You know those bombardier beetles in DE? Whenever I had a 6 person party they would stun one of them but I would save him with the rest of the guys. Now that I'm soloing, I accidently didn't get far enough to dodge the vapors and got stunned. Now, since it was stun and not hold, I just waited for it to wear off so I could run away. Thus I found out: bombardier beetles have no attacks! their only move is the acidic vapors! Eh, maybe you all knew that. Oh well [img]smile.gif[/img]

I certainly didn't notice that. :D

I had a bunch of trolls tearing up my rear while the beatles stunned my party and sprayed them with acid in the narrow corridor of the NE corner of DE lvl 2. I guess I was too occupied at the time to really pay attention to that.

In the end, this situation made me change the difficulty mode from Insane to Hard very quickly...

SPOILERS....


I'm pretty sure they have attacks in addition to their acid, but since it's stun and not hold, they may not get automatic hits. Instead you just might lose your DEX bonus to your AC. I'm not 100% sure about this, though.

If your soloing, there's a Prot. from Acid scroll you can get as loot from one of the Lizard Shaman in the Lizard King area. The scroll lasts a long time and should keep you from getting stunned. Alternatively, if you're really lucky, you'll get "boots of the fox" as treasure in the Lizard King area. This will make it easy for your C/R to sling bullets and run before getting sprayed with acid. You can then save the scroll for another time.

SPOILERS

P.S.

If you want to be "cheesy", you can simply reload the area from before you enter DE if you don't get the treasure you want (like if you get Robe of Enfusing or a ring your C/R can't use). I've done this to get the Girdle of Beatification in the Orc Cave, Glimglam's Cloak in the Mill, the +2 defender bow from the Temple of the Forgotten God, and Boots of the Fox in level 1 of Dragon's Eye.

My tactic in the latter two areas (TotFG & DE) was to combine a Potion of Invisibility and Oil of Speed upon entering the area, then run to where the treasure was, quick save, then check the treasure. If the treasure was what I wanted, I would reload the quicksave, run back to a safe area, launch my attack. If there was a bad treasure, I would just reload the autosave and do it again. To me this is a very cheesy way to play, and I was just experimenting with some of the random treasures; not playing a full game to its conclusion.

[ 12-05-2004, 01:02 PM: Message edited by: Otto ]

Immunity to Acid will not protect from the BBeetles' stun. It will merely render you immuned to their acidic damage.

Saving Throws is what will protect you from the BBeetles' stun.

Oops, I just took a hit from one of them. It took them a while though, so maybe they have something like 1/4 APR [img]smile.gif[/img]

I didn't even see any rolls that they made, so I don't think they were attacking.

I wish I had known about those boots! Oh well, I'm past that part now.

The beetles are slow, and packed nicely together. Web or Entangle + missile weapons works well. Fireball, too, although a solo C/R has to forgo that guilty pleasure. ;)

From my 2nd ed now out of date yet oh so classic Monstrous Manual: (Hehe, couldn't resist)

Bombardier Beetle

AC: 4
Movement: 9
Hitdice: 2+2
THACO: 19
No.OF ATTACKS: 1 (!!)
Damage/Attack: 2-12
Special: Acid Cloud
Special defense: Fire Cloud
Magic Resistance: Nil (?)
Size (S) (4' long)
Morale: Elite (13)
XP Value: 120

Ecology:
Interestingly, if a bombardier beetle is killed before it has the opportunity to fire off blasts of acid/fire, it is meant to be possible to cut the creature open to retrieve the chemicals. These can be then combined to produce a small explosive or fire projectile with the proper equipment. :D

Now wouldn't that be cool? A nice bit of revenge I say for all of the times I've had to rescue stunned comrades from their pesky little attacks. Give them lots of arrows and rocks to eat before they get close I say! :D

Bombardier beetles get 1 attack per round (at THAC0=19) and cause 2D6 slashing damage.

These stats are from the IWD Strategy Guide:

Morale: 17
Hit Points: 16/16
XP Value: 120-420
Armor Class: 4
THAC0: 19
# of Attacks: 1
Damage: 2d6 slashing
Special: Acid damage, deafness, stun

SAVES
Paralyzation, Poison and Death Magic: 16
Rod, Staff and Wands: 18
Spells: 19
Petrification and Polymorph: 17
Breath Weapons: 20