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40d:Adventurer mode
In adventurer mode, you pick a race (dwarf, human, or elf) and start out in either a town of your race or in a previous fortress you played on. You can receive quests, venture into the wilderness to find caves, abandoned towers and other villages. You can even visit your old fortresses and find whatever riches were left to be guarded by the creatures that fated your fortress.
The user interface differs somewhat from fortress mode; you may want to refer to the quick reference guide, or examine the detailed controls page. Site map may also prove useful.
Your first adventure
Picking a race
When it comes to picking a race, there is difference in skills. Dwarves cannot wear human sized armor, and are somewhat limited in the weapons they can wield due to their size. Elves have a slightly different set of skills. Humans are generally fairly well-balanced, and are the easiest to acquire quests from. Each race fares differently in combat; you may wish to look at the races' pages for the finer details.
Choosing skills
Basically, if you want to start with a weapon, you need to avoid having the most points spent in unarmored/wrestling. If you, for example, choose to start out with most points in swordsman, you will start out with a sword. When you have chosen your preferred set of skills, you can press Enter to embark. The higher the skills in weapons/armor determine the quality of the equipment you start out with.
If you start out with a high weapon skill (except bows and crossbows) and also an above novice armor and/or shield skill, you'll start out with armor and/or shield as well.
Setting out
If you chose human, you will start out inside the Mayor's house. You will see the Mayor (purple) and probably several drunks. Press k and talk to the Mayor. Press 'services' for a quest. You can talk to the drunks and recruit them to your party for some additional combat aid. Be sure to read the Adventure Mode quick reference or use the help files for more information on the commands in Adventure mode.
Trading
In towns you can find merchants inside some buildings. Talk to them to trade with them. After buying an item, you must pick it up manually from somewhere in the shop. look around for an item without $ signs around it.
Selling
You can also sell things to traders. Bones, corpses, body parts and rocks are not valuable, no matter how attached you are to a particularly aerodynamic kobold head. Small creatures discovered while Looking Carefully may be worth a small amount of money. In order to sell or buy items, stand adjacent to the shopkeeper in his store, and konverse with the shopkeeper. Select "Trade" and press enter to open the trade window.
Select each non-worthless item you wish to sell, and then set a price using the following format[Verify]:
- a asking for 9000☼
- s +100☼
- d +10☼
- f +1☼
- g reset to 0☼
- h -1☼ (offering)
- j -10☼
- k -100☼
- l offer 9000☼
The use of these keys may seem non-intuitive, and this is further complicated by the limit on your available offers by your current financial health.
Shopkeepers are used to adventurers with inflated ideas about the value of their goods, so it may be simplest to ask for 9000☼ for your goods, or offer 1☼ for theirs and suggest a trade. The shopkeeper will counteroffer with the actual value of the goods, and will be quite delighted to accept a trade at the price they've just quoted to you. You can then purchase things with your store credit. After the trade sessions, the balance of your coins will appear on a small table next to a chest.
Theft
You may also pick up the item before buying it, but you should never walk out of a shop carrying an unbought item, as that is theft. It is punishable by death if you are caught, and excommunication if you are not. On any occasion when you have stolen goods from a store, ie goods bounded by the $$ signs, the game requires you to exit the site and travel a considerable distance before allowing you to travel. This may make a getaway more difficult if your adventurer is not already faster than anyone else. This only applies to goods in stores; killing townsfolk and taking their personal things, including those of the shopkeep still only requires exiting the site. The moment you are out of sight, you will be able to warp out as usual. Theft and murder remain within entities; even depopulating one country and stealing all its things will not generate ill response in another country.
Equipping your adventurer
After acquiring armor from one source or another, you'll most likely want to equip it. To do this, first make sure it is in your possession--not on the ground. You can then wear it, granted you don't already have too much on that equipment slot already. You can remove or drop inferior equipment as necessary.
