Slith Horror=OMG

[BrownieMix]

So I'm walking around through Khora-Vyss, slaying silly slith, when all of a sudden I get jumped by this chief dude. My party kills him and I get me a bloodspear-mwahahaha. Then the mage slith comes to get me, and after reloading five times so she doesn't cast lightning death spell, I manage to defeat her and get whatever treasure she gives me. Frustrated that I haven't learned dispel barrier yet, so I can't get the goodies, I save my game, then decide to go after the Slith Horror-after all, if I've killed the other baddies, how bad can this guy be?

 

Um

 

Yeah

 

The first time I fight him he uses his MEGADEATH lightning death spell and kills 3 of my guys outright, then death curses the last guy and proceeds to kill him in a grand total of 2 turns.

 

I know, I'll go in with everyone hasted/augmented/steel spined/everything else! It shall be a glorious battle...if he doesn't lightning me.

 

Um

 

Yeah

 

4 turns=everyone dead, with my nephil mage's last act being an attempt to get a glimpse of any treasure in the back room so he can have a nice image before going to kitty heaven.

 

Me thinks I'll be waiting awhile before I get whatever he's guarding...I still have Lysstak to kill, after all....

 

Anyone beat this thing? If so, what level were you...and how the @#$! did you do it?

[Randomizer]

I beat it on torment, but I waited until I had done some of chapter 4 and had a few more levels. The wand of death that the shaman coughs up is really helpful in doing major damage especially when coupled with someone using shield breaker first and then mighty blow to multiply the damage.

 

Key way to survive is to only send one person to pin the Horror down and send others only to remove the death curse. Stay back and send some summoned creatures in to help keep it back.

 

It takes lots of reloads and is probably the hardest boss fight for the party's level when they first encounter it. I'm pretty sure Synergy's singleton defeated it in normal.

[Locmaar]

Boy-o-boy, do I remember this one. I also went in there before beating Lysstak and the Horror wiped the floor with my party. Even with figuring out how to remove the death curse, we got fried bad. When I mailed Jeff about it, desparate as I was, he just replied: "come back later."

 

So it comes down to this: there are a few encounters, all of them optional, that you might not be able to beat when you first come across them. You aren't meant to. This is a little concession to the often criticized linearity of RPGs if you will. It can be frustrating at first, but you will really enjoy this encounter when you come back after, say, beating Moref the Shade. I think that's when I did it. It felt good. Really good. Boy-o-boy.

[Henrik]

Did this one last of the quests in this area. Yes it's one of the worst bosses in the series I'd say.

 

I was also stupid enough to go there without killing everything off first. BIG misstake. Took a while before I got how to get rid of the death curse, doing it with a load of other sliths running around was a pain...

 

Still liked the design though

[Khyryk Eye]

I know this sounds pretty stupid...but how do you remove the death curse? I have been fighting this lizard horror for a while now and still haven't figured it out.

[Randomizer]

About two rounds after getting the curse, one of four basins (blue pools) fills and you can get it removed by drinking. The original version was everyone got death cursed at once. Which made for an interesting fight as well as winning but dying to the curse.

 

Note other death curses require different means of removal.

[BrownieMix]

SUCCESS!

 

I waited until the beginning of Chapter 4, after getting the Dispel Barrier spell and gaining about 2 levels per character. I was getting the goodies behind the barrier, and decided to take on the Slith Horror...

 

This is how it went down, for anyone who wants to use my experience as a guide:

 

-Before going in, gave EVERYONE augmentation, spine shield, and the two cheap priest blessings. Didn't haste everyone beforehand, but definitely should have done that too.

 

-Sent only my slith warrior in at first, ran up and used Battle Frenzy and attacked, healing curse when appropriate.

 

-Nephil archer held back and shot arrows, either at Horror or summoned shade.

 

-Nephil Priest cast Heal/Smite when appropriate.

