Halls Hopper
Posts: 76
Joined: Sunday, 15th December 2013, 19:43
Saturday, 1st July 2023, 22:23
Pakellas Reborn
Burn twice as bright. Burn half as long.
Description
Pakellas was once a minor god of invention. However, not so long ago, followers of Pakellas attempted a blasphemous experiment: tried to supercharge their god with faith. The result almost destroyed their god, transforming Pakellas into an explosive furnace of divine energy. The reborn god now offers power at a price to anyone who picks up a wand. Revels in destructive displays of power.
Pakellas allows followers to find wands more often, at the cost of finding magical equipment less often. Additionally, followers of Pakellas will find their wands more effective, at the cost of burning through more charges. Exceptionally devoted followers might also gain access to a highly destructive but highly dangerous form of wand. To mitigate some of the drawbacks that come with their god's favour, followers of Pekellas have also found ways to safely release excess faith, lest they wind up like their god.
Pakellas likes it when you kill living beings, you destroy the undead, you kill demons, you kill holy beings and you destroy nonliving beings.
Abilities
------Wand Dependency: When you would come across a piece of magical equipment (such as enchanted weapons/armour or jewellery), there is a chance that you come across a wand instead. The probability of this increases with your faith.
*-----Stronger Wands: Your wands are more powerful but cost more charges to evoke. The higher your faith, the more powerful (but more costly) your wands become.
*-----Vent Faith: When you use this ability, your piety decreases by one level.
******Unleash Power: Single-use. Permanent. When you use this ability, it causes any wand of flame you pick up (as well as any wands of flame you are already carrying) to transform into a wand of nuclear flame. These wands deal more damage and bypass fire resistance, but spill out heavy amounts of magical contamination. The amount of magical contamination rises exponentially with the damage dealt.
Suggested Formulae
Wand Dependency. The chance of equipment being replaced by a wand is (piety/2)%, meaning that at maximum faith, the chance of wand replacement is 100%. Note that this only applies to equipment found on the ground, so equipment carried by monsters and found in shops isn't affected. Also, artefacts may be immune to wand replacement.
Stronger Wands. At piety level 1, wands cost 2 charges and have their power multiplied by 1.6. At piety level 3, wands cost 3 charges and have their power multiplied by 2.1. At piety level 5, wands cost 4 charges and have their power multiplied by 2.5. Specific formulae might be used to make this a smoother gradient, but the point is to make it so that expending more charges at once is less efficient than expending them individually.
Vent Faith. Your faith drops down exactly one piety level. For example, if you are halfway to peity level 4, you drop to being halfway to piety level 3. There's no risk of failure or cost to using this ability.
Unleash Power. A wand of nuclear flames deals 2d(5.55 + 0.35*Evocations) smite damage, up to 2d16 at Evo 27. This means you still need a high evocations skill to get the most out of it. Contamination cost is approximately 1.2*(damage dealt^2). This means that, at high piety levels, just a couple of zaps is enough to put you in the danger zone.
Explanation
Another attempt at an evocation god. The various elements are meant to work in conjunction with each other. Stronger Wands means wands are more powerful but using them costs more charges. This is somewhat mitigated by Wand Dependency offering more wands, at the cost of potentially missing out on useful permanent items. The downsides of both these abilities can be managed by Vent Faith, which offers some decision-making to an otherwise relatively passive god.
Unleash Power is partially there to keep wands of flame viable lategame. However, it also has an interesting interaction with the Stronger Wands/Vent Faith decision. Because the magical contamination rises exponentially with damage dealt, if you're concerned about getting over-irradiated, then it's a smart idea to lower your faith. Of course, the downside there is that, when you need extra firepower the most, you might not have it.
These abilities all tie together into a larger theme: power at a price. All those additional wands you get are gaine in lieu of more permanent equipment. All those charges you expend now can't be spent later. All that nuclear flame you throw around can wind up hurting you as much as your enemies. The idea is for Pakellas's gifts to come across as inherently dangerous and unstable. For you to feel as though you're wielding a great power that you can barely control.
Possible Problems
Aside from the fact that the concept of an evocation god might be fundamentally flawed, there are other concerns. For example, there's the concern that there's some mechanics I'm overlooking or unaware of that result in Pakellas being hideously overpowered/underpowered. Sure, some of that can be mitigated by tweaking certain numbers. However, there's always some parts of balancing that can't be fixed just by adjusting the variables.
More important than that, though, is the fear that Pakellas might be unfun. The design is meant to allow for multiple strategies when it comes to worshipping Pakellas. Do you maximise faith as soon as possible and damn the consequences? Do you try to keep it low early on, until you've got enough viable equipment? Do you use Pakellas to hoard a large number of wands before switching to a different god? The idea is for players to feel as though there are a number of ways to get the most out of Pakellas. The concern is that there might be a singular optimal strategy, one that relies on tedium and busywork.
Lastly, I am aware that this "evocation god" focuses solely on wands. Initially, that was just a way to get around the fact that there are a wide variety of evocable items, each of which work in different ways. However, as my idea for Pakellas coalesced, I realised that the power-at-a-price theme worked intuitively well with wands, but less so with other evocable items. However, I'm sure new abilities could be added if Pakellas feels a little too bare bones.
