Background and race combinations for beginners

Version 0.34: This article is up to date for the latest stable release of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup.

This article contains advice from other players, which may be subjective, outdated, inaccurate or ill-advised. Take advice as you see fit, and read at your own risk!

Crawl allows you to play using widely different play styles, depending on your character and god choice. The wide variety of choices offered might intimidate or even overwhelm new players. These are a selection of strong combos from the main character archetypes in the game. Please keep in mind that accompanying strategy guides may be outdated.

Melee Brute

• Minotaur Fighter (strategy guide): Melee character (but Throwing is useful). Find a big weapon and the heaviest armour, worship Okawaru or Trog and beat things to death.
  • Berserker is another melee character, worshipping Trog from the start.
  • Mountain Dwarf, Gargoyle, and Troll are similarly strong melee species.

• Troll Gladiator: Strong melee + ranged character; able to hurl a fearsome large rock from a distance (gaining more rocks later), and using deadly claws up close. Okawaru gives you more ammo to throw and a strong buff to unarmed combat.
  • Fighter (strategy guide) of Wu Jian is another good choice for Troll, using martial attacks to move and attack at the same time. Later can use Statue Form to improve defences.

Ranged

• Minotaur Hunter: Minotaurs are really strong at all things physical, including ranged. Use a bow to kill things at range, while still being effective up close similarly to a melee brute.

• Coglin Hunter (strategy guide): Dual-wielding masters of gunslinging (or sling-slinging, as the RNG determines). Worship Okawaru to improve your chances for better guns.

Hybrid

• Gnoll (Any Class) (strategy guide): Gnolls are the ultimate hybrids, able to use just about anything in the dungeon, albeit without a great proficiency in any one thing. Two things make gnolls shine for new players: 1. You don't get bogged down by skilling decisions, the gnoll trains everything at once, and 2. Gnolls start out as the best species for every background, given that starting skill levels are boosted by Gnolls' astronomically high aptitudes (making the early game a breeze). Worshipping Ashenzari will negate any downside of the distributed training and make any gnoll a powerhouse capable of casting the best spells from every school while also using all other forms of damage as well.

Caster

• Djinni Fire Elementalist: Removes much magical complexity; you train all magic schools equally, and you don't need to choose spells at all. Scorch carries its weight all the way to the Lair, at which point new random spells will be naturally granted. Worships Ashenzari for additional bonuses. A good choice for a first attempt as a caster.

• Gargoyle Earth Elementalist (strategy guide): A durable, more standard caster with powerful destructive spells. Typically worships Vehumet.

Stabber

• Spriggan Enchanter: The classic stealth and stab character. Spriggans are a great stealth species for new players since their high speed lets them flee when stealth fails. Confusing Touch is a strong option for a surprisingly large chunk of the game, since you can keep attempting to confuse until it's successful. However, it's worth remembering that not every opponent is vulnerable to hexes.

• Kobold Enchanter: The other classic stealth and stab character. Kobolds are able to sneak more effectively due to having reduced LoS, making it easier to evade enemies or stab them. Kobolds also have good broad aptitudes to use other things when stabbing doesn't work. Wu Jian Council will allow for 'free' stabs against any enemy who doesn't wake up the moment they come into view.

• Vine Stalker (Any Melee or Stabber Class): This character starts off a bit squishy, but by training strength, the anti-magic bite can carry the game on its own and the innate guardian spirit mutation will make you tankier than your HP bar would suggest. You can choose any melee or stabber class to get started, but worshipping Wu Jian Council or Okawaru will give you the most auxiliary bite attacks per turn (bites), thus restoring your magic and keeping you alive. It also transitions out of stabbing very well easily if you're having trouble keeping the ball rolling.

These are just a few examples, there are lots of other combinations that are reasonably easy to play. Feel free to experiment.