God Tier List/showcase of amazing MSPaint skills

[tasonir]

I understand Ash as a great early god when you really need skills and he helps avoid dangerous trouble.
Why is he also among the best PANHELLTOMB gods?
What does he do for you there, if you don't need major reskilling?
Finding portals with Ash in Pan is unreliable and not that necessary, it's just convenience.

For those missing out on the backstory and replying seriously to this, in pollen_golem's last game, he converted from nemelex to ash for extended and played a spelless uncursed ash for the rest of the runes. And then apparently converted to xom for the ascension. I personally think pollen_golem is most likely an experienced player doing some performance art / trolling, rather than the initial front he presented (extremely earnest and somewhat nutty person who'd exhaustively read about crawl before playing any at all).

Plus what the hell is up with ascending with only a bear skin cap on? You're a ghoul man, no one wants to look at that body naked...Play a sexy elf or something. If your theory is right, that's one hell of a long con to set up

[Sandman25]

  Code:

You could see Qojumatao, a lich, an Executioner, 2 wasps, a worm, a scorpion and
a worker ant.

I feel sad that they didn't kill the character.

[Arrhythmia]

Wtf

PollenGolem: I just don't feel ready for Zot:5 yet

*proceeds to do a 15 runer and 20 levels of a zig without spells*

[mps]

For those missing out on the backstory and replying seriously to this, in pollen_golem's last game, he converted from nemelex to ash for extended and played a spelless uncursed ash for the rest of the runes. And then apparently converted to xom for the ascension. I personally think pollen_golem is most likely an experienced player doing some performance art / trolling, rather than the initial front he presented (extremely earnest and somewhat nutty person who'd exhaustively read about crawl before playing any at all).

I doubt it. I read a lot of wiki myself before ever playing regularly (out of cultural interest, mostly, but also to orient myself -- not realizing the downside of orienting oneself via the wiki). I suspect the number of people who begin their crawl experience reading all kinds of docs and shit would surprise people. His char was pretty diesel before switching to ash anyway, it didn't really matter what he did at that point. Heavy armor build Ghoul is a winner.

[byrel]

I ascended nethack 4 -5 times before trying crawl. You BET my first stop was spoiler-central! (AKA, the wiki)

I still think that some of the direction given there (for instance, the SpEn guide. Or the 4-5 recommended characters) helped me channel my initial characters into useful explorations of crawl. On the other hand, the advice that helped me WIN crawl came largely from the forum. I remember particularly 'Never move towards a monster' from crate, and 'The worst-case scenario for quaff-IDing potions is wasting a potion of haste.' from minmay (now duvessa). Fortunately that was after I'd upgraded duvessa from 'a-hole' to 'a-hole who's actually good'.

[DrKe]

How do you reconcile Cheibriados being the most successful species high score speed run god (ie, 15 rune extended games) with placing chei in the D tier for extended? I can't for the life of me find the thread where I tallied the gods of species high score runs, but if anyone else can, let me know. But Chei has 10 species high score games, and was taken early and used for the entire games.

I guess I see extended as optional, so even though I run it often, it's always contingent on me having the proper extended setup; this usually revolves around healing.

Of course, in the end, the most insightful post in this thread is Kroki's: good troll thread i enjoy

Speedrun play and the situations where you run Chei in extended have something in common, you need to have the proper setup. IME any character can run extended - I've completed a sub 40k run where I had about 2 potions of HW and haste to do the entire thing, no wands or spells, and that was a speedrun. A normal run can be done with any character with patience, but Chei is likely not going to be the god you want when things aren't ideal. I would not have wanted to be Chei on that character. I didn't have the ideal case in mind when I wrote the list because that would have made it really hard to do - just many different shades of "very easy"

With that said, Chei is powerful and gives the potential for things to go very smoothly as long as you don't die. The game can feel easy. I would define this version of Chei where you don't die as "Subjective Chei" (SC). Here's a version using this god:

[Pollen_Golem]

So Chei is only as good as Ash in PANHELLTOMB?!

[Rast]

I ascended nethack 4 -5 times before trying crawl. You BET my first stop was spoiler-central! (AKA, the wiki)

How many MuWz did you play?

