Deflect Missiles

Version 0.16: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

Deflect Missiles
Level	6
School1	Charms
School2	Air
Source(s)	Book of Enchantments Book of the Sky
Casting noise	3
Spell noise	0

This spell protects the caster from all kinds of projectile attacks, by slowing them and somewhat diverting their path. Successfully deflecting an incoming projectile still requires a reflexive action (your ability to do so is measured by the Evasion stat), but unlike lesser spells like Repel Missiles, Deflect Missiles typically makes this so easy that even a drunk plate-clad orc can do it.

Deflect Missiles is a level 6 Charms/Air Magic spell which strongly protects the caster from ranged attacks. It reduces the to-hit of ranged attacks against the caster to a random value between:

• vs Single-Target Beams: 0% - 50% of its normal value
• vs Bolts: 0% - 66% of its normal value

This spell only helps you to evade ranged attacks; it has no effect on your ability to block them.

Strategy

This spell gives a very good amount of protection, but there are still a few ranged attacks than can ignore it, among them such nasty things as Hellfire, Torment, and Fireball, as well as all Hexes. Even so, it can be very useful in places like the last level of the Shoals (merfolk javelineers), the last level of the Elven Halls (deep elf master archers), or Zot:5 (electric golems, ancient liches).

Despite its power, this spell's usefulness is very character-dependent. In general, it doesn't do much that Repel Missiles and a good EV or AC won't do. Usually, the characters who will find this the most useful are the purest of casters: it is possible for a DEFE to conquer the Realm of Zot with 8 AC and 16 EV if they make very judicious use of this and other utility spells. Characters that are more hybridized are often better served saving that 6 MP for another Conjuration, or a spell like Haste.