Contents

  1. Lisa Alexander, the Human Mindcrafter, Part 5
    1. Chapter 5 (cont.)
      1. Mdr 52 (take 2) thru Mdr 54
      2. Mdr 55 thru Mdr 57
      3. Mdr 57 (take 2) thru Mdr 60
      4. Mdr 60 (take 2) thru Mdr 62
      5. Mdr 62 (take 2) thru Mdr 66
        1. Chatter (1.5)
    2. Chapter 6: And The Rock Cried Out, No Hiding Place
      1. LoM 45 thru LoM 50
      2. LoM 50 (take 2) thru LoM 55
      3. LoM 55 (take 2) thru LoM 58
        1. Chatter (2.3)

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7
Latest segment (in Part 7)
Latest character sheet (after this segment in Part 6)

Lisa Alexander, the Human Mindcrafter, Part 5

Chapter 5 (cont.)

Mdr 52 (take 2) thru Mdr 54

So, had enough rest?

[stretches] "Almost too much."

Sorry. Been busy.

"Yeah, so I hear. Trilogy said she saw you running around Bree with some lizard guy."

Yes, Kazyx is one of the things that's been keeping me busy these last few weeks.

"Lured in another sucker, huh? So do I get to meet him?"

Eventually, yes; I'm still working on bringing him up to sync. For now, since you've apparently become bored, and having cleared up our house space problem for a bit, what say we get back into the thick of it?

"I'm way ready."

Then let's be off:

Mdr 52, take 2; "Looks like any other level."

Well, it isn't terribly different from most of the levels I've seen recently, admittedly. A Death knight early on nets Arvedui, and a troll pit near the end nets a randart Bolt. Oh, and we pick up a fate; remind me to check that next time we're topside.

"Right."

In the meantime, though, we push on:

Mdr 53; "You have a very good feeling…"

"Oof! Can I get a second opinion on that?"

A minor annoyance as we enter: a lava streamer cutting through the walls of our entry room exposes us to a pack of Impact hounds in the next room to the north.

"You're not the one down here getting ‘minorly annoyed’ in the face, bucko."

(shrug) You're just going to Mind Wave them away anyway, right?

"Enh, fair point. PAIN!"

The lava seems to be rather widespread, and takes some creative void jumpgate creation to get around in places. An early shock comes when we discover Lisa's first Greater wall monster—singular at first, fortunately, though it manages to get off a few replications before we manage to Pulverize them away.

"‘First’? You mean we're gonna be running into these crazy things again?"

Actually, I don't think we completely got rid of the first batch, considering we're running into more of them a few rooms in.

"*groan* Remind me again how a girl checks out of this chicken outfit."

After finishing them off this time (I hope…), we push on, running into Harowen not much further in. I manage to get in one turn of attacks (knocking him down to half hit points thanks to Divine Aim) before he blinks away.

"Now, that's a slippery character." [checks backpack] "*whew* I don't think he got anything."

No, your DEX should be high enough to prevent that by now. It turns out Harowen didn't get far, either; we run into him again not much further down the winding corridor we're in. A Wave of Power projection knocks him down to three stars, and another round of attacks finishes him off, and pushes me to clvl 47; all five skill points go to maxing Magic. Harowen drops, among other assorted junk, Lisa's first Amulet of Reflection and a Polished Green Dragon Scale Mail [+20].

"Ooh, shiny. Don't think I could pull it off, though. I'd probably look like a badguy from a Rebo and Zooty vid."

Heaven forfend… ;) A bit more lava dodging and the level is done. Let's see what's waiting for us on:

Mdr 54, Fumblefingers quest for 9 Bile Demons; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

[checks notes] No, I don't: 3500hp, speed +10, nasty melee damage, powerful poison and acid breaths, and a summon-demon spell. They can't tunnel through walls, though, so I should be able to use Stone Prison to good effect.

"That was a different Ranger this time."

Hm? Yeah, his voice did sound different, now that you mention it.

"Never mind the voice, this one's a Minbari."

How could you tell with his hood up?

"Oh, come on, you couldn't see the peaks of his bone crest? You must not hang around Minbari much."

Not much… ;) There's a Death mold in the entry room, which I almost finish Pulverizing to death before the first Bile Demon makes an appearance. And two more are approaching from the opposite direction.

"Okay, time for some tactics here."

I emPrison the first, and the second as it emerges, blocking the third in the corridor behind him. Then, with another Prison around myself to block any summons, I poke through the intervening wall at an angle and let it come to me. At full power (Adrenaline Channeling, Divine Aim, Tulkas prayer and berzerker Tactic), it takes four turns to kill, taking me down to 615/833hp with a poison breath. I'll have to remember to add Character Armor next time to cover that.

"Great time to be thinking of that. *pant* Gimme a second before we take the next one, okay?"

The next two Bile Demons fall to much the same strategy, as does one more behind them, which drops the Amulet of Carlammas. We push on, seeking the rest of them.

[squints eastward] "Those look like more of those Maulotaur things we had so much trouble with before."

Three of them, intermixed with an ad hoc monster group of 'H's. And with this not being a princess quest level, I have a feeling their shatter attacks won't be blocked. And two of the Bile Demons are in the room with them, so we can't just skip them.

"Here comes one of them."

One of the Bile Demons makes it out of the room ahead of everything else; we use the by now standard Prison tactics to take care of him. I attempt to lure out demon #6 and get two of the Maulotaurs instead. Fortunately, being invisible seems to help a lot, and the shatter attacks do appear to be blocked; the worst I get from them is a plasma bolt to the face, taking me down to 578/833hp and prompting me to quaff a Potion of Healing just to be safe.

