I'd just attained XL 5 as a Valkyrie, and immediately hightailed it to the nearest fountain to acquire Excalibur. On the first two dips my sword just got rustier. On the third, it surrounded me with snakes. I decided to risk one more dip before attempting to escape, and amazingly turned up a water demon who granted me a wish! I decided "sod Excalibur" at that point and wished up Mjollnir instead; unfortunately the snakes then killed me.
Annoyingly, I realised afterwards that I'd had a wand of digging I could have pointed downwards as a means of escape. On the one hand it's kind of encouraging that almost all my recent deaths have been avoidable in retrospect; on the other, it strongly suggests I ought to be paying better attention. I must get out of the "panic now" mindset and cultivate a reflex of instinctively stopping to think, check my inventory, etc. before I do anything irrevocable. Antelope mentality, in fact.
It's terribly good fun though... are you playing on alt.org? The Nethack channel on Freenode is quite friendly, and people will watch your game and give advice (if you want it).
No, I'm playing on my own machine. It seemed easier (in particular that way I can still play at home when my network connection goes down). I've arranged to record all my games much like alt.org, though.
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Annoyingly, I realised afterwards that I'd had a wand of digging I could have pointed downwards as a means of escape. On the one hand it's kind of encouraging that almost all my recent deaths have been avoidable in retrospect; on the other, it strongly suggests I ought to be paying better attention. I must get out of the "panic now" mindset and cultivate a reflex of instinctively stopping to think, check my inventory, etc. before I do anything irrevocable. Antelope mentality, in fact.
Can you dig down when you're on a fountain? Does it not do something bad? I find most things do something bad :-D
It's terribly good fun though... are you playing on alt.org? The Nethack channel on Freenode is quite friendly, and people will watch your game and give advice (if you want it).