Proposal: Okawaru Passive

[Psiweapon]

Someone tossed the idea around so here's my elaboration:

Heroism becomes a passive bonus to combat skills
-Can make skills go from 27 to 31 (Is this a no-no?)
-Indexed to tension.
-Lower boundary rises with piety, + 0,25 per piety *
-Higher boundary is (skill value / 9) + 1
-Slightly increases metabolism when the bonus is above +0 (Hero needs food badly!)

* piety, no skill: between +0.25 and +1 depending on tension for a theoretical max of 1 skillpoint where there is none.

****** piety, maXXed skill: between +1.50 ~ +4 depending on tension for theoretical maxes of 31



Optional: Gives you a status word giving you a rough measurement of current tension (The info would already be there if you cared to do the math, which shouldn't even be hard, so why not?)


Pros:
+Rewards piety
+Rewards skill investment (you're more likely to pull off heroics using tools you actually know)
+Waxes and wanes as you ride the waves of battles (Strongest when challenging, weakest when non-threatening)
+Triggers itself getting rid of the need to a-a for every decent battle.
+Has a food cost even if it is a passive.
+Gets rid of the "I'm at 27 skill now, what good is Heroism anymore?" question, making Okawaru more valid for the late-game.
+More varied than current Heroism: Instead of +5 across the board, each character would get better at what they already do better.

Cons:
-Would need to allow skills >27 with this formulation
-I don't know where to shoehorn a piety cost
-Indexed-to-tension may be perceived as too fickle for Okawaru
-Certain situations may cause annoying metabolism speed
-Means a semi-permanent skill increase, this may be perceived as biting Ashenzari's style, unless skill boosting is taken as Okawaru's schtick too - both can be seen as "excellence" gods (excellence through battle, excellence through sacrifice).
-The game's measurement of tension and the player's sense of threat may disagree leading to cries of foul.

Trolls welcome.

[and into]

Skills going above 27 presents a lot of problems. But, it is also completely unnecessary to the proposal, so I'm going to respond just to the more general idea of making heroism passive. I disagree with that too but maybe the reasons are a bit less obvious and thus worth going into.

As it stands, if you play Okawaru you should spam Heroism. A lot. Which is arguably a bit of a problem, because it means you aren't really thinking very much about when / how to use it.

However, making that ability passive means that you are not *ever* thinking about it. So that would be a step in the wrong direction.

Plus one of the really nice things about heroism as an ability is that you get this nice big boost that is independent of piety—so long as you have *, and like 2 skill levels (or less even) in invocations, you are set. This opens a lot of flexibility with characters. Yes, you can start a melee dude and use the ability to do melee better, and stick with that—not very exciting, but effective and simple. On the other hand, you can also leverage Heroism to very good effect in order to branch out into magic or another weapon (like ranged) or evocations or whatever at a much earlier stage, leaning on heroism to make up the difference, and remain competitive even though you are spreading out your experience earlier than you usually would / could otherwise. But a lot of that versatility is dependent on heroism coming online so cheap, and so early. And so, this whole aspect of the ability is lost if you only get a useful boost at very high piety.

Any way you slice it, the ability becomes less interesting and flexible, if it is made passive and/or piety dependent.

EDIT: And really, I'm okay with Heroism being cheap and spammable. The fact that it is so reliable, paired with the effect that it has, means that it is almost more strategic than tactical in terms of how you use it to best effect in a given game, which is something I like about it a lot. Heroism is "boring" in the same way humans are "boring"—they may seem so at first glance, but the versatility can actually lead to very different ways to build a successful character, if you are open to adapting to what the RNG throws at you and improvising a bit.

[reaver]

-Indexed to tension.

Have you ever tried playing a lava orc, particularly before the speed thing was removed? Tension is not a good mechanic.

However, making that ability passive means that you are not *ever* thinking about it. So that would be a step in the wrong direction.

Since I barely think about Heroism now, I wonder how much we would lose in this exchange. While this particular proposal is over complicated and removes some important aspects of what Herosim does, I think making Heroism passive would be a good thing.

[and into]

-Indexed to tension.

Have you ever tried playing a lava orc, particularly before the speed thing was removed? Tension is not a good mechanic.

However, making that ability passive means that you are not *ever* thinking about it. So that would be a step in the wrong direction.

Since I barely think about Heroism now, I wonder how much we would lose in this exchange. While this particular proposal is over complicated and removes some important aspects of what Herosim does, I think making Heroism passive would be a good thing.