"Sheesh, I'm down here getting smacked around like there's no tomorrow, and you're worried about using up one of your precious potions?"

Perish the thought. Nothing's too good for my star characters.

"You know I'm gonna quote you on that, don't you?"

Of course I do. ;) Anyway, after luring out the third Maulotaur and finishing it off, I finally get the sixth Bile Demon out and take it out with the Prison trick. A Monastic lich is right behind him, leaving behind a randart Sabre with +3 attacks.

[eyes Narthanc critically] "You're sure this thing is gonna develop extra attacks eventually?"

No, I'm not, and if it doesn't, this is an obvious choice of fallback weapon. Further in, beyond the seventh Bile Demon, we run into a vault-esque room that doesn't appear to match anything in v_info.txt. Its occupants, apart from some annoying Water hounds on the periphery, include a Lesser black reaver and four ancient dragons, including Lisa's first great wyrm, a Great Ice Wyrm.

"That's a really big dragon…"

[checks notes] It appears to be fairly weak as great wyrms go, actually: 4000hp, speed +10, nasty melee damage, and frost breath. Not much tougher than the Bile Demons we're already fighting.

"That's not exactly a ringing endorsement, chief."

Well, the Dracolich between them and us is about as tough, and it only takes four turns to knock down at full power.

"Uh… I wasn't supposed to get him angry at us, was I?"

No, I clearly wasn't paying attention; Fangorn, it turns out, was also wandering around in the vault, and I fire off a Mind Wave with him in full view. I really don't want to kill him as a matter of principle; I think I'll punt the vault and catch a Major Displacement out of here. :o That drops me not too far from the eighth Bile Demon, who drops a randart Short Bow.

A bit more searching turns up the ninth and last Bile Demon; his demise, as usual, fetches Mr. F. Fingers (through our Stone Prisons somehow… ;) ), who offers us Magic, Weaponmastery, Thaumaturgy and Mindcraft. Considering I've already maxed three of these, I suppose I don't have much choice… :\

We can speak telepathically while I am training you; any longer than that would look suspicious. We cannot be certain we are not being watched.

Okay, give me the executive summary, then.

We followed a Drakh warship to this place, through some kind of interspacial vortex. They appear to have been brought here by someone from this world, a being called Morgoth.

Yeah, heard of him.

You have? What do you know of him?

Not much, I'm afraid. Go to Lothlorien and talk to their queen, a lady named Galadriel; she should be able to tell you all you need to know.

Excellent, thank you. And it seems we are out of time; we will speak again when next we meet.

Yeah, see if you can come up with some useful skills next time, okay? "I assume you caught all of that?"

Yep. I suppose that begins to make sense of things.

"It still doesn't explain how I ended up here. I'll have to remember to ask him next time. Anyway, we done here?"

Yeah, that's pretty much the level. I don't think I'm gonna go back and try that vault again. And we're pretty much out of room for the segment; I think we've got pack space for a few more levels, so I'll leave it here, at the stairs down to the next level.

Mdr 55 thru Mdr 57

So, where were we?

"Well, I dunno where you were; I've been sitting at the head of the stairs waiting for you to decide to go down them."

Well, let's do that, then: ;)

Mdr 55; "You like the look of this place…"

A mixed welcoming committee of Cave ogres and Forest trolls in the entry room to train Narthanc on.

"Yeah, when is this thing gonna do anything again?"

Well, it's current at level 37 and has 1740236exp… [sound F/X: source diving] and it looks like the cutoff for the next level is 1750000, so it's pretty close.

"Well, that's… oh, no, there's that tree guy again."

It's okay, Lisa, it looks like Fangorn has forgotten that little Mind Wave you accidentally hit him with on the previous level.

"Hoom, you look vaguely familiar, young Human. Have we met?"

"Uh… *gulp* don't think so. You do remind me of this other Ent I know, though, name of Mossbark."

"Ah, yes, young Chwannrif.1 Rather hasty for an Ent, as I recall, almost unseemly. Had a habit of letting the strangest things grow on his trunk."

"Yeah, he was still doing that last I saw him."

"Was he indeed? Hoom hm, you must tell him to visit the forest next time you see him, and we can catch up." [I dismiss Fangorn at this point.]

"Poor fellow, liable to get himself burned to a crisp in the lava down here."

(shrug) That's as may be. Anyway, the level is a 1x3 small level, and thus over quickly. Moving right along, then:

Mdr 56, Princess quest for 5 Hand druj; "You have a very good feeling…"

Not really… [checks notes] They're the weakest of the druj, at only 600hp, but they're still speed +20 and have a raft of nasty spells. Five of them means the open form of the quest room, though, so I may be able to use Stone Prison to my advantage–

"Worry about that later. I've got trouble down here."

In the form of a smallish pack of Ethereal hounds immediately next to me as I enter the level, and the Lernaean Hydra not too far away in the same room. Time for an emergency Major Displacement—which, by a nice stroke of luck, lands us right near the quest room.

"*groan* I do so hope you have a plan…"

I think I do: 

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I dog-leg Stone Prison at the 'X' to create a forward assault front. After tunneling in and sealing it up behind me, I punch through due south with Dig, and not one of the accursed things has line of sight on me, >:> giving me leeway to leisurely splash them to death with Pulverize—which has such a large radius now that the druj south of the Princess gets killed by splash while I'm picking off the east and west ones.

"Whoa, slow down, chief! My teek attacks are leaking through the glass somehow, the princess is… wait a minute, wasn't she just dead?"

Another quirk of the Princess quests: even if you hurt her, you can't kill her; she just keeps coming back.