[byrel]

Oh, a half dozen. That build looks shiny!

[tasonir]

DrKE: You've solved the age old dilemma of where to rank Chei by placing Chei at both the top and bottom! Brilliant! By the way, this is not sarcasm

How would you feel about this wording for subjective Chei - Subjective chei is where you build your character around your god (chei), rather than picking your god based on your character?

This may not capture everything, but I do think it's another aspect of the chei fanatics like myself. I mentally picked Chei before the character creation screen, and then I have to pick a race/background that's compatible. Chei is less likely to be suited for randomly generated characters?

[mps]

overrates ash and vehumet, underrates kiku in extended and to a lesser extent lugonu and oka in mid to late 3 rune, imo.

[DrKe]

DrKE: You've solved the age old dilemma of where to rank Chei by placing Chei at both the top and bottom! Brilliant! By the way, this is not sarcasm

How would you feel about this wording for subjective Chei - Subjective chei is where you build your character around your god (chei), rather than picking your god based on your character?

This may not capture everything, but I do think it's another aspect of the chei fanatics like myself. I mentally picked Chei before the character creation screen, and then I have to pick a race/background that's compatible. Chei is less likely to be suited for randomly generated characters?

Chei makes a weak character feel strong and a strong character feel very strong as long as you don't die, so i just defined SC as choosing Chei in a game where you weren't going to die (for whatever reason). I find he can streamline a winning game more than most gods can. (Ash is also good at this)

overrates ash and vehumet, underrates kiku in extended and to a lesser extent lugonu and oka in mid to late 3 rune, imo.

I might agree about veh and possibly lucy but it would just be a 1-tier shift in either direction. Fairly confident about the other ones you mentioned.

[linear]

I seem to like Gozag more than many people on the forum, so I'll weigh in on his ranking. I haven't played 0.17. The only big change in the commits I see affecting early and mid game is nulling amulet of faith for Gozag, which is a definite nerf. Gold from corpseless enemies is a definite buff in extended and somewhat in late game.

Without the amulet, you only make ~$1000 to call one shop around the time you hit Lair. You also have more money to buy items in found shops. Alternatively you can use potion petition 3 times - but he might not offer what you need in dire situations. Gozag also takes away a major resource (corpses), which really binds corpse-dependent species and spell-heavy builds - especially if they don't find a food shop.

Early and late game are straightforward with a sensible build. Yeah, you run into the occasional unwinnable situation in the first handful of levels. Big deal. Mid game can be tortuous if you get unlucky with loot, principally MR and rPois. The reason I think Gozag is great is that he lets you buy tons of loot to counter bad luck. But it's only after you hit Lair that the gold really piles up.

So I think Gozag has to be lower in your early game ranking than your champ -> zot ranking. I recommend D-E early and C-D late.

[bel]

About Veh: I don't recall the last time I died in a game with Vehumet. But then I don't play species with really bad aptitudes. I feel like it offers fairly good support all through the game. Sure, its 1* gift often sucks, but piety and gifts usually come very quickly. Also, it has literally no downsides, except opportunity cost in choosing another god and doesn't even require invocations training.

[mps]

Another downside is that if you aren't using conjurations as your primary offense, which is a bad idea for most species, vehumet's abilities are largely useless.

[Pollen_Golem]

So, Qazlal is tied with Xom and no_god in extended? I'm taking a HO^Qazlal through Hell and Pan, and I have mixed feelings about his value. On the one hand, he litters your screen with monsters. On the other, he lets you wipe it clean again at the touch of a button.

[bel]

Another downside is that if you aren't using conjurations as your primary offense, which is a bad idea for most species, vehumet's abilities are largely useless.

That is the definition of opportunity cost.

[bcadren]

Another downside is that if you aren't using conjurations as your primary offense, which is a bad idea for most species, vehumet's abilities are largely useless.

Incorrect. MP for kills would still be very useful for a character that doesn't use Conj as -primary- offense. A --EE with Statue Form, Haste and Iron Shot that gets most kills with statue form UC would still be very well supported by Vehumet and the Wizardry bonus makes it much more reasonable to get high level spells online on races with poor apts. Ash, Oka or Chei might be a -better- choice in these circumstances, but Vehumet is still powerful for characters that don't -focus- conjurations. For that matter, you could play as a pure enchanter take Vehu just for the MP for kills and proceed to rely on Confuse and Ensorcelled with MP coming back on kills. Conj doesn't have to be your focus anymore than you have to focus invocations to follow Qazlal.

