Okawaru Changes

[Moose]

Hey, I just read that Okawaru doesn't gift anymore in the mines ... this is good to know, and I didn't.

Where can I read about such changes as they happen? The commit logs are too noisy, and it's hard to scan for relatively important changes like this.

If there's not a handy place to point me toward, can someone summarize the okawaru changes for my benefit? Thanks!

[giygas]

I think you have to just grin and bear the hundreds of spammy commits if you want to know what's going on.

I know nothing about the Oku changes... because I'm not patient enough to read the commits! So there.

[Deimos]

Okawaru only gives decent piety for sacrificing the corpses of non-popcorn, now. You cant just slay a thousand orcs and prepare for a forecast of sunny with a chance of artifact showers.

[Moose]

This removes an interesting tactical option from the game now. I rarely ever enter the orcish mines before having completed the lair, due to danger. But sometimes, if I hadn't yet found a decent weapon, and was a follower of Okawaru, I'd take my chances and enter the mines hoping to clear some fodder to get a relatively early gift, or build up my piety so that I could get earlier access to haste.

Not a big deal I guess, but I never found Okawaru's gifts to be too frequent, even with an amulet of faith.

Sorry if this thread turns into a design debate, I just wanted to bring that up.

[Deimos]

I agree, Okawaru didn't really need the nerf, but I think it was more to do with "This isn't how Okawaru is intended to be" then "He is too powerful.". It does help separate him from Trog a little.

[eeviac]

I play Oka practically every game (#1 best god) and the change is so minor that you may not even notice. New Oka gives less piety for killing weak dudes, and more for killing strong dudes. In a typical game's progression (D > Lair > Orc > D > Vaults/Crypt > D > Rune Branches / Elf > Zot) the only places this affects are Orc and Elf1-3, where you shouldn't even need heroism/finesse in the first place.

[crate]

I think you overall get more piety unless maybe you are a race with a really good xp apt.

[mikee]

This removes an interesting tactical option from the game now.

I think possibly most of the words in this sentence are being misused.