Ebenezum the Deep Elf Conjurer
I've not been playing Crawl very long - just long enough to have a lot of characters die, which is standard, I think. I prefer magic users, but the magic users have to be played like a coward - shoot your magic off, and run away to regen. Since I'm not good at noticing when it's time to start running, I seem to have more success with Deep Elves, since they have a deeper mana pool.
So this is the story of Ebenezum, the Deep Elf Conjurer (Ice+Air). I start with I/A because mephitic cloud is probably my favorite spell. F/E Cjs are fun too, but it's a different mindset. There, you try to kill the most dangerous stuff first. With an I/A Cj, you spam mephitic cloud, pick off whoever is closest, and run for a stair to regen. My goal is to get to where I can one shot the big stuff, which means Iron Shot, or whatever is beyond that. But I like starting with Mephitic to cover me.
Dungeon 1
D:1 starts with a glass room with lots of monsters in it. There's a door, which I'll leave alone for now. The rest of the level is low level monsters, each by themselves, and Magic Dart makes quick work of them. I pick up a runed elven dagger, which is a little bit of a risk, but I equip it anyway. It's uncursed - excellent. I'm usually willing to try edged weapons, since even if it's cursed, I can still butcher corpses for chunks. I butcher all the corpses I create, and watch the last chunk start to rot just before I get hungry - the usual. I head to D:2 as a level 3. I take Strength as my level up bonus - I hate getting encumbered when there's so much stuff to haul around, so my first few stat boosts are usually strength. DECj starts with 5 strength. Int usually takes care of itself. I blast a few more monsters and reach level 4, gaining a point of Int automagically. Love my Deep Elf. I come around a corner on auto-explore, and Terence pops up, asleep. I slink away. I should have learned mephitic cloud the instant I became level 3, but as usual, I forgot. Those first levels go by quickly. So I memorize it, then step back into sight and blast him. Terence wanders in circles while I kill him with Magic Dart. His shout draws a kobold, who also dies. Terence's glowing elven falshion is mine - nice. Not that Deep Elves should ever be getting into melee, but if I did... I find an altar to Ashkenzari (sp?), which I have no intention of using. I clear out the level, then head back up to deal with the glass room on D:1. 2 oozes, 2 rats, 2 giant cockroaches, 1 jackal, and 1 giant worm. Hmmm... I'm having second thoughts. I'm not immune to mephitic cloud, so if they crowd me (they will), then I have to run for open space to be able to cast it. I head to D:3, and leave them for later.
Dungeon 3
D:3 is a familiar map - lots of little rooms connected in a grid. I use Mephitic to take care of a couple clumps of orcs, but nothing else is worth mentioning. Hunger management is going well - I haven't had to use permafood yet, and I now have 4 bread rations and a meat ration, as well as 7 different types of scrolls, and 7 types of potions. I finish D:3 at level 5, and head down. 3 Hobgoblins greet me in an open area, and a bat and a goblin investigate once I start throwing Magic Darts around. I fail completely to use Mephitic cloud, and wind up fleeing back upstairs to rest, and update this diary, which reminds me about using Mephitic cloud. I head back down, use mephitic, and finish them all off. I go around the corner, and there's the Temple entrance with not one, but two books sitting nearby! This is starting to look very good. One is "high level", and I can't open it. Nice. The other is a book of Chemistry. Looks like I'll get started in necromancy and Fire with Distillation and Evaporate. This is a very good start. Now the only question is Sif or Vehemut. Sif is in the Temple, and Vehemut is not. But I really like extra range on my damage spells. I went with Sif last time, and missed the extra range immensely. So I'll wait for now. I learn Fulsome Distillation, so no need to quaff potions to ID them right yet - I'll learn what the nasty ones are by making them. I use some scrolls to ID them - sure enough, the stack of 8 is Identify. And the ring I found is a ring of magical power. Very good. I then curse my weapon and remove the curse again. I enchant the dagger, then curse my armor - which is some elven leather I found on D:3. Last scroll asks for an inventory item, so I pick the armor, and it gets enchanted. I have one stack of 3 scrolls left that is not identified, but I would bet it's detect curse (there seems to be more of them around than other stuff except identify), so I'll save it for later. I head back to D:4, and distill some poison from a Giant Mite corpse. Now I know what poison looks like. I soon find an altar to Nemelex, surrounded by 4 sparkling fountains. So I drink, because I'm stupid. Strong poison. Nice. I get down to 5 HP before trying my largest stack of potions, which turn out to be healing, as usual. So I'm still lucky. Stupid, but lucky. While I rest back to health, and Ogre wanders by. Mephitic cloud confuses him, and Magic Dart kills him with a thousand stings. I keep moving, find a another scroll of remove curse, which is a nice thing to stockpile. The Menkaure shows up, and I dash for the stairs to D:5. I'm not ready for him yet. At the bottom is a RandArt robe. I kill the ooze and goblin guarding it, and put it on. It's a cursed +2 Robe of Unreason, with MR, Dex-1, Acc+3. Not great, but it's an unpgrade for sure. I keep wandering, killing a few kobolds whose corpses I turn into poison. And then, around the corner I find Grinder. I hate Grinder. He's immune to mephitic cloud, and he likes to paralyze and then smite you while you watch helplessly. He's one of the few lower level things that can kill you before you can do anything about it at all. I resist his first cast, and run for the stairs. A centaur doesn't notice me, and Grinder has the good grace to blink away, so he doesn't follow. I breath a sigh of relief as I head up - and find myself adjacent to Menkaure. I head down, but pull Menkaure with me, and wake up the centaur. The centaur is shooting arrows of frost, so I head back up. Menkaure follows again. I head for the nearest other staircase. Menkaure hits me with toment once, and a kobold throwing darts makes me gulp a healing potion, but I make it. I'm clear across the level from where I left Grinder and the centaur, so I rest - and they show up immediately. Mephitic cloud confuses the centaur, and I kill him. Grinder is down a hall from me, so I just start shooting, and soon he's dead, and I'm level 7. Some days it goes the other way, but I'm glad to have Grinder out of the way. The only thing I hate more than Grinder is ghosts of my former characters. I'm sure I'll see one of those soon. The rest of level is pretty easy. I find a ring, and my identify scroll is a triple, so I ID 2 potions as well - restore abilities and heal wounds. Good to know, and good to not waste. I find 2 cloaks. The regular one if uncursed, but then I find an Elven cloak, which is, of course, cursed. Vehemut's altar is here - I'm still debating - as well as Makhleb. Makhleb's altar has a spellbook guarded by an iron devil, so I run in and grab it, then run away. It's Party Tricks, which has levitation and blink. Excellent. I'm finding plenty of spellbooks, so I decide to follow Vehemut. Time for D:6.
