I always keep floating eye corpses in the same level which I try to avoid so they don't rot, slowed if possible for the same purpouse... Then eat them all at once and gain perma esp. You need no more than 3 if you eat them one after the other, and eventually you will find 3 floating eyes in your game, so if you do this you won't need an amulet of esp later on. Perma telecontrol is much easier because the blink dogs can call another of its kin (or something like that) so you have to wait until there are three to kill them all
About the AoLS, I don't got beheaded that much, in fact it is rare for me. The only drawback of the AoLS (besides not working when beheaded) is that it raises the danger level pretty much so you may find Sherarax too soon... (when it's not to soon to find her?
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About whips making you chaotic I think I read that a long time ago. I did notice in a recent game that using the banana peels got me more chaotic but can't tell for sure.