We may not lose much, but we lose something, and what is gained? (I guess other than no longer having to hit aa so often, but whatever, an Okawaru devotee is still doing "aa" less than a spell-heavy build is doing z*)

Also passive Heroism steps on Ash's toes in a really big way. Meant to, but forgot to mention that in earlier post; that's another strike against.

What positive things would be accomplished by making Heroism active? Honestly, thus far I'm just seeing losses, and no benefits to this change.

[DracheReborn]

There was quite a lot of discussion on Oka's Heroism here

dpeg's summary seems to capture most of it, so I'll just quote it

I'll list some of the ideas that have been put forward on how to activate Heroism:

a) Active ability with low cost. (Status quo)
b) Passive ability, i.e. always on if enough piety. (minmay)
c) Active ability with increases cost, e.g. higher piety or shorter duration. (galehar)
d) Can trigger when attacking an enemy, better chance for harder enemies. (dpeg)
e) As c), but scalable: further attacks can increase the effect. (mumra)
f) Triggers automatically, depending on tension. (Lasty, Utis)

There are actually some more, but I don't feel like writing them down -- I think that e) has the greatest potential to produce something interesting. There's also pros and cons for each of them, and I'm not going to spell out those either.

Edit: Sorry, didn't meant to blow my own horn, but rather mumra's. Scaling the effect is at least half of the appeal!

So pretty much the same ideas have been brought up before, and rejected (I assume, since obviously Oka wasn't changed). I don't know if any dev is still looking to improve it.

Edit: the chaining mechanic has since gone into Song of Slaying, which works pretty well, I think. It's the noise of the spell that makes it iffy to use, IMO.

[Psiweapon]

I actually like how Okawaru and Heroism currently work, I just heard someone saying it should be passive and felt like writing that.

[sanka]

Oka is already weak, but I guess balance is not important, because it's possible to compensate. But activating it on attacks not only weakens it, it makes it's use much narrower.

For example I have used it on stabbers, because it gives bonus to short blades and stealth. It is also useful for escaping, since it improves your defenses. It's useful for casting spells, because it may decrease shield/armour penalty.

All of these can be useful *before* you attack anyone.

So making it trigger only on attacks narrows down an already a little bit narrow god (in my opinion). I do not think that song of slaying works that well, even without the noise. With this change Oka would lose it's main appeal, it's key power, so I guess we need to come up with an other strong ability not only to compensate weakening the god, but also to give it some needed flexibility.

I'm not really know how tension works, so I won't comment on that proposal.

[dpeg]

Tension is often criticised harshly, but it's not so bad. The problem is that no-one can leave well alone, and this leads to attempts of applying tension where it does not work so well. It was invented primarily for use with Xom, making the god not act completely at random, but have the tactical effects trigger when something goes on. This works very well. After that, it was extended to Demonspans' demonic guardian which -- because it does not have to reliable -- is also alright. I don't think that tension can work well in circumstances where you want a precise measure of danger. This is extremely hard to get right (see Lava Orcs) and inevitably prone to abuse.

Bottom line: you can use tension but you have to know what you want. Heroism is certainly not a place for tension.

sanka: I have plans for Okawaru but they are not related to Heroism. Also, it's not as urgent as it used to be back when Okawaru's powers were Haste and Might.

[Psiweapon]

What about adding a third power in the middle of the piety progression?

I'm happy that I did manage to foresee some of the raised objections

[Klown]

I'd like to see more passive abilities in general.

[reaver]

Bottom line: you can use tension but you have to know what you want. Heroism is certainly not a place for tension.

I definitely agree it's worthwhile in a couple places. I was just trying to emphasize this is absolutely the wrong place for this.

sanka: I have plans for Okawaru but they are not related to Heroism. Also, it's not as urgent as it used to be back when Okawaru's powers were Haste and Might.

Mind giving us a short description? The worst that could happen is whining or nonsensical responses.

[dpeg]

reaver: Asking me for god chatter? Any day, all day

I think that Okawaru's second leg, the gifts, could be improved a lot without changing anything about the tactical abilities. Instead of letting those items drop from the ceiling all the time, two things happen: (1) Okawaru can improve items you use, i.e. their enchantment levels -- including artefacts! (That'd be a flavour change; think of Okawaru as the "smith among the gods", a la Hephaistos). (2) Okawaru will hand out items, but those are temporary. You can increase their longevity by wearing them (otherwise they disappear quickly) and being heroic with them.

With (1), randarts which are good as far as base type and properties ego but crippled enchantment-wise become an option. It's an investment because you have to use them for a while but it's an option nobody else has.

