dpeg wrote:galehar: Yes, that's the other approach. If the cost is too low, so that the ability is spammed, we're better off with a passive effect. Alternatively, make the cost high enough so that players will not spam it anymore. Okawaru players would have to tell me if the two powers are generally used in unison. Are they?
No, they don't: heroism is so a cheap that is used against every non-trivial enemy, while finesse has a quite high cost and it's used only against exceptionally dangerous enemy/situation. Obviously, when one uses finesse, uses heroism too.
For instance, the TrSu of minmay used heroism 249 times, while 23 times finesse. For other similar examples, the last 3 runes victories with Oka had: 287 heroism / 7 finesse (GhMo), 181/5 (MuHu), 289/19 (CeMo).
Anyway, I don't think increasing the cost of heroism is the best idea: now it's good because it's really cheap. If its cost is raised, up the point that it isn't no more possible to spam it, it would loses much of his appeal, because the bonus it grants aren't so huge to justify an actual piety cost.
Generally speaking, I believe Oka is good and still a decent alternative to stronger gods (Trog, Makheleb, ...) only because you can spam heroism early on. when the game is harder and +5 to fighting skills is a significant bonus, while later on is a nice thing to use but nothing transcendent (sure, you can save to train some skill up to 27, but the benefits are much less significant).
If this ability is nerfed, Oka became quite a crappy God - who cares if finesse can be used later on - a source of haste, which is still better than finesse in 95% of the situations, is usually found by the time you can use frequently finesse - and his gift are totally random and usually crap anyway, so nobody consider them when choosing the god.
Ninja'ed by minmay, but I explained things a little more so whatever.