Roguelike - Dungeons of Dredmor

Since several people have picked this up recently, I figured I’d pass on some black pearls of sagacity from my ~80 hours of playing ;)

General tips:
*Start on Easy. Weaker monsters, faster health regen, more money. Permadeath is up to you; “Dying is fun!” is one of the game’s mottos after all :P Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion automatically gives you new skills/items/enemies just by installing it; if you toggle it on at the game start, the dungeon will have an extra 5 floors too.
*Every character can use every item. Warriors can use wands, Wizards can use plate mail, no level requirements or anything. The only minor exception is character who attempt to use two melee weapons (Sword/Axe/Mace/Staff) receive a damage penalty unless they take the Dual Wield skill; but if one (or both!) of your hands is a Shield/Orb/Spellbook, there’s no penalty.
*Every time you level up, you gain +1 to all of the 6 main attributes (Burliness, Nimbleness, Sagacity, Caddishness, Savvy, and Stubbornness), and an extra 3 stats based on the “class” of skill you chose that level. Warrior skills grant an extra +1 to Burl, Cad, and Stubborn; Rogues to Nimble, Cad, and Savvy; and Wizard to Sag, Savvy, and Stubborn. Thus Warrior-heavy builds will have a lot more health naturally, while Wizards have more mana, etc.
*You can have Food and Booze regenerating at the same time. Eating while digesting (or drinking while…metabolizing) will increase the duration of the regen, but the health/mana gained per turn is the same.
*Traps tend to hurt. Your Trap Skill can be used to attempt to disarm them; if you fail it explodes in your face, but success will give you XP, and if your skill is high enough you’ll PICK UP the trap so you can sell it or try to lure a monster into it somewhere else :D If you lack trap skill, you can use teleports to go through it, summons/enemies to set them off (flying monsters pass over them though), knockbacks to shove them out of your way…or healing to undo the damage. >_< Trap Sight lets you see and identify traps from farther away, and also works on invisible enemies like the Diggle Commandos!
*Thrown weapons get your bonus Melee damage added, while Crossbows get their crossbow damage added. Both are useful for softening up tough foes, whether you’re a swordsman or a wizard.
*Krong Anvils have a ~70% chance to add a bonus and a ~30% chance to add a penalty. The bonuses win out on average, but you might want a “plan B” (ie, if you want to Krong your pants, you might want a second pair within reach if your first one gets a nasty curse).
*Lutefisk shrines give random loot, but the probability maxes out at 500 Lutefisk (which is hard to do unless you have Burglary and/or grind up all your Meat and Cheese).
*Every Tome (except the Little Black Book) has a chance to cast a minor spell when you attack. Some weapons do as well!

Mushrooms – The tooltips for these are rather vague (but more helpful than older roguelikes :P ), the list is:
Azure Mob-Bennet – Grants bonus Sagacity for 63 turns
Fairywodger – heals, stacks with food for bonus regen
Fell Truffle – bonus melee damage for 6 attacks
Greedy Blungecap – vampiric melee attacks for 19 turns
Grunge Ear – bonus defense for 60 turns
Inky Hoglantern – Stealth for 6 turns (sight radius reduced while stealthed)
Lobstermane Fungus – bonus defense until you are hit 5 times
Mud Wen – POISONOUS! Used for crafting
Night Cap – restores mana, stacks with booze for bonus regen
Odius Puffball – adds 3 throwing weapons to your inventory, which explode on hit into a cloud of Confusing spores
Plumber’s Agaric – bonus Burliness for 63 turns
The Prince – bonus max health until you are hit 5 times

Skills – (full list can be found on wiki, but that’s not always up to date)

