Bug? Feature? No warning from dith on LB causing fire

[damiac]

I found this out in an unpleasant way, and nearly lost a promising character to Dith's wrath:

Dith doesn't mind you shooting lightning bolts (Should he? They would obviously create lots of light)
Dith very much minds you starting fires, which happens if a lightning bolt hits a tree.
If you target a monster with lightning bolt, with a tree behind it, you don't get a confirmation prompt like "Are you sure you want to fire at that tree? Doing so would cause penance"

So, I'm not sure if this is a bug, a feature, or a lack of a feature. However I assume it's just an oversight.

So,
FR: Confirmation prompt when firing a lightning bolt that would start a fire when following dith.

[johlstei]

Dith was more anal about things like lightning before, and it was a lot to keep in your head and kind of arbitrary. I'm guessing this edge case wasn't thought of when that was removed.

Does firing bolt of fire through a monster at a tree give a warning?

[and into]

I would suggest simply removing Dith's hatred of fire.

I have never experienced a situation in which I felt it added anything to the game. Moreover, it leads to situations like the one described in the OP, and the flavor is frankly kind of a mess, anyway. Dith likes it when you "extinguish" the lives of creatures, but doesn't mind it if you create light, so long as you don't use fire, but this includes all fire spells, even bolt of magma and ignite poison when the latter creates no open fires/light or conjure flame when you place it over water to create steam, probably you can create fire-using summons one way or another... And so on.

[XuaXua]

Dith likes it when you "extinguish" the lives of creatures, but doesn't mind it if you create light

The original impl was that it didn't like light, correct? Making it a hatred of fire was "easier".

Change it back to light, and be very specific on exclusions, and list those on the god-detail screen.

[duvessa]

or how about just not having an inconvenient and ultimately meaningless conduct just for the sake of adding crappy flavour, that sounds good to me

[and into]

For at least a while Dith didn't have any conduct at all, aside from the usual "if you worship this god, you cannot worship another god at the same time." I can't recall if that version of Dith made it into a stable version, but it wasn't overpowered to worship Dith and use fire. (Making Dith's active abilities require invocations, on the other hand, was a good move and does make shadow form more balanced. The "no fire" conduct, on the other hand, much like the "no light" conduct is not needed, and I find neither of those to be interesting.)

[damiac]

Dith was more anal about things like lightning before, and it was a lot to keep in your head and kind of arbitrary. I'm guessing this edge case wasn't thought of when that was removed.

Does firing bolt of fire through a monster at a tree give a warning?

Well, I'm pretty sure you'd get a warning for firing a bolt of fire period. Dith doesn't take kindly to those. Maybe you'd get double penance for starting a fire with it.

[argonaut]

I actually appreciate the god conducts. Dith's isn't onerous but early on it keeps you from using some wands and you have to find another way to deal with hydras. Once past lair it doesn't do much since you have other ways of dealing with things but until then the conduct can matter - and you still might have to pass up the +12 flaming double sword of awesomeness.

There's been a lot of flavor loss in DCSS since 0.5, much of it for convenience and (re)playability, but flavor can make the game much more immersive and fun rather than just being a series of tactical challenges.

[and into]

I actually appreciate the god conducts. Dith's isn't onerous but early on it keeps you from using some wands and you have to find another way to deal with hydras. Once past lair it doesn't do much since you have other ways of dealing with things but until then the conduct can matter - and you still might have to pass up the +12 flaming double sword of awesomeness.

I think it sets the horizons for Crawl design pretty low to settle for a conduct that is not very interesting in terms of game play, regardless of whether the flavor as such is considered to be good or not. Especially when there already are good examples of both being achieved simultaneously in many gods and species.

This conduct means that fire elementalists should never worship, a small fraction of draconians cannot use their breath attack, and AM lose inner flame and wizards lose conjure flame. Everything else is entirely situational, and not in a good way. Trog's conduct, "You are (effectively) barred from magic" is both much clearer and much more interesting, since I will almost certainly find spells that I would like to cast, so I am intentionally giving up a meaningful option. Sacrificing move speed under Chei forces you to play differently.

