Westheim, the Centaur Hunter

This page is a Diary of a Crawler, the journal of an individual character. This page probably contains spoilers.

This time I will play a Centaur Hunter. I never had much luck with ranged characters outside of the magical field. Then again, I have never had much luck with any character. Speed should help on the escaping side, but I already expect the lack of offense to become a problem. I don't expect this to become a 15-rune win. Westheim 23:34, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Useless stuff and Sigmund

Entered the Dungeon with a bow, 25 +1 arrows, a leather armour, a short sword, and some bread. Not much to make a living here, and success will depend heavily on the availability of tons of ammo for me. Eventually I’d need a better bow as well.

D:1

Found a ring of wizardry in the first corridor. Mua-ha, good joke, game. From there, I quickly found 48 arrows lying around, and a +0 helmet. I also found some runed weapons, but nothing good, and the last was a cursed whip which I couldn’t get rid of. I read my scrolls, finding those of identify immediately, but I had none to remove curses, only one of enchant armour. Uh-oh, trouble…

D:2

I couldn’t find scrolls for my life here. Found Sigmund though, just after reaching level 3. I had to enter from the third stair to get into a different area with some scrolls. I finally found one to enchant weapon I, which removed the curse. Okay, I had already learned a lesson here.

A dagger I had picked up turned out to be of the venom brand (I *did* learn my lesson, I had despair-IDed scrolls of detect curse earlier). Sigmund eventually found me where I was roaming now and chased me through an escape hatch up to D:1, where I ran into an adder at close range. We poisoned each other, and my venom dagger ID-ed as +2, +2. Nice one here.

D:3

Bypassed Sigmund on the level above by taking the first stair down to D:2 and progressing further down immediately. I had a healthy amount of ammo and a good pointy weapon for the moment, now I needed to find something to boost that petty AC of 5.

But first I found a pack of gnolls, which were hard to dispatch with +1 arrows. Further ahead, I found 16 runed arrows, which turned out to be of the flame brand.

I reached level 4, then level 5 here, while I cleaned the floor consisting of long narrow corridors with the occasional chamber in between. The layout was very rectangular, with the exception of a round room with doors close to the center. I bet there’s loot in there! Oops, five ants. I got the door shut down before they crawled all over me.

D:4

The first two stairs I took ended in the vicinity of an ogre. Flame arrows didn’t impress him a lot and he soon got too close for comfort.

The third stair led somewhere distant and I found some more +0 arrows. I was busy collecting scrolls and potions as well. I felt no need to identify too much yet. I found and (shortly) wore a ring of regeneration, another ring of only mediocre usefulness for me right now.

It smells worse than it looks

Cleaning out a big room on D:4 I found a glowing drain. The curious guy I am, I squeezed my body in there.

Sewer

A stream of filthy muck crossed the chamber north to south, with all kinds of rodents just waiting there to bite me. I leveled up to level 6 while stomping over grey rats. The rats were there in numbers with a few newts and ball pythons thrown in, not too much of an issue with my venom dagger. Once everything was clean, it was time to loot.

There were four doors, one on each side of the stream on both the northern and southern end of the chamber. I was fairly confident that at least one of them would contain some beast tearing me into pieces. Whether my superb speed as a centaur would be enough to survive, remained to be seen.

I opened the chamber in the bottom right hand corner, farthest from the portal out. Ooops, surprise: a pack of kobolds came screaming at me. Four of the five kobolds threw darts, which made things easier, as my ranged attack was way superior. I looted four potions (all unknown) and two scrolls (enchant weapon included once) from the chamber.

Did I have the guts to continue? Of course. Bottom left: three kobolds, one of them big, and he punched me quite a bit, but I took two more potions (un-IDed). The top left room was easy with three kobolds for two unknown potions. This left the top right, where I ran into five kobolds and was hit hard by darts of freezing from one of the little naggers. I got four more unknown potions and a scroll of detect curse.

Some Unique encounters

D:4

The little excursion had been fun and rewarding in potions (I was just hoping I had gotten some more than slowing and poison…), but had cost a bit of ammo. For the moment I found something else: a Young Poisoner’s Handbook. While I was training spellcasting a little to eventually get some utility spells (think apportation, blink or the like), this was not that useful right now.

A little further ahead I ran into Pikel and his company and that wasn’t something I was confident I could master right now. I gently wiggled around both Pikel and the ogre from earlier looking for stairs to go down over. This was easier said than done and I reached some stairs chased by the ogre.

D:5

This was a level with just a large rectangular corridor around a central pillar. There was not much space to run to and none where to hide. I encountered a crimson imp, who was hardly touchable with arrows and needed special treatment in melee. Dispatching of that demon got me to level 7.

The next encounter was Edmund, who never got into melee range thanks to my superior speed. I backed off time and again while slowly piercing away at him with arrows.

It got tougher from there. I was smitten by an orc priest, missing several shots, and then ran into Blork the orc a little further down the corridor, where it actually widened to accompany a wide open area on the outside. Blork reacted well enough to arrows of flame and tied quickly.

Just a bit more into the open area I happened across Menkaure. I turned around looking for stairs and found some – but a band of orcs and a goblin blocked it off just before my eyes. Turning and running back where I came from, more orcs cut my line of retreat, including a priest. Time to teleport away, but I was crowded very quickly, and smitten twice. The teleport didn’t get me very far away and still in sight of the priest. I was smitten once more and almost killed while running back down the corridor where I first had entered the open area.

Going up was not an option for the toughies on D:4, and hiding was impossible on this level. This just left running and trying not to scream too loud. On the other side of the level was an area with escape hatches up and down next to each other. A good place to wait for things to settle down and if necessary, disappear immediately.

That didn’t work either. While running, a human slave suddenly appeared out of thin air and chased me. I reached the hatches, but he caught me there and arrows didn’t hold him back. I escaped up.

D:4

I tried to hide in some remote area of the level close to stairs up. Time to use those scrolls of identify. Healing potions wouldn’t be too bad. I had already ID-ed potions of curing (a stack of 8) on the run. I found 2 potions of healing along with those of levitation and invisibility.

I briefly returned to D:5 to stumble across Menkaure again and was tormented repeatedly. I ran back to D:4. Would I be able to come up with a game plan?

Lay the Pharao to rest

D:5

I had only one staircase available to get down to D:5, Pikel was blocking the other two, as it seemed. After healing I went down again. Menkaure had been waiting for me. It had to be. I blasted him with flaming arrows and laid him to rest. My leather armour was cursed.

D:6

I immediately took the next stairs down. A goblin and an orc at the stairs were no obstacles. This was another wide open level with big metal pillars here and there. I reached level 8 after slicing through a bat.

Overall, the level presented little opposition and was a joke compared to D:5. My main concern was that I was running a bit low on ammo. Halfway through I was down to 52 arrows. I started to combat most monsters with my venom dagger and reserved bow and arrows for tougher things like orcs with weapons and a few ants and iguanas. I picked up a few javelins and more scrolls and potions.