WARRIOR
Swords – Grants bonus stats (mostly damage, accuracy, and Counter) when you have at least one Sword equipped, as well as some special attacks that can be used regardless of weapon choice.
Axes – Grants bonus stats (mostly damage, accuracy, and Crit) when you have at least one Axe equipped, as well as some special attacks that can be used regardless of weapon choice.
Maces – Grants bonus stats (mostly damage and accuracy) when you have at least one Mace equipped, as well as some special attacks that can be used regardless of weapon choice (the knockback is especially helpful!)
Staves – Grants bonus stats (a mix of damage, defense, and wizard stuff) when you have at least one Staff equipped, as well as some special attacks that can be used regardless of weapon choice.
Unarmed Combat – Gives a ton of bonus stats (damage, accuracy, dodge, etc) so long as you do not have a Sword/Axe/Mace/Staff equipped (Crossbows/Thrown/Orbs/Spellbooks/Shields are fair game, even if you have a shield in both hands!), as well as some passive and active special attacks (including two knockbacks).
Dual Wielding – Passively removes the 36% damage penalty for wielding two Sword/Axe/Mace/Staff, and gives some stats (mostly Counter) and some passive specials. Also gives you the Sword/Axe/Mace/Staff mastery bonuses for EACH weapon; Dual Wield + Sword Mastery + 2 swords gives you double the Sword Mastery bonuses, or Dual Wield + Axe Mastery + Mace Mastery + 1axe and 1mace gives you both the Axe Mastery and Mace Mastery bonuses.
Shield Bearer – Passively gives some bonus stats (tons of Block!) and defensive specials (including a Knockback!), and some active specials. Currently works even when not using a shield; that will be patched at some point.
Berserker Rage – Passively gives some bonus stats (including Magic Resist!), and a chance when attacking or attacked to get even more bonus stats (mostly damage and armor), as well as an active that gives +100% crit for one attack.
Master of Arms – Passively gives some bonus stats (health and armor) and some defensive passives and specials.
Smithing – Passively gives some bonus stats (lots of Burliness, some Trap skill, some damage and defense) and allows you to Craft better weapons, armor, and Throwing weapons. (Crafting will be much better in the Wizardlands expansion August 1st!)
Big Game Hunter (Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion) – Passively gives some bonus stats (mostly Accuracy, also some nice Sight!), some bonuses when fighting animals, and a very nice summon. The summoned Diggles can be Butchered for meat and XP :P
Killer Vegan (Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion) – Gives a TON of bonus stats (33 health! among others) and some okay passive and active skills. If you perform a Melee attack on an Animal, or eat any Meat or Cheese you get some nasty long-lasting debuffs…but your ultimate skill removes all debuffs, and you can kill animals with ranged attacks and spells at no penalty. And animals will never attack you (only Counter attack if you melee them), so you can get their XP and loot quite safely :p
Clockwork Knight (FREE You Have to Name the Expansion Pack expansion) – Gives small bonuses to Smithing and Tinkering craft skills, and has actives and passives that scale off of those craft skills. Also has some strong melee bonuses.
Battle Geology (FREE You Have to Name the Expansion Pack expansion) – Haven’t used it yet, but it gives a variety of defensive, offensive, and stunning spells for melee combat.