Dith's conduct, by contrast, just means that my conjurer will avoid fire spells (for instance), and it is very unlikely that my only selection of spells have fire as one of their schools. Ditto wands: Dith's conduct is annoying if I only have a wand of fire, but (almost regardless of how many wands of fire I find) ceases to be annoying if I manage to find a few other good wands that are not wand of fire, since I can't zap more than one wand at the same time, anyway. It is basically like the wand didn't generate in the first place. Not very exciting.

Dith's conduct is about as interesting as having a god completely ban use of maces & flails. Outside of a few edge cases, it doesn't really matter, and even when it does matter, it tends much more often to be a nuisance rather than an actual challenge. In the overwhelming majority of cases, it does not limit your options in a way that forces you to make tough, interesting decisions. It just arbitrarily cuts out a few things that are made entirely redundant by other things you will usually have available.

[triorph]

One downside of Dith's conduct is that you can indirectly summon a fire monster using shadow creatures (via rod or spell). E.g. cast shadow creatures in elf, get a deep elf demonologist, and it summons a demon that can cast fire. The demon immediately comes out hostile because of the conduct.

Considering he is the god of shadows, it seems odd that shadow creatures doesn't mesh well in places.

[jejorda2]

Summoned creatures have shadow equipment, right? I haven't read the description in a while. What if Dith dislikes using found (material) equipment, but grants shadow equipment of a quality that depends on piety and maybe invocations and/or weapon and defense skills? Maybe it's always unbranded, so going with dith can guarantee you a top-tier weapon at 20+ weapon skill, but it won't be branded. Being composed of shadow, it vanishes when it isn't equipped. Maybe kind of like Ash and cursed equipment, you gain more piety if you use more shadow equipment. Or replicate the current passives (bleed smoke, duplicate melee attacks, duplicate spells) as armour and weapon brands whose effectiveness depends on Dith piety.

There was a proposal for a while to make Okawaru like this: grants you good equipment, and takes away piety if you don't use it.

[XuaXua]

I cannot recall; is the "fire bad" thing the only "downside" to taking Dith? If so, I recommend those suggesting to bail on the fire to provide alternate requirement situations for penalty.

For example: Dith hates when you wake a sleeping enemy in line-of-sight. Since such a thing is both quite tedious and uncontrollable, I'd suggest that Dith piety volume swing. Gain more piety rapidly, but lose lots of piety quickly on wake-ups. It's not so meaningless as Dith piety is best used in combat.

[duvessa]

The downside to taking Dith is that you can't worship another god.

This is also the biggest downside to every other god in the game except maybe chei, Qazlal, and (on a few characters) Xom.

[XuaXua]

The downside to taking Dith is that you can't worship another god.

If you mean "can't worship another god simultaneously", then sure All gods are like that.

If you mean "can't switch to a different god at a future time..." that's strange, unless the abandonment penalties are so terrible that you might as well never switch.
It's not much of a penalty for the bonuses given to the player if the player intends to stay with Dith for the duration.

Many gods have additional "penalties". Why shouldn't Dith?

[dynast]

For example: Dith hates when you wake a sleeping enemy in line-of-sight. Since such a thing is both quite tedious and uncontrollable, I'd suggest that Dith piety volume swing. Gain more piety rapidly, but lose lots of piety quickly on wake-ups. It's not so meaningless as Dith piety is best used in combat.

That way you make people who doesnt pick dith for stabbing walk around shouting all the time to not lose piety on encounters...

Is it really necessary to change the entire flavor concept of dith just because somone light a tree on fire? i get oka's penance everytime i tab with a ranged weapon without receiving any warning and what even...

[crate]

fwiw the silly fire conduct is the reason I won't bother worshipping Dith again

it's a shame since he's actually a really good AM god other than the fire conduct, but not being able to use such a huge portion of the branded launchers/ammo in the game is frustrating at best (and for the people who actually like inner flame, can't use that either)

[johlstei]

The downside to taking Dith is that you can't worship another god.

