I am still playing with 1 arm! My left hand's maneuverability have improved, I am more accurate in my clicks :D
I wanted to try a tinker class and spammed Gunslinger until I found a style that worked.
Gunslinger has very less in means of dealing with debuffs. The Embedded Restoration System is too unreliable, maybe need to use Cloaking Device in combination to fullfil... But that is just too much steam for 1 physical cleanse!
Perhaps I should have used my tinker gadgets for the cleanses, but I couldnt find a reliable way to defend without using 2 blink runes with out of phase capped! 1 steam generator with 12 steam/turn and a shatter afflictions rune.
Gunslinger is by far the most damage I have ever achieved with any class, with almost no items. My amulet and one of my steamguns has +10% combat speed.
Strafe is very cool! The worst part about a gunslinger gameplay is the low range gun levelling. After hitting range 8(tier 3) the game starts to feel much better.
Tinkers, I have been using saw shell and Explosive shell constantly. I am using combustive bullets with 4/5 as well, currently adds 141 fire damage to each bullet. COMBINED WITH NET PROJECTOR, most randbosses die in 4-7 attacks.
I have recently changed to Iron Grip on gloves for 90% disarm immunity, a focus lens on my head for stealth and invis! I fear I will rest and die to a stealthy rogue or an invis elf caster...
The whole Elusiveness talent tree is instant uses! There is great potential there for maneuverability.
I have found great body armors along the way but I have not turned on my word! I still have my bikini up!
Leveling with tinkers is fun, but I am still a tinker noob so will say more later, maybe...
I was levelling without a plan when I hit 25, so I went with my instinct and grabbed Master of Disasters. It is hard to appreciate its effects, and I am sure there were better alternatives if I have waited a little. Ethereal Form would have been incredible, with the added bonus of defense, the Evasive Shots would go hard. Does deflected spell projectiles count for Evasive Shots? I could increase my deflect chance to around 85 with 2 uniques I believe.
Some skills are only scaled with talent levels, and gathering steampower is very hard compared to spellpower, but with Master of Disasters, I can push the steampower related skills' and gadgets' limits. I just need to invest more into Tink- Science!
I need to get a second steam generator at level 34 and find a way to deal with debuffs. I have relied on my brute damage output and running away when things got dangerous, but eventually I will have to stand my ground against many strong opponents. I can not rely on my skeleton shield and steam dependant big singletarget damage. I will have to figure it out along the way... Maybe Sawfield could work? I can see it critting for 1k/turn 4 aoe damage for 4 turns, with a 10 turn CD... Wait, can Net projector crit????
New Tech for BikiniCryptFeaster Challenge:
I have went into dreadfell at level 24 and got out at level 30! :D Then I have managed to get into last hope then into reknor!! This means that I Can delay the Dark Crypt and Godfeaster even longer than I could even hope for!

I did not even get to use my 3rd prodigy point! Along with 8 generic talent points! I wanted to get parasite race generic tree.
The ending was pretty standard along with high peak. It was as easy as Sun Cloak, Judgement, maybe Stormshield, retch, and then everything starts dying.
I am not sure what my next character will be, but I will retry the BikiniCryptFeaster! Playing with a bikini really feels off though. What's next? Playing without inscriptions?

In one of the fonts of knowledge inside the Forbidden Book "Of knowledge and horrors", I have gained a PRODIGY point!!
It felt like an easy win already but perhaps I could extend my godhood even further.
I am sitting at 100+ spellpower with %10 Cooldown red. %90 crit chance with 240 crit multi and +%180 light damage. I have 2 sets of 9 Cooldown blinks with %40 out of phase potential.
My helmet, belt, cloak and lite are replaceable, I am still using Summertide Phial :D
I sadly did not run into a tinker escort. So I have 5 inscriptions. 2 blinks, 1 shatter afflictions, 1 Stormshield and lastly Rune of Dissipation
I have been gathering tier 5 rings to use with ringcrafting, I have hit 2 orange rings with that. I have rerolled as best as I could and ended up with 2 mediocre rings, one of which has +59% light damage! :P
I have swapped my unique -10% Cooldown red. amulet with a Limmir's 3-gem crafted amulet. Nothing fancy really, just for 9 crit chance. The lack of a body armor is felt at these stages. I need consistent crits. Might change back to Cooldown reduction later.
Defeated 2 orc prides, 2 remains!