D:7

Back to small corridors here. Found a +0 helmet, which was useless, since I already had one. My AC of 5 was becoming more and more pathetic. I soon ran into an orc band, which would not have been much of a problem, but they were led by a warrior, who was less than impressed by my arrows. I shot about ten, but then had to retreat.

The other two stairs both led to the same area a bit further east. In one of the corridors the corner of the walls was not made of rock, but green crystal. Yummy vault for looting? But the presence of many zombies surrounding it probably didn’t indicate anything too pleasant to find in there.

It turned out to merely be an altar to Ashenzari. So not really worth bothering (maybe explaining the zombies?). A bit further into the level I found a general store. This was close to where I had found the orc band before. The store offered a potion of experience for 750G – I had 204. I instead bought scrolls of remove curse and random uselessness for 60G total. Both were un-IDed so far.

Continued north of the store after wandering into a dead end in the south. A door led to a passage to two more doors. The right one revealed a merman wielding a spear, and he was apparently angry about something. Retreat. The left one once opened revealed a stair down. I was caught in a net, but scrambled free in time to flee.

Meet and greet with The Uniques

D:8

Fled right into the fangs of a water moccasin, which gave me some nasty bites. After overcoming this I wandered around a bit, only to find Psyche. I was not in the constitution to fight her, but she gave me a hard chase. With the stairs up not an option for retreat, I had to flee into uncharted territory.

Took a passage to the south that eventually looped back around to where I had first met Psyche. Gnah. Also found another +0 helmet. Gnah!!

After hardly overcoming an ogre in the next room, I then encountered Prince Ribbit. Huaah. Fled, this time knowing where to find a staircase. Unfortunately, it was one leading further down.

D:9

Entered in a big room, one side made of green crystal. I also found an orcish idol. And then a jelly. I carried a few stones for exactly that reason. 14 stones were enough to kill it.

Ventured on the edge of the level avoiding the area with the idols in the center. I found a chamber in the northeastern corner. I hoped for treasure, feared enemies, but it was only an altar to Nemelex Xobeh.

Things were getting stranger by the minute. On the northern edge I eventually found a burning flame, encased in translucent rock walls, and surrounded by trees. Huh?

A scroll of identify revealed scrolls of curse weapon and a potion of brilliance. Both basically useless. After barely getting through a pack of gnolls (missed a few arrow shots), I found a pack of three scrolls of identify once I had ventured all around the edge of the level, ending at another green crystal wall. ID-ed scrolls of curse armour (2), fog (2), immolation (3!), enchant weapon II, and potions of speed, confusion, and berserk rage.

Cautiously explored the left center of the level, where an altar to Okawaru was surrounded by a few trees. Passing by there, I fell through a shaft.

D:11

Okay, now it’s getting very dangerous. Was molested by an adder and a centipede zombie immediately, but it was not that bad. But I needed to go up again!

No stairs could be found in this large, single chamber level. An ogre and a jelly posed significant threats again. I reached level 9 after laying a hound zombie to rest, but the rest of the level proved too tough for me with a sky beast, snake zombies and a hill giant coming at me. Speed was all that saved me. I eventually returned to the starting area and upon travelling a bit to the right found all three staircases up right next to each other…

D:10

The first stair led me to Joseph. Quick return, I took the second, the hill giant almost got me, but I made it safely to D:10. I only had 33 arrows left, no powerful wands and those three javelins were also hardly useful.

This was a 5x5-room level. I picked up a wand in the first room. Then I ran into Harold who zapped me with wands. Ran into an adjacent room with a goblin and an adder. Harold didn’t care: he shot bolts of fire right through everything and incinerated a few of my scrolls. Entered another room, with a roaring ogre coming at me. I wiggled through to the next room, where an escape hatch safed me.

Mop up

D:9

Safe. For a second or so. I was soon greeted by distant slurping noises. Ammo was a serious concern as I carefully explored the area near the orcish idols. Killed two orcs and a kobold and was rewarded with a book of Maledictions. This was something I was looking for: some small tricks out of the hat to enhance chances here and there.

There weren’t any more orcs around the entrance to the Orcish Mines, which was located in an ovoid chamber. There were two more smaller chambers in there, one with secret doors. Treasure time!

Or maybe trap time. Opened the secret door and found an orc warrior and three(!) priests. And I ran away for the stairs. There I waited a moment. The warrior was the only one I had seen following me. When he came into view I zapped him with the wand I had found on D:10. It was one of lightning. I felled the warrior, then the priests came into view one by one. A combo of lightning and arrows of flame killed those. Now things should be safe here, right?

Nope. More warriors were storming at me. I couldn’t kill those in time and retreated, leaving much of my precious ammo on the floor.

D:8

I retreated right into the arms(?) of Prince Ribbit. Fleeing was hard, especially with Psyche around. I wielded my venom dagger and managed to poison him repeatedly, while taking some nasty hits. Ribbit eventually succumbed to poison. Without my dagger I would have been long dead.

Well, without any more powerful weapons and armour than what I had, lying around (I’m talking about brands or randarts here), I used my enchanting scrolls. My dagger went from +2, +2 to +3, +3, and I enchanted my leather armour and helmet both to +2. That gave me an AC of 10.

Cautiously explored a little more, but I ran into Psyche again. She zapped away at me with bolts of about everything there was, fire, frost, magic darts … this time I couldn’t get rid of her thanks to pesky goblins blocking escape routes, costing precious time to slay. Finally I found a set of stairs.

D:7

No progress here, right? This was a different area than I had seen before. Going left I came into a room with a human trapped in a cage of translucent stone. I could here Yredelemnul’s voice in my head. Kill him. Kill him!

No, no, no. I retreated to the right. That was a dead end, so I took the third corridor to the south. I soon entered the area, where I had been molested by an orc band a long time ago. A quasit was now there, but was killed quickly.

I was able to recover a few arrows I had shot earlier when fleeing from the orc warrior.

D:5

We’re getting closer to daylight. I was hoping to get a single enemy here or there, but the first orc wizard alredy hit me pretty well with flames. A slave hunted me back to where I had come from, but I shook him off with my speed. Went around into the open area where I almost had been killed. In the corner I found a +0 barding! Enchanted it to +1 right away, then took a stair up. Time to get rid of Pikel.

D:4

I entered in an unknown part of the level, which had been blocked by Pikel so far. Three orc priests were already waiting for me. My wand of lightning was empty and I fled (once more).

Had to do some dodging to make it for the third stair on D:5 and re-enter the level from there. I found the entrance to the Temple, and Pikel soon after that. Some arrows of flame and a few hits with my venom dagger later, he succumbed and his slaves were freed. I picked up his whip of electrocution and in a chamber that had been blocked before as well I found a ring, that did not ID upon wearing.

Now those orc priests were left (and an ogre somewhere on this level, but he seemed to be hiding). I managed to get one alone and killed him, but was smitten several times in the process. Number 2 was less hardy, number 3 was nowhere to be found.

