Mystera Annur

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Mystera Annur
Mystera Annur.png
Initial worship
  • +1 Piety for each glyph cast
Punishment
  • all monsters on this dungeon floor gain 15% to both physical and Trait: Magic resist Magic resist
Prep penalty
  • Slows piety gain by 25%
Likes
  • Cast a glyph: +1 Piety per 2 mana spent
Dislikes
  • Get afflicted with Trait: Mana burned Mana burned :- remaining Mana in Piety
Boons
God boon: Magic Magic Multiple use
Cost: 5 (+20) Piety
Effect: Gain 1 maximum mana
God boon: Refreshment Refreshment Single use
Cost: 50 Piety
Effect: Every time you convert a glyph, 50% of your maximum mana is restored (25% while not actively worshipping Mystera)
God boon: Flames Flames Single use
Cost: 20 Piety
Effect: Your attack bonus decreases by 50%, but the Glyph: BURNDAYRAZ BURNDAYRAZ glyph deals 1 additional damage per level
God boon: Weakening Weakening Multiple use
Cost: 30 (+0) Piety
Effect: -10% magic resistance to player and all monsters on the current dungeon floor
God boon: Mystic Balance Mystic Balance Single use
Cost: 60 Piety
Effect: Mana costs of all spells are increased or decreased towards the value of "5" by 2 points.

Unlocking

Mystera is the goddess of magic and glyphs. Mystera is well-suited to a variety of races and strategies, but has very few repeatable boons. She also has few offerings to help you in the end-game. Mystera is best worshipped during the early exploration phase when there are still plenty of tiles left to reveal to earn piety, and if found late is usually not worth following.

Mystera is unlocked to the north, in a subdungeon protected by the Guardian of Magic. Although it is theoretically possible to kill this guardian, the intended approach is to use magic to get past him. This can be done by any of the following ways:

  • Using Glyph: WEYTWUT WEYTWUT to teleport past him
  • Using Glyph: PISORF PISORF to push him out of the way

Strategy

Mystera rewards you with piety whenever you cast spells, and deducts piety whenever you kill monsters that deal magic damage. Like playing God: Taurog Taurog, only in reverse, so long as you ensure you cast sufficient spells between each kill you will turn a net profit in piety. Unlike Taurog, the amount of piety Mystera offers is proportional to the mana cost of the spell, so it really doesn't matter which spell you are casting.

God boon: Magic Magic is a fairly straightforward boon, but its piety cost increases rapidly and it's seldom worth taking it more than twice. Raising your maximum mana to 15 means each mana potion will restore exactly 6 MP, but beyond that point the piety cost for a mere 1 MP is seldom worth the trade.

One of Mystera's most powerful boons is God boon: Refreshment Refreshment, granting you bonus mana regeneration every time you convert a glyph. If you can raise your maximum MP, this can be a major benefit, but it does mean the timing for converting glyphs becomes more difficult to gauge, and races like Race: Elf Elf or Race: Human Human will have to go without their conversion bonus. Races like Race: Gnome Gnome, Race: Halfling Halfling, and Race: Goblin Goblin have no problems leaving all their converting for the end of the dungeon and they benefit enormously from this boon. Keep in mind God boon: Refreshment Refreshment gets reduced to 25% if you convert to another religion! For obvious reasons, this boon is not very helpful when attempting the Badge: Hoarder Hoarder.

God boon: Mystic Balance Mystic Balance is a double-edged boon that causes expensive glyphs to cost less and inexpensive glyphs to cost more. Class: Wizard Wizards, who already have a discount to their spell costs, get little benefit from God boon: Mystic Balance Mystic Balance. Class: Berserker Berserkers, on the other hand, are largely unaffected by its downsides and benefit enormously from this boon. Ironically, this makes Mystera one of the better deity choices for a Class: Berserker Berserker, essentially cancelling out their spellcasting penalty. For most classes, whether you want to use God boon: Mystic Balance Mystic Balance depends on which glyphs you rely on primarily. Most glyphs already cost 5 MP and are unaffected. The Glyph: BLUDTUPOWA BLUDTUPOWA glyph has no mana cost to begin with and is also unaffected. The Glyph: BURNDAYRAZ BURNDAYRAZ and Glyph: CYDSTEPP CYDSTEPP glyphs are the most notable improvements, which makes this boon very useful to fireball spammers and to Class: Warlord Warlords. The Glyph: WEYTWUT WEYTWUT glyph is also dramatically improved, and becomes easier to use as a finisher. On the other hand, the Glyph: PISORF PISORF glyph becomes impractical for offensive purposes (it's still functional for breaking through walls and moving monsters, however) and the Glyph: GETINDARE GETINDARE glyph becomes less mana efficient (though still worthwhile). The Glyph: BYSSEPS BYSSEPS and Glyph: LEMMISI LEMMISI glyphs are the hardest hit by mystic balance, and are below-average to begin with; they should be consigned for conversion if you select this boon.

God boon: Flames Flames and God boon: Weakening Weakening boons are rarely worth pursuing. God boon: Weakening Weakening costs an enormous amount of piety, and it's only usable if you don't have any resistances of your own. You're usually better off using a Item: Piercing Wand Piercing Wand or God boon: Stone Heart Stone Heart, which have no downsides and reduce resistances with less effort. The massive attack penalty on the God boon: Flames Flames makes it a terrible idea for hybrids and even for most spellcaster builds. You will need to be very dedicated to a pure caster approach or a rat monarch for either of these to be worthwhile. Most characters will skip out on these two.

For most characters, the best approach with Mystera is to worship early, earn lots of piety, purchase a handful of boons that suit your strategy, then convert out. Unless there are still many glyphs left in the dungeon to leverage refreshment, Mystera doesn't give any short-term boons that can help you overcome a powerful boss. You're usually better off converting into another religion to spend your remaining piety in the end-game. Furthermore, in a dungeon with lots of magic-user monsters you can be facing massive piety penalties for clearing out the weaker monsters. Converting before doing so is highly advisable.

The alternative approach is an extreme spellcaster strategy, fuelled by Glyph: BLUDTUPOWA BLUDTUPOWA. Mystera does not reward Glyph: BLUDTUPOWA BLUDTUPOWA use directly, but as you will be using it to generate mana, which you will then spend on glyphs, the overall piety gain is much higher than for other builds, allowing you to take the more expensive boons, such as God boon: Mystic Balance Mystic Balance, earlier than would normally be possible and potentially use Mystera to fuel a pact. Depleting your life with Glyph: BLUDTUPOWA BLUDTUPOWA also means you won't be attacking much and have no use for resistances, but can cast a very large number of fireballs, which makes the trade-offs offered by God boon: Flames Flames and God boon: Weakening Weakening much more attractive than they would be for more balanced characters.