"Oh, really? Now do you believe me that something weird is up here?"

Hey, I never doubted you on that point. In the meantime, the newly freed princess, apparently none the worse for wear and not even slightly miffed at us, offers us a Metal Boomerang, a Cutlass or a Two-Handed Sword. Enh, six of one; let's take the cutlass, which turns out to be a Spectral Cutlass (+12,+3) and therefore remains on the floor where the princess left it.

"Good, that's over with. So, we done here?"

I dunno, it might actually be worth our while to go track down the Lernaean Hydra and kill it off here so we don't run into it later under worse circumstances.

"*groan* How did I know you were gonna say something like that?"

Well, in the short term, we've got a Lesser black reaver incoming. We've got resist disenchantment, so I think we can go toe-to-toe with him with Divine Aim up. That's enough to push Narthanc to level 38, and it gains a power from the Poison realm, namely… [checks notes] sense troll. :\

[slaps forehead] "Oh, well, that was certainly worth all the effort. Would be amazingly useful if I weren't already a fraggin' telepath down here. *groan* And how long do I have to wait for another shot at extra attacks?"

[sound F/X: source diving] The threshold for level 39 is 2125000exp. On the bright side, at least the reaver also dropped a Large Metal Shield of Preservation [+24]… which I can't actually use without losing Thorin's +4 CON. Scratch that, then.

After a bit of cursory searching, the Lernaean Hydra doesn't turn up, so I decide to punt and push on to:

Mdr 57; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

Well, I feel reasonably superb about finding Vorpal Blade in the very second room of the level… :D

"*groan* You're absolutely certain it's worth the effort to keep feeding blood sacrifices to the dagger."

Becoming less so by the day. In fact, I don't even bother using it on the orc pit we encounter a few rooms to the west; I just Mind Wave the whole lot to death. At least they net Paurhach and a randart Awl-Pike for our troubles.

[hefts pack on shoulder] "Yeah, speaking of that, any chance we could head back up and offload some of this deadweight?"

Yes, after quickly sweeping the rest of the 3x5 small level, which passes without major incident, we return to:

Lothlorien

Let's see what we've got here:

[sound F/X: source diving] Apparently, unlike the blessed flag, having the vampiric flag on something besides your wielded weapon doesn't get you the flag's effect; that's the bolt sold, then. Vorpal Blade and the randart Sabre I stow at home; Carlammas, Arvedui, Paurhach and the randart bow I stow in Bree, and the Amulet of Reflection I stow in Minas Anor. And that's all my homes full; I don't even have room to re-stow my restore junkart.

"Actually, why aren't we using this in the field? It would've been real handy last time down."

A fair point; done and done. We'll leave it here, then, while I do some soul searching about weapon choices…

  • 1 From the Sindarin 'chwann' "fungus" + 'rív' "bark"; see also Fladrif/Skinbark, 'flad' "smooth" + 'rív', from The Two Towers.

Mdr 57 (take 2) thru Mdr 60

We Apologize for the Delay™; too little sleep last weekend, and I didn't want to run Lisa while tired.

"And this is you well-rested and alert, is it? I ask merely for information."

That's quite enough of that, young lady:

Mdr 57, take 2: "You have a superb feeling about this level."

Telepathy is picking up Fundin Bluecloak almost immediately as we enter the level, taking on a pack of Ghouls.

"Begone, thou vile obscenities against life! Back to the soulless Void which spawned thee! Argath akbar!" Fundin summons help at this point, mostly Fire hounds but with a Gorgon and a Zombie Killer red beetle mixed in just for giggles.

"Ooh, this could get messy real quick. Hang on, chief, I've got ‘em."

By the time I punch through the hounds to get at the Ghouls, Fundin has summoned more backups, including a Nightwing, a Nalfeshnee and two Ancient dragons. By the time I've finished off the Ghouls, I'm down to 793/833hp just from the blowback.

"Okay, okay, Reverend, you can call off the hordes now."

"Thy aid is much appreciated, noble stranger. Thy attire, admittedly, is somewhat strange…"

"Yeah, I'm not exactly from around here. I'm only sticking around long enough to kill Morgoth."

"O ho! Thou art the second adventurer I hath met who claimed that noble (if overlarge) ambition. The other, if memory serves, was also somewhat unusual—a descendant of the legendary Beorn himself."

"Yeah, I know him. I think he's retired now."

"Ah, yes, the task was perhaps too great for him. May thou farest better in thy quest. As for myself, I shall satisfy myself with curbing his minions. Ah, and I see more of them to curb. Wilt thou pardon me? Begone, foul Morgul-spawn!" [I dismiss Fundin at this point]

"Man, we get all the weirdos down here, huh?"

Present company excepted, of course. ;) The restore junkart I pulled out of storage last time is useful almost immediately, after an Elder vampire temporarily knocks me back to clvl 46. He also provides a fresh reminder of how little damage Narthanc is doing, after taking fully six turns to kill. :\ On the upside, though, he drops both a Tome of the Time and a Tome of the Eternal Flame.

(flips through Tomes) "You call this an upside? I can't cast any of these spells."

True, and with our cash supply so high, it's probably not even worth it to take them back to sell. Never mind, then. After that, the level is relatively calm for a while, except for a Master mystic that makes a pest of himself by summoning Gravity hounds at me. Well, that and a nascent Greater wall monster infestation, which I manage to nip in the proverbial bud.

