Hi, I'm new and I wanted to try something different in Ivan
Okay hello everyone I'm new to Ivan and these forums. My brother got me into Ivan a couple days ago and I can't stop playing it! It's too addictive! Anyways, my third or fourth character stumbled upon an oil lamp in UT level 1. It was the only thing I had found that was usable as a weapon other than some lanterns, so I decided to try it out. I want to see how far I can get using only the lamp. I might try a scroll of harden material on it if I get one. has anyone tried this before? If so, any suggestions or strategies? (Why is the oil lamp so heavy?)

Hello, and welcome to the forums! I haven't excactly tried wielding an oil lamp, but like many of us, I have tried a lantern-only character. In IVAN you can wield any item you want, but some (such as plate mails :P ) can't be used until you have a sufficient amount of arm strenght. If you have artificial limbs, however, you'll see that wielding heavier items is much easier. Wielding unusual items isn't that useful, you can cause better damage even with a dagger and you gain experience in using weapons as you do. Unusual items are tricky also because quite often scrolls of harden material (abbreviated as SoHM at the forums) and enchant weapon/armor have little or no effect, especially the latter. Some items, such as belts, can be used as weapons. Belts count as whips, for instance. I'd say that if there was a good use for an item I'd use it for it's true purpose before using it as a weapon. Oil lamps are pretty heavy because they are made of gold, and gold is a heavy material. If you 'a'pply the oil lamp you can attract a genie (doesn't always work, though) who gives you a wish or joins you as you battle evil.

You gain experience from using unusual items as weapons too( its uncategorized weapons ) but of course its better to use them in their true purpose. But...err... Lege... Maybe you shouldnt give such spoilers about lamps when it is not asked. He was just asking why it was heavy :? ( Or at least you should warn before giving infos )

I already figured that it had something to do with genies. My lamp-wielding hero only got so far before he found an arcanite quarterstaff! Being extremely pleased with his discovery, he proceeded to beat down any opposition and now stands in front of the Holy Banana of Oily Orpiv in the Gloomy Caves level 3. This guy has been my luckiest character yet! I've found tons of great stuff, like telecontrol, ring of searching, scroll of harden material, multiple diamonds, wand of necromancy, 2 wands of lightning, 2 wands of acid rain, wand of fireballs, 2 wabds if mirroring and a wand of cloning. Phew. I'm hoping I might actually beat Petrus with this guy eventually!

My oil lamp eneded up not doing anything when I rubbed it. I did end up finding a Scroll of Change Material, and now I don't know what to do with it. I got to GC 5 but I'm scared of the Enner beast, as I lost all my wants except for a wand of resurrection and a wand of striking to a couple kamikaze dwarves(thankfully my ring of fire resistance saved me).

Post shall be somewhat spoilerish, if anybody cares. Fair warning. Homicidal genies would be why you rub all your lamps in new Atnam outside the gates (you can pick up lots of loot from the dead guards ^_^). Change material scrolls are great if you can get more than one through cloning or mirroring. I'd stash it until you could. Once you get more, simply take a large object, like that annoyingly hard to open chest in the hidden room in the GC, change its material to Ommel Cerumen, and eat it. That should raise your intelligence to a high enough level for you to change materials on other things, like your limbs, armor, or weapons, to very good materials.

How do you clone/mirror scrolls? I've cloned myself and other stuff around me while trying to clone scrolls. I have a fully charged mirror wand now, so I guess I'll save it for the change material.

Drop the scrolls on a square, stand near it, and mirror across it. With wands of cloning, this is permanent. With wants of mirroring, they'll dissapear after some time. The wands will work on the top five items in a pile, so I recomend you buy some enchant scrolls or such for the initial pile, and remove scrolls such that there's always five of the most valuable ones. Because mirrors will go away, it's important to read those first. You can tell which are mirrors because they'll be listed separately from the originals. Which of the two parts of the list is the original can be found out by remembering how many you had to start with.

Oh okay, thanks. The reason I asked because I was trying to clone a scroll of change material, which I now know isn't clonable.

I was trying to clone a scroll of change material, which I now know isn't clonable. I'm pretty sure that you can clone scrolls of change material. The only scrolls that I know of that aren't cloneable are scrolls of wishing and scrolls of charging. I've never tried a wand of mirroring on a pile of scrolls, so I can't say if it works or not. I do know that you can wield a scroll in each hand & mirror yourself to get extras though.

that would be much harder than you will think... the only mammoth I've ever saw is in Attnam, and attacking it will make you an enemy of Attnam. not a good thing. and boulders can't be CM-ed.

You cant change corpses into ommel cerumen, I've triend it many times with cave bears. Large chests give you more than enough ommel cerumen to get you past 55 int and wis and the dolphins can put you in the 90's from there.

that would be much harder than you will think... the only mammoth I've ever saw is in Attnam, and attacking it will make you an enemy of Attnam. not a good thing. and boulders can't be CM-ed. What? There's no mammoth in Attnam. It's a polar bear. You cant change corpses into ommel cerumen, I've triend it many times with cave bears. Large chests give you more than enough ommel cerumen to get you past 55 int and wis and the dolphins can put you in the 90's from there. Yeah, can't do anything to corpses with scrolls. Each dolphin can boost your intelligence by about 20, I think, and wisdom 10 or so. Multiply that by 6 8) Unless you got lucky and a fountain spawned some dolphins :D