Ick Swamp "Way of the open fist"

[gjaustin]

[Darvin]

JJ seems the way to go on Ick.

[gjaustin]

[Darvin]

Very much true. JJ is just such a solid deity. When the worst-case scenario is a hit of corrosion and weakening before you can petition, and a host of useful and powerful boons, plus a top-notch piety farm... it'd be nice if all deities were at this level.

[booooooze]

Yeah... the JJ run made me wonder why I had such a hard time with it before that. I guess I just didn't find him soon enough on other runs? I don't know. Dwarf does seem to be a reasonable choice.

[TheJohns]

I don't know how remotely feasible this is unless you get really REALLY lucky. I think the only way to make this dungeon possible is to have the right glyphs early and JJ.

I think after the magic resist nerf with the Monk and that fact that 2/3 of the monsters are magic makes this even harder. I ALMOST beat it, but I just HAD to have Firstborn as the 2nd boss. Remind me why they completely got removed the Monk's magic resistance?

What's the easiest way to gain the first 2-3 levels? I think that's the hardest part for me.

[booooooze]

So, I became mildly obsessed with this level, that is, purist monk Ick Swamp in the current incarnation. I've got a fully unlocked profile, and it's not too bad. I'm guessing with good play it's beatable better than half the time.

Here's my advice, ymmv:
1) Orc. I had a fantastic run with a (+health) dwarf, but didn't have enough base damage at the end. The naga is a pushover, but the weakening eventually will take its toll.
2) Explore everything you can without killing any plants. Then, preferably, explore all you can killing only poisonous pods. If you're still stuck, branch out to include mysterious murkshades. Last resort, corrosive creepers.
3) You need divine help on this. I'm sure Lujo or someone will jump in and say that they have a purist atheist run, but screw that. Your main challenges are:
a) you have horrible damage - that's why you're an orc
b) the enemies are mostly magical, to which you have no resistance.
c) the map is clogged.

C) is your first and primary concern. As a monk, you can explore much of the map and not worry too much about regen. To that end, in approximate order, you're hoping to find JJ, Binlor, or EM early.

-JJ is great. If I find him early, I just clear about half the map of all plants (except the barbing bushes, of course), make an experience zoo, and take chaos avatar to level up to 2, then destroy everything with ease. Take some health boosts to deal with the lack of magic resist.
- Binlor is solid, as you can explore by crushing walls, and convert out with good piety. Only take stone heart (gives you some magic resist, and drops the resist of the wraiths and the boss), and make sure to stay above 50... there aren't enough walls to do anything else. Also, it drops the resist of the magic resistant plants, allowing you to burn them up.
- EM is ok. There are plenty of plants to turn into walls, and that will help with experience, it's just sometimes tough trading off vine form and clearance. Don't forget to entangle everything, as well.

After the map is clear enough, you might want to convert if you're not on JJ (and maybe even if you are). Tiki is great, as you can take Tiki's edge, mop up garbage to level up, and get some gold for conversion junk. Dracul, despite half of the enemies being undead, is also great, as there should be lots of blood around (unless you came from EM), and the magic resist is nice.

4) If you get LEMMISI early, just sit there and look for sparkles. Again, you need the gods' help on this one.
5) If you see Bleaty, cry, then kill yourself.
6) Goes without saying, but easy to forget: don't level up and leave poisonous pods or murkshades alive. Pause before you kill things, ask yourself if you're going to level up, then go kill all non-corrosive/non-deadly plants that you can.
7) Warlocks drop attack boosters (usually... one run I did only about half of them did). All else being equal, make them a priority.

That's what's been working for me, anyway.

[Lujo]

I don't have a purist atheist run of that one deffinitely I'm more about spotting and exploiting powerfull design flaws and unecessary imbalances, with bias towards ones that reduce the amount of effort you have to put into a session, as opposed to ones that are cheezy but up the amount of necessary clicks per run. Avatar doesn't seem to mind those, though. There are also some badass badge hunters out there, to be sure.

And I agree with most of what you say except, if it still works that way - EM makes the level a cakewalk if you find her in time.

Step 1: Find EM.
Step 2: Stone a plant
Step 3: Clearance
Step 4: Repeat ad nauseum.

As long as clearance still works on non-EM generated plants, you should have quite a bit less trouble with the level. Most of my Ick Swamp runs revolved around this, so I never thought about it as a difficult level. It is

[gjaustin]

JJ + Pactmaker is still my favorite deity combination for the level.

You can hit 75% magic resist at level 1, then Chaos Avatar up to level 2.

[CznRhubarb]

I was banging my head against this quest for a while last night, but still no luck in completing it.
Pactmaker was nice when I got it, but I always have trouble keeping my piety up to take advantage of it. I kept finding myself stuck in a scenario where I am going to get punished because I was piety farming Mystera or Binlor and backed myself into a corner. (I can't ever seem to find Jehora /sadface)

Anyway, I was thinking the new GG may be worth a shot, as I'm not usually in a good position to fight monsters over my level for a few levels. Unfortunately, there is a bug as plants are level 10 monsters and I get whacked with arrogance.
Provided that wasn't there though, does anyone think he would be a viable god choice? I figure between the poison and mana burn, piety could be built up pretty quick. A mid level cleansing would be available a few times as well (before it got too expensive).