*slash slash* "Oh, yeah, except for having the very fraggin' fabric of space-time tied in pretzel knots around me, and having the fraggin' walls attacking me, just your average stroll through a lava-infested dungeon…"

Sorry. ;) Apart from that, nothing terribly interesting happens, and we push on to:

Mdr 58, Princess quest for 10 Chaos vortices; "You have a very good feeling…"

"A vortex of chaos? That cannot possibly be good."

[checks notes] Well, it's not so bad: only 32d20hp, and most of its damage is in either confusion or chaos, which are both covered by your resist chaos. It is speed +30, though, but I don't think that'll be a problem. Right now I'm more worried about this Hru that sneaks up on us early on. Fortunately, since this is a quest level, its shatter attacks are blocked; still, I fire up Divine Aim to finish it off.

"Yeesh, you need to go take a nap up there or something?"

I'm good. :o Also notable in the early game is a nascent Blood Sprout infestation—fortunately stuck in the middle of a pack of Half-ogres, limiting their ability to multiply. A bit further in, I learn that that Hru was the advance scout from an ad hoc monster group of 'P's, which to my relief apparently only had the one Hru. ;)

From there I make straight for the quest room in the middle of the level. After punching through a stray swarm of Dreads, I head for the doors, which the vortices have already smashed through. The most annoying part, to my surprise, is simply waiting for them to wander out of the quest room for me to ambush; eventually, I just push in and brazen out the chaos breaths to chase them all down. The grateful princess offers us a Scimitar, Metal Lamellar Armor or a Two-Handed Flail.

"Any of this likely to do us any good?"

Well, the Scimitar is least unlikely, I think… or not: it turns out to be a Scimitar of Slay Orc (+11,+14). On that note, I decide to punt the rest of the level and push on to:

Mdr 59; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

The superb feeling would appear to be coming from two lesser vaults on the level. Actually, the one next to us as we enter is apparently a greater vault, specifically a (Greater) Majorly Bossy Vault; the major concern therein is a Skull druj at one of the corners.

"What about that demon?"

The Nycadaemon? Fair point; I think I'll fire up Divine Aim for him… and the Lesser Balrog he manages to summon before I can finish him off… and the Erinyes the Balrog summons… After that, the Skull druj is anticlimactic, falling easily to a barrage of dog-leg Pulverizes. The Lesser Balrog nets Red Dragon Scale Mail of Defense [+22], and the vault itself nets a Heavy Crossbow of Siegecraft (x6) (+20,+26) [+13] and the Boots of Nevrast, for which I have a handy ?o*ID* from the previous level:

[checks notes] Hmm, the only thing we'd lose from swapping out our current randart boots is resist disenchantment.

"I'll take that trade." [puts on boots] "Ooh, I like."

And not only for the speed; the CON boost pushes our CON all the way up to 18/***, and our hit points up to 920.

"Okay, I'll go with ‘superb’ for this. What is this crazy contraption, though?"

That would be The Device Trap Set 'Hanisbroner's Surprise', also from the vault. It's a monster trap, a trap that would be triggered by a monster stepping on it. You can't use it, since you don't have the Trapping ability, but it makes a nice souvenir for the Mathom-house.

(shrug) "Whatever…"

;) The other vault on the level is a lesser vault (bank), which nets nothing of interest. In fact, "nothing of interest" pretty much sums up the rest of the level. Fast forward, then, to:

Mdr 60, Princess quest for 12 Gelugon; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

[checks notes] No, not really, not at 4500hp and +20 speed, and certainly not with a summon-greater-demons spell. And to top things off, our entry room sports The Lernaean Hydra, who's almost as bad: 4500hp, speed +10, annoying melee damage, and a summon-kin spell.

"Hey, didn't we run into him just a few levels back?"

[checks notes] Yes, on our first foray into Mdr 57 during our last outing. We left it there then; I don't think we'll have that option this time. I seal it up in a Stone Prison first while I Mind Wave the Water trolls around it, then fire up Divine Aim to take it on. It gets off one summon, but dies tidily in six turns, pushing me over the top to clvl 48. Hmm, the only skill in my skill plan that I haven't yet topped off is Combat, so all five skill points go there, putting it within one point of max.

I make a beeline for the quest room on the north edge of the level, where some of the Gelugon (Gelugons? Geluga?) are already out looking for me. Fortunately they can't tunnel through walls, which means I can use Stone Prison to control the battlefield: 

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Okay, Adrenaline Channeling, Divine Aim, Tulkas prayer, berzerker/running… anything else? Ah, they do have a nasty frost breath, so I'll fire up Character Armor too.

"Here they come."

The first Gelugon falls in five turns, and the second in four. That runs me out of critical hits from Divine Aim though, and the third takes six turns to kill, by which point I'm at 536/970hp. I think a Potion of Healing is in order—and it does little good, as the Gelugon breathes on me, knocking me right back down to 669/970hp.

"This is bad, isn't it?"

Don't Panic™. I toss back another !oH, which works much better this time. I fire up Divine Aim again, and make it through six more Gelugons with only one more !oH. That leaves the four trapped in the dead end to the southeast of the quest room and the room to the east of it. Three of those I manage to lure around the wall and into my anti-summoning alcove; for the last, I push into the room and set up an new alcove in the southeast corner and poke a hole through the wall to let it in, with one more Divine Aim to finish it off. *whew* That wasn't as bad as I was expecting.

"Speak for yourself." (rubs bruises)

Well, at least the Princess is grateful; she offers us a Two-Handed Flail, a Pick or a Large Metal Shield. Hmm, I doubt the shield could beat Thorin, and I don't really need the pick with my Dig spell; let's see what kind of flail she's got… not too bad: a Two-Handed Flail of Westernesse (+8,+12) (+2). It'll sell for a bit, at least.

