Transmuter Gods?

[Batty Caufield]

Hola! I'm not going to pretend that i'm anything but a complete crawl noob, but hopefully you guys will be able to educate and/or show pity on me.

I've got a 9th level purple draconian transmuter who just found the ecumenical temple on D:7. I don't play transmuters that often, and have them survive this long even less - i was hoping to keep the little guy alive for as long as i can. So i figure having the right god to have my back when the going gets rough is going to be important, but there's no less than fifteen gods down here - i don't know who to pick.

I've got them clustered into groups by how tempting they seem to me at the time. I could, of course, be wrong on any of these choices.
-Most likely to take: Makhleb, Nemelex, Okawaru, TSO, Yredelemnul
-Might possibly take: Ashenzari,Elyvion, Kikubaaqudgha, Sif Muna, Vehumet
-Least likely to take: Cheibriados, Fedhas Madash, Trog, Xom, Zin.

I'm not sure what other information would be helpful here (and i've heard talk about dumping files or something like that, but i don't know how to do it), but i'll try and give a run-down of what might be important: i've got every spell in the book of changes except for spider form memorized, 20 arrows and 2 spears lying around for sticks to snakes, rings of +5 evasion and see invisible, three wands (paralysis, polymorph and fire), and one teleport scroll.

In case i end up playing more transmuters, i'd like to know what gods in general are good or poor for them. and hopefully, you guys will be able to throw me a bone over this particular situation, too.

[crate]

fedhas is the best tm god imo, helps you get past the part of the game where you suck

[basil]

Oka and Fedhas are a couple of the better/best Tm gods: Oka so you can punch much better starting at *, and Fedhas because wandering mushrooms make everything a piece of cake until, at the very least, after Orc, and Tm get huge damage if they can just survive for long enough.

[Batty Caufield]

Wouldn't fedhas have food problems? i always assumed fedhas needed fruit to get the best effect on his defensive abilities, and i don't have any fruit on me. or is the whole point of his kit just using decomposition to get mushrooms, then turning them into wandering mushrooms for spammable allies? or is it something else? I've honestly never used fedhas before, so i don't understand quite what he's supposed to do.

Oka's heroism and finesse looked tempting to me, but the item gifts will almost certainly go to waste, which is a shame. still, the abilities aren't negligible, which is why i felt like picking him wasn't a bad idea.

Still undecided and willing to listen to ideas, could still be convinced that fed/oka is the way to go; just a bit unsure that this point, since i know that whoever i pick now i probably won't be able to drop for quite some time.

[crate]

Here is a pretty complete list of the monsters you may encounter before the end of lair that wandering mushrooms will not kill: oklob plants (good thing these aren't hostile), statues of various sorts, rupert with an axe (will kill all other ruperts just fine), centaurs if they are too far away from where you notice them
8-headed hydra is maybe questionable too, but hydra with fewer heads are no problem

I may have forgotten a few things but not very many.

[duvessa]

Oka's heroism and finesse looked tempting to me, but the item gifts will almost certainly go to waste, which is a shame.

okawaru gifts go to waste on every character, not just transmuters

[Batty Caufield]

I think i might be sold on fedhas, since summons have been/are/will probably continue to be useful. Does he require switching out after a certain point in time, though? and if he does, is his wrath manageable - and who do you switch him out for?

thanks for the advice, guys. i really appreciate it.

[dck]

Abandoning a god always lowers your chances of winning except if that god was chei. Regardless, Fedhas is a ridiculously strong god at all points so no you shouldn't leave him.

[Batty Caufield]

Abandoning a god always lowers your chances of winning except if that god was chei. Regardless, Fedhas is a ridiculously strong god at all points so no you shouldn't leave him.

xom finds this hilarious!

but no, seriously, thanks for the help. i'll start going green and never look back. here's to hoping this works out!

Edit1: just found out you can pray to weaken/kill zombies. that's rather a hardcore thing for nature to do, but i'm not objecting one bit. :p

[RBrandon]

  Code:

crate converted Batty Caufield to the worship of Fedhas Madash.
That felt like a moral victory.

[dck]

wait until you see the grenades

[diviton]

Oka's heroism and finesse looked tempting to me, but the item gifts will almost certainly go to waste, which is a shame.

okawaru gifts go to waste on every character, not just transmuters

My GhHu really appreciated the early game crossbow bolts and my MiFi really appreciated the CPA.

[and into]

My GhHu really appreciated the early game crossbow bolts and my MiFi really appreciated the CPA.

That's Okawaru's grift. He hooks you with a CPA in one game, then unloads a bunch of torn up -1 hats that somehow give you less AC then wearing nothing on your head (such is the mysterious tao of Okawaru).

