The POWDER Ascension Kit

What is the perfect equipment set? What should you have on you before attempting to kill Baezl'bub? Welcome to the guide on how to run the dungeon, what is worth keeping, and what isn't. This is the POWDER Ascension Kit.

What is an Ascension Kit?

Simply put, it is a collection of weaponry and armor which gives you the best chance of surviving what lies ahead in the dungeon. Unlike NetHack, POWDER has very few, if any constant artifacts, or named items with special characteristics. Very few items in the game consistently have the same intrinsics, and some items may not even appear in your runthrough! But there generally are some tools that will come in handy throughout your run.

The Perfect Equipment Set?

You will encounter a variety of enemies and situation throughout the game that require certain equipment to get past. Here is a list of almost everything you will need to survive in the 25 hostile floors, sorted by the type of character you are playing:

Melee-Based Characters

Required:

• A good weapon (obviously), preferably one that you're skilled with.
• A weapon which deals damage other than physical damage OR a stock of attack wands and mana potions. - For enemies like Ghosts and the Purple Tridude, who don't take physical damage. Artifacts are good, but you can make elemental weapons yourself.
• An item which grants reflect (Mirror Shield, Amulet of Reflection, or artifact) - Ignore lightning (or charge your rapiers), and fend off several other attacks.
• Items which grant resistances. In decreasing order of importance, but it's good to complete the set. Preserved corpses can help fill gaps in your equipment.
  • Poison - Don't let yourself be killed by one of the most devastating of POWDER status ailments!
  • Lightning/Electricity - Aside from lightning from Blue Dragons and Iron Golems, Blue Tridudes may cast Chain Lightning, which could annihilate you in the right circumstances. This resistance turns it into an opportunity to charge Lightning Rapiers.
  • Fire - Protects against early Imps and later Red Dragons. Helps greatly in bottling greek fire and creating flaming swords and arrows. Will also protect from flamestrikes from angry gods.
  • Acid - Aside from fending off Yellow Dragons and their acid clouds, this can let you bottle acid, then use them to halt stoning by Cockatrices.
  • Cold - Allows you to shrug off Chilling Touch from Ghosts and Liches, and wait out the Living Frosts summoned by Ice Daemons.
  • Armor/weaponry which grants breathless. Allows you to survive the poison-like "Strangled" ailment caused by Water Elementals late in the game. Also allows you to stay under water/lava/acid for extended periods of time (if you have the right resistances).
• Speed Boots - You can melee most enemies without taking a scratch if you make good use of how POWDER's Speed System works. Also useful for putting distance between you and a cockatrice or green dragon....
• An item giving a light radius, preferably something you can keep equipped. Even light radius 2 is a major advantage: besides giving you that much more warning, it lets you jump in corridors and other dark areas. More than 2 squares radius is even more helpful. Don't sacrifice too much AC for light though: you may have seen that iron golem coming for you, but the tower shield may have provided the extra AC to survive the battle.

Other items aren't quite as critical, but still recommended: In addition to the items listed above, you'll need most or all of the following:

• A silver weapon - Sears Liches, Daemons, Imps and Baezl'bub himself, and deals extra damage to them per melee. (Also harms Ghosts, but without the extra damage.) Be careful if you eat the corpses of the aforementioned enemies: you can sometimes inherit the sensitive to silver intrinsic. As of V117, save this for the vulnerable monsters, as using it indiscriminately will dull it.
• Item that grants unchanging/Amulet of Unchanging - Protects you from polymorph by a hostile god, as well as from being turned into a statue.
• Boots of Water Walking - Handy when breeding holy water or bottling lava or acid, these shine in the late game. Aside from ghost and other islands, the late caverns feature lots of water, and when battling Baezl'bub, walking over lava or water will allow you to take on Baezl'bub while avoiding most of his minions.
• Jump Boots - Almost as useful as speed or water walking, jump boots may just allow you to get out of sticky battle situations: jumping over enemies allows you to escape being cornered by a cockatrice, and repeated jumps can cover distance faster than speed boots. They also enable you to use the epic Leap Attack for extra damage. The biggest limitation is being unable to jump into darkness, but cramped quarters are also a problem.
• Wand of Teleport - Extremely useful for escaping enemies you don't want to fight. Can also be used to teleport enemies away.
• Wand of Trapping - Good for stopping enemies who are chasing you, if only temporarily. Also allows you to create an Earth Hammer if you spawn a pit and have a Wand of Digging.
• Something which allows you to dig upward (Wand of Digging, most likely). - Premature burial by Earth Elemental is not a fun way to die. (Teleportation works too.)
• Mana Potions - Can recharge wands, allowing you to have more inventory for the rest of the tools you need. Don't ever forsake this for having multiple wands ready though; "reloading" the charge on a wand will cost you a battle turn.
• An artifact which grants position fixed - Though definitely not essential, this allows you to cancel the effects of teleportation traps and will prevent you from being summoned by Purple Tridudes and Baezl'bub. Note that you get this for free on the way back up.  ;-)
• Amulet of Life Saving, or other item granting "life saved". - You will never know when a good old extra life will come in handy.

