The Tavern

Everybody has their pet hate uniques. Personally, I have a bit of a shudder when I come across Boris or, particularly, Rupert (who let us face it, I am more likely to encounter

). That guy with the scythe. Erolcha (gah).

But are there some uniques you're particularly fond of?

Personally, I love Gastronok. He's a sign the game has a silly sense of humour deep in its balanced, philosophically-driven soul. I'm almost 100% likely to be too weak to take him whenever I meet him the first time, so he tends to survive that one. Then when I'm running back and forth and could undoubtedly fry him, I just like to say Hi instead of killing him off.

Unless I really want his hat, obviously. And it is a pretty stylish hat.

I hope to run into Pikel. Especially if I've found a wand of enslavement or am playing an enchanter. I love bypassing the slaves and nailing him with enslavement...and then when the spell wears off, watching the former slaves tear him to pieces. It's a waste of good XP if I don't manage to get the last hit in, but it's fun. (And the 50% chance of a pain weapon isn't a bad added bonus.)

Erica isn't so bad as spellcasting uniques go, and her guaranteed scimitar of flaming can be a huge help.

I agree with Joellercoaster on Gastronok.

I'm rather fond of Duvessa and Dowan, just for the flavour. I was honestly moved the first time I gutted one in sight of the other.

Grinder! What a champ.

I like them all, but I had to pass along my particularly brutal trip to the Snake Pit in my latest game:

Snake:1 Louise Norris Wayne
Snake:2 Saint Roka Aizul
Snake:3 Mara
Snake:4 Duane Frances Xtahua

Snake:5 was a cool walk in the park compared to running that gauntlet.

I like Pikel because of the mini-story with freeing the slaves.

Most hated? I think I'd have to go with Mara. He's so ridiculously powerful and impossible to kill, his appearance always signals a speedy retreat, and the liberal application of travel exclusions. Pretty much every character I've had that's survived to the vaults has a floor somewhere with a level annotation reading {Mara, freaking Mara!}

I'm partial to Crazy Yiuf. At one point I had a string of 10 games or so where he showed up every time. He sorta became an old friend. "Hello again! *Axe to face* Thanks for the chaos staff and cloak- see you soon!"

I like to give uniques credit with inscriptions when I take their loot- I feel it adds to flavor. If I managed to take Sigmund's scythe, I want it to say {Sigmund's}!

My last Transmuter (with an Amulet of Clarity) had no problems with Mara whatsoever. Dispatched of him really quickly.

However I really hate Saint Roka. Can't think of a favourite one ... Maurice perhaps?

I'm a fan of Purgy, myself. I can't help but feel bad about killing him, because his story is so sad. (I also like him for the early shot at troll leather armor, which makes things even sadder. <.<)

Crazy Yiuf is also great, especially if you can confuse him for long periods of time. Also, he's a good source of cloaks. Secondary armor pieces can be so hard to find... (which gives me an idea about early uniques in general...)

Oooh. Also, in the vein of the Pikel mini-story there is Kirke.

Every time, I am faced with a dilemma: do I release her victims from piggy bondage, or dine out on delicious, delicious pork?

[edit: In this game I split the difference and introduced the lesser-known heavy metal singer/horror-movie director Hog Zombie. He's still patrolling the Swamp for undead truffles as I type.]

I see that nobody has mentioned Donald. I hate that.
I just get happy everytime I see Donald.

Also my list of archnemesises (is that a word?):
Nikola
Nessos
Tiamat
Prince Ribbit
Agnes

Duvessa and Dowan. I like finding new ways to make them suffer.

Sigmund and Crazy Yiuf

Menkaure + fire.
BURN MENKAURE BURN!! BURN FOR ALL THOSE CHARACTERS YOU KILLED WHEN THEY WERE DOING REALLY WELL AND HAD JUST GOT A HALF DECENT WEAPON! BURNNN!!!!

My two Czech hellers thrown in:

Tiamat - one of the toughest uniques outside Hell and Pan, not to mention his great band. It's a true challenge for me, too bad I meet her so seldom. Personal score: 1:1

.
Boris, of course. My personal best is four kills in one game, and my personal score is 16:0

.
Sigmund - my personal archnemesis. I tend to like my revenge when I can either kill him and eat him, or kill him and zombify him. 112:58.
Mara - usually a good reason for leaving the floor quickly, but I still like him.
Crazy Yiuf and Donald for their speech. And, while at this point, any weapon with the Noisy property - I had lots of laughter wielding such weapons.

joellercoaster wrote:Oooh. Also, in the vein of the Pikel mini-story there is Kirke.

Every time, I am faced with a dilemma: do I release her victims from piggy bondage, or dine out on delicious, delicious pork?