That's the rough version

[XuaXua]

Okawaru bequeaths animated weapons, which turn into real weapons when they die in combat.

[Hirsch I]

+1 for Dpeg's idea of "okawaru, god of the Forge", if my opinion counts.
making randarts with crippled enchantments matter would be awesome in so many levels.

[Psiweapon]

+1 for God of the Forge thing, too.

It would be sad if permanent gifts disappeared altogether, though. Having *only* temporary gifts would make the gift thing too unpredictable, I think, and also prone to timing out in the worst possible moment:

The fire dragon claws you!
Okawaru reclaims his +7 Plate Mail of Painfully Temporary Awesomeness! (rF++, dam+4, MR)
The fire dragon breathes fire!
Ouch, that really hurt!
Your scroll of brand weapon catches fire!
Your scroll of blinking catches fire!
You die.

Maybe give the player a shot at making gifts permanent, similar to how misc elemental evokables recharge?

[tompliss]

A simple thing would be to take the gifts away only when there are no monsters in sight. But then, players could simply keep a rat following them...
And not reclaiming the gifts when the player wears them would nearly keep them like it is now :/

[Hirsch I]

well, it could be linked to Tension. okawaru do not take the gifts back at high tension, and if you manage to kill the threat, the timer for the gift to be taken back would be extended. this way you would be rewarded for heroism.

[Tiktacy]

How about "temporary" items will time out like normal, but they won't dissappear until you take them off.

[Hirsch I]

then you can keep them forever, just like trog's. I think the point is Oka giving gifts to heroes, to help them do hero things. so, if you act like a coward (avoiding tension, fighting weak monsters, only clearing branch ends when they are trivial) he will take them back.

[reg]

If you are going to do that I would suggest a {Heroic} tag for gear that causes the enchantment level to grow and shrink as you do things, as I imagine having disappearing armour would lead to a lot of tedious Ctrl-F when he strips you naked in safe circumstances.

[MDvedh]

2reg: I love that, gifted weapons could use same mechanic as Wyrmbane, granting bonus slaying for killing heroic enemies. Maybe not all of them, just some randarts.

[snow]

Right now Oka is just a weaker Trog. His gifts are worse and his abilities are worse.

I like the idea of Oka improving your existing gear. It would be cool if heroism and finesse were removed entirely his abilities were replaced with abilities involving equipment.

[Sandman25]

Okawaru allows spells and hates allies dying, it makes quite a difference.

[reaver]

Right now Oka is just a weaker Trog. His gifts are worse and his abilities are worse.

This is completely untrue. Okawaru is much better for hybrids because a) He won't kill you if you try to cast magic and b) Heroism let's you skimp on completely training up your melee skills to focus on spell skills. Okawaru is also better for ammo users, because Berserk disables range and Brothers in Arms is less useful if you're rarely in melee range of the enemy. While they are similar in flavor, Okawaru and Trog have very different gameplay effects.

Another mark of support for the forge thing I guess, since I'm posting anyway.

[archaeo]

Okawaru allows spells and hates allies dying, it makes quite a difference.

He doesn't mind the allies dying thing anymore.

[snow]

Trog allows spells too though. Actually, they're the best spells in the game!

For example, the "spear to the face" spell does damage and has range comparable to crystal spear, costs way less, and you can even cast it in gold dragon armor.

If you're talking about things like regeneration and deflect missiles, you have the "Trog's hand" and "wear heavy armour and a shield" abilities. I guess you could maybe argue for blink but honestly you can just get that off evocations and it's not worth choosing Oka for.

Finally you can clear Zigs with tornado even if you're worshiping Trog so he's not ENTIRELY anti-magic.

[Volteccer_Jack]

Right now Oka is just a weaker Trog. His gifts are worse and his abilities are worse.

Um, Oka lets you memorise and cast Haste. Haste is a pretty fucking good ability. Also Swiftness, Death's Door, Controlled Blink, Dispersal, Phase Shift, Spectral Weapon, Animate Dead, Stoneskin, Invisibility, Cure Poison, etc.

Also Oka lets you train your physical skills to 22 instead of 27, which saves you a pretty huge boatload of XP.

please don't make me explain basic game mechanics to you anymore

[MDvedh]

I heard some players (and devs) dislike permanent item gifts for it gives strategical, not tactical advantage.
How about new ability instead of gifts and heroism:
The legendary weapon: gives you (and forces you to wield) a good-quality weapon you are capable of fighting with and gives appropriate skill; the duration of this weapon prolonged while you are killing strong dudes but not for too long. Enough for one tough fight, but not enough to clear the branch.