[Pollen_Golem]

you could play as a pure enchanter take Vehu just for the MP for kills

Hmm, this could work quite well on a vampire or vine stalker. Veh even supports a few hexes.

[mps]

Another downside is that if you aren't using conjurations as your primary offense, which is a bad idea for most species, vehumet's abilities are largely useless.

That is the definition of opportunity cost.

Your post mentions a narrow case of opportunity cost, not any kind of opportunity cost...

Incorrect. MP for kills would still be very useful for a character that doesn't use Conj as -primary- offense. A --EE with Statue Form, Haste and Iron Shot that gets most kills with statue form UC would still be very well supported by Vehumet and the Wizardry bonus makes it much more reasonable to get high level spells online on races with poor apts. Ash, Oka or Chei might be a -better- choice in these circumstances, but Vehumet is still powerful for characters that don't -focus- conjurations. For that matter, you could play as a pure enchanter take Vehu just for the MP for kills and proceed to rely on Confuse and Ensorcelled with MP coming back on kills. Conj doesn't have to be your focus anymore than you have to focus invocations to follow Qazlal.

Vehumet wizardry only works on bad (i.e. direct damage/"destructive" as defined by vehumet) spells. If you have haste and statue form, you win. Iron shot, which is the only thing you mention that has anything to do with vehumet, does not matter. I'm not even going to explain why going vehumet on a hex-and-stabber for the MP recovery is terrible.

[bcadren]

Vehumet wizardry only works on bad (i.e. direct damage/"destructive" as defined by vehumet) spells. If you have haste and statue form, you win. Iron shot, which is the only thing you mention that has anything to do with vehumet, does not matter. I'm not even going to explain why going vehumet on a hex-and-stabber for the MP recovery is terrible.

Statue and Haste are great, but still, I see a 1 (especially a Hell Sentinel)...I'd rather iron shot/LCS it. Especially if not already in melee range.

Another use case where Vehu MP regen may help without being a Conjurer; Warper, xBow with PProj as primary kills; use summons and cBlink to avoid getting into melee range. MP for kills keep you going. My point isn't that it's the -best- option for non-conjurers, but it's a valid one MP for kills is -really- good.

[mps]

There are basically two cases where running out of MP is likely and a nontrivial problem: Using conjurations for primary offense and guardian spirit. If you use summons, you either don't run out of mana or you have such good summons that it doesn't matter -- you have plenty of time to channel. Guardian spirit + vehumet is a bad version of makhleb, but maybe w/ random altars this could make sense in some games, idk.

[DrKe]

If you aren't using conj, vehu would be E+ early and, at best, C+ mid.

[duvessa]

Vehumet wizardry only works on bad (i.e. direct damage/"destructive" as defined by vehumet) spells. If you have haste and statue form, you win. Iron shot, which is the only thing you mention that has anything to do with vehumet, does not matter.

congratulations you are the first person to reply to bcadren advice with something even weirder

[bel]

It is very simple. "Vehumet is useless if you are not using conjurations as primary offence". It is still as good as atheist, obviously. It is worse than not having another god. Thus, it is opportunity cost of not having another god.

I fail to see how this is relevant anyhow. Obviously we are talking about gods that make sense. We are not saying "Ely is D tier" if you are a necromancer.

[byrel]

Another downside is that if you aren't using conjurations as your primary offense, which is a bad idea for most species, vehumet's abilities are largely useless.

Honestly, my problem with this is that using oklobs to destroy enemies is ALSO a bad idea for most species (since it's largely impossible atheist), but that doesn't keep Fedhas from being good (because he makes the bad idea a very good idea.) Destroying things with conjurations is a fairly good idea on most species worshipping Veh, and so if you're on a character with access to good early-game sustain (a strong start of some sort) and find an early Veh altar, it's a reasonable choice. Your god choice can MAKE using conj as your primary offense vs hard monsters viable on most species.

