Morgoth Eats Banishment Like Happy Meals

[Rowan]

How many scrolls of banishment/mass-banishment do people usually take with them? I spent an entire playthrough (cautious and thorough) never using a single scroll of banishment of any sort, collecting them diligently. When it was finally time to put the smack down on Morgoth, I took all my scrolls with me, and he forced me to use them like no tomorrow.

-I swat Morgoth
-He surrounds me with 3-4 Great Worms of Many Colours
-Banish
-He surrounds me with 1-2 Nightwalkers and 2-3 Nightcrawlers
-Banish
(repeat. summon, banish, summonbanishsbsbsbsbsbsbsbsbsb)

All my scrolls gone in like 5 minutes.

Now I can't blame him... if I were controlling Morgoth I'd only stop summoning to manastorm now and again... which he did. I got away, but now I have zero means of banishment next time I go down there.

So it makes me curious! How many do you guys take down there? I must have had at least 30 total.

[Derakon]

My go-to strategy is to fight in an area that has had Word of Destruction used in it. When Morgoth summons, instead of immediately banishing, you can use Phase Door and be almost guaranteed to not be in line-of-sight of anything. And since Morgoth moves faster than everything he summons, you can just move away from both him and his summons and he'll catch up first. You should only need to use banishment when you can't be confident that Phase Door is a safe move.

[Rowan]

...you can use Phase Door ...You should only need to use banishment when you can't be confident that Phase Door is a safe move.

Yes- of necessity I started experimenting with this. Not doing too bad until I actually used Word of Destruction and I think it erased him...

Hey, I noticed sometimes when he hits me it just does a set amount of damage, and causes an earthquake- but other times I get moved all over the place and take a whole lot more damage, with phrases about the ceiling caving in, and the floor twisting in a strange way, or something. Often this second type of attack gets me a much longer *more* string and several low hitpoint warnings. Are there two different attack types, or is there always a chance of this catastrophic destruction?

(pretty new to Morgoth in general, but getting better at dealing with him has me learning new things)

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Yes- of necessity I started experimenting with this. Not doing too bad until I actually used Word of Destruction and I think it erased him...

Hey, I noticed sometimes when he hits me it just does a set amount of damage, and causes an earthquake- but other times I get moved all over the place and take a whole lot more damage, with phrases about the ceiling caving in, and the floor twisting in a strange way, or something. Often this second type of attack gets me a much longer *more* string and several low hitpoint warnings. Are there two different attack types, or is there always a chance of this catastrophic destruction?

(pretty new to Morgoth in general, but getting better at dealing with him has me learning new things)

You must TO Morgoth before destructing, or he will take forever to respawn on the level. My go-to strategy for Morgoth is to destruct an area (first making sure he's not in the destruct range), then fighting him within the zone. Use phase door, as Derakon pointed out. I try to phase before healing or banishing. If necessary, I TO Morgoth and then destruct to remove uniques (only if I can't safely TO the uniques away individually). It's preferable to TO uniques, that way they are still on the level and can't be summoned by Morgoth. This "destruction zone" strategy can be varied if I happen to catch him in a tactically beneficial permanent walled vault, in which case I tend to use runes and a shoot and scoot or bash and bail strategy.

When Grond hits it has a chance to cause earthquakes. Sometimes @ can dodge falling debris, but sometimes @ gets crushed by the collapsing ceiling. Treat it just like mana storm. Always keep your hps above 600. Good luck in your battles with the Big Boss!

[Derakon]

You get crushed between the floor and ceiling if the earthquake spawns a wall in your tile and you fail to dodge into an adjacent open tile. Don't melee Morgoth when in an antisummoning corridor as it makes this much more likely.

[Rowan]

You get crushed between the floor and ceiling if the earthquake spawns a wall in your tile and you fail to dodge into an adjacent open tile. Don't melee Morgoth when in an antisummoning corridor as it makes this much more likely.

Ahh, okay. Feeling much more confident now; I'm just hoping I don't run out of potions! We'll see!

[quarague]

I think the big M fight is hardest for priests. They tend to deal less damage than other chars, so the fight lasts longer. That being said, I think 30 banishment scrolls should be enough to kill him. Did you also have a few mass banish scrolls? If he summons several differnt letters, don't use multiple banish scrolls. Also a staff of banishment can be very helpful for priests because of greater recharging giving you a decent chance to use it for a while. Finally, how much dps do you do, and how. More dps means shorter fight means less consumables. Ranged dps can also help a lot because M will use some of his turns to move instead of attacking.

[Thraalbee]

I find priest strong in the end game. Three ways to avoid crushing. Distance attacks, rune/glyph of protection and very high ac. The first increases the summon problem. The second breaks every 1 to 6 rounds or so but can be reapplied quickly, and Ac needs to be really high to make a difference. 300 is clearly helping compared to 150.
The ideal fighting ground is full of glyphs, summons can not appear on them. But M will not let you alone very long unless trapped in a vault so this is hardly doable and also almost cheating.
But the key is staying over 600 hp all the time. Some players like to fight M in a vault, with an ideal setup that is very easy. The summons problem is less but ?phase is not as practical. Destruct works a bit different in vaults, as M's earthquake

[fph]

Also a staff of banishment can be very helpful for priests because of greater recharging giving you a decent chance to use it for a while.

Note that Morgy has a melee attack that drains charges, too. So if you are meleeing him, your charges will be gone very soon.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Note that Morgy has a melee attack that drains charges, too. So if you are meleeing him, your charges will be gone very soon.

And that "drain charges" attack also heals the monster. I hate giving healing to the Bosses, so for this reason never carry wands or staves into the battles with Sauron or Morgoth. The only exception being a mage if I decide to go the wand of draining/annihilation route.

[Derakon]

I think the big M fight is hardest for priests. They tend to deal less damage than other chars, so the fight lasts longer.

Priests have Banish Evil, which is very nearly a perfect spell for dealing with Morgoth's summons as it teleports away all evil monsters in LOS, including Morgy. Anything that's left can be dealt with by casting Word of Destruction.

The only consumables priests need for the final fight are Potions of Speed and Potions of Restore Mana.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

I think the big M fight is hardest for priests.

I'm not sure this is true, given the Priest's virtually unlimited healing capacity and ability to Banish Evil. Much depends on what gear @ has found.

That being said, if turncount is any indication (which it might not be), I only had one priest winner that got under the 100,000 turncount mark. So, priests were my worst wins based on turncount, followed closely by mages. Although, more of my mages die than any other class, so I think they are harder for me overall.

[Raxmei]

I've never used Banishment or Mass Banishment fighting Morgoth, though I had a few priests use Banish Evil a lot. I could mostly rely on Phase Door and Teleport Other combined with smashing face really really hard. If you're able to take Morgoth on in melee a lot of the things he does will interfere with his own summons. The priest's excellent staying power really comes in handy.

[Estie]

The potentially easiest time with M has the ranger, everyone else is more or less on the same level. What the 2 casters lack in damage output, they make up for in ability to control the battle.

[brbrbr]

Yes, Morgoth eats Banishments very quickly.
It is not viable, so the strategy I use is Phase door (in destructed terrain), then teleport Morgy away, then teleport summoned creatures one by one, or destruct again.
Scroll of recharging plus empty staff of destruction works a treat for Priest and Warrior.

For Ranger game I did not destruct
In open space battle I found Morgoth is much, much more likely to come closer rather than do distance attack or summon. I would teleport P before he reaches me.
In rare case where he summons before reaching me - I would teleport myself.
Before doing that make sure you have enough health, as you may land near nasty monster.
That strategy worked solidly for a ranger.