D:2

There was somebody still roaming here. Sigmund. While looking for him, I fell through a shaft back down to D:4. Grr. I travelled back and found Sigmund in a small chamber eventually. I got into melee range before he could to anything with wands or whatever he might have in his inventory, then poisoned him to death with my dagger. He also chopped away at me pretty well, but had no chance. He left nothing of value, though. Now at least the first two floors were pacified.

D:3

There was still a room with ants on here, which I would try to clean up now. I released the ants, then went for a corridor to take them one by one. Unfortunately a band of orcs already inhabited the chosen corridor, including a priest and a wizard. No. Oh, why…

I threw myself into melee, slicing and poisoning through the orcs, taking some nasty smiting damage, while ants were on my hooves. I got through the mess, but that almost would have gone horribly wrong.

Descent

D:5

There was still work to do here. A crimson imp threw stones at me when I entered. But the slave that had chased me around before was free and happy now. There was a lot of ammo lying around on this floor, and I needed it so much. I got one arrow and one javelin back before an orc band found me and I was smitten again. Retreat down.

D:8

Three times is the charm, right? No, I wasn’t chased around by Psyche this time. I carefully explored. Unfortunately I lost some more ammo to a kobold with a crossbow and silver bolts. Then I found a warped pewter ring. Uh, shiny! Putting it on increased my strength +4, but didn’t ID it. I found a scroll of identify in the next room. This was the ring of Eternal Harmony, providing +4 strength and +2 accuracy, also offering the possibility to turn invisible. Nice one here.

D:9

The two orc warriors that had chased be before were still there. I had to resort to poisoning them. I took some nasty damage, one went down, but the second was a toughie that chased me from one edge of the level to the other before finally dying. Now I can loot the orcish treasures, right?

No, of course not. Another warrior came at me and hacked away at me, before I killed him with my wand of flame. I just couldn’t poison that guy.

Now I was able to loot the first room, which held three scrolls of identify. ID-ed scrolls of recharging (2), wands of digging (7) and confusion (5) (neither had ID-ed when zapping monsters, and they were both brass wands so I eventually mixed them up in my memory…), a ring of sustain abilities (from D:4, found after killing Pikel), and potions of poison (3). The secret room where I had released the priests only held 5G.

There was still the green crystal room next to the entrance to the Mines, but I could not find a secret door.

D:10

Even after picking up my arrows on the floor above, I only had 31 arrows. Not much. I killed some small stuff with my dagger here, before almost bumping into Joseph. Turned around to the other side of the level, where I found a fellow centaur in a room. He did not want to become friends. (sigh) I decided to dash into melee to kill him. He left me 21 arrows of flame! I also reached level 10 by killing the centaur. Time for a feast! *happily slices away at centaur*

I found some goodies in the next rooms, including a book of Wizardry, which was not too useful, though. But I dabbled into my book of Maledictions now, and learned Corona and Ensorcelled Hibernation. Spell success would be only 66% and 46% respectively, though.

I found a new wand of lightning, replacing my old empty one. I also found a sleeping troll and decided not to get torn apart by waking and angering it. Circumventing that room I came across an orc band reinforced by a crimson imp. I looted a falchion of protection (AC+5) from them. So here was some alternate weapon against poison-resistant enemies.

Time to search for the Lair with my pack almost full. I ID-ed potions of slowing with a scroll, while carefully searching the level.

I opened a door to a room full of orcs. It seemed that no wizard or priests were among them, but four warriors. Those were too tough for me. Poison didn’t kill them fast enough, and even the falchion of protection didn’t avoid me taking gruesome hits despite an AC of 20. I only killed one of them, then had to retreat quickly. I circled around the room, shaking of the warriors, then hid in the corridor leading into the orc room from the opposite site, both doors closed. Hah! They’d never look for me here!

Or would they?

They would. Hardly 50 turns after hiding in there, orcs opened the door from their room. Nine or ten orcs pushed into the corridor, where I was able to take out the first few with flaming arrows. The rest was slashed to pulp with the protective falchion. No warriors had been among them. From here on I only encountered single orcs (including the warriors). Singled out and from a distance they eventually died when shot with flaming arrows.

There were still Harold and Joseph on the level and I didn’t want to get too close to them.

D:11

The hill giant here had been waiting for me. I managed to kill him while taking some blows, then danced across the floor to continue.

D:12

This level had grey rock walls and brown floors and long winding corridors. I was also low again on arrows, a result of prolonged fighting two levels further up. I came across a staircase down with some fangs and a purple ugly thing. These unlikely allies chased me a good bit before I managed to kill them. I lost my last javelin here, then found a Book of Control (useless to me).

My falchion of protection ID-ed as +2, +2. I found a scroll of enchant weapon to improve it a bit more. I also took a wand of frost from a dead orc, yet overall this level was very tough. The long winding path didn’t allow to circumvent enemies. I had to leave when a pack of yaks spotted me and came at me.

D:13

I was down to 17 arrows here in an open level with a vault-like layout. Opened one of the pillars to find an orc band with a priest and was promptly smitten.

I encountered a vampire. Ranged weapons didn’t help and he became invisible. I was confused and an orange rat hit me. I was unable to land any hits here. Potion of curing, scroll of teleportation. Then it took my two potions of healing just to get out of there.

I found a wand of frost. Down to 9 arrows I could use every advantage there was. If I just could find the Lair! There was an unexplored area on D:11 – I had seen one or two elephants there and had turned around. Maybe the Lair was there. Problem was, I couldn’t take on two elephants (most likely not even one). But when I was cornered by a hill giant and orc warriors here, I had to go someplace and had two stairs available. I chose to go up.

D:11

Not that I had a realistic chance to resupply with arrows in the Lair, but it should certainly be easier there on the first two or three floors. Plus, my pack was still full. It would also give me a chance to test some magic on some easier monsters. It’s hard to effectively use a spell in close combat against a dangerous enemy, if the success rate is just 50%.

I was right about the assumptions about the elephants I had made. I lured one away from where he was, then came back to find the entrance. As I got closer I saw another elephant and four slugs. I had enough time to enter, but upon exiting I could expect a beating. I’d better succeed in there.

The Lair of Beasts, and I got a shopping list

Lair:1

Levelled up to 11 after killing two yaks. Then I encountered a hill giant, which seemed strange given that this was the Lair of Beasts!?

The hill giant eventually succumbed to poison, but I ended up swarmed by four yaks, a komodo dragon and an ice beast quickly. I eventually had to flee down a stair, unable to pick up an interesting elven leather armour and a book.

Lair:2

More yaks, but in a corridor, and manageable. Wandering around I eventually let go a happy squeak upon finding first 13, then 26 arrows, all +0, but at least they were arrows to shoot things with! I had been down to just nine, those of the flame brand all gone.

I slashed some minor things before I encountered a pack of green rats. I was in a small corridor, so they couldn’t damage me too hard, but suddenly they were joined by a five-headed hydra. Running away it was.

Lair:3

I had to flee the last level, too, so by now I was triple-locked. I hadn’t even placed a stash yet. I only went as far as to the next stair up.

