The Tavern

Vehu spell gifts are awkward.

1) Vehu opening spell gifts are lvl 1, but generally vehu followers are blasters/casters who have conjurations already, not people looking to branch into conjurations. This has been retracted.

2) You get through mid level spells faster than you get the xp to learn them. You can pick one or two, but you watch a lot of good spells come and go because you don't have the spell levels to commit to spells you can't cast yet.

3) You get top level Vehu spells -way- before lvl 8/9 spells are feasible. Your mid-level roulette stops at this point.

Thoughts.

1) Start vehu's spell wheel at lvl 2 conjurations, rather than lvl 1. Someone who has found a vehu altar needs throw flame/frost/stone arrow way more than they need shock or flame tongue. This has been retracted.

2&3) Keep the random wheel going through lvl 5-7 spells after you hit max piety.

2b) The choice of "build my character non-optimally (unlearn a useful spell, overtrain spellcasting) to learn Freezing cloud now even though I won't be able to cast it for a while" is not fun choice. It is anti-crawl philosophy. It is also a really irritating part of vehu.

Separate Thought
Vehu should get an overcharge ability at high piety. Increases spellpower of next spell, leaves character exhausted.

1) Vehumet should be a magic option for those without spells (Sif doesn't accept the ignorant) so starting at level 1 is good for this point. Those who know magic take V for the later benefits.

2) Your not suppose to learn every spell Vehumet throws at you (same as Oka gifts or Sifs books), although if many feel the pace is off then this could be a point. I would like to know how the gifts are timed, piety? experience? Are the gifts chosen so there's some chance you can cast them soon?

3) level 8/9 are experience heavy and often not worth it. I'd rather know what I can learn before I invest with these spell

If I go vehu at the ecumenical temple on d4, I don't want to spend d4-d7 only having access to level 1 spells. Getting a level 2 spell online at this point is minor xp, and more useful for a hybrid char.

Anyway, do non blastermages ever go vehu? Does this player exist outside of a newbie, in which case it is just a trap for new players?

It would be nice if old gifts didn't expire when you get new ones.

edgefigaro wrote:If I go vehu at the ecumenical temple on d4, I don't want to spend d4-d7 only having access to level 1 spells. Getting a level 2 spell online at this point is minor xp, and more useful for a hybrid char.

Throw Flame/Frost aren't upgrades; as compared to most of the level 1 spells, you aren't spending double the MP to get double the damage: you are spending double the MP to get a little bit of extra damage and full range.

Flame Tongue does almost as much damage (sometimes more) for half the MP. Shock does good damage on double zaps and has additional utility in being a full range bolt spell.

If I'm going to spend valuable early game spell levels on a low level spell, I'd generally prefer it to be a level 1 spell rather than Throw Flame/Frost.

(Searing Ray is good for damage and Stone Arrow is level 3)

Ima retract the statement about lvl 1 spells. OP updated. Lvl 5-7 random gifts are what inspired this post, and I don't want to get the thread derailed.

I do think it would be cool if you could "bank" a couple of Vehumet's spell gifts rather than having them immediately disappear when a new one was offered. Possibly being able to keep 2 or 3 of them in your virtual spellbook before he starts removing them would help. I often find myself in the situation where he'll offer iron shot (or parrow), freezing/pcloud, and bolt of X, and I'll have to either pass on one/two or if I'm lucky enough to have a good amount of ?amnesia forget a sizeable amount of my starting spells.

On the one hand, I do understand the idea that having Veh offer his gifts in this way is supposed to make the player think ahead and make choices, but the gifts often come much faster than you can possibly learn them at the back end (unless you're a DE). If I'm lucky enough to have found an amulet of faith, I will often put it on and remove it just to keep a gift that I want around longer, which seems like an incredibly niche and gamey use of the amulet.

edgefigaro wrote:Anyway, do non blastermages ever go vehu? Does this player exist outside of a newbie, in which case it is just a trap for new players?

I picked Vehumet with a HuWr and had iron shot castable before Lair. That was the only time I picked Vehumet with a non-spellcaster though.

Part of the "problem" is that melee is good in Crawl and there's no reason to switch from melee to offensive spells. It's plausible to pick Veh if you get the altar on D:2 and want to have some spells available in the early game where spells are kind of good. It's still iffy because why not just spend exp on better melee instead. Vehumet spell gifts have the advantage that they almost guarantee getting a decent spell that lets you transition from your early game tool set to a D:8+ offensive ability. Whereas if you're melee you're hoping for a decent weapon drop to replace your starting weapon and you may not find one. Though usually you will.