Weapons and shields are handled differently. There is no explicit equipment command. Instead, they are automatically equipped when you either get them from the ground or remove them from your backpack - provided the hand that would wield them is free. So in order to change weapons or Shields you would need to put your equipped weapon into your backpack and then removing your new desired weapon. You do not need to drop weapons and equip new ones etc. Simply remember the remove command and the put into container command.
It should be noted that the world of DF seems to have a lot of left handers, so do not be surprised if your character holds the weapon with the left hand and the shield with the right hand.
Traveling the world
How-to
You can walk around the whole world tile by tile if you wish, but given the size of the world, you might want to consider using another method. Pressing T will let see a very zoomed out map of the surrounding area. Moving about on this map is much faster, as well as it heals your adventurer, keeps him from starving, dehydrating, or getting tired. To exit this screen and explore the area you've reached, press >.
If there is more than one feature such as a town or group of creatures on that map tile you will get to choose which one you want to arrive near.
Also while traveling on the world map, there is a chance that your adventurer can get randomly ambushed by enemies. When that happens, you must survive by either fighting them off or hide from them.
Jumping off cliffs is not normally advisable; however, it is possible to do so by holding Alt while pressing the appropriate movement key. Jumping off cliffs, depending on how high you jumped, will most of the time cover your eyes in blood, which lessens visuals.
Finding quest locations
After receiving a quest, you will be able to track its location using the Quest log. Initially it will just give you the location on the Travel map, though a lesser-known feature is its use in finding the cave entry (or other such target) once you're already in the local map. Bring up the quest log again, highlight the quest objective you're after, and zoom to it. It should then provide you with a local map of your current area, complete with a 3x3 box of flashing squares. This box indicates the general location of the cave's mouth. You'll still have to do some searching, but at least it's narrowed down for you. You can bring up this map at any time that you're in the local area of a quest objective.
The compass on the left of the screen will also greatly help you in finding the entrance; the direction indicated should place you within one screen's distance of the entrance before it turns into "---".
Visiting abandoned fortresses
If you start an adventure in a world with one or more abandoned fortresses, you can take your adventurer to see the sites of your previous endeavors. When you find one of your old fortresses, you will find that everything is a mess. Items are scattered about, things are smashed up and there are probably new hostile inhabitants that you will need to fend off. Visiting your old fortresses might prove to be rewarding, since you can find armor and weapons you made (if you made any). The best thing to be found in your fortress would probably be any left behind artifact weapon or armor. This is also probably the best (and only?) way to get artifact-quality weapons and armor.
Also remember to check out any engravings you made while in fortress mode. When checking out engravings in adventure mode, they reveal a lot more specific information about the event that is engraved.
Combat
Fighting is extremely detailed in adventure mode! This adds a lot of fun in the battle, since there are so many ways to injure your opponents/victims.
Ranged
If you have a bow or crossbow, you can shoot arrows or bolts at enemies. You can also throw anything you can carry at enemies. Ranged attacks are highly efficient when you hit. To fire your bow or crossbow, press f, and move the marker to the enemy you wish to fire upon, and press Enter. Same with throwing stuff, only press t and choose which item to throw, then choose the victim. Note: Throwing is slightly bugged, but in a good and fun way. You can throw captured flies, socks and even vomit if you want, with lethal effects. (Sand piercing lungs, flies piercing hearts etc..)
Close combat
To fight a creature by hitting it, you just need to walk towards the creature. Alternatively, you can press A and choose your target. After you've pressed A and are given the list of targets to attack, you can use Enter to choose between a normal attack and wrestling before selecting which opponent you wish to target. A normal attack will make the adventurer hit the target with whatever weapon he holds. If he is holding no weapon, he will bash with his shield. If he has neither a weapon nor a shield, he will either punch his target or grab a random appendage. In wrestling, you must spend a few rounds locking the target's limbs to be able to break and splinter them (good times). Alternately, you could try gouging, pinching, or strangling them instead.
