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I don't know, for some weird reason I thought it might make me vulnerable. And I guess that it would have been true in that I might draw more monsters, but in retrospect it was better then sitting around and doing nothing.

Update 13!

Current Character: Pacifist the Troll Berserker


Welcome back to our Let's Play of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup! In this episode, I'll actually get to the Lair, and maybe do a level of it.


We enter D11 and find a steam dragon along with some jackals and orcs. Lovely.


And two centaurs.


Make that four. I'm guessing there's a centaur warrior leading them.


So I run away. Even TrBe's know when to run away, shocking as the idea may be.


SOOO much better.


Even now it's still better.


Case in point. Also that helmet down there is yet another item I can't wear.


This is Erolcha. Unlike the other uniques we've fought, she's actually a threat. She can cast Lehudib's Crystal Spear, the most powerful single-target conjuration in the game. Or Banishment, which sends us to the Abyss, which is a death sentence at this point. Or just plain Paralyze and beat you down as she does so. Yeah.


I turn on Trog's Hand and I try to paralyze her with my wand, but it does little good. Also she turns invisible, which means that she can't cast either LCS or Banishment. And of course we still have our handy ring.


Flawless victory.


Then I find some orcs, a giant toad, and a deck of cards. Giant toads are like giant frogs, only bigger and just as vanilla. The deck of cards is an evokable item that I'm not going to mess with, it can devastate my character.


More carnage. Also, poison is really handy, if you don't already know.


I knew I'd have to fight one of these. This is a centaur warrior, and this guy is nasty, look at how much HP he took from me with one shot.


...I try zapping my wand of polymorph other at him to make him something that can't actually use bows, and he takes TWO shots at me in the same period, bringing my HP to that level. I really have no clue what to do here. Healing potion won't be enough if he can shoot that quickly. Teleport is too slow. I have no blinking scrolls and he'll just catch up to me with speed. If I actually use a potion of speed, he can still shoot. Scroll of fog, maybe?


And then what? I don't want to come out of the smoke, and teleport is bad when I don't even know what else is on the level, so... Brother in Arms? I also change rings, because now I realize the artifact gives me rF- and the centaur shoots flaming arrows.


I hate centaur warriors. Also, I know that someone is going to pop up and say "if you did X, you would have survived". And if you have such knowledge, by all means tell me.


At this point we actually do have some fabulous treasure. There's actually more stuff, but I pressed Enter accidentally before I could take a picture of it, sorry.


And our score. Look at how much better it is then the others. I will get my revenge on centaur warriors one day, I will promise that much.


I think that's enough for today.

EDIT: Wait a minute. This update is update 13... of course, of course.

Sure, I added the new names and the DEIE. The VpBe will be named Edward though, that was part of the original suggestion and I kinda forgot. I also changed the names with punctuation since Crawl doesn't allow that in names.

Update 12!

Current Character: Pacifist the Troll Berserker


Welcome back to Let's Play Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup! In this update we'll (try to) get to the Lair, which would be the first time we've ever done so in this particular LP. Also to any Americans out there, have a good 4th of July!


D8. Nothing much of interest so far.


I kill a few random monsters and I get to the fourth star of Trog piety! Now I can use the ability Brothers in Arms, and although my current success rate is Very Poor, the ability turns a TrBe's game into "things I can kill myself" and "things Trog can kill for me" up until the very end game.


A ring and a scroll to identify it with. A handy coincidence.


It's poison resistance, which is handy for the Lair. I also formally identified the charges on the wand of invisibility. Meanwhile, I dumped the orcish robe, I'll check them all later when there's more to check.


Two wands? I must be dreaming.


One turns out to be magic darts, which makes it one of the worst wands out there. The other one? I'm not so sure. I think either polymorph other or healing, since the rat zombie I tested it on wasn't affected.


Ah, so it is polymorph other, better known as "polymorph other creatures into stronger creatures". It does have its uses though, against low HD (hit dice, determines HP and other stuff) monsters with annoying abilities.


Prince Ribbit. Basically a giant frog who casts Blink, which actually makes him surprisingly dangerous in the early-game.


At this point, he's really not a threat, not that he ever really was to us.


Ouch. What I just did was blow up a giant spore, which creates some fungus which in turn creates more giant spores. Can become dangerous if it gets out of control.


To us, it's just free experience.


A staff. It wouldn't have been Crawl if it stopped giving us useless items. Staves can have a variety of magical effects, none of which are really relevant to us.


I swear, these orcs popped out of nowhere. I was just autoexploring, and they just... appeared. That's probably just me, though.


Needless to say, there was carnage.


An altar to Yred, the god of death, in the middle of the lava. Yeah, that's totally worthwhile


It's not long before the level is clear.


An oblong leatherbound book? I'm pretty sure that's an artifact book. Curse you, Crawl!


Giant frog. I mentioned them when I was fighting Prince Ribbit, and they are really as vanilla as monsters get. They can be tough in the early game, but beyond that they're pretty trivial unless there are a lot.


See my point?


This is Maurice, better known as "the most annoying unique ever". He steals your stuff, blinks away, and turns invisible. So very annoying.