It's acceptable but not that great. I like it when gods work for many character types, and Vehumet does work for melee types, so that's nice. But in practice no one picks Veh with melee types so I wouldn't really care if Vehumet stopped supporting them.

Vehumet spell gifts are certainly not perfect, but I like spell gifts much better than the old book gifts. (Disclaimer: I've lobbied for the change all the time. The previous sentence just says that I like to play new Vehumet, too.)

The idea of spell gifts is to force decisions. I would like to point out that each of the three complaints of the OP can be construed as actual features -- I think this is what 666 was getting into, as well. Regarding level 5-7 spell gifts, they come at a time when you should be prepared: if they're crucial for you, you could be more conservative with loading of other spells, or train more Spellcasting, or be prepared to forget some spells. I wonder if some Vehumetists actually forget spells through books in order to learn a relevant gift?

Of course, all of this comes from a guy who cherished winning a bookless pure caster, so I am problaby a bit weird that way.

Recent NaVM snip with relevant spells:

Code:: 5539 | D:5 | Found a staircase to the Ecumenical Temple. 5547 | Temple | Entered the Ecumenical Temple 5594 | Temple | Became a worshipper of Vehumet 7275 | D:6 | Acquired Vehumet's first power 7275 | D:6 | Offered knowledge of Sandblast by Vehumet. 7287 | D:6 | Learned a level 1 spell: Sandblast 9655 | D:8 | Offered knowledge of Shock by Vehumet. 12127 | D:10 | Learned a level 1 spell: Summon Butterflies 12231 | D:10 | Offered knowledge of Throw Flame by Vehumet. 12731 | D:10 | Learned a level 2 spell: Throw Flame 13945 | D:10 | Offered knowledge of Inner Flame by Vehumet. 13950 | D:10 | Learned a level 3 spell: Inner Flame 14168 | D:11 | Learned a level 5 spell: Bolt of Magma 15364 | Orc:1 | Offered knowledge of Iskenderun's Battlesphere by Vehumet. 15825 | Orc:2 | Learned a level 5 spell: Iskenderun's Battlesphere 15846 | Orc:1 | Offered knowledge of Bolt of Draining by Vehumet. 17930 | Orc:4 | Offered knowledge of Irradiate by Vehumet. 22405 | D:11 | Learned a level 6 spell: Poisonous Cloud 22499 | D:10 | Learned a level 2 spell: Blink 22926 | Lair:2 | Offered knowledge of Freezing Cloud by Vehumet. 25607 | Lair:4 | Offered knowledge of Delayed Fireball by Vehumet. 27565 | Lair:6 | Offered knowledge of Ozocubu's Refrigeration by Vehumet. 29716 | Lair:8 | Offered knowledge of Conjure Ball Lightning by Vehumet. 33068 | Orc:4 | Offered knowledge of Bolt of Cold by Vehumet. 36840 | D:11 | Learned a level 7 spell: Orb of Destruction 36980 | D:12 | Offered knowledge of Fire Storm by Vehumet. 36980 | D:12 | Offered knowledge of Chain Lightning by Vehumet. 36980 | D:12 | Offered knowledge of Tornado by Vehumet. 36980 | D:12 | Offered knowledge of Fire Storm by Vehumet. 36980 | D:12 | Offered knowledge of Chain Lightning by Vehumet. 36980 | D:12 | Offered knowledge of Tornado by Vehumet. 40268 | Spider:1 | Learned a level 3 spell: Ozocubu's Armour. Cast: Sting | 36 | 60 | 142 | 467 | 396 | 278 | 34 | || 1413 Mephitic Cloud | 1 | 2 | 13 | 54 | 17 | 1 | | || 88 Olgreb's Toxic Ra | | 5 | 8 | 64 | 5 | | | || 82 Cure Poison | | | 1 | 14 | 6 | 4 | | || 25 Sandblast | | | 30 | 67 | 1 | | | || 98 Throw Flame | | | | 20 | | | | || 20 Bolt of Magma | | | | 25 | 120 | 207 | 138 | 5 || 495 Inner Flame | | | | 13 | 1 | | | || 14 Iskenderun's Batt | | | | 21 | 84 | 66 | 9 | || 180 Poisonous Cloud | | | | | 124 | 351 | 210 | 10 || 695 Blink | | | | | 6 | 11 | 13 | || 30 Orb of Destructio | | | | | | 134 | 236 | 18 || 388 Summon Butterflie | | | | | | 3 | | || 3 Ozocubu's Armour | | | | | | 33 | 32 | 3 || 68 Lee's Rapid Decon | | | | | | | 57 | || 57 Repel Missiles | | | | | | | 3 | 1 || 4 Regeneration | | | | | | | 18 | 2 || 20 Poison Arrow | | | | | | | | 29 || 29

dpeg wrote:I wonder if some Vehumetists actually forget spells through books in order to learn a relevant gift?