Wounds
Adventurers are liable to be wounded by the slings and *<<-iron arrows->>* of outrageous fortune, as well as an assortment of environmental hazards. Healing works the same way as in Fortress mode; Scrapes and bruises heal up very quickly, but broken and mangled limbs take months, and nervous system injuries never heal.
Fortunately, by pressing T, and travel at least 1 tile in any direction on the regional map, all wounds will be miraculously healed. Lost limbs and other bodyparts will not be regenerated, however, so if you're not careful (or very unlucky) your adventurer may soon be investing in an eyepatch. (Now if only there were peg legs...) For more information, see Wound.
Tips for survival
Dying is easy in adventurer mode, especially if you've just started out. Following these simple tips will increase your chance to survive, and reach those nice stats and legendary skills! These tips are for the faint of heart only. If you like the challenges of the game, feel free to do the opposite of what these tips say.
Basic Needs
Your adventurer gets hungry, thirsty, and drowsy. Make sure your waterskin is always filled (fresh water at the temples); you carry 1-2 stacks[5] of food; and get some sleep sooner or later.
Fresh water can be found sometimes at temples and always in rivers. Water from pools is not considered fresh water.
In order to obtain water, you need a waterskin. Unless you are an elf, you will start with a full one at the beginning of the game, but you can also buy additional ones in the towns.
Move right next to the water source and press I (capital 'i', that is) to interact in a complex manner with an item. You will be shown your inventory. Select your waterskin by pressing the letter shown to its left. If the inventory is so long that the waterskin is not shown, you may need to press / or * on the number pad to move through the pages. If you have done everything correctly, the game should offer you one or more options from which specific tile you wish to draw the water. Simply select one choice by pressing the letter to its left and the remaining free space in the waterskin will be filled with water.
Note that you can not refill waterskins that are inside of backpacks. You need to remove it from the backpack first. Also note that you can't put waterskins you are holding directly into the backpack (it is not accepted as a container for that purpose). First, drop the waterskin and then get it again. It should be put inside the backpack automatically.
Solid food will eventually rot away. However, if you move on the travel map, you will not consume any food or water. Only if you stay on a Site map for a longer time will you first feel thirst and later hunger. A normal random encounter usually never last long enough to even generate thirst. Searching a quest cave can take longer (they are quite winding), but usually, you will not go beyond thirst if you only want to find the quest monster and kill it. Thus, carrying large stocks of food is not recommended, unless you plan something that will take a lot of time.
(Warning: NEVER, EVER sleep in a hostile place, next thing you know you will be cloven asunder by your own sword, or some nasty critters will be feasting upon you)
Living Shields Companions
If you recruit some members to your party, you will not only gain extra damage output. You will also have someone else to take the damage instead of you!
When you first start out, the easiest human shields friends to recruit are the drunks. They are found in human towns inside the tavern with the Mayor (the building you start in if you play a human). They will gladly come with you and block some blows for you. Drunks will usually attempt low-skill wrestling and (mostly) damage-less punches. Don't expect them to last long when you meet that Giant you are supposed to kill.
To recruit someone into your party, press talk, move the cursor over them, and press enter. Then in the conversation that follows, simply pick 'Join' from the list of options to ask them to accompany you. Children, the Mayor, and Guards don't want any part of this silly adventuring malarkey, but the occasional peasant will be bored enough to join you.
More detailed searches of towns of various races can yield other adventurers with some actual skills. The generally have a single weapon skill (Maceman, Swordsman, Spearman and so on) and some armor appropriate to the wealth of the town they were occupying. You will also find Guards around towns, and while they are combat-capable they will not shirk their duty in order to accompany you on your adventures.
Avoid the impossible
Some things are harder than others. Decide for yourself if this is due to unbalancing of the game, realism or simply to add to the variety of challenges.