Description
Pakellas was once a minor god of invention. However, not so long ago, followers of Pakellas attempted a blasphemous experiment: tried to supercharge their god with faith. The result almost destroyed their god, transforming Pakellas into an explosive furnace of divine energy. The reborn god now offers power at a price to anyone who picks up a wand. Revels in destructive displays of power.
Pakellas allows followers to find wands more often, at the cost of finding magical equipment less often. Additionally, followers of Pakellas will find their wands more effective, at the cost of burning through more charges. Exceptionally devoted followers might also gain access to a highly destructive but highly dangerous form of wand. To mitigate some of the drawbacks that come with their god's favour, followers of Pekellas have also found ways to safely release excess faith, lest they wind up like their god.
Pakellas likes it when you kill living beings, you destroy the undead, you kill demons, you kill holy beings and you destroy nonliving beings.
Abilities
------Wand Dependency: When you would come across a piece of magical equipment (such as enchanted weapons/armour or jewellery), there is a chance that you come across a wand instead. The probability of this increases with your faith.
*-----Stronger Wands: Your wands are more powerful but cost more charges to evoke. The higher your faith, the more powerful (but more costly) your wands become.
*-----Vent Faith: When you use this ability, your piety decreases by one level.
******Unleash Power: Single-use. Permanent. When you use this ability, it causes any wand of flame you pick up (as well as any wands of flame you are already carrying) to transform into a wand of nuclear flame. These wands deal more damage and bypass fire resistance, but spill out heavy amounts of magical contamination. The amount of magical contamination rises exponentially with the damage dealt.
Suggested Formulae
Wand Dependency. The chance of equipment being replaced by a wand is (piety/2)%, meaning that at maximum faith, the chance of wand replacement is 100%. Note that this only applies to equipment found on the ground, so equipment carried by monsters and found in shops isn't affected. Also, artefacts may be immune to wand replacement.
Stronger Wands. At piety level 1, wands cost 2 charges and have their power multiplied by 1.6. At piety level 3, wands cost 3 charges and have their power multiplied by 2.1. At piety level 5, wands cost 4 charges and have their power multiplied by 2.5. Specific formulae might be used to make this a smoother gradient, but the point is to make it so that expending more charges at once is less efficient than expending them individually.
Vent Faith. Your faith drops down exactly one piety level. For example, if you are halfway to peity level 4, you drop to being halfway to piety level 3. There's no risk of failure or cost to using this ability.
Unleash Power. A wand of nuclear flames deals 2d(5.55 + 0.35*Evocations) smite damage, up to 2d16 at Evo 27. This means you still need a high evocations skill to get the most out of it. Contamination cost is approximately 1.2*(damage dealt^2). This means that, at high piety levels, just a couple of zaps is enough to put you in the danger zone.
Explanation
Another attempt at an evocation god. The various elements are meant to work in conjunction with each other. Stronger Wands means wands are more powerful but using them costs more charges. This is somewhat mitigated by Wand Dependency offering more wands, at the cost of potentially missing out on useful permanent items. The downsides of both these abilities can be managed by Vent Faith, which offers some decision-making to an otherwise relatively passive god.
Unleash Power is partially there to keep wands of flame viable lategame. However, it also has an interesting interaction with the Stronger Wands/Vent Faith decision. Because the magical contamination rises exponentially with damage dealt, if you're concerned about getting over-irradiated, then it's a smart idea to lower your faith. Of course, the downside there is that, when you need extra firepower the most, you might not have it.
These abilities all tie together into a larger theme: power at a price. All those additional wands you get are gaine in lieu of more permanent equipment. All those charges you expend now can't be spent later. All that nuclear flame you throw around can wind up hurting you as much as your enemies. The idea is for Pakellas's gifts to come across as inherently dangerous and unstable. For you to feel as though you're wielding a great power that you can barely control.
Possible Problems
Aside from the fact that the concept of an evocation god might be fundamentally flawed, there are other concerns. For example, there's the concern that there's some mechanics I'm overlooking or unaware of that result in Pakellas being hideously overpowered/underpowered. Sure, some of that can be mitigated by tweaking certain numbers. However, there's always some parts of balancing that can't be fixed just by adjusting the variables.
More important than that, though, is the fear that Pakellas might be unfun. The design is meant to allow for multiple strategies when it comes to worshipping Pakellas. Do you maximise faith as soon as possible and damn the consequences? Do you try to keep it low early on, until you've got enough viable equipment? Do you use Pakellas to hoard a large number of wands before switching to a different god? The idea is for players to feel as though there are a number of ways to get the most out of Pakellas. The concern is that there might be a singular optimal strategy, one that relies on tedium and busywork.
Lastly, I am aware that this "evocation god" focuses solely on wands. Initially, that was just a way to get around the fact that there are a wide variety of evocable items, each of which work in different ways. However, as my idea for Pakellas coalesced, I realised that the power-at-a-price theme worked intuitively well with wands, but less so with other evocable items. However, I'm sure new abilities could be added if Pakellas feels a little too bare bones.