[edit: In this game I split the difference and introduced the lesser-known heavy metal singer/horror-movie director Hog Zombie. He's still patrolling the Swamp for undead truffles as I type.]

Kirke gave me the funniest moment I had in this game so my vote goes to her. She 'porkalated' one of my dinky demons and it turned into a still allied ... hell hog. Thanks for the help there Kirke. :lol:

I now like Yuif more because after ages of finding only a vanilla hammer in his hut I just found TWO decent randart hammers in there.

I've got a love/hate relationship with Saint Roka. I love the name and backstory but I hate how he always has a flaming bardiche or some such.

I like uniques that put up interesting fights. Basically, this means that they have a unique spell or ability that nothing else in the game has (except for maybe the player), or they have a mundane ability that's used in an interesting way (eg saint roka only smites, but uses it way more than anything else in the game does, yiuf is uninteresting stat-wise but has a special weapon).

I find these to be far more interesting than the generic fighter-mage types or the ones that are basically just regular monsters with a unique name (sigmund is just an orc wizard with a scythe and slightly more hp...)

If I had to pick a favourite, it would probably be Mara. Most of the really unique uniques have one special ability. Mara gets three (!), and all of them are cool.

evilmike wrote:I like uniques that put up interesting fights. Basically, this means that they have a unique spell or ability that nothing else in the game has (except for maybe the player), or they have a mundane ability that's used in an interesting way (eg saint roka only smites, but uses it way more than anything else in the game does, yiuf is uninteresting stat-wise but has a special weapon).

I find these to be far more interesting than the generic fighter-mage types or the ones that are basically just regular monsters with a unique name (sigmund is just an orc wizard with a scythe and slightly more hp...)

If I had to pick a favourite, it would probably be Mara. Most of the really unique uniques have one special ability. Mara gets three (!), and all of them are cool.

Sigmund is not an orc. He's human

He meant that Sigmund is the equivalent of an orc wizard, as he has a similar spell set.

Grimm wrote:He meant that Sigmund is the equivalent of an orc wizard, as he has a similar spell set.

To elaborate:

Sigmund:
Speed: 10 | HD: 3 | Health: 30 | AC/EV: 0/11 | Damage: 5 | Flags: spellcaster | Resistances: magic(12) | Chunks: contaminated
XP: 104 | Spells: throw flame (3d5), confuse, invisibility, magic dart (3d4).

Orc wizard:
Speed: 10 | HD: 3 | Health: 9-21 | AC/EV: 1/12 | Damage: 5 | Flags: spellcaster | Resistances: magic(20) | Chunks: contaminated
XP: 35 | Spells: magic dart (3d4), slow, haste, blink / throw flame (3d5), confuse, invisibility, magic dart (3d4) / throw frost (3d5), cantrip, haste, throw flame (3d5), magic dart (3d4), invisibility.

One of the orc wizard spellsets is identical to sigmund's which is why I made that comment. The main difference is that sigmund has that scythe, which makes him a melee threat as well as a spellcaster. Orc wizards actually have more kills overall (4th deadliest monster in the game) than sigmund, although he is still the deadliest unique.

I actually like sigmund the way he is though, even if he's mundane.

He's less mundane because he generally tends to show up when the player isn't quite ready for magic or being confused.

Where are the deadliest monster stats?

Kirke once turned me into a pig. Need I say more?

Add another vote for Mara. Yes, he's quite difficult to get rid of, but that's what makes him fun. Well, that, and the way you can cripple one of his abilities with a bread ration.

Shout out also to my mate Mennas who took three fire storms to the face without blinking an eye and then proceeded to chase me in complete silence (I still got him, though). Those were some pretty intense moments.

minmay wrote:Bread ration? Please elaborate.

Mara's most dangerous attack is to make a player ghost of your character. If you're wielding a non-weapon item such as a bread ration, the player ghost spawned will likewise be wielding a bread ration. You can then switch weapons, while the player ghost cannot. This doesn't help much if you were a primary caster, but it shuts down the threat quite well if you deal most of your damage with your weapon.

Out of curiosity, is there an upper limit to how many times Mara can ghost-clone you? Ie, how many clones have to appear before it's 'safe' to switch back to a real weapon?

Casters are definitely in real trouble though. Most mages are not capable do taking what they dish out- especially since ghosts have no hunger or mp to conserve. I once came across Mara while flying. With airstrike in memory. It... did not go well. Maybe a reason to keep a -CAST item in inventory?

mageykun wrote:Out of curiosity, is there an upper limit to how many times Mara can ghost-clone you? Ie, how many clones have to appear before it's 'safe' to switch back to a real weapon?