If you mean "can't worship another god simultaneously", then sure All gods are like that.

Yes, and it is by far the largest cost incurred by worshipping them, far and away the "primary" conduct if you want to put things in those terms.

[Quazifuji]

If I remember correctly, the reasoning behind Dith's conduct wasn't really any more than people wanted to give him a conduct because it created more variety among gods and "no light" seemed like a logical enough conduct (eventually getting simplified to "no fire"), but I don't remember there being any gameplay reason beyond "conducts are interesting and more gods with conducts would be nice." Even in this thread, I feel like the only defenses for the conduct that I'm seeing are "it's flavorful" and people who seem to want Dith to have a conduct for the sake of giving Dith a conduct, rather than because it really fits Dith's gameplay to have one.

So is there a compelling gameplay reason Dith should have a conduct, whether "no fire" or something else? Because if the only reason anyone wants Dith to have a conduct is because some people are attached to the idea of Dith having a conduct then... well, I don't think Dith should have a conduct.

There are other interesting gods with interesting downsides, and in most cases they're designed around the conduct. Chei, Trog, Ash, Ru, Xom, and the proposed Wulndraste are gods designed around their conducts. Qazlal isn't really designed around the conduct, but it still seems like most people feel like its an interesting and meaningful downside that suits the god well.

Dith was not designed to have a conduct. The conduct was kind of just tacked on late in development, and I think it shows. It just feels out of place and unnecessary. It makes sense from a flavor standpoint, but from a gameplay standpoint it detracts from the god more than it adds.

[damiac]

Regardless of all that, which is a totally valid debate, with Dith having his anti-fire conduct right now, the game should warn you before you do anything that causes penance, including firing lightning toward trees, don't you think?

[and into]

Regardless of all that, which is a totally valid debate, with Dith having his anti-fire conduct right now, the game should warn you before you do anything that causes penance, including firing lightning toward trees, don't you think?

Yeah, honestly the situation you described in the OP sounds more like a bug than anything else. I didn't see anything similar on Mantis by searching "Dith"; perhaps you should report it?

[damiac]

Ok, I just wanted to make sure it was in fact considered a bug.

[mps]

If it's a question of flavor and the issue is light vs. dark, then obviously Dithmenos worshippers shouldn't be allowed to use lightning. Perhaps not dazzling spray either.

Alternatively, Dithmenos could have an ability that extinguishes fire, so that if you indirectly cause a fire you can put it out for no net loss of piety. Perhaps some kind fire specific abjuration type thing.

[johlstei]

If it's a question of flavor and the issue is light vs. dark, then obviously Dithmenos worshippers shouldn't be allowed to use lightning. Perhaps not dazzling spray either.

Alternatively, Dithmenos could have an ability that extinguishes fire, so that if you indirectly cause a fire you can put it out for no net loss of piety. Perhaps some kind fire specific abjuration type thing.

It's annoying enough that dithmenos block corona(did this change?). Enchanter is the exact sort of character you play dithmenos on so blocking their starting spells from him is pretty counterproductive. I would probably never worship him on an enchanter if I couldn't use dazzling spray.

[Siegurt]

Indeed, early in the development process, Dith's conduct changed from "no light" to "no fire", corona was removed from the 'forbidden' spells at around that time.

"Don't make fire" was considered a clear enough conduct

Whereas things like "does dazzling spray actually make light? or does it just "dazzle" the critters? was a questionable thing, "light" isn't really a general crawl mechanic (and fire doesn't "make light" in the sense that say corona or an angel aura would) so Dith's conduct is more clear-cut than it was when it was "no light") "No light-making" was considered a bad and unclear mechanic so it was removed.

However secondary effects that cause fire obviously weren't taken as much into account. Lightning *isn't* fire, so it's allowed, however it can *cause* fires, which are bad, however a simple "You might hit a tree with this lightning bolt" is probably a fine warning for Dith to have.

