7-challenge Grandmaster

So I made a few mistakes this run. The first is that I miscalculated -- I thought Grandmaster Scorechaser needed an almost perfect run with 7 challenges enabled (you only need that for 6, there's plenty of wiggle room with 7 as you can see from my score). The second is that I relied on a well of awareness to verify that I found everything on a floor during my ascent on floor 6 or 7, but I forgot that maybe there's a hidden room with no item (possibly a sacrificial altar room?). Fortunately, these two mistakes cancelled out and I still got the badge :)

I also way underutilized my torches. I saved them for the end game, but I had a bunch left over. This is good information for future Huntress / Mage runs, since they really need to see to do well.

I was lucky enough to get the Anti-Magic enchantment on my armor, but I didn't get a great weapon enchantment. I had "Chilling" for almost the whole game. I found four stones of enchantment (one on my ascent). The first gave me chilling, the second gave me Blooming (which is almost completely useless with Barren Land), the third brought me back to Chilling. I got shocking for the ascent, which is fine.

I found the axe at +3, and my armor was +0. After I dumped my scrolls of upgrade into the armor, I ended up finding a +2 Anti-magic plate armor, but this was in either the Dwarven or Demon halls, and I had already upgraded my armor to +6 or something by the time I got there since I needed it to survive the various battles (I dump my scrolls of upgrade into armor as soon as it would let me equip it, except for the initial upgrade my seal can carry).

For the final battle I had a +1 ring of furor and the Imp's +2 ring of elements. I wore the ring of elements, the ring of wealth, and the unstable spellbook most of the game (after I got elements, it replaced furor). I liked the Spellbook, despite its bad reputation, because it can sometimes give me Magic Mapping / Foresight, or at the very least Teleportation (which tends to teleport you next to something you don't know about, great for revealing hidden doors without spending time searching).

Pretty excited, took a lot of time to finally beat a 7-challenge run. I tried a few other configurations of challenges -- mostly all but "Faith is my armor" and "Forbidden Runes", and I was usually able to either die immediately or get to around DM-300, and I even had a game that I may have won except I got reckless in the DM battle and tried to finish him off while standing in poison gas. Those types of runs need the warrior with healing from food and the horn of plenty, since that becomes your most reliable healing.

I ended up getting like 5 scrolls of Transmutation, which I saved until the end, turned into the "12 random scrolls" thing, and tried to get as many scrolls of magic mapping and teleport as I could to ensure I cleared everything.

I'm not sure what approach I would take for an 8-challenge run. Warlock with all but either "Pharmacophobia" or "Forbidden Runes" might work with the right wands, or I might stick with Warrior and do all but Faith is my Armor. I'm a big fan of super armored warriors, and I bet I could make it through if I got better items (Horn of Plenty, a +anything tier-5 weapon, and a +anything plate armor might be good enough if I get the items at the right time). I've also learned to probably invest a point (or two!) in strongman earlier than I did (this is my first serious game where I used it at all), if it would let me access my end-game armor a few floors earlier. I also sometimes turn a potion of strength into a potion of mastery if needed, since there is such a huge difference between the usual +1 leather armor and a +6ish plate armor, but I do that only if necessary because weapons are good too. :)