 

-Nephil Mage summoned two creatures - a rat and a poison worm/cobra dude from Geneforge 4 - then hasted everyone, then cast icy rain.

 

-I only had my archer and my warrior get the death curse.

 

In the end, it took a long time, but I was victorious. Unfortunately, my archer was coming in to heal the curse and got killed by consecutive searing lightning attacks, but he was my only casualty. The Horror went on a healing spree, but I didn't mind because at least he wasn't attacking me then.

 

Phew-awesome fight. Now on to the rest of Chapter 4!

[Fael]

Wow. It wasn't until the end of Chapter 5 that I was finally able to kill...erm, the two Slith priests. Still no joy against the horror. Maybe after Chapter 6...

[Student of Trinity]

Jeff's recent games seem to produce quite a few memorable battles. He seems to have figured out how to make optional bad bosses that are really pretty bad. That's good.

 

I'm going through A5 slowly a second time, after beta testing. Now I have a singleton human divinely touched natural mage, though only on Normal difficulty, and with Arcane and Nature Lore edited up so I can find caches and read spellbooks. The Venomous Mongbat reliably panicked my guy into running into the big swarm of swooping bats, who quickly ate him. After several tries, my Madness scroll did the job. After taking enough damage, while charmed, from my previous acid spray, the Mongbat panicked, and got eaten by my fierce rat. Poetic justice: priceless.

[Fael]

Okay. I've cleaned out the Sentinal Workshop, defeated the Chitrach Queen, fought my way through the Howling Depths, entered the Lake of Trials and emerged victorious, and defeated Eyebeast Morbo. And I still can't beat the *@^ Slth Horror. Although, at least the battle is lasting a while now.

[Blacknight]

Not as much glory, but an easy way to defeat the horror is to stand on the terrace just below the entrance where you can JUSt see it at the edge of the screen, and smack it with "circle" spells like ice. I used ice, and lots of spell energy restores.

[Fael]

Well, I finally killed it. It only took me till 26th level...

[Lilith]

The Slith Horror is definitely beatable on Torment by the end of chapter 3, although it requires the right party and good tactics. I just did it with a level 13-14 party: one slith polearm fighter, two nephil archer/priests and one nephil archer/mage/priest.

 

Randomiser's tactic of sending one fighter in to attack the Horror in melee and keeping the rest of the party at the very edge of missile range, outside of the range of its lightning attack, is definitely the way to go. The fighter had Bladeshield, so the Horror's melee attacks (and those of the shades it summoned) were no big deal, and a combination of Augmentation and Steel Skin allowed him to survive the lightning attack with a fair amount of HP to spare. Be sure to use the basin in the far southwest corner of Khora-Vyss to restore everyone's magic points after casting Augmentation and Steel Skin on as many people as possible before the fight. (Only your fighter should be getting hit, so only he really needs the defensive buffs, but there's no harm in being careful.)

 

The other critical element of my strategy was simply this: debuff, debuff, debuff. When you think you've debuffed enough, debuff some more. When you think you've debuffed far too much, KEEP DEBUFFING. What you want to do is keep the Horror slowed, weakened and cursed at all times. This isn't easy, since it constantly blesses itself and shakes off Slow in a round or two (or sometimes resists it completely). Your mage should be casting at least one Slow spell on it per round, and whenever anyone's fatigue counter hits 0 you should immediately use Shield Breaker or Leg Sweep (except for your melee fighter, who should be using Bladeshield.) If your archers don't have Leg Sweep yet, that's okay, but if they don't at least have Shield Breaker then this fight is going to be even longer than it has to be.

 

Only send a character in to cure the death curse in a round in which the Horror has already acted. That way, your character will be able to get back out safely in the next round, when the Horror is slowed and can't act. Never leave a character other than your fighter in the Horror's room if it's going to act next round, unless you don't mind losing that character to a lightning attack.