As to whether he needs a conduct at all (or indeed whether any god does) that's a reasonable question, personally I like that gods have conducts, but I can see how they aren't required to make a god work.

[johlstei]

Indeed, early in the development process, Dith's conduct changed from "no light" to "no fire", corona was removed from the 'forbidden' spells at around that time.

"Don't make fire" was considered a clear enough conduct

Whereas things like "does dazzling spray actually make light? or does it just "dazzle" the critters? was a questionable thing, "light" isn't really a general crawl mechanic (and fire doesn't "make light" in the sense that say corona or an angel aura would) so Dith's conduct is more clear-cut than it was when it was "no light") "No light-making" was considered a bad and unclear mechanic so it was removed.

However secondary effects that cause fire obviously weren't taken as much into account. Lightning *isn't* fire, so it's allowed, however it can *cause* fires, which are bad, however a simple "You might hit a tree with this lightning bolt" is probably a fine warning for Dith to have.

As to whether he needs a conduct at all (or indeed whether any god does) that's a reasonable question, personally I like that gods have conducts, but I can see how they aren't required to make a god work.

Well originally it was "no light-causing spells" which included lightning and fire, corona certainly survived that first round of "cuts". He hates corona in 0.15 still, but yeah it does look like that is removed in trunk.

[Siegurt]

Indeed, early in the development process, Dith's conduct changed from "no light" to "no fire", corona was removed from the 'forbidden' spells at around that time.

"Don't make fire" was considered a clear enough conduct

Whereas things like "does dazzling spray actually make light? or does it just "dazzle" the critters? was a questionable thing, "light" isn't really a general crawl mechanic (and fire doesn't "make light" in the sense that say corona or an angel aura would) so Dith's conduct is more clear-cut than it was when it was "no light") "No light-making" was considered a bad and unclear mechanic so it was removed.

However secondary effects that cause fire obviously weren't taken as much into account. Lightning *isn't* fire, so it's allowed, however it can *cause* fires, which are bad, however a simple "You might hit a tree with this lightning bolt" is probably a fine warning for Dith to have.

As to whether he needs a conduct at all (or indeed whether any god does) that's a reasonable question, personally I like that gods have conducts, but I can see how they aren't required to make a god work.

Well originally it was "no light-causing spells" which included lightning and fire, corona certainly survived that first round of "cuts". He hates corona in 0.15 still, but yeah it does look like that is removed in trunk.

Wow, it feels like ages ago for me, but I guess since I play pretty much only trunk It has been a subjectively long time (I'm actively surprised him hating corona made it into stable though)

[johlstei]

Indeed, early in the development process, Dith's conduct changed from "no light" to "no fire", corona was removed from the 'forbidden' spells at around that time.

"Don't make fire" was considered a clear enough conduct

Whereas things like "does dazzling spray actually make light? or does it just "dazzle" the critters? was a questionable thing, "light" isn't really a general crawl mechanic (and fire doesn't "make light" in the sense that say corona or an angel aura would) so Dith's conduct is more clear-cut than it was when it was "no light") "No light-making" was considered a bad and unclear mechanic so it was removed.

However secondary effects that cause fire obviously weren't taken as much into account. Lightning *isn't* fire, so it's allowed, however it can *cause* fires, which are bad, however a simple "You might hit a tree with this lightning bolt" is probably a fine warning for Dith to have.

As to whether he needs a conduct at all (or indeed whether any god does) that's a reasonable question, personally I like that gods have conducts, but I can see how they aren't required to make a god work.

Well originally it was "no light-causing spells" which included lightning and fire, corona certainly survived that first round of "cuts". He hates corona in 0.15 still, but yeah it does look like that is removed in trunk.

Wow, it feels like ages ago for me, but I guess since I play pretty much only trunk It has been a subjectively long time (I'm actively surprised him hating corona made it into stable though)

Playing SpEns of Dith in sprint and absent-mindedly hitting zz<enter> made me all too aware of it.