New God: Dang, the Shadowed

[Siegurt]

Some D names that i will make up right now:

Draxis
Dallitate
Donopil
Dezagil
Dimmit
Domparate
Dackline
Dipocate
Dajca
Derriole
Dispex
Detaxola
Detara
Dofacole
Diflanta
Durig
Dramline
Dwaltine
Desiplaxis

[nicolae]

Some D names that i will make up right now:

Draxis
Dallitate
Donopil
Dezagil
Dimmit
Domparate
Dackline
Dipocate
Dajca
Derriole
Dispex
Detaxola
Detara
Dofacole
Diflanta
Durig
Dramline
Dwaltine
Desiplaxis

at the very least you've demonstrated a talent for naming prescription medications

[Sar]

D'Sparil.

[Siegurt]

Heheh, a lot of those names are pretty pharmaceutical-sounding.

I make up a new name for every crawl character I make, and I've been playing for years, Usually though I play around with the name and pick one that I actually like (I would probably go through a list at least that long for every character I make before I settled on a single name)

[nicolae]

I propose we simply anagram the existing name, Dsomething -> Dginsemoth, Gneshdomit, Histdomgen, Inghdemost...

You can also get "Demon Sight" from Dsomething, which is ominous.

[red_kangaroo]

Destrous - Sounds pretty grim to me and even a bit latin.

Dy - Because some gods are not happy with long names. It also sounds rather mysteriously: "I am Dy." "Sorry, Dy... and what?" "I am Dy the Dark*!"

*I see only one problem: Yred is also "the Dark".

[Lasty]

Dsomething drags you out of the shadows. (Mark status)
Dsomething has cloaked an approaching <foo>. The <foo> drives a dagger into your <sensitive bit>! (Summons a dagger-wielding humanoid next to you, deals damage as though you were just tier-2 stabbed by it).

[sgrunt]

I'm most of the way through coding up this god (really needs a name - currently in my code base the name is "Dsomething"...)

Are you married to the initial D?

I'm not (it was just the first available letter in alphabetical order)...

I propose we simply anagram the existing name, Dsomething -> Dginsemoth, Gneshdomit, Histdomgen, Inghdemost...

...but I like this idea. Let's see if I can get something without too many consonants in a row.

Let's see...

Dismenghot
Dithemsgon
Dithmengos (this one sounds the best to me of the suggestions so far)
Domsethgin
Gondisthme
Hendsitmog
Idenghtson
Nedimshogt

???

I see only one problem: Yred is also "the Dark".

Dso is currently "the Shadowed", for the record.

(...Deeso? Diso?)

Dsomething drags you out of the shadows. (Mark status)

I like this, though possibly something like "Dsomething tears the shadows away from you." instead for the flavour text.

[DracheReborn]

Dso Meth Ing

(TSO is also 3 words, Fedhas, Nem, Sif have 2 words in their names. The middle name of Meth is sort of similar to mikee's original name in the proposal.)

[sgrunt]

Well... I've coded enough that I'm ready to show people how this is turning out.

At the moment our nascent deity is named Dithmengos, though that can change fairly easily.

I may try to convince someone to get an experimental branch running on one of the servers for this.

[bisonbisonbison]

For wrath ideas: afflicting player with temporary shoutitis?

[earLOBe]

Dso Meth Ing

(TSO is also 3 words, Fedhas, Nem, Sif have 2 words in their names. The middle name of Meth is sort of similar to mikee's original name in the proposal.)

Dso the Toothless, god of Meth

*: Swiftness, slow metabolism, immunity to Sleep
**: Can pray over Potions of Remove Cold to create Potions of Speed
***: Ability 1: Haste, costs food and piety
****: Ability 2: Summon Spectral Heisenberg, costs food and piety. Summons a spirit who can haste other, throw exploding crystals, and create stationary oklob-like turrets, but will throw your permafood into inaccessible places and will become hostile if you kill his brother-in-law
*****: Berserkitis
******: Will gift random objects in return for a couple bucks man, please dude, come on, I'm begging you

Wrath:
Sleep, nausea, confusion, Zin's Imprison effect

Seriously though, I like this god although I don't know if I'd take him over the other melee options, but that's because all the 'stealth' games I've played with Oka/Trog have quickly become a high-EV+quickblade tabfest.

[nicolae]

...but I like this idea. Let's see if I can get something without too many consonants in a row.

Huh, that worked out pretty well for a joke idea I had at five in the morning.

[sgrunt]

Huh, that worked out pretty well for a joke idea I had at five in the morning.