Dungeon 6
D:6 has a party of orcs waiting for me. Mephitic takes care of them - they like to bunch. Mephitic is still loud, so I wind up having to kill everything within earshot. I'm using Throw Frost to gain in Ice Magic, but it costs twice as much as Magic Dart, does about the same damage currently, and doesn't hit automatically. So in crowds, it's Magic Dart. The singles get Frosted. I kill everything, and head for the antiques store. There are some orcish gloves that are only mildly interesting - I'll probably find some gloves soon on my own. There's a ring for 130 - about half my cash. It's just not worth it. 3 unidentified scrolls are here also. Also not worth it. Next, I find the sewer. The rats inside provide a few corpses to keep my no-permafood streak alive. Mephitic cloud takes care of a pack of kobolds (who provide me with some more poison potions - time to use Evaporate). And I grab a bunch of healing potions and head out. A centaur near the exit gives me a flaming bow. I also have to kill a worm, megabat, and Ogre who come to investigate the sound. I'm overloaded - mostly due to potions and several stacks of runed arrows, but I also have a stash of weapons. Time to find out if that stack of scroll is detect curse. It's random uselessness instead. The other one I don't have ID'd turns out to be Teleportation. Good to know, but not what I wanted. I head back to the store to buy the 3 unidentified scrolls, which now look pretty good at 26 gold each. The first is curse Jewelry. I already have a cursed robe and cloak, so no big deal. The next is detect curse. Looks like all the runed and glowing weapons I've been picking up are clean. I try them out and immediately find a short sword of Venom, which immediately becomes my new go-to weapon. The glowing falchion from Terence turns out to be an elven falchion of slicing, which is also a keeper. The rest get dumped. I'm weak, and potions of poison and confusion (needed for evaporate) are heavy. I burn a scoll of remove curse to try on a glowing robe. It's just +2, no brand. So I put my RandArt robe back on, and that's when I notice it has {Curse}, as it recurses itself. I finish exploring, finding a centaur with a bow of frost to compliment the bow of flame I got from the earlier one. A potion shop shows up, and allows me to both stock up and ID at the same time. Degeneration, Porridge, and speed are easy buys. The rest aren't worth the price. They're all new potions, so I fail to ID anything, but they'll be useful. I pick up more permafood, and finally pass out from hunger, so I'm forced to end the streak. The meat ration hits the spot. I'm still overloaded, so I have to choose what to pitch. I can throw frost already, so the bow of frost goes on the ground. I have a LOT of runed arrows, but I'll drag them down the stairs and dump them there, so I can get to them easily. I find a wand, and since I have 8 identify scrolls, I ID it - wand of lightning with 8 charges.
Dungeon 7
D:7 has a Goliath beetle near the stairs, and a Hippogriff and Giant Frog come running when I use Mephitic cloud. I confuse them all, then Evaporate some poison on them, then use my new bow of flame to finish them off. Elves have decent bow affinity, and it's nice to have a ranged weapon for shooting confused enemies after you run out of magic, so I'm looking to train my bow skill. I find a ring, and ID it as life protection. I find a shiny buckler, which has the protection brand. I don't usually use shields as a magic user, but this seems like it needs to be an exception - even though it will slow down my bow. I add a glowing dwarven sabre to my collection of weapons, and am totally overloaded, as usual, when I run into 3 Wargs. Fortunately, the buckler seems to block a lot. I kill them, pick up a wand of slowing, and find the entrance to the Orcish Mines. I rearrange my pack a bit, dump the books and some permafood, and prepare for the Mines.
Orcish Mines
I arrive at a large open area, and start spamming mephitic cloud. A Warg gives me a little trouble, and I notice that auto-pickup turns off. Probably just an orc wizard. I keep a barrier of clouds around me and kill the Warg with throw frost. And then I die. Turns out Erolcha was in the area, since that's what killed me.
Epilogue
This run started out so promising. With mephitic cloud, the orcish mines are fairly easy, and I was already counting the gold and/or randarts from the shops at the bottom. Confidence kills. Next time, when I see auto-pickup turn off, I'll just leave. Maybe. Did I mention that Deep Elves need to be cowards to survive? Ah well. Thanks for reading.
