Game #18

7055   Bob the Mountain Dwarf Hunter (level 10, -12/79 HPs)
       Mangled by a swamp worm on Level 2 of the Lair of Beasts.

This game truly depressed me, as I played it as perfect as I could, yet died to a situation I had never before encountered. I skipped over level 3, due to a ghost, as well as a later level due to a large number of orc warriors and orc priests. Once I was strong enough, I returned to those levels and cleared them. The Lair was on level 8, but I continued down the main dungeon in order to gain more experience.

As usual, I encountered poisonous creatures on level 11, but had not seen any poison resistance. However, a quick scan through the morgue file indicates that the game did give me a +3 plate mail of poison resistance in a shop on level 5, as well as a +7/+8 blowgun (!). Apparently I also had a staff of poison, which I believe provides partial poison resistance. So, the game was not completely cruel - there were poison resistance options available to me, had I searched for them.

Anyway, after encountering the killer bees, I decided it would be to my benefit to work through the Lair. I easily cleared the first level, though I don't like the fact that there are orcs in the Lair in this new version of Crawl. The Lair is supposed to be home to natural monsters, such as frogs and worms and not anything that can actually carry a weapon.

Anyway, I digress. On the second level, there was water and a very interesting room in the middle of a lake. I had never seen that before and upon opening the door, I was greeted by seven worms. Now worms are not difficult to defeat when you are at level 10, so I started fighting them. As the worms were defeated, swamp worms would appear, and I noticed that there was water within the room, but a lot of it was shallow, so I would be able to walk in.

At the end of the fight, many of the worms were wounded and running away from me, so I stepped into the room to chase them down. I had full hitpoints and nothing indicated that I was in danger. After pressing the L key, I immediately died, as two or three swamp worms ripped into me doing 91 hitpoints of damage before it was even my turn again.

This is my problem with Crawl. How would I ever know that swamp worms hide in the water and get massive bonuses while fighting in the water without first dying to a swamp worm? And how annoying is it to play a character for a long time in order to get to the point where there are swamp worms, just to have that character die learning what not to do?

I hate Crawl.

Lessons Learned
1. How not to fight a swamp worm.