ROGUE
Archery – Grants bonus stats (mostly damage and accuracy) which last I checked applied whether you had a Crossbow or not. Also increases the chance your Bolts survive their impact (so you can loot them and shoot them again!), and gives them a chance to knockback and bleed.
Thrown Weapons – Grants bonus stats (not as much as other weapons) which always apply. Also increases the chance your thrown weapons survive their impact (so you can loot them and throw them again!) and gives them a chance to bleed, and gives a special activated knockback.
Artful Dodger – Gives a ton of bonus dodge and bonuses when you dodge; also a very handy teleport called Knight’s Leap, which lets you move like a Knight in chess on a fairly short cooldown. Transdimentional Dodge can sometimes save you and sometimes kill you (or trap you behind a wall…), so personally I’d toggle that skill off when playing Permadeath (or carry Spatial Instability Potions to escape…which can do the same thing haha)
Perception – Grants bonus stats (mostly accuracy, Sight, and Trap Sight) and a handy active attack. Also passively causes enemies to drop more loot, which is especially helpful for fueling Crafting skills.
Burglary – Grants bonus stats (dodge, Trap Skill and Trap Sight), gives you some free items (especially Lockpicks for extra XP and chest loot!), and moderate cooldown actives for a Root, a Stealth, and a Teleport. Useful for any character!
Assassination – Grants bonus stats (mostly crit) and adds random stuns and bleeds to attacks.
Fungal Arts – Passively gives a little resist, and causes slain enemies to often sprout Mushrooms! Also gives some handy summons, and passively adds poison clouds to your melee attacks (BE CAREFUL if the shop keeper is nearby!)
Archeology – Passively gives a few stats (including Trap Skill and Trap Sight) and a free Fedora hat. Active skills let you turn Artifacts into XP, aoe Knockback, randomize an Artifact’s stats, or recharge an Anvil of Krong (there’s a very famous screenshot on the forums of a guy who Krong’d his fedora 60+ times…the bonuses and penalties no longer fit on the screen!). The XP skill is very popular.
Tinkering – Passively gives some stats (A HUGE amount of Trap skill), and increases your Tinkering craft skill, which mostly makes Bolts, but also some grenades, traps, even weapons and armor.
Werediggle (Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion) – Odd skill. Lets you shapeshift into a Diggle occasionally, which loses most of your human spells and stats but gets new ones. Not recommended for noobs.
Piracy (Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion) – Gives some bonus stats and a smattering of active combat skills. Also passively loots extra Gems from enemies, which can be used for crafting!
Demonologist (Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion) – First 3 levels grant bonus defensive stats and specials…then the rest of the tree removes a ton of Radiant resist (Beware the fish enemies!) and gives more offensive stuff (including a summon). Celestial Circle is an amazing defensive skill for melee fighters, and many people don’t go past that skill.
Rogue Scientist (FREE You Have to Name the Expansion Pack expansion) –Gives bonuses to many crafting skills, and has actives improved by your crafting (such as a poison bomb improved by your Alchemy). Currently glitchy (if you throw the poison bomb at an enemy rather than an empty floor space, it can insta-kill you on the ricochet) and a little weak.

WIZARD
Vampirism – Currently a very weak skill, going to be changed in a patch. It removes your ability to use Health Regen or Food, but lets you eat corpses and heal off of melee attacks (and healing spells/mushrooms/potions still work). Also grants some okay passive and active skills. Avoid for now.
Golemancy – Has some nice summons, some okay nukes, and lets you build (temporary) or destroy (permanently!) walls. With enough planning (and mana!) this can keep monsters at a safe distance.
Fleshsmithing – Grants some early summons and heals, and later has some moderate poison clouds. Nice for melee or ranged.
Mathemagic – Gives a large number of debuffs and DOTs (Damage over Time), but no AOE. Most importantly are the two teleports; Froda’s can send you through walls even if you can’t see your (RANDOM) destination, while Euclid’s is 100% reliable so long as you can see your target.
Psionics – Very versatile tree, with AOE Knockback, a heal, a Stun, and a very mana-efficient nuke.
Necronomiconomics – Power at a price, Necro spells are very powerful, but drain health (some is reduced by Necro resist!!!) and apply debuffs to yourself. Has a lifesteal spell that’s probably better than the entire Vampirism tree, for melee fighters. Commonly combined with Astrology/Emomancy (for extra Necro resist) and/or Emomancy/Veganism for the curse removal. DO NOT CAST THE ULTIMATE TOO CLOSE; like seriously, 7 squares away and be ready to run lol.
Viking Wizardry – Two powerful buffs for melee fighters, and some very solid ranged nukes and disables.
Astrology - A smattering of buffs and debuffs…and the ultimate spell is one of the most powerful AOE nukes in the game.
Promethean Magic – Fire! As expected this gives a lot of aoe burning damage, but you might not expect the (early!) summon to be extremely good, or the early spells to be so powerful; getting the Rune and the Dragon alone makes this a great mage tree.
Magic Training – Gives some passive mana bonuses (most notably the ultimate giving 5 Savvy to reduce your spell costs!), an active silence, and active mana regen (which semi-blinds you, be careful if you aren’t hiding behind a summon).
Blood Mage – Passively gives you mana and/or spell damage as you kill stuff and/or melee attack. Also lets you craft powerful potions (which debuffs you until you drink it, as it’s made OUT OF YOU), and reduces your Radiant resist (beware the Fish!).
Ley Walker – Lots of passive mana regen, and an expensive teleport. Most wizards will want at least one of this/Magic Training/Blood Mage.
Alchemy – Some passive stats, mostly increases your Alchemy crafting skill, to get more health/mana/buff potions, and a few pieces of equipment (some very nice Staves!).
Wandcrafting – Probably the weakest crafting skill, but semi-useful for melee fighters who want access to some ranged spells and buffs/debuffs.
Emomancy (Realm of the Diggle Gods expansion) – A smattering of buffs, debuffs, heals, and nukes. Less raw power than most wizard skills, but nice support when combined with one of the heavier hitters.
Warlockery (FREE You Have to Name the Expansion Pack expansion) – A complicated skillset for magical melee fighters, which given enough mana can outfight a more traditional warrior. ARCANE CAPACITOR is currently BUGGED, avoid casting that spell unless you like blowing yourself up.