Shelob's in-laws, aka Giant Cave Spiders
Unless you are a legendary or better (ok, its not possible to go beyond legendary..) bow-/crossbowman, you should at all costs AVOID giant cave spiders (Unless, of course, you enjoy Fun)!! They shoot a web at you, making you immobilized while they rip your limbs off one by one. Then when you finally break free from the web, and can attack again, you've probably lost your arms while lying on the floor and the spider is about to throw you by your head up into the roof. Cave Spiders bleed to death eventually, but they know no fear nor pain, meaning they will not black out even if you manage to inflict serious damage including severed limbs. They are also capable of surviving red-level wounds to the body and legs and multiple severed limbs for long enough to eviscerate an adventurer. Leave these for the living shields to deal with while you slip out the other way, ideally from the cave entirely, never to return.
Even if you are a legendary projectile weapon user, reconsider attacking a giant cave spider because in the tight quarters of a cave you might be shooting it from stealth when a giant rat or something similarly stupid walks next to you and triggers your loss of cover. The spider would then punish your arrogance immensely.
Note: If absolutely required they ARE killable, but you need luck, and lots of it. Adept swordsman + Proficient shield user + Skilled ambusher manages to sneak up on it and then counterstrike + block does the job. In a suicide swordsman test run I had dethoraxation (decapitation for spiders) = instakill on the first counterstrike, second GCS got a mortal wound before it webbed me and bled to death while trying to chew through me, only broke sword wielding hand and leg. Third spider broke my shield hand and had me mortally wounded in no time after that, although I eventually killed it after unwebbing myself. That makes it ~2.5/3 chances to win, not bad for a rookie. And I was healed after each successful spider kill.
To conclude: Basically, as long as your shield wielding hand is intact (and shield skill is high of course) you have pretty good chances of survival in 1 on 1, otherwise you're dead. Any extra armor (in my case exceptional full plate + normal armor skill) also helps in glancing off their bites.
Another interesting thing is that before fighting one of them I threw a spear at it and it lodged in the wound, and it seems that the spider has a priority to break my grip as it repeatedly successfully broke my grip every time(that happened ~5-6 times in a row) I grabbed the lodged spear. That points to a possible distraction for a GCS in case of soloing it.
Arrows
Don't take on quests where you need to kill elite bow-/crossbowmen! Generally, avoid flying arrows! Why? Because bow/crossbowmen have the tendency to see farther than you can. They are therefore able to fire at you from beyond your sight, making it hard to see where the arrow(s) are coming from. You may therefor end up chasing the shooter in the wrong direction, giving the shooter even MORE time to turn you into a pin-cushion. Of course, this is only the case if you manage to survive the first 3-4 arrows, because arrows are BAD for anyone but the shooter's health. Piercing hits like arrows are much more likely to damage internal organs, and while you might shrug off a moderate blunt hit to the chest a similar piercing hit could directly damage one or both lungs or your heart and instantly kill you.
One extremely useful survival tip is to immediately drop prone (with the s key) as soon as you notice you are being shot at. Prone targets move more slowly, but seem to be much harder to hit with ranged attacks than standing ones. This is also worth noting to avoid wasting ammunition on fallen targets.
If you do accept a quest against an elite bowman or crossbowman and manage to reach melee range, immediately grapple its weapon, ideally by dropping yours and pulling the weapon out of its grasp entirely before throwing it away.
Training yourself
Gaining stats (strength, agility, toughness) helps a lot when fighting. How to best train yourself?
Throwing
To find rocks simply hit l and look at any rock coulored tiles some of these will be simply called by the rock name (e.g. limestone) and cannot be picked up but some will be called pebbles. Rocks are practically free ammo. When you find a tile with pebbles, pick up a lot of them (there are infinite rocks), and start throwing them. You can simply throw them at the tile you are standing at. Every throw will gain you 30 points toward the skill "Throwing", and will after a while increase your stats (Strength, agility, toughness). You will need to throw 600 rocks to reach legendary Thrower (starting with no skill).
For best efficiency, drop all of your gear (including held but not worn items) and empty out your backpack near your throwing location. This is done in order to keep your inventory simple for the rock-throwing portion. Then pick up a ton of rocks by pressing g-a over and over- ideally one would pick up 600 rocks at a single time, but you will probably get bored before then. Then, mash t-a-enter over and over until all of your rocks are thrown back at the floor. If you are not a legendary Thrower after this, repeat. Afterwards, remember to pick up your gear and re-fill your backpack.
