Gold: When and where to spend it?
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Gold: When and where to spend it?
I find myself sitting on large piles of gold in the early/mid game and rarely checking shops save for "oh hey I need water breathing for Nur". Are there any egos or usable items that I should be looking for early on to make life easier? I find that I don't value the usefulness of totems and torques as much as I probably should, and often spend turns doing 'nothing' rather than skimming through my active-use items looking for something that would suit the situation. I realize this is probably different per class/character, but I'd like some general advice.
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
Just me but I generally tend to spend gold on inscriptions (as I find the shop ones tend to be better than the ones you can find around, at least early on), or just save it for later. Especially useful if you are a dwarf.Leeron wrote:I find myself sitting on large piles of gold in the early/mid game and rarely checking shops save for "oh hey I need water breathing for Nur". Are there any egos or usable items that I should be looking for early on to make life easier? I find that I don't value the usefulness of totems and torques as much as I probably should, and often spend turns doing 'nothing' rather than skimming through my active-use items looking for something that would suit the situation. I realize this is probably different per class/character, but I'd like some general advice.
I am generally worried that I might drop a large amount of gold on one decent item and then find one as good or better as loot in a few levels, so I'd rather buy only 'extraordinary' items.
Also, spending turns doing nothing is not exactly the best thing
Later in the game there are repeatable ways of spending large amounts of gold, BTW. Of course, the amounts of gold you can get early/mid game might not really make much of a difference then, so you might as well spend it early.
EDIT If you want to play a character who can afford to spend more, try an Alchemist? Extract Gems makes them quite richer than other classes at around the same level.
ToME online profile: http://te4.org/users/zonk
Addons (most likely obsolete): Wights, Trolls, Starting prodigy, Alternate save/resistance system
Addons (most likely obsolete): Wights, Trolls, Starting prodigy, Alternate save/resistance system
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
Haha yeah, I'm not literally doing nothing, but I feel like there are many times that switching to and activating a torque or totem would be much superior to whatever else I decided to do. I always used to have trouble with the elementals in Derth with melee characters because I extremely undervalued the damage reduction of a charged psionic shield torque coupled with a little bit of lightning resist. The more I play the more I realize the value of these items that I found myself ignoring as a new player.
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
Defensive torques are pretty great. The +armor and hardiness totems too, especially if your hardiness is already decent. So yeas you are missing out if you don't use them much. Unless you just have better things to put in your tool slot.
ToME online profile: http://te4.org/users/zonk
Addons (most likely obsolete): Wights, Trolls, Starting prodigy, Alternate save/resistance system
Addons (most likely obsolete): Wights, Trolls, Starting prodigy, Alternate save/resistance system
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
A torque of Psychoportation is very often a great purchase, they're usually dirt cheap and absolute lifesavers.
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
I tend to save up for Urgol's randarts, probably more than I should. If I'm really desperate I'll buy inscriptions and I might consider buying a psychoportation torque on an antimagic build, but I don't swap charms so anything for that slot is competing with artifacts and randarts that give passive benefits. I don't generally even look in the shops other than Urgol unless I'm looking for something specific like an inscription or psychoportation torque.
Digitochracy
n. 1. technocracy. 2. government by the numbers. 3. rule by people with the longest fingers.
n. 1. technocracy. 2. government by the numbers. 3. rule by people with the longest fingers.
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
Gloves of Dispersion are extremely useful if your build doesn't have another method to get rid of sustains. They are rare enough that I've played whole games without seeing a pair, so for some builds I will buy them more or less on sight.
Long range detection (Track) can also be quite useful and items are somewhat rare, so in higher difficulties or with squishy builds it can be useful to buy appropriate items.
Long range detection (Track) can also be quite useful and items are somewhat rare, so in higher difficulties or with squishy builds it can be useful to buy appropriate items.
Re: Gold: When and where to spend it?
This is the general overview of how I spend money in the game. I often play on Insane or Nightmare difficulty, so that might have some minor impact.
1. If I'm not an Archmage, don't put any talents in skills that use magic resources. Immediately exit to the world map and go to Zigur. This isn't possible with certain races or classes that have a different starting zone. Archmages can't buy from Zigur regardless of what they do, so don't bother with them.
2. If I'm playing a class that doesn't have good starting offensive skills and/or lacks ranged attacks, I try to buy a mindblast torque in Zigur. If I'm dead set on getting mindblast, I'll keep rerolling the character until I find one for sale. Otherwise, I'll buy whatever torque/totem that's cheap and useful. Psychoportation and kinetic torque are good options.