The ammo gifts do tend to be reliably useful if you are doing ranged combat, though, yes.

[Amnesiac]

It's possible that oka will give something good, but it's not something to rely on(unless ranged combat,yes).

The main benefit of worshiping Oka is getting +5 to your UC, neglected in favour of transmutation first and finesse which makes your terrifying UC twice more terrifying.

[and into]

I'd say bottom line is Fedhas strongest (agree with crate), but Okawaru and Makhleb are also very strong, and all three of those are fairly straightforward and low hassle to use. Plenty of others are good, of course; Ely and Nemelex are always potentially extremely strong but they don't pair really well with transmuters and are finicky. You missed Jiyva who is fun but it generally isn't a good idea to fuss about with wrath, nor to delay getting a god until late Lair.

[Amnesiac]

When someone asks me what god is good for foo, I think of gods that boost their abilities and not just strong by themselves gods like fed or mak(or trog, but not in this case) otherwise it's an answer to a question "what god is strong" and "for foo" is ignored. So Oka comes to mind first. Then of course you can benefit from fed and mak as with any other character.

[Sar]

When someone asks me what god is good for foo I try to think of a god that is good for foo.

[Sandman25]

When someone asks me what god is good for foo, I think of gods that boost their abilities and not just strong by themselves gods like fed or mak(or trog, but not in this case) otherwise it's an answer to a question "what god is strong" and "for foo" is ignored. So Oka comes to mind first. Then of course you can benefit from fed and mak as with any other character.

Yes, I agree. Playing every evil species with Nemelex and every non-evil species with Ely is boring even if it is optimal for winning. The same with Trog, it's easily possible to win most species with him.

[crate]

good thing Fedhas is particularly good for tm then! (which he is)

[damiac]

uh, if it's ok with the OP I'd like to piggyback onto this thread, and add some questions of my own.

As a DrTm, how should I be skilling, assuming I will go Oka? I've splatted 8 DrTms in a row, and only 3 of them even got to lair. One managed to get blade hands castable, but with 0 spellcasting the food cost was outrageous.

I haven't gotten ice form castable at all, and have made very minimal use of spider form, so I assume my main problem is raising skills in the right order.

My most successful character trained Unarmed and Transmutations at 50/50 until both were around 8 or so, then added dodging into the mix.

If there are any relevant guides, feel free to post a link to them, I'm not afraid of some reading.

[Sandman25]

http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Elynae%27s_ ... uter_guide

[basil]

Yes, I agree. Playing every evil species with Nemelex and every non-evil species with Ely is boring even if it is optimal for winning. The same with Trog, it's easily possible to win most species with him.

At the very least for not-book, not-zealot Ds, Fedhas is better than Nemelex

[Sandman25]

Yes, I agree. Playing every evil species with Nemelex and every non-evil species with Ely is boring even if it is optimal for winning. The same with Trog, it's easily possible to win most species with him.

At the very least for not-book, not-zealot Ds, Fedhas is better than Nemelex

Yes, I agree. Personally I don't find Nemelex all that great for new players (and those who forgot to use cards like me) but I can be wrong here.

[Magipi]

http://crawl.chaosforge.org/Elynae%27s_Sludge_Elf/Merfolk_Transmuter_guide

This is a good guide by a very good player. And it is not by chance the author recommends merfolk. Merfolk are amazing transmuters, great aptitudes everywhere, which is critical in the early stages where Tms are weak and their xp budget is extra tight.

[and into]

I haven't gotten ice form castable at all, and have made very minimal use of spider form,

That's probably the problem right there, spider form is the staple early game spell for transmuters and it remains useful for quite a while.

Elynae's guide, which Sandman25 posted, is really good, though it is incorrect on one specific point (possibly due to more recent changes with starting skill levels): You should memorize sticks to snakes at level 2 on any transmuter species with -1 or better spell casting aptitudes (so that includes draconians). Those species will naturally have *just* enough spell levels to have beastly appendage at start, memorize sticks to snakes at level 2, and still memorize spider form at level 3.

For skill training specifically: Train UC and only UC until you hit level three, at which point memorize spider form and immediately work on getting that reliable. When you are comfortable with your spell failure on spider form (~15% is usually fine but YMMV), switch back to UC until around 11. Then train dodging. If you do go for Okawaru, then when you get Heroism, put like 1 quick level in Invocations I suppose, then go back to what you were training before.

EDIT: Also Draconians make really good transmuters so if you like them, stick with that. Really I think the frustrations you were coming up against damiac weren't related to skill training so much as not fully taking advantage of spider form, but I gave you my preferred training regiment just to take your mind off of it so you can focus on using spider form to not die, which is actually the key to getting transmuters to Lair consistently.

