I can't beat naga city

[TheJohns]

It's a shame that I didn't do Naga City back when it was easy. But now I don't know how to beat it. The main dungeon level is a giant nuisance because there's a lot of bullshit blocking narrow hallways and such, but I don't know how to beat 3 bosses with such limited resources. I was able to beat Dragon Isle by abusing Dracul, but obviously that doesn't work here. Anything a non-superexpert can do to beat this dungeon? Also, I would appreciate tips on Vicious HoS.

[fall_ark]

For VHoS you might want to wait a while to see if there's any change to the current enemy lifesteal. The most straightforward classes should be Berserker, Assassin and Sorcerer. Though due to constant version changes I don't have much experience to share....

[booooooze]

Both totally doable by mere mortals.

VHoS: bring the bear mace, burn salve, plate mail. Helps to prep binlor, but not absolutely necessary. Explore carefully: if you see the bloodpools indicative of a boss, do not expose the boss if it means Blah Blah will lifesteal you. I think I try to get after the indomitable around level 7. Get him next to another enemy or in front of a long line of walls. Go to town. Once you get him to zero once, (hopefully you have some exploration left), go explore a few squares, hit him again. Burn him, then kill something else. Pretty quickly you'll get to the point where he's only damaging you because your corrosion stacks are so high, consider quaffing a burn salve if you don't want to run around wasting your exploration. Blah Blah will then be straightforward. Suggested classes: beserker (for magic resist), assassin (for cleaning up those pesky illusions), sorcerer (mana shield makes the indomitable go down even faster).

Naga city: It's really not that bad, with the shops and the bonus enemies. Prep Dracul and platemail. I can say more if need.

[Blovski]

Priest w. bear mace used to work pretty well on VHOS. I'd probably get platemail now as well (makes indomitable a cakewalk). I don't know whether the new lifesteal will make Blahblah too horrific.

As the forum's wussiest sort-of-a-vet, on NC - I just posted a Dwarf GG Paladin with Fire Heart strategy (in the strategy thread) that I've run through with some resources to spare. I think it was Joist who came up with a Binlor Monk strategy that worked great (should be in strategy thread as well). I don't think either of these need the old set-up to work (in my view the new one's probably easier for most strategies that weren't Avatar's Binlor->TT one - having extra XP downstairs is huge). Half-dragon, with silly knockback, can also handle NC pretty well.

Main things are: 1) try to engineer your XP to level off the first boss kill once you're down there
2) exploration is powerful at high levels, especially if you have poison. Also most classes can pretty reliably whack the final boss with just exploration.
3) it can get a bit dicey if you get a bad wave of bosses no matter how well you plan.
4) for most classes, conversion to Dracul at the end (TT->Dracul especially, since TT lets you pay for piety) can give you 3 or 4 full heals.

[gjaustin]

[arrenfrank]

[TheJohns]

As long as I don't do something dumb and pred a translocation scroll, I guess I'm capable of handling the bottom floor, but it's the main floor that's a huge pain for me. How do I save loads of money? Am I going to have to prep a Midas to do that? Also what's a good item to prep? I just used Amulet of Yendor for vicious dungeons.

[Blovski]

You really only need 20 gold for your first altar of choice (pactmaker can replace a desecration to get into it), then you'll get tons of cash from the bosses to unlock others or pick up the elite items down there.

[booooooze]

[TheJohns]

Thanks for the tip, guys. I beat Naga City with Half-Dragon, Dwarf Rogue, and Human Assassin. And I didn't even have a Platemail with Rogue. I actually didn't know Tikki's poison is permanent, I just assumed it worked like the venom dagger. Also the whole Mystera desecration trick at the beginning. The first few times I failed because I was trying to go with a high-res build, but that means I couldn't desecrate Mystera and Binlor easily, and stacking life steal wasn't an option. But I did it. Horray.