[bcadren]

If you aren't using conj, vehu would be E+ early and, at best, C+ mid.

You know my original statement wasn't "not using Conj" it was "not using Conj as primary offense". IE in "PANHELLTOMB" it's perfectly reasonable to kill most things with a melee weapon, but have LCS online specifically to strike at 1's and Pan/Hell Lords and a longer range spell to take out tormentors before they start spamming symbol. You aren't using it as your primary offense (even though it's actually stronger than your melee) specifically to make certain you aren't low on MP when a big bad enemy shows up. However, I've gotten where I think Ashenzari with a CBoE is probably best choice for that, myself. Vehu isn't a bad one, but not the best. I -honestly- don't think Vehu is ever the BEST choice, excluding for Ziggurrats; MP for kills when you are killing THAT MUCH in a turn is insane; I understand most people prefer Makh and can see why too, but MP for Kills + Haste, Fire Storm, and RoF; with DDoor as panic spell is pretty well YOU WIN on early zigs while in the rest of the extended where there aren't that many weaker enemies at once your MP for kills counts for less. If you try to fight/kill a Hell/Pan lord, for example Neither MP nor HP for kills is going to help you much at all.

[DrKe]

If you aren't using conj, vehu would be E+ early and, at best, C+ mid.

You know my original statement wasn't "not using Conj" it was "not using Conj as primary offense". IE in "PANHELLTOMB" it's perfectly reasonable to kill most things with a melee weapon, but have LCS online specifically to strike at 1's and Pan/Hell Lords and a longer range spell to take out tormentors before they start spamming symbol. You aren't using it as your primary offense (even though it's actually stronger than your melee) specifically to make certain you aren't low on MP when a big bad enemy shows up. However, I've gotten where I think Ashenzari with a CBoE is probably best choice for that, myself. Vehu isn't a bad one, but not the best. I -honestly- don't think Vehu is ever the BEST choice, excluding for Ziggurrats; MP for kills when you are killing THAT MUCH in a turn is insane; I understand most people prefer Makh and can see why too, but MP for Kills + Haste, Fire Storm, and RoF; with DDoor as panic spell is pretty well YOU WIN on early zigs while in the rest of the extended where there aren't that many weaker enemies at once your MP for kills counts for less. If you try to fight/kill a Hell/Pan lord, for example Neither MP nor HP for kills is going to help you much at all.

That wasn't specifically directed at you (not saying I agree with much of this)

[gammafunk]

I want tier lists for species and backgrounds DrKe. Don't care whether the idea makes sense or not.

[Turukano]

Slightly off topic: what about the choice of gods in the topscores?

Not surprisingly, especially Chei has been discussed controversial in this topic. And if we look at turncount speedruns with 15 runes, we'll see that Chei is popular (not my personal favourite though). Let's choose 15-runers within < 40 k turns, there are 130 games.

As deep dwarves are popular for speedruns (29 out of these 130 games) and - as they can't heal naturally - either worshipped Makhleb (21x) or TSO (8x) let's put them aside when looking at the gods:

!lg * win urune=15 turn<40000 species!=DD s=god

101 games for * (win urune=15 turn<40000 species!=DD): 27x Cheibriados, 16x Makhleb, 13x Vehumet, 9x The Shining One, 7x Ashenzari, 6x Beogh, 6x Dithmenos, 6x Sif Muna, 3x Trog, 3x Okawaru, 2x Zin, 2x Xom, Lugonu

Ignoring deep dwarves, Chei is the most popular god for successful speedruns! What about personal preferences?

!lg * win urune=15 turn<40000 species!=DD s=god, name

101 games for * (win urune=15 turn<40000 species!=DD): 27x Cheibriados (9x 4thArraOfDagon, 5x keymashgrqeeg, 5x Charly, 2x PurpleRed, 2x damdam, magicpoints, adasac, tabstorm, redmage), 16x Makhleb (3x PurpleRed, 2x DrKe, 2x 4tharraofdagon, 2x tlatlagkaus, 2x Yermak, z13, damdam, DenpaOtoko, eld, zzzz), 13x Vehumet (3x PurpleRed, 3x crawlian, 2x zighart, 2x 4thArraOfDagon, Bruce, bart, tlatlagkaus), [...]

