'few words' part 3
Tormentors, Hellions, etc. + undead:
The undead are important here because ZIN doesn't give Piety for killing the most dangerous demons.
So I can treat this level exactly like a mummy level with 1 exception:
After 2-3 Santuaries there won't be enough 'piety' concentrated but they would still be numerous in big levels.
I need protection from Hellfire for Hellions/Hell Sentinels/etc. will appear to the left or right of my Singularity.
So far I've been able to kill anything with javelins of penetration. I'm trying to keep some minor monster alive and adjacent to me. Anything that is suspectible to Hellfire will work. I've never been Hell-fired this way. Only when my javelins accidently kill all of them AND a Hellfire-demon notices me they MIGHT Hellfire me (they also might chose to walk closer)
Chaotic/Pandemonium levels:
Again like Mummy levels in many aspects.
There is enough piety around for this.
From time to time there are MP-draining monster among them.
Allowing them in my LOS would reduce my MP to 0 in a few turns. Those I kill with Fire Storm.
Nearing the end I cannot handle Pan Lords like the other levels because they will happily cast Glaciate/etc.
They won't do that if someone is around or behind me.
So that''s when I'm fighting inside my Singularity trying to always be between 2 Pan Lords thus preventing them from using their big spells.
The last few Pan Lords are usually among the most dangerous ones because then I won't have any cover left.
Singularity has another effect besides dealing damage: it will will confuse monster when they are rotated for 1 turn. I'm adding Tornado to that inside my Sing. and will cast Fire Storm at any remaining chaos crab outside of this 'desaster area' using Orb/Wucad Mu nearly every third turn.
These are the most demanding levels to me because I have to permanently watch my position inside this 'desaster area' to remain protected from their big spells.
There is a danger by fighting inside of my Sing.: A Pan Lord might collide with you which might cause damage. (I don't know how this is calculated)
Silent levels:
Javelins of Penetration against (in that order)
1. Curse skulls/Curse toes
2. Revenants or Tormentors/Hellions if the silent spectres are too numerous or remain outside of LOS
If this doesn't work and I'm still under silence I'll use Disc of Storms for removing some minor monsters (creating more space for silent spectres to hopefully come closer) and/or getting cover by the created rain tiles if too many curse skulls at once are attracted.
I'm still surprised how fast and powerful javelins of penetration are.
Again I'm trying to keep harmless monster suspectible to Hellfire adjacent to me if Hellfire-monster are present.
Slime levels:
Biggest threat: a lot of Eyes of draining (EoD) which would leave me at 0 MP if I allow them too long in m LOS.
The first 2 spells here are 2 Fire Storm which should eliminate every EoD even if this means that I have to cast a Fire Storm centered on me
Next spell is Singularity at the edge of LOS covering one half and me casting Fire Storm every few turns if
a) there are too many slimes at once
or
b) an EoD appears
A Level where I only watch my MP, do channeling and count the turns remaining for the next recast of Sing.
No melee, no throwing, no movement.
Fire Levels:
It's looking scary with that many OOF but this is not a dangerous level with 100% mutation prot.
1 Glaciate
1 Sing.
1 Tornado to clear out whatever is occupying MY corner
From this corner I'll recast Glaciate whenever too much is getting around Sing.
Single threats or those which are friendly enough to line up along the edge of the level are dealt with javelins of penetr.
Channeling (like in every other level) is only done when Sing is steady for several turns.
While I started as a fighter my main weapon is probably the least important piece of equipment.
The main job of my equipment is providing as many layers of protection against any harm as possible while I cast mainly Spells which give a long-lasting status effect.
This char is mainly a carrier for this collection of status effects.
I've been asked (by visitors online) whether an axe wouldn't be better. In most cases I'm not interested in killing the monster which I allow to be adjacent to me: I want them to be there to protect me from bigger threats. They can hardly harm me with their attacks.
A very important layer of defence is my shield.
