Game #1

173    Bob the Mountain Dwarf Hunter (level 3, -1/27 HPs)
       Slain by Sigmund on Level 3 of the Dungeon.

It has been a very long time since I last played Crawl, and it showed on my first game, where I completely forgot how dangerous the named NPC spellcasters are. Sigmund was invisible, blasting me with magic and swinging a very dangerous scythe. I never should have fought to the death. It is easy to forget that you do not have to defeat every monster nor do you have to explore every level in order to win the game. If you encounter an enemy that is too difficult for you to defeat right now, the correct solution is to not fight. You can always come back once you have gained a few levels of experience. Unfortunately, one of the pieces of information that you cannot learn until you die is what monsters are dangerous to a character of your level.

As Sigmund had a very slow scythe, it would have been very easy to get one space away from him, at which point I could have popped down to Level 4 and continued exploring the dungeon.

Lessons Learned
1. For any given character level, certain monsters are dangerous, in that you must be extremely careful when fighting them. If you fight, you should fight with every attack in your inventory and you should consider retreat as soon as possible, if your first attacks are not successful.

For low level characters, the named NPCs with spellcasting abilities (Sigmund, Jessica) are dangerous.

2. Escaping from a fight is always an option and should be considered in any battle where things are not going well. Defining not going well is difficult, but many good Crawl players consider leaving a fight the moment they are below 50% of their hit points. For now, I will use the same rule. I should remember to update my configuration file so I get a warning at the proper point.