…Whew. Not sure which of these are changing in the August 1st expansion, so hopefully this wasn’t a waste of time :P They're adding at least 3 new skills too.

And finally, a spoiler for those brave enough to reach the end but not brave enough to go in blind:
Dredmor himself is a powerful caster (though luckily he does not cast every turn), with high spell resist, armor, and moderate melee damage. He is most vulnerable to Radiant and Aetherial damage, and can be set on fire, bleed, and be silenced. Should you find any items along the way that can inflict those (such as Molotov Cocktails or Clockwork Sawblades), they might be worth hanging on to if you think you’ll reach the last floor! Along with ways to retreat/heal safely so you don’t get zapped for 60 damage.
 
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Marinus said:
By the way - you can use [s-poiler] and [/s-poiler] (without the dashes) to hide your message!

For instance:

example
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Thanks! Updated. When a forum doesn't have the Spoiler button in the advanced screen I assume it doesn't support them; this one has them but doesn't let you set the button captions sadly :(

Still less wall'o'text with em :)

That video was hilarious, Ewoks; I had just finished watching several of his earlier today (on Torchlight 2), then clicked your link and was like "Oh, hullo again!" ^_^
 
I picked up Dungeons of Dredmor in an indie game bundle, though I forget which.

I haven't played it yet, but it's on my backlog!
 
It was in Humble Introversion Bundle Tek if that's where you got it. I've got it as well, although I haven't played it.
 
Pheonix28 said:
It was in Humble Introversion Bundle Tek if that's where you got it. I've got it as well, although I haven't played it.
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I think it was a different bundle. I've purchased so many indie game bundles I can't keep them straight.
 
Gaslamp forums said:
The approximate changelog for Dredmor 1.1.1 is as follows. Not finalized, but close enough:

Core
•SKILL: Two new skills, Daggers and Polearms.
•SKILL: Accompanying new weapons for the Same.
•Skill: Shields: Defensive Bash changed to scale damage by block%
•FIXED: Fiery Wand now properly scales damage with Wandcrafting
•CORE: burn="1" effect removed from game.
•FIXED: made some more sconces unpushable
•ITEM: Bolt of Mass Destruction: uses a more correct Blinding Flash effect
•UI: New screens in-game for achievements
•UI: 2X controls are now on individual elements, instead of a global setting
•UI: Character window can now be dragged around the screen.
•UI: Crafting now has useful tooltips.
•UI: Lutefisk Cube now also has a tooltip.
•GAMEPLAY: Miniboss support.
•FIXED: Glacial Burst Trap
•FIXED: position of "Digest" button on 2X UI widget
•FIXED: Blackjack. Again. Hah.
•NERFED: Promethean Magic. Again.
•UI: You can now choose your title screen.
•ART: Raven sprite moved to Core game.
•ART: Raven sprite now slightly colorized.
•SFX: A bunch of new sound effects.
•UI: Crafting now has a button to access it on the belt panel.
•UI: Buffs that are stacked now display the # of buffs in a stack, and provide a visual cue
•UI: Page count now exists in the Tutorial list
•GAMEPLAY: Drunkenness. It's a thing.
•GAMEPLAY: Monsters now have a sight cone, and sneaking now works better. Monsters have two states, "suspicious" and "attempting to kill you."
•GAMEPLAY: Added a Pocket Dimension, for your Storage Needs! Find a suitable set of Wizard Keys.
•GAMEPLAY: Added new achievements! (Nobody expects these to work at this point, do they?)
•MODS: Added "buff type" hints for removing buff effects from a particular skill tree.
•MODS: Custom engravings now show tooltips if they have a description.
•CORE: Total rewrite of the save-game system. Save games are now stored in directories. At some point, we will load things one level at a time (and make our autosave significantly better); this was not done for this build, but the framework is in place.
•CORE: As an added bonus, loadsave.dat is now dead.
•STEAM: Various Steam Cloud issues.
•STEAM WORKSHOP: Mods are now embedded in save games, so that Steam Workshop won't automatically update, overwriting your mods and breaking your game.
•STEAM WORKSHOP: Mods published to Steam Workshop are now tagged.
•FIXED: Unarmed combat bonuses applied even when using weapons.
RotDG:
•SKILL: Level 5 Vegan will now only remove Vegan-related debuffs.
•SKILL: The Cure will only remove one random debuff intead of all debuffs.
YHTNTEP:
•FIXED: Fixed a misplaced blocker in the Zomby Zoo
•SKILL: Made Essence of Battle removeable (and it'll take all your mana if you do remove it).
•SKILL: Player can no longer resist Empowered version of Chronomantic Twist
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Some nice bug fixes, new skills (kinda wonder if they changed the droprates though, as with 50% more melee weapon types in the game you're 33% less likely to find the weapon that matches the skill you picked...?), yay more inventory space.

Promethean and Necronomiconomics got some nerfs though. Promethean mana costs were increased, and Burn (previously a armor-and-resist-ignoring-dot that removed a % of the victim's max health) now deals normal Fire damage over time (which can be resisted); the Burn change also affects a lot of grenades, traps, wands etc. Necro had no changes *itself*, but two of its best synergy skills had their curse removal removed (vegan) or reduced (emo); Necro is now a bit more reliant on Alchemy (Purity Potion), Wandcrafting (Zodiacal Wand), Perception (increased chance to find Purity Potions), or just ways to stealth/heal/resist while the curses run their course (my recent GRPD [Going Rogue PermaDeath] run I think I only really needed the dispel once, as I had other spells and melee to fall back on rather than cursing myself *every* turn haha). Necro is still very usable, and Promethean should be assuming the costs didn't get increased too terribly much.

Things they hoped to patch but ran out of time for: changing Lucky Pick from the "wear out your fingers getting free Lutefisk" to "a point in this skill lets you pick locks without needing lockpicks"; and nerfing Chest of Evil weapons. There are some other skill reworks they hope to do, with no schedule though, such as Vampirism and Werediggle.

Edit: Prettier list: http://www.gaslampgames.com/2012/08/01/dredmor-patch-1-1-1/
Aaand hotfix for savegame error: http://community.gaslampgames.com/threads/if-you-are-having-save-game-problems-w-1-1-1.4115/
 
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Well to spark a little discussion (and kill time at work while waiting for an email reply...) here's some builds I have used/am using.