Alternate way : It could be difficult to repeat the t-a-enter sequence without making mistake. So you can just alternate t-enter quickly : The first t will open the inventory, the second will chose the rock which is in "t" position, and enter will throw it. In the same fashion, when collecting rock, prefer a tile where the rock is on "b" position : If you quickly alternate g and a, sometime you will open the [a]nnouncement panel, wich will slow you down.
Thrown objects are also a cheap way to injure enemies before they reach you if you are a melee fighter.
You can also throw other stuff you find, like flies, beetles, worms, and even vomit or sand. If you have a tendency to chop off enemy limbs, you can even throw these limbs. Killing zombies with their companion's severed heads and feet is always good for a laugh. Iron men are fun, because they leave behind a nice statue for the taking which can be thrown. Arrows and weapons seem to be particularly deadly when thrown because they deal the same damage as they would in melee, including piercing or slashing damage type, but even the most innocuous or silly items can come up with a kill.
Most thrown objects deal blunt type damage, so they will break and bruise limbs, but arrows and weapons can deal their normal damage types. This is particularly useful to consider when trying for a desperate one-shot kill on a Giant Cave Spider that's about to web you and shred you into little chunks, as piercing attacks like thrown arrows and spears damage internal organs (making them more likely to get a one-hit kill, as an enemy can live through having the outside of their head moderately damaged but not from having the same amount of damage done to their brain) and thrown axes or swords can sever body parts and leave deep gashes (leading to massive bleeding or slit throats).
Bow/Crossbow-skill
This skill trains in the same fashion as throwing. You gain skill per shot, not per hit. This is a more expensive skill to train than throwing because you need to buy (or find) arrows/bolts, but is also a much more deadly skill. Fired projectiles do much more damage than thrown ones, and are also piercing type weapons which can do crippling damage to internal organs. The majority of thrown weapons are blunt and will do much more superficial bruising and bone-breaking damage- at best, a lucky hit will break someone's spine or damage internal organs to a small degree. Shooting arrows at enemies is fun, because it is very efficient and will destroy enemies quite easily.
Sadly, this also goes for enemy bow/crossbowmen. You will often be shot in the leg and crippled by an enemy you can't even see, who will then proceed to shoot you in the face until you die - which won't be very long afterwards unless you manage to find something to hide behind. This is somewhat avoidable - train in sneaking to avoid being seen by enemies that could otherwise perforate your skin, and get a good shield and armor to better keep arrows. (See below for both skills).
Make sure to take extra meat shields companions along with you if you're planning on using ranged weapons, it'll take time before you level the appropriate skill to bash things with your weapon in melee so it's imperative you stay out of the fighting till then. Drunks are particularly useful here, as they love to dive on things and collapse into a massive wrestling pile which you can take pot-shots at. Don't worry, you can't hit your guys. Not that you'd care.
Wrestling
Since melee weapon skills are hard train because not every hit gives points towards the skill, why not train your wrestling? When you are alone with a unconscious enemy, why not break some limbs before finishing it off? Monsters often try to break your arms and legs, so having a bit of skill in wrestling will help break those locks a lot, and breaking that legendary swordsmans sword hand at the begging of the fight will make him laughably weak. Also, training wrestling is a quicker way to better stats (strength, agility, toughness) because gain points per move instead of per "hit". Wrestling also handles dodging skill which is very handy to have.
A good way to train wrestling is to find an undead region on the map- preferrably Sinister if you remember the map layout from Fortress Mode. Obtain a pack of zombie herbivores therein, preferably of small size- do not attempt this with zombie elephants. Slaughter every zombie in the vicinity of this pack of herbivores but the one that you think is the most crippled, making sure to pick one with a throat to leave alive.
