All Trampled Uniques Go to Heaven

[Rowan]

Of course they don't. But where do they go?

Just watched the Lernaean Hydra trample over Kavlax... but the many-headed doormat is still listed as Alive in my monster-knowledge. Is he really going to show up again, or is he gone forever? Am I cursed to see him listed as Alive just because I didn't do the deed?

[Monkey Face]

He'll be back (assuming you live long enough :-)

[Zikke]

Of course they don't. But where do they go?

Just watched the Lernaean Hydra trample over Kavlax... but the many-headed doormat is still listed as Alive in my monster-knowledge. Is he really going to show up again, or is he gone forever? Am I cursed to see him listed as Alive just because I didn't do the deed?

It's as if he was never spawned, so he has a chance of showing up again at the same chance he always did.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Of course they don't. But where do they go?

Just watched the Lernaean Hydra trample over Kavlax... but the many-headed doormat is still listed as Alive in my monster-knowledge. Is he really going to show up again, or is he gone forever? Am I cursed to see him listed as Alive just because I didn't do the deed?

Similar to if you use destruction to remove a unique, he has a chance to respawn.

[Timo Pietilä]

Of course they don't. But where do they go?

Just watched the Lernaean Hydra trample over Kavlax... but the many-headed doormat is still listed as Alive in my monster-knowledge. Is he really going to show up again, or is he gone forever? Am I cursed to see him listed as Alive just because I didn't do the deed?

Trampled is not dead, just deleted. Same with earthquake "embedded in stone" and destruction. Those don't kill the unique, just remove it from level.

There is a rule in angband that monsters can't kill uniques.

That rule applies to all indirect magic too, you can't get Bullroarer killed by Dracolich nether breath even that it does way more damage than it has. It just leaves Bullroarer at one point of HP.

I once watched one of the Ringwraiths getting pummeled by hounds it summoned. I just waited for fun, I had immunity and glyph, it didn't. It just didn't die, so I poked it to death after it got boring.

[Rowan]

Thanks! Yeah he ended up appearing again a couple of levels later. After killing the Lernaean, Kavlax was a piece of cake- or more a little cookie.

I once watched one of the Ringwraiths getting pummeled by hounds it summoned. I just waited for fun, I had immunity and glyph, it didn't. It just didn't die, so I poked it to death after it got boring.

Ha! That sounds like fun! I never seem to have great success with my glyphs; monsters always seem to break them within a couple of turns.

[brbrbr]

Thanks! Yeah he ended up appearing again a couple of levels later. After killing the Lernaean, Kavlax was a piece of cake- or more a little cookie.
Ha! That sounds like fun! I never seem to have great success with my glyphs; monsters always seem to break them within a couple of turns.

Glyphs have been very good for me. Even Morgoth didn't touch them for 4-8 rounds of melee. Depends on the monster, probably.

How about following approach: The less uniques you kill, the less is the chance that strong ones will be summoned by. So do not fight them at all.
If you kill everybody but Tarrasque - only Tarrasque will be summoned!

[Derakon]

Glyphs have been very good for me. Even Morgoth didn't touch them for 4-8 rounds of melee. Depends on the monster, probably.

How about following approach: The less uniques you kill, the less is the chance that strong ones will be summoned by. So do not fight them at all.
If you kill everybody but Tarrasque - only Tarrasque will be summoned!

On the other hand, if the Tarrasque gets summoned and then you teleport it away, then it can't be summoned again because it's already on the current dungeon level. Only monsters that "don't exist yet" can be summoned.

[Bowman]

I try to kill whichever uniques I can, because the less often enemies can use summon uniques, the more often I can blow away summons with banish/mass banish instead of needing to do destruction or teleport other games. Plus, man, I just like killing uniques

On the topic of trampling uniques, though, what determines which uniques can be trampled? I'd always guessed that it was driven by level, but my last character had a couple of experiences that refuted that. Namely, Maeglin (level 81) couldn't trample Glaurang (level 70), and conversely, Atlas (level 76) was able to trample Maeglin. Is it just something like h's can't trample D's while P's can trample h's?

[Timo Pietilä]

On the other hand, if the Tarrasque gets summoned and then you teleport it away, then it can't be summoned again because it's already on the current dungeon level. Only monsters that "don't exist yet" can be summoned.

I wonder if you could add a monster spell which brings monsters that are in the level into combat. "summon nearby" or something like that.

That could make summoners really dangerous when there is a vault nearby though.

[Timo Pietilä]

On the topic of trampling uniques, though, what determines which uniques can be trampled? I'd always guessed that it was driven by level, but my last character had a couple of experiences that refuted that. Namely, Maeglin (level 81) couldn't trample Glaurang (level 70), and conversely, Atlas (level 76) was able to trample Maeglin. Is it just something like h's can't trample D's while P's can trample h's?

Maeglin can't trample anything, but can move weaker monster out of its way (swap places as movement).

[Nick]

I wonder if you could add a monster spell which brings monsters that are in the level into combat. "summon nearby" or something like that.

That could make summoners really dangerous when there is a vault nearby though.

We had a comp a while ago with 3.5.1 modified by fizzix so that summoning was replaced with this. ISTR it worked OK, and the code is still set up so that this can be easily added either instead of or as well as regular summoning.

[Bowman]

Maeglin can't trample anything, but can move weaker monster out of its way (swap places as movement).

Ah, sorry, you're right. I meant that Maeglin couldn't push past Glaurang, but he got trampled by Atlas. Still the same question of what determines "weaker onsters".

[Derakon]

Ah, sorry, you're right. I meant that Maeglin couldn't push past Glaurang, but he got trampled by Atlas. Still the same question of what determines "weaker onsters".

This is determined by the "compare_monsters" function, which simply compares the amount of experience the monster is worth. Evidently Maeglin is undervalued in terms of experience reward. (Or Atlas and Glaurung are overvalued).

[Bowman]

Oh, that explains it. Thanks!

Atlas being worth more than Maeglin, I can understand, but Glaurung is definitely overvalued