Funnily enough, I had the same idea at about 5AM too (before I saw your post). Clearly twisted minds think alike.

[WalkerBoh]

Let's see...

Dismenghot
Dithemsgon
Dithmengos (this one sounds the best to me of the suggestions so far)
Domsethgin
Gondisthme
Hendsitmog
Idenghtson
Nedimshogt

I have some good ones:
Doing Meths
Dong Times (I left out the H, sue me)
Dime Thongs

But in seriousness it's fun when god names have a silly backstory like this.

[spudwalt]

Wrath idea: Dsomething summons a shadow copy of you a la Zelda II. ("Your shadow rises to attack you!") We can probably make it similar to Mara's clones, though if we do, it should probably be less common than other results, just so people don't rage-quit as often. Stuff like getting Corona-ed, Marked, or Shadow Creature-d are also good ideas.

[Brannock]

Not sure Dithmengos should be Evil. I think a neutral god of shadows would be more interesting.

[Shard1697]

Not sure Dithmengos should be Evil. I think a neutral god of shadows would be more interesting.

I agree. Having shadows always=evil is a little dull, and it seems to me that a shadowy God favored by assassins would always be trying to do whatever is most profitable, not whatever is most evil-much like their followers.

[twelwe]

wow



i mean, it is cool that it throws a net in the first place (oghu of dith, screw the stealth i want umbra) but it doesn't do any good if the net just disappears and nothing struggles in it



owns

[Brannock]

After roughly ~3 hours total of spectating Dithmengos on CSZO today I feel safe saying that it's the Shadow Mimic part of Dsomething that's the most powerful part of the current incarnation. The rest of his abilities feel/seem balanced and flavorful.

The damage amplification you get from shadow mimicking is real good, comparable with Haste damage amplification. Perhaps it'd be better as an invoked ability instead of a passive?

[Ogre]

Wrath ideas
Map tiles conceal like they do in the Labyrinth
Level drain
Cannot see through transparent walls

Boon ideas
Can see N spaces through an opaque wall if standing next to it

[cerebovssquire]

Maprot is really dumb. In theory I could just draw a map outside of the game or copy the map into editor; it also messes with autoexplore badly in normal levels, but more importantly, if I could in theory play a better game by doing something as tedious as recording dungeon maps manually there is a huge design mistake.

[Sprucery]

Yeah, good riddance to the original effect of amnesia scrolls.

[and into]

I got an account on CSZO to test out Dithmengos. Currently have a DrEE in Lair with max piety. Really like the god overall—kudos to mikee and sgrunt!

I haven't had much chance to use the shadow form ability (I hope to do so soon) so I can't comment on that. Umbra and cloud-bleed are very cool, as is the shadow-blink ability.

I do think the shadow-mimic passive may be too strong. You could just tweak the numbers a bit to nerf a bit (most direct). A different idea would be to keep it about the same at max power but have the likelihood and/or strength of the shadow-mimic attack to scale in direct proportion with HP—at very high HP it is max power. So under Dith you start fights strong with shadow-mimic, but as you take damage that becomes less effective (however your cloud-bleed passive hopefully starts kicking in, and you have the other activated abilities as a fall back as well). Or you could make the shadow-mimic work like a shroud of golubria (but with more HP) that automatically regenerates—that implementation feels more thematic, actually.

I would *strongly* dislike it if shadow mimic became an activated ability, though. Yeah I know I suggested that earlier, as has Brannock, but I changed my mind after playing. A big part of what I like about Dith so far is that he's no fuss—you don't need to train invocations, you don't need to sacrifice corpses, his straight-up buffs are completely passive, and his activated abilities are useful, but only circumstantially so. That's ideal, in my opinion, and part of the reason Ash is one of my favorite gods. Though if Dith is added I think Ash would have stiff competition.

[some12fat2move]

There is something I don't get about shadow action...it basically is just giving you +badass. How is this interesting? Or is it not meant to be interesting, just something to prevent the god from being underpowered?

[dpeg]

It should go without saying that Shadow Action is better off as a passive power. Apart from flavour and interface, another reason is that it's an action which would otherwise be spammed and nontrivial to evaluate.

For quite some time I've been wondering if the Shadowport interface can be streamlined, to no avail. (Also for jumping.) And I am still unsure whether there should be anything related to walls and corners or not.

Otherwise, yay for a new god Thanks to mikee and sgrunt!

[and into]

There is something I don't get about shadow action...it basically is just giving you +badass. How is this interesting? Or is it not meant to be interesting, just something to prevent the god from being underpowered?