"Honestly, I'm not particularly impressed."

Well, the Gelugons manage better: two (*Defender*) weapons, Elessar, and… the Player Corpse. :\

"Uh… ew? Is this supposed to be me? Did these demons kill my long-lost twin sister or something?"

No idea. I thought it was a complete fluke when Gathraka found hers; now I'm starting to worry… Anyway, I think we should head back on this:

Lothlorien

Now, let's see what we've got here:

Elessar is an obvious choice to swap in; the only downside is that I lose the +6 INT from my Amulet of Brilliance, which will make spellcasting a little harder (the -2 net WIS from the swap, on the other hand, doesn't even bring me below 18/***…). I also have an unchecked fate, to meet a Shadow on level 34.

"Riiight, remind me to make a note of that on my calendar."

;) We swing quickly by Bree to Mathom Hanisbroner's Surprise and the Player Corpse.

"O-kaaay, should I be creeped out that they actually had a mausoleum wing to put that in?"

;) ;) Back home to Lothlorien, then. Hmm, Narthanc is up over 200Kexp now; we might actually see it gain a level next time out.

"You really think it's worth it?"

I suppose we'll find out…

Mdr 60 (take 2) thru Mdr 62

[sniffs jacket] "Phew! I am never gonna get the smell of sulphur out of my clothes at this rate."

Well, we're getting close to the end of Mordor; another couple pushes like our last outing should take care of it.

(shrug) "Let's go get it over with, then."

That's the spirit. ;)

Mdr 60, take 2; "Looks like any other level."

We arrive on the level inside one of the subrooms of a four-subroom pit, facing about half a dozen greeters, the worst being a Mature multi-hued dragon. These are dispatched quickly, especially considering that I apparently still have a few *GREAT* hits left over from my last casting of Divine Aim while fighting those Gelugons last time.

"Now, that's a long-duration spell. I mean, we've been to Bree and back since then."

That part of the Divine Aim spell goes by number of blows, not time since casting; you get a set number of critical hits, and they hang around indefinitely until you use them up. In particular, we run out in the middle of a pack of Dreads, who knock my STR back a bit but graciously leave behind a Potion of Restore Strength with which to patch it up. ;)

Otherwise, the level is pretty boring. I don't even bother firing up Adrenaline Channeling through most of it.

"‘Don't bother’? You mean you forgot, right?"

I do fire it up as a precaution against a Death knight near the end of the level. Fortunately, we also have some Divine-Aim critical hits left over from a Lesser black reaver we faced a bit earlier.

"See? You would have used it against the reaver too, if you hadn't forgotten it.

:o At any rate, we push on to:

Mdr 61; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

Nothing obviously superb that I can see after lighting up the level with Precognition. Lots of lava, though; and since Lisa doesn't have fire immunity, we'll have to be careful about that.

"Right, ‘careful’. Remind me again how a girl checks out of this chicken outfit."

Hold that thought; Saruman just put in an early appearance. He's pinned behind a group of Manes for now, so we can duck out of line of sight to plan. [checks notes] Urk, 7000hp, speed +20, hits for disenchantment (which we resist thanks to Elessar), and a whole raft of nasty spells.

"I should be worried at this point, yes?"

I think we can take him. First we should hop past him with a Minor Displacement gate, into a room at the other end of the corridor he's stuck in. A Stone Prison for protection as he approaches, and we'll power up: Adrenaline Channeling, Tulkas prayer, Divine Aim, Character Armor.

"Here he comes."

And a Dig to let him in… and one round of hits takes him down a single star.

"Yep, time to worry."

Surprisingly; Saruman doesn't put up much of a fight; in five more turns, he's down to three stars, at which point he teleports us away.

"Wait, I recognize this room."

Yes, this is where we came in—which means if we're lucky, we can simply retrace our steps and… yep, there he is again, stuck in the same corridor behind the same Manes and only back up to four stars.

"Not particularly bright for some high-powered sorcerer, is he?"

Nope, especially considering he fails to teleport us away again in the three turns it takes to finish him off. He drops several spellbooks and a couple Mage Staffs of Power, which would be quite useful if we were a mage of any sort… :\

Not far beyond him is a pack of Barbazu, with a few Bile Demons mixed in just to be a pain. That's enough to push Narthanc to level 39, with no obvious power gain.

[slaps forehead] "And how long do we have to wait for another shot at this?"

[sound F/X: source diving] The threshold for level 40 is 2500000exp, which will probably take a while. On the bright side, they did drop your first Scroll of Mass Genocide (Fireproof, even), which we can store for later.

[squints northeast] "Hold that thought; we've got more demons incoming."

Indeed: along with two more unhandled Bile Demons, I'm also picking up a Lesser Balrog and two Mariliths. I wonder what we're up against here… Well, in the meantime, I'll fire up Divine Aim again.

"‘Bout time…"

Yes, ma'am. ;) And that, apparently, is the lot of ‘em. For my troubles they leave me a Rod Tip of Teleport Other, for which I might try to find a rod.

After that, the level is mercifully boring, and we continue to:

Mdr 62, Princess quest for 11 Plasma hounds; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

"That doesn't sound too bad, actually."

[checks notes] It isn't; 60d10hp, speed +10, average melee damage, breathes plasma… [sound F/X: source diving] which fire resistance doesn't help against, but hounds shouldn't be doing too much damage with it anyway.

