5 ms·

I think my favorite games are when I don't have a wand of wishing, but I still end up obtaining most of a decent ascension kit, anyway. It's very satisfying in

I think my favorite games are when I don't have a wand of wishing, but I still end up obtaining most of a decent ascension kit, anyway. It's very satisfying in a way that few "grinding" games are. Especially that moment of getting dragon armor "the hard way". I think knowing what the ascension kit contains doesn't necessarily break the fun or the challenge of the game. It just makes it possible to win (whereas, while flying blind, you probably won't win the game given a normal human life span and a normal working adult's amount of available free time and willingness to keep playing and experiencing YASD after YASD). I've seen folks suggesting NetHack is not a good game, because it requires so much spoiling in order to be winnable. But, I kinda enjoy reading the lore. It's part of the game for me; just because it happens on the internet rather than in the game terminal doesn't make it less fun.

thaumasiotes 11y ago
> I've seen folks suggesting NetHack is not a good game, because it requires so much spoiling in order to be winnable. In fact, there is one such person commenting here! To them, learning what can happen in the game is cheating: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11523094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11523094 This makes all the sense, to me, of excoriating people who want to know the rules of chess before starting to play as "cheaters".
- agentgt 11y ago
  I sort of agree with your point but your analogy with Chess is not a good one. Chess is played with another person. Not that it is possible but reading spoilers and looking at source code is sort of like cracking open the persons brain to figure out what sort of general strategies and tactics they will use on you... it is not equivalent to learning the rules chess.
  - thaumasiotes 11y ago
    > reading spoilers and looking at source code is sort of like cracking open the persons brain to figure out what sort of general strategies and tactics they will use on you... No it isn't. That would be running the game in a debugger so you know what will happen. Learning the rules of nethack just tells you what can happen; this is absolutely the norm for everything else you do.
kzrdude 11y ago
One metagame I enjoyed a lot was to puzzle out scrolls and potions. It requires a lot of spoiler knowledge, but it's still a puzzle.
Nadya 11y ago
Slightly off-topic tangent: >I think knowing what the ascension kit contains doesn't necessarily break the fun or the challenge of the game. It just makes it possible to win (whereas, while flying blind, you probably won't win the game given a normal human life span and a normal working adult's amount of available free time and willingness to keep playing and experiencing YASD after YASD). I didn't know what "YASD" meant so had to search it. Neat! I learned something new. And on that same note, there is an entire game based entirely around YASD/YAAD! "I Wanna Be The Guy" a game about dying in a million different unpredictable and stupid ways combined with many ways to kill yourself through user error or forgetfulness. I'm not sure if the completion of IWBTG is at all comparable with NetHack as I'm not too familiar with NetHack.
- lfowles 11y ago
  It's also about memorizing the tricks. I would recommend finding videos of it from Awesome Games Done Quick or Summer Games Done Quick. Bonus! An even more challenging variant exists: I Wanna Be The Boshi. Here's the Boshi speedrun, it's entertaining even if I would never want to play myself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8GlqtSJxmk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8GlqtSJxmk

thaumasiotes 11y ago

> I've seen folks suggesting NetHack is not a good game, because it requires so much spoiling in order to be winnable. In fact, there is one such person commenting here! To them, learning what can happen in the game is cheating: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11523094 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11523094 This makes all the sense, to me, of excoriating people who want to know the rules of chess before starting to play as "cheaters".

agentgt 11y ago
I sort of agree with your point but your analogy with Chess is not a good one. Chess is played with another person. Not that it is possible but reading spoilers and looking at source code is sort of like cracking open the persons brain to figure out what sort of general strategies and tactics they will use on you... it is not equivalent to learning the rules chess.
- thaumasiotes 11y ago
  > reading spoilers and looking at source code is sort of like cracking open the persons brain to figure out what sort of general strategies and tactics they will use on you... No it isn't. That would be running the game in a debugger so you know what will happen. Learning the rules of nethack just tells you what can happen; this is absolutely the norm for everything else you do.

kzrdude 11y ago

One metagame I enjoyed a lot was to puzzle out scrolls and potions. It requires a lot of spoiler knowledge, but it's still a puzzle.

Nadya 11y ago

Slightly off-topic tangent: >I think knowing what the ascension kit contains doesn't necessarily break the fun or the challenge of the game. It just makes it possible to win (whereas, while flying blind, you probably won't win the game given a normal human life span and a normal working adult's amount of available free time and willingness to keep playing and experiencing YASD after YASD). I didn't know what "YASD" meant so had to search it. Neat! I learned something new. And on that same note, there is an entire game based entirely around YASD/YAAD! "I Wanna Be The Guy" a game about dying in a million different unpredictable and stupid ways combined with many ways to kill yourself through user error or forgetfulness. I'm not sure if the completion of IWBTG is at all comparable with NetHack as I'm not too familiar with NetHack.

lfowles 11y ago
It's also about memorizing the tricks. I would recommend finding videos of it from Awesome Games Done Quick or Summer Games Done Quick. Bonus! An even more challenging variant exists: I Wanna Be The Boshi. Here's the Boshi speedrun, it's entertaining even if I would never want to play myself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8GlqtSJxmk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8GlqtSJxmk