by sitnaltax on Fri Mar 08, 2013 4:39 am
Well, here's the brief notes I took.
Fighter
Prep the RBS and a Transmutation Seal. Be a goblin or halfling; you need a damage spike at the end, and you can get it either through health potions or a mid-fight level up. Cross your fingers for the glyphs to arrive in a helpful order. If you find yourself with extra mana, use ENDISWAL or PISORF to open up additional exploration space.
Berserker
Be a gnome. Worship Mystera immediately and use all your mana to get piety no matter what. Health and melee resources won’t help you against the boss, so feel free to burn them against lesser monsters. Take the Alchemist’s Pact for a mid-fight level up against the boss.
Warlord
This is a tough one. Be an orc, which benefits from the Goat Horns that are dropped by plants. Kill plants immediately before you level up. Eventually, you’ll worship Earthmother; don’t take many boons, but use IMAWAL on the revenants to get more XP. Later you can convert out, desecrate, and quaff one potion to cure both that corrosion and the corrosion from the plants. Items that improve your spellcasting are helpful because two of the bosses require heavy fireball use.
Thief
A relatively straightforward one that relies a little bit on finding the right monsters and chests in the right places. You get two of each debuff cure, so don’t worry too much about taking a couple stacks of weakening or corrosion as you gain levels. The boss is fragile and can be taken down with fireballs, fueled by your potions; being level 8 is fine.
Rogue
Being an orc is fine. Find Binlor ASAP; if you don’t reasonably quickly, might as well restart. Convert the extra wall crushers for attack power. Use CYDSTEPP or ENDISWAL to tank hits from the boss.
Assassin
Since undead are bloodless, you might as well stick with Binlor for the whole dungeon. Take ENDISWAL downstairs with you, and try to be level 8. Kill Berserkers to go from level 8 to 10, then kill Thralls for mid-fight level ups against the boss.
Priest
You have to tank 3 450 HP swings. CYDSTEPP never spawns but ENDISWAL always does. Pactmaker is the only altar, so take Consensus before your pact. Be a dwarf and take the Body Pact to get your resistances naturally high; depending on how efficient your exploration is, you’ll need to save both health and mana potions to take out the bosses.
Monk
Be human or orc to overcome the monk's horrible damage. You have two altars chosen from Taurog, Earthmother, and Jehora. Of these, Taurog is probably the best, even though you need to cast a lot of spells, because getting up to 65% physical resistance is very nice. Start working on the boss early, like at level 6 (knock him down with BYCEPPS even before that if you get it), and get a midfight level-up to 7. APHEELSIK (to prevent the boss's regeneration) and BYCEPPS (to eliminate its resistance) are both helpful; if you can't find APHEELSIK, fireballs are okay.
Paladin
Take a couple boons, but save most of your piety for several shots of Clearance to fuel BYSEPPS + HALPMEH at the end to slowly whittle down the boss's physical resistance and punch through with enough damage. You'll need to buy a weakening cure potion.
Wizard
Without the attack penalty, wizards are not so bad at this level. You need melee attack power to slog through the Meat Men and Golems, so be a human. Like the Berserker challenge, use your mana towards Mystera piety whenever possible even if you don't otherwise need the glyph.
Sorcerer
Probably be a gnome to take advantage of the mana potions, especially if you'll be waiting until late to convert your glyphs with Refreshment anyway. Mystera provides Mystic Balance and Refreshment; Binlor provides magic resistance, which helps against Djinns, Animated Armors, and the boss. Start wearing the boss down with extra mana early. It revives with a slightly larger health pool, so you'll need to fight through 66 death protections. Once you can tank a hit off the first form, save whatever popcorn is left for the second form.
Bloodmage
Because of the boss's nasty ability to heal from your blood pools, the usual bloodmage strategy of a massive blood-fueled spike at the end will get you nowhere. Instead, be an orc, use blood pools to level up to 8, and use PISORF (which seems to always spawn) to actually kill the boss. The boss only heals off of damage, so if it's not burning you can kill a popcorn monster and immediately drink its blood.