Spider form butchering


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Blades Runner

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Post Thursday, 11th August 2011, 16:11

Spider form butchering

Attempting to butcher in spider form yields "you can't wield anything in your present form" message. I guess in DCSS spiders can't wield their implicit knife and don't have claws, even though I believe real world spiders do have claws. Why not allow butchering in spider form? Mainly the prohibition just gets in the way. It doesn't make spider form balanced or flavorful, but it does present a very mild annoyance.

It might be fun if spiders sucked like vampires (or like real world spiders). Likewise, fulsome distillation might be more interesting (and mildly nerfed) if it followed the vampire sucking rules. (How does FD turn a worm corpse into water when a vampire can't get blood from it? Yes, blood<>water but still....)
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Dungeon Master

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Post Thursday, 11th August 2011, 16:26

Re: Spider form butchering

I'm pretty sure real spiders don't have claws. If we want some realism, spider form could suck insect corpses.
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Barkeep

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Post Thursday, 11th August 2011, 16:57

Re: Spider form butchering

It would be rather nice to be able to gain nutrition from corpses while in spider form. The situation now just leads to ending your transformation, butchering, and transforming again.

I guess it'd be a slight buff in that you could spiderform to get around wielding a cursed blunt weapon, but really... the set of circumstances where that would be necessary is vanishingly uncommon.
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Dungeon Master

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Post Thursday, 11th August 2011, 18:36

Re: Spider form butchering

Actually, I'd rather increase the restrictions while transformed. I don't like the idea of transmuters keeping forms all the time like buffs.
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Barkeep

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Post Thursday, 11th August 2011, 20:01

Re: Spider form butchering

+1 on that page in general. I'm happy with forms causing more restrictions; it's mostly that the butchering restriction is irritating while not ever causing a real hazard to the player. It's not like I'm chopping corpses while there are monsters around.

And looking back at my post, I wouldn't ever bother re-transforming immediately after butchering; I'd wait until there was something new I wanted to poison or run from.
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Vestibule Violator

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Post Thursday, 11th August 2011, 23:19

Re: Spider form butchering

Spider form being unable to butcher is mostly about Ash I think.

About the extra form restrictions, I don't like being unable to use wands (wands are nice), and I don't like the cloak removal for ice beast (I think it's funny). No evaporate in forms sounds fine to me.

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smock

Blades Runner

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Post Friday, 12th August 2011, 02:40

Re: Spider form butchering

galehar wrote:I'm pretty sure real spiders don't have claws. If we want some realism, spider form could suck insect corpses.


The penultimate drawing shows claws on spiders. I don't know if a spider claw works like a tiger claws or a legal clause.
http://www.bumblebee.org/invertebrates/Araneae.htm

Galefury wrote:Spider form being unable to butcher is mostly about Ash I think.

About the extra form restrictions, I don't like being unable to use wands (wands are nice), and I don't like the cloak removal for ice beast (I think it's funny). No evaporate in forms sounds fine to me.


The point about Ash makes good sense. I don't get why Ash is made to be better for users of blades but that's a bigger topic.

Yes to more restrictions on forms. Also, I'd like to forms' perks to be spread across more forms. Spider form, ice form and statue form all have many advantages that could be spread across more than just three forms. Venom attack, EV, swiftness, and clinging? rC+++, rPois, swimming, AC, +20% HP, freezing attack, Ozo's synergy? AC, +50% HP, str, rPois, rElec, rN+, Torment and rotting resistance, smashing, stoneskin synergy. Sign me up!
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Halls Hopper

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Post Friday, 12th August 2011, 08:50

Re: Spider form butchering

Those claws you see on the diagram are for gripping, not cutting. Spiders have no shearing blades anywhere. Zoologist away!
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Barkeep

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Post Friday, 12th August 2011, 11:49

Re: Spider form butchering

smock wrote:
Galefury wrote:Spider form being unable to butcher is mostly about Ash I think.


The point about Ash makes good sense.


... except that, if you're playing as a Tm of Ash (and not going unarmed for some reason), you'll have Ice Form castable by early-mid Lair, and Blade Hands shortly thereafter. So you'd be unable to transform to butcher for maybe a few early levels of D.

Maybe if cursed gear had a chance to prevent any transformation that would meld it, decreasing with spell power...? Of course, that'd make Ash more challenging for transmuters. Then again, Ash could mitigate that effect at some piety (or bondage) level...
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