=== The Tiny Strategy Guides ===

Halls of Mist is a difficult game, just like its predecessor FayAngband.
I thought it might be worthwhile to write three strategy guides for beginners
but I didn't have time to actually do it. Here's really short synopsises of
what the three fictional guides would include.

1) Assassin's Guide. To do well in Halls of Mist, you need to learn how to
distract (confuse, scare, sleep, or blind) tough enemies with spells or powder
vials, and then kill them with critical hits. You can increase your ambush
chance by boosting your strength and dexterity, by using an enchanted weapon,
or by boosting your combat skill with a magical buff, like Heroism. Rogue is
the specialist here but everybody -- save maybe mage -- needs to use these
tactics often.

2) Swashbuckler's Guide. How to use terrain features for fun and profit. Take
cover against spells and missiles by standing behind a table or platform. Jump
on tables and use high ground to help you defend against melee attacks. In
Halls of Mist, you can attack two opponents in melee just as well as when
attacking only one, so you may sometimes want to hop on a table to fight an
entire orc tribe! Hop over bushes and flee tough enemies through wilderness
rooms. Most enemies are probably worse jumpers than you are, with 40% in
Jumping; orcs, golems, and zombies are especially bad with only 20% in Jumping.

3) Seer's Guide. Identifying stuff is not at all straightforward in Halls of
Mist. You need to use your brain. First of all, you need to have at least 20
points in Memory + Wisdom to be able to use Lore proficiencies. (Use
proficiencies by pressing 'p'.) If you have MEM+WIS at 30 or higher, you get to
identify your whole pack at once or do some other cool things. Stand near
a bookshelf to gain a +3 bonus in these Lore calculations, or draw a Circle of
Knowledge to get +7. Or you might want to save your Lore point for Alertness
(bonuses to AC, saving throw, and detecting traps and invisible creatures until
you leave the dungeon level), and instead identify items by using them.


=== Summoners can get nasty ===

In Halls of Mist, you can explore at most 48 dungeon levels before you will
have to face the boss, the Thin White Duke. In the earlier versions there were
some exploits that allowed you to dodge this limitation and keep collecting
experience on shallow levels.

I've greatly reduced the number of breeder monsters. The ones that are left
don't give you any experience points or loot.

Summoners were a tougher nut to crack. It was painful to watch my friend Ear
farm summoners. "Hey, man, Mist is not supposed to be played like that!"
I tried several fixes during our playtesting sessions, and the last of them
seemed to scare Ear out of farming.

Every time a summoner summons monsters, SUMMON_POWER goes up by one. Then, if
you roll 1d40 under SUMMON_POWER, the summoned monsters' level is increased by
SUMMON_POWER. When you leave the dungeon level, SUMMON_POWER is reset to zero.

Farm summoners long enough, and you will face Grand Wyrms.

(This fix is quite unelegant, and will be gone in the next version of the game!
In the future summoned monsters will be phantasmal creatures formed of the blue
mist. They will give no experience or loot, and will eventually dissolve back
to mist.)