Press c and change your combat preferences from Strike to Close Combat. This means that your default attack when you press towards an enemy to making a random wrestling move, or the continuation (joint lock, break) or (strangle) if you have a break/strangle-able area held.
Then, walk over, and grab the zombie's neck (yes, with your weapon or shield- it is quite optional to drop what you're holding) and begin strangulation by holding the direction the zombie is strangling in. You will make several strangles per second and gain approximately 15 XP (tentative measure) per strangulation. Zombies cannot die from this, so you will earn enough XP to become legendary within a few minutes.
When your character becomes tired, break off from strangling and walk it off- you become less tired by ambling about aimlessly. If you become too hungry or thirsty to continue, just run away or destroy the zombie, Travel, and then repeat after moving a square and back.
This can also be done at ruins, but you run the risk of weapon-carrying enemies and especially weaponmaster quest-zombies. In an undead ruin, there are also far, far more monsters in the area compared to hunting down a pack of undead animals.
Alternatively, wait until nightfall, and wrestle a sleeping enemy. Sleeping enemies are unconscious, and cannot detect you if you sneak. The autocombat will cause your adventurer to break limbs, grab and release bits of clothing, and other nonlethal attacks. Occasionally random chance will cause a chokehold; simply step back a tile and then resume. In this manner, you can train wrestling extremely quickly without the dangers of wandering in an undead zone.
Yet another alternative is presented by fish. No harmful wrestling moves can be performed on them so cornering a carp, tigerfish, or milkfish will raise wrestling quickly, while training swimming. Avoid hippopotamus infested waters.
A final option presents itself when exploring caves, there are many weak enemies to be found here, choose one (say a ratman) and walk up to it, grabbing it perform a takedown. Before it can stand up grab its arm and try to break it, as soon as it gets up perform another takedown, continue to break all the joints in both of your toy's victim's opponent's arms and then move on to legs, finaly gouge out its eyes and begin strangling it to death. This gives you plenty of wrestling exp with very little risk as the enemy will only get in one or two strikes before being taken down after which it will prioritise standing back up.
Swimming
Having no swimming skill in Adventure Mode is not a particularly good thing if you intend to go near water. Anyone with no swimming skill who falls or is pulled/pushed into water will begin to drown immediately if it is over 4/7 deep, and will also be unable to climb out of water this deep - usually resulting in instant death.
To voluntarily jump into a pond or river you have to Alt-move off the edge of the land. This will present you with a choice of walking out into the open space above the water (immediately and unsurprisingly followed by a one-story fall) or moving directly into the water. To get back out, Alt-move into the riverbank/pond edge.
As long as you have at least some Swimming skill, you will be able to move around in deeper water and will gain Swimming skill for every tile you move. Without Swimming, you will have to find depth 4 water to voluntarily paddle about in with your water wings on for your first skill points. Any deeper and you'll start to drown, any shallower and you can't swim in it. Hit m to set your swimming options.
Another option is to find a body of water with a ramp into it. Walk down the ramp into the water, which will cause you to start "drowning". However, you can simply walk back out after 10 turns or so to stop drowning, and you will have gained some swimming skill. Repeat until you reach novice skill. If you don't have an abandoned fortress set up for this, slopes into water can be found at ocean beaches.
All in all this makes Novice Swimming an excellent starting skill, as you can (eventually) get Legendary skill simply by swimming back and forth in two squares of water and get lots of stat points in the process. However, this is mind-numbingly dull so good luck with that. One should also keep in mind that water in cooler areas may suddenly freeze when the sun starts to go down, and thus instantly kill any creatures within. As such, it's a good idea to do your training laps somewhere warm.
It also seems that you are not able to move out of water of less than (7/7) onto the river bank. In addition, while you are swimming, you can not move to the travel map! You must first leave the water.
You can crosstrain Ambushing while Swimming to save time- if you start with no Ambushing and Novice Swimming, you will be an Accomplished or Expert Ambusher, give or take, by the time you are a Legendary Swimmer. For more on Ambushing, see below.