Been playing tome a ton these past months and managed to get a few precious wins on insane roguelike with necromancer, brawler, oozemancer and now also archer added to the list.

Why archer? Well, it doesn't really sound like the most interesting character does it? My first win ever was with Skirmisher, and that was due to watching a guide on youtube calling it "the best class for beginners". That's basically how I learned to play the game, following that guide as a template on how to think in terms of building a character. It's a simple class, but also a powerful one. It uses a sling and shoots from afar. While archer, uses a bow and does the same thing? Yea... Well, sometimes you just want something simple.

Skirmisher on paper looks more powerful though, I'll be honest. It gets flat damage reduction in pace yourself, it can use a shield and has great defensive capabilities in buckler training, a beautiful aoe in hurricane shot, sling supremacy that improves damage a lot and kill shot which damage increases based on how far away you are from the target. That last one does insane damage at long range.

But archer doesn't get any of that stuff. It basically just seems like a worse version of skirmisher. And in some sense, it kind of is.

Archer CAN use a sling though, even though it doesn't share any of the same abilities with the skirmisher for it. But I was very adamant from the start that I wanted to play my archer like an archer, using bow and arrows (otherwise I think it would literally just be the worse version of skirmisher), so I never really looked at this option or entertained switching to a sling when I came across one.

Another reason for wanting to try out archer was that I had started to notice how I sometimes would get the big red target around me that says "marked", and it always made me nervous and made me back away so I wanted to test out of the source of this thing and see if it was any good.

Was it any good? Well, not that good. Using It wasn't like, "oh I got him market, now I got him for sure heheh", but at the same time, if someone didn't get market, I would be like"wtf, why doesn't this guy get marked, how will I ever be able to defeat him". It kind of became a thing you would just expect to happen in the end (since you get talents that scale the chance) so it basically just dictates which talents you will use next. If a target is marked, you use these talents, and if it's not, you use these. Basically, all of archers "first" talents, or core talents, in Archery Training, gives a percentage chance to mark a target on hit. And in archers second talent tree, Archery Prowess, it lets you use talents that give a bonus effect on targets that are marked and consumes the mark. These effects are decent enough, but not amazing.

The thing about the archer talents, there isn't really one specific talent tree or talent that seems "very good". If I had to pick one that is the most helpful to winning fights, it would be Trueshot, which for up to 7 turns gives 30%+ increased attack speed, doesn't consume ammo, and increases mark chance. Fair enough, but, imagine this... Archers also get the combat training tree, with blinding speed, giving global speed of up to like 47%. Both of these talents are instant speed, if you pop them at once, you have insane attack speed!

If there is one aspect archers really excel at, it's speed.

Towards the end I found an amazing unique bow, which might be the best bow that an archer can find tbh, with 118% inherent attack speed - The Thaloren-Tree Longbow. 10 dex, 20 will, 15% crit chance, 30%physical and 20% physical resistance penetration. I never came across a random unique one that was even worth considering rerolling.

In other words, we have at least 118% default attack speed (I can't remember if I had additional bonuses, I might have), we pop Trueshot and Blinding speed at instant speed, now we have like 200%. Then, we use talents like Fragmentation shot, that cripples, reducing THEIR attack speed by 40%, then we have poisons that reduce speed... I mean, it's insane how much speed difference you can get with archer in the end.

One area tome players might often find a bit daunting of course is the entrances to the orc prides, where you instantly spawn into a dangerous area with a boss and multiple enemies looking at you, ready to kill you. But I actually dominated these areas unlike with any other character I have played thus far, and one of these even had the elite boss in them. I was also getting powerful in other areas than just speed though.

