ADOM

• The ADOM Guidebook is a historically useful resource, though some information is outdated by now. The ADOM wiki has been maintained over the various patches.

• If you keep dying early on, try playing a troll, especially a troll barbarian or healer. They're tough enough to survive a lot of the early game gotchas the game will throw at you, though watch out for aging effects as they have short lifespans. In the long term, Wizards tend to be considered the strongest class for actually beating the game, but also have an especially tough start.

• It's good to always have a ranged weapon equipped for some free shots at approaching enemies, at least some stones to throw if nothing else. In the same vein, even a spellcaster should be prepared having to engage in melee at times.

• You can, and should, eat corpses. You can safely eat the corpses of most common creatures, with some exceptions like kobolds and normal rats.

• You can get a rough estimate of an unknown item's quality by checking how much a shopkeeper is willing to pay for it.

• Combat tactics can be changed on the fly with the F1-F7 keys without it consuming an action. Offensive tactics are especially useful when firing a ranged weapon for example, while casters tend to stay on the defense. Note that Berserk tactic prevents improving one's skill with shields, while Very Defensive/Coward tactics do the same for weapons. Coward also makes you move faster while very low on health.

• About starting attributes: Toughness is critical with any character, and Learning is useful for most, even non-casters. Charisma and Appearance have very niche uses and be considered dump stats for most characters. You start with a bonus talent if your starting attributes are divisible by 7 though, so them being cheap to raise can help hit that.

• There are two mutually exclusive quests in the first town, one by the druid and the other by the village elder. While the former can be considered more rewarding overall, the latter is the easiest way for a (non-Chaotic) character to learn the important Healing skill that boosts HP regeneration. The quest involves finding the mad town carpenter from a nearby cave who one should try to bring to the wandering healer found on an earlier level of the cave.

• Spear and shield is a solid weapon combination for almost every class, though you should use the best stuff you can find. Be careful of cursed items though, and keep an eye out for items with an irregular weight as they might be made of rarer materials.

• You can make holy water by dropping water (or "watery potion," which is just unidentified water) on the altar of a god who likes you. Anything dipped in holy water will become blessed. A lot of items become much better when blessed, and in a pinch it also allows you to remove (previously) cursed equipment.