God items

[dolphin]

God-items would be unrandart items that give you both a infinite-use effect, like a weapon or the disc of storms, and a one-time-only God-transformation; you take up that god's power's for a period of time, after which you lose the item (see miscellaneous items). For example, should you run across Trog's Wrath, the unrandart axe, you would have a spiffy hacking implement and also a single-use temporary godmode, which would transform you into something with Trog-themed powers, probably a massive uber-berserker. The downside to using the godmode would be wrath or something like it, since the gods would presumably be miffed if you usurped their powers, even temporarily, so the trade off is panic button now, angry god screwing with you later. This idea would probably have to wait until wrath is adjusted, since some wraths are trivial, and some are catastrophic. Your religion should probably also matter, since a follower of TSO probably shouldn't become the incarnation of Kiku, and an Okawaru follower might just get a, "You're all cute and everything playing with Daddy's shoes and hat and wallet, but give them back now," kind of reaction to becoming Okawaru.

Mostly this comes of a desire to have a HULK SMASH PUNY HUMAN playtime, and because I think making up god powers would be fun.

[Bim]

I can see this could work, as I always like the evokable items like the crystal balls and box of beasts etc.

I think they might fit better as an item you gain by joining a god. I always find that for a while having joined a god is pretty trivial and seems pointless if you die a few minutes later. I think it would be nice if you got given a 'potion of Trog's rage' which was, as you say, uber-berserk mode as a one time thing. I think this would help make gods slightly more interesting and useful straight away, especially gods who don't give much for a while.
However, I can imagine the balance issues would be horrendous, and thinking up something for all of the gods (which is unique and useful) would be difficult. I mean, Trog is easy, but Che and Ash??!!

Good idea though, i'd like to see what other people think.

[KoboldLord]

A consumable item that is unique and irreplaceable runs into the problem that it is Too Awesome To Use. If this item is genuinely awesome, it will completely trivialize one challenge. If it isn't genuinely awesome, it might as well be dumped at the stash because you're never going to find a time when you're absolutely sure you're not wasting it, and it'll block an inventory slot until that point. Plus it would absolutely suck if your unique item got popped by an orc wizard's Throw Frost.

I don't think it would hurt to tighten up the god gifts for deities that grant them to make sure they're more thematic, and also fewer in number, but irreplaceable consumables don't sit well with me.

[dolphin]

I suppose I was thinking that you would get an armor or weapon or jewelry "imbued with the power of 'foo god'", like Sif Muna's Thinking Cap or something, and in addition to be a good item, you could use it, once, to become that god. After the use, you still have a good item, but without the god incarnate ability. Likewise, I think the Mask of the Dragon should let you cast Dragon Form once.

I see what you mean about 'too awesome to use', but if it is something that you are wearing anyway, do you think a player would be likely *enough* to actually use it? (I think most consumable items still run into the "save it until I REALLY need it" thing.

Concerning the trivializing of one challenge, would that still be an issue if you find these things at the normal spawn rate of unrandarts, or even slightly a higher rate? I wasn't thinking of something you would see every single game, or every other game. I guess the powers should probably scale with XL and skills level. Yeah, this would take a lot of work to get right . . . {sigh}.

[jpeg]

Something similar has been suggested before: https://crawl.develz.org/wiki/doku.php? ... :item:misc

  Code:

Many (most) miscellaneous items should have two types of uses, one permanent (as now), and one single-use (disposing the item). This has a number of good consequences:

   1. Using the one-off effect of miscellaneous items turns them into expensive consumables. Expensive, because they are generally heavy and don't stack.
   2. Hence, there are choices of what to carry (in addition of when to use).
   3. This would be another boost to a (not yet existing) Evocations playing style, because a character with high Evocations skill will be more likely to have good use for these items (with both permanent or one-off use).
   4. Flavourful and large-scale effects (which are too big/powerful for scrolls) can go nicely to miscellaneous items.
   5. And there is the inherent dilemma that a good item is gone if you invoke the one-off effect.

"Become a god" is much too unspecific to be of any real use, but more detailed ideas are certainly welcome.

[mageykun]

Which items now have secondary, expensive, one off usages? I remember in nethack you had the option to break a wand in half, trading several linear zaps for one omnidirectional magical explosion (which, like a scroll of immolation, is sometimes strategically viable- if dangerous). In crawl though, I can't think of an example. The tome of destruction and box of beasts can be consumed/exhausted by evoking, but that's random, and there's no strategic reason to want to make that sacrifice.

Hrmm... actually, I suppose the new book burning amnesia thing qualifies. Forgot about that. Any other examples?


A Digression:

You don't really mean "become a god", people. Your character can't become a God and still play the game, since Gods don't have stats. Because anything with stats, no matter how high, can be killed-and Gods can't be killed*. If you're taking on the powers of a god in a physical plane, you become an avatar of that god.

Now, unfortunately, avatar is one of those words whose effect has kind of had it's coolness diluted by everyday in our culture. Literally, an avatar means the physical manifestation of the powers or will of a higher being in a lesser space. It's not the God per say- it's a remote manifestation. An empowered emissary. Spiritual robo-clone. This means an avatar is by definition less than that which it represents (meaning it's potentially killable in the environment it appears in). This also means death or destruction of an avatar need not carry back to the controller (that "if you die in the matrix you die for real" nonsense doesn't apply to Gods).