For both archers and skirmisher, the thing that determines damage isn't the weapon, it's the ammo. So that's an area you can experience some power spikes when you find better ammo. I remember I having like 154% ammo strength and one time looking in the shop at Last Hope and saw 180% ammo and was "oh wow". Suddenly my character is a lot better. Then, at some point, I found tier 5 random unique ammo - and I only found ONE of these in the whole play-through, and I actually checked pretty much all of orc pride vaults as well. This ammo had 3 "greater" modifications when rerolling, and I re-rolled the only one that didn't add power and I got power, and this ammo then gave 216%!! power, with 24% crit chance and 48 capacity. I mean, that's just insane. After that I could one and two-shot many enemies.

So the late game was kind of a breeze tbh, it was fun though. In the final boss fight I went around the whole room to close all the portals after killing Elandar, just because I could (and because I kind of wanted the achievement). The final boss isn't the peak of difficulty though, it's high peak! I am sure of that. For some reason, no matter how powerful I seem to be in the orc prides, high peak can have enemies that are just insanely strong and tough to kill. And I have died in high peak before, and that's awful when you have spent 20 hours on a character. My way of navigating high peak is simply to use track, locate the stairs (it usually has some unique on top of it, but you can kind of see it beneath him), and then aggro the fewest amount of enemies as possible and just get through to the next level. Pretty much the opposite of the strategy to all previous areas where I try to clear everything.

Because I might have found the best bow and got some sick ammo towards the end I might have been quite lucky, so it's hard to say if archer is actually a powerful late-game character or not. Had I not found that one orange tier 5 ammo or that unique bow, it's tough to say what would have become of my character.

In the beginning, I did struggle quite a bit with just dealing damage when I moved to tier 2 dungeons. I recall both in Old Forest and Daikara did I come across unique and a random boss that I just wasn't able to kill, so I had to try to find other areas to level myself up and increase my power level to be able to come back and finish the job. I did also struggle with stamina for much of the game and periodically also ammo capacity was an issue in certain situations, but only a few (keep in mind that being in Trueshot doesn't consume ammo).

One thing I lacked for most of the game was a good light source... And the reason for that was that I found a light source that gave +30% physical damage quite early on, but which only gave 4 light radius. And since I never really found any light source that gave good light radius AND something else good, I wasn't going to let go of 30% physical bonus just for some quality of life... So I walked around with like 5-6 vision for a good portion of the game. It was quite painful, but maybe that made me powerful enough to survive to the end? Archers get track anyway, which I used a lot.

For the race, I chose skeleton. Which I think is just one of the best races overall, and a particularly good fit for archer since archer scales off dexterity and strength when using bows. The "skeleton" talent itself is huge here since is basically gives free dex and strength. The only thing that annoyed me here is that I maxed this talent BEFORE getting adept, and adept doesn't work with passives until you level them up... So even though I should have had 21 str and dex, I only got 17. Not a huge loss though. And bone armor from the skeleton is such a sweet 10-turn shield that you can just pop before opening any door or even going into line of sight of any enemy.

For the prodigies, like I said, Adept. It's literally my favorite prodigy that I have picked, I believe, as the first pick on all my winning characters thus far (maybe the most unorthodox choice here being necromancer). But it just levels up everything so I don't think you can ever go wrong with it.

For the second prodigy I wasn't really sure what I was going for. I had a vague idea of ethereal form or that one that just gives 50 strength for example. There's also too many prodigies to keep track of, so I kind of just wanted to get to level 42 and see what's actually available at that stage. And the one that caught my attention was "Pain enhancement system" which after dealing a critical hit, increases all stats by 50% of strength for 6 turns (18 turn cooldown). Now, as you can see from my character sheet, we have 175 strength and 88% crit chance. So that is basically 87 + to all other stats except strength for 6 turns after the first hit. And keep in mind that dex is more important than strength for damage as arrow ammo uses 70% dex and 50% strength. So 87 dex is HUGE. The other stats doesn't really do that much, you get some saves, crit chance, stammina - it doesn't hurt at least. The only slight annoyance with this prodigy constantly activating is that because you boost constitution so much too, it looks like you've taken some damage even when you haven't. So you just need to get used to looking at absolute health numbers instead of relative.

When I reached level 42 though, my character was far from that strong of course, so it wasn't that obvious of a choice. I had less than 50% crit chance I think and maybe 120 strength, but I built my character into the prodigy to make it insanely good.