A fair amount of the level's superb feeling apparently comes from an early lesser vault of some unidentifiable sort, populated with a swarm of Barbazu and a Master mystic, along with some denizens summoned by the latter at an Ent poking around in the room, who I promptly dismiss. The Barbazu push me to clvl 49—and since I've only got one planned skill left unmaxed, namely Combat, and it's only one point away from max, I'm left with four skill points and no obvious place to put them. I think I'll go with Magic-Device, in case I find any really useful rod tips later. The Master mystic, in the meantime, nets a randart ring, and the vault itself manages a Rod Tip of Curing and the Lochaber Axe of Gothmog.

"Ulk. This thing feels vaguely like that demonic arm-eating shield thing. I thought you said we were done with those."

We've already found all his demongear, which should be the worst of it; there's also this axe and a whip to potentially find.

"Lovely."

After that, the level is mercifully calm for a while; a Death quasit even coughs up the Crumpled Scroll of Mass Resurrection.

"Cool! What does this do, bring me back to life or something?"

Not you, the monsters—only the named ones, though, like Saruman.

"Oh. Never mind, then. Wait, you're not gonna read this thing, are you?"

Not on your life. It will make a good souvenir, though. And after all that excitement, the quest room, when I finally find it, is almost anticlimactic. The Plasma hounds even come out to me, which is unusual behavior for hounds… oh, I see, they've got Dark elven sorcerers pushing them down the corridor. In short order, then, the grateful princess is offering us an Amulet of Resistance, a Lucerne Hammer or a Bastard Sword. Enh; I'll take the sword, which, after I punch through the Dark even sorcerers to it, turns out to be… a Bastard Sword of Slay Evil. Feh.

[shifts pack to other shoulder] "Hey, can we go offload some of this junk?"

I was just thinking the same thing:

Lothlorien

Now, let's see what we've got here:

The ring is tempting, but my current randart ring is my only source of resist nether, and I don't think I can afford to swap out my Ring of Damage. For now I'll stow it at home, after selling off a few things to make room. Oh, also the Rod Tip of Teleport Other and… [sound F/X: source diving] hmm, the Rod Tip of Curing fixes blindness, poison, confusion, stunning, cuts and hallucination… nah, sell it.

Let's see, what else? Oh, yes, we need to swing by Bree and Mathom Gothmog's axe and the Crumpled Scroll. [checks notes] And it looks like I'm keeping my genocide stuff in Minas Anor for now, so I'll swing by there to stow the Scroll of Mass Genocide. And as long as I'm in Minas Anor, I pull Anduril out of storage.

"So, finally giving up on the soul-eating dagger, huh?"

Not yet, but I'm leaning that way. I'm going to take Anduril back to Lothlorien for now, so that I'll have it handy if I finally change my mind. And we're about out of space for this segment, so we'll leave it here to return to Mordor next time.

Mdr 62 (take 2) thru Mdr 66

*yawn* "There you are. What kept you?"

Sorry; just getting my computer bashed back into shape.

"Yeah, I know from computer problems. Say, I know this guy from Mars Colony who does AI coding for IPX; get me out of this crazy place and I'll get him on the line for you."

That… won't be necessary. ;) In the meantime, we're pretty close to the end of Mordor; let's see if we can push through it this time out.

"I'm all for that."

Let's to it, then:

Mdr 62, take 2; "Looks like any other level."

During Zizzo's recent excursion into the Sandworm Lair, I got into the habit of Vision-lighting a level to search for viable targets. It's a hard habit to break, and I give the Precognition'ed level a once-over looking for things of interest… hmm, an unidentified scroll off in the southwest corner.

"You sound way too excited about this."

Well, at this late stage we've seen most types of scrolls, so one we haven't seen could be really good.

"Or it could be worthless."

Let's go find out, then. We take a brief detour halfway across the level to get a better angle of approach on a Lesser Balrog in a room we're about to enter. It seems not to have been necessary, though, as it seems to be completely oblivious as we walk right up next to it and emPrison ourself to prevent summoning. Three turns of attacks do get its attention, but not for long. ;) I didn't know your Stealth had improved that much.

"How do you think I've been surviving down here? My good looks?"

Well, I wasn't going to say anything…

"Watch it up there."

>:> As I arrive in the largeish target cavern, Fangorn is off in a corner beating up on a Metallic green centipede… no, actually, they're both asleep.

"How can you tell? I mean, he's a tree, after all; it's not like he's particularly sprightly or anything."

Fair point. In the other corner is Lisa's first Bone golem, which I promptly emPrison before going to pick up… a Fireproof Scroll of Fire.

[slaps forehead] "Oh, wonderful. The waterproof sponge must be on the next level."

Yeah, I think we'll leave that one here. Back to finish off the Bone golem, who smacks my STR around a bit. No sweat, that's what we pack the restore junkart for.

The down stairs, annoyingly, are back on the other side of the level. That's just a quick jaunt, though, and soon we're pushing on to:

Mdr 63; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

Another Bone golem in the entry room, promptly emPrisoned.

"What's the big deal about these walking skeleton things? We've faced skeletons before."

Not like this: [checks notes] 3500hp, speed +10, and lots of nasty spells, including summoning greater undead.

"Ah."

The entry room also sports a quickly dispatched squad of Half-trolls, and Lisa's first Amulet of Telepathy.

"Ah, you mundanes are just jealous." ;)

Redundant, yes, but it should sell for a bit. The source of the superb feeling appears to be two vaults: a lesser vault (spiral) and a lesser vault (nethack, spiral rooms). The former is closer, so we head for it first. Not much of note; the worst it has to throw at me is a couple Time hounds, but the best it has to offer is a Golden Crown of Serenity, which doesn't look like it'd sell for enough to bother.

