Jivya!

[GrumpD]

Found a Jivya altar on D:5, and I've never had the chance to use this god. I'm noticing that jellies run around on the floor eating everything and that gets me piety. OK, cool. will they eat stuff that I haven't seen yet?

[rockygargoyle]

Yes, when they do you'll hear a distant slurping noise.

[GrumpD]

Oh boy, that's uh, yeah, OK then. I didn't need stuff anyways, probably.

[rockygargoyle]

Remember to use Slimify on anything dangerous, since it's very strong and Jyiva's piety is very cheap.

[Rast]

But then he won't get as mutation gifts as often!

[tasonir]

Oh boy, that's uh, yeah, OK then. I didn't need stuff anyways, probably.

Sounds like you're being sarcastic here, but this is actually true - you really don't need most of the stuff on the floor. Also, jellies never eat artefacts, so you're safe there. You get slightly less consumables, but you have an incredibly powerful god, so it works out pretty well. If jivya was a temple god I'd take it fairly often.

[GrumpD]

I splatted the character in early Lair, but it was a fun time. My only issue with the eating stuff from the floor was losing needles.

[ajon]

Are there any races or backgrounds for Jivya that are better than others?

[rockygargoyle]

Usually races that can't use a lot of stuff are better with Jiyva: felids, octopodes, trolls, draconians, etc because they care less about getting body-slot mutations (For exemple, if a Troll gets hooves they are unaffected by the loss of boots, since they can't use boots anyway) and they won't miss the items they can't use anyway.

They say that the best backgroud for Jiyva is Transmuter, since jiyva shuffles your stats and a Transmuters usually need all stats equally.

[n1000]

Characters who have gotten pretty far are good Jiyva candidates. I prefer to pick up Jiyva pretty late and especially on guys who don't feel good about V:5.

btw, I don't agree that Tm doesn't favor a particular stat. Dex is the best--don't need much spellpower and dodging > heavy armor when you have to cast spells and use UC.

[tabstorm]

Are there any races or backgrounds for Jivya that are better than others?

Elementalists in the late mid-game once you've become a meleer. You can turn some of that useless starting Int into Str for heavier armor.