Going Rogue Permadeath (GRPD) victory: DarthVegan!
Necronomiconomics - The powerhouse of the build. Ultimate clears zoos insanely quickly, Pact of Fleeting Life lets me kill weak foes for very little mana (and gain some life!), a few random single nukes/debuffs as needed.
Killer Vegan - Extra health to offset Necropain, curse removal (no longer works, but rarely needed), biggest advantage was the "animals won't attack you" perk, which made it easier to blow up zombies/robots/etc without having to curse myself as quickly as I would have if the diggles and fish were attacking me too!
Blood Mage - Any of the 3 mana regen skills would have worked I think. Blood Mage is the weakest for boss killing but great for crowds of weaklings; also gives a lot of regen with no skill points invested.
Psionics - AOE knockback, stun, heal, and a nuke that doesn't curse myself (Pyro possibly weaker this patch though with the burn change).
Mathemagic - Teleport! Also some debuffs for bosses.
Burglary - zero-mana teleport! Also root and stealth! And trap skill! And lockpicks! (Lockpicks are more common drops this patch, so Burglary isn't quite as needed as before)
Archeology - XP. Might have been worthwhile to get Charlemegne too.

"I can't believe that worked!" achievement (win with Random build) - Promethean, Viking, Unarmed, Smithing, Burglary, Artful Dodger, Berserker Rage. Pretty unfocused, but Dragon + Magic Steel + maxed Berserk and Smithing let me melee decently, with 2 teleports to retreat; rune for Zoos, Skatha+Arctic for bosses/corrupters. Found Dredmore less than 10% of the way through the last floor...so I calmly shut the door on him (yay Burglary!), and came back after gaining ~3 more levels :P

Current build (yay Pocket Dimension!)
Clockwork Knight - Strong melee, scales with crafting.
Smithing - powers up Clockwork. Also, Burliness. And gear.
Tinkering - powers up Clockwork. Also, trap skill. And gear.
Perception - Find more crafting ingredients.
Berserking - More melee.
Fleshsmithing - Something to spend mana on; pets and a heal for 1 skill point made this attractive, not sure how early I'll get Miasma for zoos though.
Archeology - XP. Was going to be Burglary, but with the extra lockpicks from the patch, and Clockwork already having a teleport, I figured I'd grab this instead to help get the other skills faster.

Currently starting floor 3, level 8. My first 4 skill points went to Perception for the loot to make sure I'd have crafting ingredients...then the second door I open on floor 2 is a Zoo, with a boss Djinn *and* a boss Octo. With my lack of actual combat-y skills, I ended up using a *lot* of potions/mushrooms/ammo/traps that I had collected, dropping to single digit health twice :S Not sure what skill to work on next, as I want at least one more point in everything haha.
 
Currently most of the way through floor 7, would have reached 8 had Imbrucy not forced me to join LoL ;) <3 Danny's Lulu btw.

Has gone pretty smooth for the most part; went ahead and maxed Fleshsmithing on floor 6 or so, and it has definitely helped on zoos. Tinkering is maxed so traps are just free loot and XP now, and I can swim in bolts whenever I feel like it; the decision to make now is whether I go ahead and craft the clockwork set and some sawblades to deal with Dredmor, or just get all of my armor from loot and spend the crafting ingredients on a tricked-out Crossbow to launch all my bolts. Hmm...

Oh and in case you're curious, a fleshsmithing Zomby can *barely* survive a hit from a Chest of Evil Blob of Corruption on Floor 7; 4 Zombys lasted 8 turns which was enough time to Fleshbore (and Eyelaser!) him to death without risking my equipment at all :)

And speaking of corruption (and zoos and evil chests for that matter), some more General Tips to go with my Trap paragraph above:

*Some monsters (and the Corruption trap) can Corrupt your equipment, which adds permanent penalties to a random Artifact you are wearing. The enemies are Magic Golems, Magic Dragons, Entropy Elemental (smaller % chance than the others) Blob of Corruption, Dredmor (highest % chance) as well as the dreaded Diggle Archmage from Realm of the Diggle Gods (the others can only corrupt in melee, but the archmage can do so with a RANGED spell!). Corruption can only be removed by the Demonologist "Heckforge" skill, or by re-rolling the item with Archeology's Translation skill (which will just change the penalty to something else, such as changing a sight penalty to a mana penalty or something...or destroy the item entirely). The item can still be sold/crafted/sent to museum though.