Off to the second vault, then. This one looks to have a tougher assortment of monsters, notably including Lisa's first Greater titan. [checks notes] Ouch: 3800hp, +10 speed, nasty melee damage, all in confusion, which I don't resist (though I think chaos resistance from Thorin will protect me from actually being confused), and a summon-monster spell.

"You think it'll protect me. Lovely…"

Fortunately, he can't punch through walls, so we emPrison ourself and power up while he approaches: Adrenaline Channeling, Tulkas prayer, Divine Aim, Character Armor.

"Here goes nothing. Revenge this, ugly!"

And it doesn't turn out so bad: five turns to kill, and he spends most of his attack opportunities healing himself. And it doesn't look like the vault has anything else tough to throw at me–

"Are you even paying attention up there?"

Sorry. :o There's treasure on the floor all around it, so Stone Prison is out. Fortunately, it's up against a wall, so after ducking back out of its line of sight, I Dig a dog-leg hole in the wall behind it and Pulverize the bugger into submission. >:>

And after that, the vault is pretty much straightforward, netting a few minor ego weapons and Lisa's first Staff of Genocide, Fireproof and of Plenty, even, with fully 14 charges. And the down stairs are conveniently placed for us to push on to:

Mdr 64, Princess quest for 5 Dracoliches; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

Not particularly, I don't; it's an arena level (lit, mercifully), and I enter out in the open, with a pack of Hezrou not far off to the east. I emPrison myself as a precaution before scanning the level. The quest room is more or less a straight shot due west, and there doesn't appear to be much in our way.

"So how tough are these Dracolich things?"

[checks notes] You've fought two of them before: 3500hp, speed +10, average melee attacks, cold and nether breaths. We'll be approaching from the west, so they shouldn't get a chance to get the drop on us.

"Famous last words. Okay, let's go."

Hang on a second, rest your mana back up first… and now we go. We pass a team of High-elven ranger on the way and dismiss them. As we approach, we detect a pack of Multi-hued hounds in the quest room. Odd, I'm not picking up the Dracoliches… ah, there they are, they were just out of range. They're awake, and bunched up in the east corner of the inner ring trying to get to me, which should make it easy to keep them pinned.

"What about the hounds?"

They won't come out to us; we fire up Adrenaline Channeling and Character Armor, Dig through the wall, push in and Mind Wave them. With them out of the way, we fire up Divine Aim and Tulkas prayer and move in to start luring out the Dracoliches one at a time. With a bit of careful dancing, and restarting Divine Aim halfway through the third Dracolich, all five fall with a minimum of fuss, and the princess offers us a Small Wooden Boomerang, an Adamantite Rod of Nothing, or Bolts. Hmm, we've got enough money for now, and the rod might come in handy if we scare up a useful rod tip—especially considering it's an Adamantite Rod of the Istari. The Dracoliches, in the meantime, manage a Main Gauche of Aman and The Amulet of Ingwe, for which I happen to have a ?o*ID* from the previous level:

Doesn't beat Elessar, of course. A quick scan of the level reveals nothing else of interest, so we continue to:

Mdr 65; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

After the last level, I feel superb about entering into an empty room… ;) Precognition reveals only one point of interest, an unidentified amulet in a four-subroom pit due north. On approach, though, it turns out that Uriel and a Greater titan are in the next subroom up, and the way the doors are positioned, I don't think I can get to the amulet without letting them out. Not worth it.

"Suits me fine." *sniff sniff* "The sulphur smell is a lot stronger down these stairs. And it's a lot hotter, too."

Yes, those lead to Mount Doom. We won't be going there yet.

"‘Yet’. *groan* How the frag did I get mixed up in this mess?"

In the meantime, after carefully luring out and ambushing a pack of Water hounds in our way, we take the nearby down stairs to:

Mdr 66, Princess quest for 5 Greater draconic quylthulgs; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

"Oh, I don't like that look on your face. I take it these aren't your average kwithl-blobby things."

These specialize in summoning ancient dragons. Actually, though, since there are five of them, we should be able to use the same trick we used on the Hand druj back on Mdr 56. In the meantime, though, we've got a Dreadlord incoming, so we need to power up. I'll even throw in Divine Aim for this one.

"Oh, don't go to any trouble on my account up there…"

Sarcasm does not become you, young lady. The Dreadlord goes down in four turns, though not before smacking my STR and exp around some. And the restore junkart is still recharging from patching up from the Dracoliches. Well, that can wait for now.

Our entry room is in the northeast corner of the level; the quest room, just to be annoying, is in the southwest corner, and the only approach is from the north, right down the middle, which would give the southernmost Q a bead on me. To make up for it, though, a nearby void jumpgate takes me to the perfect staging point, a room just to the east of the quest room, whence I can Dig my way in from the side.

[squints west] "There are hounds in there. Is that gonna mess us up?"

I don't think the Earth hounds in the inner ring of the quest room will be a problem; we can lure most of them out on approach, and the rest should just get Pulverized along with the Qs. A couple of their corpses do land where my Stone Prison needs to be, but none on the side that will block us from the Qs, so we'll have plenty of time to clean up before–

Water hounds, coming in on the northern corridor. Fortunately, I had the Earth hound corpses cleared out by then, so patching up the Stone Prison will seal them out. After that, the plan goes just as before, except for taking longer since the Qs have more hit points than the Hand druj did.

"Ya know, now that I look more closely, I'm not entirely sure that princess is even really there. Once or twice, just for a moment, it looked like my teek blasts were going right through her."

A mystery for another time. In the meantime, the princess seems to be present enough to offer use a Shovel, a Thunderlord Coat, or Bolts. And this time, lacking a compelling alternative, we will go with the bolts, which turn out to be 24 Bolts of Slay Evil (+8,+12).