Ambushing
The Ambusher skill is the parent to the Sneak ability, which makes you character move more slowly and stealthily to avoid being noticed. Sneak cannot be activated if an enemy can currently see you, but you can use it immediately if you break line of sight somehow. Sneaking around will increase your Ambusher skill even if nobody is around to see you.
Unfortunately, the best way to train Ambushing is to start sneaking and just hold a direction to run, until you've run 18,000 squares (assuming you started with no skill). This takes a long time, so you may wish to train sneaking just by sneaking whenever possible while playing the game normally in order to avoid boredom.
Sneaking is particularly useful for avoiding ranged attacks, as even Novice skill allows you to get within four or five squares of an enemy before they spot you reliably. It is relatively easy at normal levels of skill to stand anywhere but right next to an enemy and not be spotted for a long time, if ever. However, standing next to sombody without them spotting you is difficult even with legendary skill. However, even if they spot you moving next to them they will only get one shot at you which is a lot better than the hundreds they would have had if you'd been blundering around in the dark too far away to even see them when they opened fire.
If you are far faster than the enemy you can sometimes swoop in, attack, and back off to 1-square distance where you are less visible. Sometimes they will spot you, but other times you can literally slice off the opponent's leg and retreat to a safe distance. This may occur because enemies can only make checks to see if you are sneaking during their own turns, and a very fast (2000+ speed) player can run in, stab them, and retreat to a safe distance before their turn comes up.
The skill also has a valuable part to play in the noble art of running away. As long as you can get out of sight of all the enemies after you at once - such as around a corner indoors, or ducking behind a tree outside - you can start sneaking and head off in another direction. If your skill is too low however the enemies might be close enough to see you as soon as you try to sneak off.
The most useful part of sneaking is undoubtedly the 'stealth throw'. While firing a missile weapon or attacking in melee will get you noticed immediately, throwing things at people will not. Stock up on dead enemies' weapons, clothing and severed body parts and you can pretend you're some gruesome comedy version of Sam Fisher. You know you want to.
Armor and Shield Use
Armor User lets you wear heavy armor without slowing down, and might control the passive block rate of armor - a very useful skill, if true, because it controls how often your shiny full plate suit will actually work.
Shield User helps the block roll you make when you are attacked. A Legendary Shield User is far, far more capable of taking on enemies, especially projectile-based weaponmasters whose bolts and arrows are blockable with a shield to a far greater degree than with one's torso, so it is worthwhile to train these two skills.
Normally, you gain 10 Shield User XP per time you block an attack with a shield, and 2 Armor User XP per time you are attacked while wearing armor. This means that to gain the 18,000 XP necessary for legendary, you must block 1800 strikes, and be attacked at least 9000 times. Naturally, this could take some time- time in which a low-skill adventurer may die from attacks by worthy opponents.
However, a useful shortcut exists- if you find a small zombie herbavore to strangle in the above wrestling training method, you can also (if it is a small and non-dangerous animal such as a zombie groundhog) sit down next to it (to minimize your own speed and thus get attacked more often) and hold 5 to sit down next to the animal and block its attacks over and over. This is still slow, but leagues faster than waiting to train while fighting- it also means that you are probably not in any danger assuming you picked a sufficiently pathetic type of animal.
Warnings- Make sure that you have your combat preference set to Close Combat, otherwise you may counterstrike and kill the zombie. This way, you will wrestle it during a counterstrike instead of doing something that may actually hurt it such as counterstriking with your weapon.
It is probably also preferable to start with a modicum of skill in Armor and Shield using to make sure you don't accidentally get instakilled or crippled and are good at blocking with your shield to gain XP fast. You'll also want to have non-crappy armor and a good shield or two (dual wielding shields may increase your ability to block) to maximize your ability to block and to make sure you are taking as little as possible damage, if any at all, during training.
Summary
- Recruit some living spear-catchers
- Avoid flying arrows
- Throw rocks/statues/socks/bugs/sand at enemies that still haven't reached you
- Train your stats before taking on your first quest-monster