By far my best character ever died because of such an unexpensive and easy-to-get item: Scroll of Detect Material.

I had some ridiculously over-enchanted gear, my weapons being two Flaming Adamant Swords +15, and all my armor GEF or Valpurium, enchants varying from +6 to +12. I had a bit less than 400 HP, and about all my stats were over 20. Oh, and he took on Danny in melee and survived victor.

After Ivan shamelessly stole my Elpuri kill, I proceeded past the portal. Everything went just fine until I reached the mage level, and was unable to skip it for I couldn't detect the damn staircase. I even got to the mages room, but I couldn't dispatch them in time.

what i hate the most is dying by starvation... it's just so frustrating when you're doing really good and then cant find any food, happened last time while i was in UT 5 in LIVAN, I went to get spider silk armor and ofcourse I have two poison resistance rings... the only problem with that is that you miss out on what´'s going on, I was poisoned, but i didn't loose any hp so i just kept on going forward and then.. *splat* dead. full hp, but empty stomach. Suxxors.

Did you happen to have silva? Because I found out that if she likes you, she'll do the whole earthquake thing *and* fill your stomach.

I haven't died from starvation in a long time. There's almost always food available. It might be something unpleasant, such as kobold flesh or mutant ass (if you don't have polycontrol), but it's better than the other option. You can also drink from fountains, if you're lucky they'll give you a lot of water which will help you for a short time

Yeah, but i didn't notice that I was hungry because of the frustration of the webs I was stuck in so I just hardcore held down the go button ^^

My farthest character ever, on GC 7 (Yes, I'm aware of how sad that is), just died. I had phoenix feather everything, aside from my cloak which was angel hair, Helm of Brilliance +6, Belt of Levitation, dual adamantine daggers +5, 3 angels of Mellis following me, and an amulet of life saving. I was doing great, slowly getting to the staircase, when I guess one of my angels got turned invisible right before I fired a wand of striking at the frog. D'oh. She started kicking my ass, until I was teleported away. I drank some healing liquid, found 2 of my other angels, who killed the invisible one, and they suddenly teleported away. Then, in 2 turns, an invisible mistress came up, whipped my groin to death, I came back, then whipped my head off.
:{

If she likes You, she will always summon an earthquake, but will only fill Your stomach if You're very hungry/starving. So sometimes (like for example before leaving UT or GC to get downtown) it could be beneficial to actually wait unil the 'very hungry' status.

Zombie level just got a pretty promising character of mine.
Got lepropsy and my limbs started dropping rapidly.
Before I could reach my chest, a mistress came and whipped my head of while I was defenseless.

I know it well, a promising character of mine got like exactly the same at GC10 >.<

Hah.

Evil genie at UT 1.
Wand of Striking destroyed his arm and he lost hold of his arcanite two handed scimitar.
"Victory is mine!" I thought when I picked it up and started hacking away.

But then he bit me.
In the groin.
Critically.

xD Never underestimate the art of biting!

It is also rumored that groinbiting is the reason why Dwarves are such fearsome opponents.

This pretty much sums up IVAN

That's why you never try to humiliate your opponent with a forced blowjob.

I have a new story to share, and my longest near-death so far. So i was this berserkerguy, having 12 and 13 strength from the start, steel battleaxe in each hand, and happily slashing my way through the levels, praying to cruentus and cleptia once in a while.

So I was fighting this zombie, when my left arm falls off. How could I have missed that i have lepra? Anyway, I killed him with the other axe, and started making my way to town. However, before I get far, my other arm drops to the ground. Knowing I'm screwed if I can only kick from here to New Attnam, I drink the bottle of trollblood Cruentus gave me. With two new arms, I travel on.

And that's when I found the hedgehog. In one round of fighting, my left leg lepra'd and my right was critically bitten of. So I slashed the motherfucker to pieces, and decided to sit and wait till praytime.

Guess what? Before long, my arm lets go of my body once more. However, I make it to praytime with one arm left, and Cleptia hastes me while Cruentus blesses me, with a +1 on my battleaxe... Where is the troll blood?

Well, only option left is to crawl back. So that's what I do. Only there's this huge rat at the entrance, and I keep missing him, until my other arm detaches itself.

So I start reading the only thing left in my backpack: a scroll of teleportation. Sure enough, I get out of there before the rat kills me. But I am in a room, without limbs, without food, and with 2 hours to go before praying. So, I roll off to find some food. And get stuck in a spiderweb.

Falling unconscious every now and then, choking in the web, the two hours pass quickly - though I'm starving and barely conscious by the time I pray. Hurray! A bottle of troll blood! I drink it, and get a new arm and a leg.

Two steps further, another web. I loose my leg. A spider. It bites me, and with my last efforts (and only limb) I smash it against the oposing wall, before the poison finally kills me...

Haha, damn. That's intense.

Shit... this one was pretty bad.
I had a TON of amazing stuff (Mjolak, levitation belt, ESP amulet, infra ring, understanding helmet, stocking up on carrots for high perception, permanent telecontrol), but polymorphed into a puppy. Was stressed and wandering around the world map waiting for the poly to end... didn't notice I was hungry until I was starving, and died. What a waste. All my inventory's lost, no chance of a Bones file either

Maybe not most horrible but somehow I remember this death from long time ago.
Use wand of lighting, bolt comes back to me. Thats didn't hurt me yet.
But i have 2 bottles of Vodka with me.

Killed by explosion of vodka in...

Haha. Subtle. I like it.

im kinda a newb at IVAN... but killed genatrix plant thingy with 2 whips got above ground and then starved

This is a common beginner mistake. Make sure you aren't already hungry when you leave the tunnels, and use (L)ook once you are aboveground to find the city first. That way, you don't waste your energy walking in circles.

ok i got a better one, stepped on a mine whilst i had a bag of gunpowder in GC1 (the ironic thing is i found a strongbox in one of the UT's but SOLD IT!!! )

would it be possible to die from an exploding health potion?

Only alcohol explodes.