Hello all! I just started playing two-three days ago.

On my second day (this is my third), I managed to get to the first level of the second set of caves, after killing Genetrix Vesana. Then stepped on a mine in what I think you folks call GC1.

So this is my thread of introduction. I'm actually going on a five day trip IRL starting later today, so I won't be around for a while, but I might hang around the forums after that, at least as long as I can keep myself busy with IVAN. Then I'll move on to something else, and if ?IVAN leaves a lasting impression, I'll eventually come back to play agaiin and probably peek around in the forum some more. As is my natural cycle of interests.

On a side note: It's really terrible how the game has you watch each body part go when you get blown up by a mine.

Welcome to the forums. Veteran forumers in here are really nice, although I'm starting to suspect that they are starting to lose their mind because IVAN developing has stopped. Or probably they are just bored.




Trust me, you will find find something even more nastier in this game.

If you find something more cruel than IVAN, tell me. =P

And. The last version of IVAN is what, three years old? The DEV's been gone for most of that time and some of us still play the game. So I don't think we'll disappear any time soon... We're a bunch of friends brought together by IVAN more than a bunch of people playing IVAN. Though I do admit that most of the 'veterans' haven't got much to learn any more...

I actually very much respect the fact that roguelikes are among the few games to which the Saying "Many will fight, but few will conquer" is actually true.

And they still manage to be endlessly fun.

Brilliant.

Welcome to the forums, Sylverone! Always nice to see new people in here.





If that means you're playing it until you beat it, you're going to stay for a while

Hello, nice to see polite new people here.
Indeed a nice start to get into GC1 at second day. If you want to avoid unlucky mine deaths, try getting rings of searching and fire resistance, cloaks of fire resistance, or even belt of levitation that you can get off from beating sumo in New Attnam.

We'll see....

And in response to Apple, I actually had a ring of searching equipped. I had discovered at least one mine thanks to that before, well, you know... then my long road to death became a very short one, in many pieces, scattered about the room...

Also, in that same game I got a genie following me rather early on. I decided to keep him as a servant since I wasn't yet familiar enough with the game to wish for anything useful. I just wish he hadn't kept displacing me whenever I tried to get experience killing something. When I died he had about 10-20 more kills than me...

I don't want any tips on what to wish for. I'll either find out in-game or go looking if I'm desperate (not likely, I tend to enjoy playing more than necessarily winning, so not much drive to cheat).

It's surprising how far you can get in a roguelike just using real-life common sense, when you apply it to the fantasy world. I suspect that's why some find it so difficult. They see the silliness and don't treat it seriously, then... DYWYPI? YASD.

On a side note, my trip (it's an art workshop for an art college I might try to get into) is going to keep me from being able to try out the Spore Creature Creator tomorrow. Oh well, I suppose the servers will probably crash anyway under the stress. When I come back, hopefully things will have died down.

This is probably my last post until friday/saturday.

I want to apologize my earlier statement. I Shouldn't have said anything like that, when I don't know you guys very well yet.

And Sylverone I bet you will be hooked to this game. There are so many different ways to... die.

Surprise! I seem to have a few hours to go.

Oh, I'm all to familiar with dying. I've played Nethack. And Angband. And ADOM. And Dwarf Fortress. And Incursion (pretty good, doesn't seem well-known).

I started with Dwarf Fortress, which led to nethack, and that opened the doors for pretty much every roguelike after that.

But it wasn't Dwarf Fortress that tought me that losing was fun, oh no. It was an oriental board game which few seem to actually know about, despite its number of players.

This game is known as Go (in the orient, igo, wei-chi, or baduk)

It was actually its rich history which led me into learning the game (not unlike roguelikes). And I had to put away my problems with losing to another person.

An old Go proverb (the game is possibly over 4000 years old, no joking) goes as follows:
"Lose your first fifty games as soon as possible."

I encourage anyone who enjoys strategy, or alternatively likes the concepts of zen and balance, to look the game up. There's a brilliant balance of simplicity and depth in the game. Five year olds can grasp the rules, yet no one (not even the older guys who play he game for a living and have been playing since they were very young) has truly mastered the game completely. It has never been solved by a computer, and there are people trying for sure. Deep Blue would have problems with Go, even reconfigured to play it.

Sorry for the accidental advertisement, but in any case, I'm going to go play IVAN some more...

I like board games and I'm pretty good in some of them. Never heard about Go before, but it sound interesting. I might try it some time. Well from roguelikes I haven't played anything else than IVAN, but I think I won't play anything else before I beat this game. (Some day... Some beautiful day...)

Pyk3: I wasn't trying to critisize you... I should've added some smileys. =P =) =D and so on.

Go... I've heard of it, seems like I should try it.

Ernomouse: I didn't think you critisized me. I just thought it was inappropriate to say it. Also, smileys will always save the day.

Heh, I tryed online version of Go first time in my life and won. I had no idea what I was doing, but neither had the computer AI. Well the board size was only 5 so I guess it wasn't "the real Go".

Here is link if someone wants to try it:
http://www.freegames.ws/games/boardgames/go/go.htm

Oh god, baduk. That is one crazy game. It's too complex even for my tastes, although the last I sampled it was years ago.

Pyk3, a standard board is about ten times bigger. I've seen games go for hours 'til the entire thing was filled up. In comparison, chess is, quite literally, childsplay.

Heh, I tryed it with 50 board size, but I couldn't see the pieces anymore...

Dude, do you realize how long a 30x30 game can take?

A standard 19x19 board is 351 intersections (i.e. spaces). A 30x30 board adds 539 to that, to total out at 900 intersections. Since a standard go game lasts about an hour between serious players, and since larger boards also means more complex strategy is required (or is at least potentially more involved), you could be looking at upwards of a 3-4 hour game.

Now, since the number of intersections increases exponentially with board size, you can imagine how masochistic (unless you're training for zen mastery) playing a 50x50 game is.

Also, I just got back today. Trying to get Spore to work.

Just nitpicking, the number of intersections increases quadratically (I think that's the correct word), not exponentially.

Hm... I suppose you're right. I had thought of that, but I wasn't completely sure. I just got out of Algebra 2 this year, but you know how school is. I think that the universal slogan for government funded schools should be "Learn, don't think." Unfortunately for their strong attempts, I've actually managed to survive with my brain intact.

Maybe IVAN will fix that.

On the contrary, good man. Unless you enjoy dying often, IVAN will force you to think

Very true. Actually, I'm currently in GC1 for the third time! On a bones level, no less! Just got a lot of nice equipment from a kobold and a pile of my old character's equipment. I'm heading back to town to sell some of it for a wand of fireballs.

[UPDATE!]
Alright, I ate a grey unicorn corpse in GC2, got teleportitis, blinked into a minefield, and set everything off, igniting my gunpowder backpack and breaking my wand of fireballs.

Luckily, I was wearing two rings of fire protection, so despite my demise I was relatively unhurt.