I get Iron-shot/Orb-of-Destr./Crystal spear and whatever a lot. A lot from Hell Sentinels who are frustrated that an algorithm prevents them from Hellfire me.
I cannot remember any damage from them which might be untrue but I'm watching my low HP very closely and haven't noticed anything from that kind of threat: block, block, block. For this kind of char 1-handed weapon with shield worked very fine.
Situations where I was close to death:
1. Sing.+Torn.+Recite can deal a lot damage at once. But once in a while there might be a situation where in 1 turn there won't die a single Greater Mummy while in next one nearly all of them will die at once.
I was standing around thinking that I could try some channeling. Next turn everything came at once.
And my channeling failed leaving me with 0 MP.
And my Sanctuary shrinked so I had to move back.
Nearly died.
Now I'm trying to predict WHEN I'm going to take a lot damage at once to be prepared for that.
2. Silence level 1:
I've played this char (very similiar) offline and always had a lot of shoal levels (the source for javelins of penetr).
Here I relied on getting them, too, but I didn't get any shoal levels for the first 5 zigs.
There wasn't any javel. of pentr. in shops or at the floor in the main dungeon.
I worked around that for the first 5 zigs until I hit a wall.
Aura of Abj. expired.
Disc of Storms did too much damage to me and didn't hit anything of importance.
Several curse skulls appeared.
Revenants filled the screen with their summons.
I used a teleport which put me in a situation not much better.
Trying to get to closer to the curse skulls I cleared some tiles but always the wrong monster stepped into.
Here an axe would have been useful.
I had several visitors writing something like 'slow slow death' and they were right.
I used a second teleport and for reasons unknown to me the curse skulls stopped for some time allowing me getting back to almost 2/3 hp when the teleport kicked in.
And the teleport got me 2 tiles away from exit/downstairs. It was Level 26
I survived by sheer luck.
After this I used a 1-handed crossbow and collected all the (few) bolts of penetr. in the dungeon.
This works, too, but could get ugly if a curse would have fixed me into using that crossbow for the rest of a silence level.
Lesson learned: there is a lot of loot in Zigs and even more in megazigs but you shouldn't count on getting what you want.
Something of penet. is needed imo. for silence levels.
3. Silence level 3:
I forgot to pay attention to my status.
Vitalistion ended. The same turn a silent spectre (still outside my LOS) moved and put me under his umbrella of silence.
And somehow an ancient lich avoided my sing AND avoided the silenced area AND used that turn to confuse me.
I needed several turns to quaff a potion, get out of silence, get Vitalisition back, get sing. back (ended during that time).
During that time the ancient lich used all of his anti-Gargoyle spells he had at his disposal because I hadn't payed attention late at night that I hadn't any cover anymore.
ZIN protected me and kept me alive with 1 HP.
I should have died.
Lesson: it doesn't matter how invincible you feel.
In a megazig there is always something that might kill you if you don't pay attention.
In a very long campaign like this most of the bad things that could happen will happen somewhen.
Compared to this the 2 times of double miscasts or me misclicking (I casted Silence instead of Fire Storm
) were harmless.
Getting sapped is not that dangerous to this char.
It can only happen after 2/3 of the level are already cleared.
There is always Sanctuary if I feel like.
Or I could ignore it and reduce my castings to just Singularity which I can do twice even while sapped: 1 regular. And another one with potion of brill. I just have to remember that I cannot cast anything else and should use Sanct. instead.
Berserkered:
Happened to me several times. This alone is harmless to this char.
The main danger imo is in Aura of Abj. running out during that time and Pan Lords summon a lot of mp-draining monster or giant eyeballs.
This is my worst case scenario.
So far I've been able to kill the ones responsible fast enough.
I've been thinking about that for a long time (in my offline game) and decided that I SHOULD use an amulet of Stasis which would also prevent me from using haste.
I could live without haste.
But I.........
have at least an excuse here: I NEED 3 rings of WIZ to cast any spells with WM 3