Gozag

[Lasty]

I played Gozag for the first time last night as a HuSu. I started worship in the Temple with about 350 gold, but had to pay about 250 to join. It took most of 2 floors to get back up to 350. I had been wearing an amulet of gourmand, so I started out at Engorged. My summoning spells mostly still had hunger costs, so by about D8 or so I was down to Hungry, and used some permafood and a potion petition (just to see how it worked). I eventually got into trouble due to some sloppy play and ended up at low health next to a worker ant. I tried potion petition, found only resistance and flight affordable, and died.

Overall, I felt like Gozag did nothing for me over the course of the game. Potion petition was a bust, and I never had anywhere near enough money to use the other abilities. The gold-distraction ability didn't come up much as far as I can tell, though it seems like it would encourage you to lure all the monsters on the level back to the same area to kill and leave autopickup off to avoid accidentally removing any piles of gold.

So, I'm a little discouraged by Gozag -- it seems like it's best for people who want to lure or who already have a solid early game and want an easier late game.

Has anyone had some better experiences with Gozag they can relate that might encourage me to try Gozag again?

[Wahaha]

Yes I don't think Gozag is very useful in the early game. Potion petition is affordable once or maybe twice, and you really want to avoid using it because the cost matters, unlike other god's abilities. It's a good ability but other gods can do much more. Personally, if a god doesn't do much in the early game I almost never pick them. So I hope Gozag gets more changes.

When a monster is killed it drops a fresh pile of gold. A fresh pile of gold applies the distraction ability for a certain amount of turns. After a certain amount of turns it stops having an effect. There is no luring.

[XuaXua]

For me, I picked Gozag with a HuKo, super-early, not realizing he took away chunks.

So that sucked. Then I realized it was good to get him early because then I could place more merchants...
... so if you want chunks, you take him late, but have fewer places to use merchants (fewer unexplored branches), or you take him early and eat all your permafood.

I can't think of too many non-artefact things I'd want to duplicate (any manual, a scroll of acquirement, high + Slaying ring, potion of XP, wand of hasting / healing), and there'd never be a need to duplicate armour (unless it was plain and you had no rCorr for a Slime run) or a weapon (unless a trove asked for it) or a book (unless you couldn't find amnesia scrolls).

From what I'm reading, a mercenary from a branch bribe should be treated like the mercenary card : branch bribe was the payment up-front and that's it; no more payments.

[Sar]

If you run out of branches you just place shop on the square you stand on.

[Sar]

A fair number of the posts ITT could go in GDD, I guess. /backseat moderation

[and into]

^ Yeah I was thinking that too, in fact. I'll move them, thanks Sar.

This thread is for advice relating to Goz, this other thread can be used for general Goz design discussion:
https://crawl.develz.org/tavern/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12313

So let it be written, so let it be done.

[Eyesburn]

So let it be written, so let it be done.

Creeping Death \m/

[Hirsch I]

gozag's potion petition works for mummies. that, combined with no food clock and no piety decay makes him The Mummy God.
I'm having lots of fun so far.

[tedric]

^ I hadn't hit on that synergy yet. When my current Qazlal game is over, MuXx will be the first combo I roll.