Kraken

Version 0.31: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

kraken X
HP	137-277
HD	16
XP	2324
Speed	14
AC	20
EV	0
Will	60
Attack1	50 (bite: plain)
Resistances	rDrown
Vulnerabilities	None
Habitat	Water
Intelligence	Animal
Uses	Uses nothing
Holiness	Natural
Size	Giant
Type	kraken, kraken
Flags	Cold-blooded No skeleton

A gargantuan sea monster, capable of devouring entire ships. It embraces them with its tentacles and draws them into the depths. Fortunately, the tentacles are too big to embrace a small creature like you. “... Kraken, also called the Crab-fish, which [according to the pilots of Norway] is not that huge, for heads and tails counted, he is no larger than our Öland is wide [i.e. less than 16 km] ... He stays at the sea floor, constantly surrounded by innumerable small fishes, who serve as his food and are fed by him in return: for his meal, if I remember correctly what E. Pontoppidan writes, lasts no longer than three months, and another three are then needed to digest it. His excrements nurture in the following an army of lesser fish, and for this reason, fishermen plumb after his resting place ... Gradually, Kraken ascends to the surface, and when he is at ten to twelve fathoms, the boats had better move out of his vicinity, as he will shortly thereafter burst up, like a floating island, spurting water from his dreadful nostrils and making ring waves around him, which can reach many miles. Could one doubt that this is the Leviathan of Job?” -Jacob Wallenberg, “Min son på galejan”. 1781.

Useful Info

Krakens are enormous octopuses found in the Shoals. Although they can only move through deep water, they reach out toward you with up to 4 tentacles. Their damage output is tremendous, especially if you allow more than one tentacle to reach you at once. Keep your distance and take advantage of their inability to follow you very far on land. If you encounter them while in shallow water or flying over deep water, escape may prove difficult; their tentacles move faster than any base species.

Spells

Spell set I
Slot1	Spawn Tentacles	Natural flag
Slot2	Ink Cloud	Emergency flag, Natural flag

Tips & Tricks

• Unless you are built for nothing but melee combat, avoid engaging the tentacles directly. Ranged attacks will keep you from becoming splattered on the beach.
• Damage dealt to the tentacles counts toward killing the kraken, which is nice since they often make approaching the body itself difficult. Just remember that it will flee when severely injured, so you may need some long-range attacks to finish it off.
• A kraken's tentacles can extend multiple squares out of the water. This means that if a kraken's head is in line of sight, it can probably reach you.
• Krakens lack poison resistance, so they can be whittled down with Olgreb's Toxic Radiance. Freezing Cloud can also help.
• A scroll of poison can kill a kraken in just a few turns. Try to read the scroll before the kraken deploys its tentacles, so you get the maximum number of clouds.
• Area-of-effect spells, like bolt spells or Fireball, can deal high damage to krakens by hitting multiple tentacles at once.
• Disabling the kraken's main body with paralysis or petrification will not stop its tentacles from moving, though it might give you enough time to escape their reach.

History

• In 0.32, krakens will take less damage from multiple hits to their tentacles if this damage comes from the same attack, e.g. an Arcjolt zap.