Lair:1

I wiggled through the second level to return to the top of the Lair. Simple goals now: find the stairs closest to the entrance, then find a room for the stash. Then continue looting. During all three steps: avoid getting eaten. This was not an easy task. There was also a spiny frog on this level, and more yaks.

Lair:2

I made my way through by avoiding the spiny frog and reentered. There were no really big rooms on this level, only medium sized ones, including the one where the preferred stairs ended. I began to drop some things on the wall: all four books I carried, rings of wizardry and ice, my short sword, Pikel’s whip of electrocution – then the hydra walked into the room.

The wise decision would have been to run again and leave all the stuff behind. But I was more of the dumb kind and fought her. I zapped her with puffs of frost, then quaffed a potion of might and quickly subdued her with my falchion of protection, which was probably the most stupid thing ever, since I sliced off three heads, growing six new. The beast still died because of the sheer damage done, but I probably just earned a Golden Goofus.

I returned for a moment back up to get the armour and book I hadn’t been able to take earlier. I got the elven armour, which was +3 (up one from the one I had), but the beasts held me away from the book. I returned to the stash and dropped excess scrolls and potions and my +2 leather armour.

Lair:3

Found the staircase to the Snake Pits and another ring of regeneration. Given my lack of poison resistance, the Snake Pits were off limits so far. As was any other area in the dungeons.

Around the level, I found some scrolls of identify. They showed me potions of agility and gain intelligence, scrolls of enchant weapon III, and a ring of teleport control. Items #2 and #3 were immediately put to good use. My falchion of protection was +4, +4 now. Among other more or less useful findings was a staff of fire. Now my skills in evocation and fire magic were zero flat, so it was probably not a wise choice to mishandle hydras with. I left out the bottom right corner of the level (spiny frog alert).

Lair:4

Here was the entrance to the Shoals (so no Swamp, meh), guarded by sharks, and a few more goodies. The main price was a +2, +2 quarterstaff of crushing. This could be something to … yeah, crush hydras with. I also found books of Malediction (my second) and Cantrips, the latter giving me Apportation.

Oh yeah, and Erica. Thankfully my stealth was slightly bigger than zero and she didn’t notice me right away.

Lair:5

Here be yaks. And plenty of them. They were still posing a big problem to me, not succumbing to poison quick enough and doing big damage to me, even in 1-on-1 situations.

A scroll of enchant weapon III was put to good use, giving me a +3, +3 quarterstaff of crushing. A little further I was engaged by another group of yaks and was driven back. An agate snail joined the chase. No, really. It just got between me and the yaks into a corridor. I then poisoned and hit the snail until it retreated into its shell, effectively dumping the angry yaks behind it and then retreated somewhere safe.

Well, ultimately it was not that safe, since a fire drake came to molest me. It was time to retreat when I ran into five elephants in the next room.

I ventured back up, had a hairy encounter with blink frogs on Lair:3 and dumped some stuff at the stash.

Lair:1

This floor was finally cleaned up. The book that I had twice failed to get was the Book of Summoning, so useless to me at the moment. I tried to kill the spiny frog with poison, but it rather poisoned me, and quite heavily. Fortunately potions of curing were available in abundance to me…

What was more worrying was my low offensive output. If yaks hurt me that badly, I’d better not encounter death yaks at all…

Hitting rock bottom

Lair:4

I moved back down. The plan was to check the entrance to the Shoals. On the way I reached level 12 after slaying a blink frog. The main problem with the Shoals for now was the fact that the entrance was guarded by a shark and I had no method of safe dispatch regarding that beast. Melee be it. Poison helped, but I took quite a beating before laying it to the rest on the ground of the small lake surrounding the Shoals entrance.

Shoals:1

The entrance was at the very end of a small peninsula. Before long I encountered two death yaks. That was not the place for me to venture any deeper. I took a scroll of remove curse with me and left once a spear throwing merman spotted me.

What now? My experience level and power were lacking, I realized that. There was still a potion of experience in a shop on D:7. By now, I had 864G and could afford it, but then I would have to get through the elephants on D:11 again. On the other hand, Lair:5 was infested by elephants as well. What now?

Lair:5

This level was also infested with yaks, still. My arrows were lying around everywhere, but picking up anything was difficult, as I was constantly disturbed. Attracting the attention of at most two yaks at a time was not all that easy. By now I was pelting them with a few arrows from afar, then switched to my venom dagger to poison them, then moved a few tiles to get the poison to weaken them, and then went to work on them with my crushing staff.

Lair:6

For now, this level was inaccessible, as stair one was guarded by a hydra, and the other two were next to each other and defended by orange rats and at least one death yak (and where there’s one…).

I made another attempt on the first stair, which was next to a rock. I wanted the rats to come at me slowly and one by one (if at all possible), but instead the hydra stepped out behind the rock. I fled to D:5 and we fought bitterly to the death there. Death of the hydra, that is, but it was a close decision (9 HP left at one point).

I tried to get through the orange rats with stair dancing but they drained me all the way back to level 11, those bi…easts. I killed them all, then got into huge pack of blink frogs, that also almost killed me. The attempt to get deeper into the Lair was herewith abandoned. With the Shoals and Snake Pit not options, I could only go back into the Dungeon, possibly for the Orcish Mines.

Lair:5

Upon going up, I realized that a scroll of detect curse was lying around in the next room, which I hadn’t picked up yet. I went to get it. There I met a water moccasin. I went after the snake to kill them, but only got her wounded and she fled. I chased after her, then screeched to a halt when we met a black mamba. I returned, abandoning the chase. Entering the room with the scroll, I suddenly faced the horde of elephants inhabiting the level. Between them and the mamba I was *really* badly mangled. I lost all my potions of healing and four of seven potions of curing, my potion of speed and a potion of might, and then I still had to throw in a teleport. (I did not have scrolls of blinking identified)

None of my losses could be replaced at the stash, except for potions of curing, which were my smallest problem by far.

The warg barks

D:11

As expected, the elephants and a few other monster were right around the stairs as I entered. They were all asleep, so I had a free turn and that was enough to get away more or less unharmed.

D:10

Close encounter here again with Harold, and then I couldn’t avoid to fight Joseph. He confused me twice, but I was able to bludgeon him to death eventually. He left nothing worth bothering and I continued. The entrance to the Mines was on D:9

Orc:1

This was only a medium-sized chamber and certainly not the whole floor, since there were only two stairs down. Common orcs were not an issue for me, going down quickly with my staff or falchion. More problematic were wizards and priests for their offense, and warriors, which took ages to kill. Combos of the latter three were rather unpleasant. Overall, the area was cleared rather quickly. I entered with just below 1,000G – let’s see where we can get. (Of course, I know of only one store in the whole dungeon…)

Orc:2

More priests. The opening fight already included a lot of smiting. Some glowing leather armours were dropped, but nothing too helpful. Heck, even a good robe could possibly help me. After the intense fight this turned out to be a very small room.

