ToME WikiAdded on request of Maylith. I hope others enjoy it (and learn from it) as well.
--
I've been meaning to write this anti-guide ever since I, well, died hideously during the Maeglin Quest a few days back.
Introduction
Too much success is a good thing, so it's important to die hideously at a high level every now and then. And the Maeglin quest is a perfect place to do so. So, let's get to work!
Meta-Preparation
I almost hesitate to mention the P-word, because overall it is one of the things we'll be trying to avoid (see below). So just think of these as anti-preparations, will ya?
It's a good idea to have one success in the Maeglin Quest behind you before trying to die hideously there. This will give you much-needed overconfidence. Even better is if your success was with a combo that is different from the one you use for dying-hideously, and best of all is if it is only somewhat different, as this will both make things different than before, thus making reliance on previous techniques fatal, and keep them looking similar, so that you rely on previous techniques anyway. For example, if you succeeded with a sorceror, go back and do it now with a thaumaturgist, and convince yourself you'll still be taking down summoners so fast you needn't care about them.
Be overconfident. Overall, treat the quest as just a little matter to get out of the way.
Combos that make heavy use of teleportation for their work will have an advantage here.
Short-Term Preparation
Prepare as little as you can while still maintaining in your own eyes the illusion that you are preparing. Prepare inappropriately. For example, if your main problem will be running out of spell points, be sure to carry some source of healing, and vice versa. If your magic device skill is too low to use staves of healing efficiently, be sure to bring one of those. (Just one, of course.) If you bring a source of hasting, be sure that it's not sufficient to last the entire fight.
Be sure to have some missing resists, especially related to demons and undead.
If you have some random vaguely useful items sitting around in your Gondolin house, bring them -- once again, to convince yourself you're prepared.
Be sure not to bring the ring of Flare.
Try not to be level 50 when you do this quest. You can still fail at dying hideously at a lower level, but it helps.
Once You're Inside
Panic. Then be overconfident again. Then panic again, and so on. This works wonders, especially in terms of reducing your (the player's) intelligence, helping you overlook things, and limiting your use of creative approaches. It helps if you're a little sleepy (not necessary, though). More importantly, be sure not to step back and do something other than ToME for a while when you realize you're in trouble.
The key, really, is to let summons get out of control. Once they begin accelerating despite your killing things as fast as you can, half the battle is won (well, lost)... all that's needed after that is to be surrounded on all sides by monsters. (Personally, I think having capital D's on all sides breathe on you generating 50 or so messages on your last turn of life (or unlife, if appropriate) is a beautiful hideous death, but then, the whole esthetics thing is really up to you.) Remember, pull your punches at the beginning, and only start going all out in desperation as your death looms near! This will give the summons time to get started.
Be greedy. Just because there's a period where you can still leave safely doesn't mean you can't convince yourself to clear out the level anyway, "so you can ID and pickup loot."
If you have a means of wall creation, or worse yet wall creation, wall destruction, and a magical digger (giving you a Dig 'U'se ability), all is not lost! You can still die hideously as long as you use these inappropriately, unsystematically, and in haste. In fact, by blocking your way back to the exit when you're stranded in a now summoner-friendly area formed by wall destruction, you can die hideously even more easily. The hard part here is to forget that the magical digger's 'U'se ability (which could help you quickly carve your way out of a series of stone prisons and maybe outrun digging enemies) exists. Panic helps a lot in this respect.
Undead form is great. Be sure to have it during your work, as it does wonders for generating the necessary overconfidence, while not getting in the way of our real goal here.
Lay of Protection is a bit of a problem. However, it doesn't seem to work on squares occupied by monsters or items, so once you get enough tiles littered with these, the risk of its saving you should lessen. You should still have an irrational fear of draining your piety by using it, however.
Other tile manipulation techniques: The above was very much based upon my actual hideous death, but the basic principles -- underpreparation, panic, overconfidence, and greed -- can be extended to "outwitting" other tile manipulators, like tree growing, to which you may have access.
Last, but not least: remember, killing Maeglin by NO MEANS means that it's too late to die hideously. In fact, if you've anti-prepared properly, like the aforementioned stone-prisoning of the stairs to the city, it can just add to the fun! After all, Maeglin probably had some nice drops, and you CERTAINLY can't leave without them, no matter how large of a headstart the summoning may have gotten by that point.
Have fun and die hideously!
P.S.: if you know you will fail to die hideously due to pesky coaligned summoners overload and you don't have the magic to make them angry at you, remember to exit before Maeglin dies and quaff that potion that pseudo-ID as good you looted. With any luck it's a potion of detonation!