehack

• a dragonmaster's starting pet can usually take out most shopkeepers by itself, especially shopkeepers that spawn in early Dungeon floors.
• you can not only play the common and popular vampires and convicts, but there's some really neat original ideas, like angels, infernals, cartomancers, and dancers! see here: https://nethackwiki.com/wiki/Roles_and_races_(SpliceHack)

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If you think you have to "master" vanilla first, you're missing out! Suggestion: after you get 1 vanilla win, win 1 game in each variant you're interested in, instead of punishing yourself by forcing yourself to win every vanilla role first. (Due to ascension kit requirements, all vanilla roles play extremely similar anyways!)