I re-entered through the second stairs. There was a store! It held books, and had a manual of bows. Of course, my problem was not my bows skill (three arrows took down an ogre by now), but rather my arrow count: 29 at the moment. This room was also very small, but offered an escape hatch down and a staircase up. I chose the latter, but the room on Orc:1 it led to was really tiny with only five orcs in them. I went back to the first room on Orc:2, which had to staircases down.

Orc:3

We got another critical situation here, with a priest on the far wall and a warrior, who quickly got between us. I took some blows moving around the warrior to slay the priest first, then went the distance with the warrior.

A bit further into the cave I found some green crystal walls. Turning around the corner revealed a bunch of deep elven casters. Eeeeks!

I ran a bit away, then took out my bow, waiting for them to come into view, preferably single file. They didn’t, a conjurer and a priest entering at the same time. My arrows missed. Then they aligned well for a zap with the wand of lightning. Two zaps took down the conjurer and only then, from two tiles away, the priest hurled flames at me. I quickly killed him with my falchion. Now a few orcs were coming, but I had seen four elves, possibly more, next to the crystal walls, and, already somewhat hurt, it maybe was time for an orderly retreat. I was just positioned well in a chokepoint, cutting down orc after orc, when a pair of goblins (poor little suckers) and a deep elf mage followed. The mage chose to go into melee – bad mistake, fella.

Then the second (last?) elven priest came. I hid behind the chokepoint, hoping to get him into melee. But instead he animated the corpses strewn out everywhere to form into abominations. Now it was time to run.

The other area accessible from Orc:2 held only orcs, and no priests among them, and was rather easy to clean. Two stairs led down to Orc:4, but none up.

Orc:4

I took the right stair, which led me to an open area with the entrance to the Elven Halls – if they were here, what had the elves on the upper floor had been doing there?

I was able to easily cut through the orc bands on the vast bottom floor by going slowly and hacking at them with my trusted falchion of protection. If they didn’t have much support and came in singles, even warriors were not much of a threat. A troll was laid to rest with the aid of poison. This left the northern part of the level, where I had spotted the corner of a stone structure. Here be loot.

I slowly went closer. Nobody on the southern face of the structure, which was actually several structures with doors. I went around the western face. Nobody there. An altar to Vehumet was further to the west. I went around another corner. Northern face clear. Then I was about to go across the gap between structures. There was a warg.

The warg barked. And then the warriors came.

The First Battle of Vehumet's Altar

The first few warriors were not the problem, then came one with a mighty battleaxe. That thing almost sliced me in half. I killed him. The next orc that came around picked up the axe, and the game began anew. I killed him as well, then picked up the axe. Then I turned around to the western side, where suddenly four warriors and an orc knight poured out of one of the structures. I softened them up with wands, then went into a gruesome battle against them. I managed to kill the knight and three warriors already heavily wounded from my wands of draining and lightning, then took some more nasty hits from the fourth, a warg, and another orc. My ring of regeneration was finally put to good use here!

I backed off in the direction of Vehumet’s Altar while fighting them, but it was a dead end and I could not get out again. I finally killed the last orc of that group, then took some time to rest. I went back to the north face, killed a single orc, but then returned to the west, where I met my master in an orc knight with a battleaxe of venom. I had no answer to that and ran away, losing the battle of First Battle of Vehumet’s Altar. I intend to come back.

The comeback

Orc:3

First I went back to the other chamber here with the deep elf priest. He waited close to the stairs, where I assaulted and killed him, but not before he got a few abominations up. I retreated, with a large abomination on my hooves. I danced around it, then returned. A small abomination and some crawling corpses were left, as well as an orc.

Killing all that I found something the priest had left: an elven longbow! Now I wanted to see what those elves had been guarding. But I didn’t get that far. An orcish high priest and a large abomination were there and the priest quickly summoned a few demons that chased me all the way out of the Mines. A neqoxec drained a point of intelligence from me.

D:8

I went up to get Psyche and to test my longbow. I quickly found her. Four shots from the +3, +2 elven longbow were enough to kill her and ID the bow. What an anticlimactic ending for the chases she had given me. There was one more troublesome level left.

D:5

This time we’ll clean this or we’ll die here. All the enemies here had already been killed by me more or less effortlessly in the Mines, and this time I got through there and also picked up quite a few arrows left behind before.

D:7

Actually, there was more on this floor: the two small rooms with the merman. I went there and hacked him to fish sticks. The room he had been in contained some food rations and two big fish in a pool on the side: more fish sticks. I bought the potion of experience for 750G and thus got up to level 13. I had 1,078G left.

D:10

Did some more cleanup here, but avoided Harold. I found a ring here and had already found one on D:7. One was detected as cursed, the other was clean and was a ring of +2 strength.

Now there was only one way to go: down. By the way, so far I had no gloves, no cloak, and no amulet – I hadn’t found ANY of EITHER so far.

Can't get no satisfaction

D:11

Only two elephants remained at the stairs when I entered. I tried to run and dodge one of them, but it didn’t work, both followed me. I got a lead and started to pelt the first one with arrows and javelins (picked up on D:5 again), and then went into melee. It was not easy, but I killed them both, and then a third one closer to the stairs down.

The slugs and the troll that also still roamed the level were not that much of a problem by now. There was some minor stuff left in the corner I had never gotten into so far, including a ration and a scroll of fog, but nothing that would be too exciting.

D:12

I entered from the stair which had been too tough before. Nobody there. I took the first two or three turns of the corridor before meeting a manticore, followed by a hydra. Longbow plus staff of crushing worked wonders! Then again it only had five heads – against more-headed hydras the strategy most likely would have to be refined.

With the longbow it was however possible to kill a yak in as few as three shots with +0 arrows! Which was a good thing given my ammo shortness. After going through four yaks I got to the stairs without opposition.

D:13

I was careful here given the fact that I didn’t have potions of healing and wouldn’t survive another encounter with the vampire.

I went down a path finding a komodo dragon, which was quickly put to sleep, then found some stone walls. I moved around the tiny structure. It was a 3x3 square, open on the southern face with a statue before it and a portal to the bazaar inside. And I had no means to get in there.

Or did I? I had no scrolls of blinking and no wand of disintegration. However I had un-IDed scrolls and wands with me. Well, one wand. I had zapped it twice at monsters to no effect. It didn’t have one on the statue either. Perhaps it was empty. This left scrolls. I had two pairs of unknown scrolls and a single one.

The first scroll of a pair tested was for amnesia. The second was to curse jewellery. Great. Even if the single scroll remaining was one for blinking, getting me into the bazaar, I would have to do an uncontrolled teleport to get out. Not too thrilling.

It was a scroll of blinking and I blinked into the bazaar, which had set up shop in a lava field. Interesting setting, do you get many customers here? I only had 1,097G so this would not become an extended shopping spree, but maybe I could find a few goodies.