So that little picture to the left? It's called your avatar since it's a representation of your manifestation this lesser, non-corporeal plane. Your character in every game you ever played? They're your avatars, fallible echos of your influence within the game world- but not you.

*Well, except by killing one another in pantheons where that's allowed, by ridiculous macguffins when the plot provides them, by Small Gods style forgotten limbo (poor Jiyva), or by the God stupidly taking a mortal form- which is precisely what I'm arguing against.


Back on topic:

Actually becoming a full fledged avatar of a god seems a little overpowered, but it could be done. I think the main difference between an avatar and a worshiper is that the worshiper earns the support of their god (via piety), whereas an avatar is given the full support of their deity (no piety costs) as they are literally there to do their God's will, not to prove themselves.

Becoming an avatar of a God against that God's will seems completely ridiculous and poor flavor.

[Jenx]

Could always go with the Planescape option and instead of "Avatar" call it "Proxy".

[jpeg]

Which items now have secondary, expensive, one off usages? I remember in nethack you had the option to break a wand in half, trading several linear zaps for one omnidirectional magical explosion (which, like a scroll of immolation, is sometimes strategically viable- if dangerous). In crawl though, I can't think of an example. The tome of destruction and box of beasts can be consumed/exhausted by evoking, but that's random, and there's no strategic reason to want to make that sacrifice.

Hrmm... actually, I suppose the new book burning amnesia thing qualifies. Forgot about that. Any other examples?

There aren't any. It's a... well, not new... idea to spice up misc. items.

I loved the wand breaking in NetHack, but I don't think it can be transplanted into Crawl because we have misc. items for that sort of thing. Besides, wands are planned as trap-ammunition which would, in fact, introduce another one-off usage.

I don't like the whole "playing god" idea itself. I read it more as a metaphor of becoming powerful for a short time, which need not necessarily be linked to a god.

[danr]

I think the main point of the OP was to have one-time-use, very powerful resources.

I share the concern that if found, you would save it forever and it would mostly just take up an inventory slot.

Many of the items in the game already are pretty "god-like" - such as the ability to teleport (at all), or to instantly heal your body from near death. All of these items can make the difference between life or death and they are among the most common items in the game.

Also, there are some other "one-time-only" effects, such as the weapon blessing or pain branding from certain gods.

The main effect of this "can of whoop-ass" item type would be to allow you to get through rather than escape a certain challenge, which would effectively give you a bunch of XP and possibly items you couldn't otherwise have gotten.

[dolphin]

Mageykun:

You don't really mean "become a god", people. Your character can't become a God and still play the game, since Gods don't have stats. Because anything with stats, no matter how high, can be killed-and Gods can't be killed*. If you're taking on the powers of a god in a physical plane, you become an avatar of that god.

Actually, I was thinking really become a God. I have some memories of Aztec mythology (just vague memories, no sources. sorry) to the effect that the being that wore the paraphernalia associated with the god really did become the god, such that if Tlaloc removed his headdress and whatnot, and you put it on, you would be the god of rain, including acquiring some of Tlaloc's personality quirks, for as long as you wore the stuff. If Crawl has assumed that Gods exist only in the abstract or spiritual world, then I don't suppose becoming an incarnation would work very well, and 'avatar' would indeed be the right term. However, there is precedent for spiritual beings existing materially, at least in LoTR or the Silmarillion, such as Gandalf or Bombadil or Morgoth (whose feet were literally cut off after the breaking of the Thangorodrim), or in Christianity (which holds that Christ was a human who was also entirely God, as opposed to being possessed or something). If Crawl hasn't defined how gods exist, then I would say that this idea of being a god incarnate is theoretically possible and thematically consistent with the general idea of a god, but if it just isn't for Crawl, well, okay.

Looking at this again . . .
Pros: Moments of HULK SMASH can be fun, ideas for the Incarnate characteristics might serve as bases for other ideas.
Cons: Game-breakingly powerful, hard to design good God Incarnate abilities and characteristics, potentially inconsistent with the theme of crawl.

If I were a dev, I don't think I would spend my time trying implement this, it just looks like a lot of work for relatively little payoff.

Since I think the only potentially useful part of this is the ideas for characteristics, I would say:

Ash: Stuck to single point on a map, Entire map visibility, smite based irresistible Confusion or Frenzy, smite based Apportation (with a limited range that increased the longer you remained Ash Incarnate), smite based Curse status (Forget Spell, Inacc, Damage Malus)
Chei: Everything is slow relative to him, so he would appear to be moving quickly; damaging a monster increases its speed, but it cannot die until it is back in time; Slouch-like continuously damaging radius, so fast monsters take damage over time, and more as you move close to them; Walk on Water (since the water wouldn't be moving fast enough relative to you to be a liquid)

[MrMisterMonkey]

danr: the OP actually acknowledges the wiki page about one-off uses for misc. items
(the OP is actually about the specific god items idea)