Powered By Death as a Top Tier DS Mut

[wizzzargh]

Powered By Death is really amazingly good, and completely changes what your character is capable of in terms of not having to rest and being able to chew through hordes of enemies without resting, with healing that can easily be similar to chugging !curing every single turn. It greatly rewards killing enemies quickly and encourages a very aggressive playstyle as opposed to the 'optimal' tactics of lure one enemy away from its buddies and murder it, then rest to full, and repeat.

In comparison, the 'top' level DS mutations Passive Freeze and Resist Torment+Black Mark are hardly noticeable and don't much change the way a character is played, especially with how late they seem to come online. Spiny can be very impressive early game, but Passive Freeze is barely noticeable against fatty lategame threats. I guess I've slowed a few draconians with it?

I'd say Powered By Death is more worthy of taking a top tier DS mutation slot than passive freeze or black mark, which feel more on par with powered by pain, spiny, ignite blood, nightstalker, and other 2nd tier DS mutations. Though as an aside, most of those 2nd tier mutations, in my experience, still tend to influence my strategy more than black mark and passive freeze ever have.

[Berder]

Reasonable.

[wizzzargh]

Anecdotal evidence isn't worth much but for what it's worth, my last 6 wins have all had Powered by Death. Maybe that's more a testament to my playing style than actual overpoweredness, but currently it seems like this mutation is massively superior to anything else Demonspawn get.

[Aethrus]

I had a Demonspawn with Powered by Death, Qazlal, and the Shield of the Gong. I had so much regen that I could stand completely surrounded by powerful enemies and fight extended battles at almost constantly near full HP, which worked well with my Augmentation.

That said, I think my build was a unique situation with a powerful screen-wide nuke from my god and enough noise to build regen up to absurd levels alongside very effective defenses.

I think this is the result of it no longer being tied to the enemy dropping a corpse and being near the rapidly rotting corpse while it happened. Those were excellent quality of life improvements but it has also made the effect much easier to stack.

It certainly has some of the biggest impact of the demonspawn mutations if a character plays aggressively enough to leverage it. I don't see the fact that having it makes luring single opponents away and fighting them solo, with rest between, as an actual problem with it though. If anything, I'm glad it makes something that isn't boring much more viable!

[wizzzargh]

Did I come across as though I supported luring? That wasn't my intention at all... I think the new PBD is a great mutation and I don't necessarily want it nerfed, I just think that it's more 'deserving' of being a final mutation than the lameness of Black mark and Passive Freeze. I don't know what the devteams design goals are for DS, but I assumed that your top mutation was supposed to be something that you saw and and went 'This is going to be great fun.' But in the current state of affairs, I'm waaaay more excited to get PBD than I am for any of the top tier mutations, except maybe Hellfire or the +20 AC Icemail.

This thread seems to be basically just me posting my opinions though, so meh.

[kuniqs]

Powered by death makes playing the game so much fun it would be nice if every race had a form of it.

[Sar]

Makhleb?

[bel]

Ninja'ed by Sar.

[Sprucery]

Makhleb?

Poor Demigods...

[nago]

Vamp weapon for them

[dowan]

Makhleb?

A DS who gets demonic guardians and powered by death basically has mahkleb built in. Yeah, yeah, you lose the destruction spells, but who cares. Of course, you could (and probably should) double down on the goodness and worship mahkleb while you're at it.

What's my point? I agree with the OP, PBD is a really good mutation, and should switch places with one of the other ones listed in the OP.

[Shard1697]

This is a bit old now, but honestly I really strongly agree with it. Once you get powered by death it completely changes how you play and what you are capable of, so many dangerous situations become simple if there are weak enemies around to get crazy regen off of.