Bazaar

Well, it was a small bazaar with only few goodies. No weapons, no armour (of course!). It had two wand shops, a book shop and a jewellery shop with only four or five really interesting items, and I could buy at most two:

• Wand of teleportation (9) – 390G
• Wand of healing (7) – 858G
• Wand of healing (3) – 546G
• ring “Rorchin” (+Blink, rPois, rF+) – 490G
• ring “Shro Tuano” (rC+, rN+) – 374G

This was utterly frustrating. The first ring would open up the Snake Pit for me, while the wands were yummy for obvious reasons. For the smaller wand of healing I could get the wand of teleportation and one of a couple of wands of disintegration (with 159G left before the latter). Well, sigh. Make it so. I left with the three wands and 18G.

D:13

That had been the most unsatisfying bazaar ever. Now I had to teleport out of the gate room. With about half of the level explored, the chances to end in unknown territory were about 120%.

I ended up close to the edge of uncharted territory, next to a hill giant. An orc warrior joined the fray, but I hacked my way through. Eventually I returned to the bazaar area, where I had left some of my stuff (in the vain hope to find lots and lots of goodies in the bazaar). The un-IDed wand I had zapped at the statue was still not ID-ed.

A dangerous encounter with a Cyclops later, only the area around the vampire was left. I let it be.

Smokes and mirrors

D:14

The first stair was not very good, ending up between Sonja and some other dangerous monsters. I was immediately poisoned and returned up, now chased by orcs and the vampire on D:13…

The second stairs brought me to an adjacent rooms with a couple of doors. I heard all kinds of things: snorting, slurping noises, and the ticking of a clock nearby. There be loot!

I went around a corner and found the jelly. I almost had it killed with stones, when Sonja and her band showed up. She poisoned me and hit me, warping spaces around me and eventually teleporting me away. From where I was now, I moved around three corners, then found the entrance to the Labyrinth. A band of surprisingly well armed kobolds assaulted me with crossbows and one even had a wand of disintegration which blasted me a bit, but I slugged through. Had that been Sonja’s entourage? She had not been among them.

Labyrinth

I carried 15 rations, more than plenty to get through here. I soon found a way into the stone wall area, from where the path went almost straight through into the metal wall area, where I came upon a rock wall structure. Hmmm, suspicious. On the right side was a door. I equipped my longbow and a ring of +2 strength, then opened.

No, we’re not here yet. A room with three small statues and two white potions was ahead of me, with three doors on the far side. I feared the worst, two of them ought to be trapped and my traps skill was … not so good. Three un-IDed white potions were next to the entrance. I managed to detect one teleport trap at the center door, but nothing else despite trying very hard. The tile right before the center door was not trapped. There was not much room behind it, I equipped my quarterstaff of crushing (+5, +4 now after I had applied another scroll of enchant weapon III), and opened.

It was the wrong door. In was a scroll of remove curse. Nothing else.

I would now try the upper door. A trap besides it and 17 stones behind it.

So it had to be the lower door. Two traps at the sides, I opened, uh, gotcha! There was the minotaur. I quaffed a potion of agility, then went into melee – which almost ended badly. I could hardly hurt him with my staff and he abused me pretty badly. I had to zap myself twice with my wand of healing.

The loot included: a rod of destruction, a wand of frost, three un-IDed wands, a book, a few scrolls, an un-IDed ring, two amulets (I didn’t have any so far!), and some weaponry and armour that was not useful to me.

I couldn’t even carry it all. First I picked up as much stuff as possible, then read a scroll of detect curse. No cursed items among the loot. The ring turned out to be of +1 intelligence and not that useful for me. The amulets did not ID upon wearing. One was an artifact and gave +3 dexterity, but had other goodies in it. I used the scroll of identify in the loot to reveal it as the amulet “Isuog”, also granting warding properties. The scroll of recharging was put into my wand of healing to give back the two charges I had just used, but nothing more.

The book was the Book of Burglary. I learned the Swiftness spell, then left.

D:14

There were jellies here, yet I first went for Sonja. I had no stones (I had dropped mine in the Labyrinth to carry all the stuff in there) and no inventory space. Sonja was pretty nasty with her curare-tipped needles and a weapon that continued to blink me around, but she went down quickly when I just resorted to zap her to death with a wand of frost. I did the same to a jelly that came to molest me while I was still slowed. Sonja had left a wand, but I could not carry any more …!

I used a few kobolds to ID wands I had found in the Labyrinth. I had gotten magic darts, cold, and fireball. Good selection. I had the kobolds under control, until they were joined by cyan ugly things. These things responded well to arrows, but were outnumbering me. On my fighting retreat I took one up to D:13 to kill it there in serenity, but had made my assumptions without the vampire there. It took some running to survive. When I just got into the direction of another staircase, a Cyclops cut off my avenue of approach and forced me to go up instead.

Via D:12 I used different staircases to get back to D:14. On the way I found an empty arch on D:13, surrounded by strong weapons encased in translucent rock.

Just back on D:14, I ran into a door mimic. Really? Door? Hmz. Once I got through the ugly things and a few remaining weaker monsters, the level was pretty clear, but still had stuff lying around I couldn’t carry. I had to venture for my stash and drop some wands and rings.

D:13

This was the new D:5, really. Now ugly things had come out of nowhere, and I had also spotted centaur warriors.

That was so clear. I had only killed ONE common centaur so far – I REALLY could have used the arrows someplace! Did some dancing and hiding here to wiggle through. Stairs up and stairs down were far apart here…

Lair:2

Dropped rings of +2 STR, +1 INT, and an un-IDed, cursed one. Dropped wands of confusion, magic darts, and frost (the latter zapped 13-times). Dropped scrolls of fog and amnesia. Dropped potions of porridge (two left, those were the ones found in the Labyrinth) and resistance. Dropped the one wand that had resisted identification for ages now, and dropped the rod of destruction. I still carried 12 wands, including duplicates of digging and disintegration: one was with charges known among both pairs, one not. Finally, I dropped my trusted old bow. I love you. I will come back to see you, I promise.

Everybody likes the underdog

D:13

Things were getting increasingly scary here! Travelling through this level became genuinely unsafe, as somebody had released slimes now. I was wounded quite a bit just going for the stairs, then went to pick up all kinds of stuff still lying around on D:14.

D:15

Stair one led to another stair down, both encased in translucent rock. Kobolds danced around it.

Stair two. This was the same room, but a bit further away and with a scroll shop nearby. It had a scroll of blinking for 99G and four of identify for 36G each. Yay, I carried 108G… I bought one scroll of identify to ID the amulet I had found in the Labyrinth (the second one after the randart). It was a useless amulet of faith. I also ID-ed potions of degeneration (drop) and a scroll of holy word.

There were slime creatures on this floor. I would have loved to soften them up before meleeing them, but I only had 20 arrows left. This grief was remedied when I killed a centaur warrior in melee after walking around a bit. He left me 33 +0 arrows. Some were immediately lost again to kill a hydra.

