My most promising start!

[AtT]

Gradually I've been able to get to and clear the first 7 levels or so of the lair but I have never gotten a rune. Once with a deep elf summoner i was on the last level or orc clearing it when I accidentally quit w/o saving.. but have gotten at least to the lair on most of my people. I really don't know which rune to attempt first, maybe 5-7 layers of the layer then i should go do some of the main dungeon again before attempting a rune? I almost cleared orc before but the last 2 levels were intense. I usually play caster types and have a certain inability to find poison resist. usually.

I thought maybe it would be a good idea to try a new race for my summoner this time around. After I killed off my Tr and Vm in stupid ways I won't do again, I decided to pick up the summoner again. I started as a Felid, the idea being since I never actually hit anything that wasn't very squishy with my last summoner, I might as well pick an equally squishy and mana intensive race. Even not making many mistakes though (which I also did do) it seems like the game is not kind to a deep elf. After the first few levels of the layer I literally always had a squad of 4-5 hounds around me and an ice beast no exceptions. Including visits to my stash. This saved me from surprises more than once as that is easily enough to surround an enemy. This seems like it would be easier for a Felid, as they could more easily slip behind their allies and peace out if the battle was going sour. Still though, on the 6th level of orc I fell though a trap door and landed in the middle of a room with about 20-25 orcs of various types, a few cyclopses and ogres, etc. All awake. Basically an entire screen full of baddies with me having half mana and no pets. A scroll of tele and a few lucky dodges landed me in a corridor that looked like a lowercase "t" where i could hide behind 3 pets attacking one enemy at a time, and even then I had to burn most of my wands. I think that in situations like this, the extra life system could really help out. Seems like as a summoner you don't need much health but extra lives will help if the RNG decides to bend you over or you make a mistake, which I will.

As I started this run, I found a ring of poison resistance D1, ring of wizardry D2, and ring of cold resistance D3. Also a gourmand somewhere but thats not a huge deal. While I may (and probably will because of posting this >.>) YASD on this run, I think this combo has great potential for me. I even found a book of low level hexes like confusion hands or whatever. All before the temple. I need to pick a god, thinking sif/veh haven't really decided.

Anyway I have no idea when to try to get a rune. Seems like every dungeon rapes my characters in the first few levels and I have to get out of there. All but the summoner I had could never get close, even though the actual lair wasn't that hard (lvl 1-7) Is there something I'm missing (besides resists usually)? There has to be an easier rune, or maybe I just go down the dungeon more to level up first?

Wish me luck

EDIT: Also I tend to use the hounds for a very very long time because they last so long, ice beasts when I need them. Never got scorpions before are they good? The though of them spawning unfriendly turned me off of em so I never got the spell.

[bobross419]

General consensus seems to be Clear D to L, L to L:7, Orc, Shoal/Swamp/Snake to 4, D to Vault, V to V:7. If you can handle bees then do Hive whenever you can. If you have high MR, SInv, and a way to deal with mass summons and ranged attackers then you could try Elf. Clearing it to E:4 shouldn't be bad, but the E:5 vault can be nasty - It is worth it though as there is usually plenty of loots.

As you're clearing if you get to a point where you think you're in over your head then go to another branch or clear some more of D. Swamp/Snake/Shoals don't really have great loot on the Rune level from what I've seen and these levels are usually harder than the preceding levels. You can always come back to them later for the rune when you're ready to go to Zot. D:27 you might see some Dragons and Draconians, so if your resists aren't good then you might want to stop at D:26.

Crypt has been hit or miss for me. Lots of undead and sometimes the end vault has an ancient lich that can really ruin your day, but good loots to be had there as well.

[RFHolloway]

Summon imps is also worth a look - primarily for the shadow imps who raise from the dead (cast post combat). Scorpion probably isn't worth it.

what other spells do you have available? that is probably your next challenge

[AtT]

ugh lost 2 lives due to being practically 1 shotted good thing i'm a kitty. Just got to Dlvl 13 and no lair i must have missed it running from a scary unique i'll have to backtrack.

So most people clear out multiple rooms before trying for a rune huh? sounds like what i've NOT been doing. I'll give it a go. I got a ring of resist cold and a ring of ice so that will help for like.. the crypt if i get there? idk i've never been deeper than 15ish usually die trying to nab a rune apparently too early

The book I found had animate dead or raise skeleton or whatever so I didn't bother with the imps I just went for faster dogs. Tried scorpions they seem ok, better than spammals since you can only do 2 at a time now. poison is nice i guess. mostly i use dogs tho. I don't really have any not-summoning spells

[slowcar]

rune vaults are usually a lot harder than the rest of the branch, and also compared to other areas of the game (of a similar level).
this means it is easier to gain xp in other places and come back later, after all you need the rune only when you have mastered zot and cleared the way to the orb.

[AtT]

i see. gotta grind a lot especially with slow lvling races eh?

Having a bit of a hard time in 11-13 levels of the dungeon. managable but not as ezpz as the rest was.