Casters are definitely in real trouble though. Most mages are not capable do taking what they dish out- especially since ghosts have no hunger or mp to conserve. I once came across Mara while flying. With airstrike in memory. It... did not go well. Maybe a reason to keep a -CAST item in inventory?

Mara creates only one your ghost. On top of ton of illusions and Mara himself that is more than enough :twisted:

That trick works both ways. If Mara clones your berserker while you are berserk, the ghost is permenantly berserked. Then when your berserk runs out he's 4 times faster than you (At least in the current version).

Unfair...

I had to kill Gastronok last night, sadly - because he was faster than me :oops:

(same game as the one where I had to kill Gastronok, a long time later)

I just got attacked by Grinder on my Orb run.

I'd just flattened a Pan Lord a floor or two previously, and was overcome by a fit of mercy. Ran around him and continued up on my way... I think this game is getting to me.

I just got turned into a pig by Kirke - that was "unique"! You can't do ANYTHING as a pig except run - no spells, scrolls, potions, wands - nothing!

I managed to get away, but now I can't find her again to finish her off!

Yeah, dying as a pig is one of the most irritating deaths to have.

danr wrote:I just got turned into a pig by Kirke - that was "unique"! You can't do ANYTHING as a pig except run - no spells, scrolls, potions, wands - nothing!

I managed to get away, but now I can't find her again to finish her off!

That's new in trunk? Because in 0.7 i remember one time when I got berserked went melee and start bashing her with my Minotaur. She turns me into pig - I keep... erm...biting I guess, and kill her. Then turn back to normal.
If you can't attack in melee while porkified,I think it should be fixed.

minmay wrote:You can move and attack, but not much else.

And squeal. Don't forget about that

It's good to be melee in this case - you have chance to kill her anyway.

Curio wrote:And squeal. Don't forget about that

Please, please tell me there's a special case for if you try to shout for attention as a pig.

mageykun wrote:
Curio wrote:And squeal. Don't forget about that

Please, please tell me there's a special case for if you try to shout for attention as a pig.

Yes!

apparently there is - just checked in WIZ-mode :lol:

I like Roxanne. Haven't seen her for ages, though. It would be nice if she would turn up for my sludge elf earth elementalist soon (but not yet, I can barely use Iron Shot...)

Wow, I just found my favorite way to take care of Dowan and Duvessa: enslave one and let them kill the other :lol:

seth wrote:Wow, I just found my favorite way to take care of Dowan and Duvessa: enslave one and let them kill the other

Oh my, that is evil. If the enslaved wins, does it prevent the boost of the other? There should maybe be some special cases in the code for the non-enslaved elf

I wonder which one has a lesser MR; I would assume Duvessa, since she's less a magic-user. Though it would really depend on if her berserk goes off when she kills him. I kill Duvessa first, always, because I want to avoid her berserk.

szanth wrote:I wonder which one has a lesser MR

Surprisingly, Dowan's MR is lower.

szanth wrote:Yeah, dying as a pig is one of the funniest deaths to have.

Fixed.

szanth wrote:I wonder which one has a lesser MR; I would assume Duvessa, since she's less a magic-user. Though it would really depend on if her berserk goes off when she kills him. I kill Duvessa first, always, because I want to avoid her berserk.

Duvessa is easier to affect and the best choice to enslave. Dowan is a spaz - constantly blinking around and rarely attacking.

I always kill Dowan first, since his power-up is permanent and more dangerous. At least with Duvessa, you can escape and kill her when she's no longer enraged.

vintermann wrote:Oh my, that is evil. If the enslaved wins, does it prevent the boost of the other? There should maybe be some special cases in the code for the non-enslaved elf

"What have I done?!", start crying, and still power-up.

What's hilarious is that you still maintain control over them, if enslaved.

vintermann wrote:If the enslaved wins, does it prevent the boost of the other?

Yes. I'm pretty sure dead elves don't get any boost

Zicher wrote:Surprisingly, Dowan's MR is lower.

lucy_ferre wrote:Duvessa is easier to affect and the best choice to enslave.

Actually, they have both the same MR.

lucy_ferre wrote:I always kill Dowan first, since his power-up is permanent and more dangerous. At least with Duvessa, you can escape and kill her when she's no longer enraged.

yeah, kill Dowan, teleport, come back when she has cool down. That's cheap. We should fix this and give Duvessa the berserk spell when Dowan dies.

galehar wrote:yeah, kill Dowan, teleport, come back when she has cool down. That's cheap. We should fix this and give Duvessa the berserk spell when Dowan dies.

I think when the twins were added she was deliberately only given a one-shot berserk to avoid being too mean. I am almost tempted to agree that she could just get the spell anyway, though.

Though I'm pretty sure I've teleported away, went upstairs and waited for 200 turns, only to come back downstairs with her seeing me and going berserk again.

The Tavern

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