Primer Eventually a Primer

From wikipedia,

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup is a roguelike game where the player creates a character and guides it through a dungeon, mostly consisting of persistent levels, full of monsters and items, with the goal of retrieving the "Orb of Zot" (a MacGuffin) located there, and escaping alive. To enter the Realm of Zot where the Orb is located, the player must first obtain at least three "runes of Zot" of the 15 available; these are located at the ends of diverse dungeon branches such as the Spider Nest, Tomb, and Slime Pits.

Movement

You have three options. Arrow keys, Numpad, HJKL YUBN.

You can test out HJKL YUBN below. I prefer this because it allows you to keep your hands in the home position and easily transition between commands & movement. Hold shift to move till you dead-end.

In a nutshell,

Navigate around, find weapons to [w]ield and equipement to [W]ear. Scrolls can be [r]ead and potions [q]uaffed.

Definitely familiarize yourself with how to attack, throw things, shoot spells, go up and down stairs, etc. You can bring up a command key menu in game by typing [??], there's an image of it here.

[ctrl-o] to see what dungeons and altars I've found

[ctrl-x] to see what's all in sight. for monsters this can be a quick way to select one and then press v to describe

Here's the dungeon order via hyperelliptic:

D:11 → Lair → D:12 → Orc → D:15 → S:3 → maybe other S:3 → get both S runes → maybe Elf (but not the Elf:3 vault) → Vaults:4 → maybe Crypt → Depths:4 → Vaults:5 → maybe Slime → Zot ("S" means Shoals/Snake/Spider/Swamp)

And here is Bcadren, which is an extended order and ignores Dungeon levels:

New Order: Orc, Lair, S:$, other S:$, Slime, Elf, Vaults:4, Crypt, Tomb, Depths, Vestibule, Zot (Clear for XP and so it's cleared), Hell Branches, Pandemonium, Abyss (if it wasn't done earlier when abyssed or something), Vaults:5, Orbrun.

Where to play

Choose the closest webtiles server

Register at the server nearest you then I suggest you play the Latest Version.

I usually play on CBRO.
Browse all the servers

You can also play on a console over ssh.

Here's a bash helper script you can use to setup the ssh keys and select a server.

Resources

Tools

Random Stuff

Scoreboards

Discussion

“Or burst the vanish’d Hero’s lofty mound;
Far on the solitary shore he sleeps:
He fell, and falling nations mourn’d around;
But now not one of saddening thousands weeps,
Nor warlike worshipper his vigil keeps
Where demi-gods appear’d, as records tell.
Remove yon skull from out the scatter’d heaps:
Is that a temple where a God may dwell?
Why ev’n the worm at last disdains her shatter’d cell!
Look on its broken arch, its ruin’d wall,
Its chambers desolate, and portals foul:
Yes, this was once Ambition’s airy hall,
The dome of Thought, the palace of the Soul:
Behold through each lack-lustre, eyeless hole,
The gay recess of Wisdom and of Wit
And Passion’s host, that never brook’d control:
Can all saint, sage, or sophist ever writ,
People this lonely tower, this tenement refit?”