User:Ion frigate/Firearm strategy

Was writing up a page for bullet when I realized my text was probably better suited to the firearms page. Keeping it here to merge it there later.

Collecting bullets

A well-enchanted firearm with a large stack of enchanted bullets can be a very effective weapon in the endgame, but amassing such a stockpile requires some planning. In particular:

• Decide early if you want to try and build a bullet stack. Outside of the Castle and Fort Ludios, soldiers are not that common, as barracks do not ordinarily generate in SLASH'EM.
  • Tourists and Yeomen will see large numbers of soldiers on their quests, and both roles can gain skill in firearms.
• Once you decide to start to collecting bullets, pseudo-identify (but do NOT formally identify or altar-test) a stack of +0 uncursed bullets. The easiest way to do this is to simply kill a few soldiers, collect their bullets, and choose the largest stack: this will almost always find the right stack, and even if it doesn't, it will become quickly apparent, as few new bullets will stack.
  • #Naming the stack is helpful, but not absolutely necessary.
  • Alternately, if you have ready access to a source of cancellation, you can simply collect all bullets you find and cancel them once you're ready to enchant them.
• To reduce the amount of weight you have to carry, put all but one of your stack of bullets in a bag of holding. You will continue to be able to identify +0 bullets by seeing which ones stack.
• In areas where soldiers are plentiful, try to take them out stealthily and quickly, collecting their bullets right after killing them. It only takes one grenade to destroy almost the entire supply of bullets, since grenades on the floor can be detonated by other grenades, creating huge explosions that engulf every soldier in the area. Bag bullets as you collect them.
• Set a target number of bullets to collect. This number will vary depending on your character and their inventory, but a good rule of thumb is that it will take around 300-400 bullets to take out high-priority monsters (such as the Riders and various summoners) on the Astral Plane.
• Find a submachine gun or an assault rifle: a submachine gun is slightly lighter and more accurate, while an assault rifle has a higher rate of fire and a longer range. Enchant it to +7.
• Once you reach your target number of bullets, enchant them to at least +4 (to bypass enchantment resistance), and preferably to +7. Do this in a safe place, as enchanting a large stack of bullets will likely render you burdened or worse.
  • It is advisable to also rustproof your bullets and gun, since monsters such as shoggoths can corrode anything in your open inventory.

mklev.c in SLASH'EM 0.0.7E7F2, line 769: Due to a bug, the game only tries to randomly generate barracks if soldiers are genocided: such barracks will contain very few bullets, since random monsters will replace the now-genocided plain soldiers, and the loss of bullets from the Castle and Fort Ludios will likely offset any bullets gained from sergeants and above in these rooms.