"But it's only 6 turns bro, that's not good", ok, but need I remind you of the insane speed bonuses archers have? You get tons of attacks with this prodigy being active as archer. I think it's a great one.

Character sheet: https://te4.org/characters/286762/tome/d340af5a-8ffc-444b-b5b2-4b4435c75518

The only thing the character sheet doesn't show AFAIK is the crit multiplier. I had 245% I believe, you can see I am wearing Dakhtuns gauntlet that gives 50% and a cloak that gives 45%.

Ok, that sums up my experiences with the archer. I completed it a couple of days ago. Let me know if anyone actually read these.

Right now I am playing a Yeek Summoner, which I am having a great time with thus far. I have made it to level 27, chosen adept again as always, and kind of feel I might be over the worst early game difficulties. The summons does actually seem to scale very well, so that is promising. Even after taking adept the difference in the bonuses a level 4 summon get compared to a level 5 is still noticeable. For my second prodigy I am already eyeing blighted summoning, which makes the summons even better, so I think this is a character with a lot of potential.

I have miraclously survived the Dark Crypt and the Godfeaster. But I could not save the Godfeaster NPC Maiyu. I feel like completing the game with this character. I still have my bikini on :D
I have went into Ruined dungeon at level 24 to get stronger before Dark Crypt. But I think I could have been better off entering Dreadfell at 24.
My Ghoul Sun Paladin is level 49 at the moment, nickname is ElPrimoTheSecond.
My next attempt at the challenge will be with a different race/class combination.

I have broken my right shoulder collarbone recently and I was right handed, played with numpad all the time. My right arm is on a sling, hanging from my neck. It will take around 30 days for me to have a functional right arm. So, I have rearranged my hotkeys to my left hand side and have taken on a challenge.
Do Dark Crypt and Godfeaster when prompted, and have a bikini/mankini up.
Some dude I met on the discord suggested this challenge to me. I really liked the idea :D So I've promised him that my next challenge would be that. I am not using any addons or the item vault ofc
I have been trying to get Ghoul Sun Paladin to work. Haven't managed past level 24 yet. Died a few times, learned a few things. This is my first time with a ghoul, so my deaths were very sad. Got trapped in sand in sandworm lair at level 23, I moved like I would normally, didnt think the sand would cover 2 tiles next turn because I am slooow. Found out that a biting gale rune is better than a shielding for me. Mirror image could be an alternative if I could get 30-40 out of phase as well. I am planning for an Avatar of a Distant Sun playthrough.
I have been playing this game for over 10 years and this is my first time sharing here :D I have also enjoyed very old versions of DC:SS
I sometimes stream on twitch without commentary and with long breaks.
Thank you for reading my blog!

I got a pop up saying I was given it for free twice now, specifically that a "gift was left in my inventory", but I have no idea how to access it.

Any help would be appreciated!

Here she is: https://te4.org/characters/382098/tome/e1a720e3-7450-4ff3-bd8b-eac655e13c16

Enormously tanky, guaranteed crits, 3 weapons, anti-magic Krog. This is my 5th winning Wanderer, and only the second deathless one, and the first time I kill Atamathon at all. Very happy about this char! :D

>Boot up ToME
>NEW GAME
>Dwarf Alchemist named Talson
>Health and MAGIC it has got to be OP
>Start in dungeon
>Has golem and staff
>Start Bla-
>Change hotkeys
>Blasting enemies
>Descend and repeat
>New boots, LVL UP
>New armor, LVL UP
>New Staff, LVL UP
>Is this Diablo?
>Descend
>nearly dies to boss
>Golem carry.
>Iron Council.
>some guy leaves, cool I guess
>trys to shop, Every thing expensive.
>leaves to mushroom forest place.
>golem wreck everything, LVL UP
>I am carrying to much loot
>Maybe if i sell stuff i can buy stuff.
>give some equipment to golem.

This is just going to be me recording my adventure. it going to be a good time.

Done with a dwarf berserker. Didn't realize that I wasn't supposed to hit the thing but instead it's minions lol