I slow him with curare, but then an ice beast and a centaur magically show up.


I kill him and I gain level 10 in the process. Also, this was the first time ever when my artifact ring was actually useful.


Then I meet a kobold pack, led by a big kobold, which is exactly what you think it is. Kobold packs are like orc packs only more trivial and show up later in the game.


Glorious carnage. Because you never get tired of seeing that.


Giant eyeball. They paralyze you and do exactly nothing else.


Another wand. Let's hope for something actually useful for once.


Manticore. They shower you with ranged attacks, making them actually slightly interesting.


We steamroll over it as always.


Ooh, our first "dragon", despite the fact that it looks like a lizard. Steam dragons fire balls of steam at you and don't do much else.


It's pretty easy, but we take some damage.


Another level cleared. Let's hope that Lair actually shows up soon.


Not much that we can see so far.


Another book. Because we still don't have enough.


Ooh, our first yak. Yaks are pretty vanilla monsters extremely common in the Lair, and they are something of a mascot for the game. There are death yaks and yaktaurs in this game, I do not kid you.


Yaks come in packs. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.) It actually makes them rather dangerous to squishy casters, just because they seem silly doesn't make them any less dangerous.


Yaks run away, actually most animal creatures in the Lair do. It's extremely annoying and makes you feel like they're wasting your time (and they are).


Poison is wonderful against fleeing monsters.


Jelly. I don't think we've even encountered one before, but they eat items and heal and divide when they do so. Also, they corrode things. Nasty, nasty creatures.


First things first, I test that un-ID'd wand I have. Paralysis, which is very handy in the early game but steadily becomes less and less useful.


I try to polymorph it into something less annoying (a very good use for polymorph wands), and it turns into a yellow wasp. I think these things are actually somewhat dangerous.


Thank goodness it was paralyzed.


More yaks, and no convenient corridors to retreat to.


Keyword was 'convenient'.


I also use a scroll of identify to identify that ring. It turns out to be regeneration, but we really hardly need it as a troll.


This is a portal to a treasure trove. In exchange for some inane demand, I get an insane amount of GOOD treasure. They last forever, so take your time. Let's see what it wants.


19 scrolls of identify... uhh, no. Maybe later.


An altar to Sif Muna. You must be kidding me, Crawl.


A weapon shop! Even if we use UC, let's see its wares.


All useless to us. /sigh


Another spore.


Hint: use a weak ranged attack.


Fungal extermination is so fun.


I finish the level. I think I'll actually have to cut the update short at this point, sorry, need to go grocery shopping and do other important things that take precedence over this.

Forest of hammers. But yeah, it just means that he has a ton of hammers with him.

Alright, even if this is a whole day late, I'll just continue from here instead of making a new post.


D7 seems to be an open level, which is awful for meleers, since it lets creatures start swarming you. Good for summoners, though.


Another wand, and a nearby amulet. I think this is Crawl's apology.


And the Temple. The Temple shows up at somewhere between D4 and D7, and in there are altars to several gods, making it an essential early-game location. Also, there are no monsters there. We have no need to really explore it, since we've already got a god. Might be good to come back to ID items, though.


A wand and a necrophage. Necrophages can be annoying, as they induce rot.


And an orc horde right behind it. Classic Crawl, really.


Pictured: glorious carnage.


Testing wands on random animals. The thing at the top is a goliath beetle, which is absurdly slow and tough in the early-game (and is poisonous to eat), while the thing at the bottom is an iguana, which is basically an upgraded giant gecko. Pretty generic, if anything.


The EPA will be on us soon, especially once we get into Lair.


More carnage. Also, our first store of this LP, an antique store! Nothing like capitalism to make the day better.


The ring is mediocre, bordering on "bad". I'll use it when I need see invisible or levitation.


Our amulet turns out to be warding, handy against summoned things.


One of our scrolls turns out to be immolation. Nasty, if not really lethal.


Also, we meet some bees. They are fast and hit reasonably hard with poison, so they're not exactly non-trivial in the early-game.


I actually had to use berserk and a potion to take them out. So yes, they made me consume more items then every unique I've encountered combined.


Another altar to a god I don't care about.


The downstairs cluster featured in this dungeon layout.


A level! Also, I think the Orcish Mines entrance might be in this structure.


I am of course correct. I'll come back later after I finish Lair, the Orcish Mines are generally considered harder.


I also find a secret chamber. I think I'll actually berserk for this, wargs can be tough and orc priests are annoying and deadly as always.


Glorious triumph.


Crazy Yuif seems to be here. Basically he's a crazy old Xom worshiper with a staff of chaos (sometimes deadly) and a cloak who lives in a hut in the forest (of trees or hammers).


Ta-dah. The cloak is unenchanted (I once got a cloak of preservation), but hey, at least it's there.


And a glorious altar to our god. That pretty much concludes the level and this update. This level was actually pretty interesting, so yeah.

...oh

Also, if and when I do play VpBe, I'll probably end up abusing Trog's Hand for the regen more then I'll berserk.