Tuesday, 21st June 2011, 12:47 by Happy Corner
It may just be my own bad luck, but Shoals:5 seems to have a higher population of uniques than most... at least most Lair branches. I can almost promise you'll see at least one, and possibly several. They can be nasty, too. I've encountered Saint Roka down there before, and Mennas on another occasion. (Actually, Mennas was on a Shoal level above 5 that game... I'm just saying that this place doesn't pull its punches.)
The island buildings have diggable walls. If you're a melee type (or even if you're not), that makes them useful to funnel the monsters so that they can't all surround you, or take cover from all the javelins that will be flying at you, or even peeking in one of them to see if the rune is there. With all the deep water and monsters, you're not necessarily going to want to circle it to find the door...
None of the merfolk resist poison, so don't forget your venom weapons and poison spells, too. They deserve it!
As for getting the Abyssal rune instead, why not both? The Abyss isn't too hard if you can survive the Shoals and know how to deal with it. Either keep moving (keep the walls between you and the demon hordes as much as possible) and don't let yourself get surrounded... or find a nice corner blocked off on as many sides as possible, wait for the random teleport, and repeat. Sooner or later, the rune will pop up. Once you have it, keep moving until you see the exit portal. Other than the greater demons, of course, keep yourself out of sight of the smoke demons (smiters) and the purple nexoqec demons (who cause mutations).