To deal with Corruption, the safest way is to kill them from a distance (their tooltip usually says "Don't let it touch you!"), with spells or crossbows or softballs or your pets. If forced to melee them (or when facing the Archmage!) you might want to temporarily replace your important items with weaker ones you don't mind losing (or non-magical items; a basic "Steel Sword" or whatnot can't be corrupted).

*Monster Zoos are a special room that can randomly appear on most floors (I don't think they can occur on Floor 1 unless you install a mod), which show up on the map as turquoise and have their own special music. If you kill the entire zoo (there's a "monsters remaining" counter below your map) you are rewarded with an Artifact! If you leave the floor (Staircase or Pocket Dimension, or rarely if you run too far away) the zoo event ends. Sadly, the Wizardlands expansion skill Skeptecism (from Paranormal Investigator) also renders zoos unwinnable, because it's impossible to kill a monster that you've transformed.

To deal with zoos, Area of Effect is your best friend; spells, Grenades, traps, Brimstone Flasks, whatever. Leading enemies to a chokepoint is slow but a possibility. Try to have a large stack of food and booze too!

*Speaking of Booze, the Wizardlands patch added Drunk buff/debuffs; drinking alcohol while already drunk will still extend the duration...but it also can buff your Caddishness at the expense of your Sagacity, accuracy, and other stuff.

*Chests of Evil are frequently Brucy's doom, and a lot of fun :) Opening one has a chance to give you a *very* strong artifact weapon...or to release a boss monster (which will usually be pulled up from a few floors down and given a bunch of extra health and damage). It's *slightly* safer to open one from a diagonal square (if a monster spawns, it can't hit you first turn that way), but really you should have a teleport/stealth ready in case things get nasty; killing one is difficult unless you have a strong weapon from a previous chest, and a lot of health to spare. Killing the boss will occassionally give you a free item, but usually it's just some XP.
 
Ended up dying on floor 9 :( Super bad luck on the RNG caused 2 Diggle Geologists to entomb me in a row, while a Magma Carrot and Big Red were able to melee through the armor bonus. Lost 80+ health without getting a turn.

Anyhoo, new character I'm trying is a ranged-focused rogue build:
Tinkering - Crossbows, bolts, trapskill.
Perception - Find more stuff to Tinker, see further to shoot.
Artful Dodge - Knight's Leap to kite
Burglary - root/stealth/teleport to kite, free lewtz
Psionics - knockback and stun to kite, healz
Fungal Arts - heal and stealth, pet for kiting
Unarmed - Boosts crossbow damage and tankiness, knockback for more kiting.

On floor 3, haven't needed many bolts yet (punching stuff is fine for now, want to hold off on crafting bolts til Tinker is maxed).

Also, update to my skill breakdown from my first post: (can't edit after 24 hours T_T )

*Rogue Scientist is not weak; I had not had a chance to look at it myself when I wrote the above, was just going by the opinion of the people who were like "the ultimate has too long a cooldown". Looking now, and listening to more thoughtful opinions, it's actually very good. The cooldowns are long, but are fine additions to the more spammable skills you're probably getting from other trees; the craft scaling is nice if you have it but not essential; and the big thing, the craft points *it* gives you are enough for Health and Invis potions, Sonic wands, and a couple of bolts and bombs, all from one tree. It is still possible to kill yourself with the "throw gas at a monster instead of floor" glitch, but that's avoidable.
 
Thanks for posting your stories. I have not been able to play recently due to traveling, but reading this thread has me all jacked up to try some new builds. I will give more feedback when I can, but for now I wanted to pop in and say Thanks! for posting.
:)
 
You're welcome!

