Balrog Guides

This article is a rough walkthrough of how to beat the Balrog as quickly as possible, with various methods. These are not failproof, but certainly speed up gameplay. When choosing between them, it is generally best to go with whichever required items are obtained first.

Quickening

Required Items: 2+ Runes of XP, a Portal to Chaos

First, a good rule of thumb if you plan on this method is to return to the Overworld every three floors or so to drop off your strongest weapon and armor at that point, as well as one of each identified rune. This way, you gain rune identities as well as a store of weapons and armor. Once you get to Chaos, you must begin farming for Runes of XP, which you can locate there. Be sure to use a gnoll face when opening chests, as they provide a scavenging bonus.

The best place for the Overworld Portal in this scenario is one floor beneath the Balrog's spawning floor. This way you can die and restart multiple times until you are able to find a Rune of XP, and the Balrog will be nearby. This method truly takes advantage of the portal system and the ability to restart the game.

Once you have at least two Runes of XP, chase the Balrog until he is in a corner. He always moves toward the floor exit, so one way to corner him is to circumnavigate and come around to block his path. His inclination will be to move towards you. Next, eat the two Runes of XP consecutively to guarantee quickening him to death. Having your minion with you provides even more lightning, which is useful.

Death's Scythe

Required Items: A portal to the Underworld, a Nymph's form

Death has in his possession a Level 20 Scythe, by far the strongest melee weapon in the game. It is also enchanted heavily with Undead runes, meaning that it is less effective on Undead than you might like, but that it also heals the Minion with every kill, or revives the Minion if he has died.

The next step, becoming a nymph, is fairly difficult, but there are many ways to do it.

• Get a Mimic face and fight Nymphs to steal their form
• Polymorph yourself, get RNG to polymorph you, or get hit by a chaos rune that polymoprhs you into a Nymph
• Decapitate a Nymph and get its face

Once you have done this, open a portal to the Underworld by praying to RNG. Attack Death as a nymph and you will obtain his Scythe, which gives you a massive advantage over other monsters. You'll still have to get to the appropriate level, but since the Balrog is not an Undead, attacking him with the scythe is a fairly reliable way of killing him. It's still a tad bit unfair, but less so than the Quickening method.

Soccer

Required Items: Many monster heads

Monster's heads can do damage when enemies hit them, and it is no different for the Balrog.

To set this system up, get a bunch of decapitated monster heads on a level where Balrog already exists, but hasn't approached the bottom stairs yet. You'll want to kick the heads so they are all in Balrog's way as he approaches the bottom stairs. Be careful not to crush the heads!

At any rate, once you've set up this obstacle course, you just need to chase the Balrog and he'll run into the heads himself, greatly decreasing his health and potentially even dying just from that. If not, then you can finish him off.

Blessed Knockback/Stun-Lock

Required Items: Lots of Stun Runes and/or a high-level blessed weapon

This is less fleshed-out than the rest, but basically the best way of preventing Balrog from jumping past you is being able to stun and knockback the Balrog. If you have high-level weapons that you cast Holy on to bless them, or just lots of Stun runes on them, they can effectively lock the Balrog in place and prevent him from descending to the next level.

Werewolf

Required Items: Werewolf form (rogue and/or minion), good armor or high level

Werewolf bites can turn enemies into werewolves, so one possible way to defeat the Balrog is by turning him into one. First you or the minion must become a werewolf, either by polymorph, a face drop, or, most easily, sustaining a werewolf bite. The next step will be acquiring excellent armor or XP, so that you can survive while attempting to convert the Balrog into a werewolf.

To finally kill the Balrog, you must be able to survive a reasonably long encounter with him until he turns into a werewolf. If at this point you are not very high-level or do not have good armor, you will need to heal frequently and perhaps run away. If you have good stats and can survive, the Balrog will turn into a werewolf and become much easier to kill. It helps at this point to have both you and the minion in werewolf form, to double the odds of conversion.

The source for this guide comes from an uncontrolled test, in which the minion turned the Balrog into a werewolf. It is unconfirmed, but it was assumed that the fight was made easier. The minion died by the Balrog was finished off with the arabus.