3. If I can afford inscriptions, I check all towns to see what they have available. On Insane+, O usually have 50+ gold from loot from drops after drowning NPCs, so you can usually buy something right away. On Normal/Nightmare, I probably need to clear Trollmire before I have enough gold. During this stage, I want wild (physical and/or mental) infusion, movement infusion with 5+ turns of stun immunity, shielding rune with 100+ hp for 4+ turns, or teleport rune with the highest range you can find. It really depends on race/class.
4. After getting all the inscriptions I need, that are actually available in shops, I look for cheap +hp items. I can often find cloaks and belts with 30+ hp for about 50 gold. If I'm playing a weapon-based class, I consider buying a weapon upgrade in Zigur or Last Hope. Most equipment slots aren't worth buying at this point because I'll fill them with random drops and they aren't essential to my success in the short term. If there was a store that sold lanterns, I would definitely look there because light radius is critical.
5. If my class doesn't have Technique/Combat Training unlocked by default, I buy it from one of the weapon/armor stores in Last Hope for 50 gold. If I need another unlockable category like Spell/Staff Combat or Wild-gift/Mindstar Mastery, I buy that from Angolwen or Zigur once I have enough gold.
6. Once I unlock Angolwen, I look for a clairvoyance wand if I haven't found one yet. I also check for runes/infusions.
7. If I haven't found an undead/waterbreathing item by the time I want to clear Lake of Nur, I check the shops for one of these items. I don't like to spend more than 100 gold on this, but I can often find one for about 50 gold or so.
8. When I'm around level 25-30 and have 300+ gold, I check all the relevant shops for any items that look particularly good. It's not worth just buying everything I can afford because I want that money to buy randarts later, but sometimes I can find really good items like gloves of dispersion or even some fixedarts. Check the shops again when they get updated at various stages of the game.
9. After coming back from the East, I buy randarts from the merchant for critical gear slots that need an upgrade. Any gold I accumulate after this point generally goes toward buying more randarts, unless I find a good items or inscription for sales after the shops update.
1. If I'm not an Archmage, don't put any talents in skills that use magic resources. Immediately exit to the world map and go to Zigur. This isn't possible with certain races or classes that have a different starting zone. Archmages can't buy from Zigur regardless of what they do, so don't bother with them.
2. If I'm playing a class that doesn't have good starting offensive skills and/or lacks ranged attacks, I try to buy a mindblast torque in Zigur. If I'm dead set on getting mindblast, I'll keep rerolling the character until I find one for sale. Otherwise, I'll buy whatever torque/totem that's cheap and useful. Psychoportation and kinetic torque are good options.
3. If I can afford inscriptions, I check all towns to see what they have available. On Insane+, O usually have 50+ gold from loot from drops after drowning NPCs, so you can usually buy something right away. On Normal/Nightmare, I probably need to clear Trollmire before I have enough gold. During this stage, I want wild (physical and/or mental) infusion, movement infusion with 5+ turns of stun immunity, shielding rune with 100+ hp for 4+ turns, or teleport rune with the highest range you can find. It really depends on race/class.
4. After getting all the inscriptions I need, that are actually available in shops, I look for cheap +hp items. I can often find cloaks and belts with 30+ hp for about 50 gold. If I'm playing a weapon-based class, I consider buying a weapon upgrade in Zigur or Last Hope. Most equipment slots aren't worth buying at this point because I'll fill them with random drops and they aren't essential to my success in the short term. If there was a store that sold lanterns, I would definitely look there because light radius is critical.
5. If my class doesn't have Technique/Combat Training unlocked by default, I buy it from one of the weapon/armor stores in Last Hope for 50 gold. If I need another unlockable category like Spell/Staff Combat or Wild-gift/Mindstar Mastery, I buy that from Angolwen or Zigur once I have enough gold.
6. Once I unlock Angolwen, I look for a clairvoyance wand if I haven't found one yet. I also check for runes/infusions.
7. If I haven't found an undead/waterbreathing item by the time I want to clear Lake of Nur, I check the shops for one of these items. I don't like to spend more than 100 gold on this, but I can often find one for about 50 gold or so.
8. When I'm around level 25-30 and have 300+ gold, I check all the relevant shops for any items that look particularly good. It's not worth just buying everything I can afford because I want that money to buy randarts later, but sometimes I can find really good items like gloves of dispersion or even some fixedarts. Check the shops again when they get updated at various stages of the game.
9. After coming back from the East, I buy randarts from the merchant for critical gear slots that need an upgrade. Any gold I accumulate after this point generally goes toward buying more randarts, unless I find a good items or inscription for sales after the shops update.