An antique weapon shop carried a pitted staff for 203G and a runed bow for 89G. I’m sorry, that’s too much for me…

I found a ring and wore it, it was a cursed ring of teleportation. I had scrolls of remove curse, no problem. I explored a little further, but then had to take evasive action, when I came upon Azrael from a good distance. I had no fire resistances apart from a ring, which was not enough to make me take that fight.

D:16

I went further down over the protected first stair in the translucent rocks. The first thing I came across here was a giant frog, which was killed quickly and I reached level 14.

There was quite some general loot around here. This included a bloodstained leather armour, but I couldn’t find a nice quiet corner to try it on. Also: more wands (un-IDed, still, there are more??), and scroll of identify. One wand was one of enslavement. It was nice to see yaks go against each other.

I went a bit further until I suddenly turned a corner and bumped into Aizul. Running away didn’t seem like an option. Melee. With a potion of might I threw myself against him.

Boy, did I take a beating. He almost killed me and I had to do an uncontrolled teleport just to get away. I ended up next to a wyvern and couldn’t run away. I went through all my potions of curing, zapped it to teleport away, while I was close to some stairs, but still had to zap myself to heal.

D:15

Now that encased stairwell here came in handy. Here I could also test the bloodstained leather armour, which was the +2 leather armour “Gazxuni”, and gave +4 accuracy.

I then entered again from a different stair to explore this level. Azrael didn’t make this too easy, I constantly had to run away. At least I gained 90 arrows after killing a band of centaurs. Among them were a few arrows of dispersal.

This was one of those very dangerous floors (like, all from D:1-D:27…). I was roasted when I stepped on a fire trap that burned many of my scrolls. I hacked away at a dragon zombie and found a general store that held nothing that was remotely interesting. I also came across Josephine, some ugly old conjurer, that quickly turned invisible. I backed into a corridor and then shot arrows down the aisle until they hit something, then grabbed my falchion and attacked. I was hit by a bolt of draining, but killed her quickly.

There was also a rock troll zombie that refused to be destroyed. I found the third staircase down, but was quickly overwhelmed there and retreated.

In the bottom left corner of the level was a 3-tile corridor with granite statues of monsters left and right in certain distances. This so totally screamed trap all over.

While I was trying to examine it more closely, Azrael came in from behind. We would decide this here and now. He fireballed me for some awesome damage, but five zaps from the wand of cold killed him.

Back to examining the corridor with the statues. I was looking for pressure plates here that would possibly animate the statues. With nagas, centaurs and big birds among them, this would not be an easy fight. I carefully examined the corridor, which forked after some distance, and found nothing. Nothing happened. No loot either. Just an ogre and a frog. Disappointing, I must say.

D:16

I quickly visited D:16 again to take out a group of centaurs, getting a flaming bow and some 80-odd arrows here, then entered from another stair. I killed some rakshasas, but was then chased by a rock troll.

D:15

Reentering, I was terribly burned by a mottled dragon and lost about my last few scrolls. I could not make any headway here. I had to go somewhere else.

D:13

This level was a major obstacle between me and the Lair and my stash. I was immediately crowded and was followed back down by two white ugly things and a centaur warrior. They almost killed me and I had to empty my wand of healing. I eventually managed to squeeze around the outside of the level.

I was now completely without any means of healing, until I picked up my last five potions of curing at my stash. Where to go now?

Silence in Orc City

D:10

I was to go for the Mines again, and I meant it, with 168 arrows and a grim look. On the way I came across Harold again, who paralyzed me with a wand, forcing me into melee with him and a troll. Both died.

Orc:4

I’m back. The Second Battle of Vehumet’s Altar can begin.

I started on the southwestern edge of the stone structures after dispatching of a few single orcs on the way from the stairs. The area between the structures and the altar was clean. I went into the gap between two structures and met the first orcs there.

Then I ran into an orc knight. I retreated and constantly plinked him with arrows, which made for a very long battle. Then a second knight joined us. Oh, dear. It took a ton of arrows, dancing, and wands of draining, fireball, and lightning to kill them, by which time I was heavily poisoned and badly wounded.

I rested thoroughly, then returned. Single orcs were not a problem, even knights! Softening them up from a distance, then meleeing them with the falchion of protection was a great strategy, but they weren’t allowed to have any support for this to work.

Then three knights came out of one of the structures to get me. This was impossible. I had to take one of them to D:3 to make this work, killed him there, then returned from a different stair to continue. They absolutely had to be singled out.

It took a *long* time to get things ordered here, but when I was finally done, half the level was covered in blood. Unfortunately there was only little gold to find here, only four shops in some of the structures. One was a weapon shop that held the +6, +5 bow “Trupt”, with velocity, teleport, and +3 dexterity. It was okay, I only lacked 729G to afford it. I only bought a potion of healing in another shop here and made big eyes at the bow.

But at least the battle was won. And what now. There was some golden staircase on this floor? Where would it lead me?

The ammo store

Elf:1

The entrance led into a corridor with cells secured by iron grates on each side. Behind those were deep elf summoners. Unreachable. Progress was not possible here.

The only option was to zap a wand of digging at the rock wall right next to the entrance and try to progress that way. It worked, revealing a passage behind the cells on the right side. The summoners only raised a few small demons that were not much of a threat.

The elves were a threat. Single summoners or soldiers I met in the first rooms and corridors were not that dangerous, but I then bumped into a priest with a few soldiers. The priest confused me and made the soldiers invisible and it was a nasty fight. I think most of my hits were sheer luck as I killed them all.

Yet, if there was one place in this dungeon to properly restock on arrows: this was it. Many of the fighters were equipped with bows (many runed) and arrows. Everything went rather well until I fell through a shaft.

Elf:2

Close by was a knight and we engaged in a shooting derby, which I won, but he had landed some nasty hits. He left 18 runed arrows, which soon turned out to be enchanted +3! Perfect for getting rid of conjurers and the like here. I also found arrows of frost and generally so many runed and glowing bows and swords I didn’t know where to put them, but finding one with a brand was not that easy.

Not easy was also surviving a bigger pack. I found a room with a fighter and a soldier after a while. I shot them with arrows, but suddenly six or seven more elves came at me, including priests. This was a close battle…

Part of the level was submerged in water. Without any means to cross the deep water, I had to go somewhere else.

Elf:1

There was still part of the level unexplored. I found a +2 elven leather armour of fire resistance (shortly after being incinerated by a conjurer), then couldn’t kill a summoner quickly enough before he summoned an army. Thankfully I still was speedy enough to get out of there. I also found a +2 elven leather armour of magic resistance and a +2, +3 elven bow of velocity.

Elf:3

The first stairs were heavily guarded. First, there were only fighters and a few soldiers, which I would have taken on, but soon casters joined the battle, and there was one guy with arrows of dispersal here, so I retreated and re-entered elsewhere.

The second stairs were also defended my casters; I killed a conjurer, then hogs attacked. Was Kirke here? Better retreat. There was just one little problem: there was only one escape hatch left on Elf:2 – so the submerged area hid an island with stairs somewhere, accessible only from below.

Well, so it be. I had to do some stair dancing here. The first batch brought up was quickly subdued (including an orcish summoner), but then on the second try a deep elf summoner raised some nasty things, including a sixfirhy that almost killed me.

I kept slugging away here and soon reached level 15 and found an opalescent robe, the +2 robe “Ibrunlot”, offering rC++. There als were some pools on this floor, inhabited by all kinds of stuff, including electric eels. Thankfully they were quite easily silenced by three or four +0 arrows from the bow of flame. Of course, the arrows were most likely lost in deep water.

But then I ran into something that was impossible to overcome for me: Nikola. He did brutal damage to me on even a single zap, where I couldn’t hurt him at all. All the stairs were located fairly close together, and he always seemed to be near, and Kirke was also running around here, so I had to abandon my campaign here, since I couldn’t hurt her either.

Where to go now? I still had *nothing* giving me poison resistance (and by the way neither cloak nor gloves), which ruled out the Snake Pit.

But the Lair was still a possible option. The Vaults always are manageable on the first two levels or so, but I hadn’t even found the entrance.

Breathing beasts

Lair:5

I stopped at my stash and dropped some of the bows I had found. I had around 200 arrows with me, so for the moment I could excessively rely on ranged attacks. The Snake Pit entrance was on Lair:3, where I killed the naga guards from distance easily, but stronger nagas would most likely chop me into pieces. I had no means of healing and without poison resistance it was not an option to go there, although if everything else failed, one could at least peek at Snake:1.

But for now I went deeper into the Lair. I cleaned up Lair:3 and 4, killing Erica in the latter, and then went against the elephants on Lair:5. In singles, they were easily killed by arrows, but the last two came in a pair. The first one through the corridor fled when wounded, upon which I faced a healthy one directly in front of me. I took some damage, but killed it.

Lair:6

Here starts the work. There were death yaks here, so cautious movement was king. I found a scroll of identify and ID-ed my only unknown scroll, which was one of acquirement. Better use it, before someone evil burns it. What did I need? Food I had plenty, gold didn’t really advance me here. I had some jewellery to choose from. Armour and weapons were possible choices. I could choose armour and hope for a cloak of poison resistance – that would be sugar sweet.

I got a +1 shield of positive energy. Sigh.

I continued and met a death yak. I tried to kill it with arrows – fail. Before I was able to look twice, I had about five death yaks, three blink frogs and an eight-headed hydra on my hooves. I had learned mephitic cloud just earlier, but it was no help in this situation.

Lair:7

There was no point in going up again. I needed to kill stuff and find something granting poison resistance. For the moment I found an eight-headed hydra, which was killed swiftly by +3 arrows, which I nevertheless had a limited supply of. Then I met a bunch of bumlebees, which poisoned me heavily before I cut through them. I hid a bit with my ring of regeneration on, but overall this open level (just four pillars around the center) was rather easy compared to above. I also finally found a cloak, albeit just a +0 one.

Lair:8

That last one had been so easy, this’d be too, right?

Wrong. There were death yaks here, and although I could take on one, it got scary, if they came in pairs. It took a while to kill them. In the south was the entrance to a stone cave with grey plants around. I went in, and soon faced a catoblepas. I was petrified and slowed a couple of times, but got moving again just in time to kill the beast. I happened to find the entrance to the Slime Pits, but was in no way ready to enter them.

The cave made a sharp turn, behind which a six-headed hydra awaited me. Thankfully I’m flexible with the way I’m killing stuff here. I still had a few of those +3 arrows which were useful time and again. Deeper into the cave, death yaks were just waiting to gore me, together with sheep and common yaks.

There should be loot in there. Maybe there was a different way to get it. The inner part of the cave was made of rock walls. There was a possibility to reach it with a wand of digging. I cut a bypass into a chamber with granite statues. I first killed a sheep, but then there was another catoblepas. I succeeded in getting him into the freshly cut corridor, so if he petrified me again, at least no yaks could join the beating. That one worked, but I was still severely wounded in the battle. Finally those wands of slowing, paralysis and so on were finding some use. I was putting him away just as he did me.

I slowly went deeper into the cave, but was soon chased out by three death yaks. They pursued me all the way to a corridor, where I meleed them. Two fled wounded to return later…

I went back to the cave after healing, where I encountered another of those annoying catoblepas. But that had been the last one: when I entered the cave behind him, I found the loot, some gold, a rod and a dyed leather armour. A cursed ring of hunger was also there. The loot was rather disappointing: the armour was +2, the rod one of demonology. On the way out I was almost squished between death yaks and elephants. There were some scrolls still on the floor, but I would let them be.

I couldn’t find an item of poison resistance for my life… I would take a tiny peek into the snake pits. Maybe I could clean a level without hitting warriors.

Your touch, so cold

Snake:1

I shortly went to my stash, then returned here. Common nagas should be beatable, but the first enemies found here were all snakes. Two of the first three were black mambas, which hurt me a ton. I walked around, finding nothing worth bothering, until I ran into the first naga. It was a warrior. I didn’t even try and ran for the stairs.

D:16

I went to my stash, then continued down the dungeon to this level. I carefully avoided the area where Aizul had almost killed me and instead picked up some general items lying around. Time to delve deeper and find the entrance to the Vaults.

D:17

I ended up *right* next to Wiglaf. Returned to D:16, but he followed me. I gained some distance, but I arrows hardly hurt him. I dodged him and instead returned here.

The danger zone. It was right here. Blundered into a teleport trap, then faced slimes and a hydra. And then a dragon. I quickly equipped my ring of fire resistance, but there was no time to don the leather armour granting fire resistance. Still, I carried only three scrolls, the rest had already been burned. The dragon was almost dead when he went into melee and I chopped away at him. He fled – then a wolf spider attacked me. The dragon was gone. I went after him, he hid with some kobolds. I shot them all with arrows, then finally managed to kill the dragon from afar.

It didn’t get boring here. I went to butcher the dragon, but centaurs attacked, joined by a wraith. At least the fight allowed me to re-stock arrows. Many had the flame brand, which was fine, although I carried a flaming bow to use with +0 arrows.

I found a scroll of recharging, which put six charges into my empty wand of healing. Just a tad further into a corridor I encountered Rupert and fled. He confused me – I barely made it to the stairs, slowly went to the next stair on D:16 and came down again.

Killed a centaur warrior, who left me 30 +4 arrows – yummy! But then I rounded a corner to find Frances, aided by slimes and a wyvern. This was not the fight I could pick. With the level about fully explored, I ventured down –

D:18

… into the arms of Norris. I could not go back, and he immediately became invisible. I didn’t know, where to go, and suddenly was paralyzed and chopped away at. When I could move again I tried to slash away at him as he had just flickered. He brutally mishandled me and I became confused, then paralyzed. I had to go to my wand of healing, then my wand of disintegration, which didn’t help. I emptied my wand of healing and wanted to bring in a zap from the wand of teleportation, but was paralyzed again. When I moved again, I zapped myself to teleport away, but he chopped me apart before the teleport kicked in.

Sic transit gloria mundi.