I try to avoid it when possible, but I certainly will if I'm reasonably sure that a: I won't want the spell back later (usually true) and b: I won't want to forget something else from the same book (less frequently true).

I forget spells via book all the time.

One of the things I hate about Vehu gifts is, Sure I'd branch into FIRE/ICE (as a non-mage, --Wz or --Cj that took Vehu), but if you are just offering me B.Fire/B.Cold right now I have no clue if you'll give me the other relevant spells that combo well with that! Makes the decision tedious and has a high potential for wasted XP/Spell Levels.

Also, yes, not being able to accept gifts because of Spell Levels is really annoying. I RNGed Vehumet when praying at a "faded altar" as a Troll and due to the -5 Apt. Even Focusing * Spellcasting/+ Conj didn't give me sufficient spell levels to learn much at all. It'd be better paced to where a person could reasonable make those decisions (without having to 100% their XP into Spellcasting and Conj and make their defenses and melee lacking). I'd even joked about intentionally putting on and removing Faith repeatedly with Vehu to slow the gifts down enough for races with bad apts.

-- A better solution for this would be basing the gift rate on relevant skill levels, perhaps --

dpeg wrote: I wonder if some Vehumetists actually forget spells through books in order to learn a relevant gift?

I almost always do, at least. Most of Vehumet's gifts won't be useful, but you need to make room for the good ones somehow.

You can forget spells through books? I never knew that. I've rarely have the need to forget spells, but that could be partly due to my ignorance of this feature, choosing instead to forgo the memorization of spells I did not totally want, unless I already had a stack of amnesia available. Maybe I should read the game help more.

dpeg wrote:I wonder if some Vehumetists actually forget spells through books in order to learn a relevant gift?

I do this very often. If I've already learned all the spells I want from the book, why waste the ?amnesia

bcadren wrote:you are just offering me B.Fire/B.Cold right now I have no clue if you'll give me the other relevant spells that combo well with that

bolt spells combo pretty well with themselves imo

I forget spells through books all the time.

As to OP: Vehumet's early gifts are crappy but it gives a lot of spells to work with later on. Lvl 1 spells are sometimes not useless, for instance, if I'm playing a VM and get offered sandblast or flame tongue, I will take it, sometimes, to handle poison resistant monsters.

Later on, of course there is a lot of choice. If you feel you are running low on spell slots, just train more spellcasting. Personally, I rarely run out of spell slots with Vehumet, though I might need to forget a few spells to make room sometimes. But that is usually not too difficult.

As to lvl 8/9 spells, they are often too expensive, but for certain builds it makes sense to go for them. Vehumet's wizardry bonus really helps here.

Now that I think of it, I never forget spells through books. Of course I should do it in some cases. I guess this just means that I've always had enough ?amnesia for my needs.

How about this:

Veh keeps offering spells at the same rate he currently does, but up to three will stay available at a time, instead of just one. Not only does this give you more time to get more spell slots, it also allows you to wait after he offers a spell you're uncertain about, so you can see what his next couple gifts are before deciding.

On the back end, instead of offering all three final gifts at once and wiping out everything else on your memorization list, he should offer them one at a time, just as with previous gifts.

dpeg wrote:The idea of spell gifts is to force decisions. I would like to point out that each of the three complaints of the OP can be construed as actual features -- I think this is what 666 was getting into, as well. Regarding level 5-7 spell gifts, they come at a time when you should be prepared: if they're crucial for you, you could be more conservative with loading of other spells, or train more Spellcasting, or be prepared to forget some spells. I wonder if some Vehumetists actually forget spells through books in order to learn a relevant gift?

Except literally none of this happens, because you can just decay your piety to keep a spell gift around as long as you want. It's a terrible design compared to just giving single-spell books: it confuses players, makes M screen functionality inconsistent, and makes you count the number of gifts. Every problem with Vehumet spell gifts disappears, without changing Vehumet's power or functionality, if you just go back to giving regular damn books, but you're so insistent on this pet feature that you try to justify it with situations that don't even exist.

Veh had ought to be able to grant you the use of the spells he offers without memorizing them. Piety cost to forget spells you asked to remember divinely. Up to (3+invo/3) spell levels can be divinely memorized, perhaps? Or a piety dependence. But this would let you work the spells without spending for them.

duvessa wrote:Except literally none of this happens, because you can just decay your piety to keep a spell gift around as long as you want.