Well, especially 4thArra has become a fan of Chei speedruns.

So the discussion about strong/weak Chei continues...

[partial]

Chei is the most popular god for successful speedruns!

the irony

[WingedEspeon]

I think Gozag should be ranked way higher in pan/hell/tomb because you should have a massive gear advantage from him by that point.

[tasonir]

I think Gozag should be ranked way higher in pan/hell/tomb because you should have a massive gear advantage from him by that point.

While I agree with the massive gear advantage part, that isn't any reason to stick with Gozag. Imho optimal gozag play is to summon as many shops as possible and then switch to another god. Use potion petition if you need to, of course, but avoid using it if possible. Then get massive gear advantage + any god you want. So I would argue there isn't much benefit to -staying- with gozag in pan/hell/tomb.

[DrKe]

Updated for 0.17 stable

[Pollen_Golem]

what changed? did you move jiyva upwards?

[DrKe]

what changed? did you move jiyva upwards?

since the last version: http://pastebin.com/diff.php?i=7jNNVar2

there were a few other changes that i didn't update the thread for prior to that, if you check the subjective chei image

[Pollen_Golem]

So makhleb fedhas gozag chei got small boosts.
Vehumet got kicked off S down to A in Champion-to-Zot.

[Sojiro]

Could you explain why you made these changes?

[WingedEspeon]

Gozag needs to be moved up early game. early game ! HW are REALLY strong and might and agility are a lot stronger than they are later. Haste is about the same power, but your sources are more limited. If you play well a D:1 gozag can be better than a D:1 oka for melee characters because of how good the free petition potion is. a D:6 oka is probably better than a D:6 gozag, but potions are still strong. Later, gozag provides a very strong gear bonus and maybe deserves up one tier, it is hard to tell.

[DrKe]

Gozag needs to be moved up early game

You were quite right.

Due to all the attention this got I did a minor update, early gozag gets +.Extended Kiku gets +, as imo he's better than the other gods in that tier in most circumstances.

[TwoLeggedMammal]

All this chart did for me was make it clear how similar the altars for Dith and Yred are.

That's certainly how I found myself worshipping Yred for the first time. And it turns out I really like him.

[TwoLeggedMammal]

I think Gozag should be ranked way higher in pan/hell/tomb because you should have a massive gear advantage from him by that point.

While I agree with the massive gear advantage part, that isn't any reason to stick with Gozag. Imho optimal gozag play is to summon as many shops as possible and then switch to another god. Use potion petition if you need to, of course, but avoid using it if possible. Then get massive gear advantage + any god you want. So I would argue there isn't much benefit to -staying- with gozag in pan/hell/tomb.

I felt the same way, but recently I saw that the record holder for # of mega-zigs is a worshipper of Goazag: https://www.reddit.com/r/dcss/comments/470y3y/a_celebration_of_excess_info_in_comments/

It's a highly specialized character, Demonspawn with 2 required mutations, but it certainly made me think differently about Goazag's power level. And the funny part is that his gear doesn't even look that great, especially after all those Zigs and having near infinite money for shops.

[DrKe]

I think Gozag should be ranked way higher in pan/hell/tomb because you should have a massive gear advantage from him by that point.

While I agree with the massive gear advantage part, that isn't any reason to stick with Gozag. Imho optimal gozag play is to summon as many shops as possible and then switch to another god. Use potion petition if you need to, of course, but avoid using it if possible. Then get massive gear advantage + any god you want. So I would argue there isn't much benefit to -staying- with gozag in pan/hell/tomb.

I felt the same way, but recently I saw that the record holder for # of mega-zigs is a worshipper of Goazag: https://www.reddit.com/r/dcss/comments/470y3y/a_celebration_of_excess_info_in_comments/

It's a highly specialized character, Demonspawn with 2 required mutations, but it certainly made me think differently about Goazag's power level. And the funny part is that his gear doesn't even look that great, especially after all those Zigs and having near infinite money for shops.