Magic-Based Characters

Magic-based characters should have the same set-up as melee based characters, with a few exceptions:

• If you are going for a purely magic based character (and not a Battle-Mage), replace the weapons with a Staff. Finding the right staff can grant you powers you don't have or can't yet learn, and will be extremely useful in becoming powerful without leveling significantly (as long as you have the mana to cast them).
• Aim for the highest AC you can get. On pure wizard characters (I've yet to see someone succeed with such a character), you'll have 15 HP for the entire game, and you'll need every bit of damage reduction you can get.
• You can forsake some of the resistances/armor for better armor by using spells:
  • Preserve will prevent stoning (as well as allow you to save food for later levels, essential if being a pure wizard/very useful if you are a necromancer)
  • Cure Poison may be a viable alternative to Poison Resistance, but the higher poisoning levels ("Deadly") can kill you if you wait too long.
• Reflection can be used offensively as well as defensively. Trap an enemy between you and a wall, and shoot a bouncable ray-based attack at it. The ray will bounce between the wall and you, striking the monster many times and increasing the damage by a lot. Even Magic Missile can do some serious damage this way if you have a high magic level.
• Fur-lined boots (if they are in your game) are the best item for cold resistance. If you aren't looking to be fast or be able to jump at any time, these serve as a usually good source of AC and a resist item.
• Torches/Other sources of light are essential to being a magic user. Strike your enemy before they can strike you. As an alternative, consider the Helm of Telepathy or Warning, especially if it is the Feathered Helm (highest helm AC, compares to Iron Helm)
• If you are a necromancer/aren't following Pax, you may want to consider becoming a Lich via the Lich Ritual. This requires that you have a Tome of Necromancy or Raise Dead, Reclaim Soul, and Dark Ritual. Liches don't need food, have resist cold, resist poison, regeneration, teleport control, and see invisible, as well as a slew of spells you may not have access to. The only drawbacks are the vulnerability to fire, which can be countered by having fire resistance (you'll just take normal damage instead of double) and the vulnerability to silver, the latter of which will rarely be a problem unless you need to wear a silver ring, the Silver Circlet or a Mirror Shield. Having some of these intrinsics will allow you to don other items which may make you essentially invincible to attacks.
• If you have a Wand of Polymorph, an item which grants polymorph control, and have seen a Ghost, you may consider becoming a Ghost. First of all, ghosts can only be attacked by elemental attacks. Ghosts can also retreat into walls to avoid damage (unless the enemy is right next to you). They have Chilling Touch and Frost Bolt as beginning spells, and have an unusual melee attack known as frighten, which sometimes paralyzes enemies. You are breathless and hungerless, but also vulnerable to silver. They also have more HP than a typical pure wizard (15 vs. 40). If you survive long enough to level up, you will also level up your base human character. If or when you die, you will retain all those levels you gained as a ghost and revert back to your normal self, making this a doubly useful form as well as providing a sort of "life saved." The only real disadvantage to being a ghost is that you can't wear any armor or weapons whatsoever. Thus, you will lose some of your resistances (though, physical resistance may be enough to make up for this).

NOTE: This piece is an opinion piece. Feel free to add to it and correct mistakes, but be aware that it is a subjective guide, not an objective one. This is a work in progress.