It is supposed to just make you stronger, yes, much like Ash's skill boost or Makhleb's HP-for-kills and all of Vehumet's passive abilities. If it is too strong it should be nerfed, and there could be many ways to do that, but it shouldn't be made into an ability that you have to activate.

[twelwe]

WHO ME? OH, GOOD, JUST SHADOW STEP GIANT CLUB STABBING MOTHERFUCKERS! YOU?

[Leafsnail]

There is something I don't get about shadow action...it basically is just giving you +badass. How is this interesting? Or is it not meant to be interesting, just something to prevent the god from being underpowered?

It is supposed to just make you stronger, yes, much like Ash's skill boost or Makhleb's HP-for-kills and all of Vehumet's passive abilities. If it is too strong it should be nerfed, and there could be many ways to do that, but it shouldn't be made into an ability that you have to activate.

The thing is Makhleb's ability does change your tactics (you are now actively looking for kills so you can get your health back) and Vehumet's is geared towards helping a particular style of play. I don't really think Shadow Mimic is either of those things - it just makes you more powerful regardless of what playstyle you're using.

[Yermak]

Ok, I've tried this god, and it seems good. I'd be happy with just umbra aura, but first ability and fog are awesome too.I haven't tried the second active one yet, but I'm gonna do it in Tomb.
An idea: Stabbing targets that are still enough is instant.
And a bug: You don't get "Invis" status effect after successful invisibility evoke. You're effectively invisible, able to cancel invisibility, just no status.
Upd.: Minor bug: killing lava snakes who spit fire isn't appreciated whilst killing any ugly thing is appreciated.

[Grandiloquent Gentleman]

Ideas for wrath:

Ely like damage block ("the shadows block your view and you miss the foo")

damage (or otherwise inconvenience) you ("as you hit the foo your shadow strikes you off guard") as a sort of anti shadow action

bring your contamination level up to yellow ( or just a bit las than yellow) "The shadows forsake you"

make fog turn into miasma after one turn spent in it (or just one turn) (might not work so well in hallways although a dead end might be interesting)
(don't use if immune to rot i.e. undead Ds Lich)

give a random enemy in los a (permanent?) become shadow enchantment ( prefer higher HD )

[nago]

Trying the shadow god with an HO with a big axe, just because so.
I've no fucking idea how the shadow step works - maybe is because in title shadow aren't displayed (yet)? Every time I've tried to use it, I've got the message "the shadow isn't still enough". Or are other problems?
The shadow form seems really powerful - sometime (e.g. against hydra, as I hadn't reliable way to kill them) is very nice to deal less damage and have a lot of resistance.
Some bug I've found:
- fire dragon doesn't count like illuminating enemies, while zombies do (e.g. mottled dragon ones).
- quicksilver dragon can dispel shadow form - I believe it shouldn't (other god's abilities aren't dispelled)
- maybe enemies with fire weapons should give bonus piety too (only for lore question, it's quite weird a centaur shooting 2 fire arrows per turn isn't considered someone illuminating the dungeon).

[ontoclasm]

Every time I've tried to use it, I've got the message "the shadow isn't still enough". Or are other problems?

You can only shadow step to enemies that are immobile (generally because they're asleep).

[Piginabag]

The "meng" part of Dithmengos sounds kind of comical. Sounds like mangoes. The god of shadows and fruit. I like "Dithmenos" if you're willing to deviate from the anagram Or "Dithmenos G" the gansta god.

Also wrath idea: Reduces your LOS to 1-2 tiles for xx turns, specifically during combat against ranged enemies/casters, not affecting the ability of enemies to detect you.

[dck]

LoS is reciprocal and it's a bad idea to make it not reciprocal under basically any circumstance I can think of.

[twelwe]

oghu of dith: 0 crawl: 1

My first run through got to V:1 where I died. I can't find the morgue, so let me describe the rollout: Ring of Robustness (+8ac) +6+4 GSC (crushing) Amulet of the Air (inacc +fly relec ev+5 rmsl) ring of slaying +5+3. The last two accuracy penalty/bonus cancel each other out.

Dith does a great service to ogres. Shadow tiles really benefit from high damage weapons, and in the end it came down to me not hitting my target fast enough to counter what I was taking in. I severly overestimated the power of shadowform, using it for the first, only and last time at 33hp with two nearly dead vault guards (warden and the one that takes damage away from other enemies) which was not enough to live. Umbra gives you a false sense of security, especially with rmsl it is very hard to be hit and the large HP pool of ogres doesn't allow you to notice the damage spikes as much. In essense, dith magnifies the glass cannon effect ogres tend to be associated with early game.

