I don't plan on entering the Orcish Mines yet, so I went to clear the rest of the level. I ran into a few wights and lured them into a corridor. Wights are undead warriors with a draining attack.
All undead are immune to negative energy, poison, rotting, and torment. They're also very resistant to cold attacks. Of course, they're vulnerable to holy and silver items. And to Dispel Undead, which we can't use.
Normally, draining attacks would be very dangerous this early in the game, but these guys rarely drain you. I keep killing wights, but more of them keep appearing.
For wight #5 I decided to show off two spells from my rod: Summon Imp and Summon Demon. The purple, squid-faced demon is a neqoxec. They can drain your INT, summon imps, and mutate you. I'm glad it wasn't hostile towards me or I'd be in trouble!
After getting rid of all those pesky wights I find a spell book nearby. Trog worshippers can burn spell books to gain piety. Burning a book turns it into a cloud of flames, so it can be used as a one-use Conjure Flame spell. I'll be saving this book for future use.
I finally decided to go back and kill the imps. I played with the rod some more and summoned a hostile smoke demon. They can cast Sticky Flame (similar to poison, but with fire and scroll burning!), Steam Ball (hot steam, obscures LOS), and Smiting. Needless to say, I didn't want it around.
I threw a dispersal dart at the smoke demon and ran. I ran around in a circle and went to where I killed those wights. I used berserk to quickly kill the smoke demon and both imps who followed me.
A giant frog (fast, plain monster) decided to mess with me while I was exhausted. I blasted it with the rest of my lightning wand charges and finished it off with poison.
A bunch of orcs appeared while I was finishing up the level. They never put up much of a fight.
A dead orc wizard had a dagger of venom. The venom brand poisons a monster half of the time and the poison effect stacks, so you can kill susceptible enemies very fast.
I also identified a ring, dexterity (+6), which is okay for now. And I removed my curses. I guess I'm done with D:7.
When I head downstairs the 1st monster I see is Erolcha. Why is part of the level mapped? I fell through a shaft trap on the last level. There were no monsters in that area. Anyway, back to Erolcha:
An especially cunning ogre-mage.
Erolcha is a potentially lethal unique. Why? She might have Banishment (sends you to the Abyss, which is a very scary place at my level), Lehudib's Crystal Spear (most powerful single-target attack spell), or Paralyze. I say "might" because her spell set is random. Be very careful around her.
She turned invisible after I woke her up, which means she doesn't have crystal spear or banishment. She could still have paralyze, so I decided to retreat upstairs.
While waiting for Erolcha's invisibility to wear off I came up with a brilliant plan for defeating her: Hit her until she dies!
I went downstairs, used Trog's Hand, and called her over to me. When she turned the corner I used berserk and stabbed her repeatedly with my venom dagger. She died before being able to do anything.
You notice that ax sticking out of the ground north from dik-dik? That's a mechanical trap. These traps can come darts, bolts, needles, etc. They're hidden on the ground and cause damage when to step on them. This is one of the reasons why you shouldn't travel around while injured.
You can disarm mechanical traps (Ctrl + direction of trap), but if you fail you'll get damaged. You can easily bypass them by flying or levitating over them. Other types of traps include:
Magic traps:
- Zot trap - Nastiest trap in the game. They're basically high level miscast effects, such as banishment, summoning hostile greater demons, mutations, etc. Rare in the dungeon, but common in the Realm of Zot.
- Teleport trap - Teleports you to a random location on the level. It can be bypassed with teleport control on a level that allows it, or an item that blocks teleportation.
- Alarm trap - Makes a loud noise for attracting monsters to you.
Magic traps can't be bypassed with levitation or flight.
Shaft trap - Drops you down 1-3 levels.
I killed the beetle and found a copper ring nearby. Heading further south, I encounter another unique, Eustachio.
An apprentice summoner with a flowing moustache. He has funny ideas about honour.
Eustachio, despite his magnificent mustache, is a wuss. He died in a few turns from needles.
I continued searching the level, but I didn't find anything interesting, except for a vault shaped like numbers in the next screen shot.
Looks like I spoke too soon. Seriously? How many uniques am I going to fight here? Joseph is a moderately dangerous unique. He carries a quarterstaff and a sling, which are often branded.
Joseph's bio:Looks like a mercenary.
It's gonna take more than flaming bullets and a big stick to stop us!
I took Joseph's weapons as trophies to add to my collection.
We're done with D:8. Look at all that exp. I guess I'm gonna have to do some off-screen training. See you next time!