Forgot a funny story that happened between my Clockwork and my current character; my first attempt ran into a boss Djinn on floor 1, and I ended up being chased to one of those "4 teleport levers on separate islands" rooms. When I tried to use one to escape:

1. I pull the lever
2. Djinn punches me.
3. I die.
4. I stand up.
5. I snap my fingers.
6. I teleport.
7. I die.
8. Repeat steps 4 and 7 approximately 5 times.
9. Tombstone screen.

o_0

Currently ready to start floor 6. Floor 5 had one of my scariest zoos yet; my only teleport is Knight's Leap, which can be awkward to position with some of the pillars and such that spawned next to the zoo. And one of the bosses was a Snow Baal...yeah they hit hard enough WITHOUT the boss bonus. Killing him used 2 potions, 3 Hoglanterns, a Blungecap, a couple of wands (that didn't do much), some bolts, and about 4 Slime summons, while running around trying to find safe spots to teleport between Kleptos and Corrupters. Reward was a Cat Ears with +2 Trap skill which is alright, but the Inconsequensia quest I completed 2 rooms later gave me a second Cat Ears with +dodge and +EDR. ~nyan~

And then 3 rooms southwest of the zoo was a Dwarven Express Post. First chest had a Magic Dragon (2 floors upgrade, same as Snow Baal); slowly sniped him, with a little help from the Slime. Second had a decent Axe (only one point in Unarmed still, so it's a fine trade; had been using a mace with 5 less damage). Third chest had a BIG RED. From the 9th floor. That could oneshot my Slime (and two-shot me...), and was immune to said Slime. He Resisted all the traps I led him through. My bolts did about 1 pixel. WHAT DO I DOOOO.....

Oh hey, that stupid skillshot Sleep spell that comes with Psionics does full (5) damage to him. Nothing around to wake him up...

4 mugs of Grog later, I got a thousand xp and continued on my way ;)

Current skills:
Tinkering: 5/6, maxing next level. Need better bolts.
Perception: 5/6. Potions and metal have been wonderful...I want Eyelasers too, as it would save some bolts :/
Dodge: 3/5, Knights Leap. Akido has been nice too, as I have 5 Rogue skills.
Burglary: 2/6, Lockpix yo. Got a bunch of free xp from kickable doors, and the extras have given me a full 500 stack of Lutefisk which I will hopefully use on floor 9 or 10 (not sure how big a difference the floor makes, as I've gotten 6star items on both floor 3 and floor 10 in the past...)
Psionics: 4/6; Nerve Staple has been very helpful, Crystals save on mushrooms, Shove is my only AOE (only damages casters at this point though) and fine crowd control, and Sleep beat the Big Red. Huzzah! Pyro is glitched this patch (the new Burn debuff doesn't work) and the ult is never great, so I'll probably stay here.
Fungal Arts: 2/5. Still have yet to get a 3rd point here on any character, but the first two are wonderful (even with the 80% nerf to OCD people hehe).
Unarmed: base. Will max by floor 10, for now I melee more than I crossbow and Evil Chest weapons outdo all of the tomes/shields I've found so far (aka two Little Black Books and no shield above 4stars). More concerned with getting better bolts to shoot first.
 
New patch!

http://www.gaslampgames.com/2012/08/23/dungeons-of-dredmor-patch-1-1-2/

Fixed a bunch of stuff, broke some new stuff, business as usual ;)

Haven't played much in the past week, Mann vs Machine and D3 1.04 (and some RL stuff too, yuck) have taken some time. Currently floor 8, no super exciting stories come to mind. I ended up grabbing Pyrokinesis despite the bug, and it sped up floor 7 considerably (roasting a Diggle Mage from a distance, without having to find a clear line of fire for a bolt or wait 15 turns for a second Nerve Staple!)

Unarmed tree is almost maxed; I have an artifact crossbow with Radiant damage on it that will probably work, but I also have the ingredients and recipe for a Clockwork Railgun...not sure what else to spend them on (already fairly stocked on bolts and Sawblades), so at the end of floor 9 I'll probably go ahead and craft one if I haven't found better.

The patch made the Lucky Pick change they had hoped to work into 1.11, so this will be my last character to enjoy the easy Lutefisk... other skills can do it, just takes longer :/

Edit: also good video of the CTO explaining how they wrote most of their humor, with suggestions for others: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBAbfEU9wys
 
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