Morgoth forced to approach in single-file!

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Elf Ranger turns Morgoth into a pin-cushion. Never suffers a single blow or touch.

Sauron went down handily to Slay Evil Arrows at around turn 78000. Then @ spent over 20,000 turns seeking some Morgoth killer Holy Might Arrows, or some more Slay Evil arrows. Finally, having recently found Belthronding as well over 60 Holy Might Arrows, @ descended to attack Morgoth.

The Big Boss was in a vault with a long permanent walled corridor. @ was able to get up next to the big "P" and cast a RoP, back up one and cast another. From this relatively safe spot, @ fired a hail of Holy Might Arrows at Morgoth. Whenever the Dark Lord broke a RoP, @ backed up one and cast another. Thereby always having one RoP between @ and "P". Once the Holy Might Arrows were exhausted, @ sent his remaining Seeker Arrows of Wounding and Mithril Arrows of Wounding down-range. Morgoth was down to two * when all the missiles had been fired. Standing on the last RoP, @ pummeled Morgoth with his Holy Might Mace of Disruption. A few ?Banishment along the way. Morgoth died in the first round! Never had to teleport him away.

http://angband.oook.cz/ladder-show.php?id=18185

[Rowan]

Awesomeness! I've never beaten him, but have faced him once. Every time he saw me he summoned really powerful monsters who also could summon and/or breathe for massive damage. The level got swarmed.

Maybe I was tremendously unlucky. Was Morgoth summoning as you fought him? RoP wouldn't have saved me from all the monster breath attacks. The Vault sounds crazy useful, though!

Curious Morgoth-Noob here. XD

[Carnivean]

Ingwe, flawless victory. Excellent work.

Originally Posted by Rowan

Was Morgoth summoning as you fought him?

Morgoth summons U and D mostly, so scrolls of Banishment and Mass Banishment are a must to keep it a 1 on 1 fight. Word of Destruction (assuming you have pblind) is the safest way to remove them, but you risk losing Morgoth from the level and having to start again, or in the case of vaults, nullifying the terrain advantage. When Morgy summons, and you can't ignore them, take a moment to remove them. With WOD, teleport other on Morgoth, then WOD the rest. Morgoth will come find you again.

[Derakon]

He also summons uniques, unless of course you take the time to personally kill every other unique in the game. I don't. Uniques are immune to banishment, but not Word of Destruction -- but Morgoth isn't immune to Word of Destruction either, so careful you don't lose your progress in the fight in your haste to get rid of a bunch of uniques.

You can also teleport uniques away, which may be preferable because then they can't be summoned again because they're already on the level.

[Timo Pietilä]

Originally Posted by Derakon

He also summons uniques

And Greater Undead. W, L and G.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Originally Posted by Rowan

....Was Morgoth summoning as you fought him?

Sure, the Big "P" did his share of summoning. In the permanent walled corridor, summoned monsters could only appear behind him or behind @, and at the start of the battle at the corner, pretty much only behind @. TO'd a couple nasties that appeared behind @ and read ?Banishment a few times. Some of the less dangerous ones I simply left alone in favor of shooting Morgoth. Fortunately, no super bad uniques appeared behind Morgoth where @ couldn't have reached them without TO'ing Morgie. The stuff that did appear behind him was either banished or Morgoth killed them himself when casting mana storm.

[Rowan]

Ahhhhhhhh so that's where the banishment spells are useful. I never liked them because of the player damage that comes with them (or am I confusing them for something else?).

Yeah, I'm one of the annoying players that kills every unique he possibly can before Morgoth. In my case it was a bunch of summoned Pit Fiends that did Morgoth's job for him. It had been so long since PFs first appeared, and the battle with Morgy was so tense that I forgot all about swapping in my rpois. Ouch.

[Ingwe Ingweron]

Originally Posted by Rowan

Ahhhhhhhh so that's where the banishment spells are useful. I never liked them because of the player damage that comes with them (or am I confusing them for something else?).

Yes, ?Banishment and ?Mass Banishment cause @ damage, but that shouldn't be a concern when you're in the end-game. The damage is far less than the blows you are taking. I rarely, if ever, use any banishment scrolls until the final battle with Morgoth. I save all of them that I find or can buy in the BM.

[Derakon]

Originally Posted by Ingwe Ingweron

Yes, ?Banishment and ?Mass Banishment cause @ damage, but that shouldn't be a concern when you're in the end-game. The damage is far less than the blows you are taking. I rarely, if ever, use any banishment scrolls until the final battle with Morgoth. I save all of them that I find or can buy in the BM.

Banishment scrolls can be worth using fairly casually, since they're so narrowly-focused (to only one category of monster). They can take out an inconvenient greater demon pit or make a vault with some nasty drujs or Quylthulgs much easier to deal with.

Mass Banishment scrolls are almost exclusively reserved for the endgame though, yes.