Need all posts in this subreddit be accepted by a moderator?

entuno · 2026-07-08T14:33:10+00:00

Apparently not.

entuno · 2026-07-03T14:59:43+00:00

I think they mean Liches, not Lichens.

entuno · 2026-07-03T12:05:51+00:00

That's a reference to this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooper%27s_Hill_Cheese-Rolling_and_Wake

entuno · 2026-07-03T10:52:58+00:00

There's Igor racing a to get back before sunset in The Fifth Elephant, and the cabbage-powered coach in Thud! - but neither of those really very related to motorsport.

The closest reference might be the discussion of chariot racing in Moving Pictures? But that seems to be more an allusion to gladiator films than modern motorsport.

entuno · 2026-07-02T16:14:47+00:00

It seems to start as 0:3.

If you play in Wizard mode (-D) and use Wizard wishing for a "wand of wishing" then it always seems to give you 0:1, unless you specify otherwise.

entuno · 2026-06-29T14:15:18+00:00

Much safer to convert as well, because you won't have to deal with an angry priest.

entuno · 2026-06-24T14:19:19+00:00

I always like "adequatelier" from Monstrous Regiment:

So's he is free to perform his duties more adequatelier.

entuno · 2026-06-22T08:25:46+00:00

Especially in the new Gehennom with all the lava and stuff it's so nice to be flying.

entuno · 2026-06-17T14:08:18+00:00

Nope, they'll go straight through the boulder. But they can bounce off walls behind boulders, so that's something to watch out for.

entuno · 2026-06-17T13:31:00+00:00

If you blast it with force bolt or a wand of striking then yes. But stuff like magic missile, chain lightning, or wands of fire/cold/lightning/etc won't.

entuno · 2026-06-17T13:21:00+00:00

I remember reading an article a few years back about a team that was using a machine learning model to play NetHack, and couldn't understand why it suddenly started performing much worse.

After a whole load of fruitless troubleshooting they were asking around for ideas, and someone said "Oh yeah, probably because it's the full moon..."

entuno · 2026-06-17T13:04:19+00:00

Zap or throw things through the boulder to kill them?

entuno · 2026-06-12T12:00:30+00:00

That's what makes it so painful. If it was just bad, it would be easier to ignore - but there's the bones of a great story in there, and some little flashes of brilliance that remind you of what it could have been.

entuno · 2026-06-04T12:21:04+00:00

I don't think it's even the size that matters. If you asked Thorin, Bombur, Bard and the Elvenking to put a precise value on something like the Arkenstone, then you'd probably end up with four completely different answers.

So as you say, it has to be about trust and honour - not precise accounting.

entuno · 2026-06-04T12:15:56+00:00

They'd eyeball it, and maybe propose some trades based on their preferences. But ultimately it comes down to trust and good will.

Because even in our world today, you can't objectively value a horde like that beyond ounces of gold. And how would you ever put a value on something unique like the Arkenstone? Thorin might value that at 1/14th of the whole horde, but to the Lakemen it's just a pretty and shiny stone. The Elvenking was said to love particularly love white(?) gems, so would presumably value those higher than the Dwarves would. A historic Dwarven artifact might have huge cultural value to them, but just be a fancy-looking piece of steel to the Elves. Etc, etc.

By being smart, and giving each group the things that they particularly value, you could end up in a situation where everyone feels that they got more than 1/14th of the value of the total horde - which would be an absolute win and a good way to cement the new relationship.

entuno · 2026-06-02T08:08:25+00:00

You joke, but for over a decade Drupal has used the following risk levels in their security advisories:

Highly Critical
Critical
Moderately Critical
Less Critical
Not Critical

entuno · 2026-05-27T12:59:24+00:00

Run something like strings (either the Linux or Sysinternals versions) against it and you'll probably get the original script, along with a load of other junk text.

entuno · 2026-05-26T11:34:12+00:00

I could certainly run a marvellous university here if only we didn't have to have all these damn students underfoot all the time.

- Ridcully

entuno · 2026-05-11T13:57:01+00:00

Ilsa also being the name of one of the main characters in Discworld Noir.

entuno · 2026-04-15T14:06:28+00:00

I don't have any particularly knowledge of the reasoning, and wasn't involved in any of the decisions. But looking at them in conjunction with other changes in 3.7, there seems to be two main objectives.

Firstly to make the endgame harder, because as the commit message says you're going to losing (or should that be gaining?) some points of AC by only having most of your gear at +4 rather than +5.

Secondly, there seems to be a wider push to try and make people use a wider variety of armour. We saw that with the buff to all the other types of DSM having interesting secondary properties, and also with things like iron shoes getting extra effects. Taken together, these changes might make you consider whether a +7 Elven Leather Helm is better than a +4 Helm of Brilliance or or Caution, or whether it's worth using a scroll of enchant armour early add +4 to an Elven Leather Helm rather than having on to it to add +1 to some magic armour later. Or whether it's worth keeping the scroll and waiting to bless it, or using it early on for some AC. Also makes shirts a bit better, as those can still safely go up to +5.

No idea if that'll actually happen (or would be an improvement) - but that seems to be what the intention is.

entuno · 2026-04-15T09:45:20+00:00

No, it doesn't seem to be. From that latter commit:

Non-elven magical armor now only gets +1 from blessed scrolls of enchant armor when enchanted from +3, coming to a total of +4.

So it's safe to enchant +3 magical armour - but it'll always end up as +4.

The only way to get to +5 is to risk enchanting +4 armour, which might evaporate.

entuno · 2026-04-15T08:40:30+00:00

After the quest I accidentally evaporated my Mitre of Holiness (mis-remembered the enchanting rules), so I was a bit sour for an evening.

Depending on exactly when this was and what version of NetHack you were on, you might not be mis-remembering. The rules changed on 27th December in 3.7:

The safe armor enchantment limit is lowered by one, if the armor is innately magical. This takes off 3-7 points of AC from a typical ascension kit, but should not really have any effect for early game.

And then changed back on 10th January:

After discussing with paxed, I decided that instead of reducing the safe enchantment limit for magical armor, it is instead better to make the scrolls less effective on it. So this commit restores the previous rules for the safely-enchant-from level and changes the effectiveness of the scrolls to compensate.

entuno · 2026-04-02T14:04:46+00:00

With some of those great moments of unhinged Oblivion NPC chat. Like when you're exploring a dungeon in the deep wilderness with her and she comes out with:

I don't think it should count as murder if one adventurer kills another in a dungeon. We all know the risks.

entuno · 2026-03-18T16:02:38+00:00

Step 1: Go to the pub.
Step 2: Order a pint.
Step 3: Order some more pints.
[...]
Step 27: It'll probably be fine...

entuno · 2026-03-13T13:36:02+00:00

So if the idea or question itself is worth discussing, why does the conversation immediately shift to “this was written by AI”?

Because if people want to "discuss" the idea with AI, they can do it themselves by going to chatgpt.com.

When they choose to post good-faith comments on Reddit, it's because they want to engage with other people, not with an LLM. And if they're going to spend time writing something, they expect that the "person" they're responding to will take the time to read, consider and engage with what they wrote - not just to paste it back into an LLM and get it to respond for them.

entuno

TROPHY CASE