Grog

Grog (2018) by Thomas Biskup, the author of ADOM: a small, fast roguelike. Descend as deep as you dare and live to tell. Original: roguelike.games/grog.

Saving

• In the browser the game saves itself into this browser's storage (IndexedDB) whenever it waits for a command; reload the page and Grog continues that game. Q saves into one of the game's ten slots and quits, as in the original; loading a slot deletes it.
• Death is final: the autosave is deleted when the run ends. High scores, options and ghosts stay. Export save / Import save move all game files, New game deletes them.

Your first minutes

1. Answer the start questions: name, gender and type. They decide your attributes and starting kit, so a new name gives a new character.
2. Press g to explore. It stops when a monster shows up; walk into it to fight, or walk away.
3. Pick things up with c and look at them with i; use them with f.
4. When the level is done, press >: Grog walks to the stairs down and takes them.

Staying alive

• Rest with . before you go down; hit points come back slowly.
• Fight in corridors so only one monster reaches you. You move in four directions only, and so do the monsters.
• Pray (p) when you are about to die, but not often: watch Piety in the status line.
• Throw (x) what you cannot use; wands (z) are your ranged attacks.

Tips

• Run if you can't win: most monsters are slower than a dextrous character.
• Pray (p) in real need only; the Piety value shows whether your god will still listen.
• Carrying items long enough identifies them, so pick up everything you can.
• Throw spare items and potions of unknown use at dangerous monsters (x).
• m shows what you know about the monsters in sight: hit dice, attacks and damage.
• Try a few names: the same name, gender and type always give the same starting character.

Credits

• Grog 1.0.2 (2018): Thomas Biskup (roguelike.games/grog), author of ADOM. Free to download, all rights reserved (title screen: © 2018 Dr.-Ing. Thomas Biskup), released as a Windows .NET binary only; this port is built from its decompiled code. The in-game credits thank the Roguelike Celebration organizers, Slashie (Santiago Zapata), Ignacio Bergkamp and Andrew Clifton.
• Sound effects: synthesized for this port at build time (the game has none).
• Web port (.NET browser-wasm), auto-explore, stairs walking, command and item menus, windows, autosave, save fixes for .NET 10: memmaker (github.com/memmaker/grog).

Online Help

Grog is controlled by case-sensitive key presses:

  <Ctrl> + q ................ Quit the game
  Q ......................... Save & quit
  o ......................... Configure options

  w or Cursor-Up (*) ........ Move north
  a or Cursor-Left (*) ...... Move west
  s or Cursor-Down (*) ...... Move south
  d or Cursor-Right (*) ..... Move east
  <Shift> + <Movement-Key> .. Move quickly

  <SPACE> ................... Wait for one turn
  . ......................... Wait until fully healed

  r ......................... Interact (e.g. use stairs)
  <ENTER> ................... Command menu
  g ......................... Explore (stops on danger/news)
  < or > .................... Walk to stairs (again: take)
  e or i .................... Manage your inventory

  c or , .................... Pick up items
  f or u .................... Use item
  z ......................... Zap wand
  x or t .................... Throw an item
  p ......................... Pray for help

  m ......................... Enemy (monster) list

  <Ctrl> + r ................ Redraw the screen
  h or ? or <ESC> or <HELP> . Show the help menu
  v ......................... Display game version

(*) Cursor keys behave weirdly on some terminals.

More

  At various places in the game '---more---' prompts
  show up. They are inserted to give you the time needed
  to consume the information presented. Passing these
  prompts in the message line at the top of the game
  screen can be sped up by pressing ENTER which skips
  all further prompts.
  

Character Generation

  Your name, gender and type deterministically generate
  your initial attributes and starting equipment. Feel
  free to experiment to find an adventurer that suits
  your particular needs.
  

Rules

  Your character is described by a number of statistics
  shown in the status bar at the bottom of the screen.
  These are:
  * Armor Class (AC): How hard it is for monsters to hit
    your character. Higher is better.
  * Hit Points (H): Your life energy. When they drop to
    zero your character dies and is gone forever.
  * Strength (St): Raw physical might. Affects the
    number of items you can carry as well as hit
    probabilities and damage in melee combat.
  * Dexterity (Dx): Affects Armor Class (AC) and how
    fast you move in comparison to monsters.
  * Constitution (Cn): Health and toughness. Affects
    your Hit Points (H).
  
  Additionally the game shows your current dungeon level
  (D), the amount of gold carried ($), the number of
  moves executed so far (M) and your experience (XP).
  Experience shows your current level, followed by a
  slash followed by the number of experience points
  needed to advance to next level. Experience is gained
  from killing monsters.
  
  Finally 'Piety' is shown - which basically is an
  indicator on whether the player character can safely
  utter more prayers (via the 'p' command) or not.
  

Enemy (monster) list

  The enemy list shows data for all enemies in sight.
  Depending on your experiences with the monster in question
  the following data might be available:
  * Name
  * AC (Armor Class, how hard it is to hit the monster)
  * HD (Hit Dice, the number of dice thrown to determine
    the hit points of the monster
  * H: the actual and maximum hit points
  * #A: the number of melee attacks made by the monster
    during a single turn
  * D: the amount of damage caused by the available
    melee attacks
  

Hints

  * Run if you can't win.
  * Think smart. There are surprisingly many strategies
    available to get out of tight situations.
  * Pray in times of need. But pray sparingly because
    your god might get annoyed when pestered too often.
  * Carrying items for prolonged periods of time will
    identify them.
  * Remember that you also can throw stuff at monsters.
  

Credits

  * Thanks to the organizers of Roguelike Celebration
    for allowing me to experience the original Rogue
    on an original PDP-11 (during Roguelike Celebration
    2018). It was a marvelous experience and the
    morning afterwards Grog was born as a nod to this
    amazing game.
  * Slashie (Santiago Zapata) for being the torchbearer
    of the roguelike world, many great discussions about
    game design and friendship across continents.
  * Ignacio Bergkamp for his lightning talk at Roguelike
    Celebration 2018 (there you go again ;-) ) providing
    the idea of allowing players to add custom flavor
    texts to highscore entries - Grog probably was the
    game to deliver on this idea.
  * Andrew Clifton for his talk at Roguelike Celebration
    called 'Don't generate, hash!' from which I took
    inspiration and code in order to create grog player
    characters in a stable and platform-independent
    manner.
  * Krzysztof Dycha for relentless play testing, bug
    squashing and invaluable design discussions.

 --- Axes High!
     Thomas Biskup, { [Ultimate] ADOM | Grog } Maintainer

Playing in the browser

• Your games live in this browser (IndexedDB). Q saves and quits; loading a save deletes it, as in the original. The game also saves itself automatically whenever it waits for a command: closing the tab loses nothing, and the next visit continues the game.
• Audio ▾ turns the synthesized sound effects on (off by default; Grog has no music).
• File ▾ → Export save downloads all game files (saves, options, high scores) as one file; Import save loads them back.
• Windows ▾: one window (the whole game screen) or several (map, messages, status, inventory, visible monsters). Drag the gaps to resize, A−/A+ on a title bar sets that window's text size. The layout is kept in this browser.
• ---more--- prompts never wait here; every message goes to the Messages window.