Trunk Updates 15 May 2020 and tentative 0.25 release tournament info

The trunk updates explode into fragments!

Hello crawlers and welcome to the last featureful trunk update of the 0.25 cycle. We’re entering into feature freeze today, the remaining time before the 0.25 Release and Tournament will be devoted to bug fixes, balance tweaks, and polish—as well as implementing a new tournament scoring system. You can give your feedback on the proposed new system on the tavern. Tentatively the 0.25 Tournament will start on either May 29 or June 5, depending on the implementation of the new scoring system.

So as you oil up those tab keys and clean your monitors, lets look at the very latest round of changes you’ll face in the upcoming release (stay tuned for the full 0.25 changelog! edit: since this post is getting shared and continues to be confusing to people reading it out of context; this list is not a 0.25 changelog, but rather a trunk update covering just the last few weeks or so):

• Abyss exits that spawn from earning xp can spawn after the initial spawn, instead of every subsequent spawn being a downstair.
• A few Nemelex cards have changed:
• The Pain card no longer summons flayed ghosts, instead it torments monsters at high power (not the card user, though)
• The cloud card now places vision obscuring black smoke instead of damaging clouds
• Tins of Tremorstones are now an XP charged evocable with 3 charges that scales with evocations and automatically targets the center of all visible monsters. Wands of Scattershot have been removed.
• Several amulet, scarf, and cloak egos have been shuffled or adjusted:
• Gourmand, Harm, and Rage amulets are no more.
• Amulets of reflection now attune at full HP and give +5 SH. Additionally, piety is now properly given for reflected missiles, banishment, and poison damage.
• Scarves of cloud immunity and spirit shield are removed; new scarf egos harm and invisibility are added.
• Invisibility cloaks are no more (you need a scarf for that now!); cloaks can now grant stealth or preservation (corrosion resistance).
• Jewelry with plusses now get constant plus values: strength, intelligence, and dexterity rings give either +6 or -4; protection, evasion, and slaying rings give either +4 or -4.
• Summon Lightning Spire now places the spire on a random square.
• Malign Gateway tentacles can no longer attack out of LOS and appear sooner after casting.
• Scrolls of acquirement are now cancelable, allowing you to fully inspect your character, stash, etc. before making a decision. When you reread the scroll, you’ll get the same choices until you make a final selection.
• Leech is now a (cosmetic) sloppy eater: large hits will sometimes turn monsters into large blood explosions!
• Sceptre of Torment can now be used with spectral weapon. You’d just better be undead unless you want your spectral weapon to torment you!
• An ASCII screenshots section has been added to morgues, and a screenshot is made there every time you take a note with the : key.
• Target acquisition for the Foxfire and Conjure Ball Lightning spells has been improved so they only acquire targets within player LOS.
• Formicids can no longer cast the spell Swiftness.
• The option auto_butcher defaults to true and the option auto_butcher_max_chunks now defaults to 10.
• The option explore_auto_rest now defaults to true.
• Several usability improvements for visually impaired players have been implemented.