And since we finished with a Princess quest, we can take the express route back to:

Lothlorien

"Whoa, wait a minute, how the frag did you get those stairs to bring us back here?"

(shrug) Quirk of game mechanics. You'll be pleased to learn, though, that the reason I was able to do that was that that was the last level of Mordor.

"Finally. Oh, frag, wait a minute, where are we going next?"

Well, for now, we're just going to swing by Minas Anor to stow Ingwe and the Staff of Genocide. As for next time out, I haven't decided yet…

Chatter (1.5)

ZizzoTheInfinite: And an updated character sheet through Mordor.

EhUd42: Just an idea after looking at your skill point distribution. If you put the last 5 points into spell power would it be enough to buy an extra blow from spread blows?

ZizzoTheInfinite: Ooh, interesting idea… [sound F/X: calculation] Mm, not quite: for six blows, I'd need to get the spell effect level of Wave of Power (I assume that's what you meant) up from 31 to 34, for which I'd need a skill level of at least 7.5 in Spell-power, which at my 0.600 multiplier would need 13 skill points. If I can get more blows per round, though (if I get lucky with Narthanc, for instance), that might be just enough to get past a tipping point. I'll keep the option open for now. Thanks.

Chapter 6: And The Rock Cried Out, No Hiding Place

"Whoa… you look fragged up there."

Yeah, I've been running Mossbark through Angband.

"Hoom, yes, a most unpleasant place. Full of nasty things that were most stubborn about not dying when I hit them. Hm hum. I was surprised, actually, that my trees would grow in such a deep hole."

And lucky for you they did. You'd probably be dead a dozen times over by now if you weren't still back in 2.1.2, where Ents' grow-trees power could grow trees over lava and trees blocked flying and tunneling monsters.

"Yikes. Any chance we could maybe skip that place?"

No such luck, alas. That's where Morgoth lives.

"Lovely. Oh, frag, wait a minute, that's not where we're going next, is it?"

Not on your life—literally. No, we're heading for the Sacred Land of Mountains next.

"Mountain climbing, huh? Any place around here sell ropes and pitons?"

That won't be necessary…

LoM 45 thru LoM 50

LoM 45; "You hear the sound of a market."

"Tourist resort at the base of the mountain, eh? So this is, what, a popular vacation spot or something?"

I think that's just the locals, actually—especially considering that the dungeon town is in "scattered" form. Precognition reveals a Scribe, a Common Shop, a Polearm Smith, a Library, a Sword Smith, and a Forbidden Library.

"Oh, frag, more libraries. This is gonna be as bad as Moria, isn't it? We're gonna be coming back here for weeks."

No, ma'am, we've got all the spell books we'll ever need, barring any hits from Mr. F. Fingers. In fact, the only store of any particular interest to us is the Scribe, and that isn't very interesting. To my mild amusement, though, we apparently had one (and only one) Divine Aim *GREAT* hit left over from that Dreadlord way back at the bottom of Mordor.

Other than that, very little of interest, so we push on to:

LoM 46; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

"Again?"

That's something we'll probably just have to put up with at this stage of the game. A fairly calm level, actually, at least to start. I'm reminded afresh, though, of something I miss back here in 2.2.7: the don't-step-on-known-traps option.

"What, was that a trap? All it did was trigger that triphammer thing to smash the relic-looking thing under it when I picked up this polearm. Not much good as traps go."

Actually, that was a Trap of Divine Anger, hidden under the Pike you just picked up. Tulkas is now mildly annoyed with us.

"Why? How the frag was that my fault?"

Well, we're still up above 127K piety, so it wasn't much of a hit anyway. And these Gnome mages just summoned some Vrocks for us to kill and get back into his good graces.

*slash* *slash* "Ya know, there is such a thing as taking the whole ‘look-on-the-bright-side’ thing a bit too far…"

Sorry. ;) Apparently, though, the Gnome mages were part of an ad hoc monster group of 'h's; we also run into a couple Dark elven sorcerers, a Dark elven druid and a Mind flayer.

*shudder* "Those things give me the creeps. Especially as a telepath; my mind is my most valuable asset, after all."

Indeed; I think we'll take the luxury of knocking him down with a couple Neural Blasts—which are, unsurprisingly, quite a bit more powerful than the last time I used it. ;)

Otherwise, not much to see; moving right along, then:

LoM 47; "You feel your luck is turning…"

"Well, that last level wasn't terribly exciting; this one must be dead boring."

Oh, I dunno, it's not every level one sees an Air hound raw meat just lying on the floor of a room.

*shudder* "Thank Tulkas for small favors…"

Agreed. ;) On the whole, though, Lisa is unfortunately correct; there ain't nothin' goin' on here. Fast-forward, then, to:

LoM 48; "You feel strangely lucky…"

I feel strangely cramped, considering the level is a 1x1 small level. At least that means it's quick to sweep, netting a long since useless Potion of Wisdom, and we can continue to:

LoM 49; "You have a superb feeling about this level."

"Aw, and I was hoping that first one was just a fluke."

Sorry. Not that there's anything noteworthy about the level, much less superb. Well, except for yet another Potion of Wisdom, this time from a chest.

"You don't think maybe this is supposed to be a hint or something, do you? That maybe it's not so wise to be up here?"

Nah, the RNG isn't usually that subtle… ;) No, the RNG's usual level of unsubtlety is indicated by this randart ring with -6 attacks that a Mature red dragon just dropped. :\

"So… what would happen if you only had five attacks a round before you wore this?"

I shudder to think. I say let's not find out, and instead leave it on the ground and push on to: