Snake Pit

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

The corridors of the Snake Pit are home to all varieties of serpent, and are inhabited by a society of powerful nagas and salamanders. A dungeon features only one of the Snake Pit and Spider Nest branches. The entrance to this branch can be found between levels 2 and 4 of the Lair of Beasts. This branch is 4 levels deep. This branch contains the serpentine rune of Zot.

The Snake Pit is a 4-floor branch found in the Lair. Those who explore it are rewarded with the serpentine rune of Zot, but must deal with the many snakes, nagas, and salamanders that call these halls home.

The entrance to the Snake Pit is located between Lair:2 and Lair:3. If you find Snake, you will not find the Spider's Nest in your current game.

Layout

The Snake Pit's layout is very variable, ranging from collections of small square rooms connected by doored hallways to wide open areas, occasionally spotted with bodies of water. It most closely resembles the Dungeon, but without some of its more exotic layouts. Most walls are made out of rock, which can be dug through.

Unlike Spider, this branch generates shops, though this is by no means guaranteed.

Snake:4

Snake:4 will always contain a stone-walled, heavily-guarded rune vault which is drastically different from the rest of the Snake Pits, but the specific design will vary from game to game. This vault will take up a large portion of Snake:4, but the rest of the floor will generally be made up of simple rooms and hallways.

Strategy

As with the other Lair branches, you won't want to enter Snake when you first encounter it; few characters can handle its threats so early.

Poison resistance is very helpful, since there's a high amount of poison-themed enemies. All nagas can Spit Poison, but resistance also reduces the damage of Poison Arrow, and naga ritualists can inflict rPois- with their Virulence spell. If you don't have rPois, consider waiting before doing Snake. Other than poison, the following elements are worth resisting:

• Fire - Salamander bands are common. Common salamanders have fiery melee attacks; salamander tyrants have highly damaging fire spells.
• Electricity - Shock serpents are the only common electric enemy, but they can deal high damage quickly. Their bolts can doublezap, they can fire twice per turn, and their damage ignores 1/2 of your AC.

Most of the monsters in Snake consist of naga packs (slow moving) and snakes (fast).

• Nagas can constrict, making it hard to escape (even a scroll of blinking can fail), and each naga comes with its own abilities. Naga warriors are tough melee threats with all sorts of weapons, naga sharpshooters can hit for upwards of 50 damage with smite-targeted projectiles.
• Snakes are hard to escape from. Anacondas are fast, constricting threats, mana vipers can drain your MP, and shock serpents are high damage electric threats.
• There's also salamanders, fiery enemies at normal speed. In addition to common salamanders and tyrants, salamander mystics can haste other, nearby nagas and salamanders.

Since snakes and salamanders are faster than their naga brethren, a common tactic is to back away to separate the group. The same applies to naga mages and nagarajas that cast Haste on themselves.

Some of the more dangerous monsters include:

• S Guardian serpent - these aren't terribly dangerous on their own. However, their Blink Allies Encircling can quickly surround you with monsters in the serpent's line of sight - including monsters that you didn't know about. Being constricted by 8 nagas is a very quick death.
• N Nagaraja - the most powerful nagas, nagarajas are tough and dangerous threats. They can Haste themselves, increasing their damage significantly (and making them faster than most players).
• N Salamander tyrant - As mentioned above, these salamanders have very strong fire spells. Their Eruption creates lava, and Pyroclastic Surge can only be used if you're on or adjacent to lava. By avoiding lava (if at all possible), you make it less likely for you to be hit by a fire spell.
• S Shock serpent - Buffed electric eels, these fast creatures fire Electrical Bolts. The bolts can doublezap, much like Shock, so try not to stand in front of walls.

Useful Traits

• High AC and EV
• Poison and fire resistance at all times, electricity resistance as needed
• Blink or teleport (to escape constriction easily)

Snake:4 Vaults

The bottom floor of the Snake Pit will always contain a large, heavily-guarded rune vault. There are a couple of possibilities:

• Three Stairways: One of the nastier rune vaults, this vault's entrance chamber is filled with a variety of nagas, including nagarajas and guardian serpents, as well as three upward staircases. Because of this, players often find themselves out in the open facing several dangerous enemies as soon as they enter the floor (though due to the fact that one of these staircases may be an escape hatch, there may also be a normal staircase leading to another part of the floor). After clearing this chamber, there are several narrow hallways and small chambers densely packed with further guards, with the rune located all the way in the back.
• Serpent's Egg: A large rectangular chamber with an oval stone chamber in the middle, open at the top. The entire chamber is heavily populated with nagas of all sorts, and the rune can be found resting against the inner wall of the "egg".
• Caduceus: This vault consists of a large rectangular block with a straight hallway running through the middle and a winding hallway weaving back and forth over the central. All along these paths, nagas of various sorts will be waiting. The winding hallway eventually ends in a narrow, heavily-guarded chamber containing the rune, as well as several nagarajas. This is by far the easiest rune vault, as almost any character can lure the guards out one or two at a time, eventually clearing their way to the end.
• Naga Fortress: The most elaborate of the Snake:4 vaults, this consists of a large trapezoidal stone structure taking up roughly half of the floor. Accessed from either the right or left corner of the structure, it consists of a series of hallways weaving back and forth over each other, eventually ending in the rune chamber. Each chamber contains a variety of nagas, and most also contain some lava with a few salamander mystics or lindwurms. However, the wide door to the final chamber instead hides anacondas and many other snakes, including shock serpents.
• Spirals: A large corridor with two spirals branching off in each direction, guarded by various nagas and some guardian serpents. There are no chokepoints or sharp corners, but if you're stealthy you can pick off one or two nagas at a time. One spiral will contain the rune and the other will contain an acquirement-level item (or occasionally a rune mimic!)
• Pools: This vault is filled with pools and sea snakes. After opening a wide door you will find a small chamber with various snakes and a few nagas. Beyond this is another chamber with more nagas and sea snakes, and the final, larger chamber which contains similar threats.
• Serpentine Throne: A well-guarded snaking corridor leads to a large throne room filled with nagas. The rune is at the very back.
• Scales : A triangular stone structure with a double door entrance. Guarded by nagarajas, nagas, snakes and possibly Vashnia. Rune can be found in one of the three rooms in the back of the vault.
• Quicksilver Temple: Has statues of dragons on its entrance. Guarded by 2 quicksilver dragons, this vault is very dangerous to tackle early - these dragons are fast and dispel buffs like haste and teleport.

Note that salamanders are uncommon in these vaults, with the exception of the fortress.

Monsters

S Anaconda	S Black mamba	S Electric eel	S Guardian serpent	S Mana viper	S Sea snake
N Naga	N Naga mage	N Naga ritualist	N Naga sharpshooter	N Naga warrior	N Nagaraja
N Salamander	N Salamander mystic	N Salamander tyrant	S Shock serpent

Uniques

i Agnes	S Aizul	H Asterion	R Azrael	d Bai Suzhen
@ Donald	@ Frances	g Jorgrun	@ Josephine	@ Kirke
@ Louise	R Mara	@ Nikola	8 Roxanne	@ Rupert
o Saint Roka	N Vashnia

History

• In 0.19, Salamander stormcallers are no more.
• Prior to 0.18, there were Salamander firebrands instead of Salamander stormcallers patrolling the Snake Pit.
• In 0.17, the Snake Pit was reduced to four instead of five levels, just like the other Lair branches.
• In 0.15, ball pythons and adders were removed, though they still appear in the rest of the dungeon.
• The monster set for the Snake Pit was greatly expanded in 0.14, adding salamanders, salamander mystics, naga sharpshooters, naga ritualists, shock serpents, mana vipers, and Vashnia. Lamia was also removed.
• Lamia was first introduced to the Snake Pit in 0.12.
• Prior to 0.10, nagas were unable to constrict you, making the branch much safer for melee characters.