 

The Horror's ability to summon shades was annoying, and I dealt with them using Repel Spirit whenever possible. Don't panic, though: they'll curse you and generally get in your way, but they don't do tremendous amounts of damage. Having my melee fighter death-cursed was another especially inconvenient situation, since it could be hard to get to the basin and back in time to stop the Horror from moving around. If this happens, consider having your squishy characters hide around a corner while your fighter leads the Horror around until it's back where you want it to be.

 

If the Horror charms your fighter, send a priest in immediately to cast Unshackle Mind. If the first casting doesn't work, send a second priest in. It really helps if your priests are faster than your fighter, so that they can get to him before he runs off to attack your party (mine were, since they were Nephilim with a bunch of Dexterity; my fighter, who had been putting most of his skill points into weapon skills for unlocking battle disciplines, only had 3 Quick Action and no Quick Strike). It may also be necessary to send priests into the room occasionally to recast buffs on your fighter: try to avoid this by casting War Blessing and Protection at least 4 or 5 times each before the battle starts, and having your mage cast Haste at least twice on each character.

 

It was a long, slow fight, but once I'd perfected the strategy, no character was in very much danger of death. The only consumable item I ended up using was one energy potion on my mage, although by the time the Horror fell I was close to needing a second one.

[Fael]

That was probably my issue -- I wasn't debuffing enough. I tried slows and curses and stuff a couple times early on, but it seemed like it was still getting two attacks a round and blessing itself, so I eventually concluded my spellcasters would be better off concentrating on damage spells and trying to end the fight as quickly as possible (and use their area effect spells to take out the summons with incidental damage).

 

One thing I wondered later, but never tried, was whether sending in the melee fighter was even a good idea? In all my numerous attempts at this fight, I didn't have very many rounds where I didn't have a melee fighter next to the Horror. But, when I did, it tended to throw spears at my mages. Normally, I hate that, but in the Horror's case, that's about the least irritating thing it can do, since I can heal the mage faster than the spears can damage it. Would that work as a long-term tactic, or would the horror eventually get bored and charge?

[Randomizer]

The slith horror will eventually come out of there and then all your characters can be come vulnerable to its death curse and lightning aura attacks. Keeping it confined means you don't have to waste time moving your own characters as much.

[nonoson]

I know I dealt with the slith horror after obtaining dispel barrier at solbergs tower. How long after I can't remember.But it seems I did it early compared to some struggling members in here.

So I can add to strategies.

 

I don't use a real specialized archer. I have two melee fighters all human, one pole, one sword.

I steel skinned, augmented, and hasted the whole party.

then starting the fight just outside where the horror don't see you, and charging with a fighter that leg sweeps, next fighter going in for braking shield.

now my priest going in close enough to be able to remove charms and centered so everyone will benefit from mass healing. I think smite worked too, but I don't remember now.

my mage getting in, now and trying to slow the horror. As soon as the horror is slowed I'd summon help w wizard, and depending on how great help I'd get, I might even haste the aid.

otherwise I moved back the wiz a bit and used lightning spray for damage, since this also worked well on the shades the horror summons it's great.

Whenever some character was death cursed I'd generally move them to a full basin, in the order of them receiving the curse.

For some reason, my fighters were tough enough to live through the serious damage spell the horror lands on them, if healed in between.

 

I really noticed that the summoned creatures did quite good damage on the horror. And when killed I liked to get them up asap again. If you get a worm, or a fire lizard protect it. they do great damage especially hasted.

another thing was to keep the momentum. keep slowing the horror and keep up pressure, leg sweeping (my fighters didn't have more battle skills than to this level).

 

the first time I did this I missed that one of my fighters had a death curse and after the battle he died. So I had to do it again since I wanted him to receive the reward I got behind the barrier at the priests place.

 

three missed tries, and then I did it again. getting a bad start, my fighter not hitting when leg sweeping / shield breaking, my wiz not succeeding slowing, was a problem..

 

but the reward is awesome when you win this one