If I do this again, I'm going to pump a lot more stealth and abuse swiftness + bleed smoke much much more. I can see bleed smoke being more effective on lower HP species than ogres etc. since I believe it works as a function of total hp percentage, not damage received. I am convinced this will not be a permanent problem. One question: does the "bleed" effect given by claw damage trigger bleed smoke?

dith is a lot of fun! try it out, really any build should be good for this god

[twelwe]

dith is going to open so many hybrid playstyles... it is a viable option to pump strength and carry 12 large rocks everywhere you go

[nago]

Every time I've tried to use it, I've got the message "the shadow isn't still enough". Or are other problems?

You can only shadow step to enemies that are immobile (generally because they're asleep).

I see, thanks - the description of "still" enemies wasn't enough clear for me.

Regard the fog activation, probably it depends on a percentage of total hp, because sometimes it triggered for 1 hp damage due of poison - maybe it would work better if depending also on value of damage suffered.
Btw, my Ho seems the 2nd victorious character of shadow god - but I don't believe he's the best option for a "melee" dude. Fog is as always very good when trigger, shadow mimic seems good (but I couldn't understand how much damage it adds effectively) and shadow form is a strong panic button, but overall the other "traditional" melee god seems better to me.

Ah, a bug/weird behaviour of shadow mimic: sometimes it triggers even when casting buff - I don't know if it is intended but it could be a problem when duplicating haste or invis, due to glow (it happened to me sometime, but I couldn't understand if glow was doubled).

[sgrunt]

oghu of dith: 0 crawl: 1

My first run through got to V:1 where I died. I can't find the morgue

http://dobrazupa.org/morgue/twelwe/morg ... 164506.txt

You're welcome.

Ah, a bug/weird behaviour of shadow mimic: sometimes it triggers even when casting buff - I don't know if it is intended but it could be a problem when duplicating haste or invis, due to glow (it happened to me sometime, but I couldn't understand if glow was doubled).

I've disabled mimicking of self-targeted spells (you can still shadow-haste or -invis allies; just not yourself).

[Arrhythmia]

Thank you mikee and SGrunt for coming up with a cool new god and for making that cool new god a reality. You're doing the lord's work.

[sgrunt]

To paraphrase tileschat, the deagle has landed.

The only thing missing is a credit for mikee (if we don't have one already), once I figure out how mikee would prefer to be credited.

[nicolae]

To paraphrase tileschat, the deagle has landed.

The only thing missing is a credit for mikee (if we don't have one already), once I figure out how mikee would prefer to be credited.

"alan smithee"

[WalkerBoh]

Upon abandoning Dith, he turns your shadow into a unique named Mikee who lurks in the shadows and pops out to stab you now and then. You can't hurt Mikee (all attacks phase through him), and he has lots of dialogue about how great Dith is and how his name is actually Seth.

[Roderic]

Kudos!

In SA forum people complain about the cacophony of the name. Let's see if more feedback is giving a better chance or wait until people mispelled it in a fancy way.

[dpeg]

It's hopeless to try to come up with a name in a group, I think. Personally, I am more worried that some people seem to have reverse-engineered the anagrammatical nature of the name. That's not so good

[Roderic]

By the way nobody used gn and mn resources from greek or latin

Dethgnomis

Dethgimnos

Domnesight

I found even Demonsight

for those who like Tibetan/Vietnamese-like sounds

Dso Ti Mengh

[Piginabag]

Dethgnomis has a ring to it. Unfortunately it also sounds like death gnome.

Dehmgithos is pretty smooth.

Thanks again to everyone involved, very exciting to have a new god

[tsouns]

Great to see a new god!

He says:"Let there be no light!"
and there was no light.
"U can use lightning, though, no problem!"
*sets all the forests to fire with a wand of lightning

--

Shouldn't lightning be banned, too, to fit the theme?

[pubby]

I haven't had a chance to play the shadow god yet, but I look forward to doing so soon.

I have a question. Are shadow-y monsters like shadow demons and shadow dragons handled in a special way? Perhaps some type of buff when they're standing in an umbra?

[duvessa]

I have a question. Are shadow-y monsters like shadow demons and shadow dragons handled in a special way? Perhaps some type of buff when they're standing in an umbra?

I don't think "it has shadow in the name" is a good criterium for special treatment. Should Ashenzari's wrath summon curse toes?