[Magipi]

I've splatted 8 DrTms in a row, and only 3 of them even got to lair. One managed to get blade hands castable, but with 0 spellcasting the food cost was outrageous.

With 0 spc, the food cost for a level 5 spell is 350, and 1 chunk gives you 1000 nutrition. I guess you should get more than 1 chunk out of 3 big fights in the Lair

Also, I think you should not rush to blade hands. Pre-lair, spider form is the king, and in early Lair, ice form is very good (slows all frogs and snakes, gives rPois). And you have time to train up BH for late Lair (death yaks and the like).

[Batty Caufield]

Update: i won't post a YASD because it's an uninteresting death, but i got zapped by a couple of electric eels, tried to run away, got blocked by a swarm of killer bees. That being said, it's been a while since i've managed to get fairly tough summons on my side, and i'd forgotten how useful they were. I'll keep playing DrTs, make sure to grab spider form as soon as i can, and put more stock in Fed across all of my characters.

@Damiac: i'm not only fine that you piggybacked onto this thread, i'm grateful for it. the guides posted and advice dispensed have given me a better idea of how to play transmuters, though i think i'm going to continue to play draconians for a while and see if i can't get things to work out. being squishy makes me nervous, but i'm appreciating the raw power of blade hands, and draconians having a natural AC bonus puts me more at ease.

@ and into: i was only listing gods i saw in ecu - jiyva also looked like a tempting option, because transmuters looked like they could take full advantages of his (rather useful-looking) transmutations. again, though, i've never had a character worshipping jiyva, so i don't know what that feels like.

@everyone in general: i'm definitely sold on nemelex, don't get me wrong - but could someone explain to me the strengths of elyvion? i feel like i don't fully understand her.

[Viashino_wizard]

@Damiac: i'm not only fine that you piggybacked onto this thread, i'm grateful for it. the guides posted and advice dispensed have given me a better idea of how to play transmuters, though i think i'm going to continue to play draconians for a while and see if i can't get things to work out. being squishy makes me nervous, but i'm appreciating the raw power of blade hands, and draconians having a natural AC bonus puts me more at ease.

Draconians are pretty much the go-to race when you want to play a caster without being (too) squishy. While they don't have any amazing magic aptitudes until level 7, the fact they get more AC than most characters in light armor while having 0 encumbrance is incredibly useful. It also helps they have that +10% HP. For Transmuters specifically, that free tankiness is especially important since you're melee, and the auxiliary tail slap really helps out early on when your UC is still crappy. Later on, of course, they have special synergy with Dragon Form.

@everyone in general: i'm definitely sold on nemelex, don't get me wrong - but could someone explain to me the strengths of elyvion? i feel like i don't fully understand her.

Ely gives two extremely powerful things:

1. A non-finite source of burst healing, which is extremely rare

2. The ability to neutralize almost any threat you're not able to deal with via Pacify

That being said, I personally find her playstyle really boring, but that's just a matter of personal taste.

[damiac]

Awesome, thanks for the advice. Yeah, it sounds like my main problem is not using enough spider form, and rushing too hard for blade hands. TM is a very XP starved background early on, and my early skilling practices are... sub optimal...

I notice the guide says to just pump int. But of course, it also talks about sludge elves, so I assume that part of the advice is obsolete. The current advice is to pretty much exclusively pump dex on transmuters, right?

But it does make me wonder, should I be building my transmuter as a mainly melee fighter, or should I be planning to use some conjurations? It doesn't really seem like there's enough XP in the early game to do any extra branching into other skills.

[Batty Caufield]

I'm not sure if i've got anywhere near as much experience as you do, damiac, but i've generally pumped int on both primary spellcasters and hybrid classes. the sooner you can get spells up reliably, the sooner you can switch over from spell skills to UMC, fighting and the various defensive skills that will keep you alive longer. and on the off-chance that you're able to dabble into other spell schools, you'll be better suited to do so.

granted, dex offers things that are strictly useful for transmuters, but the benefits besides increased spell success chance look pretty good to me, too: better spell power (handy for sticks to snakes summons early on) and reduced spell hunger (makes blade hands more spammable) both seem solid. This might just be because DrTs don't seem to have amazing intelligence early-game, though.

If you're worried about not having enough XP to invest in more than a single spell school, then i guess pumping dex and training exclusively combat skills after getting blade hands at a comfortable level might be your best bet. I've assumed that if i can survive the lair, throwing XP into a secondary spell school won't be too much of a detriment to my fighting skill, and the other school (summons, conjurations, translocations) might just save my bacon.

I'll defer to the people that have played more often, though.