Gozag is one of the top 5 gods in the game now, probably not for non-zig extended but the passive always does some work + you have bribes

[PowerOfKaishin]

I think Sif should go up for extended. She gives you limitless mp to spam tons and tons of spells. This is relevant in hell where more campy play is discouraged in favor of moving quickly. This is especially true for the builds that actually use Sif, which are generally a little more squishy than your average extended character.

Edit: wow the necroposting is real. I know this has been updated since the last post since it includes hepl and uska

[severen]

I just won a 15 rune with qazlal its not an E if you use disaster area right and use an amulet of faith.

I had powered by death and that helps a lot because Qazlal is nice if you never need to rest. But basically upheaval can kill pesky mutators/tormentor if you put yourself behind a friendly/unfriendly blocker and disaster area with 27 invo and smart positioning just flat out kills everything. If Oka is a C then Qaz is a C IMO, in the end the major ability of Oka is purely about killing stuff (double weapon speed) and so is Qaz. Disaster area is just as good if not better at killing stuff (certainly is better for a zig).

Chei ... meh ... if you have the tools to make chei work well its very good ... if you don't you get fucked. Darkness+lesser beckoning (range 6) + statue form can clear tomb just fine if you have controlled blink and a L9 nuke then whole game is fine. But in the end you can have all that and not be chei. So meh. I am not sure its useful to put Chei in a rating, it requires tools other gods don't require and you need to find them. If you find em all you are very strong.

Edit: when I say kills everything, I mean EVERYTHING.

[severen]

Im curious why Qaz is behind Fedhas in the Pan/Hell/Tomb Tier. He may not be great in extended, but at least he doesn't need corpses to do anything.

Not looking for a hugely detailed analysis here, obviously tiers are very hard to structure within Crawl since everything is so circumstantial.

Probably the most useful thing Qaz offers is smiting hellions/tormentors dead, but in exchange he's also the god that makes a fuckton of noise on your position to bring everything and their grandmother to you.
Which is slightly impractical in extended.

And yes, this is a somewhat silly format to place gods in but whatever.

He's much better for early melee than for early conjuration guys if only because the latter benefit a lot more from being able to run away.

would you rather play a HOSu of Chei or a HOFi of Chei

HOFi, because I'm guaranteed to actually have a usable weapon. (oh and a potion of might also helps)

But really, Chei is S-tier for shit like Mi/Gr/VS-Fi/Mo because of how ridiculously strong you will be pre-lair and how easily said combos kill the early game.

I think you are vastly underestimating disaster area at 27 invo. Let's say you played really poorly in extended: you have your back to a wall and there are 2 tormentors and 3 brimstone fiends on your screen at various ranges and 2 nequoexec and 1 cacodemon. One disaster area at 27 invo will kill everyone of them almost everytime since your back is to the wall.

In point of fact I found disaster area to but MUCH MUCH more useful than upheaval in extended, although I did use it for exactly what you mention.

Additionally although finesse is probably better against, for example, Cerebov if you restrict LOS right disaster area will still do large chunks of completely unavoidable to damage to him and be very close to finesse.

You can clear an entire Zig from 1 to 27 with just disaster area. Gods like dith or oka can't do anything similar really.

In hell the noise is not that big a deal, you get stuff summoned on you frequently and are basically diving anyway. Its not really bad in Pandemonium either, although super high stealth is helpful in Pand. The noise is nowhere near as bad as the slow on chei. I found on comparing my OpFi fifteen rune staute form Hepl run and my latest DsFi of Qaz run that I got roughly similar encounters in Pand. If you cast glaciate/fore storm even once in the level and you don't have massive stealth then there is almost no functional difference between Qaz and not-Qaz in Pand. You will still run into mobs of demonspawn etc. Now on my current OpIE of Chei who has maxed out stealth yes I can run through pand with a large number of things unware if I keep meleeing. But all in all when you watch what the typical Vehumet guy is doing in hell and Pand there is no difference between them and qaz really, in fact the vehumet nuker pulls significantly more things I think. Qaz is 16 noise versus that nukers 25. In pand my experience is you get realatively normal amount of things attacking you. Roughly the same as someone with low stealth (+ or ++). And I did like 40 pand level on that 15 rune. Basically sustained melee does the same thing as Qaz anyway and a large number of things wander or just flat out spawn in pand anyway.