Part 28: Matchstick, MuWz - Two

You know what else helps with hydra deaths? Not dying. And what helps with that? More Matchstick.

Update 2: Conquering Fear


We're back in the Lair, having killed a frog for safety. Ignore the invalid command, that was me forgetting about Irfanview not running, and trying to use alt + `.



A quick review on where we stand in spells and experience. We're a far cry from how poorly the mummy starts out, aren't we? That'll only get better. Lair is fairly boring, I'll skip out most of the boring details (It's 8 floors of samey crap)


Unless you get a portal. This is the entrance to the volcano. It's filled with fire, lava, and fire enemies. It's rewards at the end of the thing include flaming weapons, random potions, and fire resist armor. Sounds like a great place for a flammable mummy, right?


Of course it is. Matchstick can only conquer the fear of fire by jumping headfirst into an active volcano. Of course, it's denizens, namely a handful of molten gargoyles and fire vortices claim otherwise. I ignore the vortices on the right side, and open the door to the gargoyles. I came prepared, of course (mainly by sheer luck), with a couple wands of frost and cold. Molten gargoyles are weak to ice, so these tear right through them fairly quickly.


A short volcano with 5 gargoyles along the left hand side, and we get the reward of a fire resistant animal skin. What? Fur is fire resistant now.


Moving right along, I find a Book of Death. This contains one of the most important spells for extended endgame, Dispel Undead. A level 5 pure necromancy spell, Dispel Undead can deal up to 87 AC ignoring damage to undead, which is massive. I had to wield my staff to even get a chance to learn this spell without any necromancy, and even then I had to spam it while it held a 94% failure rate.


A wonderful bee vault, or an experience farm if you prefer. Given bees are susceptible to poison, you can imagine what happens when I coat the door in mephitic cloud, and let them sting each other. Queen bees have changed in 0.10, and will berserk any bee in range if the queen is in your LOS. Not fun, but then a berserk confused bee means twice the stinging of other bees too.


Spiny frogs, on the other hand, are a problem. Fast, have a bag of HP, and can deal some pain to a caster, they can be solved in one way. A line of conjure flame. I need something stronger though, Conjure flame is good, but if I want to kill stronger enemies, I need to let them wail on me while they stand in the flame. Sif, don't fail me now!


Oh boy, the last surprise of mummies!


Mummies get a power boost to necromancy, akin to the robe of the archmagi, and also get the ability to cure rot by sacrificing 1 permanent MP. The second ability is more important than the first, as rot becomes an issue without a source of rMut to prevent errant mutations from sapping it (a mummy's body decomposes instead of mutating)


I would be afraid of a fire drake, except Matchstick lived through a volcano. Also, fire drakes aren't immune to poison.


Oh please Sif, be kind...


Oh baby, Sif was kind and then some. Sif bases her final ability, book gifting, roughly on your current experience in magic along with current spells learned. Since the majority of mine is in conjurations and fire magic, I got IMB and Bolt of Fire. We've seen IMB already, Bolt of Fire acts the same as a wand of fire, passing through enemies dealing large amounts of damage. Thanks Sif! That is, of course, the only useful book she gifted me in the Lair, the others being fairly bad for me.


A fun vault, this one is filled with various bats. Fruity Bats, Megabats, Microbats, Phasebats. They're all still bats, and they all still die to IMB.


As I enter Lair 4, this is how my spells are panning out. I've dropped Dispel Undead's failure by half, and Bolt of Fire will almost never fail while wielding the staff of wizardry. I can live with this.


A surge of power (Robe of the Archmagi may never come off my decrepit body), and a line of enemies gets cooked. Only fire resistant groups may pose a real threat to me now, or wide open spaces.


The whip gets ever more powerful, as I read ID an enchant weapon 3 scroll. These give a 1d2 roll for each modifier, still subject to the failure rate of actually having the enchantment stay on the weapon above +4,+4.


Our subsections this run through are the Swamp, Snake Pit, and Slime Pit. I haven't done Snake Pit since the addition of constriction to all naga. That'll be fun.


More little vaults. This one doesn't pose too much of a threat now. Death oozes can hit hard, but are still not fire resistant. Also, they can be killed by Dispel undead (if I had any real chance of casting it, maybe I would have done it). Also present around the corner is an azure jelly. They hit multiple times for cold damage, and have rC+. The downfall of it? It's weak to fire. Yeah.


Sif grants a book. It sucks. War Chants, if I'm not mistaken. Would be useful, if I could cast Regeneration on myself.


Wandering mushroom. These things creep me out. Won't move when you're in sight of them. Move out of sight, run around the dungeon, then turn around, and there it is. It stalks you. Also has a nasty pollen effect for confusion in melee range which also destroys food, and can pack a punch at that range too. Course, it not moving means it won't fight back from multiple IMB shots to the face. Hilariously, if you are foolish and decide to polymorph this thing, it can turn into an Oklob plant. Take your pick of a stalker or an acid spewing plant.


Death Yaks would be threatening...


If Bolt of Fire didn't have a near 1% cast rate at this point without the staff of wizardry. Also, Lair 8. Could you tell I was changing floors? I couldn't.


Elephant herds die much in the same way as death yak herds.


Ooh, I know this end vault. Has a crazed wizard, and something special if you search carefully.


He immediately went invisible, so I waited by the door for him to arrive. Then he shot a single magic dart at me, and I followed it back to him with a couple IMB's. Wizard battles like that aren't all that invigorating.


Killing a dire elephant and setting fire to the world. Seems Matchstick is over his fear of fire?


And there's the special part of the vault, and why the wizard was so insane. There's a portal to Hell there, and a bunch of demons. The only one I perceive as a threat is the Sun Demon, that yellow one at the bottom, only because it hits with fire. Interestingly, it ISN'T resistant to fire.


Also these guys. You guys aren't demons! Get out of here!


A staff of power, should I feel the need to have 42 mana I can regenerate in about 10 turns with Sif's Channeling. The whip is more versatile, and the wizardry staff is more useful. I hold onto it though.


Where fire vulnerable enemies are burned terribly, cold vulnerable enemies are frozen. He takes an IMB to the sunspot and dies.


Finally, back at the stash I made in L:2, I deposit the items I don't feel like using and prepare to save.




How we stand after the entirety of the Lair. Up next? Some more dungeon, I guess. Maybe some Orcish Mines. Only time will tell.