Q:

Avoiding crash in risk of rain to get the miner character

I'd like to get the miner class in risk of rain, but whenever I go into that area of the magma barracks, it crashes the instant I hit the direseeker/lemurian down there. ( in linux)
Are there any workarounds to this? 

A:

You can edit your save file to give yourself access to the Miner: https://riskofrain.wikia.com/wiki/Save_values
While the community tends to look down on save editing for the sake of cheating, I don't think anyone would fault you for having completed the requirements to unlock a character multiple times but having the game crash on you each time. 
(Unfortunately, Risk of Rain is a very buggy game.  It was the dev's first commercial game, and while they did a lot of things right, one of the things they struggled with was getting all of the bugs out.)