General Gameplay Guide (How to beat your first run on any character)

### **Introduction:**

If you're looking for specific game plans for a particular class, check out Guides to see if they have a class guide for you. There is also a tactics guide here which talks more in detail about general manipulation of the enemy AI.

### **Essential mechanics:**

This is not a comprehensive list of mechanics in the game, but just the ones you need in order to win a game.

1. Protection - Every point in protection reduces physical damage by 0 to 1 point.
2. Resistance - The first point in each resistance reduces 40% of damage up to each resistance. Try to get a point in every resistance, or prioritize (Fire > Ice > Toxic > Electric) with rings and Tome of defense.
3. Food - Guaranteed to appear every 4 floors or with merchants when you encounter them
4. Potions - When you drink potion of health or energy potion at max HP/MP, you gain +4/+1 HP or MP respectively.
5. Charms + Enhancement - When you enhance a charm, it adds 1 charge and refills the charges completely. This is extremely useful when you have a scroll of enhancement on hand as it means that it's possible to quickly use multiple charges of your charms which can make or break a fight.
6. Regeneration - Usually you gain 1 HP / 10 steps, each point of regen you get reduces the number of steps you need in order to get 1 HP back.

### **Game plan: Survive**

HP is **KING** - Invest first few points into Fortitude even if you're range class / Spell-based class. You will want to get 50 HP minimum, typically this means 5 points in fortitude with a few health potions which you pick up. For melee classes, I'd recommend investing all points into fortitude, as you will need the HP pool to face tank monsters when rushing to corners/corridors

* Allows you to walk around more when hungry, amplified even more when you chain health fountains
* Prevents 1 shots as ranged classes

Equipment does not grant you HP, only protection/resistances from rings or offensive stats, this means that if you want to survive the run, you will need the HP pool to maximize the effect of your equipment protecting you.

### **Rough** **Floor guides:**

Floor 1 - 4: Every class should be able to deal with the first 4 floors with ease, explore the floor as possible to collect everything. If you encounter a Well of wishing/Transference table/Enhancement table during these floors do not use it yet until you entered a 9+ floor so that you have higher chance to get a +3 or higher equipment that you need.

Floor 5-8: These floors get a little harder as monsters come in bigger packs and there are new effects to be aware of on the ground such as grass/oil with fire as well as electric with water. However, should still be able to fully explore all the floors completely.

Floor 9: This floor is special as there will always be a merchant as well as 4 bookshelves and 3 crystal chests. Remember to hover over the crystal chests before choosing which one to open.

Floor 10: If you have found a well of wishing in previous floors, time to double back and use well of wishing to obtain equipment that you need to complete your set. Priority would be: Weapon > Charm > Armor (If you are still using starter weapon of your class at this point, it is a good time to swap it out after floor 9).

Floor 11-15: Take your time with these floors and remember to clear out the entire area next to the staircase to the next floor as you might need to double back and heal up with shift click if need be.

Floor 16: Before entering floor 16, if you are holding a scroll of hellfire or a blink scroll/blink charm, once you open the stone gates and clear the initial mobs in the room, you can rush towards the goblet for a quick win. If you do not have a scroll of hellfire or a blink scroll/blink charm, drag out enemies out of the room onto the bridge in order not to get swarmed by monsters.

### **Well of Wishing and Acquirement Scrolls:**

More indepth information here

Choose items in this order:

1. Weapon - Damage scales incredibly well with a better weapon. Getting a better weapon is the main priority.
2. Charms - Good charms can save or ruin your run
	1. S+ tier charms: Blink charm (Having a +2 or +3 Blink charm during the run can save your run as you are able to blink even when webbed, which is what usually prevents you from running away), with 2 blinks you can skip the entire 16th floor, which is the hardest floor of all, which is why it is the best charm to get during a run. (However, this is removed in the steam version and is only available on the web version)
	2. A tier charms: Confusion charm / Charm of healing / Charm of energy (If you are a spell class, otherwise it is worthless)
	3. B Tier charms: Damage charms (Only exception is charm of infectious disease, do not get infectious disease as it is too easy to suicide using it as your character can get infected as well)
	4. C Tier charms: Passive charms - while these charms, seem good on paper, having charms with active effects are infinitely better as you can avoid fights when you do not have charges, which is the trade off of having passive charms, which are always good.
3. Here decision making gets a bit more complex:
	1. If you are missing 3 or more armor slots -> Armor **survivability is king.** (Head, Body, Boots, Gloves are all armor slots)
	2. If you are missing 1 or more suitable ring slots -> Ring, generally rings are always good as it is quite common to get resistance rings which can help prevent magic damage.
4. If you have most armor slots, both rings and a decent upgraded weapon (+2 or +3) then:
	1. Scrolls - If you have everything else i.e. 2 food at floor 15, a few wands in inventory and your equipment is looking good you can try your luck to get scrolls or either hellfire, blink or enhancement. When you get better at the game, the priority is weapon -> scrolls.
	2. Food - If you are missing 1 armor slot, but you are running low on food it might be good to get food instead of hoping that you get the correct armor slot that is useful for your class.
	3. Wand - If you still have a wishing well and you're past floor 10, then get a wand that is +3. Most wands are usually useful, so this is almost never a bad call to make.