Morgoth Eats Banishment Like Happy Meals

[Werbaer]

Hmm. What terrain did you prefer? Did you try making corridors, flit around in a destruct-ed area, or open room? I didn't have much luck my first couple of times trying to OoD him, and my melee seems to do more damage.

Reading the forums, I definitely got the feeling people believe using OoD for any unique is "doing it wrong." I'm more inclined to agree with you, though. I destroyed every known unique with it, except Maeglin, for whom it was just plain easier to stand on a rune and swat him.

For Morgoth, i use a large open are, preferable in a corner of the map.

I usually kill all uniques up to 3000' with the orb, and a high number of the later ones, too. I do enough melee with warriors/rogues/paladins, so i want to play priests differently.

What is hard to kill with the orb are unqies which are not evil, have very high hit points, and/or (especially) can heal self. That inculdes the unique Ainur, Ungolianth, and the Tarrasque.

I once played a priest without using melee or ranged weapons, only spells and magic items (wand of magic missile for the start). And it was in the version where 'smart monsters' cast spells twice as much as regular. I had most problems with Fundin Bluecloak; he just continued to heal himself.

[Timo Pietilä]

And it was in the version where 'smart monsters' cast spells twice as much as regular. I had most problems with Fundin Bluecloak; he just continued to heal himself.

At one point smart monsters were badly broken: if monster had heal self spell and big enough HP you could not kill it without having really big artillery at hand. AFAIK monster heal spell heals big % of monster max HP, so Ungoliant which has something like 10k HP was pretty much unkillable.

[Rowan]

...unqies which are not evil, have very high hit points, and/or (especially) can heal self. ...

Yeah, it's the summoning and the heal-self that makes me prefer using OoD from hockey-stick and similar configs.

Maybe I will try OoD next time I fight Morgoth, but man, his regeneration is no joke. I almost wonder that OoD even keeps up with it!

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Yeah, it's the summoning and the heal-self that makes me prefer using OoD from hockey-stick and similar configs.

Maybe I will try OoD next time I fight Morgoth, but man, his regeneration is no joke. I almost wonder that OoD even keeps up with it!

I encourage you to do the math when you next take on Morgie with a Priest or Paladin. Possibly OoD will be your best weapon, but more likely it will be missiles and melee, especially when standing on a Glyph, which you can cast in virtually unlimited fashion.

[Avenger]

Given that there are 3 pages I haven't bothered to read through, this has probably been mentioned already, but for my MAngband kill, I found a small(2 squares wide interior) permavault and destroyed until I had walls everywhere but one direction.

I then proceeded to summon and recharge until Morgoth appeared, and I sat there whaling on him and healing as needed. I had a staff of Banishment but never used it - anything that did appear in the spaces left open by his earthquakes either wasn't strong enough to touch me, or died almost instantly(Deathwreaker eats even the biggest Wyrms in a round or two, and it has no mercy for the undead, either).

The biggest threat to me was Manastorms, not summons - though to be fair, this was a very, very late endgame attempt, with all the gear and consumables I could reasonably want, not a standard endgame or pre-endgame run, and different strategies might come into play with those.

Still, the setup is a good one if you're playing a variant that allows you to summon indefinitely - the big stuff you don't want on you in addition to Morgoth is alot more tolerable when it's alone in a destroyed permavault like that.

Even without summoning, there are permavaults where Morgoth can be lured into a reasonably safe anti-summoning corridor of sorts. You just have to find them

[Derakon]

I encourage you to do the math when you next take on Morgie with a Priest or Paladin. Possibly OoD will be your best weapon, but more likely it will be missiles and melee, especially when standing on a Glyph, which you can cast in virtually unlimited fashion.

For a paladin, sure, you're almost certainly going to want to wade in there and get your hands dirty. Long, drawn-out fights are what paladins excel at. For a priest, it's less clear, because they're just awful at melee and ranged combat. The damage numbers may look nice when 'I'nspecting their weapons, but their hit rate is pretty poor, which tanks their numbers significantly.

Orb is a guaranteed, what is it, 150+ damage per shot? That's very likely to be better than what they can put out with a bow unless they've found a launcher with good damage and +shots, and even though they can spam Healing until the sun goes out (again), that doesn't mean they necessarily want to stand in melee range.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

...For a priest, it's less clear, because they're just awful at melee and ranged combat. The damage numbers may look nice when 'I'nspecting their weapons, but their hit rate is pretty poor, which tanks their numbers significantly.

Orb is a guaranteed, what is it, 150+ damage per shot? That's very likely to be better than what they can put out with a bow unless they've found a launcher with good damage and +shots, and even though they can spam Healing until the sun goes out (again), that doesn't mean they necessarily want to stand in melee range.

I figure the chance to hit Morgoth, with buffs, is usually about 72%.

Examining my ladder history for priests, not one of them bothered with OoD for fighting the Big Boss.

• Dwarf Priest - Aule (348*.72=250.6), Lothlorien Bow, Holy Might Arrows (305.72=219.6)
• Gnome Priest - Disruption x2 attacks (466*.72=335.5), Buckland x4, +2 shots, don’t remember the ammo but it was even better than the mace.
• Kobold Priest - Holy Avenger Scythe (455*.72=327.6),
• Human Priest - Disruption slay evil (454*.72=326.9), Lothlorien Bow, Holy Might Arrows (350*.72=252)
• Elf Priest - Deathwreaker (529*.72=380.9),
• Half Troll Priest - Scythe Slicing slay evil (415*.72=298.8)
• High Elf Priest - Deathwreaker (537*.72=386.6), Belthronding, Holy Might Arrows (none left, so unknown)
• Half Orc Priest - Disruption holy avenger (495*.72=356.4), Belthronding, Heavy Crossbow extra shots, Holy Might arrows and bolts (exclusively used Holy Might arrows and bolts to take out Morgoth)
• Hobbit Priest - Disruption x2 attacks (571*.72=411)
• Dunadan Priest - Aule (386*.72=277.9), Lothlorien
• Half Elf Priest - Holy avenger scythe (378*.72=272), Buckland x4, +2 shots, Belthronding, Heavy Crossbow extra shots, (exclusively used Holy might ammo and mithril shots. Morgoth never touched @)

As for standing in melee range. Cast or read Destruction, stand on a Glyph and fire or wail away. When the glyph is broken phase door and make a new glyph, phase door and heal as needed. Rinse and repeat. In my experience, the damage (multiplied by the to-hit chance) of weapon or missiles outperforms OoD.

[Werbaer]

Maybe I will try OoD next time I fight Morgoth, but man, his regeneration is no joke. I almost wonder that OoD even keeps up with it!

I took notes with my last priest winner. It took 138 Orbs to kill Morgoth. He used summoning spells 32 times. I used 4 scrolls of Mass Banishment when things got crowded, 6 charges from my 3 staffs of Banishment, and 1 Banishment scroll when thought i couldn't risk the staff to fail. Casted Banish Evil 9 times to teleport both Morgoth and the summons away.

138 Orbs at 171 damage against evil. 23600 damage total. So his regeneration meant i needed 20% more time.