For what very little it's worth, I've literally never seen a player do this. You're totally right that it would work, I've just never seen it happen once, whereas I see about a thread a month where a player talks about changing their playstyle in order to take advantage of Veh gifts. Chalk it up to player incompetence, but it's not exactly a problem anybody's taking advantage of, afaik.

Seems like you could also just change how piety decay works with Veh slightly if you want to preserve the behavior dpeg prizes; I don't think it really matters either way. Your book-gifting idea would sure be a lot less spoiler-y.

It never occured to me you could... and that's with multiple Veh ascensions.

Hurricos wrote:Veh had ought to be able to grant you the use of the spells he offers without memorizing them. Piety cost to forget spells you asked to remember divinely. Up to (3+invo/3) spell levels can be divinely memorized, perhaps? Or a piety dependence. But this would let you work the spells without spending for them.

This is a massive nerf to Vehu except in a ridiculous endgame character, if you can't just use spell slots for divine gifts.

Using the divine spell slot idea, might be fun to make veh gifts pokemon style and ditch spell levels altogether for them. "You're trying to learn a vehumet spell, but you already have 3 memorized, choose which spell to forget!"

RE: Spell forgetting through books for vehumet players. Amnesia through books should either be removed or made more transparent. Also, you can't forget veh gifts from books early game

archaeo wrote:
duvessa wrote:Except literally none of this happens, because you can just decay your piety to keep a spell gift around as long as you want.

For what very little it's worth, I've literally never seen a player do this. You're totally right that it would work, I've just never seen it happen once, whereas I see about a thread a month where a player talks about changing their playstyle in order to take advantage of Veh gifts. Chalk it up to player incompetence, but it's not exactly a problem anybody's taking advantage of, afaik.

Seems like you could also just change how piety decay works with Veh slightly if you want to preserve the behavior dpeg prizes; I don't think it really matters either way. Your book-gifting idea would sure be a lot less spoiler-y.

You need to beware the hunger cost, though. Unless there is some way to decay your piety without just waiting that I do not know of. Can't believe I just provided a justification for food.

It's not as if "This is a hypothetical problem, even though no one takes advantage of because it would be too unpleasant" has not been used as justification before. Just look at food.

^Amulet of piety.

I've taken advantage of it and seen other players take advantage of it. I'm not sure why it's so hard to believe someone would take advantage of it, given that the very first post in the thread is from a player who would clearly benefit from it.

I rarely do it just via piety decay, although I have on a couple occasions. But I mentioned gaming veh piety with an amulet of faith earlier, and I personally know of at least a couple of other people who do it that way, and I can't imagine it's all that uncommon. The OP would also benefit from either.

Now that I know that one can game vehu with an amulet of faith in a very non-intuitive way, I'm not so concerned about it. Crawl is working as intended.

I have taken off faith ammy to slow down Veh gifts

but that was only really necessary because I had the faith ammy equipped in the first place

duvessa wrote:
dpeg wrote:The idea of spell gifts is to force decisions. I would like to point out that each of the three complaints of the OP can be construed as actual features -- I think this is what 666 was getting into, as well. Regarding level 5-7 spell gifts, they come at a time when you should be prepared: if they're crucial for you, you could be more conservative with loading of other spells, or train more Spellcasting, or be prepared to forget some spells. I wonder if some Vehumetists actually forget spells through books in order to learn a relevant gift?
Except literally none of this happens, because you can just decay your piety to keep a spell gift around as long as you want. It's a terrible design compared to just giving single-spell books: it confuses players, makes M screen functionality inconsistent, and makes you count the number of gifts. Every problem with Vehumet spell gifts disappears, without changing Vehumet's power or functionality, if you just go back to giving regular damn books, but you're so insistent on this pet feature that you try to justify it with situations that don't even exist.

I have basically no Crawl time these days, but got to say I'm pretty sure this rant tells a lot more about you than about me or my pet features.

For what it's worth, I've been aware of intentional piety dropping back when the whole thing was a mere idea, I've never witnessed any of it, and I was/am prepared to do something about it should it happen. If you fail to see the difference between spell gifts and single-spell book gifts: your loss!

Else in this thread: thanks for feedback about amnesia through books, that's good to know.

dpeg wrote:For what it's worth, I've been aware of intentional piety dropping back when the whole thing was a mere idea, I've never witnessed any of it, and I was/am prepared to do something about it should it happen. If you fail to see the difference between spell gifts and single-spell book gifts: your loss!

Else in this thread: thanks for feedback about amnesia through books, that's good to know.

In this very thread it has been claimed that 'intentional piety dropping' has happened. I'm not sure I'd do it personally, but I would play knowing that I should and it wouldn't feel good.

In your view what are the significant positive differences between spell gifts and single-spell book gifts?

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Vehu Spell Gifts

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